Kept at the Argentine's Command

‘He never spoke to me again.’

‘Oh, Alejandro, that’s awful.’

Alejandro shrugged, but the empathy in Lulu’s brown eyes warmed something that had been cold inside him for a long time.

‘I took control of this place at twenty, and almost lost it. My father’s gambling debts had to be paid off. The girls were still at school and there were fees.’

‘Your mother couldn’t help?’

‘She told me she’d put up with the old man for almost two decades and she wanted her share. It wasn’t as if she could go out and resurrect her modelling career.’

‘But couldn’t she have retrained and done something else?’

Alejandro gave her an arrested look. ‘She’s nothing like you, Lulu. It would never have occurred to my mother to help herself—or anyone else.’

‘I’m so sorry that happened to you.’ Lulu was aware he’d just paid her the most enormous compliment.

She desperately wanted to wrap her arms around him, but she also didn’t want to impose when he was standing there so obviously man as an island. Men did that. She’d noticed it with her brothers when they were hurting. She would wait to have her cuddle.

‘It’s obvious you had a lot of responsibility on your shoulders from a young age.’

He lifted those thick lashes guarding his amazing amber-brown eyes. ‘From what you’ve said, Lulu, so did you.’

‘But my mother was always there to help me.’

Alejandro acknowledged this with a slight grunt.

‘My mother didn’t give a damn about her kids,’ he said in a low voice, chewing out the words, ‘and she sure as hell didn’t lift a finger to help anyone—including herself. She took her frustrations out on us. All I remember from my childhood are her threats. She’d say she wanted to leave my father—he wouldn’t let her go. She’d tell me she was going to kill herself—’ He ground to a halt, rolled his shoulders as if shaking it off. ‘She was a nightmare,’ he muttered.

‘She threatened to kill herself?’ Lulu tried to keep her voice even and not make a drama of this. ‘Did you believe her?’

‘I was a kid,’ he said without inflection. ‘Of course I believed her.’