Kat And The Dare-Devil Spaniard

‘Kat,’ came a whisper as strong hands now shook her with surprising gentleness and her eyelids fluttered open. ‘Wake up. Come on, wake up, Princesa.’

Her vision cleared and her heart missed a beat. Because the man holding her was none other than Carlos—sitting in her cabin and on her bed and wearing nothing but a pair of jeans.

The same man who had made it very clear he didn’t want her was holding her in his arms—and Kat knew she should have torn herself away from his embrace and told him to go. What had she told herself about pride and not letting him see her vulnerable again? But she was still scared enough from the aftermath of the dream to want to stay exactly where she was. Here, where she could feel the powerful pound of his heart.

Carlos stroked the silken tumble of her hair, knowing that the rhythmical movement would soothe her, in the same way that frightened animals were always soothed by rhythm. He was aware of her sweetly scented femininity—but at least she wasn’t distractingly naked. In fact, he was slightly taken aback by her choice of night attire, because a pair of cotton pyjamas was not what he might have expected the sexy Kat Balfour to sleep in.

‘You were having a bad dream,’ he stated softly.

Briefly closing her eyes, she shuddered. ‘Yes.’

‘Well, you’re awake now, so forget it. Come on. Let it go. Nightmares don’t happen in real life.’

Was it reaction to the shock of having the reoccurring dream that made her want to contradict him? Or was it because, with Carlos holding her like that, she felt as if nothing or no one could ever hurt her again?

‘It’s…it’s n-not a n-nightmare.’ Her voice was shaking with fear as she spoke against the silken warmth of his bare shoulder. ‘It’s t-true.’

Carlos knew about fear. After all, that was one of the simple lures of bullfighting. That’s what the spectators paid huge amounts of money to witness. Why poor men would happily forgo half a week’s wages to watch the ancient battle between man and bull. It had been a long time since he had encountered real fear outside the ring, but he could sense it now in the slender frame of this woman in his arms, and he stilled. ‘What are you talking about?’

Lifting her cheek away from his shoulder, she looked up at him, her heart pounding as she met the gleam of his eyes which was as bright as the light of the moon. ‘I told you,’ she whispered. ‘It’s true—all of it!’

Suddenly, she looked vulnerable, dangerously vulnerable. He stared down into the pale blur of her face and saw the way she was biting her lip—no trace of the confident Kat Balfour now, he thought in surprise. ‘What’s true, Kat?’ he questioned softly. ‘Tell me what is frightening you so much.’

Kat trembled. It was the first time he had ever really spoken to her as an equal. The first time he’d shown her kindness, or consideration. It shouldn’t have mattered but somehow it did—it mattered much more than it should have done. She tried telling herself that she shouldn’t trust him—but somehow she couldn’t help herself. Was it the protective warmth of his embrace which suddenly loosened her tongue—or the inexplicable understanding in his deep, accented voice which made her want to pour it all out?

‘They killed him,’ she whispered. ‘They killed him and I couldn’t stop them.

’

‘Who did?’ he commanded urgently. ‘Tell me, Princesa.’

‘I don’t know where to start,’ she whispered.

‘Start at the beginning,’ he said simply.

And then words really started tumbling out—like feathers falling from a pillow which had been ripped wide open by a particularly sharp knife. Words she’d never spoken before. Words which her father had paid counsellors a small fortune to try to extricate from her and which instead she now found herself telling a cold-hearted Spaniard on a luxury yacht in the middle of the Mediterranean.

‘I told you my parents didn’t marry for love—but for c-convenience,’ she stumbled. ‘But then my mother met someone else—someone she knew could be special to her. My father felt it was only fair to let her go, and so they divorced, and she married Victor. He was a major in the army and he was lovely. Really lovely. And a good stepfather to me and my sisters.’

For a moment she allowed herself to remember the happy times. Her mother being truly in love with a man for the first time in her life. The sense of being a proper family. The real bond which had existed between her and Victor. She had been the youngest girl and he’d spoiled her, treated her just like his own daughter. She remembered the joy of his promotion and the sense of excitement they all felt at the prospect of an exciting new country to live in. ‘When he got posted to Sri Lanka, we all went with him,’ she said slowly.

Carlos nodded and continued to stroke her hair, careful not to say anything in case he halted her flow.

‘We were happy there. And then my mother had to take my sisters back to England, back to boarding school, the way she always did. And one night…’ Her voice began to shake again. ‘One night, while I was asleep…b-burglars b-broke into the house. There was nothing much to steal, but Victor challenged them. There was…there was a fight. I woke up and heard voices shouting, and then…then…’

This time he did prompt her even though he could feel the frozen fear in her body. ‘Then?’

‘I heard a gun go off!’ she blurted out. ‘I was so frightened that I just lay there. I was terrified that they were going to come upstairs and shoot me.’ For a moment she said nothing, her breathing shallow and rapid as she relived that night of violence.

‘That’s why you don’t like fireworks,’ said Carlos slowly, as he remembered her brief moment of fear in the boat.

Kat nodded.

‘So what happened next?’ he questioned softly.

She swallowed. ‘I crept downstairs—to see the burglars fleeing. And that’s when I found Victor. He’d been shot….’ She swallowed, trying and failing to quell the pain of that awful memory. ‘There was blood…everywhere.’

Carlos stilled. ‘And?’