Bride in a Gilded Cage

His mouth had been a grim line. ‘I told you that one of the reasons I wanted to get married was to stop public speculation and talk. So far we’re not doing a very good job of it.’

Isobel’s hands had clenched at being reminded of the loveless nature of their union. ‘Well, that could be in part because this marriage was never a mutual decision. We were thrown together, thanks to events outside our control.’

As she’d watched him, it had seemed to her for a moment as if some of his golden-olive colour leached from his face. But then he’d turned, fixing her with that black, glittering glare. Isobel’s heart had thumped.

‘Save it, Isobel,’ he’d bitten out. ‘Just try to pretend we’re in this together tonight.’

Silent for the journey, Isobel felt her head ache.

She let Rafael take her by the hand to lead her into the exclusive restaurant. They greeted Bob and Rita, and for the entire evening Isobel drew on every single piece of social training she’d received growing up.

Rafael caught her eye, and Isobel felt a frisson of approval transmitted from him to her. For a moment she basked in a heady sense of pleasure, only to realise later what it meant. She was falling headlong into that world—the world she’d always fought against—and yet she wasn’t feeling oppressed. There wasn’t even a hint of wanting to rebel within her. It was giving her immense pleasure to be supporting Rafael.

She was realising this and feeling extremely tender as Rafael followed her into the house when they returned home. She turned abruptly, inarticulate words on her lips, suddenly wanting to talk to this man who felt like a stranger and yet at the same time like someone she’d known for ever. But he put a finger to her lips and then replaced his finger with his mouth, spearing his hands into her short hair, caressing her skull, kissing her senseless.

He pulled away, and it was a struggle for Isobel to open her heavy eyelids. He just looked at her intently. ‘Thank you for this evening. Bob Caruthers told me while you were getting your coat that he’s going to sign the last contract to let me set up the business here…we did it.’

Relief flowed through Isobel, but it felt as if she was standing on quicksand, knowing that she’d never thought she would be concerned about something like this. ‘I’m glad,’ she said huskily. ‘I’d hate to think I’d played a part in sabotaging something so important.’

Rafael moved closer, bringing Isobel flush against him, and through the thin silk of her dress she could feel his burgeoning arousal. Liquid heat invaded her veins and made her feel wobbly.

‘See? We can be good together.’

Isobel’s heart was thumping hard. She felt as though she was stepping over a fine line in the sand. One more step and she’d be committed to something untenable—a life half lived with a man who would never love her…and whose love she was beginning to crave with an awful, desperate hunger.

‘Maybe…’ was all she could say.

‘Maybe nothing,’ he replied harshly,

and in the next second Isobel was lifted into his arms and carried upstairs.

A month later Isobel was feeling dazed from the intensity of the lovemaking Rafael had subjected her to the previous night. She felt as if there was no space in between to grab her breath. Each time they slept together it was more intense than the last, taking another piece of her soul, her heart. Dragging her deep into a dark vortex of bittersweet pleasure mixed with emotional pain.

She was getting ready to greet the guests coming for dinner to the house that evening. Putting gold earrings in her ears, she couldn’t believe how much her perception of Rafael had changed; a huge part of his work was pure philanthropy, and the reason it wasn’t more well-known was because of his own innate humility. He simply didn’t want people to know, believing he got more out of clients and colleagues if his charitable work was done anonymously.

After a last cursory inspection, Isobel left the bedroom to join Rafael downstairs. She steeled herself, locking away her tender secret core in a bid to protect herself from the pain of Rafael’s emotional distance. Her heart clenched as she remembered a day just a couple of weeks ago, when he’d surprised her by encouraging her to take the vintage Bugatti out for a drive, despite her protestations.

She’d been terrified and exhilarated in equal measure, and when they’d arrived back at the house she’d been unable to keep the huge grin off her face, believing for a moment that perhaps Rafael was opening up to her. But it had been a mirage.

Within seconds she’d watched as Rafael had visibly closed up in the face of her joy. The afternoon had been ruined, and since then she’d been careful not to read too much into anything, no matter how intense their lovemaking might be. Clearly Rafael didn’t and would never feel anything more for her.

In a desperate effort to try and morph into the wife that Rafael evidently wanted, Isobel had found herself accepting invitations to endless rounds of coffee mornings with her peers, and had been swept up into a whirlwind of shopping on the Avenida Alvear, and trite conversations centring mainly around gossip. She’d even succumbed to a manicure.

It had been a pathetic attempt to see if she could break Rafael out of his cold shell, gain a measure of the approval she’d felt that night they’d had dinner with Bob. She’d only lasted days before Rafael had found her weeping tears of frustration as she tried to get the hideous acrylic nails off with acetone.

He’d taken her raw and red hands to inspect them and she’d sniffed. ‘I can’t do it, Rafael. I tried, I really did, but I can’t do the society thing.’

In a curiously tender moment he’d bent his head and kissed the corners of her mouth reverently. ‘It’s okay. I don’t want you to be like those social vultures. Let’s find Juanita. I’m sure in her chequered past she has gained some knowledge of false nail removal.’

That small moment had made Isobel fall even more in love with Rafael, but afterwards it had been as if nothing had happened. He’d gone back to being cool and distant.

Except at night…Then there was no coolness or distance. Only intense heat followed by pain, when Isobel curled up next to his body and recalled that he’d lost his heart a long time ago and never intended losing it again.

Cursing herself for thinking of all this now, she descended the stairs.

Rafael was waiting for Isobel to come downstairs. She had been preparing all day with Juanita for their guests. He frowned minutely. Even Juanita had come under Isobel’s spell, and the two were now staunch allies. He poured himself a measure of whisky and drank it back in one gulp, wincing only slightly as it burnt its way down his throat. His marriage was progressing exactly to plan. He had no reason to complain…and yet it wasn’t enough. Isobel didn’t fight him any more. She didn’t come at him the way she first had, like a raging tornado of quivering injustice about every little thing.

Now she looked at him warily, and spent most of her time working on plans for the dance studio. She’d retreated to somewhere he couldn’t reach. She’d once told him he would never really know her, and he now realised what she’d meant.