The blood on her thighs was easy to deal with. A hot shower, plenty of soap and the blood drops were gone even if the pain in her heart was still there.
The sheets were different. She agonized over what to do with them. The thought of one of the maids seeing that blood and knowing what had happened was more than she could bear.
Quickly she stripped the bed, carried the sheets into the bathroom, sponged them clean, then dried them with the built-in hair dryer.
She dressed in the same clothes she’d been wearing since the evening Lucas had taken her from the ranch, whenever that was. One day. Two days. Three. She’d lost track.
One of the maids had been thoughtful enough to wash and press the garments. They looked like hell but they were, at least, clean. Not that she gave a damn. Who cared how she looked? She certainly didn’t.
She left her room fifteen minutes before the hour after giving the timing some thought. Instinct told her to saunter down the stairs a few minutes late. That same instinct warned that if she were late, Lucas would leave without her.
Being early, waiting for him so that he’d seem to be the one who was late, seemed the best solution.
No such luck.
He was already in the vast entry foyer, lounging carelessly in an elaborate leather and wood chair that reminded her of a throne. Deliberate on his part, no doubt, she thought coldly.
He rose when he saw her and she knew she’d lied to herself about not caring how she looked. Lucas looked—why not admit it? He looked magnificent. His dark blue suit had surely been custom-made to suit his broad shoulders, narrow waist and long legs. Beneath it, he wore a crisp white shirt and maroon tie. She could tell he’d just showered: drops of water glittered like tiny jewels in his midnight-black hair.
He’d shaved, too. The dark stubble that had covered his jaw was gone.
The dark, sexy stubble that had felt so delicious against her thighs, her breasts…
“You need new clothes.”
Alyssa drew herself up. “I need nothing from you, Your Mightiness.”
A dangerous glint flared in his eyes. “Clothes, and manners. We are about to meet with Ricardo Madeira. You will not address me with disrespect, nor will you argue with what I say.”
“I also will not curtsy,” she informed him as they stepped into the back of the long black Rolls-Royce waiting in the driveway. “I suggest you keep that in mind.”
To her surprise, he laughed. “I think I would have known you had Spanish blood even if no one had told me your middle name was Montero.”
“I hate to disappoint you, but my blood is pure Texan. The Montero name dates back four centuries in the New World. I am descended from conquistadores.”
Another quick laugh. “Some would say that is nothing to boast about.”
“They did as men did in those times. And they were brave and fearless.”
“What of your real father? Montero? Did he divorce your mother?”
“He died, when I was two.”
“So you don’t remember him?”
She shook her head. It was one of the sorrows of her life that she had no memory of the father who had surely loved her as Aloysius never had.
“No. I don’t.”
“When did McDonough adopt you?”
“When my mother married him. I was four.”
Why was she telling him all this? She never talked about her past to anyone. Losing the father who’d loved you to be raised by one who didn’t was no one’s affair but her own.
“He was unkind to you?”
“I don’t see that any of this is your concern.”