Taken the Spaniard's Virgin

There was that sorry word again. She hated it. Her mom was sorry, too. She’d lied to Amber her whole life and she understood why, but it hurt to know the woman she trusted so implicitly could do that. Her dad was sorry he’d been such a rotten father to Ellie that Amber’s mom had not felt safe making her known to him…tothem .

None of the sorries changed anything. Didn’t undo the pain of the past.

And then there was Miguel and his pathetic little sorry. She’d fallen in love with him and he thought he’d work her out of his system in months.

Sorry didn’t make that okay.

She felt so stupid. All the things she thought meant she was special to him had been no more than the window dressing he’d given their affair. He’d even warned her, in the very beginning…his relationships were not based on emotion, but an exchange of commodities.

Not a cold exchange in their case when the commodity had been mutual passion, but still…not emotion…not love.

“Perhaps if we are both free of other entanglements when I return, we can connect again.”

The words sliced through her already shattered emotions, cutting her heart loose from the fragile threads holding it to its moorings. He had no intention of avoiding other “entanglements”—that was obvious.

“So you can work me out of your system once and for all?” she asked in a voice like ground glass.

“As you said, things change. Given the right timing, who knows what could happen between us?”

“But now is not the right time.”

“You know it is not.”

She pulled the phone from her ear and stared at it. She knew the pain inside was from the words coming out of the phone, not the instrument, but she had this insane urge to pummel it with a hammer. Sounds were coming from the earpiece, but she couldn’t make them out, didn’t want to.

His words hurt her.

She pressed the end button and the sounds stopped.

But the pain didn’t. Three days ago she had been happier than she’d ever been in her life, missing Miguel already, but happy. Now, everything was gone. Her hope for a future with him. Her belief in her life as she knew it.

The only thing that remained was her career and it was not the comfort it had always been. She wished she could be the mannequin she’d often compared herself to…no emotions, no pain lacerating her insides.

The phone chirped again a few minutes later, but she ignored it. When it rang a third time, she turned it off and threw it against the wall. It thumped and fell with an empty thud, nothing to satisfy the feelings raging through her.

A knock sounded on the door. “Amber, sweetheart, you need to be at your shoot in thirty minutes and I haven’t heard the shower go.”

Her mom’s voice sounded hoarse, like she’d been crying. Amber could not afford to rage…to give into the pain…not right now. Her mom needed her to be strong. She needed to be strong for herself. Using the techniques she’d taught herself to get centered for a shoot, she pulled the emotions in until they were contained deep inside.

Another knock sounded. “Amber…are you all right?”

“Fine.” Her own lie added to all those her mom had told her…for the same good cause, though. Right? “I’ll be out in a little bit.”

“Okay, honey.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Was that normal voice hers?

How could it be? But she had to keep it together. There was too much emotional turmoil surrounding them already at the moment. She’d tell her mom about Miguel. Later. After her dad and sister had gone home to Boston. After she was sure her mom was going to be okay emotionally as well as legally.

Amber would be strong for her mom. Strong for herself, she couldn’t rely on anyone else.

CHAPTER TEN

ONLYAmber didn’t tell her. She didn’t see the need. Her mom asked about Miguel once and Amber told her about his trip to Prague. Thingsdid heat up with her career and she was so busy working, she saw her mom rarely.

When Helen told her that she was going to work for George Wentworth and moving to Boston so Amber could spend her off time getting to know her family there, she was relieved her mom would not be alone. She kept the house in California as a home base, though. She knew they all expected her to go to Boston, that her mom had moved to make it easier for her, but she couldn’t do it. She needed time to come to terms with where her life had gone.

Her sister got married and Amber flew to Boston to be maid of honor. She spent the two days she had with her family wearing the smile that had launched her career. The nausea had started a couple of weeks after she and Miguel broke up, but she didn’t worry about it. Stress could do that to a person.