‘Later,’ he repeated.
She fell silent but he sensed her gaze darting back to him, again and again, questioning. Confused. In the car, a thick, heavy silence enveloped them, Emily’s rigid posture telegraphing her anger.
He cursed under his breath.
Coming to Barcelona had been a mistake.
When they reached the villa, he stopped the car outside the front steps and kept the engine idling. ‘Go inside, Emily.’ He felt the weight of her gaze on him, but he looked straight ahead, his hands clenched on the steering wheel.
‘Where are you going?’
He didn’t know. But he needed some space. He couldn’t deal with her questions right now. ‘Go inside,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Please.’
She got out and slammed the door, and he gunned the engine and drove off.
* * *
Dinner that evening was a tense, awkward affair, the empty chair beside Emily a painful reminder of the awful incident at the tapas bar.
She still had no clue what the confrontation had been about, but she knew one thing with utter, unequivocal certainty.
Her baby’s father was not a murderer.
She wished he would come back and tell her that himself. But she hadn’t seen him since he’d sped off in a cloud of gravel and dust and brooding testosterone.
Anxiety gnawed at her, diminishing her appetite for the lovely meal in front of her. Question after question tumbled through her head. Where was he? Was he okay? Why hadn’t he called? Had he been involved in an accident? Why hadn’t he returned for dinner?
Had he abandoned her?
Reading her anxiety, Elena said gently, ‘He’ll be back.’
The man seated across from her gave a derisive snort. ‘This is typical of him to run off.’
Xavier’s voice vibrated with anger and Emily gripped her knife and fork, everything within her rebelling against the notion that Ramon had ‘run off’.
He wouldn’t desert her. Not here. Like this. He could have run at any time in the last three weeks, starting from the moment she’d told him she was pregnant. He hadn’t. And she refused to believe he’d done so now.
‘I am sorry you had to witness what you did this afternoon.’ Xavier spoke to her. ‘My brother—’
‘Xavier.’ Vittorio interrupted his son. ‘Emily deserves an explanation, but I think it must come from Ramon.’
Xavier’s expression tightened, his intense, somewhat superior gaze flicking back to Emily.
Like his younger brother, he was devastatingly handsome, but far more formidable. Although they weren’t genetically related, nature had graced them both with strong, broad-shouldered physiques and stunning facial structures. The most striking contrast Emily could see was their eyes. Where Ramon’s were expressive and warm, Xavier’s were a cold, hard grey. Not unlike her own, she supposed, though hers were several shades paler and a lot less piercing.
She suppressed a shiver.
Had she been wise to tell them what had happened? When she’d gone inside, bewildered and upset, Xavier had been there with his parents and Elena had seen her stricken expression and immediately put a comforting arm around her. Before Emily had thought better of it, she’d spilled the details of the entire incident.
Distracted, she toyed with the food on her plate.
And then the sound of a car engine and gravel crunching outside had everyone surging to their feet.
Xavier threw down his napkin and stormed out first, a fierce scowl on his face.
Vittorio strode after him.
Emily made to follow, but Elena placed a restraining hand on her arm. ‘Give them a few minutes,’ she advised. ‘My boys have tempers. There might be some fireworks.’ She looped her arm through Emily’s. ‘Walk with me on the terrace.’