‘Yes, she did. Maybe she thought she could benefit then. But it was too late.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Almost seven.’
Lexie gasped. ‘But that’s so young...you were still so young. Why didn’t you go with her?’
Even as she realised that Cesar wasn’t going to answer her she had a moment of intuition. He’d been left here when he was so tiny, yet he had been old enough to remember. Remember his mother walking away. Lexie couldn’t even begin to imagine what had broken inside him in those years after his mother had left him. Broken so badly that he’d let her walk away from him again.
Cesar stepped back and said, ‘We should go. The plane is ready.’
* * *
After a short trip in a sleek Land Rover to a local airstrip, Lexie knew she shouldn’t have been surprised to see a small private plane waiting for them—reminding her, as if she needed it, just who she was dealing with.
Except the man she was dealing with had just shown her a side of himself that was raw and bleak, and she couldn’t stop her chest from aching. Even though she knew that he wouldn’t thank her for it. He hadn’t had to say a word for her to know that he would scorn the slightest hint of pity.
Cesar parked the car and swung out of the driver’s seat with lithe grace. He’d come around to help Lexie out before she could object, taking her hand in his firm grip.
An assistant took their bags to the plane. The pilot was waiting to greet them, and then they were stepping into the plush, luxurious world of the super-rich. Although Lexie was still a bit too shaken up by what Cesar had revealed to truly enjoy this novel experience.
A steward showed her to her seat solicitously, and Cesar took the seat opposite. There was no waiting for other people to arrive, to sit down. Once they were in they buckled up and the plane was moving.
In a bid to try and shake some of the residual melancholy she felt at hearing abou
t Cesar’s less than happy-sounding childhood, Lexie asked, ‘So what’s the function this evening?’
Cesar stretched out his long legs across the aisle. ‘It’s a dinner and Spanish music event at the Italian Ambassador’s residence.’
Lexie felt her stomach plummet. ‘Seriously? But I’ve never met an ambassador in my life...I won’t know what to say—’
He leaned across and took one of her hands out of her lap and held it to his mouth, kissing it. Effectively shutting her up. The air in the cabin seemed to get hot and sultry.
‘You don’t have to worry about saying anything. They’re not going to present you with an IQ questionnaire before dinner to see if you qualify.’
Lexie hated this insecurity that stemmed not only from her dyslexia but from having left school early. ‘But they’ll be talking about politics and the EU and economics...’
‘And,’ Cesar replied without hesitation, ‘if they do I can’t imagine that you wouldn’t know just as much if not more than them. These are people, Lexie, they’re not intellectual giants.’
‘Well, you are...’ She was being distracted by the hypnotic stroke of Cesar’s thumb on the underside of her wrist. His thumb stopped and he frowned at her.
‘Where on earth do you get that from?’
Lexie shrugged, feeling exposed again for having researched him in the beginning.
‘You’re one of the most successful men in the world...you go to economic forums...all those books in your study and apartment...’
Cesar’s mouth twisted. ‘All those books in my study belong to my family. The only reason I haven’t ever got rid of them is in case I need them for reference and for reasons of pure vanity—because they look good.’ Then he said, ‘Me, though? The books I like reading are popular crime thrillers—nothing more intellectual than that, I assure you.’
Something shifted inside Lexie. An ominous feeling of tenderness welled up.
‘And as for school...I was not a natural A student—far from it. I had to work for every one of my grades. Once my grandparents realised this they recruited the local swot—Juan Cortez, who is now the Mayor of Villaporto, the local town—to come and help me.’
The tenderness swelled. ‘Are you still friends?’
Cesar smiled. Another rare, proper smile. Lexie had to stop herself from gripping his hand tighter.
‘Yes, but only because we nearly killed each other when we were ten.’