God, she was angry. Furious. She pulled at the rest of her buttons and stopped when she caught sight of herself in the free-standing mirror that stood in the corner of her bedroom. Slowly she walked towards it.
An ordinary female figure stared back. An ordinary female figure with a flushed face and a wild mane of horrible hair. And tender lips. She put her fingers to them. They looked the same as they always did, but they felt softer. Swollen. And there was a slight graze on her chin where Cruz’s stubble had scraped her skin.
Her pelvis clenched at the remembered pleasure of his mouth on hers. He hadn’t even kissed her like that eight years ago. Then he’d been softer, almost tender. Today he’d kissed her as if he hadn’t been able to help himself. As if he’d wanted to devour her. And never before had she kissed someone like that in return. Thank God Gypsy Blue had tried to knock some sense into them.
She had no idea why she’d acted like that with a man who had insulted her so badly. Maybe it was the fact that seeing him again had knocked her sideways. Somehow he had dazzled her the way he’d used to dazzle the women at polo matches. He was so attractive the crowds had always doubled when he had played, because all the wives and girlfriends had insisted that they simply loved polo and had to spend the whole day watching it. Really, they’d just mooned over him when he’d been on the field and drunk champagne and chatted the rest of the time. He’d dazzled her friends too.
Unconsciously she licked her tender lips and felt his imprint on them. Really she felt his imprint everywhere—and especially in the space between her thighs.
Heaven help her! She would have had sex with him. Had inadvertently wanted to have sex with him. The realisation of that alone was enough to shock her. She hated sex!
So why was she currently reliving Cruz’s wicked kisses over and over like a hopeless teenager? He hadn’t kissed her out of any real passion—he’d kissed her to make a point and to put her in her place and by God she had let him! Putting up a token resistance like the Victorian virgin he had accused her of acting like and then melting all over him like hot syrup.
She scratched the hair at her temples and made her curls frizz. Grabbing the offending matter, she quickly braided it, pulled on her jeans and shirt and stomped down to the stables.
Donny raised a startled eyebrow as she muttered a few terse words in his direction and started work at the other end. The rhythmical physical labour of putting away tack and shifting hay, of bantering with the horses and going through the motions of bedding them down for the night, was doing nothing to eradicate the feeling of all that hard male muscle pressed up against her.
‘Make sure you don’t burn your bridges unnecessarily, Aspen. Pride can be a nasty thing when it’s used rashly.’
Pride? What pride. She had none. Well, she’d had enough to say no to both him and Billy Smyth.
‘Oh, Billy Smyth! There’s no way I would have slept with him even if he wasn’t married,’ she told Delta as she brushed her down vigorously.
But you would have with Cruz Rodriguez. Even without the money.
‘I would not,’ she promised Delta, knowing that if she had sex again with any man it would be too soon.
She stopped and leant her forehead against the mare. She breathed in her comforting scent and stared out over the stall door, looking up when something—a rat, maybe—disturbed a sleeping pigeon.
Her eye was immediately drawn to a rusty horseshoe lodged firmly between two supporting beams. Her mother had told her the story about how it had got there when she was little and it was the first thing Aspen had looked for when she had come to Ocean Haven, missing her mother desperately. Since then, whenever she was in a tricky situation she came out here and sought her mother’s advice.
‘And, boy, do I need it right now,’ she muttered.
Delta nudged her side, as if to tell her to get on with it.
‘Yes, I know.’ She patted her neck. ‘I’m thinking.’
Thinking about how much this place meant to her. Thinking about the dreams she had that would never materialise if she lost it. And she would lose it. To some faceless consortium in five days. Her stomach felt as if it had a rock in it.
Cruz’s offer crept back into her mind for the thousandth time. He was right; it was pride making her say no.
So what if she said yes?
No, she couldn’t. Cruz was big and overpowering and arrogant. Exactly the type of man she’d vowed to keep well away from.
But you’re not marrying him.
No, but she would have to sleep with him. Which was just as unpalatable.