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  ‘Maybe because I’m an empty vessel.’ He tried damn hard not to let the acid-like guilt bleed through his voice.

  ‘No, you’re not. You just like to pretend you are. Have you considered that by pretending to be something you’re not, all you’re doing is attracting attention to the very thing you wish to avoid?’

  ‘That’s deep. And I presume that thought challenges you endlessly?’

  Her hand had moved dangerously close to his fly. If she looked down or moved her actions a few inches west, she’d realise that, despite their verbal sparring skimming the murkier waters of his personal life, he was no less excited by her touch.

  In fact, he wasn’t ashamed to admit that he found the return of his libido exhilarating. For a few weeks after he’d emerged from his coma it’d been touch and go. His doctors had cautioned him that he might not resume complete sexual function. Raven Blass’s appearance in his hospital room five weeks ago had blown that misdiagnosis straight out of the water.

  ‘No,’ she responded. ‘I know better than to issue challenges to you.’

  ‘You’re such a buzzkill,’ he said, but he felt relieved that she’d decided to leave the matter of his mother alone.

  He saw the faintest trace of a smile on her face before it disappeared. Her fingers moved away, rounded his hip and settled into his back. The movement brought her closer still, her chest mere inches from his. Firm, relief-bringing fingers dug into his muscle. Again he suppressed a moan of relief.

  ‘I know. But think how smug I’d feel if you got back into racing before you were ready and reversed your progress. You’d never hear the end of it if you proved me right.’

  The sultry movement of her mouth was a siren call he didn’t try very hard to resist. His forefinger was gliding over her mouth before he could stop himself. Her fingers stilled before digging painfully into his back. The rush of her breath over his finger sent his pulse thundering.

  ‘Or I could die. And this relentless song and dance could be over between us. Once and for all.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE CALM DELIVERY of his words, spoken with barely a flicker of those lush jet eyelashes, froze her to the core.

  ‘Is that what you want? To die?’ Her words were no more than a whisper, coated with the shock that held her immobile.

  ‘We all have to die some time.’

  ‘But why, Rafael? Why do you wish to hurry the process when every rational human being fights to stay alive?’

  ‘Mi tesoro, rational isn’t exactly what most people think when they look at me.’

  ‘That’s not an answer.’ She realised she was hanging on to him with a death claw but, for the life of her, Raven couldn’t let go. She feared her legs would fail her if she did. And hell, she wasn’t even sure why Rafael’s explanation was so important to her. For all she knew, it was another statement meant to titillate and shock. But, looking closer, her blood grew colder. Something in his expression wasn’t quite right. Or, rather, it was too right, as if he held his statement with some conviction. ‘What is it, Rafael? Please tell me why you said that.’

  ‘Quid pro quo, sweetheart. If I bare my soul, will you bear yours?’

  ‘Would that give you something to live for?’

  Raven could’ve sworn she heard the snap of his jaw as he went rigid in her arms. Grasping her by the elbows, he set her away from him and straightened to his impressive six foot three inches. His lids shuttered his expression and he returned to the seat behind his desk.

  ‘The amateur head-shrinking session is over, chiquita. Modify your regime to accommodate travel and liaise with Diego if you’ll need special equipment for where we’ll be travelling. We leave on Wednesday.’ He reeled off their intended destinations before picking up a glossy photo of the latest Cervantes sports car.

  Knowing she wouldn’t make any more headway with him, she turned to leave.

  ‘Oh, and Raven?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We’ll be attending several high profile events, so make sure you pack something other than kick-boxing shorts, trainers and tank tops. As delectable as they are, they won’t suit.’

  * * *

  Raven fought the need to smash her fist into the nearest priceless vase as she left Rafael’s study. Not because he would see her, although the glass walls meant he would, but because not losing control was paramount if she wished to maintain her equilibrium.

  She’d fought long and hard to channel her tumultuous emotions into useful energy when, at sixteen, she’d realised how very little her father cared for her. For far too long, she’d been so angry with the world for taking her mother away and replacing her with a useless, despicable parent, she’d let her temper get the better of her.

  Rafael could do his worst. She would not let him needle her further.

  Taking the sheet into the vast living room, she spent the next hour revising Rafael’s regime and speaking to Diego about organising the equipment she would need. Again she felt unease and a healthy amount of frustrated anger at Rafael’s decision to return to X1 racing. She didn’t shy away from the blunt truth that she herself wanted to avoid the inevitable return.

  Even though she’d been paid handsomely by Team Espíritu and treated well by the team, she’d always felt ill at ease in that world. She didn’t have to dig deep to recognise the reason.

  Sexual promiscuity had been almost a given in the paddock. Hell, some even considered it a challenge to sleep with as many bodies as possible during one race season.

  She’d received more than her fair share of unwanted male attention and, by the end of her first season, she’d known she was in danger of earning a frigid badge. Ironically, it was Sasha Fleming’s catapult into the limelight as the team’s lead racer that had lessened male interest in her. For the first time, female paddock professionals were seen as more than just the next notch on a bedpost.

  ‘A two-line frown. I don’t know whether to be pleased or disappointed.’

  She looked up to find Rafael standing a few feet away, two drinks in his hand and his walking stick dangling from his arm. He held one out to her and she accepted and thanked him for the cold lime based cocktail she’d grown to love since coming to Leon.

  ‘I was thinking about how it would be to return to the X1 circuit.’

  ‘Shouldn’t that warrant a three-line frown since I feature in there somewhere?’

  ‘Wow, are you really that self-centred? A psychologist would have a field day with you, you know that?’

  With a very confident, very careless shrug, he sank into the seat next to her. ‘They’d have to fight off hordes of adoring fans first. Not to mention you.’

  ‘Me? Why would I mind?’

  ‘You’re very possessive about me. If you had your way, I’d stay right here, doing your every bidding and following you around like a besotted puppy.’

  Eternally thankful she’d swallowed her first sip, Raven stared open-mouthed. Several seconds passed before she could close her mouth. ‘I’m stunned speechless.’

  ‘Enough for me to sneak a kiss on you?’

  Blood rushed to her head and much lower, between her legs, a throbbing started that should’ve shamed her. Instead, she exhaled and decided to give herself a break. A girl could only withstand so many shocks in one day.

  ‘Earth to Raven. I don’t know how to interpret a wish for a kiss when you go into a trance at the thought of one.’

  ‘I...what?’

  ‘I said kiss me.’

  ‘No. I don’t think that’s a good idea.’

  ‘It’s a great idea. Look at me; I can barely walk. You’d be taking advantage of me.’ His smile held a harsh edge that made the Rafael de Cervantes charm even more lethal.

  ‘Whatever. It’s not going to happen. Now, is there anything else I can help you w
ith?’

  His sigh was heavy and exaggerated. ‘Bianca is almost ready to serve dinner. I figure we have twenty minutes to burn. Shall we be very English and talk about the weather before then?’

  ‘The weather is fantastic. Now, let’s talk about your return to X1. I don’t wish to get personal...’

  His low laugh made heat rush into her face.

  ‘What I mean is...you’ll have to be careful when it comes to being...um...’

  ‘Just spit it out, Raven.’

  ‘Fine. Sex. You can’t have sex.’

  He clutched his chest, then tapped carefully on his sculpted muscle. ‘Dios, I think my heart just stopped. You can’t say things like that.’

  ‘I mean it. The last thing you need to be doing is chasing after paddock bunnies. You could reverse any progress we’ve made in the last few weeks. Your pelvis needs time to heal properly. You do want to get better, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, but at what cost? My libido could just shrivel away and die,’ he returned without the barest hint of shame while she...she’d grown so hot she had to take a hasty sip of her drink.

  ‘It won’t.’ She set her glass down on the table. ‘Not unless you put too much stress on your body by taking on too much. Look, I’m not asking for much. I’m saying keep your...keep it in your pants for just a little bit longer, until you’re more fully recovered.’

  He opened his mouth but she raised her hand before he could speak. ‘And please don’t say you need sex to recover. Despite what you want everyone to think, you’re not a sex addict. In fact you were one of the most disciplined men I knew when it came to dedication to racing. All I’m saying is apply that same discipline to your...needs, at least for the time being.’

  Sensual masculine lips tilted at the corners. ‘I think there was a compliment in there somewhere. Fine, I’ll take your lecture under advisement.’

  ‘You need to do more than that, Rafael. Your injuries are too serious to take recovery lightly.’

  He shoved a hand through his hair. ‘Dios, did I call you a buzzkill earlier?’

  ‘I believe you did.’

  ‘Congratulations, you’ve just been upgraded to manhood-killer. Ah, here comes Bianca. Let’s hope she’s got something to revive me after that complete emasculation.’

  ‘Yeah, my heart bleeds.’

  * * *

  Rafael tried to follow what the financial newsreader was saying on the large high definition screen on his plane. He failed.

  Opposite him, ensconced in the club chair, Raven twirled a pen between her lips as she read and made notes on a piece of paper. On any other woman he’d have ridiculed such a blatant sexual ploy. But he knew the woman opposite him was unaware of what she was doing. And its totally groin-hardening effect on him.

  Giving up on finding out how the Dow-Jones was doing, he turned off the TV and settled back in his seat.

  She raised her head and looked at him with those stunning hazel eyes. ‘What?’

  ‘How did you get into physiotherapy?’

  She regarded him for several seconds before she depressed the top of her pen. ‘The random kindness of strangers.’

  He raised an eyebrow.

  She shrugged. ‘A chance meeting with an ex-PE teacher in my local park when I was seventeen changed my life.’

  ‘Was he hot?’

  She rolled her eyes. ‘She realised I loved to exercise but I had no interest in being an athlete. We met and talked a few times. About a month later she took me to the local sports centre where professional athletes trained and introduced me to their head coach. By the end of the day I knew what I wanted to be.’

  ‘And she did this all out of the goodness of her heart?’

  ‘She realised I had...anger issues and worked to give me focus. She didn’t have to, so yes, I guess she did.’

  He held back the need to enlighten her that nothing in life came free; that every deed held a steep price. ‘What were you angry about?’ he asked instead.

  ‘Life. My lot. What do most teenagers get angry about at that age?’

  ‘I don’t know. I was on the brink of realising my dream and getting ready to step into my very first X1 racing car when I seventeen. I was pretty happy with life at that age.’ Blissfully ignorant of the consequences fate had in store for him.

  ‘Of course you were. Well, some of us weren’t that lucky.’

  ‘Not all luck is good. Some comes from the devil himself, bonita. So, you achieved your light bulb moment, then what?’

  Her gaze slid from his. He forced himself to remain quiet.

  ‘Although my teacher helped direct my vision, I couldn’t really do anything about it. Not at seventeen. I spent most of that year counting the days until my eighteenth birthday.’

  ‘Why?’

  He saw her reticence. Wondered why he was probing when he never intended to get as personal himself.

  After a minute, she answered. ‘Because turning eighteen meant I could make my own decisions, get myself away from...situations I didn’t like.’

  Rafael knew she wouldn’t elaborate more than that. He respected that but it didn’t stop him from speculating. And the directions his thoughts led him made his fist tighten on his armchair.

  Raven’s attitude towards sex and to him in particular had always puzzled him, not because of the women who had fallen over their feet to get to him since he’d shot up and grown broader shoulders at sixteen.

  No, what had always intrigued him was the naked attraction he saw in her eyes, coupled with the fortress she put in place to ensure that attraction never got acted upon.

  It didn’t take a genius to know something had happened to make her that way. Her little morsel of information pointed to something in her childhood. He tensed, suddenly deciding to hell with respecting her boundaries.

  ‘What happened to you? Were you abused?’ he rasped, his fingernails digging into the armrest.

  She froze. Darkened eyes shot to his before she glanced out of the porthole. When she returned her gaze to his, the haunted look had receded but not altogether disappeared. ‘Have you ever heard of the term—the gift of the gab?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Well, my father could make the world’s most famous orators look like amateurs. His silver tongue could charm an atom into splitting, so the term abuse never could stick, especially if the social worker who dealt with any allegation happened to be a woman. So technically, no, I wasn’t abused.’

  His teeth gritted so hard his jaw ached. Inhaling deeply, he forced himself to relax. ‘What the hell did he do to you?’

  She blinked, looked around as if realising where they were, or rather who she was with. Her features closed into neutral and she snapped the pen back out. Lowering her gaze, she snatched up her papers from her lap and tapped them into a neat sheaf. ‘It doesn’t matter. I’m no longer in that situation.’

  Rafael almost laughed. Almost told her being out of the situation didn’t mean she was out of its control. The past had tentacles that stretched to infinity. He was in the prime place to know.

  His father...his mother. Not a day went by that the memories didn’t burn behind his retinas—a permanent reminder only death would wipe away. They plagued him in his wakeful hours and followed him into his nightmares. He could never get away from what he’d done to them. No matter how far he went, how much he drank or how many women he let use his body.

  ‘I’ve revised the regime.’ Raven interrupted his thoughts, her tone crisp, businesslike. Her lightly glossed lips were set in a firm line and her whole demeanour shrieked step back in a way that made him want to reach across and ruffle her.

  Grateful for something else to focus on rather than his dark past, he settled deeper into his seat and just watched her.

  She flicked a glance at him and
returned her gaze to the papers. ‘I’ve ensured that we’ll have a clear hour every morning for a thorough physio session. You already know that if you sit or stand for extended periods of time your body will seize up so I’ll recommend some simple exercises for when you’re in meetings, although the ideal situation would be for you not to be in meetings for extended periods.’

  ‘I’ll see about scheduling video conferences for some of the meetings.’

  Her head snapped up, surprise reflected in her gaze. ‘You will?’

  ‘Don’t sound so surprised. My boundless vanity draws the line at cutting my nose off to spite my face. You should know that by now.’

  ‘If you can video conference, then why do you need to be there in the first place?’

  ‘Like any other organisation, there’s always a hotshot usurper waiting in the wings, ready to push you off into the great abyss at the slightest hint of weakness. I’ve grown attached to my pedestal.’

  ‘You speak as if you’re decrepit.’

  ‘I haven’t had sex in months. I feel decrepit. And with your decree of no sex, I feel as if my life has no purpose.’

  ‘You mean you miss your fans and just want to resume basking in their admiration?’

  ‘I’m a simple man, Raven. I love feeling wanted.’

  Her lips compressed again, although he saw the shadows had faded from beneath her eyes and her colour had returned to her cheeks. He barely stopped himself from feeling inordinately pleased by the achievement.

  She stared down again at the sheet in her hand. ‘Why Monaco?’

  ‘Why not? It’s the glamour capital of motor racing. Most of the current and ex-drivers live there. It affords the best platform for the launch of the All-Star event.’

  ‘Will there be any actual racing?’ she asked.

  He caught the wariness in her tone and suppressed another smile. Like it or not, Raven Blass was worried about him.

  Just like Marco. Just like Sasha... Just like his father. He had no right to that level of concern from them. From anyone.

  The tiny fizz of pleasure disappeared.