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‘I will make sure you get safely back.’ Maggie’s eyes connected with his and her stomach went into a lurching dive. There was nothing safe about the glow in his smoky eyes. ‘But what,’ he asked, tilting his chair back to avoid a collision with some passing dancers, ‘is the hurry?’
Enrique called out and winked at her as he whirled his new partner past.
‘What did you say to him before?’ she asked suspiciously. ‘Were you talking about me?’
‘I simply translated.’
Maggie replayed the conversation and her eyes widened in dismay. ‘You didn’t!’
One corner of his mouth lifted in a mocking smile. ‘Actually I gave him a modified version—I told him that you eat little boys like him for breakfast.’
‘What if he thought you were serious?’ she charged.
His eyes dropped and Maggie was shocked and embarrassed to feel her body respond to the slow, insolent sweep of his densely lashed eyes.
‘What makes you think I was not serious?’ he countered. His voice lowered a husky octave as he leaned into her and observed softly, ‘You are a very desirable woman.’
Tongue-tied and blushing, she looked away, unable to come up with a smart remark to diffuse the fizz of sexual tension.
Did she want to diffuse it?
A thoughtful expression drifted across his lean predatory features as Rafael watched her plunge into a state of delicious blushing confusion. Rather than exploiting her sexuality, she seemed shocked by any reference to it.
‘I think maybe I will have some more to eat.’ Not looking at him, Maggie picked up her plate.
As she hurried across the grass towards the long trestle table loaded with food she bit her lip to repress a groan. So much for the new improved sexy me—I must have looked like a scared rabbit! What must he think of me?
Unable to stop herself, she glanced back over her shoulder and it became clear he wasn’t thinking of her at all. Her place had been taken by a pretty woman in a low-cut blouse who as Maggie watched threw back her head and laughed, her uninhibited spontaneity a striking contrast to Maggie’s own stilted self-consciousness.
She felt a stab of something that was obviously not jealousy but was nonetheless unpleasant. It was strange. She was not normally so self-conscious; it was just something about Rafael… Something? Who was she kidding? It was everything about Rafael!
The fact was she had never been attracted to a man this way in her life before. It wasn’t just the fact he was incredibly handsome, which he was, it was more…his earthy sensuality… She shook her head, frustrated by her inability to analyse what it was about him.
Maybe it was not possible to analyse; maybe she just had to accept that looking at his mouth made her ache.
One minute she was thinking about his carnal perfect mouth and the things she was shocked to realise she would have liked him to do to her with it and the next she was running.
Later, when she tried to work out the exact sequence of events they remained a confused jumble. In each reconstruction her shocking, shameful thoughts somehow mixed up with the sense of panic and urgency that she reacted to instinctively.
She was never even sure why she had glanced towards a pile of recently sawn timber—perhaps movement caught her eye? She actually looked away, barely registering it as her attention drifted to the children playing a hundred yards or so away.
Then a low rumble just audible above the sounds of merriment made her turn her head again. She froze, paralysed with horror as she saw the stack of felled trees begin to move… Like a house of cards they slipped, fell and began to roll down the steep incline.
Straight towards the group of playing children.
The plate slipped from her fingers. She was told later she yelled—that was what caught the attention of the others who set off in her wake—but she had no memory of that. She just remembered running, praying and the sound of her laboured breathing loud in her ears as she raced towards the children.
By the time she reached them the older ones, alerted by cries, had already started moving, running out of the path of the approaching danger. Some were crying, but the sound was lost in the general pandemonium.
Maggie bent and scooped up two of the smaller children sprinting to the safety of higher ground before depositing them in the arms of women standing, shocked, watching, and she went back, passing men running in the opposite direction with children in their arms.
One child remained, a solemn-eyed little boy who raised his arms to Maggie when she reached him, hefting him into her arms. She turned, pressed his face into her shoulder and tried to run; her legs felt leaden. They worked painfully slowly as she fought against the inertia, struggling to suck air into her oxygen-starved lungs.
She could hear the danger approaching but didn’t dare look… Convinced she wasn’t going to make it with her last ounce of strength she flung the little boy at a young man who was running out to meet them.
She saw him safe and closed her eyes as the adrenaline rush in her bloodstream dipped dramatically. She tried to run felt her legs give and cried out. Safety was tantalisingly near but she couldn’t… Her face scrunched into a teeth-clenched mask of determination as she tried to push herself forward.
Then something hit her. For a brief moment she thought it was the loose timber, then she realised the solidity was warm and male—it was Rafael. She stopped fighting as he carried her from danger.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE impetus of Rafael’s sprint carried them both past the crowd of cheering villagers and to the brink of the grassy slope beyond. He dug his heels in but the momentum he had built up was too great to resist and they went over the top, Maggie still in his arms.
As they landed at the bottom the breath left her body in a painful whoosh as she sank into the mercifully soft ground. For a moment she couldn’t breathe or speak…but euphoria made her want to explode. She was alive—that was a big, a massive, plus considering the way things had been looking seconds earlier. A little detail like speech loss was fine, bruises were fine, Rafael on top of her was…
Her chaotic thoughts slowed from a breathless gallop to a slow canter. Rafael was on top of her!
He was breathing like a marathon runner. She was underneath him, a position that if she was honest she had been imagining pretty much from the second she saw him.
She felt fingers frame her chin and heard a deep voice harsh with concern ask, ‘Are you all right, Maggie? Can you hear me?’
‘Of course I can hear you. I’m not deaf.’ She opened her eyes, his face suspended above her was very close.
His heavy-lidded eyes blazed, the heat in them pinning her as surely as his body; the bones of his face stood out in stark prominence beneath his gleaming golden skin.
She got breathless and it had nothing to do with his weight pinning her down—well, only partly. The veneer of cultured civilisation and urbane charm was totally stripped away, revealing the essence of the raw masculinity beneath.
Without a word or taking his eyes from her, he bent his head and fitted his mouth to hers, kissing her hard, then without a word he rolled off her.
‘You went back?’
She turned her head in response to the stark incredulity in his voice. Rafael lay on his back, one arm curved above his head, staring at the sky. She could see his chest rising and falling in sync with his laboured inhalations.
She decided that if he could pretend the kiss hadn’t happened, so could she. She could definitely ignore the fact her lips tingled and his taste was in her mouth, a piece of cake!
‘I think you saved my life, thank you.’ Twice, if anyone was counting.
She expected him to mention the fact. He didn’t.
‘I don’t want your thanks.’
She lay there on the floor as he got to his feet in one lithe athletic bound. He dragged the hair back from his brow before extending a hand.
After a pause Maggie took it and found herself hauled to her feet.
‘You insane idiot, do you have a death wish?’
Maggie was spared from responding to this savage question because at that moment the village en masse swept over them like a blanket of goodwill and concern.
Maggie was carried away on a wave of hugs, kisses and tears, taken quite literally to the heart of the village.
She was declared a heroine bilingually. It was all very emotional and Maggie, both embarrassed and overwhelmed by the attention, went very quiet.
She lost count of the number of times she said she was fine. It was Rafael who finally rescued her from the love and adulation, saying firmly that she needed rest, could they not all see that she was about to collapse?
She repressed her natural inclination to deny she was that pathetic and allowed herself to be escorted back to his car. It seemed to Maggie from his manner that Rafael’s intervention was motivated more by irritation than concern for her well-being.
He had received his share of gratitude too and with every thank-you his mood seemed to have got darker.
Was she paranoid or was she the focus of his annoyance?
Maybe he was actually hurt but was too macho to admit it. She had got the definite impression when they were falling that he was trying to shield her using his body and his arms, which had circled her like a steel barrier to cushion the impact.
And despite his assurances to the contrary the cuts on his dark face did suggest he hadn’t escaped as lightly as she had. His dark hair was tousled and his shirt was ripped almost off his back, revealing a very distracting expanse of brown chest, well-developed shoulders and flat, muscle-ridged belly, not to mention a hand-sewn label that explained in part his irritation: his shirt was no more off the peg than his body was.
Maybe he blamed her for everything, including the ripped shirt. She thought about the angry kiss—hard not to—her eyes half closing as she remembered the texture of his firm lips, the warmth of his breath…the brief explosion of mind-numbing passion.
It was lucky, really, that everyone had assumed her numbed state was caused by the trauma of the accident. She wanted them to carry on believing this version. For Rafael to even suspect that a kiss that had barely registered on his radar had turned her the next best thing to catatonic would have been too mortifying.
She lifted a hand to her mouth and tilted her head back to catch a glimpse of his beautiful sculpted mouth, and immediately stumbled on the rocky ground where the cars, including Rafael’s, had been parked.
Several pairs of arms reached to catch her but Rafael’s were there first. Ignoring her weak protest, he swung her up into his arms, barely breaking stride.
Reaching his car, he deposited her in the front seat.
‘That was quite unnecessary,’ she said frostily.
‘You are welcome.’ He inclined his dark head, his grey eyes mocking her.
Maggie managed a stiff smile as one of the women placed a blanket over her knees. The man standing beside the woman waited until she had tugged it snugly around Maggie before he leaned into the car and clasped one of Maggie’s hands between both of his and said something in Spanish.
Maggie gave a helpless smile and the old man looked to Rafael.
‘The little boy you went back for was Alfredo’s grandson. He says to tell you that you are an angel sent from God.’
Maggie gave an embarrassed little shrug, then turning her hand to grasp the teak-coloured gnarled fingers that lay on top of hers, she squeezed and smiled saying huskily, ‘I’m glad nobody was hurt.’ She glanced at Rafael, bit her lip and, struggling to control the husky throb of emotion in her voice, said, ‘Tell him what I said, please.’
Rafael’s eyes lingered on her face, moving up in a sweep from the graceful line of her slender neck, the curve of her cheek, the fullness of her lips and her wide-spaced liquid dark eyes. Alfredo’s description seemed apt—she did look like an angel, a sad, sexy angel.
This was a situation where seeing both sides of the argument was not useful. Maggie Ward might have many excellent qualities beyond a kissable mouth and a sinfully sexy body, but he didn’t want to know about them. It confused the issue.
She was a danger to the happiness of two people he cared about. Focus on that, he told himself, and forget about her mouth and her courage. Think of her as a problem to be solved and maybe a pleasurable interlude.
And why not? Why was he beating himself up because he found her attractive? He knew the attraction was reciprocated. He was in danger of letting her innocent aura make him lose sight of the facts. He had not kidnapped her, drugged her or sworn eternal love; she had come of her own free will.
Maggie Ward knew that his intentions were strictly dishonourable and she had come along anyway. She was a young woman who wanted to add the spice of a one-night stand to her trip, so why should he feel as though he was taking advantage?
He had been staring at her so long that it crossed Maggie’s mind that for some inexplicable reason he might be about to refuse her request.
‘Please?’
Responding to the prompt and ignoring the questioning look in her eyes, Rafael translated.
Maggie watched the elderly man’s lined face crease into a wide smile as he listened to Rafael. He turned his attention back to Maggie, said fervently, ‘Angel.’ And pressed something into her hand before bowing out of the car to join the other villagers who had gathered to say goodbye.
‘Watch the door.’
Maggie responded to the abrupt instruction and pulled the blanket closer as Rafael slammed the passenger door with what seemed to her like unnecessary force. There was nothing in his manner to suggest he agreed with the other man’s version of her actions. Now she was sure it wasn’t her imagination—his attitude towards her since the accident had been terse and unfriendly to a degree that could not be due to a spoiled designer shirt.
Any inclination to flirt with her had presumably vanished along with her make-up and hairgrips. He was obviously a man who could not see past dirty faces.
Or maybe his taste didn’t run to angels?
She had no idea why she felt so let down. It wasn’t as if she had been thinking of him as deep and meaningful when she looked at him, though a bit of dust on his face had not lessened his magnetism, she admitted, sliding a covert peek at his dark face.
But then it was hard to think of anything that would.
Slightly embarrassed, she waved back to the crowd that had gathered as the car drew away. As they vanished from view she opened her hand.
‘Oh,’ she gasped. ‘I can’t take this.’ The gold medallion resting in her palm was obviously old; the carving was delicate. ‘It must be valuable.’ She held it out towards Rafael.
‘It’s a Saint Christopher.’
‘I know. Take me back. I must return it.’
Rafael did not respond to her urgent request. ‘You can’t do that—it would offend him.’
‘But.’
‘He wanted you to have it.’
‘I’m a stranger,’ she protested.
‘A stranger who saved his grandson’s life, his angel.’ And was she anybody else’s angel? he wondered. Was there a man back home who would not be pleased that she had driven off into the mountains with a stranger?
She wore no ring, but that didn’t mean she was unattached. For some women a man back home did not prevent them indulging in a holiday romance, though for some reason he was struggling to put her in that bracket.
The mockery in his voice brought Maggie’s chin up. Her fingers tightened around the medallion. His cynical sarcasm made her see red. ‘You shouldn’t make fun of him,’ she said fiercely.
‘I wasn’t making fun of him. I couldn’t help but notice you were enjoying the attention.’
This totally unfair scathing evaluation took Maggie’s breath away. ‘And their heirlooms, don’t forget that. I managed to fleece them too.’ She allowed her dark eyes to move contemptuously over his patrician profile before putting the medallion over her head. She freed her tangled hair from the chain. ‘You do know that you are a very unpleasant man, don’t you?’
‘Is that why you let me pick you up?’
Colour scored her pale cheeks. ‘I made a mistake and assumed you couldn’t be as shallow and superficial as you appeared—I was wrong. And you sulk.’
The bitter afterthought drew a startled look from Rafael.
