She caught her breath. She hadn’t felt sexy in months, but a shiver of awareness swirled into her middle and sent echoes of pleasure into her erogenous zones.
Whatever had driven them into a frenzy that day was still there, lurking and circling under the surface, teasing her to let it swallow her again.
Apparently, he was impervious. “Get settled. I’ll be back in an hour,” he said, and abruptly left.
It was a kick in the face. A profound rejection that left her floundering in a sea of abandonment. Never mind the nurse or housekeeper hovering behind her. They seemed nice and well-meaning enough, but she wasn’t about to hand over her newborn to strangers. She didn’t want to.
She asked to be shown to Locke’s room, where she changed and fed him.
Self-reliance had been drilled into her from her earliest memories, when her father had been surly and hungover, her mother nursing a bruised jaw or a wrenched shoulder, unable to do much. Scarlett had made the breakfast, and gotten herself and her siblings to school. When she’d begun needing female necessities, she’d found herself a job to pay for them. When she had gone to social workers, her mother hadn’t backed her up and things had almost returned to the way they’d been—only worse. When she’d had to stay home to nurse her mother, teachers hadn’t given her a break on exams.
There’d been no concessions at university, either, when she’d had to drop out to help the family. Niko, demanding and vainglorious as he was, had made her work herself to the bone for the job she held. Kiara had promised to show her the ropes of new motherhood, but their talk of rearing their children together at the villa had been a fantasy. Texts from Kiara revealed she was off to Italy with Val while Scarlett had come to Madrid.
Despite having no one to rely on, ever, Scarlett had thought things might be different with Javiero. He’d been so considerate yesterday. He had sounded so determined to be part of their son’s life. When he’d talked of a partnership, she’d heard team.
But this relationship would be as one-sided as all of them, she supposed, ignoring the fog of despondency that manifested around her. She would manage. She always did.
When Javiero returned two hours later, Scarlett had just settled Locke in his bassinet and was at the door, taking delivery of the parcels she’d ordered.
“Why aren’t you resting?” Javiero’s hair and beard were freshly trimmed. It was a startling change, exposing more of the discolored claw marks, but reinforcing his natural, commanding air.
He took all the bags from the intimidated young man and gave him a few euros to send him on his way.
“I thought you were going to your office.” She gazed at Javiero, once again struck by what a close call he’d had yet rather taken with the clean-cut version of his brutish looks. “You look nice.”
His flat stare refuted her compliment. “It’s a haircut. I couldn’t blame you for rejecting my proposal when I literally looked like something the jaguar had dragged around its pen.”
“Javiero!”
He brushed away her pang of hurt and dropped the bags into a chair. “I spoke to my doctor about a prosthetic eye. I need more reconstruction before I can be fitted. He wants another week of healing before I go for the consultation.”
“Your scars have nothing to do with my reasons for putting off marriage. I’ve...” She faltered with self-consciousness, then pressed on. “I’ve always found you attractive. I still do.” Her voice faded, not from a lack of sincerity, but from the way he trained his one eye on her and made the floor go soft under her feet.
“Really.”
“Why do you sound so skeptical?” she asked crossly. “You’re very...” Virile. He must work out like a demon because he had a chest and shoulders like a stevedore. His biceps were equally powerful and his thighs were like tree trunks. She would bet any money that his strength had saved him, allowing him to fight off the jungle cat.
She swallowed and looked away as heat came into her cheeks. The sensual awareness she’d always felt around him was back with a vengeance, now coupled with the knowledge of how making love with him really felt. Their connection through their son magnified it, leaving her defenses in tatters.
“Really,” he said in a tone heavier with speculation and traces of the charisma that had drawn her so inexorably.
“Well, I wouldn’t have slept with you if I wasn’t attracted, would I?” she defended hotly, unable to look at him.
“The jury is still out on your motives.” His voice turned flinty. “Val would have slept with you if you’d wanted him to. He and Evelina would have loved to screw my side out of Dad’s fortune completely. I can’t believe he didn’t offer.”
“Of course he did,” she said with a snort of obviously.
A flash of something murderous flickered in his expression. “When?”
“In the early days.” She hugged herself. “Before he learned that I would keep talking about your father until his libido shriveled back into its shell.” She shrugged off what had been a minor annoyance in the big scheme of things. “Val wasn’t serious, just testing me the way you’re doing right now. You’re trying to see if you can disconcert me into saying something that will prove I’m a liar. You want me to admit I found Val attractive so you can hate me for it. I did,” she said, her heart pounding at the risk she was taking in being so blunt.
He snapped his head back.
“In a very objective way,” she clarified. “Who wouldn’t? He made his fortune in fashion because he epitomizes fashion’s idea of masculine beauty. And he knows it. Which is why I’m not genuinely attracted.”
He studied her. “You don’t find arrogance attractive?”
“No,
