‘You have two more candidates. Maybe you’ll strike it lucky second time round. If not, three times will be the charm.’
The restlessness that prowled through him intensified. ‘You’ll come with me tomorrow.’
She froze and stared at him with wide, wounded eyes. ‘I’d rather not, Reyes. I’m not the one marrying these women!’
He exhaled harshly. Ploughing a hand through his hair, he glared at her. ‘I...need you.’
Her eyes widened further. He kicked himself for uttering words he had no business saying. ‘No, you don’t. I’ve done my bit. It’s time to do yours.’
‘Dios! Have you always been this infuriating?’
Her face fell. ‘You think I’m infuriating?’
Reyes was overcome with a desire to placate her. Take that look off her face. Replace it with one of those stunning smiles that lit up his insides.
He pondered the feeling, adding extreme puzzlement to the many emotions he felt around this woman.
This woman should be in jail somewhere dark and harrowing, not enjoying the luxury of a Parisian emperor suite, wearing a sexy bikini, and swimming in his pool.
‘Yes. You’re infuriating. And you’re also supposed to be good at your job. So far you’re doing a pathetically poor attempt. Were you in my permanent employ I’d have fired you a long time ago.’
She looked down at the floor for several seconds, before she glanced back up. ‘Wow, you don’t hold back when you really get going, do you?’
He dragged a hand through his hair. ‘I had a call on my way back. My father had a better health day today than the doctors have seen in the last six months. I missed it, Jasmine. I missed it because I’m attending dinners and vetting potential brides just so my people’s faith in me can be restored. You think I should go easy on you for that?’
She’d grown paler as he spoke, and tears filled her eyes by the time he finished.
Reyes felt like a toad for upsetting her. He cursed silently when her mouth trembled.
‘I wasn’t going to apologise again. I think saying sorry loses its power after the first dozen times. But once again, please know that I never wished for this to happen to you, Reyes. I was protecting those I love and misjudged the consequences. But what’s happening with your father is good news. You weren’t there to witness it but that doesn’t take away from the fact that he’s better.’
About to denounce her for her unwanted optimism, he paused in surprise when she leaned in close and kissed his cheek.
His breath punched out as her alluring scent engulfed him. Too soon, she stepped back and he fought down a keen sense of loss.
Rocking back on his heels, Reyes eyed her. ‘Why did you do that?’ He was shocked enough for his voice to emerge flat. At every turn this woman threw him for a loop.
‘You looked like you needed it. You’ll be back home soon enough and in control of things. And Santo Sierra will get better with you in charge. I’m certain of it.’
She secured the towel around her, grabbed another one and proceeded to dry her hair. He found himself transfixed, unable to take his eyes off her.
When she sat cross-legged on the lounger, Reyes fought to avert his gaze from her bare thighs. Seeing another scar on her knee, he frowned. From what he knew about her, he was aware her childhood hadn’t been a bed of roses. But the physical marks caused him to wonder exactly what had happened to her.
‘Did this happen to you in juvie?’ he asked tersely as he sat opposite her.
She followed his gaze and shook her head. ‘No. It was yet another product of my misspent youth.’
His fist clenched. ‘That’s not an answer, Jasmine.’
Her throat moved in a small swallow. ‘I was pinned between two gangs during a turf war on the council estate where I lived. This is the result of flying glass from a shattered window.’
He forced himself to release his hold on the glass before it broke in his fist. ‘Shattered glass from...?’
‘Bullets.’
Icy fury washed over him. ‘Your mother let you live in such a dangerous place?’ His voice sounded gruff and almost alien in his ears.
‘We had nowhere else to go.’ No self-pity, just a statement of fact. And yet he knew that the situation must have been gruelling. Why else would she have fought to never return to a place like that again?
Overwhelmed by the protective instinct that continued to build inside him, Reyes looked at her knee. He barely resisted the urge to run his hand over the jagged scar. Just as he fought to ask whether there were more signs of her traumatic childhood on her body.
It wasn’t his business. She was a transient presence in his life. He wasn’t even interested in punishing her for the theft of his treaty any more. Her life had been a difficult one. She’d made choices she wasn’t proud of, but she’d made those choices out of loyalty, a need to survive.
As much as he wanted to damn her for the turmoil she’d left behind, deep down he knew that, faced with the same choice, he would choose the same path. How many times had he shielded his own father from his mother’s misdeeds? Lied to protect his father’s feelings? Even knowing what his mother had been doing the day she died, he’d tried to keep the truth from his father for as long as possible.
Except Reyes didn’t want to let Jasmine go...not just yet.
What he wanted was to assuage the alarming, visceral need to flatten her on the nearest surface and rediscover the heady pleasures of her body.
His eyes rose to her face.
Awareness throbbed between them. Then she glanced away to the view of Paris at night.
‘I was about to order room service. Do you want some food?’ Her voice was husky, warm and sexy in that way that reminded him of their encounter in the darkened bedroom on his yacht.
He forced his gaze from her sensual mouth, and nodded. ‘Sí. I’m starving. Make sure you order an extra-large bread basket.’
She picked up the phone to make the call to his chef. Reyes traced the seductive line of her neck, and resisted the urge to jump into the pool to cool down his out-of-control libido.
* * *
Reyes dismissed the second candidate after a mere twenty minutes.
‘What was wrong with her?’ Jasmine asked, despite the heady pool of relief building inside her. Taking pains not to examine the feeling too closely, she hurried after him as he strode away from the restaurant on the Champs-Élysées.
‘Your notes said she had nothing to do with her father’s media business. That turned out not to be true.’ He rounded on her once they were in the car and driving away. ‘In case I haven’t made it quite clear, I detest the media. They made my and my sister’s lives a living hell when we were growing up, thanks to their insatiable interest in my mother and her infidelities.’ His mouth was pinched and the lines around it deep and pale.
‘I didn’t know that about your mother. I’m sorry.’
He inhaled deeply and loosened the blue-striped tie he’d worn with a pristine white shirt and a dark grey suit. A muscle twitched in his jaw as he exhaled. ‘Gracias. Perhaps I did you a disservice by not giving you enough time to prepare for this.’
It was the closest he’d come to an apology for the unreasonable demands he’d made for her assignment. But even though she nodded her acceptance, Jasmine couldn’t shift from his statement about his mother.
‘Did your subjects know...about your mother?’ she asked.
He