“Are you crazy? You can’t miss something like that. You’re the host! If you don’t even bother showing up, what do you think it will do to your stock price?”
“It’s fine. Really.” He shrugged. “I don’t have a date to the ball anyway.”
“You honestly expect me to believe you don’t have a date—you?”
“You have to admit it’s kind of your fault.”
Now we were getting down to it.
“How is it my fault?” I said suspiciously.
Tilting his head, he looked at me from the sofa. “I did have a date for tonight.” He stroked his chin thoughtfully. “A beautiful Swedish swimsuit model, in fact. But when I called her yesterday and explained I wouldn’t be picking her up in my jet because I’d just discovered a former mistress had my baby and I had to spend the day buying you presents instead of flying to Stockholm to collect her, well—for some reason, Elsa wasn’t interested in flying coach to Madrid to be my date tonight.”
I hid a laugh, tried to look mad. “Too bad for you. But it’s really not my problem.”
He nodded sagely. “You’re scared.”
“Scared? Of what?”
“Of spending time with me. You’re scared you’ll be overwhelmed with desire and say yes to everything, and wake up tomorrow morning, in my bed, with a ring on your finger.”
In his bed? My mouth went dry.
“It’s all right. I understand.” He fluttered his dark eyelashes outrageously. “You don’t trust yourself, because you want me so badly.”
It was so true. “That’s so not true!”
He lifted his eyebrows. “Then you’ll be my date?”
I thought about the type of people I’d be likely to meet at his party. A bunch of wealthy, beautiful, mean people. Just like Claudie. “No, thanks.”
“Why?” he demanded.
“The baby will wake up at midnight for a feeding...” I said weakly.
“I’ll have you back by midnight. Via pumpkin coach if necessary.”
“There’s no one I can trust as his babysitter!”
“Mrs. Gutierrez raised four children, and has ten grandchildren. She’s very trustworthy and experienced, and she’s agreed to stay.”
“You thought of everything,” I grumbled.
“So say yes.”
“I won’t fit in with your friends, okay?”
“Always so afraid,” he sighed. “Of me. Of them. Of your own shadow.”
He was clearly taunting me, but I couldn’t help but bristle. “Even if I wanted to go with you, it’s too late. Your party starts in twenty minutes, and unless you bought a ball gown in London yesterday without me noticing, I have nothing to wear!”
Alejandro smiled. “Did I ever show you our bedroom?”
I shook my head with a scowl. “It’s either yours or mine. Not ours.”
“That’s what I meant,” he said innocently. Walking ahead in the hallway, he pushed open a door.
The bedroom was enormous, with an amazing view of Madrid, but sparsely furnished, with only an expensive, masculine bed. And, incongruously, a crib beside it.
But when I looked closer at the bed, I saw a flash of pink. Coming closer, I gasped when I saw a pale pink gown, a delicious confection of flowers and silk, spread across his plain white bedspread. I picked it up with one hand, then dropped it when I saw the tag peeking at me. Oscar de la Renta.
A pumpkin coach, indeed! I whirled to face him. “You bought this yesterday. You always intended to bring me as your date tonight,” I accused.
His lips were curved in a sensual smile, then his hands went up in mock surrender. “I admit it.” Then he put down his hands, and his expression changed. His dark eyes became intent. Sensual. “I always get what I want,” he said softly, searching my gaze. “And I don’t give up. When something is difficult to possess, that only makes me want it more.”
For a long heartbeat, we stared at each other in his bedroom.
Then I tossed my head, hoping he couldn’t see how my body was trembling. “Fine. Have it your way. I’ll come with you tonight, since it means so much to you. I’ll do it for Miguel’s sake, so your friends will know he wasn’t just the result of some cheap one-night stand. But that’s it.”
His dark eyes burned into mine. “A cheap one-night stand? That is the last thing you were to me. You should know that by now.”
A shiver went down my spine and through my soul. I straightened, locking my knees, and I handed him the baby. “I’ll get dressed as quickly as I can.”
Thirty minutes later, Alejandro helped me out of the limo, holding my hand as we walked up a red carpet, past the flashbulbs of the paparazzi.
“I thought your company was a metals and real estate conglomerate,” I murmured beneath all of the attention.
“It is,” he said innocently, “among other things. We recently bought a movie studio. Look.” I followed his gaze to see a beautiful movie star whom I’d admired for years just ahead of us in a tight sequined gown. “That’s the reason for the paparazzi.”
“She is beautiful,” I said.
He looked down at me. “You’re more beautiful than her on your worst day. Even when you are wearing a dress like a sack and barely brush your hair.”
I snorted, expecting mockery. “You are so full of—”
Then I saw his expression, the frank hunger in his eyes as he looked at me, and my mouth went dry.
“Come on,” he said roughly. “The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can go home.”
I licked my lips, tasting lipstick, which was foreign to me. But in this pale pink ball gown, I didn’t feel like myself at all. I might as well have been wearing glass slippers....
Alejandro led me into a large ballroom, filled with people dancing and drinking champagne beneath enormous crystal chandeliers high overhead. I watched as, ten minutes after we arrived, he went to the elevated dais and made a short speech into a microphone, congratulating the staff of his company, and thanking all their investors and friends, which was met by a roar of applause. When he left the microphone, he returned to my side.
“Now the work is done,” he whispered, nuzzling my ear. “Let’s have some fun.”
He took me out on the dance floor, and I trembled, remembering the last time he’d held me in his arms on a dance floor, the way he’d slowly seduced me, until I surrendered in my first kiss. Now, I felt his arms around me, and I shuddered from deep within, feeling his warmth and strength beneath the tuxedo, breathing in his cologne and the scent that was uniquely him. When the music ended after the first dance, I pulled away.
“I—I need some champagne,” I said unsteadily.
“Of course,” he said huskily, his dark eyes intent, as if he saw through me, every inch and pore, down to my heart and soul.
For the rest of the night, Alejandro was the perfect gentleman, solicitous, getting me champagne, even cheerfully introducing me to the acquaintances who quickly surrounded us.
One of his friends, a German tycoon of some kind, looked me over appreciatively. “Where did you keep this beautiful creature hidden, Your Excellency?”
“Yes, you should have introduced us,” a handsome Japanese millionaire said.
“You