‘I don’t think force will be necessary to persuade you to give me what I want,’ he murmured.
Sabrina’s stomach muscles clenched as his sensuous molten syrup voice tugged on her senses. Time seemed to be suspended and her breath was trapped in her lungs. Her eyes widened as she watched his dark head descend, and her heart gave a jolt when she realised that he was going to kiss her. He wouldn’t dare, she assured herself. But this was Cruz Delgado—a man who would dare to make a deal with the devil if he believed the odds were in his favour.
‘I warned you—I’ll scream.’ It was melodramatic, but she felt melodramatic! She gasped as he pulled her against him and she felt the heat from his body melting her bones.
He gave a wolfish smile. ‘Perhaps you will. I remember how you used to scream with pleasure and claw me with your sharp nails, gatinha.’
‘Cruz!’ In desperation she thumped his shoulder with her fist, but her blows had as much effect as a mosquito landing on a rhino’s hide.
‘You are so beautiful,’ Cruz said harshly.
He could not resist her, and he was shamed by his weakness. If he kissed her perhaps the heat blazing inside him would cool and he would be released from this mad desire that made his muscles grow taut and his heart pound. He clamped one arm around her waist and slid his other hand into her hair and up, to clasp her nape as his mouth swooped down and captured hers in a kiss that instantly engulfed Sabrina in a white-hot flame.
Claimed by passion!
Cruz Delgado and Diego Cazorra—two men brought up in Brazil’s favelas—have literally dragged themselves from dirt to a diamond empire.
But having the world at their feet and dripping with their jewels is not enough. Now they will have their revenge against the women who walked away.
It’s time for Cruz and Diego to claim what’s theirs … and for both of these women to be
Bought by the Brazilian!
Read Cruz and Sabrina’s story:
Mistress of His Revenge
Read Diego and Clare’s story:
Master of Her Innocence
Mistress of His Revenge
Chantelle Shaw
CHANTELLE SHAW lives on the Kent coast and thinks up her stories while walking on the beach. She has been married for over thirty years and has six children. Her love affair with reading and writing Harlequin Mills & Boon began as a teenager, and her first book was published in 2006. She likes strong-willed, slightly unusual characters. Chantelle also loves gardening, walking and wine!
Contents
THE HONOURABLE HUGO FFAULKS—with two Fs—was drunk and being sick into a vase. Not just any vase, Sabrina noted, her lips tightening with annoyance. The vase was a fine example of early eighteenth-century English porcelain and had been valued at fifteen hundred pounds by an auction house that had recently catalogued the antiques at Eversleigh Hall.
Compared to the value of the hall’s art collection, which included two Gainsboroughs and a portrait by Joshua Reynolds, fifteen hundred pounds was not a vast sum, but in Sabrina’s current financial crisis she needed every penny she could lay her hands on and selling the vase would at least allow her to pay the staff’s wages and the farrier’s bill.
A frown crossed her smooth brow. If only horses did not need shoeing every six weeks. The cost of the farrier, plus vet’s bills, feed and hay meant that Monty was becoming an expense she simply could not justify. She had spoken to a reputable horse dealer who had assured her that she should get a good price for a seven-year-old thoroughbred, but the thought of selling Monty was unbearable.
She turned her attention to Hugo, who was now leaning on one of the other party guests and trying to stagger in the direction of the bar.
‘Take him to the kitchen and get some black coffee into him,’ Sabrina instructed Hugo’s friend. She wished she could phone Brigadier Ffaulks and ask him to come and collect his son, but Hugo’s parents had paid her a sizeable fee to organise a twenty-first birthday party at Eversleigh Hall. Hugo and fifty of his friends had arrived the previous evening and would be staying at the hall for the weekend. Tomorrow after breakfast—if any of them could face a full English breakfast—they would be able to enjoy clay-pigeon shooting on the estate and fishing in the private lake.
Opening up Eversleigh Hall for weddings and parties was the only way that Sabrina could afford the huge running costs of the estate until her father returned. If he ever returned. She quickly pushed her fears about the earl to the back of her mind with the rest of her worries and smiled at the elderly butler who was walking stiffly across the drawing room.
‘I’d better fetch a mop and clear