Loe raamatut: «The Mediterranean Millionaire's Reluctant Mistress»

CHAPTER ONE

‘MR SYMMONDS, would you kindly inform your client that her behaviour when I went to collect Miguel from her home yesterday was unreasonable—’

‘Mr Shaw, would you kindly inform your client that I consider his behaviour yesterday worse than unreasonable—it was positively inhuman!’ Brynne’s eyes sparkled deeply blue and her cheeks flushed with temper as she glared across the room at the man who stood so tall and broodingly remote in front of the window of his lawyer’s office. Alejandro Santiago’s swarthily attractive face was half in shadow as he returned her gaze.

Paul Symmonds, her own lawyer, spoke reasonably as he sat beside her. ‘I’m afraid, Miss Sullivan, that Señor Santiago really does have the law on his side—’

‘Perhaps he does—’

‘There is no “perhaps” about it, Miss Sullivan. The judge decreed three weeks ago that, as I am Miguel’s father, his place is now with me,’ Alejandro informed her glacially. ‘But when I called at your home yesterday, as was prearranged, you refused to hand Miguel over to me.’

‘Michael is a six-year-old boy,’ she said, deliberately using the English version of her nephew’s name, ‘who recently lost the only parents he has ever known in a car crash. He is not some parcel left at the lost-luggage department for you, as his natural father, to just collect and move on!’ She was breathing hard in her agitation, and her hands were clenched at her sides.

What she really wanted to do was scream and shout, to tell this man that, although it might have been proved he was Michael’s natural father, and she was only his aunt by marriage, the little boy was staying with her.

Except she knew that wasn’t going to happen. The legal battle with this man was already over, a private legal battle—a battle Brynne had lost—that had nevertheless received much publicity in the press.

But she wanted to shout anyway.

Alejandro eyed her coldly, his harsh good looks, from his Spanish heritage, completely unemotional.

He was tall, with slightly long dark hair and the coldest grey eyes Brynne had ever seen, his face was all hard angles, and the tailored business suit he wore added to his air of cool detachment. He was a man Brynne had come to dislike as well as fear over the last few weeks as she fiercely opposed his claim on Michael.

‘I am well aware of Miguel’s age, Miss Sullivan,’ he rasped stiffly in response to Brynne’s outburst. ‘I am also aware, as I am sure are you, that, as my son, his place is now with me,’ he added with determination.

‘He doesn’t even know you!’ she protested.

‘I am aware of that too,’ the tall Spaniard dismissed abruptly. ‘Unfortunately there is nothing I can do about the six years of my son’s life that have been lost to me—’

‘You could have tried marrying his mother seven years ago!’ Brynne scorned.

Alejandro’s nostrils flared angrily. ‘You have no idea of the circumstances! Do not presume to tell me what I could or could not have done seven years ago!’ he amended harshly.

‘Damn it.’ Brynne choked, deciding to tell him what he should have done more recently instead. ‘For the last three weeks, since the judgement was ruled in your favour, I’ve been waiting in vain for you to use that time to get to know Michael. But you haven’t even attempted to see him. In fact, I’m not even sure you’ve still been in the same country!’

His hard grey gaze narrowed icily. ‘Where I have been for the last three weeks is none of your—’ He broke off impatiently, turning to the two watching and listening lawyers. ‘Mr Symmonds, can you not explain to your client that she has no legal right to keep my son from me? The only reason I agreed to this meeting today in the presence of our respective lawyers was as a courtesy to her—’

‘So that you didn’t have to go back into court, you mean.’ Brynne sneered in disgust.

‘I do not fear meeting you again in a court of law, Miss Sullivan,’ Alejandro Santiago assured her coolly. ‘We both know that you would lose. Again.’ His mouth twisted. ‘But I accept that you are fond of the boy—’

‘Fond of him?’ she echoed, outraged. ‘I love him. Michael is my nephew—’

‘He is not, in fact, related to you by blood at all,’ the Spaniard told her harshly. ‘Miguel was already four years old when his mother married your brother—’

‘His name is Michael!’ she bit out tautly.

‘Look, Miss Sullivan,’ Paul Symmonds cut in smoothly. ‘I did advise you before this meeting today that you really have no choice but to—’

‘Michael is still deeply distraught by the loss of his parents,’ Brynne continued to protest, still upset herself at the death of her older brother and his wife in the car crash that had left Michael orphaned. ‘I’m sure, when he made his ruling, that the judge believed Mr Santiago would use this three-week interim period to get to know Michael, not that he would just—just suddenly turn up on my doorstep and expect to take Michael away with him!’

Alejandro raised his dark brows, impatiently wondering why this woman continued to fight him. She had done so now for the last six weeks since it had been revealed that her nephew, through her brother’s marriage to the boy’s mother, was actually Alejandro’s son from a brief relationship he’d had with Joanna seven years ago.

If Brynne Sullivan thought that revelation had left him unmoved then she was mistaken, he thought grimly.

It had been awful to read in the newspapers of the horrific motorway crash that had killed eight people, including Joanna and her husband, Tom.

But the photograph in the newspaper of Joanna’s son, the little boy who had miraculously survived the collision, and who bore a startling likeness to Alejandro at that age, had been enough to arouse his suspicions as to the boy’s paternity.

He had followed up these suspicions with discreet enquiries about Joanna and Michael, quickly learning that the little boy had been four years old when Joanna had married Tom Sullivan, and that there had never been a father in evidence before that time.

That information had certainly shown that the timing and circumstances seemed right, and together with the child’s clear likeness to himself there was a clear possibility that Miguel could be his son.

Alejandro had flown to England immediately in order to make further enquiries, and then eventually make his legal claim, a claim that had resulted in the judge ordering tests to be taken in order to prove or disprove his paternity.

It had been proved beyond doubt!

But this woman, this Brynne Sullivan, the younger sister of Joanna’s husband, still continued to fight that decision.

By calling him inhuman amongst other things!

He stepped away from the window impatiently. ‘As I have said, this meeting today was a courtesy only, and now it is over.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ Brynne protested firmly.

‘Yes, it most assuredly is,’ Alejandro insisted in measured tones, very near to the end of his patience with this infuriating woman. ‘You will have Miguel’s things packed and ready so that he can leave with me by this time tomorrow—’

‘No, I won’t.’ Brynne gave a firm shake of her head. ‘I can’t let you just take him like this—’

‘I’m afraid you have no choice in the matter, Miss Sullivan,’ Alejandro’s lawyer interjected gently. ‘The law really is on Señor Santiago’s side.’

He received a glittering blue glare for his trouble as Brynne turned to look at him.

Under different circumstances Alejandro would have thought the woman attractive, with her slender figure, long titian-coloured hair, creamy complexion, sparkling blue eyes and air of youthful confidence. But as the only thing that stood between him and his newly recognized son, he instead found her irritating in the extreme!

‘Then the law is an ass!’ she bit out angrily in answer to the lawyer’s remark.

Under different circumstances, Alejandro would also have found her stubborn determination amusing as he recognized in her a will as indomitable as his own.

But the circumstances were not different, and as such Brynne Sullivan was just an irritant he wanted removed. As soon as possible!

His lawyer looked at her pityingly. ‘Whether it’s an ass or not, Miss Sullivan, Señor Santiago’s claim of paternity has been proven and upheld.’

‘He doesn’t love Michael as we do!’ Brynne said as she glared at Alejandro with undisguised dislike. ‘Michael was only four when Joanna and Tom married, and now that they’re dead my parents and I are the only family he has left—’

‘He has grandparents, an uncle and aunt, and two cousins, in Spain,’ Alejandro interrupted derisively.

‘He doesn’t know them any more than he knows you!’ she retorted tartly.

He drew in a deep, controlling breath. ‘Miss Sullivan, you have made the same argument for the last six weeks,’ he cut in impatiently. ‘But as I have already stated, neither you nor your parents are related to Miguel by blood—’

‘You really are a monster, aren’t you?’ Brynne stood up to accuse heatedly. ‘Michael still has nightmares because his mother and the only father he has ever known are now dead. How can you even think about wrenching him away from the people he believes to be his grandparents and his aunt in this callous way?’

‘I am merely taking what is mine,’ Alejandro ground out coldly, still unsure of how he felt towards Joanna for keeping his son’s existence from him all these years.

Admittedly their own relationship had been of short duration, nothing more than a holiday affair, but that didn’t alter the fact that Joanna had to have known Miguel was his son, and had chosen not to tell him.

Brynne glared at him in frustration. She knew that it had been medically proven that Michael was this man’s natural son. She also knew that legally he now had the right to take Michael wherever he wanted.

She had never really stood a chance of keeping Michael, not once Alejandro Santiago proved his claim as the little boy’s father. How could a single woman of twenty-five, a schoolteacher, possibly compete with a man who counted his money in millions of pounds, owned homes all over the world and flew around the world on business in his own private jet? The simple answer was, she couldn’t. But that hadn’t stopped her from trying!

‘I really do not have any more time to waste on this subject,’ the arrogant Spaniard turned to tell the lawyers sharply. ‘I have business commitments in Majorca that I have already neglected the last twenty-four hours—’

‘Heaven forbid ensuring Michael’s future happiness should interrupt your work schedule!’ Brynne snapped scathingly.

Cold grey eyes raked over her dismissively before Alejandro turned back to Paul Symmonds. ‘Now would be a good time for you to once again advise your client to have Miguel ready to leave for Majorca with me when I call for him at her apartment at ten o’clock tomorrow morning,’ he stated briskly. ‘Anything else will result in my bringing further legal action against Miss Sullivan,’ he added grimly.

He would do it too, Brynne acknowledged in defeat as she looked at the implacability of the man’s expression.

It still seemed incredible to her that her beautiful, fun-loving sister-in-law, Joanna, could ever have been involved with a man like Alejandro Santiago. Aged in his mid-thirties, he was just too arrogantly self-assured. Too cold. Too—too immediate, she acknowledged, although she recognized that his height, overlong dark hair and arrogantly chiselled features made him the epitome of tall, dark and handsome.

A fact Brynne, despite her anger and frustration with his claim on Michael, had been all too aware of herself the last six weeks.

Had he been as emotionally aloof seven years ago? Or had something happened during that time to make him this way …?

Not that it mattered; the courts had decided to uphold his rights as Michael’s father, and there wasn’t a damn thing Brynne could do about it.

She looked challengingly at Alejandro. ‘Haven’t you forgotten something, Mr Santiago?’

Alejandro’s eyebrows raised. ‘Have I?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Brynne Sullivan informed him triumphantly. ‘The judge made several other rulings, one of them being that it would be best for Michael to stay with me for a further three weeks so that he could complete the summer school term.’

He eyed her warily. ‘Which is now over …’

‘But he also ruled that, as my school year is now over for the summer too, that if I wished to do so, I might be allowed to accompany Michael for the first month of his stay with you. In order to ensure Michael’s—smooth transition into his new life,’ she said, unable to disguise the disgust in her voice.

Alejandro was aware the judge had made that compromise to what was obviously a delicate situation. It just wasn’t one that he had ever thought this woman, disliking him as she so obviously did, would ever take up!

Brynne Sullivan, he was sure, would be nothing but a nuisance if she came to Majorca with him and Miguel, and would no doubt disagree with him over every decision he made concerning his son’s future.

‘That would seem to be the ideal solution to Michael’s immediate comfort, don’t you think, Señor Santiago?’ Paul Symmonds prompted carefully while Alejandro looked at his own lawyer with a frown and received only an acquiescent shrug in reply.

What of his own comfort? Alejandro inwardly fumed. He didn’t doubt that if he agreed to this the rebellious Brynne Sullivan would enjoy making life difficult for him for the next four weeks.

Brynne wasn’t any happier at the prospect of going to Majorca than Alejandro looked at the idea of taking her there. For one thing she was all too aware of the fact that, despite everything, she actually found the man attractive, nerve-tinglingly so.

But practically she knew her presence would be of help to Michael in learning to accept his change of circumstances. It wouldn’t make parting from him at the end of that month any easier for Brynne, but at least she could try and ensure that Michael was reconciled to living with his new father.

She had tried to explain things to Michael, of course, but as a six-year-old he really hadn’t been able to understand the complexities of the situation.

‘Mr Santiago …’ She looked across at him confrontationally, well aware that the wariness she felt towards him was more than reciprocated.

Not surprisingly, really; she had fought this man every inch of the way the last six weeks. A battle Brynne had been destined to lose.

But accepting this man’s legal right to his son, and then just walking away while he took Michael from all the people who loved him, were two distinctly different things!

Alejandro gave a dismissive shrug of those broad shoulders. ‘It is of little interest to me whether or not you choose to accompany Miguel to Majorca, Miss Sullivan,’ he snapped dismissively.

‘I’m sure that it isn’t,’ she replied irritably, her face flushed with resentment.

‘But if that is your decision then I advise that you also be ready to leave with Miguel tomorrow morning at ten,’ he concluded harshly.

So cold. So intransigent. So damned arrogant!

Only the thought of being with Michael for another month could ever have persuaded Brynne to spend even another second in the company of this man she should have disliked intensely, but who instead made her legs feel slightly weak just looking at him, and her pulse race!