The Twelve-Month Marriage Deal. Margaret Mayo

       Elena wanted to back away, but it was impossible. All she could do was watch in fatal fascination as his face got closer and closer. Study the intent in his beautiful grey eyes framed by decadently thick lashes. Observe that his breathing got just that little bit faster. And his lips—his beautifully moulded lips—were opening the merest fraction.

      There was not a thing she could do but await her fate. But at the same time she ordered herself not to respond, not to let him see by the simplest of movements that pressure was building up inside her, threatening to spill over the second his mouth claimed hers.

      Was it disappointment she felt when he didn’t kiss her straight away? When he cupped her face in his hands, his thumbs stroking her expectant lips, his touch so gentle it was like the brush of a butterfly’s wing and yet as deadly as snake’s venom?

      Elena couldn’t keep her promise to herself. Her resolve flew out of the window, her lips parting freely, the tip of her tongue coming out to moisten her lips and encourage Vidal’s touch, her head rocking back on her shoulders. It was wrong, all wrong, but somehow she couldn’t help it.

      Margaret Mayo was reading Mills & Boon^® romances long before she began to write them. In fact she never had any plans to become a writer. After an idea for a short story popped into her head she was thrilled when it turned into a full-scale novel. Now, over twenty-five years later, she is still happily writing and says she has no intention of stopping.

      She lives with her husband Ken in a rural part of Staffordshire, England. She has two children: Adrian, who now lives in America, and Tina. Margaret’s hobbies are reading, photography, and more recently watercolour painting, which she says has honed her observational skills and is a definite advantage when it comes to writing.

      

      The

      Twelve-Month Marriage Deal

      by

      Margaret Mayo

      

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Chapter One

      ‘YOUR’RE expecting me to marry Vidal Marquez?’

      Elena looked at her parents as though they were out of their minds. This was the last thing she had expected when they had asked her to come home. The very last thing. She didn’t know what she had been expecting, but it certainly had never entered her head that they would try to persuade her to marry Vidal.

      Her already huge brown eyes widened into enormous orbs of shock and doubt and her heart began an unsteady tattoo. It was actually unbelievable; it was insanity of the highest order. How could they ask this of her? How could they even think it?

      It was her sister who had been going to marry Vidal. They’d been engaged for months. And now her sister had run away! And no one knew where she was. So what had happened? And more to the point, why were they suggesting she take her place? Why was it so important?

      None of it made any sense.

      The afternoon sun streamed through the window, adding highlights to her glossy black hair. It was ironic that it was such a gorgeous day outside and yet here in her parents’ house her whole world was slowly falling apart.

      ‘It’s ludicrous.’ She stood tall and proud, her beautiful face flushed with fury and indignation, her golden eyes almost shooting sparks of fire. Her hair, cut just below her ears with a side fringe, swirled in complete disarray every time she shook her head. ‘For one thing I do not plan to get married for a very long time. I have a business to run, in case you’re forgetting. I’ve spent years getting where I am today and I have no intention of giving it up to marry—’ she drew in a deep, unsteady breath at the enormity of what her parents were asking ‘—my sister’s ex-fiancé.’

      Elena deliberately put great emphasis on the word ex. She loved her parents dearly, but for the life of her she couldn’t understand why they were suggesting she take Reina’s place. Plenty of couples split up and there was never a thought of their siblings stepping in.

      Actually it was hard to believe that Reina had done this. Her elder sister never put a foot wrong. She herself was the wilful one, the one who her parents sometimes despaired of. When she’d gone to live in Los Angeles they had feared for her well-being. And yet she was running a successful wedding-planner business while her sister had turned her back on the wedding of the year.

      She could imagine how hard they had taken the news, Vidal’s family too. The wedding was already in the planning stages. Anyone who was of any note in Spain would already be on the guest list.

      ‘I’m sorry Reina’s putting you through this,’ she said, privately thinking that it was better her sister had found out now that she didn’t love Vidal rather than after their marriage, ‘but is this about losing face? Why would you even think about me taking her place? Why can’t the merger go ahead without a marriage between the families?’

      ‘Because,’ answered her father quietly, ‘we fear that without it the deal will be off. We didn’t tell you this before,’ he added unhappily, ‘but—it was an arranged marriage—for business reasons. We all thought that Reina was happy with the situation. We thought she actually loved Vidal, but—’ He lifted his shoulders and let them fall again, his face a picture of sadness and sorrow and fear for the future.

      ‘Arranged?’ Elena could not believe what she was hearing. The whole situation was getting more bizarre by the second. ‘No wonder Reina ran away. What were you thinking? And now you expect me to take her place. No way! Not ever! I don’t even like Vidal! If you want my opinion he’s a pompous, arrogant bas—’

      ‘Elena!’ Her father’s shocked voice resounded through the room. ‘I will not have that language in my house.’

      ‘Nevertheless it’s what he is,’ she declared firmly. God, she was seething. This was her worst nightmare. How could they even think about asking her to marry this—this…? Words failed her.

      She had never understood why they wanted to merge the two banks anyway. Not that she’d ever had any inclination to work in the business; she’d opted for freedom. She loved her parents dearly, but sometimes found their affection stifling.

      ‘There is another reason,’ said her father, his arm about her mother’s shoulders now, putting on a united front, ‘and I hate having to tell you this, but—’ he dragged in a deeply troubled breath ‘—the bank is in trouble. We fear that we shall be financially ruined if Vidal doesn’t take over.’

      Looking at him, Elena saw the deep lines of strain on his face and the worry in his eyes that she had assumed were because of her sister’s actions, but it now appeared that something more serious was afoot. Even her mother’s face was filled with fear, her brown eyes haunted, sunk more deeply than Elena had ever seen them.

      Instantly, Elena folded her in her arms, holding her trembling body close. Her mother had always been such a strong woman that it hurt to see her like this.

      Her parents’ bank was a private one, whereas Vidal dealt in corporate banking. Theirs wouldn’t be the first one in trouble that he had bought. They were talking about a merger, but Elena knew very well that if Vidal got his hands on it, it would be the end of the road for them. All she could hope was that he was offering them a fair deal. Though why she had to become a part of it Elena had no idea.

      ‘So,’ said her father firmly a few seconds later, ‘you will do this? It’s not only for ourselves, you understand, but our employees too. Some of them have been with us for a very long time. We owe them to do the best we can.’

      Elena screwed her face up