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‘Practising being a statue?’ Sophie slipped an arm under hers. ‘You should have seen that suit! It was gorgeous but Ben said black wouldn’t suit me and I’d have to live and sleep in it for fifty years to get my money’s worth!’
‘Typical boring accountant!’ Lisa sniped, still annoyed with him for making her doubt—if only for a moment—her darling, adorable Diego.
‘Now you know you don’t mean that,’ Sophie scolded mildly as they slowly, arm in arm, approached the wide flight of steps that led up to the hotel foyer. ‘You know he can’t help being practical any more than you can help being a dreamer. And cheer up, do. Such a long face! I can’t wait to meet your Diego. It looks like he’s serious about you if he wants to see me and Ben—your minders—on your last night in Spain!’ She gave Lisa’s arm a tiny, reassuring squeeze. ‘I’ve told Ben not to say a word out of place; you know how protective he is of you. And I told him Diego probably wants to ask his permission—in the absence of your father—to visit you in England.’
Or to get a free slap-up meal and plenty to drink as a final perk. Lisa hated the disloyal thought that sprang into her head just as much as she hated her inability to prevent it forming. And loathed Ben for putting it there in the first place. She ousted it firmly. Diego wasn’t into fancy food and wines. He’d always come provisioned with a picnic lunch on their days together. Crusty bread, olives, fruit and bottled water. Simple, cheap and wholesome.
‘We’re a bit early,’ Ben commented as he caught up with them on the steps, eyeing the impressive smoked glass revolving doors.
‘So?’ Sophie shrugged. ‘So we sit in the foyer, cool down and people watch.’ She pushed through the doors and Lisa followed, wishing the dragging minutes away, desperate to ask Diego what he’d been doing with that devastatingly beautiful woman, why he’d let her kiss him, why they’d disappeared into that jeweller’s together. Desperate to hear an entirely acceptable explanation.
And time, perversely, seemed to pass even more slowly in the air-conditioned space. All cool marble floors and stately columns, chandeliers and hushed opulence. Seated in matching pale jade-green upholstered chairs around a low table, Lisa had her back to the main area but Sophie was avidly scanning the languid comings and goings of the wealthy patrons.
‘Now, how’s that for an invitation!’ Sophie giggled. ‘Over there, by Reception—turn round and take a look. It’s his lucky day!’
Lisa obliged. Anything to pass time, to stop her friends from wondering what was wrong with her, why she was wearing what they’d teasingly describe as her Tragic Face.
Diego and that woman!
Lisa shuddered with disbelief and a pain that wrapped icy fingers round her heart. What she was seeing wiped out every beautiful moment of the last weeks. Her eyes filled with tears. She blinked them away. One of his hands rested on the sexy curve of her black-silk-clad hip while the other flipped the lid of a small jeweller’s box closed and slotted it into his pocket. A gold signet ring to match the watch she had bought him? Had the fabulous dark-haired woman already kitted him out with the classy casuals he was wearing?
Stretching up on her high spiky heels, the owner of the scarlet sports car reached up to whisper in his ear. Whatever she said made him grin, that wide slashing grin that said he was happy. She knew it so well!
A slender gold-dripping arm was lifted, beringed fingers dangling a room key in invitation, just before she turned and swayed away towards the bank of lifts, sexual confidence in every movement of those endless legs and delectable body. Diego watched her, still grinning, then turned and sauntered over to Reception.
‘Steamy, or what?’ Sophie hissed and Lisa had to summon every ounce of will-power to make her face blank as she turned back to face the others.
Ben kept glancing impatiently at his watch and Lisa said, trying not to sound as if her world had just fallen into ugly little pieces, ‘Let’s go and find a drink; I’m sick of sitting here.’
She shot to her feet to stall any protests from Sophie who was clearly enjoying her people watching session. And Ben followed suit but insisted on finding the disco bar, even though Lisa was convinced that Diego wouldn’t turn up. Why would he, when he obviously had better prospects lined up? The betrayal was so immense she couldn’t bear to think about it and she couldn’t drag the others away from this place without confessing that Ben had been right about Diego.
Tapas and heavy beat music. Lisa demanded champagne. She would have asked for something strong enough to dull the piercing ache that stabbed through her heart—whisky, maybe—but she knew Ben wouldn’t oblige. Convent educated by nuns strict enough to make your eyes water, treated like a vaguely annoying house guest by a father who had never taken much interest in her when she was home, Ben still tended to regard her as a delicate flower in need of perpetual care and attention.
‘Yes, let’s let our hair down,’ Sophie put in when she noticed Ben’s eyes gravitate to the soft drinks dispenser. ‘It is our last night.’
Lisa drained her glass in two long thirsty swallows and sneaked a refill when Ben wasn’t looking. He was peering at his watch.
Already ten minutes after the appointed time. Diego wouldn’t be coming. Lisa was psyching herself up to tell them why, admit that Ben had been right about her Spanish waiter, drinking her second glass like water to dull the pain when Ben, watching her put the empty glass down on the tiny table, grinned at her. ‘Dance, Lise?’
She wanted to dance about as much as she wanted to sit in a barrel of hot tar but anything had to be better than sitting here, getting tipsy, wanting to cry and doing her best not to, wanting to get her hands on Diego and strangle him after asking him how he could be so cruel.
She took Ben’s hands and got to her feet. The floor dipped and heaved so, instead of dancing opposite him like the other couples, she clung on to his shoulders and was grateful when he clamped his hands around her waist to steady her. He raised his voice above the level of the thumping music and lectured, ‘Squiffy, Lise? That will teach you not to drink a glass of champagne in five seconds flat.’
Two glasses, did he but know it! A hysterical giggle, halfway to a sob, caught in her throat. About to bury her head on his wide shoulder and confess everything, she saw Diego arrive. He said something to his glamorous new girlfriend who gave him a conspiratorial wink before sashaying off to the bar.
How dared he? How could he? Lisa knew she was about to be horribly sick. But she mustn’t! Her fingers dug into Ben’s shoulders. The pain in her gut was unbearable. Think about something else.
Revenge.
Show him! Show him that she wasn’t a silly little girl with the smell of the schoolroom still lingering around her; that she wasn’t the type to cry for a month because she’d been conned by an expert.
He was now standing a scant three feet away, his beautiful eyes lightly hooded as he watched her. What was his intention? How did such guys operate? Would he tap her on the shoulder, wish her a pleasant flight tomorrow, then join his new prey at the bar?
Or would he simply ignore her?
Well, he wouldn’t ignore this—without giving herself time to think—her misery was too great to allow coherent thought—she lifted her hands, pulled Ben’s head down and kissed him as if she were auditioning for a part in a blue movie.
And while Ben was trying to recover, his face brick-red, she looked into Diego’s suddenly ferocious black eyes and lashed out, ‘Go away! You’re cramping my style!’ and watched him turn abruptly on his heel, his mouth hard, his shoulders rigid, as he walked over to his new woman. Lisa thrust her knuckles into her mouth and bit them. She wanted to run after him, take it all back, beg him to make everything all right again.
