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Shocked, he stared down at her in the dark bedroom. Her beautiful, round, upturned face was glowing, tears sparkling down her cheeks in the moonlight.
“I love you, Eduardo.” Closing her eyes, she pressed her cheek against his bare chest. “I never stopped loving you, and I never will.”
A tremble went through his body as he stroked her hair. Hearing those words on his wife’s lips—the words he’d detested and avoided hearing from any other woman—was a sudden, precious gift. Sweet beyond measure.
Poison in his heart.
Now he had even more to lose. Even more to protect. His arms tightened around her. Would she still love him if she found out what he’d done? After Brandon McLinn explained it to her in the most destructive way possible?
He said with forced cheerfulness, “What do you think about spending Christmas in the south of Spain?”
Pressing her face against his chest, she gave a contented sigh. “Spain?”
He stroked her back, keeping his voice casual. “I have a villa on the coast, not too far from my old village.” And five thousand miles from Brandon McLinn. “What do you say?”
She smiled up at him sleepily. “I’ll go anywhere with you.”
Eduardo gloried in his wife’s generous spirit and trusting heart. Callie knew his flaws better than anyone. And yet somehow she’d chosen to love him.
It was the most precious gift he’d ever received. And the one he least deserved.
Within minutes, she fell asleep in his arms. Eduardo stared out the windows at the dark city and the vast blackness of the Hudson River. It was cold December, when night lasted forever and spring was a distant promise. She loved him. And it was like hot summer to a half-frozen man.
He would never let her go. Ever. Even if it cost his very soul.
In the darkness, his eyes hardened.
He wouldn’t lose her. Not now. Not ever.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SITTING by their pool overlooking the Mediterranean, Callie was trying—again—to convince her body to tan in the warm Spanish sun. She glanced back toward their luxurious, enormous villa, where her baby was taking her afternoon nap. Callie loved it here. All right, she was still shockingly pale, but she’d never been so happy.
Or so sad.
In the four months since they’d left New York, her handsome husband had taken their family all over the world via private jet, to all the glamorous places she’d once dreamed of as a girl. They’d spent Christmas here at the villa, decorating their enormous Christmas tree with oranges. On Christmas Eve, they’d gone to a candlelight service, then after putting the baby to bed she and Eduardo had a midnight supper by candlelight. It had been a special, sacred night between them, the one-year anniversary of the first time they’d made love.
When she woke the next morning, Eduardo was gone, as always. Getting Marisol from her crib, she’d gone downstairs to discover an obscene number of gifts beneath their Christmas tree, and beside it, a debonair Santa with twinkling black eyes, in a red suit far too large for his sleek physique and a fake white beard over his chiseled jawline. Marisol had laughed in wonder and delight, and so had Callie. Santa had presented their baby with so many expensive toys and clothes that it could have satisfied a child army. Marisol had responded by playing with the tissue paper and then trying to chew on her own shoe.
Callie had giggled. “See what happens when you spend too much money on a baby, Santa?”
Santa turned to her. “And I have something for you, Mrs. Claus, er, Cruz.”
Reaching into his big black bag, he’d pulled out a key chain that had her initials, “CC”, created in what looked to be diamonds and gold. She’d taken the key chain with an incredulous laugh.
“It’s beautiful … but are you crazy? People lose key chains. I’ll be scared to use this.”
Santa smirked. “The key chain isn’t the gift. Look again.”
Frowning, she looked down at the ridiculously expensive gold-and-diamond key chain and saw the key. Her mouth went dry as she looked up. “What’s this?”
He gave her a sudden wicked grin. “Go outside.”
Still in her red-and-green flannel pajamas, she’d lifted their baby on her hip, and gone out into the courtyard of the villa, with Santa close behind. Even on Christmas Day, the Spanish sun was warm, and the air smelled of orange groves and the ocean. She’d stopped abruptly in the dusty courtyard.
There, with a big red bow on the hood, she saw a brand-new Rolls-Royce.
“The silver reminded me of you,” he murmured softly behind her. “It’s the color of the dress you wore to the Winter Ball a few weeks ago. You sparkled like a diamond. You shone like a star.”
