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As we help ourselves to cold meats and salad, with various rice dishes and new potatoes, Diana addresses me for the first time.
“Chastity.” She laughs softly. “What a pretty name, although perhaps your parents were trying to make a point.”
I stiffen at the reference to my parents and merely shrug and gaze across the beautiful garden.
She tries again to rile me.
“You’re not Leo’s usual type. He prefers them a little, softer and not so, um, brash.”
I merely shrug. “He wasn’t complaining an hour ago.” I chuckle softly and Leo laughs and runs his arm along the back of my chair and kisses me on the cheek. “I have nothing to complain about.” He says seductively, and it’s the sweetest thing he could have done. For some reason, it warms my soul because nobody has ever shown me affection before. Desire by the buckets, but never affection.
Diana tries to disguise her anger, but I see it flashing in her brilliant blue eyes and then she changes direction and smiles sweetly.
“Then I’m happy for you. You must forgive me, Chastity. I’m a little protective of my family.”
I almost laugh out loud as Leo says sharply, “The Ortegas arenotyour family, Diana, and they never will be.”
She shakes her head and stares at him with a wounded expression. “I realize you’re angry, Leo, and I would be in your shoes. I hated what happened with your father. I never expected him to be, well, as angry as he was, and I never intended to come between you and your brothers.”
“But you did.” Leo says with a snarl. “Now you must live with the consequences of that.”
Diana says nothing and just takes a sip of wine and turns to gaze at the amazing view.
“I’ve always loved this view.” She says softly, and Leo grasps the back of my neck which tells me immediately he’s on edge.
“I particularly love the view from the terrace onto the beach below.”
There is something I’m missing here because Ryan has also stilled beside me, and his face is a picture of concern.
The atmosphere shifts and tension takes over and I do the only thing I can and wave my hand, knocking my glass of orange juice purposefully into Diana’s lap.
“What the…” She jumps up as the juice stains her cotton dress and I love that it must be pretty sticky right now. Her furious gaze falls on me as I say apologetically, “I’m so sorry. Such a pretty dress, too. Please, let me help you.”
“There is no need for that.” She says grimly and wipes it down with her heavy cotton napkin. “I’ll go and change. It’s only a dress.”
As she heads off, Leo relaxes and Ryan scrapes back his chair and stands. “I’ll leave you both to it. I have some business to attend to.”
Leo nods and as he heads off, he turns to me and says with a sigh. “Walk with me.”
I take his hand and as we head over to the terrace, I wonder what he has on his mind.
CHAPTER14
LEO
It hit me like a sledgehammer, exactly as she knew it would. Despite the fact it was years ago, it’s not a memory you forget in a hurry.
Thank God for Chastity’s quick thinking of removing Diana from the table because I was ready to remove my gun and shoot the bitch dead and save us all a whole heap of trouble.
We wander over to the terrace, hand in hand and Chastity is silent beside me, which I’m grateful for.
Seeing Diana standing here earlier brought back an extremely painful memory. Her reference to this being her favorite view was just another dagger to wound me with.
I gaze down on the beach below and say roughly. “My mother died on this terrace.”
Chastity says nothing but squeezes my hand a little tighter.
I carry on. “When we arrived, Diana was wearing an identical dress to the one my mother died in. It was no coincidence. She planned it.”
