The car barely made a sound as it turned off the road and made its way along the dirt track to the house. Ari looked up. Black, sleek, expensive, there was no one else it could belong to.
Rafael.
‘I’ve got to go,’ she told Jason. ‘Rafael just arrived.’
He let out a hoot of delight. ‘Tell him we’re on the way back. If he needs anything,anything—’
She didn’t want to think about what he was implying there.
She hung up as she rose to her feet, ready to confront him.
Only the fire had drained out of her now. The ebbing rage had just left her nauseated, her stomach roiling and bitter, twisting in on itself.
Rafael got out of the car, as sleek and refined as the vehicle itself even though he was casually dressed. It made no difference. The black jeans hugged his legs and the T-shirt made him look like a film star. How did he do that? With just a T-shirt.
‘Did you forget about lunch?’ he asked, taking in her running gear.
‘Did you forget that you don’t own me and I am not for sale?’ she snapped back.
For a moment it was almost comical, the look on his face, the surprise in his eyes. His mouth opened, but he didn’t seem to know what to say, which had to be a first.
She stood there, hands on her hips, waiting.
‘Ah,’ he said at last. ‘I wanted to talk to you first.’
She waved the phone at him. ‘The wonders of technology beat you to it.’
‘Please let me explain.’ He spread his arms wide as he spoke, his voice entirely calm. Like he was trying to pacify a wild animal. Well, she was more than ready to bite right now.
‘I don’t think there’s anything to explain. I’ve been losing my mind about what we saw last night, on the cliffs, I have no idea what happened and then today…you just tried to buy me? Twice?’
‘It’s not like that. I was going to ask, I promise. But I had to act fast. I wanted everything in place first. I need your help, Ari.’
‘So you can just dictate my life? Is that how you operate?’
‘I would never try to do that,’ he replied. ‘I promise. But I still need you. Especially after last night.’
‘You can’t buy people, Rafael.’
A smile twitched across his handsome face, sad, tragic, and all too knowing. ‘I love that you still believe that,’ he murmured. There was a sorrow beneath the words though, a grim knowledge that gave her pause. ‘But we come from very different worlds. Clearly. I’m offering to fund your brother’s work and to ensure that the school you work for are more than compensatedifyou chose to stay here. I’m trying to make it all go as smoothly as possible. That’s all. I’ll do whatever it takes. Just tell me what you need and I will do it.’
A thousand answers flooded her mind, none of them good enough. Some were downright impossible, and more than a few were physiologically unlikely.
He was desperate. She could see that in the depths of his dark eyes. The strain around them made her frown. There was something she was missing. Something that was driving him that she didn’t know, something far more important to him than all the riches in the world, something he couldn’t afford to lose. He would do anything.
It hit her with such a force, she couldn’t deny it. He was scared. Alone. Facing the impossible. But last night they had faced it together.
‘Gwen tried to warn me about you, about this. She said I should just leave.’
He gave a snort of laughter. ‘That sounds like Gwen.’
There was clearly history between the two of them. Ari didn’t know what had gone on between them in the past. Didn’t want to know either.
‘I thought you didn’t believe any of this, your family curse and all that.’
She might well have slapped him, he looked so surprised. ‘After last night? How can you ask that?’
It was a fair question. She was still reeling from it all herself. At least, she thought, he wasn’t denying it or trying to find some rational explanation for what they had seen. Some part of her, she realised, had been terrified he would say it never happened, that it was imagination and they had not seen Simon or Ankou or whatever the hell it was. At least there was this. And yet…
