Blackmail & Secrets: The Sandoval Baby / The Count's Secret Child / Playboy's Surprise Son

‘I’m very glad the solicitor was able to locate you,’ Freya said, and again Rafe felt that flicker of suspicion. She did not sound very sincere—or was he simply being cynical? God knew he had enough reason to be cynical where women were concerned. Not one had deserved his trust or love.

He pushed the question aside, too impatient to deal with it, or the woman who had caused it. The sooner he—and Max—were gone from this awful place the better.

‘Yes, indeed,’ he agreed pleasantly, although he knew she heard the thread of steel in his voice. He’d had enough of pleasantries. ‘When Max wakes up you can pack his things. I intend to return to Spain tonight.’

Any faint hope that Rafe Sandoval might not be interested in his son crumbled to dust in light of his coldly delivered statement. And, Freya told herself fiercely, that was fine. That was good. Max needed to be with his father—the only family he had now. During the last week she’d told herself that again and again. Yet still the idea of losing him so quickly, so coldly, of him being ripped away from her just as—

Freya stopped that train of thought immediately and made herself smile at Rafe. ‘I can certainly understand your haste, Señor Sandoval—’

‘Can you, Miss Clark?’

His dark eyes flashed dangerously, and she knew he was mocking her. He was a beautiful man, with his high cheekbones and the dark slashes of his eyebrows a bold contrast to the sensual fullness of his lips. Although his hair was cut quite short, it looked silky and soft, and he couldn’t quite keep it from flopping over his forehead. She imagined that annoyed him. He’d raked his long, brown fingers through his unruly fringe three times since he’d come into the house. A tiny insecurity, but it made him seem more human. More approachable.

And this was the man Rosalia had never wanted to speak of. A man she’d had to escape because he was so hard and cold and even cruel. Freya knew better than to believe every accusation Rosalia had hissed out in her anger and fear, but Rafe Sandoval did have an intimidating presence. She could sense a leashed anger emanating from this powerful man; it vibrated in every taut line of his muscular body. His fingers clenched into a fist at his sides and then straightened out again. Twice.

‘I can,’ she replied steadily. ‘I know you must be eager to spend time with your son, and get to know him—’ Actually, she didn’t know that. From everything Rosalia had said, Rafe wasn’t interested in Max. Never had been. Then the solicitor had rung and told her Max’s father had been located, had never known about his son, and was coming to collect him as soon as possible. Freya’s safe little world had suddenly been rent apart—the truth she’d built it on that Max had no one but her now shown for a lie.

Yet she should have known it would happen at some point. She was Max’s nanny, not his mother. She was temporary, expendable, replaceable. She’d always known that, even if she’d managed to pretend otherwise while Rosalia had partied in London and she and Max had lived their separate, contented existence here. Even if she’d let herself love him, had been as good as a mother to him for over three years. She’d still known, and it was that knowledge that was breaking her heart now.

‘Indeed.’ Rafe’s tone was forbidding, the word clearly a close to the conversation. His dark gaze flicked towards the stairs.

Freya felt a rush of gratitude that Max had been so tired from his morning at playgroup that he’d fallen asleep. A small mercy, but a crucial one. She needed this time to convince Rafe Sandoval to take her to Spain with him.

And, from the ill-disguised impatience on his coldly handsome face, it wasn’t going to be an easy job.

‘Did the solicitor say anything to you about Max?’ she asked.

Rafe’s fingers clenched once more. ‘He told me that he was my son, and the paternity test verified that. Is there more I need to know?’ From the sardonic note in his voice Freya knew he was being sarcastic, and she felt a lick of anger, which she suppressed. Losing her temper would not help her in this situation.

‘Actually, there is. Max has just lost his mother—’

‘I’m well aware.’

‘And is in a fragile state,’ Freya continued, ignoring him. ‘He needs consistency, stability.’ He needs me. She barely kept from saying the words. ‘Rushing him off to a foreign country is not the best thing for him now.’

‘Being without his father for three years wasn’t the best thing either,’ Rafe returned, an edge to his voice.

‘True, but there is no point adding one hardship on top of another.’

Rafe stared at her, his gaze icily assessing. ‘What do you suggest, Miss Clark?’ he finally asked, his tone as cold as his look.

Freya took a deep breath. ‘I have been the one consistent element in Max’s life,’ she began evenly. I love him. She swallowed down the words, knowing they wouldn’t help. They might even hurt. They certainly wouldn’t sway a man like Rafe—a man who, according to his ex-wife, had no interest in love at all. A man who was staring at her with cold impatience. ‘I think I should stay with Max as he makes the transition—’

‘I intend finding a suitable carer in Spain,’ Rafe returned flatly.

‘There’s no need,’ Freya argued, her voice calm. She felt as if her heart were flinging itself against her chest, but she’d never let Rafe Sandoval see how much this meant to her—how much she’d come to love Max over the last three years. He was the only person she’d let into her heart in ten years. Since—

No. She would not think about that. She lifted her chin. ‘You have a suitable carer right here.’

Rafe let out a slow breath, studying her. Freya waited, knowing judgement could come swiftly, in seconds. ‘I would prefer,’ he said finally, ‘to have a completely fresh start.’

‘Understandable,’ Freya countered, knowing how acrimonious the Sandovals’ divorce must have been. ‘But fresh starts are not always good for children. Max was happy here.’

Rafe glanced around the little parlour, which Freya knew was a bit … worn. ‘Really?’

Scepticism dripped from his voice, and Freya stiffened. ‘You don’t need a mansion or a flashy car to make a child happy.’

‘How about a father?’

‘Yes, exactly. Someone to—’ Once again she swallowed down that dangerous L-word.

Rafe narrowed his eyes. ‘I will give you severance pay,’ he said, his look and tone both assessing. Suspicious. ‘A generous package. So if it’s money you’re concerned about—’

‘It’s not money,’ Freya replied sharply. Colour flashed into her face. ‘It’s Max.’

Rafe arched an eyebrow. ‘You care for him?’

‘Of course I do.’

‘Enough to travel to a foreign country?’ ‘I’m familiar with Spain,’ Freya admitted, trying not to show how reluctant she was to reveal that fact. She didn’t want to think about the last time she’d been to Spain, or the mistakes she’d made. The loss she’d endured. She never thought about that. She met Rafe’s speculative gaze clearly, refusing to allow even the faintest flicker of emotion to cross her face.

‘I’d prefer,’ he said, ‘to have someone care for Max who speaks Spanish.’

Freya could not keep the triumph from her voice as she told him, ‘I’m fluent in Spanish.’

Rafe smiled faintly as he conceded the point in their power struggle. ‘You are full of surprises, Miss Clark.’

‘I don’t mean to be. But Ro—Max’s mother wanted me to speak both Spanish and English to Max.’

‘I’m glad,’ Rafe said, in a voice that was carefully, painfully bland, ‘that she did not keep Max from his Spanish heritage.’ His mouth hardened into a thin line. ‘Only his Spanish father.’

Freya said nothing. She’d had no great affection for Rosalia Sandoval, but she’d felt sorry for her. The woman had been clearly unhappy, and underneath the anger Freya had thought she’d seen hurt. At one point, Freya suspected, Rosalia had been deeply in love with her husband.

Rafe straightened, glancing around the little parlour with an expression of dismissal. Freya felt her heart lodge like a stone inside her. ‘I appreciate all you’ve done for Max,’ he said briskly, ‘but children adapt. And Max is going to have a completely new life—one in which he will not want for anything.’ His expression softened for only a second, those dark eyes shadowed with something like pity. ‘On occasion a fresh start is exactly what is needed.’

His tone was so unbearably final that Freya could not keep herself from retorting sharply, ‘I doubt Social Services will agree.’

Rafe tensed with a predatory stillness, all traces of pity vanished. ‘I hope,’ he said in a dangerously soft voice, ‘you have not involved Social Services in the life of my son.’

Freya bit her lip. She’d just made a critical error—one that might cost her any possibility of staying with Max. Although, she acknowledged with a stab of pain, that possibility already seemed depressingly remote.

Rafe was still levelling her with a hard stare, compelling Freya to confession. ‘No,’ she admitted, ‘I haven’t.’ Rafe’s solicitor had been clear on that point.

This last week, the week after Rosalia’s death, had been a terrible blur. Hearing of Rosalia’s accident, arranging the funeral, seeing the solicitor, and all the while trying to comfort and reassure Max, whose world had collapsed without him even realising it. And then the sudden, startling news that Rafe Sandoval, the man Rosalia had seemed to hate, was coming to England to take custody of his son.

All Freya was meant to do, the solicitor had told her with unctuous urbanity, was bring Max for a blood test to confirm paternity, and then wait until he arrived. Rafe had been unreachable when Rosalia had died, which was why he’d missed the funeral. The solicitor had said something smarmy about a very important business deal in South America.

Freya had constructed a picture of Rafe Sandoval in her mind of a man too caught up with his own affairs to care about his ex-wife—or his son. A man who insisted on genetic testing before he so much as stirred himself to consider the child that had been left in his care. A man who would be more than willing to hand over such care to the nanny already in place.