Adriana Rodriguez flounced into the second floor office her brother preferred to use when he was working at home. Her brother pointedly ignored her as he sat behind the sprawling walnut desk, the phone receiver propped on his shoulder as he riffled through a sheaf of documents. She leaned on the low window sill, arms crossed, and waited to be acknowledged. He shifted the phone and reached for another stack of papers.
“Yes—Antonio Rodriguez for Clarence Damien.” He glanced up as his call went through, and his eyes locked with his sister’s. “You have something on your mind?” He frowned.
Adriana frowned back. “You know exactly what I want to talk to you about, Tonio, and it is time you took this seriously!” She paced across to the edge of the desk and drummed her scarlet-tipped fingers absently on the satin-smooth finish of the wood. “You know only three eligible females who could possibly make a match for you, Tonio, and two of them you can’t stand!”
“Correction,” he drawled in a bored tone, “three of them, I can’t stand.” He stopped his sister’s indignant retort with a raised hand as his father’s business manager picked up on the other end of the line. He said quickly, “Damien! Rodriguez here. I need you to have all of my father’s records available so that I can review them when I arrive on Monday.” His gaze slid over his sister’s livid complexion, and he wondered if she had always been so foul tempered, or if he simply always managed to bring out the worst in her. “Very good. I’ll see you in three days, then.”
As he hung up, Adriana gave him a narrowed glare that might have withered another man’s resolve, and she rasped, “You know very well that Maria Vargas would make you an excellent wife. She has breeding, looks, AND all of Ricardo Vargas’ money! She is the obvious choice. She is your perfect match, socially and financially.”
He drew a deep breath and frowned at his beautiful, extremely self-serving sibling and wondered if it would be illegal to strangle her. She had been after him for these past eight months to marry that fish-cold, supremely selfish bitch. Perfect, indeed! He barely managed not to give a disgusted snort.
Instead, he replied coolly, “I do not wish to spend the remainder of my existence tied to the apron strings of that sour-faced bitch. Perhaps old Vargas didn’t mind your dear friend intermittently sharing his bed, but I prefer women who are capable of some sort of response. The only time I ever saw Maria Vargas show so much emotion as to smile was when she told us that old Vargas had finally gone to his grave.” He rose from his chair and shoved his hands deep into his pockets. “She is about as responsive as a cadaver.”
He knew he had pushed her a trifle too far as her eyes flared and her voice rose to a shrill pitch. “Maria Vargas loved her husband! She was a good wife to him! She gave him five years of her life, and she gave him the son his first wife could not! How dare you speak of her so?”
Fighting the urge to throttle her with both hands, Tonio shrugged with studied indifference. “Yes, she gave him a son—whose, no one will ever know.” He shook his head, his voice low.
His sister was livid as she hissed, “Ricardo Vargas was an old man. He cared little who fathered the boy. He simply wanted a son! She did what she had to do to please him. She did her duty as a wife.”
He laughed unpleasantly. “How very dedicated. I’m certain she preferred it to the alternative.”
“Alternative?” She glared at him.
“Losing his millions,” he replied absently, wishing he were miles from here.
“How dare you speak of her this way? You are hardly the one to preach on moral values, dear brother. Isn’t this a trifle like the pot calling the kettle black?”
Tonio was not about to get into another long discussion of his lack of morals or the terms of their father’s will, both of which he knew all too well already. “I have no time for this today, Adriana. You can lecture me on having no sense of duty or decorum when I return from the states.”
His statement made her pause, as did the set of his mouth and the look in his dark eyes. She knew him too well to continue to press him. It would be like butting her head into the stones of the pasture wall. She decided to let it drop for now. After all, their father’s will made it very plain that he must marry before the year was out, or lose his inheritance to their cousin, Luis. There was nothing for him to do but capitulate, for there were few worthy choices for a man of his social status and wealth. He would come around.
She knew he had no intention of allowing their greedy cousin to take possession of this house, the Coldwater Canyon estate and of all the Los Angeles properties. He enjoyed his lifestyle. He would not allow it to vanish simply because he did not wish to be tied to a wife. She knew he would not allow their fortune to be given away. She made a distasteful face at the thought of having to leave her comfortable home and live on the pittance her mother had left to her. Tonio was obligated to think of her, too! Who could live on half a million for long?
“I think you and Maria would do well together,” she said off-handedly. “She would be no burden on you financially, and she would seek her pleasure elsewhere if you could not find it in yourself to want to take her to bed. She is not in love with you, thank God! She sees the joining of the two families as an important thing, and she can rise above her own selfish desires to make certain that she weds well.”
Antonio stared at her thoughtfully. Did she really think him totally incapable of finding a female he was compatible with? Was she so desperately terrified of having someone beneath her social station become a part of the all-important Rodriguez family? Or perhaps she was more worried about Luis taking over this house and losing her precious status? All of the above, most likely.
He did not answer her. How could she know why he had no desire to wed? His sister knew virtually nothing about his private life beyond sheer gossip—and he preferred to keep it that way. Gossip was easier to bear than pity.
He made a point of ignoring her, walking through the arching doorway to the airy hallway and heading for the library. He wanted to be alone, and the library was Adriana’s least favorite room. It contained books, and his sister had no use for books. Her tastes ran to clothes, jewels, and parties—none of which could ever come out of a book. He could hear her raised voice behind him as she told him once more that his time was running out.
As he closed the library doors, he drew a deep breath. He rubbed his temples with one hand, closing his eyes to shut out the thought.
That damned will! His father had begun to despair of his only son ever marrying and carrying on the family name. He had wanted to see a Rodriguez grandson before he died.
Tonio frowned. He had always hated being the only boy—being expected to marry well and to maintain the family traditions. When his young sisters, Lorena and Estella, had both been killed in a tragic boating accident, he had shuddered to hear his father say quietly to a friend at the double funeral, “Better it was two of three daughters than my only son!”
Perhaps that was the very reason Tonio had avoided marriage—to punish his father for saying such an insensitive thing about two beautiful little girls who had not deserved his concern simply because they were not male.
No. That was not the sole reason.
His mother had been devastated. And, perhaps it was because of her older sisters’ deaths that four-year-old Adriana had been so utterly spoiled. His mother had protected her like a tigress, just as his father had completely ignored her.
At twenty-four, Adriana Rodriguez-Hidalgo was blissfully ignorant of the realities of life, having been kept well insulated by a great deal of money and a great deal of pride against such dreary necessities as working for a living. He certainly hoped Manuel would manage to clip her wings soon and take her off his hands.
He knew that the only drawback had been Adriana’s lack of personal wealth. Manuel Guerra’s family expected his wife to bring with her a good dowry, and now Adriana had one. How long she kept it might very well depend on the man who finally married her. Guerra had a good head on his shoulders.
Yes. Tonio had been a bitter disappointment to his father. He was nearing forty, and seemed to care nothing for his family’s needs. His short engagement to Dolores Hidalgo-Ramirez, a second cousin on his mother’s side of the family, had given the old man hope. But then Dolores had changed her mind and had wed a far wealthier man instead, and Tonio had withdrawn into a shell, avoiding the subject of marriage whenever it arose.
He had begun to seek out women his father heartily disapproved of, women who gave him pleasure without reminding him of his “duty.”
“Have your mistresses, by all means, son, but think of your family first. Marry one of Alejandro’s girls, or the Jimenez girl, and take as many lovers as you need—but marry.” His father’s angry words still rang in his head.
But when he had never been so inclined, his father had been utterly furious with him. And so, with his father’s death, Tonio had been given an ultimatum. He had to be married within one year of his father’s death, or lose the family estates to his eldest male cousin. He would be allowed to keep only the smaller inheritance that had come from his mother’s family, half of which Adriana already had received at his request.
His pickle-headed sister had no idea that their father had left her nothing, and that he had asked the attorneys to split the money from the trust his mother had left for him with his sister. She would be left virtually destitute if he did not marry. He knew his sister’s tastes well, and she would manage to run through that half million in less than five years at her current spending rate. He sighed and shook his head. She was so terribly spoiled and self-indulgent. Anyone else could make that much money work for them, and live off the interest, but not his beautiful, empty-headed sister.
He had been thinking of ways to get around the will. He opened his eyes with a sigh of frustration. There were a number of methods, but none of them was practical. If he married one of his sister’s choices, he would be unable to free himself at the end of the two years his father’s will demanded he remain married. He would, of course, be expected to marry in the church, and divorce was unthinkable in his social circle. He just might end up marrying the Vargas widow after all, if he didn’t do something—and soon.
No. He couldn’t let that happen. He had to find a woman. A special one. One who cared nothing for him, and who would be willing to sign a prenuptial agreement to part amicably when the terms of the will had been met, with no claims upon his fortune, or his person. He would be willing to compensate her well for her help. It must be a business arrangement. He frowned at his immaculately manicured hand with the Rodriguez signet ring resting on his long, lean finger.
Finding a woman who had no designs on his wealth was going to be difficult enough, but finding a woman who would be attractive enough to convince his sister and cousin that it was a real attachment was going to be tougher. Adriana knew his tastes well, and the women he preferred to be with were seldom ones who possessed all of the traits he required. Being deliciously sensuous, full breasted, and a blue-eyed blonde wouldn’t come amiss. But that would prove far too tempting.
The woman he chose had to be honest, beautiful, and impervious to him as a man. He hadn’t met a woman yet, married or unattached, who didn’t act like a simpering fool around him, or fall all over him when he was alone with her. They behaved like idiots. He shook his head. Where was he going to find such an unusual, highly qualified individual in such a short time?
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