She couldn’t.
“I’ll go with you. I’ll sign papers stating the Corazón del Diablo is irrevocably yours, and I’ll stay in Buenos Aires for three months if you’ll help Jacques. But I can’t marry you. There’s no reason for it.”
“There is every reason,” he said, his voice cracking like a whip against her senses. “I will have no more questions about who owns the stone. It is mine by right, by birth. Any questions of ownership will be dead once we marry.”
She felt like someone was squeezing her, sucking all the air from her space. “How do I know you’ll keep your word, that you’ll help Jacques?”
“I’ll put it in writing.”
He was boxing her in and the box was growing smaller by the second. How could she refuse? How could she deny Jacques the same care he’d given her when she’d needed it? Comfort, care, and love. Francesca closed her eyes, swallowed.
“There would be no need for a marriage in anything more than name,” she said, the words like razor blades in her throat. “You can continue seeing other women. When the time is up, we can divorce and no one will be the wiser.”
The scar scissoring from one corner of his mouth made him look so dangerous, so sensual. When he smiled it made him look more predatory, not less. He truly was a devil.
“Ah, but I would know, Francesca.” He grasped her hand, pulling it to his mouth. His breath stole over her skin in the instant before his lips seared her.
Her body reacted. God help her, it reacted. Sensation spread outward from that one hot touch of his lips. Flooded her senses. Brought parts of her to life that she’d thought were permanently shut off.
No! This was precisely why she couldn’t do this.
You have to, Francesca. You have no choice.
“Stop touching me,” she managed, her heart fluttering like a moth trapped in a jar.
His smile was still so wolfish. “I am not willing to ‘see’ other women, as you put it. I intend to be true to our vows, for as long as we are married.”
He was torturing her. There was no other explanation. He didn’t really want her—couldn’t want her. But if she didn’t agree to his plan, he wouldn’t help Jacques. Uniting d’Oro and Navarre once more would cement his possession of the Corazón del Diablo in the eyes of the world. He would be satisfied with nothing less.
Once he’d done that, perhaps he would lose interest in punishing her. Perhaps he’d let her go.
Francesca pulled her hand away. “I want the contracts drawn up first. I want to see it in writing.”
Marcos took out his phone and punched in a number. Moments later, he was speaking in rapid-fire Spanish. When he finished, he put the phone away and smiled again. That devastatingly handsome smile that proclaimed his intention to win no matter the cost.
“The contracts will be ready when we arrive.”
“I’d rather see them before I leave New York.”
“This is too bad,” he said. “My plane is prepared and the flight plan has been filed.”
“Flight plans can be changed,” she insisted.
Marcos’s eyes were hard. “Not mine.”
“You can’t force me to go with you,” she said, throwing one last desperate statement into the air between them.
“I will carry you onboard myself, Francesca, if you insist on acting like a child.”
“I’ll scream until someone notices—”
“And sentence your Jacques to certain death? I think not.”
“I hate you,” she whispered, turning to watch the city slide by before he could see a tear fall.
His voice, when he finally spoke, was as soft as satin, as hard as the Corazón del Diablo. “Then perhaps we understand one another after all.”
Francesca closed her eyes. She understood all right. Understood that she’d just sold her soul to the devil.
And deals with the devil never ended well…
Chapter Three
THE FLIGHT TO Buenos Aires took more than ten hours. Though they’d traveled in luxury aboard Navarre Industries’ corporate jet, Francesca was exhausted by the time they arrived. She hadn’t slept well since the night before when she’d stolen into Marcos’s hotel room and liberated the Corazón del Diablo.
Though it was dark when they landed, the city lights bathed the night sky in a pale pink glow. Francesca stumbled on the stairs leading from the jet, but Marcos caught her around the waist and kept her from tumbling down the gangway. His fingers burned into her back as he guided her the rest of the way down.
A sleek Mercedes waited for them nearby. Francesca sank into the interior and moved as far away from Marcos as she could get. He immediately took out his phone and made a call. She listened to the lyrical sound of his voice speaking Spanish as the car left the airport and headed into the city. She spoke tolerable French and German, could read Latin, but she’d never learned Spanish. She was certainly regretting that now.
Marcos eventually finished his call and they rode in silence. The city moved by at a quick pace, but a few things caught her attention.
The obelisk that looked like the Washington Monument, which sat at the center of the very wide street down which they’d been traveling, for instance. When she remarked on it, Marcos informed her it was called El Obelisco and had been built to commemorate the four-hundredth anniversary of the city.
“There are concerts held here from time to time,” he said, and she realized there was actually a semicircular swath of grass and concrete on one side of the monument that could accommodate many people.
In fact, though it was dark, there were people everywhere, lingering around the obelisk or crossing the wide street. She even spotted a couple doing the tango. There was a crowd gathered to watch, but the scene slid by before she could see much of the dance.
In spite of her exhaustion, in spite of the reason she was here, the color and movement of the big city excited her. She’d traveled quite a bit as a child, but she’d never been to South America. Her mother had loved to frequent Paris, Rome, and the Med. While she and Livia fidgeted inside hotel suites with their tutors, her mother attended fashion shows and shopped like there was no tomorrow.
Perhaps her mother had been onto something, since most of her father’s fortune died when he did. Penny Jameson d’Oro no longer took shopping trips abroad. A fact for which she firmly blamed Francesca.
“I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a street so wide,” she said in a rush, pushing away the ugly, depressing thoughts that came whenever she thought of her mother.
“No, you are not likely to do so either. This is the Avenida 9 de Julio; it is the widest street in the world. There are twelve lanes of traffic.”
“Fast traffic.” Cars zipped along at Autobahn speed—or so it seemed.
“Sí, people are in a hurry to get where they are going.”
“And where are we going? Is it much farther?” As much as she feared reaching their final destination, she also wanted to collapse on a bed and sleep for the next twelve hours.
“We are nearly there,” he said. “My family home is in Recoleta.”
“I thought we were in Buenos Aires. Have we left it behind?” It was entirely possible, she supposed. As tired as she was, they could have driven to another city and she wouldn’t have really noticed.
“Recoleta is a barrio, a neighborhood.”
“Did