“Because then you would wonder how they came to be in your mother’s possession.”

“And you didn’t want me to find out about your father’s relationship with my mom.” She frowned. “He must have truly loved her if he gave her a lot of valuable jewels.” A funny feeling in the pit of her stomach accompanied a sudden image of the brusque and lordly Robert De Leon and her funny, gentle mother.

How much fun they’d had choosing those trees for the grove by the cottage. Why had it never occurred to her before that they were intimate?

“It was a relationship of convenience, nothing more.” Naldo crossed his arms over his chest.

Irritation stiffened her spine. “I see it clearly now. You are the reason your father left the land and the cottage to my mom. He knew you hated their relationship, and that you wouldn’t want her here to remind you of it. He figured that when something happened to him, you’d make her leave-just like you’re trying to get rid of me.” Her voice shook on the last words. “Your father didn’t want my mom to be forced out of the home she loved.”

“She could have bought a much nicer home with the money.”

“Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars doesn’t go too far these days.”

Naldo’s eyes simmered with an emotion she couldn’t quite read. “All right. Four hundred thousand dollars.”

Ice trickled through her veins as she saw the determination in the set of his jaw. He wanted to be rid of her that badly? “Does that include the cost of the jewels?” Her voice sounded as cold and hard as a faceted diamond.

“The jewels can be valued and the price negotiated.”

“But you haven’t found them yet. Perhaps my mom sold them already.”

“She wouldn’t do that.”

“No? You don’t seem to think much of her, so what makes you think she’d cherish them rather than sell them for cash?”

The door opened and Tom came in to remove the plates. They’d barely touched their food. Dinner with Naldo didn’t encourage an appetite.

A tense silence accompanied Vicki’s appearance with two plates of a fresh fruit torte with whipped cream. The family had always liked the cook to serve the food herself so they could admire her presentation and inquire about ingredients and technique. They enjoyed close and warm communication with everyone who worked there. Now, though, Naldo said nothing beyond a polite thanks.

“The staff must have all known,” Anna said once Vicki was gone.

“Perhaps.”

“And Isabela. It’s not quite the secret you hoped.”

Naldo turned and looked up at the portrait on the wall. Anna’s eyes followed his, and the cool beauty in the painting seemed almost to raise an eyebrow at her in challenge.

“I’m sure I can count on your discretion.” Naldo narrowed his eyes as he looked back at Anna. “Neither of us wants our parents to be the subject of prurient gossip.”

“Oh, really? Perhaps your father gave my mom those jewels to buy her silence. Paid her to be invisible, a nobody. A secret mistress.” She rose to her feet, heart pounding, and threw her napkin on the table next to her untouched dessert. “Well, I’m ashamed to know any of you. My mother was a wonderful loving woman who was treated shamefully by my father and apparently by yours, too.”

“You don’t understand the situation.” Naldo’s icy voice chilled her.

“I understand all I need to. My mother was good enough to sleep with, but not good enough to marry.” Tears threatened, and she gulped air trying to keep them at bay. It wasn’t fair that men could use women and take what they wanted without making any promises in return. Why did women let them get away with it?

Fists clenched against the onslaught of all she’d learned and couldn’t even begin to process, she rushed from the dining room. She strode past a startled Pilar, tugged open the heavy front door and flew down the stone steps.

Her van was back at the cottage.

Her heels would be ruined by the time she got home, but she’d have to walk.

Naldo didn’t come after her. She’d hardly expect him to. He knew she’d be back for her money.

She knew it, too. And that only made the long, dusty moonlit walk back to the cottage more grueling than ever.

Naldo stood at his bedroom window looking out over the dark shadows of the groves in the predawn hours. Why couldn’t Anna just make this easy?

A light shone in the distant upstairs window of the cottage, and his groin stirred as he watched her stretch, as sleepless and restless as himself.

She would sell. There was nothing to keep her here. It was simply a matter of agreeing on the price. What difference did it make that their parents had been lovers? That was in the past and had no bearing whatsoever on the business between them.

Anna lifted her hair off her neck. Though he was too far away to see details, he had a flash of insight into exactly how that action would stretch her flimsy T-shirt over those high, firm, full breasts.

He wheeled away from the window, desire thickening inside him. It struck him as ironic that his father probably stood at that same window looking out at his own lover.

His chest tightened. His father had been a good man. A caring and affectionate man. And he’d loved Letty Marcus like a wife.

Was it fair for him to let Anna think he’d merely used her? His barbed remark at dinner-that theirs was nothing but a relationship of convenience-dishonored his father’s memory as well as her mother’s, and left a bitter taste in his mouth.

He ran a hand through his hair, then stretched to try and release the tension in his shoulders.

Anna’s tearful departure left him unsettled, edgy. They’d both feel better if he soothed her and calmed her so she could get some sleep. He’d smooth her ruffled feathers, then they could get back on course and get this deal resolved.

His impulse to visit her in the dead of night had absolutely nothing to do with him wanting to kiss that exasperating mouth into breathless silence and plumb its warm depths with his tongue. He had no thoughts whatsoever of peeling the clothes off that lithe, athletic body and investigating its warm, musk-scented mysteries.

Quite the opposite.

The night air would cool his blood.

It was 3:00 a.m. and Anna had torn the cottage apart looking for the jewels. She’d even slit open the undersides of the mattresses. The cottage was so small there just weren’t that many hiding places to check.

The shocking knowledge of her mother’s affair with Robert De Leon made her see every object and slip of paper in the cottage in a new light. Would she stumble across love notes? Secret tokens? After six hours of rifling through drawers and even through boxes she’d already packed, she found nothing. Her mother had been absolutely discreet.

Somehow that made her sadder than ever. So loyal to her beloved boss-and lover-that she’d never dared mention her relationship with him to her own daughter. The jewels were probably locked in a safe in the big house. Her mom would hardly have worn them out in public, and Naldo was right, she’d never have sold them.

She rubbed her tired eyes with her hands. Her mother’s mysteries were destined to remain just that. A life of quietly kept secrets. Like the identity of Anna’s father, a man who’d gotten her mom pregnant, then casually revealed that he was already married.

Anna reflected that she had good reason to hate all men and their cruel games. She’d married Barry Lennox five years ago, filled with hope for a long and happy life together, and he’d betrayed her in every possible way.

Marriage had meant everything to her. A pledge to care for each other, the promise of a lifetime commitment, the assurance that they were equal partners in a relationship. She’d always promised herself she’d never settle for less, that she’d never make the same mistakes her mother did and let a man use her, but he’d done it anyway.

She sank into the old sofa, hearing the springs creak like they did when she was ten and she and her mom had arrived here from Cincinnati to start a new life.

Fresh tears pricked the backs of her eyelids. Could she find enough hope to start all over…again?

A sharp rap on the door made her catch her breath.

“Anna.”

What the heck is Naldo doing here at three in the morning?

“I know you’re up. I saw you moving.”

“Go away.” She couldn’t hide the tears in her voice.

“Let me in, please.”

“You’ve got the key,” she muttered.

She gritted her teeth as she heard him use it. Wiping her eyes, she rose to her feet as Naldo appeared in the doorway.

His hair was uncombed and dipping into his eyes, which fixed on hers in the dim light. With his fine linen shirt wrinkled and untucked, he didn’t look nearly as elegant and imposing as he had earlier.

Unfortunately he didn’t look any less breathtakingly handsome.

She attempted to summon a fresh nugget of hatred for him, but found she didn’t have the strength.

“I saw your light on. I can’t sleep, either.” His voice was low.

“I was looking for the jewels. They’re not here.” She tried to sound cold, but just sounded tired.

“Never mind about the jewels.” He took a step toward her. The overhead light glazed his features as he moved under it. “Your mother made my father happy. He did love her. He loved her very much.”

His words, and the strange look in his eyes, made her catch her breath. “Why are you telling me this?”

But Naldo didn’t speak. He stepped forward and took her in his arms. Somewhere in the back of her mind she tried to conjure a protest, but it withered as his strong, warm arms closed around her.

His sturdy embrace undermined the last of her carefully guarded strength. She’d had no arms to rest in for so long.

“I hadn’t been back to visit in nearly three years.” The horrible confession underscored how much she’d lost. Her heart ached.