Page 22 of The Forbidden Cabrera Brother
It was mid-afternoon. He should still be at his glass high-rise in the Silicon Valley just outside the city centre.
Why was he here, driving up the tree-lined avenue towards his house?
Of course, he knew why. He hadn’t been able to focus. He hadn’t been able to focus for the past three days.
That shopping expedition...
Dante had been shopping with women before. He had always taken his laptop because, in between watching the inevitable parade of outfits, he had always been able to catch up on his emails as he’d positioned himself on a chair, in for the long haul.
He enjoyed lavishing presents on the women he went out with. Why not? He had more money than he knew what to do with. And women enjoyed being treated like queens.
Caitlin had not been one of them. Her remark about him throwing money at women because money was an easier sweetener to dish out than time and commitment had rankled. As far as he was concerned, it wasn’t a case of one or the other. It was a case of him not being interested in commitment but enjoying being lavish. How were the two connected? He had refused to rise to the bait and had been outraged at yet another foray from the woman into his private life, which was and always would be out of bounds. She had accepted, finally, his offer to cover the cost of a new wardrobe, seeing that she was stuck in Spain, but he had then to persuade her that the purchase of cheap plastic shoes and disposable tat was out of the question.
What sort of man was Alejandro? he had privately questioned. Stingy? Surely not. He might not be on familiar terms with his brother, but stinginess didn’t run in their family. So how was it that the woman he planned on marrying had to dip into her own pocket for essentials?
Dante knew that some might call him a dinosaur for thinking like that but he really didn’t care. It was how he was, and he was shocked that his brother was not cut from the same cloth.
Accustomed as he was to the twirling of women as they tried on clothes, their insistence that he stay put so that he could give his opinion, Dante had been perversely fascinated by Caitlin’s lack of interest in what he thought of her choices. Made sense, he knew, because it wasn’t as though they were involved on any level, but he had still found himself dumping the laptop and watching what she went for even though there were no trying-on performances.
The three exclusive shops he took her to didn’t offer anything he figured she would automatically make a beeline for. Nothing baggy. Nothing made from fabric better employed for curtains. Nothing designed for women who didn’t want their bodies on show.
He’d found himself curiously keen to see the transformation and he had that very evening when he had stood there at the bottom of the stairs, glancing at his watch and waiting for her to emerge.
The dress she had worn to the ill-fated engagement party had revealed a figure she was at pains to hide. She had looked good but had clearly been ill at ease in it. The silk culottes and little matching silk vest she had worn to his parents’ were much more her thing. She felt confident in them and that confidence spilled over into the way she moved, the way she carried herself, the way she walked. Did she imagine that, because they didn’t cling to every inch of her, her figure was, somehow, less on display? If so, she was very mistaken. Knockout.
That was three days ago. The fierce pull of temptation had set alarm bells jangling in his head and he had dealt with the situation immediately. In between taking her daily to see Alejandro, he had cocooned himself away in his office at home and worked. He had told her that without the distractions that cropped up when he was accessible in his high-tech glass office, which was located some distance away from Madrid, in the equivalent of Silicon Valley, he could power-work and be at hand for any emergencies that might crop up at the hospital. They had met over dinner, prepared and left ready for reheating by one of his staff. They had made pleasant conversation about Alejandro, her job, the weather and various other bland topics. He had done his utmost to keep his eyes off her but, having told himself that she was out of bounds, he had been even more tempted to look.
He had noted the swing of her hips when she had carried her plate to the sink. He had been drawn to the fullness of her mouth every time she smiled. She had a tiny waist and that was apparent in the outfits she had bought—soft khaki shorts...a small denim skirt...a strappy dress with buttons down the front.
How could a man concentrate on work-related issues when the temptation of the forbidden had taken up residence in his head?
He had gone into his offices first thing that morning and had packed it in as soon as his meeting was over.
It was Friday. It was hot. He couldn’t think straight. The constant interruptions had been getting on his nerves.
Made sense to return to his house and bury himself in his office as he had done previously. At least he wouldn’t have to deal with his office door opening and shutting every three seconds.
So here he was. The simmering, dark excitement that seeped into his veins at the thought of seeing her was easy to dismiss as just the irrational pull of what was banned. The dangerous desire to hear her voice and indulge in those invigorating verbal sparring matches was a little more difficult to dismiss but Dante had every confidence in his capacity for self-control.
It was what made him the man he was today. No one ever rose to the top by allowing emotion to get the better of them and Dante, who had started with the sort of privileges most could only dream of, had risen to the very top, expanding his empire beyond belief, because of his ability to detach, his ability to suppress emotion in favour of cool-headed logic.
Cool-headed logic dictated that whatever temptations Caitlin posed, they were little more than titillating distraction in his high-powered but otherwise predictable life.
And anyway, he still wanted to find out what was going on with the woman, what the deal was between her and his brother, whether anything had to be severed before problems could arise.
So all in all...yes, it made complete sense to be returning home on a hot, sunny Friday afternoon...
From her bedroom window, Caitlin could appreciate the stretch of stunning manicured lawns, the clever array of trees that cast just the right amount of shade in just the right places. Facing towards the back of the house, she could almost delude herself into thinking that she was on holiday in some vastly expensive enclave for the super rich.
Dante was out of the house. She knew that because he had been leaving for work when she had descended that morning and had politely quizzed her about her plans for the day. His driver would be available, he had informed her, should she wish to go anywhere. He had already given her the guy’s mobile number and she knew that, should she text Juan, a car would be ready and waiting to deliver her to any destination within seconds. When the wealthy snapped their fingers, people jumped to attention.
Were she on holiday, she now thought, stifling a sigh, then her head wouldn’t be constantly buzzing with anxiety.
For the past few days, in between hospital visits and, on that one occasion, seeing Alejandro’s parents for dinner, and generally trying to deal with Dante’s unsettling presence, Caitlin had busied herself trying to sort out various stays of execution on loans she had discovered her parents had taken out, which they could no longer service. The deeper she dug into her parents’ finances, and dig she did, the more rot she was discovering.
She communicated with her office but had already lost one job because she wasn’t around to take it on. She felt their sympathy was not going to be limitless and her frustration was growing by the hour.
Dante had told her, on that very first evening, when Alejandro’s fall had put paid to their carefully made plans, that when she wasn’t worrying, she should see her stint out in Spain as a little holiday.
