Jane Porter - Lazaro's Revenge

Her mouth quivered. Her eyes searched his, her lashes damp, matted. “How can I trust you?”

“I don’t know.” He fought the urge to touch her, fought the desire to reach out and cup her cheek. Her skin looked so soft, so tender. Like her heart, he thought, she was soft. She shouldn’t have ever been exposed to a man like him.

This was Dante’s doing.

In Dante’s determination to protect Daisy, he’d exposed Zoe, rendered her vulnerable.

Lazaro felt a tightness in his chest, anger and revulsion. He’d felt this same anger and revulsion nearly all his life. The dirty, barefoot street kid outside the store window looking in. To want something and be denied, not just once, but your entire life…

He, the outcast, the untouchable, had climbed the social ladder but he hadn’t forgotten and he hadn’t forgiven. If anything, the rage burned hotter, brighter, and he was more determined than ever to take what was rightfully his. To seize life—opportunity—and shake it by the throat.

Yet looking at young Zoe Collingsworth he realized all over again how ruthless he’d become, how hard and cruel.

He saw her hands balled in her lap. She was pressing her nails into her palms, the bare nails digging deep, breaking the skin.

“Give me your hand,” he said quietly.

She shook her head.

“Give me your hand,” he repeated.

He could see the fear in her eyes, as well as the uncertainty. She didn’t know what to expect, didn’t know what he wanted with her. Truthfully, he wasn’t entirely sure, either. Sex, maybe. But there was something else, something he couldn’t define but powerful, intoxicating. He was drawn to her. Which would only worsen Dante’s situation.

He waited for her hand and slowly she slipped her palm onto his. His fingers wrapped around hers, his hand holding hers firmly, securely.

“You are safe with me, Zoe. My fight is not with you. Trust me on this.”

Every time he touched her, it happened, she thought wildly. Heat, energy, pleasure. His touch was unlike any touch she’d ever known. There was something in his skin, something warmer, stronger, more real.

Zoe stared at his hand, felt the heat and the ripple of delicious sensation surge through her, hand to heart, heart to belly, belly to legs.

Her heart slowed, her body felt liquid, bones melting, even as her senses became quivery and alert.

“Daisy’s everything to me,” she said, mesmerized by the back of his hand, with the burnished-gold skin and the wide strong bones of his wrist. “She practically raised me. She gave up college for me—”

Suddenly he leaned forward, his dark head blocking light and she knew he was going to kiss her. It was as though she’d known from the very first moment she’d met him that this would happen, that this kiss was destined to happen.

His mouth brushed hers. It was a fleeting kiss, a kiss so light her heart ached and tears pricked the backs of her eyes all over again. She could feel his breath against her cheek, smell the sweetness and subtle spice of his cologne. He was big and strong and dark, and yet he smelled of light, sunshine, like meadow grass and flowers after an early summer rain.

His lips barely grazed hers a second time. His mouth slid over her lips to the corner of her mouth. “I will try my best to protect your sister from this, too.”

It wasn’t the same promise he’d made her. She was afraid to ask, but she had to. “What about Dante?”

Lazaro stiffened. “What about Dante?”

His voice had hardened, the tone turning cold. He didn’t like Dante. “This is about Dante.”

“Yes.”

This was about Dante.

Zoe rushed from beneath his arm, fled to the far side of the red marble bathroom.

This was about Dante. He’d kidnapped her to hurt Dante. He’d done this to make Dante suffer.

But she adored Dante. He was the big brother she’d never had. He’d saved their farm, fallen in love with Daisy, had taken care of their father. Dante was the answer to the Collingsworths’s prayers.

She felt sick, and cold again, deeply cold, as though fear and pain had settled all the way into the marrow of her bones. Pointing to the door, Zoe ordered Lazaro out. “Go.”

He slowly stood, rising to his full height. In the dimmed light his cheekbones looked like angular slashes above his full mouth. His broken nose shadowed his blunt chin. “Someday you will understand.”

“I will never understand. Dante is a good man. He’s the most generous man I know.”

“You don’t know the full story.”

“Get out.” She turned her back on him, wrapped her arms across her chest.

He crossed to the door. “No matter what happens, I will keep my promise to you.”

In the bath Zoe soaped and scrubbed, feeling sullied after the trip, the abduction, the kiss. She didn’t understand how she could feel so many intensely conflicting emotions. She was afraid of Lazaro Herrera and yet intrigued.

Toweling off, Zoe knew she had to act to get word to Dante and Daisy, knew time was of the essence. She’d look for that phone as soon as she could.

Dry and wrapped in a robe, she faced the open closet in her adjoining bedroom. Someone had unpacked for her. She couldn’t imagine it was Lazaro.

Zoe didn’t like feeling naked in this strange house and dressed quickly, putting on comfortable jeans and a well-washed yellow sweatshirt. She’d just started to put on socks and sneakers when a knock sounded at the door.

Opening the door, Zoe discovered a tiny old woman, no taller than five feet, with gray-streaked hair and an extremely wrinkled olive-complexioned face. “Hello.”

“¡Vamanos!” The unsmiling old woman crossed her hands over her stomach. Her voice sounded sharp. “La cena.”

Definitely not a warm welcome. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand,” Zoe answered slowly in English. “I don’t speak Spanish.”

“La cena. La comida.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

The older woman exhaled noisily, tossed up her hands. “¿Que dice?”

“I…I don’t know what you want me to do. I don’t speak Spanish.”

“¿Que?”

“Señor Herrera. Ask Señor Herrera, sí?”

The elderly woman muttered something beneath her breath and stalked off. She made it halfway down the hall before turning around.

With short, curt gestures she motioned to her mouth, and opened and shut her mouth in an exaggerated chewing motion. “La comida. La cena. La cena.”

Understanding dawned. “La cena.” Food, dinner, Zoe finally got it. But that didn’t mean she was going to rush on out and eat. Who wanted to be invited to dinner like that?

Zoe shut her door and it slammed closed far harder than she intended. Wincing, she climbed on her bed, grabbed a pillow and buried her face in the pillow where she let out a muffled scream of frustration.

This was a nightmare.

She couldn’t stay here. Nothing made sense. Everything was off kilter, from the brandy to the marble bathroom to the kiss. She felt lost…confused.

Her door banged open less than two minutes after she’d slammed it shut.

“¡Por Dios! What happened?” Lazaro demanded from the doorway. “I’ve never seen Luz so upset.”

“Luz?”

“My housekeeper.” He braced his hands on his hips, indignation written all over his hard, dark features. “What did you say to her?”

“Nothing.”

“Yet clearly you’ve offended her.”

Zoe mashed the pillow between her hands, squeezing the pillow into a ball. “You’ve got to be joking.”

“No. She said you spit in her face and slammed the door. I heard the door slam, too.”

Zoe flushed. “I didn’t spit. I wouldn’t spit. That’s rude.” She swallowed hard. “And I didn’t mean to slam the door. It closed harder than I expected.”

He stared at her for a long moment, his jaw tight, his mouth compressed. He seemed to be considering her, the situation, Luz’s version of events. “Que joda,” he ground out after a moment.

“What did you say?”

“I said, what a nuisance. You don’t want dinner, fine. Stay in your room. But I’m not going to send special trays to you. There is a dining room in this house, and a very nice antique table with matching chairs. If you want to go to bed hungry, that’s your choice. If you want to eat, you know where I—and the food—will be.”

He knew she wouldn’t join him for dinner and he didn’t have dinner held. It didn’t bother him eating alone in the elegant dining room, either. He almost always ate alone, and had ever since his mother died when he was seven.

He used to think it was poverty that killed her. The two of them were always hungry, and despite the fact that she worked every job she could secure, there never seemed to be enough money to get them off the streets.

Luz entered the dining room, reached for his plate, saw that he’d barely made a dent in his dinner. “Not hungry?” she asked sharply, her wrinkled brow doubly lined with concern.

Luz had befriended his mother before she died. Luz had been poorer than his mother, too, and yet she had fire, and a fierce spirit which made her fight back against those who would oppress her. She’d tried to teach his young mother, Sabana, to stand up to the aristocratic Galváns but his mother was terrified of the powerful Galván family.

“I’ll have coffee and something light later,” he said, leaning back so she could clear his place.

Luz held the plate in her hands. “Who is she, the girl?”

“A friend of a friend.”

Luz made a rough clucking sound. “The truth.”

“It’s half truth, and that’s enough for you to know.” Lazaro pushed away from the table. “Thank you for dinner.”

He walked out, headed for the living room and discovered the fire had burned low. Sitting down on the couch, he put his feet on the massive iron and wood coffee table and stared into the glowing embers.

He’d built this house for his mother. Of course she’d been gone nearly twenty-five years when he had the plans drawn and the house finished, but the attention to detail had been for her, in honor of her. He’d insisted on the best of everything. Crystal chandeliers, silk window hangings, marble bathrooms, French antiques.

She’d been a beautiful girl when Count Tino Galván took her against her will. Just seventeen. Not even out of high school.

But taking her innocence hadn’t been enough for Count Galván. After he’d hurt her, Tino Galván had Sabana sent away, exiled to a remote Patagonia village where she delivered her son alone. The Galváns had hoped the baby wouldn’t survive.

But Lazaro had.

Since his mother died, he lived for but one thing. Revenge. Revenge on those who hurt his mother, and revenge on those who’d shut their doors on him.

Zoe went to bed hungry and woke up ravenous at three in the morning. Between the time change and the growling of her stomach, she couldn’t fall back to sleep. Lying in bed awake, her thoughts quickly turned to Daisy. Daisy would be worried sick and Zoe knew she had to reach her sister as soon as possible and reassure her everything was fine.

She also needed to alert Dante to the danger Lazaro posed, without getting Daisy involved.

Throwing back the bedcovers, Zoe slid out from between the warm sheets and reached for her thin white cotton robe that matched the pink-sprigged nightgown.

It was a girlish set, something she’d had forever and yet refused to part with despite the cotton wearing thin and the rosebuds fading to peach and cream. The sleep set had been a gift from her dad years ago. Daisy got one like it, only hers had been blue.