THE VALQUEZ BRIDE Read online

  A wedding night she’ll never forget!

  Untouched Theodora Marlstone always wanted the fairy-tale wedding—a white dress and an adoring groom. Instead she’s walking up the aisle toward a marriage of convenience to outrageously attractive Argentinean Alejandro Valquez! He promises raw sensuality, not devotion, but thanks to her father’s will, Teddy must say “I do”….

  Alejandro never wanted a wife, but his buttoned-up bride is a delicious present just waiting to be unwrapped. Beneath the white silk lies a woman who exceeds his wildest imagination, and it’s clear that this union will burn the very paper it’s written on!

  “You said a paper marriage.” Theodora was surprised her voice came out at all, let alone so evenly.

  Alejandro’s eyes were still hooded and trained on her mouth. “That was the plan.”

  Was? Her heart jolted against her rib cage. What did he mean “was”? Was he thinking about shifting the goalposts on their arrangement? Changing the rules? Breaking the rules? A trickle of traitorous excitement flowed through her at the thought of him making love to her, of his long, strong body possessing hers. Enrapturing hers in a feast of the senses that so far she had only ever imagined.

  Another beat of silence.

  “You should let go of my chin.” And stop making me want to kiss you so badly I can’t think about anything but how sexy and male and tempting your mouth is.

  His thumb brushed over the base of her chin. “What if I don’t?”

  Teddy disguised a gulp. “You’d be breaking the rules.”

  A corner of his mouth came up in a sexy slant of a smile. “What if I wanted to break the rules?”

  The Playboys of Argentina

  Introducing the untamable Valquez brothers…

  The Valquez brothers are living legends.

  Alejandro’s business prowess is staggering, Luiz’s success on the polo field is unparalleled and their reputations in the bedroom are scandalous!

  But they’re both about to face their biggest challenges yet…

  Alejandro must marry, but he never anticipated desiring his convenient wife!

  And notorious playboy Luiz finds his match in the delectably innocent Daisy Wyndham!

  You won’t want to miss this scorching new duet from Melanie Milburne!

  Read Alejandro’s story in:

  The Valquez Bride

  October 2014

  And

  Luiz’s story in:

  The Valquez Seduction

  November 2014

  MELANIE MILBURNE

  The Valquez Bride

  All about the author…Melanie Milburne

  From as soon as MELANIE MILBURNE could pick up a pen she knew she wanted to write. It was when she picked up her first Harlequin Mills and Boon® book at seventeen that she realized she wanted to write romance. Distracted for a few years by meeting and marrying her own handsome hero, surgeon husband Steve, and having two boys, plus completing a master’s of education and becoming a nationally ranked athlete (masters swimming), she decided to write. Five submissions later she sold her first book and is now a multipublished, award-winning, USA TODAY bestselling author. In 2008 she won the Australian Romance Readers Association’s most popular category/series romance, and in 2011 she won the prestigious Romance Writers of Australia R*BY award.

  Melanie loves to hear from her readers via her website, www.melaniemilburne.com.au, or on Facebook.

  Other titles by Melanie Milburne available in ebook:

  AT NO MAN’S COMMAND

  PLAYBOY’S LESSON (The Chatsfield)

  NEVER GAMBLE WITH A CAFFARELLI (Those Scandalous Caffarellis)

  NEVER UNDERESTIMATE A CAFFARELLI (Those Scandalous Caffarellis)

  To Nataly Espinoza, for your help with the Spanish translations, but also for your friendship. It was lovely meeting you on the tour of The Kimberleys. xxx

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  EXCERPT

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE ONE WORD that stood out on Teddy’s father’s will started with M but it wasn’t money. She looked at the family lawyer in open-mouthed alarm. ‘Marriage?’

  Benson nodded gravely. ‘I’m afraid so. Within a month. Otherwise, your second cousin Hugo will inherit the lot—every property, stock and share, including Marlstone Manor.’

  ‘But that can’t be right!’ Teddy gripped the arms of the chair so tightly her fingers dug into the leather arms like claws. ‘Dad told me this place was mine. He told me the day before he died. He said I would always have this roof over my head.’

  ‘Your father changed his will the month before he was diagnosed with cancer,’ the lawyer said. ‘It was as if he’d known he didn’t have much time left and wanted to get his affairs in order.’

  His affairs?

  It was her home! That was her affair. It was her life! It was her safety and security. How could her father hand it over to her cousin, who hadn’t even visited him once during his illness?

  Teddy’s heart was galloping so fast and so hard she could feel the blood beating in every one of her fingertips. Shock chilled and chugged through her body like a flow of ice. She blinked to clear her vision. What sort of nightmare was this? Was she really sitting in the library with her father’s lawyer having this crazy conversation?

  It had to be a mistake.

  For the last five months she had nursed her father through his pancreatic cancer and stayed with him and held his hand as he finally slipped away. It was the only time she had felt close to him. During those last days he had shared snippets of his childhood previously unknown to her. It had explained so much about his difficult personality. The way he had constantly found fault with her. How he was so impossible to please. How he was such a control freak who never let her have a say in things. Towards the end she had found a space in her heart to forgive him. She had even told him she loved him. Something she had vowed she would never do.

  And yet the whole time he had been intent on tricking her?

  Betraying her?

  She swallowed tightly, annoyed at the knotty lump of hurt that was lodged in her throat like an oversized walnut. Why had she fallen for it? Why had she let her father do that to her? He had made her feel safe and then whipped the rug of security out from under her. Why hadn’t she seen it coming? Why had she been so...so stupid to fall for that happy families routine?

  ‘My father led me to believe Marlstone would always be mine.’ Teddy tried to speak clearly and steadily even though her emotions were tumbling and twisting inside her chest like clothes spinning in a dryer set on too fast a speed. ‘Why would he have changed his mind? Surely I don’t have to be married in order to inherit what should be automatically mine? That’s totally outrageous!’

  The lawyer tapped the legal document with the pen he was holding. ‘It’s a little more specific than that...’ He paused for a beat as if he was trying to find a way to say his next words without causing her more stress. ‘Your father has also nominated the groom.’

  Shock opened a broad hand inside her belly and grabbed at her intestines. Nominated the— ‘What?’

  He pushed the document towards her. ‘He wants you to marry Alejandro Valquez.’

  Teddy looked at the name. Saw the man in her mind. Felt the bottom of her spine loosen as she pictured that imposingly tall, dark-haired, dark-eyed playboy with the enigmatic smile of a fallen angel. The man women the world over flocked around like bees to top shelf pollen. She felt her cheeks heat up as if twin furnaces had been lit beneath her skin. This had to be a joke. Her father couldn’t possibly be so cruel. To force her to marry someone so out of her league it would make her a laughing stock the moment it was announced. The press would mock her. They would ridicule her mercilessly. No one would believe it for a second. Alejandro Valquez and her? She could already see the headlines: Lame Lady of the Manor Lands Argentinian Playboy in Money Match Marriage.

  What had she done to deserve this? Was this her father’s way of showing his disgust for her disability? To make her a target of ridicule and derision? To be the butt of puerile bar room jokes for the next decade?

  Teddy took a steadying breath, slowly bringing her gaze back up to the lawyer’s. She had to keep cool. There had to be a way to solve this. It wasn’t going to help things by panicking and getting hysterical. That wasn’t her way. Cool and composed was her modus operandi, even though below the surface her nerves were stretched to snapping point. ‘Is there any way of...getting around it?’

  ‘Not if you want to retain full ownership and occupancy of Marlstone Manor.’

  She looked out of the library windows to the gardens and the rolling fields beyond. The green folded valleys with their borders of thick hedgerows, the curve of the river that flowed through the forest that fringed the upper boundary. The still and silent silver sheet of the lake, the sycamore, beech and yew trees that had stood for centuries while life moved on around them.

  The Wiltshire mansion and its surrounding estate was her home. It was her inspiration for her work as a children’s book illustrator. Her botanical drawings with their whimsical themes were inspired by her surroundings.

  Her studio was here.

  Her home was here.