Master Of El Corazon

Master Of El Corazon
Sandra Marton

Master of Matrimony Arden Miller - a coolly professional independent woman… until the night her boss makes a pass and sacks her for rejecting him. Then she is a girl alone and in trouble!Conor Martinez - his name means power and privilege… or does it spell "danger"? He believes that Arden led her sleazy boss on, but now he's the only one who can help her. Within days, Conor's initial distrust has turned to passion, and in weeks he proposes.At first Arden is overjoyed: if Conor loves her the way he makes love to her, this will be a marriage made in heaven! But then she wonders if love has anything to do with it - she has inherited the El Corazon ranch, and Conor will gain control of it by possessing her … .

Excerpt (#u000ad12f-0379-5806-9da1-60fabc9894ba)About the Author (#ucc311db0-b729-56e9-b60a-dc580c50c0d8)Title Page (#u5031cc05-e251-577d-80f3-67f6ada87221)CHAPTER ONE (#ue8193f00-a3e5-50e5-993e-347f08102000)CHAPTER TWO (#u1043def8-05fe-5966-ae96-3070274f4b5a)CHAPTER THREE (#u025df0c2-6081-5c19-9d9f-37bd0d16c6dc)CHAPTER FOUR (#u4c2134a8-858b-51db-a22c-9f6bcb0b49d9)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

“I know you for what you are.”

Arden moved quickly, but not quickly enough. Conor caught hold of her wrist before she could strike him.

“Don’t,” he said, very softly. “Not unless you’re prepared to face the consequences.” She stood facing him, her face white, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. Her voice trembled when she spoke. “I hate you!” she said.

He laughed. “What has that to do with anything?”

Her brain worked desperately for words that would tell him how despicable he was, but before she could think of anything, he cupped the back of her head, drew her toward him and kissed her hard on the mouth.

“I won’t buy you,” he whispered, stroking his thumb over her bottom lip. “I’m a patient man. I’ll wait until you find your way to my bed on your own.”

SANDRA MARTON is the author of more than thirty romance novels. Readers around the world love her strong, passionate heroes and determined, spirited heroines. When she’s not writing, Sandra likes to hike, read, explore out-of-the-way restaurants and travel to faraway places. The mother of two grown sons, Sandra lives with her husband in a sun-filled house in a quiet corner of Connecticut where she alternates between extravagant bouts of gourmet cooking and take-out pizza. Sandra loves to hear from her readers. You can write to her (SASE) at P.O. Box 295, Storrs, Connecticut 06268.

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Master Of El Corazon

Sandra Marton

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

CHAPTER ONE

THE night the world came tumbling down around Arden Miller’s ears began just like any other, or, at least, like any other during the five months since she’d transferred from McCann, Flint, Emerson’s New York office to the firm’s newest branch in Costa Rica.

She put in her usual eight hours as executive secretary to Edgar Lithgow, bid him a polite good evening, then drove her Ford Escort—a perk of her new job—the few miles to the hotel in which the company housed its small roster of North American employees.

The clerk at the reception desk greeted her pleasantly.

‘Buenas noches, señorita. The cook says to tell you the langosta is especially good tonight.’

Arden smiled. ‘I’m sure it is, but I think I’ll settle for a chicken sandwich in my room. Would you ask Alejandro to bring it up in an hour or so?’

The clerk smiled. ‘With iced coffee, yes?’

‘Please.’

‘Of course, Senorita Miller. It will be my pleasure.’

No, Arden thought, no, all of this is my pleasure. I have never been so fussed over, or made to feel so much at home as I have these last months.

But she didn’t say that, of course. Such an admission would have been far too personal and out of keeping with her carefully honed professional image. Instead she gave him another smile, scooped up the few messages and letters that had been left for her, and made her way to the lift. She stabbed the button, then turned her attention to the envelopes in her hand.

There was an advertisement from Macy’s, urging her to take advantage of a sale on shoes, and a form letter from a candidate for local office, pleading for her vote in an election that had taken place a month before. Arden smiled. It was amazing, the mail the post office re-routed so it followed you all these thousands of miles.

The third letter was from her mother, and Arden opened it eagerly. Evelyn wrote that she was feeling fine and still happy in her new job as live-in housekeeper to the Carsons, up on the Hill in Greenfield. Did Arden remember them? Arden’s mouth turned down. Yes, she certainly did. They’d had a couple of sons who’d thought it was their absolute right to sexually initiate girls from the Valley in the back seats of their cars, and if there were any complaints they’d had the money and the clout to hush them up.

Her gaze dropped to the next paragraph. There was good news about Emma Simms, her mother said. She’d just finished a course in beauty school and she was head over heels in love with that nice Evans boy, the one who was working over at Destry’s Plumbing. They planned to get married in February and honeymoon in Disneyworld. And Nan Richards was pregnant with her third baby and working weekends for a caterer so she and her husband could buy a house.

Arden shook her head. Some things never changed, nor did the expectations of some people. She loved her mother dearly, but how Evelyn could be content working as a servant for the rich was beyond her to understand. As for the news about the girls she’d grown up with—well, if Emma and Nan were happy, that was wonderful, but for Arden happiness had always meant establishing herself in a career. You had to have goals in life, and the higher, the better.

As for falling head over heels in love and getting married—well, that sort of nonsense made for catchy song titles, but it had little place in——

‘Señorita.’

Arden’s head lifted sharply. The lift had arrived, the door had slid open, and she saw that a man was lounging in the far corner, watching her. His arms were folded across his chest, his feet were crossed at the ankle, and he had a lazy smile on his beard-stubbled face.

His eyes—surprisingly green in his sun-darkened face—met hers, and she took an unexpected step back. For barely an instant she’d felt—she’d felt as if the ground had suddenly tilted under her feet...

She gave herself a mental shake. That was what came of skipping lunch. But Mr Lithgow had asked her if she’d mind working through, so she could finish up the reports he’d needed for an afternoon meeting—

‘Espera usted a alguine?’

She looked at the man again. Are you waiting for someone? he’d asked, his husky voice and little smile adding a twist to the simple words so that she knew he was asking more than the reason she hadn’t yet stepped into the lift. The knowledge made her hazel eyes turn cool.

Did he really think she could possibly be interested in someone like him? Yes, she thought, her mouth tightening with distaste, he probably did. He had to know there were women—lots of women—who’d look at such a man and like what they saw. He was tall, wide in the shoulders and narrow in the hips, with a classically handsome Spanish face that was made even more attractive by a nose that seemed to have been broken some time in the past. A canvas backpack leaned against his leg, its age and condition matched by his dusty leather boots. He wore jeans and a denim work shirt with the sleeves rolled back to show tanned, muscular forearms.

But any woman with half a brain would see beyond the blatantly macho good looks. Arden had seen others like him several times since she’d arrived in San José, the sort of man who’d come to Central America from any of a dozen other places with nothing but a passport and a handful of colones in his pocket. Some people called them adventurers, but what was the sense in using romantic euphemisms to cover the truth? He was a tramp and a drifter, a man who never planned beyond tomorrow and earned what money he needed by signing on for a day’s manual labour here and there in his travels. Heaven only knew how he’d scraped together enough to rent a room here for the night.