Page 24 of Chris

Valeria was going crazy.

Yet, as she stared across the room from her hidden position in the shadows of the doorway, it seemed Chris recognized someone was looking at him. His attention left the conversation, and his gaze drifted upward, finding the spot where Valeria hid, watching him and the others. She stiffened, her heart picking up pace with its beats, as his stare lingered her way. A heat danced over her skin when those thin lips of his twitched before curving into a sensual smile.

Did he see her?

“Careful,” a soft voice said behind her.

Valeria jerked in her heels. “Jesus, Abril. Make a noise.”

Her sister-in-law laughed under her breath, a single dark eyebrow lifting in what seemed like a challenge. “Like you’re doing?”

“Well …”

She had a point.

Abril stepped in beside Valeria in the shadows but didn’t glance her way. Instead, she stared across the room, looking at the men, and specifically, the one man who still had his attention focused in their direction.

“Don’t let Jorge see you staring at one of his new friends,” Abril said under her breath, “lest he get in his feelings about it, and wonder if something is going on, sí?”

“What might go on?”

“Nothing. He only needs to think there is. We both know what happens then, Val.”

Right.

Valeria stepped back from the entryway, needing five minutes to breathe alone, and far away from her confusion. “Tell Jorge I wanted to take a walk outside—it’s hot in here, and I’m not feeling well.”

She might as well take the chance to get away even if her husband would come looking for her soon enough. He always did; it was one thing she counted on with Jorge although she wished he would find someone else to focus his attention on.

Well, he did that, too.

Any woman pretty enough he wanted to stick his dick in, he did exactly that. Not that Valeria complained. If he fucked someone else, then he wasn’t raping her night after night.

Win some, lose some.

“Tell him for me, if he asks,” she said again.

Abril nodded. “Sure.”

Valeria sensed the presence join her on the back stairs of the mansion before he even said a word. She hadn’t heard him open the door, or his steps as he came to stand next to her while she stared up at the stars dotting the inky sky, but she felt him.

Somehow.

“Christopher,” she said, not unkindly.

“I prefer Chris,” he returned.

Valeria did her best to keep her gaze on the sky overhead, and not the handsome man next to her. She wasn’t sure why he had come out here. Had he seen her in the shadows and followed her?

If so, what did that mean?

Nothing decent, she imagined. Her heart stuttered at the idea, and she liked it too much. Not good.

“Care to take a walk?” he asked.

Valeria looked at him then, surprised at his offer. Earlier, when they met, and even at dinner, she hadn’t spoken more than a few careful sentences to him. It wouldn’t be enough for him to assume they were friendly, or otherwise. And yet, he smiled at her as though he already had her answer.

“As long as it’s where the guards can see,” she finally replied.