Free The Spanish Duke's Virgin Bride by Chantelle Shaw

place a bubbling cauldron of fury. Javier Herrera was insufferably arrogant and downright rude. She would wear what she damned well liked, and how dared he try to lay down the law?
    â€˜Or I will strip you faster than you can blink.’ Javier’s mouth curled into a smile that held no warmth. ‘Although I confess it may take me considerably longer to dress you again,’ he murmured coolly. ‘It might even result in us being late for the banquet, but our hosts would surely forgive the heated passions of a betrothed couple, and the stain of sexual warmth on your cheeks would be preferable to you looking like a wan ghost.’
    â€˜You are despicable, and I won’t go through with this.’ Grace felt tears of rage sting her eyes, and she blinked furiously, determined to stem their fall. ‘I couldn’t remain married to you for five minutes, let alone a whole year.’
    Javier shrugged his shoulders indifferently and took his mobile phone from his jacket pocket. ‘Fine—we’ll call the whole thing off.’ He paused fractionally and then added softly, ‘I thought you cared about your father, but obviously I was wrong. The only person you care about is yourself, isn’t that right, Grace?’
    â€˜You know I would do anything for him,’ she whispered thickly. Javier had the upper hand and they both knew it. If she refused to marry him, he would easily find another bride—his multi-million-pound fortune guaranteed that. But she had no other way of saving her father from prison. She was trapped; there was no way out. Frantically she moistened her suddenly dry lips with her tongue and could not bring herself to meet his gaze.
    â€˜Two minutes, Grace,’ he warned, handing her the blue dress, and with a muttered oath she swung round and marched into the bathroom.
    If she was honest it was a beautiful dress, and the colour complemented her delicate colouring far better than black, she noted sourly. With narrow diamanté shoulder straps and a neckline that plunged lower than anything else she had ever worn, the gown was both elegant and sexy. The fluid silk seemed to caress her skin, skimming over her curves with a lover’s gentle touch…
    For heaven’s sake! She glared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Where Javier was concerned it was imperative that she keep her wits about her, not drift off into some fantasy world where the sensual heat she’d seen reflected in his amber eyes transmuted into the feel of his hands exploring her body. She didn’t even like the man, she reminded herself irritably. In fact, she loathed him. He was too big, too powerful, and altogether too much, and the less time she spent with him during the coming year the better.
    Taking a deep breath, she opened the door leading from the en suite. ‘Satisfied?’ she demanded coldly, unable to repress a little quiver of awareness when his eyes slid insolently over her.
    â€˜Not quite—come here.’
    She felt like a dog called to heel, but the gleam in his golden gaze warned her to hold her tongue. Squaring her shoulders, she walked across the bedroom until she was standing in front of him and then gasped when he spun her round so that her back was to him and she could see their reflection in the long mirror. With swift, precise movements he removed the pins from her carefully arranged chignon, and when her hair uncoiled down her back he picked up her hairbrush and began to stroke it through the silky strands.
    It was shockingly intimate. Heat coursed through Grace’s veins and she jerked away from him, but a sharp tap on her derrière with the back of the brush quelled her escape bid.
    â€˜Keep still.’ The glint in his eyes was faintly mocking, as if he was aware of her Herculean effort to hold her furious words in check. She’d like to commit murder, she thought savagely, clenching her hands into small fists. And yet the glide of