Page 58 of Out of Office Nights
And in the very place he’d hoped to make a fresh start while sipping cognac and waiting to tell her that he’d achievedhis deepest desires, after all. He’d been found worthy of the attention and recognition that had long been denied him.
Where he’d hoped to erase the memory of his mother using his talent to drape herself in his masterpieces then happily forgetting he existed until the next time she needed a new wardrobe.
Teo had taken all that in stride. Hell, just like the magnificent haute couture he created, he’d mastered the art of making beauty and flaws, pleasure and pain coexist in one dazzling whole, so no one bothered to dissect where one ended and the other began. He’d become a master at breathtaking camouflage.Sí, he’d learned too late that he’d become too good at it and it had ultimately cost him time with his father. But that was all behind him now.
So why did this panic burrow deep into a soft and shockingly vulnerable place he hadn’t known existed until she’d given him her condition about secrecy?
He exhaled long and slow, while his brain frantically rushed to provide clarity.
Perhaps it was a good thing he was here in Cartana. Slackening his guard beneath the Moroccan sun and in her fierce beauty and will had clearly made him soft. Sleeping with her, while intensely pleasurable, had further addled his senses.
Besides, there was a much more important reason he’d instructed Fernando to inform him the second the queen left, the reason he’d taken Valenti’s car and rushed here. And if she paled at seeing the unabashed ruthlessness that rushed through his bloodlines, he didn’t care.
‘You’ve given me your conditions. Now let me tell you one of my own.’
Dread danced over her face, but to her credit, her chin remained high, her gaze unwavering. ‘I don’t see why you would have any.’
His hard, little smile felt starched. ‘Patience,cariña.’ He gritted his teeth at the careless endearment he’d used a thousand times with dozens of different women. It tasted…wrong with Sabeen. But thetesorohe’d taken to calling her felt…risky. Exposing. ‘The possible seismic shift might require fortitude.’
‘Don’t drag it out, then,’ she said.
His gaze trailed over her, lingering, his mouth watering in searing recollection, even while his heart hammered for a different reason. The thing that had jolted him in Azar’s living room.
‘We didn’t use protection this morning.’ The words shook through him, and he couldn’t help himself as an image lit through his brain. Azar’s mention of his pregnant wife had immediately conjured up a mental picture of Sabeen’s belly swollen with his child. A vision he suddenly wanted to become reality more than he wanted his next breath.
And if there’s no child?
Another lash of anguish flayed him, letting him in on another shocking discovery.
He wanted her to be pregnant.
Wanted an heir, treasured from the moment they first drew breath, not three regretted decades later.
‘Until such time as we know the consequences for that oversight, you’re not straying one foot from my sight.’
CHAPTER TEN
Sabeen felt asif she was outside of herself, hearing his words fall. Hitting her like vicious little darts. Some poisonous enough to weaken her legs, others striking her heart with…elation?
He lunged forward and caught her before she even realised she’d sagged dangerously. Her arms flailed, then latched onto his strong arms…because of course they did. Quickly dropping them, she stepped back, bumped into the table and scrambled further.
‘Easy,’ he warned, his voice stiff with suppressed emotion.
A hysterical little snort escaped her before she could check it. ‘Easy?’ She swiped her hands over her eyes, in a vain effort to calm herself. ‘I feel like I’m in a damn wood chipper.’
Did he flinch? She shook her head, still rocked to her core that the slip hadn’t even occurred to her. She’d been so busy craving when she could slide into his arms next. When she could have him inside her once more.
His eyes narrowed. ‘You can’t use this as one of your conditions to leave if that’s what you’re contemplating. There can’t be any doubt that the child is mine. I’m sure you’ll work out why.’
His meaning fell into place instantly. Eden and Azar. ‘You think I’m going to somehow become an amnesiac and forget who impregnated me—if indeed that’s even remotely on the cards—and live obliviously in some metropolis with your child for two years?’
Cynical humour twisted his mouth. ‘Emulating my brother’s and Eden’s journey would be most unoriginal, and you and I are far from boring. That said, I intend to mitigate any chance of misplacing you by not letting you out of my sight. I haven’t forgotten that you fell off the radar recently. That’s not going to happen again.’
The sensation of walls closing in on her, where she’d only last night felt a rebirth, dredged disquiet through her heart. The idea that he was merely covering his bases, ensuring he knew to the second what their recklessness had produced, squeezed a vice around her heart. ‘And if I say no?’ she threw out, desperately testing turbulent waters.
Maybe she knew what it would achieve. Maybe she even secretly craved that primal reaction. Because his face turned to beautiful, forbidding stone, quicksilver eyes zeroing in on her with feral intent that sent shivers dancing over her skin.
‘You’re welcome to do as you please, of course. But it won’t come as a surprise that the likelihood of you carrying my heir won’t be one I’m going to be blasé about until we know one way or the other,’ he finished with gritted teeth.
