Page 20 of At the Sheikh's Bidding
“Then let’s have dinner.”
Her heart sank. If she thought she’d escaped the temptation of being seduced by this man, she was wrong. Because she still had the evening and night ahead of her. Just the two of them. Question was, could her willpower withstand another assault?
CHAPTER9
As Amare kept up a flow of talk about neutral things, things which he thought would remove the trapped look out of Janey’s eyes, he wondered how the hell he was going to manage two very competing demands. One, that he now understood he had to give her space, woo her gently, if he weren’t to let her slip through his fingers again. And, two, he had only a week to do it. That would challenge evenhisseduction skills.
He punched in the security code to access a short-cut through the gardens and the door sprung open.
“After you,” he said.
He hated the way she hesitated, and a shadow of distrust flickered across her eyes. He silently added a third point to his challenge. To wipe away that distrust. He wanted her to understand that she could trust him implicitly. He had no intention of doing anything which would hurt this woman on whom he’d set his heart.
“It’s a short-cut,” he added with a reassuring smile. “Because I’m hungry.” He assumed from the relieved smile she hadn’t realized that food wasn’t the only thing which he was hungry for. He was also hungry for her and he was doing something which didn’t come naturally—notfeeding that hunger the moment he felt it. “You must be too,” he added, unable to stop himself from trying to elicit some kind of response from her other than fear.
To his relief, she grinned, and her eyes brightened. “Starving,” she said, stepping into the gardens. “So I’m glad we’re taking a shortcut. It was quite some mission locating the harem.”
“I assume you found the maps in the library?” he said, shifting an overhanging blossom from out of her way.
“Yes, amongst other things. What an amazing collection of resources you have there. It’s a wonder we hadn’t heard of it. A wonder that no other European universities have come knocking on your door before now.”
He hesitated briefly before continuing on. He hoped she hadn’t noticed. He really didn’t want to engage in a discussion about who had been in the library and visited the harem before. Because then the truth would come out. And he didn’t want that. Not yet. He had something to accomplish before it did.
He continued walking and gave an ambiguous shrug. “Leonora discovered it recently. If she hadn’t been on her honeymoon, no doubt she’d have told you about it.” He paused as he opened the other gate, which would return them to the palace. “Of course you may make use of it during your stay…”
“I sense a ‘but’,” she said.
“But you must know I will be with you every step of the way. You tried to access the harem tonight, but I’d anticipated your move.”
“Move?” she gave an uncomfortable laugh. “You make it sound like a game of chess.”
“Not chess. We’re not in competition with each other. We both want the same things.”
“You think?” she asked.
He hated the doubt on her face. How could she not know they were meant to be together?
“No, Iknow.”
She stopped walking, and he turned to her with a sigh.
“Tell me, before we go any further, what it is you know,” she said, her voice laced with tension.
“Janey,” he huffed her name. Should he tell her the absolute truth or keep it light? He knew, deep down, that the absolute truth would scare her off. He revised his reply. Best to keep it vague. “I know I want to help you.” Help you heal, and help you see that we’re meant to be together, he wanted to add. But it was too soon.
She frowned. Apparently, his response was too vague.
”Help you in any way I can,” he added.
“Truly?” she asked. “You want to help me find the diamond?”
“Of course. Isn’t that what I’ve been tasked to do by my brother, the King? Isn’t that why I’m going to convey to you what my grandmother told me about the harem? I’ve agreed to all of that.”
She nodded. “Yes, and I appreciate that.”
“Then I think we’re on the same side, don’t you?”
This time, she shot him a relieved smile. He shot one right back, because he was also relieved—relieved that she hadn’t pushed him into telling her what other ways he wanted to help her. Ways which involved getting to the heart of her and helping to remove the pain which he saw there. Instinctively, he knew that only then would he stand a chance with her. And he had a week to do it. Just one week. But he would succeed, because there could be no other outcome. He couldn’t envisage a future without Janey.
