Page 7 of At the Sheikh's Bidding
She refused to turn around, as she continued to stare without blinking at the departing backs of Leonora and Darrius. Her heartbeat quickened, and she gritted her teeth as she caught sight of Amare out of the corner of her eye. She turned away and grabbed her bag, determined to leave before he could reach her. But she hadn’t even risen to her feet before he stepped in front of her and, in order to distance herself, she was forced to sit back in her chair.
He glanced at her bag. “Leaving so soon?” he asked cooly.
She wrung the leather straps of her bag in her hands, gripping them tightly like a lifeline. She shrugged. “Leonora’s gone now so there doesn’t seem much point in hanging around.”
His lips tweaked at the corner, and his eyelids lowered slightly, making his gaze even more intense, even more sexy. She swallowed.
“I’d have thought there were plenty of things to keep you ‘hanging around’, as you say.”
She cleared her throat, trying to dredge up some shred of self-control because her body had entered some weird fight-or-flight response and all she wanted to do was run. She knewthatwouldn’t be a good look, though. He’d either run after her or proclaim a moral victory. She refused to allow him to win this battle of wills.
She forced a tight, polite smile onto her face. “Really? It seems we don’t agree on that matter.”
He raised a cool eyebrow. “You don’t think that talking to the one person upon whose support your visit to Sifra either succeeds or fails is important?”
“I—”
He interrupted. “You don’t think that spending time with the one person who possesses information that no one else knows is useful to you?”
“What—”
He interrupted again. “And if you don’t think that we have other, more important things than the Bahr Al Noor diamond to talk about, then you’re fooling yourself.”
She closed her mouth. Suddenly, she had nothing to say. Her hands tightened once more around her bag. Her flight reaction had just won over her fight response. She jumped up, not liking how near he was to her now, and not liking how he didn’t move away to give her space. They were standing so close she could see the tension in his jaw muscle, belying the coolness in his eyes. She could smell his aftershave, which instinctively she inhaled deeply, needing the essence of him inside her. As she felt the warm sandalwood of his aftershave combined with his innate maleness, fill her deep inside, she did something she really didn’t want to do. She swayed instinctively towards him. And in that moment, the tension in his jaw relaxed and his eyes darkened with desire and something else which irritated the hell out of her—victory. He thought he’d won. He thought he’d just proved something to her.
“No!” she said, refusing to allow him to interpret her show of momentary weakness as a victory.
He frowned, his dark brows dipping towards the vertical crease at their center. “No? And what question is that your answer to?”
She couldn’t think for a minute. Then he took pity on her, smiled, and stepped away. She could breathe at last and her mind was released from the trap in which it had been caught.
“To whatever it is you believe we have to discuss, apart from the diamond.”
His smile disappeared. “Come on, Janey, you can’t ignore what happened. It’s the elephant in the room. We can’t talk around it.”
“I don’t see why not.” She winced at how primly her response emerged.
He leaned in so that only she could hear. “Then you’re a bigger fool than I took you for.”
She froze at his words. The same words her father had used to her. The same words which spurred her on day after day, to work harder so no one could ever accuse her of being a fool again.
Her heart beat fit to burst. All she could do was shake her head and back away. She bumped into a chair which fell to the marble floor with a clatter. She kept on backing away until she bumped into someone who exclaimed loudly. It was only that which brought her back to earth, not the pain of the chair against her leg, nor the dangerous expression in Amare’s eyes. She shook her head at him before turning to the person and apologizing.
But the collision had already been forgotten and Janey took the opportunity to slide between groups of people, apologizing as she went, and disappear through the nearest open door. Her walk turned into a run as she went down the marble corridor, leading to goodness knows where. All she needed to know was that it was putting distance between her and Amare—between her and admitting to the truth of what had passed between them.
But it wasn’t until her heartbeat had slowed and her thoughts had become rational again that she realized she was completely alone. There was no trace of the wedding reception—no sound, nor any people. She stopped and looked around, suddenly realizing she had no clue which way she’d come, or where she was. Somehow she’d drifted into the old part of the palace, which was a maze of corridors and doors and gardens. None of which were like the chambers through which she’d passed earlier, when being shown to her room. The pristine marble had given way to worn stone and the decoration was much, much older.
But where the hell was here? The room in which she stood looked like something from another world, with its soaring stone columns decorated with ancient geometric designs whose colors of ochre and cobalt blue were as vivid now as they must have been over five centuries ago when this part of the palace had been built. She took a few steps further into the room, absorbing the ancient atmosphere. Then she exhaled heavily, releasing some of the tension she’d been holding.
She turned a full circle. There was something about the beautiful space which calmed her. Everything in this country was so different from anything she’d experienced before. It was intriguing. Alongside a sense of peace, she felt the familiar stir of curiosity—a thirst for knowledge—and was reassured by a return to her old self. But, she thought ruefully, it wouldn’t help her find her way back to her room. There was nothing for it but to retrace her steps.
She stepped back into the hall from which she’d just come and looked around for someone to ask. But there was no one. Nothing but the silence of the ancient palace. At first she found the quiet reassuring after the stress of meeting Amare, but, as she continued on, a sense of panic grew. Far from the bright lights of the wedding reception, the light was dim, provided only by the moon and stars streaming in the large windows. She continued on, but it still didn’t look familiar.
Suddenly, she heard some car doors bang and the sound of distant laughter drifting in from an open window. She paused. The sound came from outside. She flung open the door and stepped outside. The cooler, fragrant air instantly calmed her, and she continued on until she was halfway across the vast gardens when she heard music and people’s voices coming from what must be the wedding reception. The closer she got, the more relieved she became. She could see people moving around now. Too many people. She frowned and hesitated. She should return to the reception and ask someone to show her to her room. But what if Amare was still there? Maybe she should wait until most of the people had gone? She really didn’t want to have to face him again so soon.
So she turned around and sat on the edge of a pool of water, the cool of its marble surround a welcome relief. Water splashed from a central fountain, casting moonlit drops into the pond. Such a beautiful place, she thought, looking up into the star-sprinkled sky. Such a magical place to find herself in and yet so foreign. So unknown. Apart from Amare. That one night she’d spent with him made her feel like she knew him. He was the one person she knew in Sifra, after Leonora left on her honeymoon the next day, and yet he was the one person she had to avoid. She closed her eyes as she remembered how his gaze had made her feel—totally at his bidding. Just one look from those eyes that conveyed sensual knowledge, and she turned to jelly.
Suddenly she heard footsteps close by and she opened her eyes with a start. But it was only a man leading a woman to somewhere quiet, looking for a place where they could be alone and do what they couldn’t do in public. Eventually, they disappeared. She had to get a grip. She’d come all this way for one reason only. To finish what Leonora had started. The work she could do on the harem would give her everything she needed to establish a career at Oxford and get the kind of validation she’d never received growing up. She could do this. But Amare… Just the thought of his name, so connected with sensual love, took her breath away. He threatened everything.
