Page 16 of At the Sheikh's Bidding
“There’s so much you’re unwilling to tell me. About your family, your feelings...” He sighed. “And I know why.”
“No, you don’t. Face it, Amare, you don’t know me at all.”
“I know one thing now, which is one thing more than I knew before we arrived here. You’re hurting. Something happened to you. Something deep and I intend to get to the bottom of it because until you face whatever is haunting you, you’re not going to move forward. You’re not going to have any kind of future.”
“I’ll have the future I want,” she said firmly.
He gave a low, dismissive grunt, shook his head, and turned and walked away. She didn’t follow, didn’t want to argue with this man who could somehow see deep into her soul.
* * *
Amare didn’t go far.But there was no way he could have stayed looking at her—her blue, blue eyes the color of the sea, the color of the ocean he wanted to dive into. But he’d dived, and he’d found pain in those eyes. He’d found a hardness in those eyes which was covering up the woman he’d known so briefly years before.
He’d had no idea that she was from such a wealthy and influential family. And no idea why she wanted nothing to do with that family.
He’d thought he’d bring her here to woo her, to break down her reserve, but he’d ended up being surprised. He wasn’t often surprised. And it made him even more determined to destroy her reserves and make sure she didn’t run away from him again. But he knew, now, that he couldn’t do it by force. You didn’t control a frightened animal by force, but through something much more challenging for him—through understanding, through a gentle wooing.
He’d give her what she wanted—access to the harem—so he could spend time with her, coaxing her into submission. He just hoped that she didn’t realize she’d be getting a whole lot more than she imagined, because he knew she’d run a mile. Just as she did before. And he couldn’t risk it this time.
Trouble was. He knew something she obviously didn’t. That there was nothing new to be discovered in the harem. She’d find out in time. And, when she did, she’d be in too deep to leave.
CHAPTER7
Janey leaned back against her seat in the helicopter on the return flight to the palace and tried not to heave a sigh of relief. There was a distance now between her and Amare, and she was glad for it. Her breakdown at the beach, revealing a little of her past to him, had left her feeling shaken, and she needed some space to think. She was annoyed with how easily he’d cracked her defenses and extract something she didn’t want people to know. Especially him.
And she was also relieved to be returning to the palace. She needed to get back on track, re-focus on what was important once more. This…interlude, she decided to call it, was only a blip. As soon as she returned to the palace, she’d make sure she re-focused on what was important. Not that she thought it would be easy, but it was only for a week, no matter what Leonora believed. Then, she and Amare would go their separate ways, and she’d have all the research she needed to secure her future.
She remembered a warning from her colleague, Ashley, with whom she’d worked on her harem research. Ashley had ended up marrying her sheikh, and she’d joked that Janey would, too. It was nonsense, of course. There was no way she was going to be dominated by any of these controlling men. How Ashley and Leonora had succumbed, she had no idea. Well, maybe she had an idea, but she refused to dwell on it. Instead, she focused on their return to the palace, relieved to have gotten out of such an intense situation unscathed—or nearly unscathed. She just hoped she didn’t find herself in another one anytime soon.
“Janey!” Amare called.
Her heart sank. It didn’t look as if she was going to get off so easily. She turned to him in query. He pointed to an oasis far below them, the outline of a central building in front of a small lake clearly visible.
“That’s where my grandmother’s family came from,” he said. She released a small sigh of relief. She was just grateful he wasn’t grilling her for more personal information. She was also interested. From his brief mention of her before, his grandmother was the key to unlocking the mystery surrounding the diamond.
“Your grandmother? What was her background? How did she come to know so much about the diamond?”
Amare smiled, knowing that he’d snagged her interest. “Her direct descendant was Queen at the time of Lord Gleave’s visit and she knew all the stories—stories which haven’t been written, but which were passed down orally from generation to generation.”
“And she passed them to you?”
“She did.”
“And you’ll tell me them?”
“I will. But not now, not yet. I’ll tell you the stories when the time’s right.”
She bit back her frustration and wondered when the time would be right, if it wouldeverbe right. But she knew there was no use trying to prize the information from him. But her curiosity was roused about the woman who’d known so much and who Amare had obviously been very close to.
“What was she like?”
Amare looked surprised. He’d obviously imagined she’d take a more direct approach. But she’d learned that when trying to find out information, it was always best to get what you wanted indirectly. People opened up more then. “My grandmother?”
“Yes.” She shrugged. “Clearly, she was someone who was very important to you, and also someone with a rich history. I just wondered what she was like.”
She was rewarded with a softening in his eyes as he thought for a moment. “She was kind,” he said with a sigh. “Kind, but also no-nonsense. She’d never let me get away with anything, but she knew I wanted—no, what Ineeded—a different kind of life from my brothers. And neither of my parents understood that. But she did.”
“How different?” For all her desire to keep her distance from this man who threatened to disrupt her carefully laid plans, her curiosity was piqued.
