Page 37 of Desert King's Forbidden Temptation

He gestured towards the cabin and she walked beside him, several feet away—still getting used to the idea of being completely alone with him. There was a crude path, paved with gravel; he left it for her to walk on. They approached the cabin and he lifted a hand, running it over the stone. ‘My father and I built this, many summers ago.’

She was filled with awe. ‘Really?’

‘He believed we were men first, sheikhs second. The royal life threatens to disconnect one from reality; he wanted to avoid that.’

She echoed his movement, tracing the building with her palm, feeling the roughness of the materials and shivering as she pictured Tariq in the act of constructing it, laying stone by stone until the work was completed. ‘You must have been very proud of yourself.’

‘There was a great sense of achievement.’

‘Why did you choose to build it here?’

‘This was one of my father’s favourite places, before it was mine.’

‘You’d come out here together?’

He nodded once.

‘And you still like to escape here, whenever you can,’ she murmured, as he went to the door and moved something aside to reveal a pin code. He entered a succession of six digits and the door clicked open.

‘Yes.’ He stood back to allow her to enter first, then flicked on a light switch. She stepped into the cabin, looking around and smiling, because it was basic but also, absolutely charming. The layout was simple enough: a living area with a kitchen, wooden table and chairs and a single sofa. Two doors came off the space, both were open. One revealed a double bed, the other a bathroom.

‘Very rustic,’ she said, flicking a quick glance at him.

‘It’s for camping,’ he said with a shrug. ‘And hunting.’

‘Hunting?’

‘A national pastime.’

She shivered.

‘Not to your liking?’

‘Not particularly,’ she said, pulling her lips to the side. ‘I’ve never been a fan of the idea.’

He moved closer almost unconsciously. ‘Then you don’t have to hunt.’

‘I’m glad. I’d hate to think there was some royal decree demanding I take arms against innocent animals.’

‘Not on this occasion,’ he responded in kind, lightly teasing. Goosebumps lifted over her skin.

It was too easy to flirt with him, to tease him, to joke with him. Too easy to slip into a conversational groove. She had to keep things focused on Elana. That was the reason she was here.

‘Her Highness is an avid outdoors person,’ she said after a beat, and she knew she wasn’t imagining the way his eyes darkened.

‘Is she?’

‘She’s the only reason I was able to survive the school camp experience, in fact.’

‘You didn’t enjoy it?’

She shook her head quickly.

‘You said it was dormitories, though? That’s not exactly roughing it.’

She hesitated a moment, the truth something she’d only ever told Elana. And yet, here, with this man, she felt it slipping through her like a river she couldn’t dam, no matter how hard she tried. Slowly, she moved towards the kitchen, simply to have something to do with her hands.

‘When I was younger, and my parents would fight, my mother would lock me in a closet. Ostensibly, it was to protect me. I don’t know, maybe she thought sound couldn’t travel through the flimsy walls,’ she muttered, so caught up in her admission that she didn’t see the way his body had grown tense. ‘I hated it. I was scared of the dark. Scared of their fighting. Even more scared of the silence that followed. Sometimes she would forget me—’

---