by Jane Porter
His golden gaze raked her bare shoulders and simple black dress. “You broke your word.”
So that was it. This was just about revenge. About inflicting pain. Fear balled in her stomach and she realized yet again how dangerous this was for Ben.
The appetizer arrived, a savory baked crab dish with buttery crumbs and cheese. Bryn normally loved crab but at the moment her stomach was so queasy she could barely tolerate the smell, much less eat. Kahlil, she noticed, took none, either. “I thought you were famished.”
“I am. I’m waiting for you to serve me.”
As if she was one of the women from his harem! Incredible. “You are not helpless, Sheikh al-Assad!”
“But why should I serve myself when you are here to serve me?”
She glared at Kahlil, resenting his beauty, the black hair, the strong brow, the elegant sweep of cheekbone. She’d fought so hard to free herself, ripped her heart in two to escape him. It had taken her years to move forward and now that she finally was ready to marry again, he’d returned.
Treacherous man. Man that could disarm her with just a glance from his beautiful eyes. She’d loved him too much, needed more from him than he could give.
Blindly she stumbled to her feet, her long black dress tangling between her legs. His hand snaked around her wrist and drew her roughly down again. “You are not excused.” His dark eyes flashed at her, deep grooves etched on either side of his imperious mouth. “You did not ask my permission to leave the table.”
“I’ve never asked your permission for anything and I’m not about to start now!” Good God, who did he think he was? Bryn threw her head back, tears shimmering in her eyes. “I can’t believe I once imagined myself in love with you. What a fool I was!”
“You didn’t imagine it. You did love me.”
“Did,” she repeated bitterly, “as in past tense. I only feel hatred for you now.”
“Love, hate, who cares? I’m more interested in ensuring you honor your vows.” His anger emanated from him in great silent waves. “I realize you were very young when we married but I’ve given you time to grow up. Three and a half years. Now I’ve come to bring you home.”
“Zwar is not my home!”
He snapped his fingers. “Semantics,” he said brusquely. “I’m tired of debating. The fact is your place is in Tiva, at the palace, bearing my children.”
“That is one scenario which will never happen.”
“You think you’d be happier married to your pathetic little insurance agent? I’ve had my intelligence look into him and he’s a man without fire, a man without drive—”
“And I love him.”
“I don’t care. You can’t have him.”
Anger swept through her, anger so strong that she lifted her hand and took a swing at his face. He caught her by the wrist just before she struck his cheek. “Have you lost your mind?”
Her wrist tingled from the tightness of his grip, his fingers wrapped viselike around her fragile bones. “Leave Stan alone. He doesn’t deserve this.”
“But you do. You’ve insulted me, and my family. You had a responsibility—you were Princess al-Assad—and you abandoned my people.”
Her wrist began to throb. Tiny pinpricks flashed against her closed eyelids. “Please, release me.”
“I expect an apology.”
“You’re hurting me.”
His nostrils flared, his dark eyes flashing, but he opened his fingers, freeing her wrist. She drew her arm back to her lap and stared at her wrist, seeing the livid marks of his fingers against the paleness of her skin.
Kahlil dragged the heavy velvet drapes closed. The violet-purple fabric fell in deep inky folds, hiding them from the rest of the restaurant.
He was pulling her back into his world, forcing her to submit. She couldn’t let him. She wasn’t just his wife. She was a mother, Ben’s mother.
The tears that she’d fought so hard to contain trembled on her lashes, slipping free. She pressed her lips together, fighting to keep control.
“Do not cry,” he said roughly. “I won’t have my wife weeping in public.”
“You’ve drawn the drapes. No one can see.”
“I can see.”
Everything about him was so hard. Every word sounded harsh. She clamped her jaw shut, refusing to engage in a battle of wills with Kahlil. He was a far better debater than she. He was far better at everything than she, but that didn’t make his needs more important, his feelings more correct.
Kahlil must have accepted her silence for submission as his hard expression gentled a fraction. “If you don’t want a fight, don’t provoke me. I didn’t travel all this way to be scorned by a woman.”
Had he always been so arrogant? So damned condescending? Maybe once she’d found his machismo attractive but now it filled her with terror. Terror not just for herself, but Ben, and Ben’s future.
If Kahlil knew he had a son, he’d insist that Ben be raised in Zwar, his small oil-rich kingdom in the Middle East. Zwar was beautiful but far removed from the freedom she and Ben knew in Texas.
Abruptly Kahlil leaned forward, grasped her chin, drawing her toward him. She nearly flinched, inwardly shrinking from his touch, but steeled herself outwardly, not wanting him to know how strongly he affected her.
Yet when he stroked her lips with the pad of his thumb, her whole body shuddered, a response she couldn’t possibly hide from Kahlil.
“You’ve become quite skittish,” he drawled, clearly intrigued. “Doesn’t Stan ever touch you?”
“My relationship with Stan is none of your business.”
“A bold answer for a woman in a precarious position.”
Her lips twisted, her smile forced. She ignored the truth in this, realizing she was indeed caught, but pride overwhelmed her common sense. She couldn’t back down. “I have changed, Kahlil. I’m not the girl you married.”
“Good. Then we both have adjustments to make. I’m not the man you married, either.” He smiled without humor, his gaze never wavering from her face. “And you have changed. You’ve grown more beautiful.”
“Don’t flatter me.”
“I’m not flattering you. I’ve met a lot of women in my life, but I’ve never met another woman like you. No one with your sweetness, softness—”
“Stop.”
“Your pale, flawless skin. Your eyes, the dark blue of precious sapphires. Your mouth softer than a rose.”
Her spine tingled, her skin prickling. Don’t listen to this. Don’t let him get under your skin. You’ve survived him once. You can do it again. “You only want me because you can’t have me.”
His fingers opened, freeing her, and his smile remained the same. But his eyes looked harder, the glints brighter. “I can have you. I just haven’t been aggressive.”
No, he’d never been aggressive with her before tonight, but she suddenly knew he could be extremely ruthless, correctly reading the menace in his hard features, and danger in the crooked curve of his mouth.
His smile faded. “Does Stan know you’re a flighty little wife?”
Oh, low blow. “He knows I left you.”
“Did you tell him you left without leaving a note? Or giving me a kiss goodbye? He knows you just took your purse, your passport and walked?”
“He knows I took my purse and ran.” Her gaze locked with his. If he wanted to make it tough, she could play tough. That’s all she’d been doing since leaving Zwar anyway. Cutting coupons to buy breakfast cereal. Shopping for clothes from a secondhand store. Working double shifts at the insurance agency. She’d shouldered parenthood on her own, and succeeded.
“Did Stan ever ask why you left me?”
“He knew I was unhappy, and that was enough for him.”
Kahlil lifted his wine goblet, swirled the glass, ruby-red wine shimmering in the candlelight. “What an understanding man. Will he be so understanding when you toss him away, tired of that marriage, too?”
His sarcasm was as sharp as razor bla
des and cut deep. If she thought she could get away with it, she’d run. But she wouldn’t get away from Kahlil, not like that, not this time. “I never tossed you away.”
“No? It felt that way. It looked that way, too. The palace was wild with gossip. The scandal affected the entire kingdom. I didn’t just lose face. My people lost face.”
“What scandal?”
“Rumor has it you were…unfaithful.”
CHAPTER TWO
“NEVER.” Color suffused her cheeks, embarrassment and surprise. How could he think such a thing? How could he think the worst?
The realization that he did, hurt far more than she’d expected.
Early on she’d hoped he’d come looking for her. She’d also hoped he’d discover Amin’s treachery. Instead Kahlil accepted her betrayal, accepted her failure, accepted that she’d been unfaithful. Apparently it hadn’t crossed his mind to even think otherwise.
Then he’d failed her, too. Twice.
Tears burned in her throat, unshed tears she’d never let fall.
Leaving him had nearly destroyed her. It had been the hardest thing she ever had to do. She’d nearly shattered all over again when back in Texas, she discovered she was pregnant.
It was a baby Kahlil wanted. It was a baby he’d never know. The guilt had nearly eaten her alive. Thank God for poverty. It forced her out of bed every morning, forced her to work until she dropped into bed at night, dead with fatigue.
Kahlil might mock Stan and his insurance agency, but working as a secretary at the agency probably saved her life. “Why don’t you just divorce me and get this over with?” she said hoarsely.
“Can’t do that.”
“Why not?” Lifting her gaze, she looked at Kahlil, noting the firm set of his mouth, the intelligence in his warm golden gaze and saw her son there, the same eyes, the same nose, the same mouth. Why hadn’t she ever seen it before? Ben was Kahlil in miniature.
And like that, she saw the awful truth. She and Kahlil weren’t completely strangers. They did have something in common, one precious little person. Ben.
“Too easy,” he answered curtly. “Divorce might be the easiest thing, but I’ve never taken the easy way out.”
She knew what he was talking about, knew the reference to their marriage. He’d warned her ahead of time that their marriage would create an uproar, predicted his family’s reaction, including his father’s harsh disapproval. Kahlil had said there would be hell to pay and she’d shrugged it off, kissing Kahlil’s lovely mouth, his cheekbone, his jaw. She’d been confident she could win his family over, so certain that Kahlil’s love and approval would be enough.
And she was wrong. Very wrong.
Knots balled along her shoulder blades, her back rigid, her neck stiff. Her gaze settled on his hard profile. Once she’d love to kiss the strong angles and planes of his face. She remembered how she lavished extra kisses on the small scar near the bridge of his nose.
She could feel the heartbreak again, thick and sharp. She had loved him. Once. She’d wanted nothing but to be with him. She loved him to distraction, needed the assurance he felt the same. Instead he withdrew, his warmth disappearing behind an impersonal mask. Duty, country, business. Their worlds no longer connected, their lives ceased to touch.
“How badly do you want a divorce?”
His question sent small shock waves rippling through her middle. He was toying with her the same cruel way a cat played with a mouse just before the mouse became a feline supper.
Her spine stiff, her shoulders squared, she lifted her chin, wanting to defy him. She wouldn’t dignify his games with an answer. Let him speak first. Let him be the one to grope for explanations.
But her righteous anger collapsed on itself, even as she confronted the enormity of her problem. This wasn’t a small matter. Ben’s whole future was at stake. Rather than provoking Kahlil, she needed to work with him, humor him. The baby-sitter, Mrs. Taylor, would be dropping Ben off at eleven, less than three hours from now. She needed to be home by then, and she had to be rid of Kahlil by then. “Badly,” she choked.
“Badly enough to risk everything?”
“What do you mean by everything?”
“You’d become mine for the weekend.”
She reached for her water glass, lifted it to her mouth. The rim of the chilled glass clicked against her teeth, icy water sloshing against her lips.
He leaned forward. “I want you for a weekend.”
“That’s your proposal?”
“I’m giving you an opportunity to take control of your life.”
“I spend a weekend with you, and you’d grant me a divorce?”
“If my terms were met.”
He made it sound so easy. Bryn stared at the water drops darkening the white cloth, her mind strangely blank. No words, no sound, no light filtering through her brain. “And those terms…?”
“I want a long weekend with you. Four days. Three nights. City of my choosing.”
She touched one of the damp drops on the tablecloth with her finger. “You want me to be your wife.”
“I want you to be my lover.”
Her head lifted, gaze meeting his. He smiled without a hint of warmth in the eyes. “I want to possess you, enjoy you at my leisure, and make you mine—completely mine—again.”
Something inside her stirred, hunger, awareness. He knew how she responded to him. He knew he could seduce her at the drop of the hat. “You don’t think I have the strength to walk away from you a second time.”
He shrugged. “Did I say that?”
“You don’t have to. I know you.”
“If you please me, I shall process the divorce papers in Zwar. If you cannot fulfill the required duties to my satisfaction, you shall return to Zwar with me and take lessons from the palace concubines.”
“Either way, you win.”
He ignored that. “You’d only sacrifice four days of your life, and surely, Stan’s love is worth at least that?”
Stan’s love was worth more, but Kahlil’s price…
Four days in his bed. Four days making love. A vision of tangled limbs, warm bodies, damp skin flashed before her and she felt blood race to her cheeks. “It’s a humiliating proposition.”
“But it gives you possibilities. Hopes for the future.”
Hopes for the future. Ben’s future.
Bryn draw a deep breath, and actually considered his offer. Just for a moment. Alone, naked, weak. He’d reduce her to hunger and fire all over again and she would need him too much, want him too much. Like before.
It was too risky. For herself, and for Ben. She felt raw, exposed, Kahlil’s proposal peeling off needed protective layers that shielded her heart from the past, and the danger Kahlil still posed.
Something wonderful and awful happened when they were together. She felt more alive, more physical, more aware, but that acute awareness came at a terrible price. Kahlil made her feel emotions and desires that she couldn’t control. It hurt then, it hurt now, and this feeling couldn’t be natural or normal. Emotions shouldn’t run so deep.
“I can’t,” she gasped, dying inside. “There’s just no way.”
His mouth curved, a crooked smile. “You don’t have to give me your answer yet. You might want to think it over a little longer. Take an hour. Take two. After all, it is your future.”
Dinner finished, Kahlil tossed a handful of bills on the table—several hundred dollars, Bryn noted woodenly, chump change to Kahlil and a small fortune to herself. Money like that would pay for new shoes for Ben. A rib roast for Sunday supper. Maybe even a night on the Gulf Coast.
Resentful tears pricked the back of her eyes as Kahlil steered her to his waiting limousine. He had no idea what it was like to struggle and worry about every purchase, every trip to the grocery store, every new month because it meant starting the vicious cycle over again—rent, gas, electric bill, car payment, and on and on until Bryn wanted to scream. It hadn’t helped that Stan was always offering to
ease her load, make payments for her, pick up expenses. She’d been sorely tempted but had never accepted his offers, never accepted his frequent marriage proposals, either—not until last Christmas.
She’d finally worn down resisting, reluctantly accepting that bald, bespectacled Stanley would be the right thing. Not for her. But for Ben.
Numbly Bryn slid into the back of the limousine and buckled her seat belt across her lap.
Kahlil directed the driver back to her house.
Bryn’s fog of misery lifted, recognizing the peril of letting Kahlil close to her home. Ben’s toys and bedroom had been packed for the move but there could be knickknacks around the house, photos or artwork she’d overlooked. “Why don’t we go for a drive?”
“A drive?”
She ignored Kahlil’s incredulity. “Or a walk. It’s a beautiful night. Not too humid for the first time in weeks.”
Kahlil viewed her through narrowed lashes, his expression speculative. “Who are we hiding from?”
The fact that he could read her so easily reinforced her fear, as well as her determination to be rid of him as soon as possible. Already she felt as though she was drowning, the water rising, destruction imminent. She had the agonizing suspicion that she might not be able to pull this off. Kahlil was so clever, too clever, and also too angry.
No sooner had she swallowed the sour taste of panic than she pictured Ben as he’d run out of the house earlier, eager to go with Mrs. Taylor. His small white sneakers had slapped the sidewalk, his miniature jeans rolled up at the ankle. She always bought his clothes big, trying to make them last two seasons, maybe even three.
He’d stopped at Mrs. Taylor’s truck, turned around to wave and he blew her an enormous kiss. “I love you, Mommy!”
His zest brought tears to her eyes and laughing, she’d blown him a kiss back. She’d felt a spike of worry then, the kind of worry she felt every time she kissed him good-night, what if something happened? What if there was an accident? What if she lost him? What if…
The what-ifs could drive her crazy.
Fierce love rose up within her, love, determination and conviction. She wouldn’t fail Ben. She’d fight tooth and nail to protect him. He was the one perfect and true thing she’d ever known.
