The Sheikh's Virgin Hostage: Seducing her was never part of the plan...

by Clare Connelly

  She blinked. “But nor is Mansour. And not of this one, either. Can’t he live his life?”

  “That’s all he does! He doesn’t expect to work a day in his life. He is a childish, selfish boy. Look at how he has deserted your sister. He cares nothing for the name of our family.”

  She frowned. “I admit, leaving Cass the way he did, when she’s besotted with him, looks bad… At least he didn’t know about the baby.”

  He made a growl of frustration. “I wish she had told him. He might then have done what was expected of him.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “To bring her to Amar’a and marry her.”

  “Rafiq! They’ve only known each other a few months! True, she seems to adore him, but that’s not a basis for marriage. And, I know you’re probably going to bite my head off for saying this, but if he ever loved Cass, he would know this is the last place in the world she would be happy.”

  “Amar’a is beautiful.” He contradicted harshly. “And she would be in a unique position of wealth and comfort.”

  “But you don’t know Cass.” Emma leaned forward, her tone imperative. “She is a free spirit, and an attention seeking supermodel! Trust me, Rafiq, you don’t want her here anymore than she wants to live in Amar’a. You talk about scandal? She’d have them banging on your door daily. Did you know my sister does nude Pilates on the beach every Saturday? When I asked her about the paparazzi, she told me that her figure is in such good shape that it would just be free advertising.”

  His face twisted with a mix of cynicism and amusement. “Even more reason to bring that child to Amar’a.”

  “No, no,” Emma tried to backtrack. “She will be a great mother, and I dare say many of those behavioral traits will pass once she has a baby. She will have to grow up. I’ve always mothered her, and now she’ll be a mother of her own.”

  Rafiq bit down the scathing retort he’d been about to make. “You are twins. Why did you end up mothering her?”

  Emma lifted her iced water to her lips and drank it thoughtfully. “Didn’t you just hear me tell you that my famous sister does nude Pilates?” She watched as Rafiq’s face transformed with humor, and he laughed. “She’s never had much maturity when it comes to decisions. When our parents died,” her voice choked a little, as it always did, at the reference to her folks, “we were sixteen. The family court agreed to leave us be, with a social worker checking on us every now and again. And so, it was just us. Even at that age, Cass had modeling gigs all over the world, but when she was home, I was making sure she ate properly, got her school work done. You know what it’s like with siblings. There’s a dynamic that falls into place from birth, and it never really changes.”

  “It can’t have left you much time for your own life.” Rafiq thought to himself that the mother of the next heir to Amar’a sounded like quite the Diva, and how much more urgent it was to secure the child for his own control.

  “Not really.” Emma shrugged. It was something she hadn’t really thought about until this week. In the back of her mind, she wondered if she would be quite so affected by Rafiq if she had more romantic experience.

  “I know that you are a writer. And you do not have a boyfriend. So how else do you fill your time?”

  She flushed to her hairline. “How do you know I don’t have a boyfriend?”

  He leaned forward, green eyes scanning her face with such intensity that she could almost feel his touch. “Do you?”

  Ah! How she wanted to lie and tell him that she did. She wondered if it would make him change his mind about this course of action. “No.”

  “What about in the past?”

  She scrunched up her nose. “Is it your usual practice to interrogate your hostages?”

  “Do not tempt me,” he muttered.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “If I wanted to truly interrogate you, Emma, I would have you singing like a canary.”

  She shivered, and it had nothing to do with the cool desert breeze that was providing relief after the day’s heat. “You are incredibly arrogant, Rafiq.”

  “Arrogance is reserved for false claims. I do not believe I am exaggerating.”

  She looked down at her dinner. The meal had seemed alluring only minutes earlier, before this conversation began.

  “So, you were telling me of your past liaisons?”

  “I was not!” She denied, lifting her water to her lips. He reached across and took the glass from her hands before she sipped it. She watched, mesmerized, as he dipped his forefinger into the glass and then trickled cold liquid over the velvety skin of her inner wrist. As she watched, he lifted her wrist to his mouth and sucked the water away, his eyes holding hers. The water was icy, but his lips were warm, and she shivered as her body was besieged by sensations.

  “Rafiq, please…” she whispered. And she couldn’t have said if she was asking him to stop, or begging him not to. She only knew that she was shaking with a desire so strong it terrified her.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I’ve never met anyone like you,” Rafiq said finally, his eyes hooded as he regarded her in the glow cast by the flickering candles.

  His words punctured the veil of need that had enslaved her and she pulled her hand free, placing it in her lap, beneath the table, so that he wouldn’t see that she was shaking like a leaf in the breeze.

  “In what way?” She asked, her voice a little unsteady.

  “You are an enigma to me. So confident and passionate, yet shy and timid at the same time. You are funny, yet you are also infuriating. I find myself thinking about you more than I like.”

  His words made her smile with pleasure, but she dipped her head to hide it. “You think I’m infuriating?” She said with mock severity. “You are the bossiest man I have ever met.”

  “I would imagine so,” he conceded unapologetically.

  Gradually, her heartbeat returned to normal, and she was able to try some of the meal before her. It was delicious. Since meeting Rafiq, every one of her senses seemed hyper alert. Her taste buds, her sense of smell, her sight, and certainly her body. She felt alive in a way she hadn’t known possible. He called her an enigma, but the same was certainly true of him. While he was strong and aggressive, there was so much more to him than just those qualities. She’d seen it when he had spoken of his parents and his brother. Family mattered deeply to this man – why else would he go to such lengths for this child?

  “What is it, Emma? I can tell when your mind is running you away from me.”

  Her lips curled at his slight misuse of the expression. “You said Mansour was educated abroad. You weren’t?”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “You don’t speak English quite as naturally as someone who’s lived in the States or the UK.” She said frankly.

  He frowned. “I have never found my language skills to be lacking.”

  “Didn’t we already agree you’re uncommonly arrogant?” She couldn’t resist teasing. “Your English is excellent. It’s only sometimes, when you use a colloquialism, that I remember it’s your second language.”

  “Actually, it’s my fifth language,” he corrected without conceit.

  “But you didn’t? Go to school overseas?”

  “No.”

  “And Mansour did?”

  “As I’ve said.”

  She frowned. “Why?”

  He relaxed back into his seat, watching the narrowed eyes of the woman across from him. He had meant what he’d said. He found her unexpectedly riveting. He had cancelled an important meeting with the Egyptian delegation regarding trade regulations simply to spend more time with her. It was a very, very dangerous preoccupation, for he had known from the outset that she weakened him, somehow. Vulnerability was not to be tolerated in someone of his position, and obsessing about a woman was a surefire way to become vulnerable.

  “It is as it has always been. The first in line to the throne has a very specific upbringing.”

&nb
sp; She tilted her head to one side; a gesture he now knew meant she was trying not to say the first thing that came to her mind.

  “You may say it,” he commanded, and her face showed her surprise.

  “I… Say what?”

  “Whatever it is that makes you do this,” and he imitated her gesture, tipping his head to the side and pursing his lips. It was so accurate that she burst out laughing.

  “I do do that!”

  “Yes. Usually when you are thinking something that even you find too sassy to say.”

  “Sassy. Golly. I haven’t been called that since my sophomore year.”

  “You were going to say?” He prompted her back to their original conversation.

  She bit down on her lip, another gesture he now recognized well. “Only that you might have benefited from some time abroad.”

  “I travelled extensively,” he corrected.

  “Not long enough to pick up other cultural traits.”

  “That isn’t strictly true,” he murmured, leaning forward and lacing her fingers through hers. “I spent several summers in Paris, and learned much from that culture.”

  Warmth spread through her body from where their fingers were connected, arrowing up her arm and swirling in the pit of her stomach. She could guess what he was referring to.

  When she’d first picked her cat Minky up from the shelter, she’d laughed at the way Minky would chase after a ball at the end of string. For hours on end, it would amuse the spunky little tabby. But right now, Emma had the strangest feeling that she was the cat, dangling on the end of a string ball. A string ball being controlled by this powerful Sheikh. She pulled her hand away and forced herself to appear calm.

  “I’m sure you did.” Wow. She sounded so prim! She saw the way his lips curled at the corners and felt the full force of his mockery.

  “There’s something else I don’t understand,” she said into the silence.

  “And what would that be?”

  “You claim to value bloodlines above all else; to the point you’re willing to kidnap a woman to secure an heir.” His eyes flared at her summation of their situation, but he didn’t contradict her. “So how can you talk about disinheriting your own brother? Surely you’re better to focus on him, rather than the next generation of rulers?”

  “Mansour is a lost cause, when it comes to Amar’a.” He made a sound in the back of his throat, like an angry growl. “He’s not a bad guy, Emma, but his reputation is dirt. If I were no longer here, and Mansour ascended to the throne, there’d be civil war within a year. Amar’a might be progressive, but there’s a large proportion of the country still wedded to more traditional beliefs. Traditional beliefs that Mansour has insisted on trampling all over from when he was a teen.”

  “And this man is the father to my niece or nephew,” she said with a small, humorless laugh. God, she just hoped Cassandra was okay.

  Suddenly, she felt bleak, trapped by her situation, and terrifyingly more attracted to Rafiq than she could admit, even to herself. “I want to go home.”

  Her voice was so quiet that the desert winds almost carried it away. But Rafiq caught it. He ignored the strange emotion that cut through him like a knife at her pained expression.

  “You know that is not possible.”

  “I… I can’t ask Cassandra to come here, Rafiq.” She stared across at him, her eyes wide in her pretty face.

  His shrug was pure nonchalance. “Then we will marry.”

  “Please stop saying that!” She snapped. “I cannot marry you! You know I can’t!”

  His voice rang with a clear authority. “I know that you will marry me, if you do not convince your sister to return to Amar’a. Now, come. We have gone through all this before. Let us not waste words when it is all decided.”

  “Nothing is decided,” she contradicted hotly, standing up and pushing her chair back so violently that it toppled over.

  “You have just said you don’t feel you can ask yourself to bring Cassandra here. Which means the first option, marriage to me, is more palatable.”

  “There is nothing I find palatable about the idea of marriage to you.”

  He watched her carefully, and for a long time, there was quiet. Then, he spoke. “Your own body makes a liar of you, Emma.”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, because he was right. She was weak, weak, weak. She should hate this man for the way he was puppet mastering them all. But she didn’t. Well, not completely. When she opened her eyes, he was standing in front of her. Not touching, but so close she could feel his breath.

  “You’re huge,” she said the first thing that came to mind.

  He nodded. “And you are tiny.”

  A light breeze ruffled her dress and she smoothed it back down at the same time he did, so that their hands connected against the cotton fabric. Green eyes clashed fiercely with blue.

  “Do you really intend to keep me here indefinitely?”

  “You know the price of your freedom.”

  “My sister, or me.”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t ask it of Cass.” She whispered, tears stinging her eyes.

  “Then you have made your decision.”

  “How can you be such a bastard about this?” She asked quietly.

  “You will not find marriage to me difficult to tolerate, Emma, I promise. Apart from the necessity of begetting an heir, we will rarely need to see one another. You can continue to write. You may involve yourself in projects approved of by me. You will have more wealth than you know what to do with.”

  “A marriage in name only,” she surmised, wrapping her arms around her waist, feeling cold to the bone.

  “Precisely.”

  Her cheeks colored but she forced herself to ask the question that had been fraying at the edges of her brain since he first proposed this ridiculous scheme. “And other women?”

  His face was carefully devoid of any emotion. “Do you mean to ask if I’ll be using my harem to service my needs in your stead?”

  Her innocent eyes flared wide. “Yes.”

  “Harems are a thing of the distant past, habibte. Not since my great, great grandfather’s day has a ruling Sheikh even had more than one wife. With you and your seventeen different personalities to contend with, I daresay I will feel like I have several wives anyway.”

  “Stop talking about this as if it’s a foregone conclusion.”

  “It is, little one. You’re just fighting with me now for the sake of it.” And almost as if he couldn’t help himself, he lifted his fingers and ran them through her mane of hair. “Your hair is indescribably bewitching.”

  Her lips parted at his huskily voiced words.

  “And your eyes… so expressive. They show me everything you feel in here.” And he caught her hand in his and brought it to her racing heart. “I can see now that you’re afraid. That you’re sad. And even though you believe me devoid of any humanity, let me tell you this. I do not like being responsible for your suffering.”

  She swayed a little at his softly spoken admittance, and they were so close, that her body was pressed lightly into his. He held her close, feeling her rhythmic breathing, and her softly curved body. With monumental effort, he broke their embrace and smiled down at her noncommittally. “You should sleep, Emma. It is late and you have had a busy day.” He pressed a kiss against her cheek and then disappeared, through the door way, and away from her.

  With legs that weren’t at all steady, she walked to her bed and flopped down onto it. She was too tired to shower. Too tired to undress. She fell asleep where she lay, and all night, she dreamed of Rafiq Al Sadini.

  * * *

  The room was spectacular. Even crowded as it was now, she could see what a stunningly grand hall she was standing in. She’d wandered in by mistake. Rafiq had not come for her that morning, and after she’d sent another quick, carefully bland email to Cass, and tried to get her head back into the book she needed to write, she’d given up. She told herself that she wasn’t l
ooking for him. She was just looking for something to do.

  They’d only explored a fraction of the palace’s rooms the day before, and so, dressed in yet another outfit from the wardrobe, this time a vibrant violet color with pale yellow detail, she went in the opposite direction. As she’d explored though, the rooms had become more populated with staff, and it eventually dawned on her that she’d found her way into an area of the palace that was used for governance.

  Briefly, she wondered if she should ask someone to help her escape. Just as quickly, she dismissed the very notion. To start with, she knew Rafiq was admired and respected. It was unlikely any of the staff members who were trusted to work in proximity to him would betray him for her sake. But mostly, she didn’t want to escape, she realized. Though marriage to him scared the heck out of her, she knew she was walking a one-way path now. There was no turning back. There was inevitability to their union, and she was just brave enough to face it head on.

  She had slipped into yet another room, this one a small antechamber to the cavernous space she now found herself in, and the noise had called her inside. And here she stood, on the outskirts of a very formal state room, filled with shabbily dressed people.

  And at the head of the room, Rafiq. Sitting in a gold-gilt throne, dressed more formally than she’d ever seen him. His robes were jet black, with detailed gold embroidery around the cuffs and collar. His dark hair had been slicked back from his face today, exposing his strong bone structure and glinting eyes. She froze at the back of the crowd, mesmerized by the sight of Rafiq in all his ruling glory.

  She had known he was attractive. Of course she had. From the first instant she’d seen him on the luxury yacht, she’d felt her body go all funny. And that was even when she believed he had slept with her twin! But he wasn’t just big, and strong, and handsome. He was also a complex tangle of responsibility and emotion, and now, she saw, that he was compassionate, too.

  For the group of people thronging before her was quite clearly made up of Amar’an poor. One by one, they approached him, and a team of two aides, and spoke.

  Unable to help herself, she slowly skirted the edges of the group, moving closer, but also keeping her distance. For some reason she couldn’t explain, she wanted to watch him without being seen.