Forbidden Seduction (The Diamond Club Book 12)

by Elizabeth Lennox

  Avi stepped into the room and sighed as the silence surrounded her. It was a library, with big, wooden tables and fabric covered chairs, but the best part of the room was the silence. No reporters, no diplomats, no spouses of diplomats trying to talk to her. Granted, it was her job, her role here this week, to speak with as many people as possible and promote Cordaire’s interests. But she needed a bit of silence and…!

  “They can be a bit much, can’t they?” a deep, rough voice broke the silence of the room

  Avi’s eyes flew open and she looked around to find him seated off to her right, one leg crossed over the other and holding a crystal glass resting on his knee.

  He wasn’t smiling, she realized, but there was amusement and…understanding…in his eyes. The amusement irritated her, but the understanding soothed her frazzled feelings.

  “Great minds think alike?” she offered as she pushed away from the closed door and made her way towards him. She knew that she should keep her distance. Instinctively, she knew he was dangerous. But the feminine side of her craved his energy. So, she followed that instinct and moved closer.

  His eyes moved over her body, setting her cells on fire with awareness and…anticipation?

  A moment later, he gestured to the other chair, indicating that she should sit.

  Avi glanced at the chair, but didn’t move. When her gaze shifted back to his, she knew that he understood her hesitation. “We’re enemies,” she said what they were both thinking.

  “All the more reason to sit and talk,” he countered.

  He had a good point, she thought, acknowledging his comment with a tilt to her head. “We’re not going to resolve our countries’ issues by talking tonight.”

  He chuckled. “Why don’t we just have a drink together?” he offered and stood up, moving over to the bar tucked in a corner that Avi hadn’t noticed before.

  He came back with another glass, extending it towards her.

  When she still hesitated, he moved closer, towering over her. “Tell me that you’re not going to let ancient history interfere with sampling our host’s excellent scotch.”

  She laughed, rolling her eyes as she accepted the glass. “Fine!”

  Sitting down in the other chair, she watched him as she crossed her legs. He watched her just as carefully as he sat back down.

  “You’re Princess Aviera from Cordaire.”

  Avi grinned despite the tension permeating the air between them. “And you are Sheik Lugar al Asan of Shadir.”

  He tilted his head in acknowledgement. “Now that introductions are done, tell me about yourself.”

  She took a sip of her scotch, appreciating the smoky flavor, trying to relax back against the cushions of the leather chair. There was a power, a tension around him that made her feel…aware. She relaxed her shoulders, hoping that she appeared at ease, even though she was completely aware of every breath he took. “What do you want to know?”

  “Why were you in that village two weeks ago?”

  She hesitated, not sure if she should reveal something that could endanger her team.

  “Anything we say here won’t go beyond these walls,” he vowed.

  Avi eyed him for a long moment, wondering if she could trust him. He was her country’s enemy but…there was just something about him that seemed…honest. “Fine. I’ll agree.” She shifted in her chair, crossing her legs. “I’ve trained a team that help me resolve various…issues.”

  “And that night, the issue was dogs?”

  She lifted her chin, daring him to laugh at her. All animals were precious in her mind, and humans needed to help them when evil forces treated them badly. “That’s what my information told me. We hadn’t heard anything about human trafficking.”

  “And if you had heard about that aspect?” he asked.

  Avi saw the muscle clench in his jaw and almost laughed at how similar he was to her brother. “If I’d known about the human traffickers, I would have gotten the military and my brother involved. Human traffickers are a whole other level of evil. One my team isn’t prepared to deal with. I would have brought fire power and back up and planned much more intensively.”

  “But you still would have gone in and helped with the rescue?”

  “Absolutely!” she replied emphatically. “But thankfully, you and your team were there and were more prepared. So, thank you.”

  “You’re welcome,” he replied with a mocking tilt of his head.

  Avi ignored the teasing glint in his eyes. “How did you hear about the women?” she asked. Immediately, she saw that he wasn’t going to answer and her eyes narrowed. “Quid pro quo, Your Highness,” she warned. “I told you about my team. So spill.”

  He chuckled and the mood lightened. He explained how his team had heard about the traffickers and the team he’d assembled to combat the issue. They talked tactics and strategy, moving from one subject to another. Before she realized it, two hours had passed.

  “Good grief!” she gasped after noticing the time and sat up, reaching with her toes for the shoes she’d kicked off over an hour ago. “It’s so late. I wonder if the party is still going!”

  He stood and moved to her chair, bending down to pick up her shoes that had been accidentally kicked under the seat. With one hand wrapped around her ankle, he moved her foot forward, sliding one shoe, and then the other, onto each foot.

  “Isn’t there a precedent about the shoe fitting?” he teased, still holding her ankle. Slowly, his hand traveled higher, smoothing along the back of her calf and Avi felt as if she had been lit on fire. Just from his touch? That seemed crazy, but as his hand moved, she felt sparks dance along her skin. She wanted to lean forward, whimpering for more of his touch. She wanted him to kiss her and do things that she’d only read about in books.

  But that was crazy, right? They’d known each other for only a couple of hours! She couldn’t feel this strongly towards a man so quickly.

  Could she?

  “I’d better go. Both of our security teams will be looking for us,” she whispered.

  He stood and took her hand, helping her up. With her fingers still in his grip, he gently tugged her closer. “You’re a beautiful woman, Princess Aviera,” he murmured.

  Avi couldn’t stop herself. She moved closer, drawn to him in an oddly powerful way. “And you are a very attractive man, Sheik Lugar.”

  Her eyes moved from his gaze to his lips, wondering what it would be like to kiss him. Would it be hard and demanding? Or gentle and coaxing?

  She didn’t have long to wait. With a growl, he lowered his head and brushed his lips against hers. Back and forth, coaxing a response from her. She whimpered and moved closer, feeling his arms move from her hands to wrap around her waist. At first, his hands simply rested on her hips, but when she lifted her face up, silently asking to deepen the kiss, the next rough sound from him preceded his arms pressing her against him. Gone were the coaxing, teasing kisses. Now was the demanding caress as one hand moved to her back, then slid higher so that his large palm cupped the back of her neck.

  Avi had been wondering what it would be like to be in his arms and now he was holding her, and it felt…incredible! But there was no way for her to process everything that was happening because…he felt too good. Her thoughts simply blanked as he deepened the kiss even further, angling her head as his tongue invaded her mouth, demanding that she respond.

  It was pure bliss!

  Lugar was in hell! Aviera’s kisses were incendiary, he wanted to lay her out on the table behind them. He wanted to strip off that blue silk dress and find the satin of her skin, explore every inch of her body, and discover what other caresses caused her to make those sexy sounds in the back of her throat.

  Unfortunately, they were at a diplomatic gala, with about a thousand other foreign representatives less than a hundred feet away. He couldn’t make love to her right here. Hell, he couldn’t make love to her at all! Princess Aviera might be the most gloriously made woman he’d ever met, but she wa
sn’t made for him. They were enemies and there was no way this relationship could go anywhere.

  Lifting his head, both of them struggling for breath, Lugar reminded himself that Princess Aviera was light and happiness. She was sunshine and silky moonlight all combined into one. He was…not! He was scarred in more ways than one. Beauty and the Beast was a fairy tale that would never survive in this reality.

  “We need to get back to the party,” he groaned and, even after saying that, he pulled her close, needing to feel her body against his for just one more moment.

  “I know,” she whispered back, pressing her cheek against his chest. He wondered if she could hear his heart pounding. He certainly hoped not. Lugar didn’t want her to know how hard he was struggling to contain his need. It was bad enough that they’d kissed. They needed to walk away and never discuss this again.

  But laenatan, she felt amazing!

  Pulling back, he took her hand. For a long moment, he stood there, condemning himself for kissing her while, at the same time, thrilled and wanting to pull her back into his arms to do it all over again. Knowing that would be wrong on so many levels, he sighed with resignation. “Come. Let’s move back into the party where there are chaperones,” he teased.

  Aviera laughed and he thought the sound was delightful. Even as he thought that, he wondered what the hell had happened to him. Before meeting this woman, he’d never considered any female to be “delightful”. They were nice and lovely, but “delightful”? That word hadn’t even been in his vocabulary.

  He led her back to the gala, which, not surprisingly, was still going strong. Unfortunately, at the end of the hallway, she pulled her hand away and took several steps from him. He glared at her for a long moment, but when she pointedly lifted her eyebrows, he sighed. “Right,” he grumbled. But he still waited until after she reentered the fray before moving into the party himself, needing to ensure that she was safe.

  Chapter 4

  Avi woke up, glaring at the sunshine. She hadn’t gotten much sleep. Every time she fell asleep, a certain dark, dangerous man with a rumbly voice called to her, making love to her in her dreams. Several times, she’d woken to find the sheets tangled around her legs and her breathing ragged.

  “Not good,” she muttered as she pushed the still-tangled sheets off. “This has to stop!”

  She got out of bed and stumbled to the shower, hoping that the warm water would revive her. She had another long day of meetings at the United Nations building and she needed to be at the top of her game.

  Unfortunately, none of her meetings included a representative from Shadir.

  A half hour later, Avi was dressed, her hair pulled back into a severe bun and she’d applied a generous amount of makeup, trying to conceal the dark circles under her eyes.

  She grabbed her notebook and sighed as she headed down to the hotel’s restaurant where she was due to meet with several people from a trade delegation who wanted special privileges in Cordaire. “Great,” she grumbled, then thought of Lugar and the way he’d said her name last night, the arguments he’d delivered about several issues and…the way he’d held her, kissed her, the touch of his hands against her back. He was…amazing, she thought, her body tingling with excitement at the memory of that kiss.

  “Not a good idea to think of him like that,” she reminded herself, then moved out of the suite. Instantly, her guards surrounded her and, it occurred to her to wonder where they’d been when she and Lugar had been inside the library last night. Usually, they didn’t let her out of their sight. They might be inconspicuous, but they’d still keep her within their line of sight as others surveyed the crowd.

  As soon as she stepped out of the elevator into the lobby, her gaze was drawn to the tall, ruggedly attractive man standing on the other side of the room. His eyes narrowed on her features and she pretended to look away, but her eyes kept coming back to Lugar, drinking him in.

  Wait, what was he doing? He was coming over to her? They couldn’t be seen together!

  “Princess, we need to talk,” he snapped.

  Avi glanced at her guards, none of whom were sure what to do under the circumstances. They didn’t want to create an international incident in the hotel lobby, but nor did they want their enemy to take her out of their protective circle.

  “I’ll be fine,” she told them, lifting a hand to stall their progress. “He just needs to discuss…”

  He didn’t give her a chance to finish that explanation because he pulled her into an empty room and closed the door.

  Avi blinked up at him, stunned at his abrupt move. “What do you think you’re…?”

  He pulled her into his arms and kissed her.

  Avi struggled for a fraction of a second before her arms wrapped around his neck and pulled him closer. She opened her mouth, kissing him back with all of the pent-up frustration that had kept her wake last night.

  When he finally lifted his head, he looked down at her, his hands caressing her back almost as if he needed to touch as much of her as he could.

  “You didn’t sleep well, did you?” he asked, one finger gently tracing the dark circle that wasn’t completely covered by the makeup.

  She sighed, leaning back against the wall of the empty ballroom. “No. I was…” she blushed.

  “Me too,” he grumbled, pulling her closer again.

  For some reason, that made her smile. At least she wasn’t the only one suffering here.

  “Yes, but…” she shifted in arms and looked up at him. “Lugar, we can’t see each other. This has to stop.”

  He ran a finger down her neck. “I know.” He kissed her, just a brief kiss. “I’ll stop. That’s the last time,” he promised her and even stepped back, allowing her to adjust her clothes.

  As she tugged at her skirt, she eyed Lugar curiously. She wanted to know how he’d gotten that scar under his eye, why his nose was so crooked, what he liked to eat for breakfast, what he wore to bed, and how he managed to look so amazingly vital and alive when she felt as if she were a member of the walking dead. Sighing, she mentally shook herself, straightening her shoulders against the magnetic pull of his personality. “We need to go our separate ways.”

  He looked down at her and the heat of his gaze sent her pulse spiraling again. “Lugar, you’re not listening to me, are you?” she asked, but her lips curled ever so slightly, feeling…proud that she could make such a powerful man want her like this.

  “Not really. Have lunch with me,” he ordered.

  She laughed, leaning her head back. “Remember that little issue of us being enemies?” She paused when he lifted a dark eyebrow in response. “Still there!”

  “We both have to eat,” he argued. “And if we do it in public, then we’re more likely to keep our hands off of each other.”

  He had a good point. But…! No, she had to keep away from him.

  “I have a lunch meeting already scheduled,” she replied, taking her lipstick out of her purse and touching up the mess he’d made of it. He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, wiping away the mauve color from his lips and cheek.

  “Damn it,” he muttered. “I’ll figure something out.”

  She glanced away from her mirror and laughed, but then realized that he wasn’t teasing. “You’re kidding, right?”

  His eyes looked determined. “No. Be alert.”

  “Alert for what?” she asked, snapping the cap back onto her lipstick and putting it back into her purse.

  “For something. I haven’t figured it out.” He sighed and brushed a hand across her cheek. “Just be ready for when I do.”

  With that, she stepped out into the ballroom, not daring to look back at him. As soon as she heard the door close behind her, she beamed as if her whole day had just turned a whole lot sunnier.

  Chapter 5

  Lugar sighed, frustrated with the slow process and seemingly endless conversations. In his mind, these people just needed to make a decision and move forward. The endless discussions, even after i
t seemed that there was consensus on the actions to take, were just an opportunity for everyone to hear themselves talk.

  As much as he sometimes grumbled about his responsibilities, Lugar knew that he preferred being in charge and making things happen rather than sitting in meetings like this. Hence, why he’d assigned a skilled diplomat to represent Shadir at the United Nations.

  But Lugar understood the need for his presence here as well as these conversations. Public perception was important, not just inside of Shadir but also with his allies.

  So here he sat, only half listening to the conversation as one speaker after another pointed out basically the same issue as the previous person, just with slightly different language.

  Lugar contemplated last night’s kiss with Princess Aviera. Her soft curves had fit against his body perfectly. She wasn’t model thin, thank goodness. No, the lovely woman was curvy and soft and astonishingly feminine.

  He wondered what life would be like with Aviera by his side. As a wife…a word he hadn’t thought about using in a long time. Correction, he’d never thought about getting married, so the term “wife” hadn’t even been a concept for him. Mistresses, yes. He’d had several mutually satisfying relationships in his life over the years. He liked sex, but in his mind, he didn’t care if the scars on his body horrified a mistress. He paid his mistresses well, giving them large amounts of money to spend on whatever their hearts desired, as long as they were available for pleasure.

  Thinking about his scarred body, he wondered what the beautiful princess would say if she ever saw all of his scars. At that thought, Lugar’s jaw clenched. There was no way he’d ever allow Aviera to see his chest and back. No way! She might melt in his arms when he kissed her, but she’d run screaming from the room if she ever saw what was underneath his clothes.

  Sighing, he shifted in his chair and focused on the debate going on, pushing the idea of Aviera and any hope of a relationship with her out of his mind. It was impossible, he thought.