Lauren swayed at the coldness of Zafir’s threat.

His resentment was like a force field she couldn’t penetrate. And she began to understand that his anger held a glimmer of pain that disconcerted her. “If you care about the welfare of the baby then let me go, Zafir. I would never deny you your rights.”

“No,” he said, and his voice was raised enough to reverberate around them. “Get this into your mind, Lauren, for once and for all. I will never let a child of mine grow up without knowing me, and nor will I agree to be a stranger who lives a million miles away.”

She slackened against the wall. “Then we have a problem.”

“I do not see one.”

Her stomach tightened into a knot. He was too calm, too sure of his own mind, which sent panic rippling along her nerves. “I live in New York—you live here. I’d call that a major problem.”

“Your life in New York is over.”

His will was like an immovable, invisible wall.

And still she tried to bang away at it—because the alternative was unthinkable. “You can’t dictate what my life is … force me to turn it upside down. I’m not one of your minions.”

His gaze became hard, his tone relentlessly resolute. “If you want to be a mother to my child, you do it in Behraat.”

TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a romance, which was much more exciting than a mathematics textbook. Years later, Tara’s wild imagination and love for the written word revealed what she really wanted to do. Now she pairs Alpha males who think they know everything with strong women who knock that theory and them off their feet!

The Sheikh’s Pregnant Prisoner

Tara Pammi

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For my lovely and wonderful editor, Pippa—for these ten books and many, many more to come.

Contents

Cover

Introduction

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

COULD HE BE DEAD? Could someone as larger than life as Zafir be truly gone? Could someone she had known for two months, someone she had laughed with, someone she had shared the deepest intimacies with, be gone in the blink of an eye?

Lauren Hamby pressed her hand to her stomach as dread weighed it down.

It had been the same for the past two days. The more she saw of the colorful capital city of Behraat and the destruction the recent riots had wreaked, the more she saw Zafir everywhere.

But now, staring at the centuries-old trade center building, every nerve in her vibrated. The answer she had been seeking for six weeks was here, she could feel it in her bones. All she had was his name and description but she was desperate to find out what had happened to him.

Desperate to find out about the man who had somehow come to mean more than just a lover. More than a friend, even.

The richly kept grounds were a lush contrast to the stark silence in the city. The glittering rectangular shallow pool of water lined on either side by mosaic tiles and flanked by palm trees showed her strained reflection. She walked the concrete-tiled path laid out between the pool’s edge and the perfectly cut lush lawn, her heart hammering against her rib cage.

Marble steps led to the enormous foyer with glinting mosaic floors, soaring, circular ceiling and, she couldn’t help smiling, palm trees in giant pots.

There was so much to look at, so much to breathe in that the sights and sounds around her dulled the edge during the day. But at night, the grief pushed in with vehemence, pressing images of him growing up in this country.

She saw him in every tall, stunning man, remembered the pride and love with which he’d painted a picture of Behraat to her.

“You coming, Lauren?”

Her friend David had spent the past few days capturing footage about the recent riots in the city.

She looked up and averted her face as he pointed his camcorder at her. “Stop filming me, David. Is my asking to see the records of people who died in the riots so necessary to your documentary on Behraat?”

Her gaze moved past the reception area, taking in the spectacular fountain in the middle of the hall, the water shimmering golden against the light shed by the orange, filigreed dome.

A hum of activity went on behind the gleaming marble reception area.

Her rubber soles made no sound as she walked past the fountain toward the reception desk. The glass elevator pinged down, a group of men exiting.

A quiet hush descended over the activity. Her nape prickling, Lauren turned, the sudden shift in the very air around her raising goose bumps on her skin. Six men stood in a circle in front of the elevator, all dressed in the traditional long robes. One man, the tallest among the group, addressed the rest in Arabic.

His words washed over Lauren, the tenor of his tone harsh and unyielding. It whispered over her skin like a familiar caress.

Rubbing her palms over her midriff, she tried to quell the sudden shiver. She turned back toward David, who was filming the group of men with arrested attention. The tall man turned, bringing himself directly into her line of vision.

Lauren stilled, her heartbeat deafening to her ears.

Zafir.

The red-and-white headdress covered his hair, rendering his features starker than usual. His words resonated with authority, power, his mouth set into a hard line.

He was not dead.

Relief was like a storm, rippling and cascading over her. She wanted to throw her arms around him, touch the sharp angles of his face. She wanted to...

A cold chill seeped into her very bones even though she was wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt and loose trousers to respect the cultural norms of Behraat.

Zafir was unharmed.

In fact, he’d never looked more in his element. Yet she hadn’t heard a word from him in six weeks.

She moved toward the group, an incessant pounding in her head driving away every sane thought. Adrenaline laced with fury pumped through her. The man standing closest to her turned around, alerting her presence to the group. One by one, they all turned.

Her breath suspended in her throat, her hands shook. The few seconds stretched interminably. A hysteric bubble launched into her throat.

Zafir’s gold-flecked gaze met hers, the sheer force of his personality slamming into her.

Everything else around her dulled as the explosive chemistry that had punctuated every moment of their affair sparked into life, a live wire yanking her closer.

There wasn’t a trace of pleasure in his gaze.

No shock in it.

But there was no guilt either.

The fact that he felt no remorse whatsoever fueled her fury. She’d shed tears over him, she’d reduced herself to a shadow of worry over him and he didn’t even feel guilt.

The men stared with interest as he stepped toward her. Two guards flanked him at a little distance.

Why did Zafir have guards?

The question shot through her and fell into nothingness like dust. His dark sensuality swathed her. Her skin shivered with awareness, her stomach churned with every step that they took toward each other.

The intoxicating power of his masculinity, her intimate knowledge of that leanly honed body, everything coiled around her, binding her immobile under his scrutiny. He stopped at arm’s reach, his mouth a hard slash in that stunning face, the burnished, coppery skin a tight mask over his features.

A regal movement of his head, his nod was barely an acknowledgment and so much a dismissal. “Ms. Hamby, what brings you to Behraat?”

Chilling cold filled her veins.

Ms. Hamby? He was calling her Ms. Hamby? After everything they had shared, he spoke to her as if she was a stranger?

Every little hurt Lauren had patched over since she’d been a little girl ripped open at that indifference. “After the way you left, that’s what you have to say to me?”

A taut nerve throbbed in his temple but that golden gaze remained infuriatingly sedate. He looked so impossibly remote, as harsh and bleak as the desert she’d heard so much about. “If you have a complaint to register with me,” he said, as now a thread of temper flashed into his perfectly polite tone, “you need an appointment, Ms. Hamby. Like the rest of the world.”

His dismissal scraped her raw with its politeness but she held on to her temper. Somehow. “An appointment? You’re kidding me, right?”

“No. I do not...kid.” A step closer and she could see something beneath that calm. Shock? Displeasure? Indifference? “Do not make a spectacle of yourself, Lauren.”

A shard of pain ricocheted inside her, stealing her breath.

“Don’t make a scene, Lauren.”

“Grow up and understand that your parents have important careers, Lauren.”

“Swallow your tears, Lauren.”

Her heart beating a wild tattoo inside her chest, memories and voices swirling through her head like some miniature ghosts, Lauren covered the last step between her and Zafir and slapped him.

His jaw jerked back, the crack of the slap shattering the silence like a clap of thunder.

The sound of quick footsteps pierced the haze of her fury, her hand jarring painfully at the impact, her breathing rough. Angry commands spoken in Arabic rang around them.

But she...it was as if she was functioning in a world of her own.

Something ferocious gleamed in his eyes then.

Oh, God, what had she done?

Caught in that flare, Lauren shivered, something hot twisting low in her belly. His long fingers dug into her forearms as he jerked her toward him, the scent of sandalwood and musk drenching her. “Of all the—”

An urgent whisper spoken in rapid Arabic rattled behind them. Zafir’s fingers instantly relented. His gaze raked her, before the fire of his emotions slowly seeped out, settling that indifferent mask into that lethal face.

When those golden eyes met hers again, it was like looking at a stranger—a forbidding, dangerous, contemptuous stranger.

“Your Highness...let security deal with the woman.”

Your Highness? Security?

The adrenaline ebbed away, leaving her cold.

Zafir barked out a command, something short and hard in Arabic and then stepped back.

Cold sweat trickled down her back as she looked around. The most unholy silence enveloped her, and everyone watched her with curiosity and contempt.

Two men with discreet-looking guns flanked her. “Zafir, wait,” she called out, but he’d already turned his back on her.

Her gaze followed the elevator’s ascent, but he didn’t look at her, not once. She tried to step back, only to find her every move blocked.

What nightmare had she walked into? Where was David?

Trying to stem the panic bubbling inside her, she turned and noticed an older man who spoke to the guard. “What the hell is going on?”

The man’s eyes chilled. “You’re under arrest for attacking the Sheikh of Behraat.”

* * *

Zafir Al Masood stalked out of the meeting with the High Council. His displeasure must have been evident in his face because even the most audacious members quickly shuffled out of his way.

For the first time in six weeks, the outrageous complaints from the council pricked him.

Who was the woman? How could a woman, a Western woman, an American at that, have such familiarity with him as to strike him? Was he going to bring the Western world’s wrath on Behraat?

Was he going to doom Behraat for a woman like his father had done?

He entered the elevator, hit the button to hold it there. Fury and frustration pumped in his veins as he sought to control his temper.

The glass walls around him reflected his image back at him, forcing him to take stock. Forcing him to swallow his bitterness, as he had done for the past six years.

Did they see a glimpse of his father, the great Rashid Al Masood, the man who had brought Behraat out of the dark ages, in him?

Would he be never allowed to forget that his father had only acknowledged him as his son when he had needed a different crown prince, thanks to his corrupted half brother Tariq?

Once upon a time, he would have been glad to hear that his father’s blood flowed in his veins. But now...now that he was spending his life paying for his mistake...

He cursed the wretched High Council and its power to elect the High Sheikh. Maybe if the bunch of corrupt cowards had spoken up during Tariq’s regime, Behraat wouldn’t be in this state now.

But with Rashid’s strict regulations blown apart, they had been busy stuffing their pockets with Tariq’s bribes while he had ruined relations with neighboring countries, destroyed peace treaties and violated trade agreements...

Yet they used any reason to doubt his rule over Behraat, harped on and on about the separation of tribes from the state.

As if it was his mistake and not his father’s.

Zafir headed straight to the situation room, determined to stomp them out. Much as he hated his father for bringing him up as a favored orphan, he couldn’t turn a blind eye to Behraat. Even before he had learned about his birth, duty had been filled in his very blood.

This was his father’s legacy to him.

Not love, not pride, not even the knowledge of his mother, but this infernal sense of duty toward Behraat.

Lauren’s face on the huge plasma screen monitor brought him to a sudden halt.

Something twisted deep and hard in his gut...a hard thrum in his very muscle, an echo of a primal need that he couldn’t fathom to this day...

That plump bottom lip caught between her teeth, her complexion paler than usual. Blue shadows marred the beauty of wide-set black eyes. The scarf she had used earlier to cover her hair loosely was gone, her black hair cut to fall over her forehead, once again hiding her entire face from him.

The long-sleeved cotton T-shirt molded the curve of her breasts. She sat with her fingers entwined on top of the table, her posture straight, reckless defiance in every line.

Defiant and honest, sensuous and wary, from the moment he had set eyes on her, Lauren had ensnared him.

At his command, his special security force had locked her up, confiscated everything from her. Punishment meted out to anyone who was suspected of being a threat to his new rule. And all the evidence they had gathered since didn’t bode well for her either.

But he couldn’t shake off the betrayal, the hurt that had glittered when she had looked at him. He had wanted to kiss her. He’d wanted to plunder her mouth until the betrayal etched into her face turned into arousal.

“She planned the charade,” Arif said in his matter-of-fact tone. “She clearly means to exploit your weakness in indulging in an affair with her. You should have mentioned her to me after you returned so that I—”

“No.”

Still transfixed by the sight of her, Zafir scrubbed a hand over his face.

There was no place for regret. There was no place for softness, in his feelings or in his actions. There was no choice to be anyone but himself.

Already he’d made a mistake, somehow he’d let her get too close.

“What would be her motivation, Arif?” he asked the older man. His father’s oldest friend, Arif was now his biggest ally.

“She walks around the trade center with a journalist friend who knew you would be present, Zafir. It’s all planned,” Arif spat out, with a vehemence that had been nurtured over a lifetime for women, foreign or otherwise.

Zafir remained quiet, giving the doubts that polluted his thoughts free rein.

The few members of staff present at the trade center had already been pledged into silence. He had offered an explanation to the High Council—to keep the peace for Behraat’s sake.

Her bow-shaped mouth was pinched, her shoulders strained under the weight of her feigned defiance. “Did they find him?”

The older man’s disquiet was answer enough.

Zafir switched off the monitor, taking away the temptation messing with his head.

“We need to contain this as soon as possible. If that video falls into the hands of the media...” Arif continued, letting his silence speak for the consequences.

“We might have a full-scale riot on our hands again,” Zafir finished. Tariq had used too many women, bloated with power and Zafir couldn’t be seen in the same light.

If they didn’t find the video and contain it, what little trust he had gained of the people of Behraat could be blown to smithereens.

Already, the High Council was questioning his proposals for change, looking for ways to skew public perception of him. “I’ll talk to her. No one else,” he said, wondering if he had misjudged the first woman to mess with his head in...ever.

* * *

How dare he lock her up?

Lauren eyed the camera in the top corner of the room. She wanted to march toward it, stick her face in it and demand they release her. But it would only waste her dwindling energy.

The sheer fury she had been running on was crashing already. Misery gnawed at her.

She turned her attention to the small room with its austere white walls and concrete floor. The sterile smell of the room made her empty stomach heave. A window boarded shut with cheap plastic and a faded plastic chair and table graced the room. The other end of the spectrum from the magnificent foyer and reception hall where she’d stood in awe only a couple of hours ago.

Even if she wanted to delude herself that it was all some ghastly mistake, the gritty reality of the room stopped her.

She held her shoulders rigid. But each passing minute filled her with increasing dread and confusion. The old man’s words rang in her ears.

Zafir, the Sheikh of Behraat?

It sounded straight out of a nightmare, yet how else could she explain all this?

She rubbed her eyes and swallowed, her throat dry and scratchy like sandpaper. They had taken her backpack, her cell phone. She thought longingly of the bottle of water in there and even the granola bar she usually hated.

The knob turned as the door was fiddled with on the outside.

Her muscles tensed up, her lungs expanding on a huge breath.

Zafir stepped into the room. She sagged against the chair, saw the tight line of his mouth and instantly pulled herself back up.

He had ordered his minions to lock her up. Just because he was here didn’t mean anything, she told herself sternly.

He cast a look at the camera at the top wall. The tiny orange flicker went out.

Apparently, all it took was a blink of an eye from him and the world rearranged itself.

He closed the door behind him, and leaned against it.

His gaze swept over her, noting everything about her with a chilling thoroughness.

The traditional attire was gone yet he felt no more familiar than the cold stranger she had slapped so foolishly. A white cotton shirt folded back at the cuffs revealed strong forearms, the burnished bronze of his skin a startlingly stunning contrast against it.

Black jeans outlined the hard strength of those muscular legs, legs that had pinned and anchored her in the most intimate of acts, a mere couple of hours before he had stepped out of her life.

The Zafir she had known in New York had still been a mystery, but he’d been a kind, caring man. Not friendly but she’d felt safe with him, even after knowing him for only an hour.

Not straightway approachable after the way she’d ripped into him at the ER, but he’d still been a gentleman.

Not exactly the boy-next-door type and yet he’d laughed with her.

Had all that been just a mask to get her into bed?

He prowled into the room and leaned against the opposite wall, forcing her to raise her gaze. Her stomach was tied up in knots, but she refused to let him intimidate her.

Standing up, she moved behind the chair and mirrored his stance.

He folded his hands and pinned her with that hard gaze. “Why are you here, Lauren?”

“Ask your thugs that question.” She gripped the back of the chair with shaking hands, and tilted her chin up. “Sorry, I mean, your guards.”

He raised a brow, quiet arrogance dripping from every pore. How had she not seen this cloak of power he wore so effortlessly? “This is not the time to play with the truth.”

“Look who’s talking about truth,” she said, anger replacing the dread. “Is it true? What that man said?”

An eternity passed while his gaze trapped hers. But she saw the truth in it.

In fact, the truth or a shadow of it had been present all along.

In his tortured words whenever he spoke of Behraat, in the anguish in his eyes when they had watched a TV segment about the old sheikh still in coma, in the pride that resonated in his voice when he spoke of how Behraat had emerged as a developing country under the sheikh’s regime.

Even in that sense of stasis she had sensed in him, as though he was biding his time.

His very presence was a ticking powerhouse in the small room. He shrugged. Such a casual gesture for something that shook her world upside down. “Yes.”

The single word grew in the space between them, bearing down upon her the consequences of her own actions.

Her throat dried up, every muscle in her quivered. All the stories she had heard from a fascinated David about Behraat, of the ruling family, they coalesced in her mind, shaking loose everything she had believed of Zafir.

She stared at him anew. “If you’re the new sheikh, that means you’re...”

“The man who ordered the arrest of his brother so that he can rule Behraat. The man who celebrated victory on the eve of his brother’s death.” His words echoed with a razor-sharp edge. “But be very careful. You’ve already committed one mistake. I might not be so lenient again.”

CHAPTER TWO

“LENIENT?” LAUREN GLARED at him, hating the tremor she couldn’t contain at the casual power in his words. “You had your thugs throw me here without hearing a word I had to say.”

“If you were anyone else...the punishment would have been much worse.”

“I slapped you. It’s not a capital crime.”

“You slapped me in front of the High Council who thinks women should stay at home, that women need to be protected from the world, and from their own weaknesses.”

There was no smoothness to his words now. They reverberated with cutting hostility. “That’s archaic.”

“Fortunately for you, I agree. Women are just as capable of deception, of manipulation as any man I’ve known.”

Lauren stared at him. “So you’re a misogynist as well as being a sheikh? I don’t know how much more of this I can handle.”

Something entered his gaze. “This is not New York, Lauren. Nor am I an average Joe.”

“No, you’re not,” she whispered. Even in New York, she hadn’t made the mistake of thinking he was an average man.

A small-scale exporter, he’d told her, struggling to keep his place in Behraat because of the changing political clime. The gleam of interest in his eyes—six feet of stunning, sexy, jaw-droppingly arrogant man’s interest in her, averagely attractive ER nurse, who’d long ago chosen a life of non-adventure and boring normalcy, because it was safe—it had gone straight to her head.

She’d swallowed his lies all too willingly.

Instead, he was the ruler of a nation and, if the media was to be believed, one who had seized power from the previous sheikh. He was the very embodiment of power and ambition she despised, far from the rootless man she had thought him to be.

The black-and-white tiles swam in front of her eyes. She slid into the chair in a boneless heap, tucked her head down between her knees and forced herself to breathe.

The fine hairs on her neck prickled, the air coated with an exotic scent that her traitorous body craved all too easily. Standing over her, his presence was a dark shadow stealing every bit of warmth from her.

His long fingers landed on her nape and her skin zinged. “Lauren?”

The concern edging into those words tugged at her, but she resisted its dangerous quality. Because it was reluctant at best. “Don’t pretend you care.”

Shock flared in his gaze. At least, that’s what her foolish mind told her. But when she looked back at him, it was gone. Before she could move, he trapped her behind the table, his arms on either side of her head. “Did you know already?”

“Know what?” Her answer croaked out of her, every cell in her pulsing with awareness at his proximity.

Her gaze fell on the thin scar that stretched from the corner of his mouth to his ear, on the left side. The memory of tracing the scar with her tongue, the taste of his skin, the powerful shudder that had gone through him, it all came back to her in a heated rush.

“Look at me when I’m speaking to you,” he said, his tone dark and gravelly.

More than impatience colored his tone. She pulled her gaze upward, her stomach doing a funny flip. His nostrils flared. The same memory danced in his eyes, making the irises a darkly burnished gold.

With a curse that reverberated around them, he clamped his jaw, until the memory and the gold fire was purged from those eyes.

The ruthlessness of his will was a slap.

She was tired, hungry, and her composure was hanging by a very fine thread. All she wanted to do was crawl into her bed and never look at the world again.

“What did I know, Zafir?”

“Did you know who I was? Is that why you slapped me and had your friend record the whole thing?”

Her sluggish brain took several seconds to react. When it did, it destroyed the barrage of unwanted memories and their effect on her. “What the hell does that mean?”

He bent down toward her, swallowing her personal space. Until their noses were almost touching and his breath fanned over her heated skin. “Your journalist friend David had a tiny camcorder and shot the whole...incident.”

“So? Which part of the word journalist confuses you?” she said, confusion swirling within her. “He was running that thing all day...”

“Did he know what you were about to do? Did you plan it?”

His voice was no more than a raspy whisper yet each word dripped with menace.

Shredded everything she’d ever felt for him. “Is that how much you know me?”

* * *

Zafir ruthlessly tuned out the hurt resonating in Lauren’s words.

The feel of her soft, warm flesh under his fingers was already disturbing his equilibrium.

His muscles tightened, his blood became sluggish and the spiraling desire to kiss her mouth was a relentless hum in his veins.

He closed his eyes, and let the pictures of Behraat from six weeks ago swim in front of his eyes...the people who had died in the riots, the destruction Tariq had wrought on it. The mindless carnage instantly took the edge off his physical hunger.

A sense of balance returned to him, a cruel but efficient tether to control his body. He swept his gaze over her, letting the harsh reality of his life creep into his words. “Do we really know each other, Lauren? Except for what we like in—”

Pink seeped into her cheeks, her fiery gaze shooting daggers at him. “Stop it, Zafir.”

“We knew each other for two months. I brought Huma to the ER. She told you I was...rich and you pursued me for a donation. You recklessly challenged me and I...rose to it. Against my better instincts, I started an affair. The fact that I hadn’t been with a woman in a few months could have been one factor.”

He continued like the ruthless bastard he was, refusing to let her pale face, the way she retreated from him, the way she shrank into the wall as though she couldn’t bear to be touched by even his shadow, thwart him. “And we continued to sleep with each other because it suited us both.”

He tucked away a distracting lock of hair from her cheek and she flinched. “So no, I don’t know what you’re capable of.

“What I do know is that you were always, what is the word, chummy with the press. That reporter friend David, that lawyer, Alicia and you...”

She ran long, trembling fingers over her forehead. “To set up an abuse shelter in Queens. I have nothing to gain by exposing your true colors to the world.”

Frustration made his words harder. “I need that video, Lauren. The current political climate of Behraat is volatile. Even something as simple as a lover’s tiff can be interpreted in so many different ways. My...predecessor abused his power, toyed with women as if they were his personal playthings. Your act questions my credibility, paints me in the same mold as him.”

She shot her hand out, her slender fingers spread out, defiance shining out of her gleaming gaze as she ticked off her fingers. “Abuse of power? Check. Toys with women as though they were personal playthings? Check. It seems you’re the perfect man for the job, Zafir.”

His skin crawled to think she would cast him in the same mold as Tariq. “I’ve never treated you with anything other than respect.”

“Respect?” The words boomeranged in the sterile room, mocking him. “If you respected me, you wouldn’t be treating me like a criminal, questioning my actions, you wouldn’t have walked out in the middle of the night and disappeared.

“The only thing missing was a bunch of cash on the nightstand and a recommendation to your friends.”

“Enough. How dare you speak as if you sold yourself to me?”

“Because that’s what you’re implying, Zafir,” Lauren shouted back at him. With an increasing sense of emptiness, she fell against the wall.

He trapped her against it, his hot gaze burning, his body a seething cauldron of aggression and sensual intent. There was no control now, only a sense of possession. She had truly angered him and still, Lauren didn’t feel fear. Not when he stood close like that.

Silly, stupid Lauren.

“Is that why you did it? Because you’re angry with me, you thought to teach me a lesson?”

“You know nothing about me. And I’m realizing how little I know you.”

“You have no idea what you have done, Lauren. Are you ready to face the consequences? To take responsibility when another riot begins?”

She’d already learned enough about the atrocities suffered by the people of Behraat. And the sooner this nightmare was over, the sooner she would be able to leave.

She clutched on to the thought like a mantra. “Even though it isn’t something I should have to explain, I will. Your claim that David and I planned...this whole thing is ridiculous. He doesn’t even know about our affair.”

“Then why did he run, Lauren? Why not wait to find out what happened to you?”

“Maybe because against your claims to the contrary, you seem to be walking exactly the same path as the old sheikh. You had your men seize me for a mere slap, Zafir. Can you blame him? What would he do with that video anyway? Put it on YouTube?”

His gaze hardened and she realized it was exactly the thing he wanted to avoid. He pulled her cell phone out of his pocket and slid it into her hand. “Call him. Ask him to meet you in the front lobby and bring his camcorder.”

“Why?”

He glared at her. “So that we can delete that video.”

“I told you. Even if David recorded it, it would be by accident. He would never do anything to hurt me. I know him.”

A vein stretched taut at his temple, something hot and indecent uncoiling in his eyes. “Is that as well as you knew me or even better?”

There were so many things wrong with that question that she couldn’t sift through the nuances for a minute. “What...does that mean?”

“You fell into my bed three days after we met. You traveled halfway round the world to see a man who walked out on you. I will not put much stock in your judgment right now.”

A soft whimper fell from her mouth and Lauren hated herself just as much as she hated him.

Her judgment? He was using their weakness, their utter lack of control when it came to each other against her?

“You’re manipulative too, great.” She whispered the words softly, slowly, as though she needed to believe them herself.

A headache was beginning to blur her vision. “David isn’t even aware of our...liaison,” she said, intent on making him understand. “When he told me he was traveling to Behraat, I persuaded him to let me join him, made him wait until my visa was through. He didn’t even know why I was coming.”

“Why?”

“Why what, Zafir?”

“Why did you come to Behraat?”

Because I’m a silly, sentimental fool. Because, even after all these years, I still didn’t learn.

He was right. Her usual common sense had taken a hike from the minute she had woken that morning six weeks ago and found him gone. But she’d acted the fool enough.

“I thought you were dead, Zafir.” The hollow ache she had battled for six weeks resonated around them. “I came to see the Behraat that you told me so much about. I came to Behraat to mourn you.”

He flinched and took a step back. Shock radiated from him.

“I saw the news coverage of the riots. When I didn’t hear anything from you, when they reported the number of civilian casualties, I thought you had died fighting for your country and its people,” she paused to breathe, to pull air past the lump that seemed to have wedged in her throat like a rock. She rubbed her fingers over her eyes, feeling incredibly tired. “But I’m such a fool, aren’t I? If you had cared, you could have picked up the phone, no wait, you could have barked a command like you did before, and one of your thugs could have informed me that you were alive. That you were through with me.”

He didn’t blink, didn’t move, just stared at her. Had he thought it meant nothing to her? Had she meant nothing to him?

“I never promised you anything, Lauren.”

She nodded and the movement cost her everything she had. “As you pointed out so clearly a few minutes ago, it was an affair at best, an exchange of sex.” She laughed through the tears edging into her eyes, through the haze of something clouding her eyes. All of a sudden, she felt woozy, as if there wasn’t enough oxygen in the room to breathe. “I’ve realized that the man I came to mourn doesn’t exist.

“Or if he did, he’s truly dead.”

Her words hit Zafir like a fist to his gut, rendering everything inside him still. The man he’d been with her, he had been neither the orphan nor the ruler.

He’d been just Zafir, free to pursue whatever he wanted.

But not anymore. Never again.

She licked her lips and swallowed visibly, her skin losing the little color she had. “Now, unless your plan is to torture me, in which case I demand a lawyer, please order one of your thugs to bring me some water. My throat feels like it’s on fire.”

Her gaze unfocused, she swayed on her feet and slid down the wall in a tangle of limbs.

Zafir caught her before she hit the floor, his heart pounding.

Propping her up, he tugged her close, pushed the silky strands of her hair away from her forehead. She was burning up and dehydrated.

It could happen to anyone visiting such a hot clime for the first time, but her fainting was a direct result of his actions. Because she had been locked up the whole morning without water. On his command.

With her body slumped against his, he pulled his phone out and called Arif.

He traced the stubborn angle of her jaw with his finger, mesmerized by the contrast of his rough, brown hand over her delicate soft skin. That was it.

She had mesmerized him the moment he had set eyes upon her. Stunning features, alabaster skin and a sensuous mouth that could make a man forget he wasn’t allowed something as frivolous as a blazing hot affair.

And even if he had somehow resisted her beauty, her biting tongue and no-nonsense attitude had won him over.

He had never met a woman like her before.

But she’d been a distraction, a respite, all that he could ever have. So he had walked away when it was time for him to return to Behraat.

But, why hadn’t he, as she’d so recklessly demanded, told her he was through with her? A simple phone call would have done it...why hadn’t he been able to let go?

As the door opened behind him, he lifted her in his arms and laid her on the stretcher brought in by his personal medical staff. He shook his head as Arif opened his mouth. They waited in silence as the two paramedics checked her vitals.

He couldn’t let her go, not until he found the video footage. But he refused to lock her up.

“Put her in the extra suite in my wing. Plant someone from my personal guard outside her suite and ask Dr. Farrah to give her a thorough checkup.”

All three men froze around him. His command went against one of the traditional customs of Behraat. No unmarried woman strayed near the edges, even by mistake, of a man’s quarters.

Arif said, “We can send her to the women’s clinic in the city and still have a guard there.”

“No.”

Letting Lauren wake up in some unknown clinic amid strangers when this was all his fault, that was inexcusable, even for him.

He wanted her close, somewhere she could be watched without causing a fuss and curiosity, which she undoubtedly would anywhere else.

And he was no normal man like he had told her. He was not the favored orphan anymore either. He was the sheikh, and he was damned well going to use, or abuse—he didn’t care which—his power in this.

“Do as I command, Arif.”

Stealing one last look at her, he turned and headed toward the elevator, Lauren’s words echoing in his ears.

“The man I mourned doesn’t exist. Or if he did, he’s truly dead.”

How close she’d come to the truth. That carefree, reckless, indulgent man he’d been in New York, he truly didn’t exist.

CHAPTER THREE

LAUREN OPENED HER eyes slowly, feeling a sharp tug at her wrist. Her mouth felt woolly as if she had fallen asleep with cotton stuffed into it. It took her a moment to focus around the strange room. Feeling a little frayed, she propped herself on her elbows and scooted into a sitting position.

She was lying on a huge bed on the softest scented cotton sheets. The subtle scent of roses tickled her nostrils. A dark red tapestry hung on the opposite wall while sheer silk curtains fluttered at the breeze. Her whole apartment in Queens could fit into the suite, she thought, awed by the magnificence of the surroundings.

“It is nice to see some color in your cheeks,” said a voice near the foot of the bed in heavily accented English.

The IV tube tugged at her wrist as Lauren moved.

A woman laid a cool hand against Lauren’s forehead and nodded. She wore a bright red tunic with a collar and long sleeves, and black trousers underneath it. Her hair was tied into a ponytail at the back. Her skin, a shade lighter than Zafir’s rich copper tone, shone with a vibrancy that made Lauren feel like a pale ghost.

“The fever is gone. Would you like something to drink?”

When Lauren nodded, instead of handing the glass to her, the woman tucked one hand at Lauren’s neck and held it to her mouth with the other. The cool liquid slid against her throat, bringing back feeling into her mouth. Feeling infinitely better, Lauren looked at her. “Where am I?”

A little line appeared in the woman’s smooth forehead. “The royal palace.”

Holding her growing anxiety at bay, Lauren studied the suite again. Rich, vibrant furnishings with hints of gold greeted her eyes. A high archway lighted with bronze torches led into the balcony on her right, from which she could see the turrets and domes of the palace.

First, he had her locked up accusing her of conspiracy, and now he had staff waiting on her?

She ran a finger over her dry, cracked lips. Her blouse was creased and her cream trousers looked dirty. “I’ve never fainted in my life before. If you remove the IV, I’d like to wash up. And then leave.”

The woman shook her head. “That’s not possible.”

After the day she’d had, Lauren was in no mood to be ordered around. “Excuse me, but who are you?”

“I’m one of the palace physicians, the only female one. His Highness ordered that I attend to you personally,” she said, her words ringing with pride.

It took Lauren a moment to realize who she meant. She was still a prisoner then, upgraded from that stark...cell to the sumptuous palace. “Well... His Highness can screw himself for all I care,” she muttered, emotions batting at her from all directions.

The woman’s mouth fell open, and she looked at Lauren as though she had grown two heads. Lauren felt like an ass. It wasn’t really the woman’s fault.

“I’m sorry....”

“Dr. Farrah Hasan.”

“Dr. Hasan, I have to leave. In fact, if you can just hand me my phone.” She pointed to her gray metallic handbag—the funky bag looked as out of place on the red velvet settee as she felt in the grandiose palace. “I’ll call the airport and reschedule my flight.”

“You can’t leave, Ms. Hamby. Besides the fact that His Highness has forbidden it,” she rushed over her words as if afraid that Lauren would lose it again, “given your condition, you’re very weak. I recommend that you spend at least a week in bed and wait two weeks before you fly long-distance.”

“My condition?” Lauren said, her heart beginning a strange thump-thump loud enough to reach her ears. “Nothing’s wrong with me except the effects of dehydration.” Which was really His Highness’s fault. But she managed to keep the words to herself this time.

“Your pregnancy,” Dr. Hasan said with a frown. “You’re not aware of it?”

Lauren felt as if she’d been physically slapped. She shook her head, huffed a laugh at the ridiculousness of the suggestion. The doctor’s eyes remained serious.

She couldn’t be. “But that’s not...”

She collapsed against the bed, shaking uncontrollably from head to toe. Her breaths became shaky, and a vicious churn started in her stomach. Pregnant? How was that possible? She took her pill without missing it a single day. She clutched the sheets with her hands, tears leaking out of the corner of her eyes.

Fear and shock vied with each other, a heaviness gathering in her belly.

She couldn’t be pregnant. A child needed unconditional love, stability, two parents who loved it, who would put it before anything else, before their own ambitions and duties.

Zafir and she couldn’t even bear to look at each other without distrust.

Panic unfurled its fangs, and she felt woozy again.

“Just breathe, Ms. Hamby,” the doctor said, and Lauren let that crisp tone wash over her, glad to have someone tell her what to do.

As her breathing became normal again, a little flicker of something else crept in. She shoved her top away under the cotton sheets and splayed her fingers on her stomach. A tiny life was breathing inside her, and it felt as though it breathed courage into her.

A baby.

Her job as an ER nurse at an inner-city hospital in Brooklyn consumed every ounce of her energy, both physical and emotional. Christ, she had never even had a normal boyfriend.

She saw and dealt with unwed, single mothers and their difficulties on a day-to-day to basis. That gritty reality coupled with her own childhood had made at least one thing clear in her head. She’d never wanted to bring a child into the world that couldn’t have the love of both parents.

“Is everything okay with the...baby?” she said, her thoughts steering in another direction suddenly.

Dr. Hasan smiled, as though reassured of Lauren’s mental state. “It is very early in the pregnancy, I’m assuming. As far as your health, you’re fine. But you’re dehydrated and I suspect your iron content is low. Nothing that a week’s rest and nutritious food wouldn’t cure, though.”

Lauren nodded, feeling a little calm. As much as she hated staying within a ten-mile radius of Zafir, she wasn’t going to take any chances. She’d stay a week and then fly back to New York on her originally scheduled flight.

She needed to sort out her life, and she couldn’t do that here. Once she was back in her own city, adjusted to this new change, then she would tell him.

“Are you friends with Zafir?”

Deep pride filled the doctor’s eyes. “Yes, Zafir... I mean, His Highness and I have known each other since childhood.”

So Farrah was not only his staff but one of his friends. A week was a long time surrounded by people who worshipped the ground Zafir walked on. “But as your patient, I have your discretion?”

She frowned. “Yes, of course, Ms. Hamby.”

“Please call me Lauren.” She tugged the sheet up and clasped her hands on top of it. “I need you to keep...this,” she said, as her fingers fluttered over her stomach, “between you and me, Dr. Hasan.” A part of her flinched at the lie she was spouting with such little effort. “It doesn’t concern Zafir and I would like to keep it that way.”

A frown furrowed the doctor’s forehead. “Of course, it’s not something I will disclose to anyone. But if—”

Lauren turned away from her questions. It was better for everyone concerned if she said very little right then.

* * *

Zafir signed the last file with satisfaction and pushed it into the pile for his assistant. This was one of his pet projects, a plan sanctioning the money to upgrade the existing women’s clinic on the outskirts of the city for the tribes that still resided in the desert and constantly faced the challenge of bringing their women into the city for medical care.

He stood up from the massive oak table and walked toward the liquor cabinet. He poured himself a glass of whiskey and drank it straight. It burned a fiery path through his throat and gut but did nothing to curb the seething mass of frustration. Knowing that Lauren was in the palace, just in reach, was messing with his self-control.

Tariq’s death had put an end to their affair, but he had not forgotten the mindless pleasure he had found in her arms.

The man he was in Behraat couldn’t have an affair without courting undue scrutiny from the High Council and more importantly, the wronged people of his country. He needed to create a different image, put distance between him and the scandalous life led by Tariq. Yet...

Arif stepped into his office, a tiny camcorder in his hand. “We found the man.”

Zafir’s heart pumped faster, as if he was on a stallion racing against a desert storm. “And?”

“He gave us the footage, said he didn’t want to do anything to upset the balance of power in Behraat. As long as you give him an exclusive one-on-one.”

Perversely, her friend’s indifference toward Lauren’s safety riled Zafir while she had refused to betray him in any way. “He did not inquire after Lauren?”

“He did. I took him to speak to the woman. He was satisfied about her safety and a little curious about her stay in the royal palace,” Arif said, a little hint of his own dissatisfaction thrown in for good measure.

Excitement pulsed through Zafir. He pushed his chair back and stood up. “Say it, Arif.”

“Send her away, immediately.”

No other man would have dared to suggest what Arif had said. But his old mentor was nothing if not ruthlessly loyal to Behraat.

“Why?”

“That woman,” Arif continued, showing his distaste by not mentioning Lauren by name, “is trouble. Only two days and she has already...unsettled you.”

Zafir shook his head. “I walked away, in the middle of the night, without looking back. Hid my identity from her.”

All he cared about now, or ever, was Behraat. Yet, the same thought plagued him. Did that mean he was not entitled to even the little pleasures he wanted?

“She’s due a little anger.”

His gaze steady, Arif shook his head. “You cannot let anything distract you from your path.”

And what Arif didn’t say was that he already had. Frustration and anger mixed in with a healthy dose of unsatisfied libido swirled through him.

All he had ever done was to give of himself to his father, even though he hadn’t known it then, and to Behraat. And yet, in return, he would be denied such a small thing as the one woman that tempted him no end.

No!

“Should I live my life like a monk?” It was a question he’d already asked himself. And with Lauren within reach, the answer was becoming blurry to him.

“The best thing for your future, for the future of Behraat would be to find a suitable young woman, one who knows her place in your life and marry her. Cement your position in front of the High Council.”

A pleasant, traditional, biddable Behraati woman would never talk back to him, would definitely not even think of striking him.

That’s what the future held for him. But he was in no hurry to embrace it just yet.

Tariq’s wife, Johara’s portrait caught his attention.

Johara was delicate, stunningly beautiful, shy, the daughter of a member of a powerful High Council member. Someone like her was what he needed for a future wife.

Lauren, on the other hand, was the exact opposite of Johara. Tall and lithe, hardworking, tough, prickly, and unflinchingly honest.

She asked for nothing, made no demands of him, and had nearly killed herself with flu instead of asking for help once. She had few friends outside of her work at the inner-city ER, no personal life. They had been like two perfectly matched ships crossing each other at a port.

Yet she had come looking for him, had cared enough to mourn for him.

A dangerous temptation for a man who rarely allowed himself any personal attachments...

“My life is, always will be, about Behraat, Arif. No woman will change that. Or change me into something I never could be.”

But, for once in his life, he wanted to indulge himself.

She had made the choice to come, hadn’t she? After the brutal reality of the past few weeks, maybe Lauren arriving in Behraat was his prize.

Just the thought of her was enough to tighten every muscle in his body with need.

But first, he needed to make it right with her. And he knew how to do just that.

After all, there had to be some perks to being the ruler of a nation.

* * *

Lauren pushed the French doors aside and stepped onto the private balcony. Dusk was an hour away and it painted the sky crimson. She tugged the edges of a cashmere sweater tighter around her shoulders, feeling the chill in the air.

It was something that amazed her even after a week in Behraat. As hot as it got during the day, with sunset, chill permeated the air.

She couldn’t believe she was in the royal palace, home to the royalty of Behraat, with its various turrets and domes.

Landscaped gardens, water fountains, meandering pathways amid tiled courtyards, everywhere she looked, old-world charm, sheer opulence and unprecedented luxury greeted her. It was a setting straight out of a princess tale her aunt had read to her years ago from a book her parents had gifted her after another diplomatic stint in some far-off, exotic country, just like Behraat.

The quarters she’d been given boasted a large antique bed with the softest cotton sheets spun with threads of gold, satin drapes and the en suite bathroom with a marble bathtub was fit for a princess. Plush, colorful rugs snuggled against her bare feet, a vanity mirror framed with intricate gold filigree...everywhere she turned, the opulence of Zafir’s wealth, the sheer differences in their worlds mocked her.

Even when she lay down on her bed, there was the soaring ceiling inlaid with an intricate mural that cast a golden glow over the room. As though she needed a reminder of where she was or who she was dealing with.

She turned around and walked back into the suite. Restlessness and uncertainty gnawed at her, even though it had been a full day since she had learned of her pregnancy. “You’re a fully qualified doctor?” she shot at Farrah who hadn’t left except for a couple of hours.

Farrah looked up from her journal and nodded.

“It doesn’t bother you that he’s ordered you to play nursemaid to me?”

“It’s a small request from a man who saved me at my lowest without judgment, when...even my family had forsaken me.” She put the journal aside. “And it is clear that you are important to him.”

Lauren ignored the obvious question in Farrah’s words and shot one of her own. “Because he has jailed me here rather than one of those underground cells?”

“You misunderstand. You’re in Zafir’s private wing. Women are not allowed here. If imprisoning you was what he intended, he could have put you anywhere.” She paused as though waiting for the import of her words to sink in. “Here, he can be absolutely certain of your safety.”

Lauren refused to attach any meaning to Farrah’s revelation.

She walked toward the dark side table laden with exotic fruits and pastries. She picked up the elegant silver jug and poured sherbet into the gleaming silver tumbler and took a sip. Apparently, in Zafir’s world, silverware meant actual silverware.

The smooth fruity liquid slid down her parched throat blissfully. “The only person posing a problem to my safety is His Arrogant Highness.”

“There have been two attempts on his life since he returned to Behraat, Lauren.”

The tumbler slid from Lauren’s grasp, soundlessly spreading a stain on the thick Persian rug at her feet.

Lauren gripped the wooden surface, an image of Zafir dead instantly pressed upon her by her overactive mind. Nausea rose up through her, turning the sweet taste of the sherbet into bitterness.

That he might be dead was a reality she had accepted a few days ago. Yet having seen him, she couldn’t bear the thought of anything happening to him. She picked up a napkin and knelt to soak up the stain from the rug. “Why would—”

A knock at the door to the suite cut off her question.

A woman, dressed in a maroon kaftan and head robes that covered her hair, entered the suite. She had a silver tray in her hand, the contents of it covered by a red velvet cloth lined with gold threads.

Kohl-rimmed eyes stole glances at her as the woman spoke to Farrah. Her eyes wide, Farrah stared at Lauren and back at the woman. “His Highness wants to see you in an hour on the rooftop garden,” Farrah said, her gaze tellingly blank of any expression.

The woman stepped forward and stretched her arms. Lauren took a step back, unease settling low in her belly.

Her heart going thump-thump, she pulled the velvet cloth and bit back a gasp. With shaking hands, she took the precious emerald silk gown from the tray and unfolded it, the soft crunch of tissue wrapped in its folds puncturing the silence.

Thousands of tiny crystals, sewn along the demure neckline and the tight bodice, winked at her. A pencil line skirt flared from the waist with a knee-high slit in the back.

A dress fit for a princess, a sheikha, or a rich man’s plaything.

It would fit her like a glove, Lauren realized. Her gaze caught Farrah’s for a second, and the same knowledge lingered there. Her temper rising, she dropped the gown, feeling more dirty than she had ever felt.

The curiosity with which the two women watched her every move, every nuance in her expression, scraped at her nerves.

Were they coming to the same conclusion as her? A female guest tucked away in the High Sheikh’s quarters, on whom he bestowed gifts of the most intimate kind.

What kind of a game was he playing?

A sick feeling coursed through Lauren, settling in her stomach. She showed the velvet case no such care as she had done the dress. She yanked it open and stared at its contents.

A diamond necklace, with matching earrings and bracelet. The name of the top designer in gold threading on the velvet case was redundant to Lauren. She knew this particular design too well. Tears that she dare not shed choked up her throat.

He remembered her obsession with diamonds.

Every surface in her apartment in Queens was littered with brochures and catalogs from the top diamond galleries of the world. It was her guilty pleasure to spend a lazy evening in her recliner, going through the catalogs, marking the ones she liked, while in reality, she didn’t own a tiny pendant.

The diamonds glittered and winked at her as she closed the lid, struggling to keep a check on her unraveling temper.

Did he think she would be softened by this blatant display of wealth, that she would forget everything that had happened? That he could buy her off with expensive gifts?

The fact that he remembered her obsession plunged the stab of his betrayal a little deeper. Whatever he said now, whatever he did, she had to remember that he’d made the choice to cut her out of his life with little regret. That he’d suspected her of the worst.

She dropped the velvet case onto the tray on the bed. “Please instruct her to take it back, Farrah, and to inform His Highness that I don’t intend to see him. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever again.”

CHAPTER FOUR

LAUREN TIED THE sash on the plush thigh-length robe and walked into the sitting area of her suite. With another plush towel, she rubbed the wetness out of her hair. She would have lingered another hour in the marble tub, playing and luxuriating in the innumerable jets and settings, if she wasn’t scared she would turn into a prune. “That marble tub is decadent, Farrah.”

“I’m glad something in my palace gives you pleasure, Lauren.”

Husky, honeyed—his tone sent waves of sensation rollicking over her already tingly flesh. Her knees wobbled. She pulled her towel off her face, her cheeks tightening with heat.

Uncurling himself from the velvet armchair, Zafir cut a direct path toward her, his gaze traveling over her with a thoroughness that instantly put her on edge. Flaring with shock, Farrah’s gaze volleyed between them.

“Leave us, Farrah.” He threw the command without turning his thoroughly disconcerting gaze from Lauren.

“I have nothing to say to you that Farrah can’t—”

“I have,” he said, stopping a few inches from her. Farrah had already gathered her things and quietly exited the room.

His hair still wet, he smelled so good that her stomach did a funny flip.

In a light brown V-neck T-shirt and tight blue jeans, he looked sexy and approachable. Like delicious dark chocolate that she wanted to sink her teeth into. The shirt exposed the strong column of his throat, hugged the hard contours of his chest and muscled abdomen.

Her throat dry, Lauren tucked her hands at her sides and tugged her gaze up.

His tawny gaze glinted with incinerating warmth, a hint of mockery in the grooves around his mouth. It swept over her with invasive familiarity, lingering far too long over the opening in her robe.

Her pulse went haywire, a new kind of oxygen deprivation drying her mouth now.

She tugged at the sash holding it together, the soft silk burning against her overheated skin. His hand shot out to her cheek in a quick movement, too fast for her hazy senses to grasp. Every cell in her being pushed her into leaning into his touch and she resisted it. Just.

When he touched her, his movements were gentle, tracing the circles she sported under her eyes. “You look awful.” He said this in a tone that spoke of regret. As if it hadn’t been in his power to not hurt her. As if he hadn’t made that choice himself.

She stepped back. “Thanks for noticing, Your Highness, and for deigning to see me,” she drawled. “I should curtsy, but seeing that you had me locked up here for two days, I’m not in the mood. Instruct your staff to release me. I want to leave, at once.”

A frown twisted his brows and then smoothed down. Her hands instantly went to her midriff and that incisive gaze followed. She pretended to secure the knot of her robe, her fingers shaking. Heat flushed her from within when he moved closer again, triggering every nerve into a hyper-aware state, stealing rational thought.

“Stop that,” she said softly, suddenly wishing the dark stranger from that afternoon back. She wanted to be angry with him, she was, yet her body seemed disjointed from her mind.

He raised his hands like shields, a butter-won’t-melt expression on his face. “Stop what?”

“Looking at me like that,” she croaked.

“It gives me pleasure to look at you.”

She rolled her eyes, hoping that he couldn’t hear the thudding of her heart. “I fell for that line six weeks ago. Fool me once—”

His finger on her lips cut her off. She trembled all over, the simple contact breathing a firestorm of need all over. “Choosing that gown and the jewelry was the most pleasure I’ve had in six weeks.”

He had picked the gown himself? Her heart, if possible, skipped a beat, his words falling over her like sparkly, magic dust, ensnaring her senses into a web of intoxicated desire. How else could she explain the gooey mass in the center of her stomach?

“If you had worn it and accepted my invitation for dinner, I would have been even more pleased.”

“I...me...my pleasure, self-absorbed much, Zafir?” she mocked him. Something uncoiled in his gaze but her bitter words were the only things she had to fight him with. “Your gifts don’t mean anything to me except that you think you can buy your way out of anything. You locked me up here. Dinner with you is the last thing I want.”

“I wanted to make sure Farrah could take proper care of you. What is bothering you?” he said, steel creeping into his words.

“You’re kidding, right? Should I fall at your feet because you moved me here, because you threw some gifts at me? Three days ago, you accused me of conspiring against you and now...” She vibrated with anger and hurt, barely getting words out. “You talk to me as if nothing happened. I’ve had quite enough of you and this...place.”

“I would like to apologize for that. I knew that you weren’t capable of scheming like that.”

“And you came to this realization after getting concrete proof from David and not a second before?”

His mouth hardened and Lauren realized she hated this version of him. Every time he spoke or thought of Behraat, he became someone she didn’t know, someone she didn’t want to know. “I needed that video, Lauren. I have to be ruthless from time to time. Consider it one of the hazards of being the ruler.”

“More like the effect of being drunk on your own power.”

Instead of the anger she had expected, his mouth curved into a smile. His gaze moved to her mouth and she felt his perusal like a tingle. “Surrounded by my people, I’ve forgotten how outspoken you are.” He pushed a lock of hair from her forehead. “It was the first thing I noticed about you.”

Whatever she had been about to say flitted away. Pure sensation skittered over her skin. He cupped her jaw and pulled her close, the rough pad of his thumb rubbing her skin. “I brought Huma to the ER, you took one look at her, and demanded if I was the one who had given her those bruises. The way you looked at me with fire burning in your eyes...” His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down.

“You reminded me of a lioness I once saw in the zoo...ferocious and breathtaking.” His tone became molten, honeyed on those last words, a fire burning in his eyes.

“I have never in my life become so hard just by looking at a woman, ya habeebti.”

Wet warmth pooled at her core and she clutched her thighs together.

Torture, that’s what it was. And worse than being locked up. Because when he accused her of nefarious intentions, she could fight him, and despise him.

But when he spoke like that, with desire, with honesty, with nothing but that warmth, she stood no chance.

She tried to let her body go slack, but she had no control over her own muscles. All she wanted was to drop the robe and let him ease the ache between her legs. God, and he would...with those clever fingers, he would unravel so easily and efficiently...until there was only her and him and that fire between them.

“Stop touching me,” she finally managed, sounding breathless and shivery.

Forcing her back until the back of her legs hit the bed, he crowded her. His thumb moved over her lower lip, the heat from his body swathing her. “You love it when I touch you. In fact, while we were together, we couldn’t get enough of each other.”

“I used to.” She somehow pulled her sanity together finally. “Now all I want is to put several thousand miles between us.”

His gaze became hard, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “I thought you would have cooled off by now.” He spread his hands around, and the lack of economy in that movement betrayed his rising temper that his even tone hid. “Seeing that you assumed I was dead and I’m clearly not, I thought you would get over your shock and be happy to see me.”

“And that we would take up where we left off six weeks ago?” she yelled the words, masking the lump in her throat. The incredible arrogance in his assumption left her shaking, dousing her desire with the efficiency of an ice-cold bath. “I’m never going to get over it, Zafir.

“If I weren’t a...sentimental fool who jumped on a plane, we wouldn’t have seen each other again...ever. You made a deliberate choice to walk out of my life that night. Don’t act as though you care now.”

Her legs quaked beneath her when she meant to move away from him. She felt light-headed.

His arms forming a steel cage, Zafir picked her up instantly and laid her down on the settee. His forehead wreathed in concern as he studied her face. “Ya Allah, you were about to faint again. What the hell is going on with you, Lauren?”

She had let herself get upset by his gifts this morning and barely touched her lunch. No wonder she felt so weak, so vulnerable. She couldn’t do this again and again. She couldn’t let her child pay the price for her weakness.

Moving back on the chaise, she wrapped her hands around her legs. “I’m just hungry,” she whispered. He immediately picked up the intercom and ordered enough food to feed an army.

When he reached for her, she shook her head. “Leave, before the staff arrives.”

“Why?”

“Because you’ve already given them enough to gossip about. I would like to not become another dirty spectacle of your palace, Zafir.”

His jaw tight, he glared at her. “You are awful at taking care of yourself. I will wait until I’m sure you’re not going to collapse again,” he said, the frustrated anger in his voice snaring her again.

After everything that had happened that day, it was the last thing she wanted to hear. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“You had the most virulent flu two weeks before I left, remember? And it’s obvious you’ve not recovered from it. When Huma found you on the bathroom floor and called me, you looked like you were about to die. I literally carried you to the clinic. And here you are again looking like a ghost. What have you been doing, starving yourself?”

Shying her gaze away from him, Lauren drank a glass of ice-cold water.

She had been worried over him. But there was no point in reiterating what a fool she had been.

Instead, her thoughts moved to that evening he had taken her to the clinic. For a week, he and Huma had taken shifts, nursing her back to health, not leaving her alone even for a few minutes. By the time her friend Alicia had heard about her illness and arrived with chicken soup, Lauren had been halfway to recovering.

And when she had gotten better, he had come to her that evening, and dismissed Huma, a wild light in his eyes...

It was the last time she had seen him, the only time he had actually stayed over at her apartment in two months...

Her gaze flew open, her stomach twisting at the final nail in the coffin.

Zafir laid his hand on her forehead, frowning. “Do you feel faint again?”

She shook her head, dislodging his hand. “Huma knew, didn’t she?”

A stillness crept into his face. “Knew what?”

“She knew about us...that we were...” she forced the words out, killing any tender thought she had ever indulged in, “having sex?”

His expression became distasteful. “I do not discuss my sex life with Huma. But yes.”

“Did she also know you were leaving the next morning?”

He looked as though he was weighing his response and she wondered why when he had given her the absolute truth earlier. “Huma’s the daughter of an old friend whose life was in danger here. She was under my care in New York. I had to tell her that I was leaving, that I had made plans for her.”

Huma had left a week after he had. With a hug and something muttered in Arabic that Lauren couldn’t understand to her question about Zafir.

“Did she tell you that I had been worried?”

“Yes.”

She bolted from the chaise, fury finally, mercifully coming to her rescue. All this could have been avoided. It could have all ended in New York just as he’d intended.

She turned back to him, one last question gnawing at her gut.

Leave it alone, Lauren, a part of her whispered, the part that preferred to cling to delusion.

No.

Knowing the bitter, eviscerating truth was better than driving herself crazy for years to come with speculation. She’d learned early on, with her parents’ indifference, that hope was toxic, gnawing away at one’s self.

“Were you ever going to call, Zafir?”

Silence stretched between them, its cruel fingers shredding her patched up nerves.

“Leave,” she whispered.

He turned her around, his fingers gripping her tight. “It was a decision I made. But I did...regret the necessity of making it. It doesn’t mean I didn’t think about you in these last few weeks.” Arrogant features softened. “Stay in Behraat for a while, as my guest.”

She stared at him, her mouth hanging open for several seconds. They were mere words but she could already feel herself softening, traitorous desire whispering sweet temptations in her ears.

It seemed nothing had changed in how she reacted to his magnetic presence. After everything she had gone through in the past few weeks, she was ashamed to feel the thrum of excitement his words incited.

“No,” she forced the word out.

He trapped her again. Rock-hard thighs pressed into hers. Molten gaze hovered over her mouth and a low hum began to vibrate over her skin. “Why not?”

She licked her lips and straightened, fisting her hands. It was either that or touch him. God, how she wanted to run her fingers over his sensual mouth, lean into him and relish the heat of his body.

His hands crept into her hair and tugged her closer, his long fingers encircling her nape. Awareness shot through her like a surge of current. “You’re a workaholic and haven’t taken a vacation in forever. Besides, I’ve missed our Friday, what did you call them, movie and...make out sessions.”

“You’re serious?” she said.

He didn’t answer her question, only pulled her closer. It went straight to her head, making her light-headed with longing, shooting need to the apex of her thighs, drenching her in liquid heat.

How she wanted to close her eyes and let him take her to ecstasy once again. How she wanted to delude herself that physical pleasure was intimacy...that lust was caring...that she mattered and not just as a willing woman.

Fears and insecurities she had repressed for so long festered in that void. And she detested herself for feeling so much. “I can’t. In fact, if I never lay eyes on you again after tonight, it’ll be too soon for me.”

A vein fluttered at his temple, his grip tight in her hair. Her pulse hammered, her insides feeling as though she had taken a vertical leap.

“You’re a liar.” His mouth hovered mere inches from her, his breath brushed her skin in a featherlight touch, teasing. “Do you have any idea how I long to possess you again? How much I need you, Lauren?” His gaze came alive, his words low and husky. “And if I kiss your luscious mouth, can you honestly say you’ll stop me? Can you deny us both the pleasure we want so much?”

Lauren shook her head, knowing everything she felt was reflected in her eyes. A grim satisfaction shadowed over his face, its razor edge mocking her feeble defenses.

“No. I’ll admit that I’ll enjoy the sex as much as you do. I’ll go as far as to say you’re the best lay I’ve ever had,” she said, hungry to see his smooth charade fracture.

Thunder danced in his gaze, his razor-sharp cheekbones streaked with color. Even as he knew that she had had one lover before him, a boyfriend in college who had been more into his military career than into her.

“The best lay you’ve ever had?” he inquired silkily, the force of his anger all the more fierce for the leash with which he reined it.

“Yes,” she said, tilting her chin up with a recklessness she was far from feeling. “You’re extremely skilled and generous when it comes to sex.”

Reducing their affair to the crudest terms was the only thing that would save her. From him and herself.

“But I have to resist the attraction, the lure of self-delusion this time. Your power and the ruthlessness with which you wield it, the reckless indifference it affords you of other’s feelings, especially someone like me who’s all too willing to fall into your bed...

“How long before you decide that you’ve had enough of me, before you decide I don’t belong in your world? How long before, once again, you walk out of my bed in the middle of the night and have one of your guards throw me out without so much as a goodbye?”

An immense stillness came over him. Her breath hitching in her throat, Lauren waited. For something—for refusal, for anger, anything that refuted her accusation.

But nothing came.

His silence plunged her deep into a vortex of painful memories.

Discarded in the name of ambition and lofty goals, picked back up with no thought to her feelings, and discarded again. She couldn’t count the number of times her parents had hurt her.

The insecurity, the fear that she didn’t somehow measure up, her resolution to make no demands—a vicious circle of pain that stole every ounce of joy from her. That’s what she would bring upon herself if she succumbed.

Stepping back from him when every inch of her thrummed to be with him, it was the hardest thing she had ever done.

Her heart stuttered anew at the dark beauty of the man.

God, he was the father of her child, the first man who had made her feel so much...the first man for whom she had forgotten herself. And she...she had to walk away.

“If you truly respect me, leave now, Zafir. Let me leave Behraat.”

Even now, a fragment of hope flickered inside her, waiting for him to persuade her otherwise.

He stepped back, slowly, irrevocably and Lauren’s knees gave out under her.

“As you wish, Lauren.” That dark gaze swept over her face with a thoroughly hungry appraisal before he turned and marched out of the suite.

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