What she was doing. What he was doing.
What could happen here, if he was truly willing to let it. If she was willing to accept that the things she felt for him weren’t going anywhere.
“And what happens if I simply use you and throw you out the door tomorrow morning?” she asked him, breaking that simmering silence that had been wrapped around them since they’d left the French Quarter. “Like any other regrettable one-night stand?”
He looked even more dangerous then, with that sizzling heat in his dark gaze and that faint ghost of a curve on his mouth. He loomed there in that foyer as if, were he to shrug, he might bust it wide open with the force he exuded from every pore. Every inch of him the sultan, no matter that they were discussing the terms of a surrender she still didn’t believe he could make.
But seeing him here was educational. He was made to rule over the desert he came from, truly built for it. He belonged there with every sinew and muscle and bone in his tall, commanding body. Those wide-open spaces. That lonely sky, crowded only at night with the faraway stars. Nothing else could possibly contain him.
Certainly not an overly fussy foyer in a small Southern mansion, filled with cut flowers and darling vases Khaled looked as though he could shatter with his thoughts alone.
“Ah, yes,” he murmured, snapping her back to this minefield they were standing in. “Your extensive knowledge and experience with one-night stands. It had somehow slipped my mind.”
“For all you know, I’ve had one every night since I left you.” He didn’t look particularly concerned with that possibility, which, perversely, Cleo found insulting. “I have you to thank for awakening me to the joys of insatiable desire, after all.” She smirked. “Thank you, Khaled.”
That dark, narrow gaze of his invited her to keep going, to push him further and who knew where they’d end up—and Cleo’s pulse went erratic and much too fast and she could have sworn he knew it.
“You’re welcome” was all he said.
“You could at least pretend to be outraged at the very idea. Break something in a jealous rage. Say something obnoxious and faintly medieval.”
It occurred to her after she stopped speaking that she’d as good as admitted she’d done nothing of the sort.
“I would be more than outraged if I thought it was possible,” he replied silkily. “I would long to tear every one of your lovers apart with my hands and take out my darker feelings on your sweet flesh. But you didn’t touch anyone.”
Cleo couldn’t tell if she was stung or touched by that. “You can’t possibly know if I did or didn’t.”
“I know you.” The way he looked at her then was more powerful than a touch. Darker and deeper. Searing straight through her. “And for better or worse, despite your own preference I expect, you see nothing but me.”
She jerked as if he’d slapped her, then felt something hot and breathless spread through her. Leaving her flushed and much too close to wrecked all over again. And Khaled only watched her, as if he could see every tiny thing that happened inside her. Where had that serene mask of hers gone? How had she managed to keep it up for so long?
“I liked the fantasy,” she whispered, more to herself than to him. “You were incidental.”
But he was the Sultan of Jhurat. He laughed.
“You have accused me of a number of things tonight,” he said after a moment, walking farther into the house, his footsteps as loud as her own heart against the gleaming floors. He eyed the prissy living room to his left, then turned back toward her. Cleo realized then that she was still anchored to the floor in the foyer as if she’d become part of the antebellum furniture. “Think of this as your chance to use all those weapons against me.”
“This isn’t a war.” She eyed him, and reminded herself that she’d been brave enough to leave him. She could do this, too. “This is nothing more than sex. This has always been nothing more than sex, dressed up in your marketing campaign.”
She sensed his impatience more than saw it, and then he crossed his powerful arms over his chest. He’d never bothered to rebutton his shirt and so it simply hung open, that remarkable torso of his right there. It made it difficult to think.
“Sex is the symptom, perhaps,” he said in his gravelly way that lit a fire low in her belly. “But I think you know perfectly well it’s not the disease.”
“You called it a disease, not me. Remember that.”
“I remember everything.” And like that, he was all steel and menace, seeming to loom over her from across the room. “Everything, little one.”
“Don’t call me that.”
But it wasn’t because it was a condescending term, used only to put her in her place—which was what she’d told herself over all these long weeks as she’d tried to think Khaled out of her system. It was because, despite everything, she loved it when he called her that, as he had in the oasis. Something inside her flipped over and thrilled to it. It made her feel cherished. Precious to him.
She could hate him for that lie alone.
“As you command,” he said, with only the faintest mocking edge to his voice.
“Fine,” she said. “Let’s do this.” She roamed toward him with her arms crossed in front of her, only realizing as she drew closer that she was unconsciously mimicking his posture. Because he was the most commanding person she’d ever met, she thought darkly, and gritted her teeth. “Strip.”
His perfect brows, dark and naturally arched, rose.
“I beg your pardon?”
“You heard me.”
“How deliciously uncivilized, Cleo.” His voice was sinful, dark and bittersweet, and she thought she could easily have lost her way in it if the perfect plan hadn’t come to her then. “I didn’t know you had it in you.”
“Don’t make me tell you again,” she said boldly, and pretended she didn’t hear his low laugh.
And then he did what she’d told him to do.
Khaled held her gaze, direct and demanding even while he was the one following orders. He shrugged out of his shirt, letting it fall to the floor behind him in a simple move that called even more attention to the sheer masculine beauty of that chest of his, all of those flat planes and delicious ridges that she knew entirely too well.
And still wanted to taste, so much so that her mouth watered at the thought.
His hands moved to the waistband of his trousers and he maintained that simmering eye contact as he unbuttoned himself. He paused to kick off his shoes and then he thrust his trousers and the boxer briefs beneath to the floor in a single smooth motion.
And then Khaled was perfectly naked, standing there before her, and he didn’t look the slightest bit diminished.
It was Cleo who felt off balance.
“Excellent,” she said breezily, as if she often had naked sultans at her disposal, ready to leap at her every command. She walked past him with all the false confidence she could summon, heading for the flight of stairs at the back of the house and the master bedroom above. “Follow me.”
But she’d forgotten he moved like the night, so quietly she had to keep checking behind her to make sure he was there—following her with that narrow, hungry look on his fierce face and all that fire in his eyes—and she was all too aware that doing so did not exactly emphasize her position of command.
She strode into the master bedroom and then stopped dead in the middle, because she’d underestimated the effect it would have on her to bring him here. The bedroom was done in calming pastels and soft creams, and Khaled in the middle of that was...anything but soothing. He was far too male. Overwhelming. Too powerful to be anything but in charge, no matter what games they were playing tonight, and Cleo wasn’t sure what that tiny fluttery thing was, down deep inside her, that wanted to call this off. That wanted simply to throw herself at him and see what happened.
Cleo knew she couldn’t do that, or this really would be a one-night stand. Their last-night stand, and she accepted, standing there in a stranger’s bedroom with this dangerous creature who was her husband, that even though she’d left him that wasn’t what she wanted. It never had been.
Khaled studied her for a moment, the faintest hint of amusement on his face, and then looked around. At the graceful two-sided fireplace that dominated the far wall and led into the vast bathroom. At the French doors that opened out over a cozy balcony with only the lush garden below.
Not, she noticed, at the bed that waited there in the middle of the room, as if it hardly signified. As if, unlike her, he didn’t have one flaming hot image after another hurtling through his head and making it difficult to stand still. Or breathe.
“I know you think this is all about sex, but you could be in for a surprise,” she blurted out, as much to get herself under control as to focus his attention. “What if what I want is you performing acts of service in the nude, like a very large trained dog?”
He took a long time to look back at her, and when he did, she hardly recognized that light in his eyes. Pure, untempered laughter? But that was impossible. This was Khaled.
Though it warmed her in ways she hadn’t thought possible to see it. Worse, it made that small, unruly thing inside her chest swell.
“By all means, enjoy yourself thoroughly,” he said, and that same current ran beneath his words. It had to be laughter—and it was like a revelation. A bright hot wanting that sneaked into her bones and settled there. Like hope. “Demean me however you choose, if you feel you must. But there are always consequences, Cleo. You know that.”
She frowned. “I thought this was a gift. I thought you were surrendering yourself. You can’t retaliate for something you decided to do.”
“Can’t I?”
And it didn’t matter that he was naked and she was clothed then. He stared at her until she flushed too hot, and then was perilously close to a guilt she refused to let herself feel.
“Don’t pretend that should have some special resonance for me,” she hissed at him. “It doesn’t. I left because I had to leave. It isn’t the same thing.”
“If you say so.” But he didn’t stop looking at her like that, as if he saw everything. As if he knew things about her that Cleo herself didn’t know, and she couldn’t tell, any longer, if she hated that or craved it. Or even if it mattered anymore. “You have all the power, Cleo.”
“If you dare tell me I always did...” She couldn’t finish the sentence, and she was horrified to realize that she was shaking, and that that burning sensation in her eyes was the threat of tears. “You know that’s not true. You went out of your way to make sure it couldn’t be true.”
His dark eyes flashed. “I never said I wasn’t a bastard. I only point out that you were never as helpless as you pretend. You’ve always had control over me, Cleo. You simply never exercised it.”
“Because you never let—”
She cut herself off when he merely raised that aristocratic brow of his.
“On the bed,” she snapped. “Now.”
And that time, he really did laugh. At her, but it was still so beautiful it very nearly hurt. It poured over her like sunlight and Cleo wanted nothing more than to make certain he laughed again. Often. Always—
But that wasn’t why they were here.
She’d had the courage to leave him. She supposed, in a way, he’d given her that. If he’d never been so certain she could play the role of his wife, she never would have found it in her to imagine she could either—much less imagine they ought to have been more than the narrow little relationship he’d wanted. It was that Cleo who’d walked away from him.
She’d had six weeks to figure out that this wasn’t a change of clothes, this version of herself. This was who she was. And whatever happened next, whatever became of her battered little heart, she’d earned the person she’d become.
This was her opportunity to prove it.
He took his time walking over to the bed and stretching out on the colorful comforter. Cleo watched him, admiring the play of all that sculpted muscle, the sheer beauty of so much masculine perfection right there before her. Then, when she saw he was watching her, his amusement still so bright in that gray gaze of his, she pulled in a deep breath and started moving.
First she went to the chest of drawers that stood opposite the bed. She rummaged around in the top drawer and pulled out what she wanted—an old pair of panty hose and a light summer scarf. She carried both over to the bed and smiled down at Khaled, pretending she wasn’t seriously tempted to forget this half-cocked plan of hers and simply melt all over him.
“Losing your nerve?” he asked her, a quiet taunt that proved he really could read her. She decided to view that as a positive thing.
“Not at all.” She nodded toward the wrought-iron headboard above him. “Grab hold of that.”
He shifted, something she couldn’t quite interpret moving over his arresting face, but he reached above him and grabbed on to the iron as she’d requested.
Cleo pulled the length of the scarf taut between her hands and leaned in close, fastening his strong wrist to the dramatic curl of iron nearest it. Khaled’s other hand came up and grabbed hold of her high up on her side, his fingers just brushing the lower slope of one breast.
Her hastily indrawn breath was much too loud in the quiet of the room, and she had no doubt that he could see how fast and hard her heart was beating in the crook of her neck. That he could feel that instant fire in her, radiating out from the simple touch, making her burn everywhere, the way she always did.
She looked down. His dark eyes were glittering. His mouth moved—but he didn’t say anything, and she had the impression, somehow, that it cost him.
“Khaled,” she said softly, her gaze fast on his. Challenging, even. “Obey.”
* * *
He thought it might kill him. She might kill him.
Cleo was soft and close, leaning against him, her honey-colored eyes defiant and demanding, that distracting mouth of hers within reach—
But he was a man of his word, for all the good it had ever done him. He reached up and grabbed the headboard again, and then he lay there in what passed for obedience when every part of him was tense and hard, and let this tiny little woman tie him to her bed.
Because she wanted to do it. And he’d agreed to let her do what she liked, like the colossal fool he was.
“I had no idea you were so kinky,” he murmured, and she pulled the length of panty hose tight. Too tight.
Then only smiled serenely when he slid a dark look her way.
She shifted back away from him, admiring her handiwork for a moment. “I don’t think the faintest hint of bondage really counts as kinky, do you?” She laughed when she saw his expression. “This is the Big Easy, Khaled. The rules are a bit different here.”
“And what are these rules, exactly? They seem increasingly opaque.”
“The rules are what you said they were. Me in total control. All night long. Without interference from His Excellency, the Sultan of Jhurat. Are you ready?”
He was sure it would kill him, then. Without a doubt. Perhaps that was her goal.
“Do your worst,” he invited her, as if he was completely at ease.
He didn’t know what he expected her to do, but she only kicked her shoes off and then pulled her knees up beneath her, settling next to him on the bed. And then she looked at him for a very long, uncomfortable moment.
“Is this your worst?” he demanded, with perhaps a touch too much aggression. “Staring at me?”
“You might be in for a long night, Khaled,” she said, a faint hint of a smirk on her lovely mouth. “You’ve been under my c
ontrol for exactly three minutes and you’re already cracking.” She eyed him until he sighed in some version of surrender, and then she leaned a little bit closer. “I want to know why.”
A faint chill of foreboding moved over Khaled’s skin, then settled in his gut. He couldn’t keep himself from testing his bonds, though he didn’t break them. She watched him do it, and he thought he saw a sadness in her pretty eyes that nearly undid him.
It humbled him, certainly. And that made him lie still. Grit his teeth and take it.
“Why what?” It came out far gruffer than he intended, but she didn’t so much as blink.
“What happened between your parents, for a start?”
“You cannot possibly wish to know such ancient history. How can it matter now? My mother is dead and my father doesn’t know his own name.”
“This isn’t a debate, Khaled. Answer me.” She scowled at him in that way of hers that always undid him, with its total lack of the usual reverence he commanded. That he had missed so much more than he cared to acknowledge. “Or admit that you can’t keep your promise. That you can’t let anyone have control over you, ever.” She shrugged, and her voice was too casual when she continued. “Between you and me, I don’t think you can.”
Khaled had never before been so adroitly—or literally—hoisted by his own petard. He couldn’t decide if he hated it with every shred of his being or if he wanted nothing more than to throw himself at this woman’s feet and beg.
Not that he had the slightest idea how to beg, or what for.
This is madness, a voice inside him declared, but he didn’t care. He’d never been anything but desperate where Cleo was concerned. He’d lied to himself from the start—anything to have her, anything to keep her, anything.
Even this.
“My parents were madly in love,” he said after a moment, and he ordered himself to relax as he spoke. “My mother was a tremendous beauty—a great prize—and my father not only won her tribe’s traditional lands when he married her, but her heart in the bargain. It was, by all accounts, a tempestuous and passionate connection as well as a political one.”
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