“Sir, it might be better for you to hold off for a few days. Allow us to work with him.”
“No. I will come tomorrow. You know drugs, but I know Ra’if. He needs to know I am here, even though he appears to wish otherwise. He needs me.”
Zamir squared his shoulders.
He would be there for his brother. For as long as it took.
* * *
Twenty two years earlier
“It’s okay, Zami,” Ra’if crept into bed beside his brother and pulled his arms gently, so that the smaller boy was sitting. His eyes were red from crying and his lip was quivering. “It’s okay. It’s all okay. It was just a nightmare.”
“No,” Zamir shook his head. “It was not a bad dream; it was a good one.”
Ra’if understood. His brother had been dreaming of their mother. Dreaming of a time when she was alive and with them. “She is still here,” he lifted a hand to Zamir’s heart, and then his forehead. “Everything she was is still within us.”
“Just go away,” Zamir sobbed, thinking he didn’t want his mother in his heart or mind. He wanted her! To feel her arms wrapped around his little body, to hear her words whispering in his ear.
“No. You can cry and you can scream, but I’m going to stay here because I’m your brother, and that’s what brothers do. I’m not leaving you, Zami.”
CHAPTER THREE
Her phone rang at one forty seven exactly. She squinted at it and then pushed up onto her elbows.
She would have put a million dollars on who the caller was.
Zamir.
The man who had brooded silently the whole drive back from the desert, and then walked away from the car without so much as a look of thanks or acknowledgment in her direction, was beckoning her again.
Olivia had half a mind to ignore his call.
Except that her job was to be what he needed, and she knew, without a shadow of doubt, that he needed her.
“Good evening, sir,” she said on autopilot.
“Good morning,” he responded.
“Let me guess,” she was already standing and pulling pants over her slender legs. “You would like some tea and conversation.”
He was quiet. “Actually, I would like something much stronger.”
Than what? Tea or conversation? She squeezed her eyes shut in an attempt to block out the distracting thought.
“Of course, sir.” She disconnected the call and finished dressing, then slipped out of her room.
He was waiting inside the door, when she arrived at his suite. “Good morning.”
“Oh!” She was surprised to see him so close. “Hello.”
He looked at her for a long time, and Olivia didn’t feel comfortable to say or do anything. There were times when he resonated with the power of majesty that was inherent to his upbringing; this was one of those times. He was regal and commanding; a true prince.
“I rarely drink,” he said finally.
“Nor do I,” Olivia said, thinking guiltily of the penchant she had for exceptional champagne and fine scotch. “Okay, that’s not completely true.” She smiled at him nervously. “I don’t ever drink while I’m working.”
His expression was distracted. “Make an exception.”
“Oh.” She put aside her awe at his royal persona and looked at the man instead. “You’re upset.”
His expression was a thundercloud before he suppressed it. “No.”
“Yes,” she contradicted softly. “Why don’t you tell me about it?”
He shook his head. “Because I don’t want to,” he said finally, but the long pause made her doubt he knew what he wanted.
“Fine. Then let me make you a tea …”
“I don’t want a damned tea,” he snapped. His eyes clung to her lips and he knew then that he wanted her. He wanted to make love to her until all thoughts of his brother’s addiction and fall-from-grace were erased from his consciousness. He wanted to make love to her until only pleasure filled his body.
“What do you want?” She asked huskily, as though perhaps she’d read his mind.
“Let’s start with a scotch.”
Olivia had worked for enough clients who drank scotch to know that nothing in the mini-bar would answer his tastes. She moved silently to the receiver and placed a call to the desk downstairs. With a few words, she’d ordered a bottle of their oldest liquor, then turned back to face Zamir. “It’s on its way.”
He nodded. He had known, from the first moment he met her, that she was beautiful. But he hadn’t understood how desirable she was. He moved with a slow purposefulness towards her. Or was it just that he needed human contact, and she was there? Did he care that it might cause problems? Did he care that it might confuse her? He wasn’t sure he did.
“You have worked for Thomas Ellery,” he said, confusing her with his swift change of subject. He stopped walking only an inch from her. He was so close she could see every lash that framed his eyes in detail.
“Yes,” she said. It was a matter of public knowledge; he had been one of her highest profile clients, and she’d been photographed with him frequently.
“He is known for his interest in women,” Zamir drawled thoughtfully.
Olivia blinked and lowered her eyes, fanning her lashes across her cheeks.
“And before him, there was Cy Yates,” he murmured, referring to the lead singer for the hottest boy-band in the world.
She nodded again.
“And there has also been Andre Filipe, Mark Batterington, and Will Shiffer.”
“Yes,” she would have stepped back, except the desk was right there, pressing against her rear.
“Mostly men.”
“Several women, too,” she said, forcing herself to meet his eyes.
“Men who live a fast lifestyle. Who bed women for sport.”
She felt her pulse quiver at his assessment. “I wouldn’t say that.”
“Men who are used to getting what they want,” he continued thoughtfully, as though she hadn’t spoken.
She shrugged. “As are you.”
“Very true,” his laugh should have been a warning. “And did these men ever want more from you than your professional services?”
Olivia felt her chest squeeze tightly. Some had. Most had seen her as a convenience and only that. Of course, the curse of her generous curves meant all men stared, not just her clients. She’d become used to that.
“Only my professional services are ever on offer,” she said, her voice thick with caution.
“You mean to say that these men didn’t try to entice you into their beds too? To add you to the list of women they’ve slept with?”
Olivia side-stepped him now. It was a matter of self-preservation. “What they did or didn’t attempt is none of your concern. I would never do that, anyway.”
“Do what?” He followed her, his expression thick with the maelstrom of feelings he was navigating.
“Sleep with a client,” she hissed, then took a deep breath and forced herself to stop walking. She almost bumped into him.
“Or drink with one,” he said ironically, for he fully intended to share a scotch with this woman, if not his bed.
As if on cue, one of the security guards appeared at the door, followed by a member of hotel staff. The bottle was mid-size, over forty years old, and the label was gold with swirling black writing.
“Thank you,” she said brusquely and took the bottle from the tray. “We have glasses. You can go.”
Both the hotel concierge and security agent disappeared almost instantly.
“I will not drink with you, either,” she said when they were alone.
“Then I’ll have tea.”
She unscrewed the top of the bottle. It was the fourth of its kind she’d opened, and each time she’d marvelled at a single container of alcohol being worth more than fifty thousand dollars.
She pulled a glass from the bar and poured it neat. She handed it to him without speaking and he took it with both hands, his e
yes moving beyond her to the view of the city beneath them.
“Why do you care?”
“Care?” The smell of the scotch was magnificent.
“About my previous clients.”
His lips lifted derisively. “I don’t particularly.”
“Then why ask about them?”
“Because, Olivia, right now, I want to be distracted and I don’t think just talking to you is going to cut it. Frankly, I’d like to put your delightful lips to better use.”
Her mouth dropped and she spun around, unable to look at him. It was her fantasy come true, and yet it wasn’t. It was sexy and sleazy in equal measure. When she spoke her words were ragged. “Are you actually propositioning me?”
“I highly doubt I am the first man to do so.”
He wasn’t, it was true. But he was the first man she’d really wanted. The first man she’d fantasised about.
“Wow.” She blinked her eyes shut, and so didn’t see Zamir move to her. She felt his body right behind her; his strong, firm body, and she shivered. She knew she should move away.
He placed the glass onto the coffee table beside them and then put both of his hands on her shoulders. He ran his fingers down her arms, and then back to her shoulders. He felt her shiver at his touch and he smiled. It was almost too easy.
For the past two years, Zamir had been careful. He’d had lovers, of course, but he’d selected them with great thought, to ensure their affairs would not reach the headlines. Prior to that, when Ra’if had been heir and Zamir had been less in the spotlight, he’d enjoyed indulging his libido whenever it pleased him.
And in that moment, he craved to indulge it with Olivia Henderson. Seducing her would not be difficult. But working with her afterwards might be. He pushed the concern aside.
He wanted her. And he somehow knew she would blot out the pain of the day from his mind.
“It is only sex,” he whispered in her ear, before pressing his kiss to the sensitive flesh at the base of her neck.
Olivia froze. Only sex? There was no such thing.
She had to be strong. It was imperative.
“I want only this,” he murmured, lifting her shirt so that he could touch her flat stomach. She moaned softly as his hands crept upwards, to cup her breasts. Her nipples were taut against the lace fabric of her bra and he teased them with his fingers. He moved one hand to hers, and guided it to touch his rock-hard arousal. “And this,” he moved his hips and felt her shudder again.
He spun her in his arms, so that she was facing him, and he pressed his body firmly to hers, so that she could feel what his pleasure would be like. Her lips were parted, her pupils enormous in her face. He took her mouth with his, kissing her passionately and desperately. His intensity was a plea; he knew she could make him forget. He was begging her to.
He pushed at her shirt and it came apart, revealing her beautiful breasts, held firm by the fabric bra, and his ache for her grew.
Olivia was drowning in a sea of desire; it was churning her and making her forget everything she should feel and do. She kissed him back, because in that moment it was what she wanted more than anything in the world. Her hands, though, had other ideas and they tangled in his hair, and curled around his neck.
He began to unzip her pants, and it was then that Olivia froze. This was completely wrong. If she didn’t press pause on what was happening, it would be too late. Both of them would be lost to the swarming hive of sensation. She stepped away from him, shaking with lust and panic.
“I’m not …” she pressed her hands into her hips, but his eyes were drawn to the roundness of her curves and she regretted it instantly. Her shirt was across the room. She walked to it quickly and pulled it on roughly. It messed her hair.
Zamir was watching without reacting, and that only angered Olivia more. “I’m a personal concierge. Not a hooker.” She straightened her spine and sent him what she hoped was her most withering look. “Of course, if you want to have meaningless sex with someone you don’t know, I’d be happy to find an escort for you.” She moved past him with as much dignity as she could muster.
Zamir, for the first time in his life, was being rejected. And it set off an prickling sense of shame in him.
“Olivia,” his voice was a harsh command. She stopped walking and looked at him, but mutiny was writ large on her face. Hurt glowed in her eyes.
He felt anger, and it was all directed at himself. “I shouldn’t have done that.” He grimaced. “I was rude and inappropriate. It won’t happen again.”
Regret was unmistakable. She forced a small smile to her face but it was obviously a mask. “Fine. It’s fine.” Her heart was still pounding.
“No, it’s not. I was going to use your utterly delightful body to forget my problems, and believe me, I wouldn’t have cared that I was using you if you had acquiesced.”
Coldness spread through her veins like ice on a lake. “Do you do that often, then?” She pushed the question back on him.
“Not really.” He wasn’t childish enough to tell her it wasn’t her business. For it was, now. He’d inadvertently given her access to more of his private life than he’d intended to share.
“So you’re saying I’m the first woman you’ve propositioned for sex in the middle of the night?”
His laugh was soft. “In a manner of speaking.” His eyes drifted down her body and then lifted back to her face.
And Olivia knew why. People, men particularly, took one look at her and jumped to all the wrong conclusions. She had the misfortune of having been built like a playboy centrefold, and she had an outgoing nature. Therefore, she had to be a slut with a capital S. Only Olivia wasn’t. She’d always drawn the wrong kind of guy. Men who obviously wanted her body and didn’t much care for what was in her mind. As a result, she’d never got beyond a first date with any of them.
As for sex? Forget about it. Looking like a sex object made her loathe to become one. What would Zamir Fayez say if she revealed that she was a virgin at twenty four? Needless to say, he’d back away from her faster than he could say, No way in hell.
Why had he done it?
She knew there was something going on with him. The mystery visit to the desert facility had obviously upset him. What was going on? What was he keeping private?
It was definitely not her place to ask. And yet, it certainly wasn’t his place to kiss her and touch her as he had. “Sir…”
“Do you not think you might call me Zamir now?” He prompted with a mocking glint in his eyes.
“I …”
“You have touched my dick. I have felt your breasts. Please. Call me Zamir.”
“God,” she closed her eyes at his crude yet accurate assessment. “Don’t.”
He laughed. For reasons he didn’t begin to understand, he liked that he had shocked her.
The question she’d been about to ask died on her lips. How could she ask what it was that haunted his nights when he spoke to her like that? “Did you need anything else, sir?”
Zamir was very still. She wasn’t going to forgive him. And he couldn’t blame her. He was being deliberately crude. He was all over the place; his behaviour was beneath him.
“No.”
“Fine. Good night.” She walked away from him with a jangling sense of displeasure. Her body was frustrated and her mind was knotted.
What the hell had just happened?
CHAPTER FOUR
Whatever the building was, it was beautiful. Olivia sat beneath the enormous tree, the grass green and luscious beneath her, her eyes trained far in the distance, where the heat made the desert haze like an optical illusion beyond the thick grey fence.
Zamir had been inside for almost an hour.
Zamir.
Her heart stammered as she thought of him, and her traitorous body tingled in memory of his touch.
Why had she stopped it?
Why hadn’t she kissed him back and pushed her hands beneath his shirt, as she’d longed to? Why hadn’t she
wrapped her arms around his back and held him to her body, and let her fingers run over every inch of him?
Because she would have lost her virginity to a man who was a very, very inappropriate choice as her first lover. She would have slept with a man who needed a body – any body – and nothing else.
She pulled a blade of grass between her fingers, and it squealed a little at her touch. She plucked another, and this one she brought to her lips. The smell reminded her, strangely enough, of an Australian summer. The days she’d spent lying on her back staring up at the clouds, enjoying the heat on her limbs and the almost soporific sound of birds in the air.
“Miss Henderson.” It was Marook. She stood immediately, her smile broad despite the waves of confusion that had besieged her since the night before.
“Yes?”
“His Highness has just left the building.”
She stifled a giggle and the urge to modify his sentence into the famous Elvis reference. She was pretty sure Marook wouldn’t appreciate her sense of humour.
“Fine,” she nodded and fell into step behind him, as he cut back to the vehicle. They arrived only a few moments before Zamir.
His attention was clearly diverted. His eyes were looking just as Olivia had been, towards the sand that was visible far beyond the compound walls.
“Miss Henderson?”
Her heart flopped. “Yes, sir?”
His eyes narrowed at the use of his formal title. “I will require you upon our return.”
“Certainly, your highness.” Her breath was ragged; torn from her lungs. Did he want to attempt to seduce her again? To try to change her mind? Her heart leaped at the very idea. Would she be strong enough to refuse him a second time?
Her nerves were pulling tight; they continued to stretch as the car ate up the distance back to the centre of Vegas and the five star Infinity hotel.
She kept her attention on her lap. She didn’t dare try to catch his eyes in the side mirror.
By the time the car pulled up in the basement, she could barely contain her anxious excitement.
And she knew, of course, that it was excitement. The prospect of being alone with him, no matter what he wanted, filled her with a fiery sense of pleasure.
The Sheikh's Convenient Mistress: What he needed from her went well beyond the call of duty... (The Henderson Sister Series Book 2) Page 4