by Abby Green
Knowing the reason why she’d always been shunned by her father wasn’t exactly a comfort. It only compounded her sense of dislocation. Isolation. Love had done this to her father—made him bitter.
In a way, discovering this had only confirmed her belief that love was not to be trusted. It made you weak and vulnerable.
If anything, she more than most should agree with a marriage based on the sound principles of practicality and necessity. She just hadn’t ever figured that she would have to put it into practice. She’d relished the prospect of an independent life. Free to make choices of her own.
Living in Europe for the past couple of years had given her a false sense of freedom. That freedom had been an illusion. Even if she hadn’t come back here to take her sister’s place, her family’s neglect and disapproval would have always cast a long shadow, reminding her of how unlovable she was.
Since her father had mentioned that her husband-to-be was the CEO of a luxury conglomerate, Liyah imagined him to be the sort of individual who gorged himself on rich food, beautiful women and vacuous pleasures.
She didn’t want to blight her last days of freedom—ha!—by thinking of a future she couldn’t change, so she hadn’t even bothered to look him up. Which she knew wasn’t exactly rational—but then she hadn’t been feeling very rational for the last week as the full enormity of what she’d agreed to sank in.
The water of the deep pool looked inviting and cool and she felt hot and constricted. Panicky.
She let the turban that had been wound around her head and face to protect her from the sand drop to the ground. She started to take off her clothes, knowing she was safely alone because no one ever came here. It was too close to the palace to be a stopping point for travellers. And the Sheikh—her future husband—had arrived just before she’d left, with an entourage. Not that she’d hung around to see him.
She undid the buttons on her shirt and it fell down her arms with a soft whoosh. The cooling evening air made her skin prickle. She undid her bra, let that fall too. She opened the button on her soft leather trousers—trousers that her father would never approve of as they were not feminine. Which was precisely why Liyah loved them. Apart from the ease of movement they gave her.
She shimmied them over her hips and then down her legs, stepping out of them. She pulled down her underwear.
Now she was naked.
Her horse whinnied softly. The sky was a dark bruised lavender, filling with stars. A crescent moon was rising. A swell of emotion made her chest tight. Would she ever be back here again? She loved this place. It was where she felt most at peace. Cantering over the sand with her bird high in the sky above her. Wild. Free.
Liyah stepped into the water, still warm after the day’s intense heat. It glided over her skin like silk as she walked in up to her waist and then dived deep, where the depths were cooler and darker.
Only when her lungs were about to burst did she kick her way back up and break the surface, sucking in deep gulps of air. It took a second for her ears to clear before she heard a man’s voice.
‘What the hell were you doing? I was about to rescue you.’
At the sound of the voice Liyah whirled around in the water to face the shore. Shock at the sight of the very tall, broad and dark stranger almost made her sink under the surface again.
His hands were on his hips and he stood in the shallows, the end of his long white robe drifting in the water. He had short, thick dark hair. His jaw was stubbled. But even through her shock Liyah could see that he was breathtakingly handsome. And powerful.
His eyes looked dark too. High cheekbones. A firm mouth. Currently in a disapproving line.
That line of disapproval snapped Liyah out of her shock. She’d had enough disapproval to last a lifetime. Her peace had been invaded. Her last night of solitude.
‘I don’t need rescuing.’ A thought occurred to her and an acute sense of exposure made her ask, ‘How long have you been there?’
‘Long enough.’ He sounded grim. ‘You need to come out.’
Indignation filled her at his autocratic tone, reminding her of how little autonomy she had over her own life. ‘I don’t need to do anything, actually.’
‘You’re going to stay there all night? You’ll freeze.’
It was true. The scorching desert temperatures fell precipitously at night. Liyah could already feel the chill of the water creeping into her bones.
‘I can’t come out. I don’t have any clothes on.’ Strangely, she didn’t feel unsafe, even though this man was a complete stranger.
‘I know.’
Liyah stopped treading water. ‘You did spy on me.’
Yet, strangely again, the thought of him watching her strip and dive into the water wasn’t making her feel indignant. It was making her feel...aware.
In the dusky half-light Liyah couldn’t be entirely sure she wasn’t dreaming. She could have sworn there had been no one else here when she’d arrived, but then, she hadn’t exactly checked her surroundings thoroughly.
When she looked over the man’s shoulder now, she could make out the shape of a tent amongst the trees on the far side of the oasis. And a horse. It whinnied softly and her horse answered.
‘You’re camping here?’
‘For the night, yes.’
His voice was deep. Deep enough to reverberate in the pit of her belly. He had an accent she couldn’t place. Mid-Atlantic, but with a hint of something else—something foreign. But also familiar to here. An intriguing mix. Yet she knew she’d never seen him before. He was a total stranger.
She should ask who he was, but for some reason the words wouldn’t form on her tongue.
And he was right: she couldn’t stay treading water all night.
‘I need something to wear.’ Her own clothes were scattered along the shoreline, but instead of going to pick them up the man reached behind his head and pulled off his robe.
Liyah’s breath caught in her solar plexus when his bare chest was revealed. Massive and tightly muscled, with dark hair curling over his pectorals and a dark line dissecting his abdominals to disappear under the loosely fitting trousers that hung low on his lean hips.
‘Here, take this.’
He held his robe outstretched to her from the shore. She swam towards the shallows until she could feel the ground beneath her feet. The water lapped around her shoulders.
She could see that the bottoms of his trousers were in the water. ‘Your trousers are getting wet.’
‘They’ll dry.’
Again, Liyah wondered if she was in a dream. But no dream she’d ever had came close to this. She started to walk forward, feeling the resistance of the water against her body.
The waterline dropped lower, now just covering her breasts. Liyah stopped. She expected the man to turn around, to show some respect. But he didn’t. He’d already watched her. Albeit from behind.
Again, it didn’t make her feel violated in any way—it excited her.
If she was being rational for a second, excited was the last thing she should be feeling. Scared. Wary. Insulted. Indignant. Those were the things she should be feeling. Yet she wasn’t.
She should also be asking him to turn around. But, again, the words wouldn’t form in her mouth. She was filled with a fire that made her feel rebellious and reckless. Surely just a reaction to everything that was happening to her—everything that was expected of her? But she had a sense that she was somehow regaining some control over a life that had veered wildly out of control.
She also had an overwhelming compulsion to go towards this complete stranger as she was. Naked.
She took another step forward. The water broke just over her breasts. Another step. Now her breasts were bared to the man’s dark gaze. She could see him more clearly now. His eyes were dark. His jaw defined. Tight. His gaze dropped. Her nipples were alread
y tight and hard from the water. They tingled.
She kept moving forward and the water lapped at her belly, then her hips, the tops of her legs and thighs. Between her legs, where the centre of her body pulsed with heat.
In some corner of her brain she was aghast at herself for behaving with such wanton confidence. She wasn’t this person who would allow a stranger to see her naked body. But here, in this place—this place that had been a sacred refuge to her for her whole life—she felt removed from reality. Removed from the confines of normal behaviour.
And this man was more than just a random stranger. She’d sensed it the minute she’d laid eyes on him. He held himself with the arrogance and confidence of a born leader. Entitled. Proud.
She stepped into the shallows and reached for the robe he held out. She pulled it on over her head, aware of that dark gaze watching as the fine material settled over her body, the bottom wet from the water.
The heat from his body lingered on the robe and made her skin prickle even more. Her breasts felt heavy. Tight.
‘Thank you.’ She sounded breathless.
‘You’re welcome.’
Strangely, even though she was covered again from neck to toe, she didn’t feel any more protected from that penetrating gaze. Up close, she realised he was even more magnificent. A virile man in his prime. Tall. Broad. With dark olive skin that gleamed under the rising moon, stretched taut over hard muscles.
He held out a hand and Liyah looked at it for a long moment. The air was heavy around her. Heavy with a tension that had nothing to do with conflict or conversation. It was a tension that came from the crackling energy between them. A tension that came from this whole improbable situation.
In all her years of coming here she’d never met anyone else. Ever. But tonight, on the eve of her wedding to a man sight unseen, here was this compelling stranger. She wasn’t usually prone to superstition, but it felt somehow...fated.
Tomorrow her life would change for ever, but tomorrow wasn’t here yet... There was a whole night between now and then. A whole night of tantalising freedom left. The last piece of freedom she would have for some time.
Before she could think about it she put her hand into his. It was big. Slightly callused. Something about that evidence of hard work thrilled her. His fingers closed around hers and he tugged her out of the shallows and onto the sand.
Sharif had wondered if he was hallucinating. If he’d conjured up the goddess who had disappeared into the black depths of the oasis pool. But then she’d emerged, like Aphrodite, dark olive skin glistening like satin as the water sluiced over her body.
She was no marble statue, cold and rigid and pale. She was all woman. Flesh and bone. Limbs long and sleek.
And the hand in his now felt real enough.
Instinctively his thumb felt for her pulse and it throbbed at her wrist, echoing the throb in his blood.
‘You are real...’ he said, almost to himself.
Even though she was covered again, her naked image was imprinted on his brain. For ever, he suspected. He had watched her disrobe, too transfixed to say a word. Her body was carved from an erotic fantasy he hadn’t even realised he’d had—strong and supple, athletic, but with curves that pronounced her a fertile woman in her prime.
Wide hips, small waist, long legs, lush bottom. And her breasts... Bigger than he would have guessed. Firm. Perfectly formed, with dark nipples that made his mouth water.
Dark tight curls at the juncture of her legs—he wanted to spread her there, see if she glistened...
‘I am real.’
Her voice, husky, cut through the fever in Sharif’s head. His hand tightened around hers and he tugged her towards him. He caught her scent—roses and earth and sand and heat.
The other thing that slammed into his awareness now, up close, was the fact that she was stunningly beautiful—and tall. The top of her head would graze his jaw. Dark eyebrows framed huge almond-shaped eyes. He couldn’t make out their colour in the light, but they weren’t as dark as his. Straight nose. High cheekbones. That dark olive complexion.
His fingers itched to reach out and touch her, explore to see if her skin felt as satiny as it looked.
But her mouth...
His avid gaze stopped there. Her mouth was beyond provocative. A lush invitation to taste and explore. To crush under his as he enticed her to give up all her secrets.
Sharif felt dizzy. He had met and slept with some of the world’s most beautiful women and not one had ever affected him like this. On a visceral, primal level. He knew that if he didn’t have this woman—
He couldn’t even finish that thought. He would have her. He had to.
Her thick, wild hair was wet, but he could see that it was already showing a tendency to curl again.
‘Where did you come from?’
A man not remotely prone to superstitions or fantasies, Sharif felt for the first time in his life as if the world around him wasn’t entirely...concrete.
‘I could ask the same of you.’
The fact that she sounded equally at a loss to explain this set of events was little comfort.
‘Does it matter?’
Sharif knew as soon as he asked it that it was a rhetorical question. They were here now. That was all that mattered.
She shook her head. ‘No, it doesn’t. Who we are doesn’t matter either.’
Sharif barely heard the thread of desperation in her voice. It was only afterwards that he would recall it. Long afterwards.
But right now he felt a weight lift off his chest and shoulders. For the first time since he could remember he was with someone who had no idea who he was. There was no preconception, no misconception, no judgement, no expectation.
‘Would you like something to eat?’
She blinked. ‘Yes...okay. I’d like that.’
Keeping hold of her hand, Sharif led the woman over to his tent.
The tent that was set up in the shelter of the trees was larger than Liyah had expected, but the man still had to duck his head a little to go in. He had to be six foot five at least. Tall enough to make her feel small. And she was used to towering over most people.
Men in particular seemed to find her height a provocation. But not this one. The way he’d looked at her so intently just now... Her heart hadn’t slowed down since she’d laid eyes on him.
Her eyes adjusted from the falling light outside to the golden glow of lots of candles. There was a table set up with food, and a place-setting for one. There was a bed in the corner, large and luxurious, with jewel-covered throws.
Liyah looked away quickly, suddenly ambushed by the memory of how it had felt to walk out of the water naked, with his dark gaze on her. She didn’t want him to see her looking at the bed. He’d already crossed about a dozen boundaries that, if her rational brain was working, she would never have allowed anyone to cross. Not to mention a complete stranger.
He let her hand go and went over to the chair and pulled it out. ‘Please...sit down.’
Liyah looked around. ‘There’s only one chair.’
‘I’ll find something. Please.’
It was so surreal that Liyah did as he bade, moving around the table to sit down. She felt him behind her, his hands close to her shoulders. Her hair was still damp. Heavy. It was too long, too unruly, but every time she got frustrated and determined to cut it she would think of the pictures she had of her mother, with the same long hair, and she’d lose the will to let it go.
Any memory or connection with her mother was so tenuous. And precious.
The man had disappeared behind a screen that presumably hid the washing area. And now he reappeared, taking Liyah’s breath away with his sheer physicality.
He had put on a plain white T-shirt and it made his dark olive skin look even darker. It highlighted the musculature of his chest, somehow mak
ing it more provocative than if he’d still been bare.
He put down a wooden stool on the opposite side of the table. For the first time she could look at him up close in the light and she was mesmerised.
He was breathtaking. His face was lean and sculpted, the low flickering candlelight casting shadows and making his skin gleam like burnished bronze. Hard jaw defined by stubble. Nose like a blade. Deep-set dark eyes. Fathomless.
His mouth was as strong as the rest of him, but wide. His lips were full, more than hinting at a sensual nature—as if Liyah hadn’t noticed that as soon as she’d seen him. He oozed a sexual magnetism that had stunned her as effectively as if he’d shot her with a dart from a gun.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to take the chair? That doesn’t look very comfortable.’
He shook his head and put an empty plate in front of her. ‘Help yourself.’
At that moment Liyah realised she was famished. In the stress of the last week she’d barely eaten, and she didn’t do well on low food supplies. The food looked...amazing. There was hummus and flatbread. Dolma vine leaves stuffed with meat. Succulent pieces of lamb with balls of spiced rice.
She picked a selection and put them on her plate. She heard a cork and saw him pour white wine into a glass.
He handed it to her. ‘Drink?’
Liyah took it, and watched as he poured himself a glass. He raised it. The candles imbued the whole scene with a golden glow that didn’t go anywhere near helping her to keep a grasp of reality.
‘Here’s to...unexpected encounters.’
Liyah lifted her glass. She could feel any desire to try to restore sanity, to remember who she was, where she was, fatally slipping away, to be replaced by a wholly different and far earthier desire.
She touched her glass to his and it made a low melodic chime. She echoed his words. ‘To unexpected encounters.’
He lifted his glass to his mouth, and just before he took a sip he said, ‘And what we make of them.’
CHAPTER TWO