THE SHEIKH’S VIRGIN HOSTAGE
Clare Connelly
All the characters in this book are fictitious and have no existence outside the author’s imagination. They have no relation to anyone bearing the same or names and are pure invention.
All rights reserved. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reprinted by any means without permission of the Author.
First published 2014
(c) Clare Connelly
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Website: http://clarewriteslove.wordpress.com/
Email: [email protected]
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CHAPTER ONE
“You, over there. You do not agree with me?”
Emma felt a trickle of danger run down her spine as she slowly raised her eyes to the all powerful leader of Amar’a, Sheikh Rafiq Al Sadini. His posture hadn’t changed. He sat, casually reclined, in the centre of the yacht’s luxurious saloon. Only a sixth sense alerted her to an inner tension. Like a spring, tightly coiled, and held in suspense. He was too still, too relaxed seeming.
“I asked you a question,” he repeated quietly, pinning her down with eyes as green and terrifying as a stormy ocean.
The full force of her hatred for this man made her body shake, but she fought to hide it.
Clearing her throat, she opened her mouth to speak. “I beg your pardon, sir. I’m not sure what you mean.”
His eyes narrowed. “You have two ears on the side of your head, do you not?”
Color stole into her lightly freckled cheeks. “Yes, sir.”
He let out an exasperated sigh. “Listening is not a crime. I take it you didn’t agree with what I said?”
Since when did the exalted Sheikh of Amar’a care what commoners thought? She bit down on her lower lip, casting about for something acceptable to say. In the four weeks she’d been working for the royal family of Amar’a, she’d never thought about what she’d actually say if she got the chance to confront him. In those four weeks, she had only seen him a handful of times, and this was the first time he’d spoken to her.
“Come here.”
She swallowed away the urge to decline. She might hate him, but she feared him more. Tentatively, she crossed the room, unaware of how her body radiated trepidation as she went.
Up close, he was more devastatingly attractive than she’d appreciated. Then again, Cassandra had impeccable taste in men, at least when it came to sex appeal. Her twin sister was blessed with all of the looks of the pair, and gorgeous men had always fallen at her feet. Emma straightened her back, knowing that she had to put aside her nerves if she were to have any hope of getting this bastard to own up to his responsibilities.
“Yes, sir?”
He shifted a little in his seat, unintentionally drawing her attention to the breadth of his shoulders. He was wearing a traditional white robe, but she knew beneath it was a honed, muscular body. He was a giant of a man, at least six and a half feet, with a rippling six pack and narrow hips. She knew this because he’d gone swimming the day before, and she hadn’t been able to avoid seeing how perfectly sculptured his body was in just a black bathing suit.
“Leave us.” He addressed the man sitting opposite; who Emma gathered was a high level advisor. She felt her stress rising as the man exited the luxurious chamber, then, the rest of the staff followed suit. She tried to catch the eye of her friend Becky but it was no use. Rats! She was trapped. Alone with the Sheikh.
“Please, sit.” Even his voice was sexy! Rich and deep, with the hint of an exotic accent.
In the normal course of events, Emma would have politely declined. But one did not simply decline an invitation to join Sheikh Rafiq Al Sadini, exalted ruler of one of the super oil-rich nations. She slowly eased herself into the armchair opposite, unconsciously toying with her pearl earring.
Her skin prickled under his steady observation. He made no attempt to hide his curiosity as he took in her red hair, pulled into the severe braid she always wore. Her face was passably pretty, with wide set blue eyes, pale skin and a sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose. But from then on, it was downhill. Unlike reed thin Cassandra, Emma was curvy in a way she had always hated. As the Sheikh slowly dragged his eyes down her frame now, she forgot to be ashamed of her looks; and she forgot to be furious with this lying rat. Instead, she felt an inexplicable pool of awareness in the pit of her stomach. It caught her totally by surprise. She had taken this job purely to confront this man. The last thing she wanted was to feel desire for one of her sister’s ex-lovers. Especially this one, who’d so callously broken her heart.
“What is your name?” The sheikh had finished his inspection and now fixed his gaze squarely on her face.
She straightened her glasses, wishing, out of nowhere, that she had bothered to put her contact lenses in that morning. “Emma.”
“Emma What? Do you have a surname?”
She bit down on her lip. Would it tip him off? Curious, despite the certainty she was playing with fire, she nodded. But butterflies were waging war with her body. At least a million butterflies, surely, were zipping around her insides, making it difficult to focus. His lips were so full. It was the kind of detail you only noticed up close, but now, she couldn’t stop staring at them. Full and pink lips, set in a symmetrical face, with a darkly stubbled, very square jaw line, and even, white teeth. She shivered.
He spoke a word in a foreign language, and from the inflection and volume, she gathered it was a curse in his own tongue.
“Anderson!” She blurted out, her blush deepening. “Emma Anderson.”
“Well, Emma, what exactly did you take exception to earlier?”
She squeezed her eyes shut. She wanted to confront him, didn’t she? So what the hell did it matter if they got off on the wrong foot? “I don’t think you’re right to cut your foreign aid contributions.”
His eyebrows rose. “Would you care to explain why?”
“Not particularly,” she said with a dry smile.
“I insist.” His words held a note of warning that even she didn’t ignore.
“As you wish,” she said with an imitation of a shrug. She marshaled her thoughts together as best she could, recalling the conversation that had caused her to frown in disagreement. “Amar’a is a country of peace and wealth. But my understanding is that the rest of the region is politically instable. The funding you offer is building schools that help equalize society. It’s creating legitimacy in political systems. You have an obligation to help make the world a better place.”
He laughed, and it was such a rich sound that she shivered again. Her eyes flew wide as saucers as she stared across at him.
“You don’t agree?”
“Of course I agree. Unfortunately, your socialist view point does not tally with the reality. I’m not talking about reducing foreign aid. I’m talking about taking a tighter grip on how money is dispersed.” He dragged a hand through his hair and she realized he was stressed. There were fine lines around his eyes, perhaps even some dark shading, too, though it was hard to tell beneath his spectacularly tanned skin.
“Why?”
“Because, we have intelligence that suggests half a billion American dollars that we’ve sent to foreign aid has been funneled into organizations associated with terrorism. And that’s a price too high to pay.”
“Oh.”
“Yes. Does that wipe that disapproving little frown off your face?”
She stared at him, sure he must be able to hear her he
artbeat, even over the sound of the sea, lapping against the sides of the boat. “Do you particularly care if it does or doesn’t, your highness?”
Rafiq didn’t want to admit it to himself, but he’d been strangely annoyed by the waves of disapproval he had felt emanating from this woman. He’d noticed her several days ago, and every time he’d seen her since then, he’d felt a strange emotional intensity leveled at him. He was not used to being criticized, and certainly not by someone in his employ.
She could have been quite attractive if she’d tried. Her face was striking, and her hair the color of flames. But she seemed determined to downplay any beauty she could have displayed. Even the way she wore the uniform was strange. The fit was all wrong, too big, somehow, so that instead of looking like a woman, she just looked lumpy. And yet, there was a swan-like elegance to her neck. Her wrists were fine boned and slender. He suspected that beneath the navy suit, her body might be quite attractive, too.
Such speculation was beneath him and he suppressed it from his mind with the kind of mental discipline he was renowned for. “No.”
“No?” She stared at him, momentarily lost. What did he mean, no?
He seemed suddenly impatient. “No, I do not particularly care if you approve or disapprove.” He reached down to the coffee table between them and picked up a yellow legal note pad. “You may go.”
As dismissals went, it was pretty summary. Much as her sister’s had been.
The next time Rafiq saw Emma, she was polishing silverware and laughing with another member of staff. A young male with blonde hair and Hollywood heart throb good looks. Rafiq was simply walking past the galley and turned his head at just the right moment, to catch her as she let out the kind of laugh that spoke of true pleasure. For some reason, it made him restless, and he found himself hearing her laugh over and over again in his head, almost as if it were taunting him. That night at dinner, he found he was watching her, instead of paying attention to the conversation at hand. She was simply standing in the corner of the room, as a back up to the main servers of the meal. He was surrounded by officials and advisors, and yet he felt oddly overcome by a desire to clear the room with the exception of her.
The next morning, he woke early. The dawn light was just breaking over the horizon, and he stretched restlessly. He really shouldn’t linger much longer. Mansour wasn’t coming. He’d have to be an idiot not to realize that his brother wasn’t missing by accident. Mansour had run away. Even for the confirmed party animal of the family, it was a strange departure from his usual modus operandi. His disappointment as Sheikh was eclipsed only by his worry as a brother. Mansour and he rarely saw eye to eye, but he was kin, and Rafiq valued little else above blood ties.
He threw back the waffle print blanket and crossed the cabin, naked and virile. His tanned skin glowed like sun-warmed caramel. He pulled on a pair of jeans and strode out of his private chamber up on deck. It was deserted at this hour, as he’d expected.
In the distance, he could just make out the buildings of Athens, glowing in the pre-dawn light and looking as stately and imposing as ever. It made him homesick for his own beautiful city. For surely there was nowhere with a richer history than the capital of Amar’a, the ancient city of Agbesh? He had to give up this fool’s errand, and soon.
A noise caught his attention and slowly, he angled his head.
It was as if his dreams had conjured her from thin air. Emma Anderson. Dressed in the ill-fitting uniform, her hair in that silly plait she always wore, spectacles low on her nose. A breeze whispered past, brushing her plait against her cheek. He watched as she fingered it away, without looking up from her notebook. She was writing, he saw with interest. A pen poised in her hand, her face frowning with concentration. A trickle of suspicion iced down his back, and before he could think through the logic of what he was doing, he strode over to her.
“May I see what you are writing?” He demanded, in a voice suffused with cold power.
She physically jumped at the interruption. “Oh! Your highness!” She stood up quickly, holding the book behind her back. He wasn’t imagining the way guilt was etched in every line of her face.
“Your notebook,” he commanded, holding out his hand expectantly.
Her eyes were wide with panic, confirming his worst suspicions. She was a journalist of some sort. The Amar’an media were famously respectful of their royals’ privacy. But foreign media did not have the same ethical approach to news reporting, in his experience. And Mansour, with his endless parade of parties and scandals, did not help the situation.
“Why do you need to see my notebook?”
Unused to being questioned, he shifted his weight from one leg to the other.
“You do not ask me why. You simply do what I ask.”
Her heart rate doubled as she stood, staring at him. With hands that weren’t quite steady, she passed the notebook to him. But as his fingers wrapped around the worn cover of her Moleskine, she found she didn’t let go. “Please,” she looked at him beseechingly. “It’s private.”
Something in the way she looked at him so earnestly made him pause. “Are you a journalist?”
“A journalist? Lord, no!” She exhaled slowly, trying to calm her buzzing insides. “I am a writer, though. Strictly fiction. I was just putting down some thoughts…” She didn’t want to elaborate. She tried to keep as much distance between herself and her best selling nom de plume. Emma Anderson had always run as far as possible from the lime light.
His eyes bore into hers, brooding and assessing, and she felt that same slick of desire in her abdomen. Heat coursed through her as she stared up at him, noting the way the breeze ruffled his jet black hair. He really was spectacularly attractive, in that very macho kind of way.
Finally, he released his hold on the notebook. “Fine.”
He turned on his heel and walked away, leaving Emma standing there, a puddle of sensation with a frantically churning heart. She wanted to scream at him, but there was something so naturally authoritative about him that, frankly, she was scared into silence whenever he was nearby. Oh, she felt like a traitor to her sister. She couldn’t have imagined that, when the opportunity presented itself, she still hadn’t spoken her mind to this big, muscled jerk. Every moment she didn’t confront him, and tell him what she thought of him, was one moment too late.
“Emma!” Becky came bounding into their bedroom later that morning, her pretty face crinkled into a smile. Becky was the sort of person who should be working on a yacht like this. She was pure beach-girl beauty, with a deep tan, sun-bleached hair, eyes like a cat, and an athletic body that, when the Sheikh was not in residence, she displayed in just a bikini, day in, day out. Becky had hired Emma (after about a thousand security and background checks), and from that first day, she’d tried to get the other girl to lighten up, but Emma just couldn’t shake her bookish nature.
“Emma, guess what?”
Emma scanned the rest of the paragraph and then placed her finger in the page, lifting her eyes to Becky. “Mmmm?”
Becky’s whisper was thick with excitement. “Em, His Royal Hotness wants to see you!”
Immediately, that sense of dangerous attraction thudded through her, and she had to remind herself that this man was a total ass. The worst kind of bastard. She’d seen for herself just what he was capable of, and somehow, she was going to make him pay.
“Do you know what for?” She asked, dog-earing her book and laying it aside.
“I haven’t the foggiest, but I’d run right there, if I were you. Oh, he’s so yummy! I wish I could go in your place…”
“So do I,” Emma said under her breath as she pushed up off the bed.
She tried to regain the sense of purpose she’d brought with her to the boat. Her sister’s future and happiness lay in her hands and she just had to find a way to get over her nerves. Sure, he was impossibly gorgeous – her sister had an eye for men who could make you melt with one look – but Emma had always valued integrity and s
trength of character over more physical concerns.
When she reached his room, the door was slightly open, but nonetheless, she knocked.
“Come.” His voice was unmistakable. He had a regal authority at all times. As if she weren’t nervous enough. Summoning her fury and wearing it as a cloak of confidence, she took two steps into the room. And froze. He was lying on the bed, a newspaper in hand, wearing only a pair of jeans. The same jeans he’d been wearing on deck earlier that day.
She gulped down the flood of desire and forced herself to square her shoulders. “You wanted me, sir?”
He did want her, he realized with consternation. She was nothing like the women he usually went for, but there was a strange magnetism between them. He was half tempted to act on it. He probably would have, except there was an inherently dangerous quality to this woman. Something about her particular type of bewitching appeal that made him think she would be trouble. Besides, she really was not his type. He regarded her speculatively, thinking again, what a travesty it was the she chose to hide her body in a suit that was at least one size too big for her.
“Emma, for God’s sake, come in. You have a habit of looking like I’m going to eat you alive and frankly, it’s getting on my nerves.”
And because his words sparked more of that strange fire inside of her, she gritted her teeth. “Sir, I was in the middle of something. Was there a particular reason you summoned me?”
And just like that, rational thought fled from his brain.
He stood and walked, with a panther-like grace, to shut the door. He moved, so that he was standing directly in front of her, so close that they were almost touching.
He could feel the way her breath was labored. The way it made her breasts rise and fall in a steady rhythm. And the last modicum of common sense he possessed evaporated. She had the largest eyes he’d ever seen in real life. Huge and round, with thick black lashes. If he’d been presented with a photograph of them, he would have said they’d been computer generated.
The Sheikh's Virgin Hostage: Seducing her was never part of the plan... Page 1