by Dani Collins
“Sounds like I’ll have time for dessert and a second cup of coffee.” She didn’t relax, still defensive even though his hands were settling, smoothing and massaging in a way that was kind of comforting, as though he wanted to offer and take pleasure in equal measures.
“Karim—”
“This is new territory for me, Galila. Don’t expect my ease with this to happen overnight.”
She let out a choke of humorless laughter. “Even though it was the deal you agreed to for that particular type of night? Are you just angling for more sex right now?”
His hands stalled. “Sex can wait until tonight.”
Disappointment panged inside her even as he sighed toward the ceiling.
“I can stand depriving myself. Hurting you so badly you won’t even look at me? That I cannot bear.” His hands moved again, reassuring now then clenching possessively on her curves. “This level of passion isn’t normal, you know. If you had had other lovers, you would know that and be as wary of it as I am.” He dipped his head forward so his mouth was against her shoulder, whiskers tickling her skin.
She considered that as she spooned yogurt into her mouth. He wasn’t offering her the open heart she wanted, but he was talking, at least. He had dismissed their audience. It was a small step, she supposed. One that allowed her to relax a little on his lap and enjoy the way he cradled her.
“You resent desiring me? That only makes me begrudge feeling attracted to you. That’s not healthy, is it? Are we supposed to apologize for the pleasure we give each other?” She set petulant elbows on the table while she scraped at her yogurt bowl, deliberately jamming her buttocks deeper into his lap at the same time.
His hands gripped her hips and he drew a harsh breath.
She sent a knowing smirk into her bowl.
“Do you understand what you’re inviting?” he asked mildly, opening his thighs a little so the shape of his aroused flesh dug firmly against her cheek.
“I believe you demonstrated that in great detail last night. Why do you think I’m so hungry? You’ll have to let me finish my breakfast, though, before we satisfy other appetites. Otherwise, I’m liable to faint on you. Tell me something about yourself while you wait. What was your childhood like?”
“I didn’t have one.”
She started to rise, wanting to shift back to her own chair so she could look at him and gauge his expression as he spoke, but his hands hardened, keeping her on his lap. Keeping her with her back to him, she suspected.
“I didn’t mean that to be an insensitive question,” she said gently. “I thought, well, I supposed you might have played with cousins when you were young? Perhaps traveled when you were finishing your education?”
“My university was the throne of Zyria. When I wasn’t with my tutors, I sat with my uncle, learning how to run my country. What did you do as a child?”
“Compared to that, it seems beyond childish. One of my favorite pastimes was learning pop songs. I have a decent voice and performed them for my mother’s friends. I’m good with languages, too, which was another parlor trick she liked me to show off. I rode horses with my brothers and we camped in the desert with family sometimes. My childhood was fairly ideal. My teen years were more challenging.”
“Why is that?”
She bit into the flatbread. It tasted like cardboard. For a moment, she thought about changing the subject, but maybe if he understood why she found his distance so hurtful...
“That’s when she began to criticize me. I became obsessive about earning back her approval. I spent a ridiculous amount of time learning about fashion and makeup, trying to look more like her, thinking it would please her. I asked her to make every decision from my shade of lipstick to the shoes I wore. I kept thinking she couldn’t disapprove of the way I looked if she made all my choices, but then she would say I was badgering her. Too needy. Everyone said it, my brothers especially. I felt like everyone hated me. It was awful.”
Her scalp tickled as he idly played with her hair. “Did she send you away to Europe?”
“I begged my father to let me finish my schooling there. I couldn’t take her moods. Even then, I was so careful to only be in the tabloids for good reasons. Helping a children’s hospital or whatever. Anytime I received good press, though, she would say I was upstaging her. Begging for attention. There was no pleasing her.”
She tried to twist and look at him, but he didn’t let her. He continued playing with her hair, lightly tugging, dipping his nose to inhale, breathing out against the side of her neck.
“How are we talking about me?” she asked. “Tell me what you like about ruling Zyria.”
“I like providing stability. No ruler can make an entire populace happy all the time. The best I can do is avoid war and ensure my people are not suffering in poverty. If they can eat and send their children to school, get the care they need and a new refrigerator when the old one breaks, then I am winning the game.”
“That’s true. You can’t make someone happy. Do you ever wish you had brothers or sisters?”
He didn’t answer. When she tried to turn her head to look at him, his hand tightened in her hair, preventing her. She gave a little shrug of warning, but he wasn’t hurting her. He didn’t let go, though. After a long minute, he answered.
“There are times I have thought my life would have been easier if I’d had an older brother and the responsibility I carry had gone to him,” he spoke with a hint of dry humor, but his tone was also very grave. “Perhaps a lot of things would have been different. I don’t know. But I can’t make a sibling happen, so there’s no point wishing for it.”
She waited, but he didn’t say anything else.
She pushed aside her emptied plate and sipped her coffee. When she set it down, he shifted her sideways so her legs were across his and they were finally looking at each other.
His face was impassive, difficult to read, but she understood him a little better. He carried a country on his shoulders and had for a long time. If he was lonely, he had made it his friend. That was why he was having such trouble turning to her.
Smoothing her hand over the silky hairs on his jaw, she said very sincerely, “Thank you for telling me that.” She pecked his lips with hers.
The light kiss turned his dark eyes molten. “Are you sufficiently rejuvenated?”
“I could be talked into returning to the bedroom.”
“Here will do.”
* * *
Karim had to be extremely careful with his inquiries, but he had learned more about Adir. In the three weeks since Zufar’s wedding, Adir had married Amira, the bride who had been promised to Galila’s brother. Rumor had it they were expecting.
An odd pang had hit him with the news. For years, Karim had been ambivalent about procreating. More than one of his cousins had the temperament to rule. Was it latent sibling rivalry that prompted a sudden desire to make an heir?
“What’s wrong?” Galila’s soft voice nudged him back to awareness of the view off her balcony as her scent arrived to cloud around him.
He glanced back into her apartment and discovered her maids had finally left them alone.
In another lifetime, which was mere days ago, he would have brushed off her inquiry with a brisk and conscienceless “Nothing.” He wasn’t required to explain his introspective moods to anyone.
But Galila’s slender arms came around his waist as she inserted herself under his arm. Her pointy chin rested on his chest and she gazed up at him. The pretty bat of her lashes was an invitation to cast off his pensiveness and confide in her.
“There are things I would discuss with you if I could, but I can’t,” he said, surprised to discover it was true. He wanted to confide in her. It was yet another disturbing shift in his priorities. “It’s confidential.” He stroked the side of his thumb against her soft cheek to cushion his refusal.
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br /> “Hmm,” she said glumly. “Bad?”
“Not violent, if that’s what you mean.”
“Trade embargoes or something,” she guessed.
Did not acknowledging his potential successor to Zyria’s throne count as an embargo? “Something like that.”
“You can trust me, you know. I know I behaved indiscreetly the night we met, but I’m not usually so reckless. That was a special case. With a special man,” she added, lips tilting into the smile that he fell for like a house of cards.
She hadn’t had a drop of alcohol since the night they met, he had noted.
She shifted so they were front to front and rested her ear on his chest, sighing with contentment. His hands went to her back of their own accord, exploring her warm shape through the silk robe she wore over her nightgown.
This was becoming the norm for him—holding her. He wasn’t a dependent man, but she was so tactile and affectionate, seeming to thrive on his touch, he couldn’t resist petting and cuddling her.
“I don’t regret telling you about him that night. Adir, I mean,” she murmured.
He stalled in stroking across her narrow shoulders.
“I’m glad you’re willing to listen. That I can trust you,” she went on. “I’m still so shocked by Mother’s affair and Adir. I keep wondering about Amira. How she even knew Adir well enough she would run away with him.”
He almost told her the woman was married and expecting, but she would wonder how he came to know it.
“Did you know her well?” he asked instead, resuming his massage across her back.
“Her father is one of my father’s oldest friends. She was promised to Zufar since she was born. I was looking forward to having her as a sister-in-law. And Zufar—you saw him on a really bad day. He can be gruff, but he would have done his best to be a good husband. I’ve asked him what he has learned of Adir, but he’s so angry, he wants nothing to do with it. I don’t know what to do. I want to be sure Amira is well and happy with her decision, but I can’t very well make inquiries without spilling our family secrets, can I?” She leaned back to regard him. “See? I am capable of discretion.”
“I’ll see what I can learn,” he promised, pleased when she grew visibly moved.
“You will? Thank you!”
He was growing so soft. He very much feared he was becoming infatuated with his wife, constantly wanting to put that light in her expression and feel her throw her arms around him like he was her savior.
He picked her up and took her to the bed, distantly wondering what she would say when he told her he had learned her friend was pregnant.
I don’t desire your children.
He didn’t know why that continued to sting when they made love so passionately every night. It was early days in their marriage and he ought to be pleased they were making love frequently without morning sickness or other health concerns curtailing their enjoyment of each other.
Still, as they stripped and began losing themselves in each other, he was aware of a deeper hunger that went beyond the drive for sexual satisfaction. Beyond his need to feel her surrender to him and take such joy at his touch. He wanted all of her. Every ringing cry, every dark thought, every tear and smile and whispered secret.
He suspected he wanted her heart.
* * *
Do I look pretty, Mama?
Galila was in the gown she intended to wear to stand next to her mother at the children’s hospital gala. This used to be one of their favorite events, but for months now, her mother had been growing more and more critical. Galila didn’t understand why.
She had tried very, very hard this time to be utterly flawless. Her gown was fitted perfectly to her growing bust and scrupulously trim waistline. Her hair fell in big barrel curls around her shoulders. Her makeup was light, since her mother still thought she was too young—at sixteen!—to wear it. Nail polish had been allowed for years, though. She had matched hers to the vibrant pink of her gown and wore heels, something the queen had also been arguing were too old for her.
She thought she looked as beautiful as she possibly could and smiled with hope, trying to prompt an answering one from her mother’s stiff expression.
Her mother winced and gave her a pitying look. I expect you to have better instincts, Galila. The green would be better and a nude shade on your lips.
Rejection put a searing ache in the back of Galila’s throat. She turned away to hide how crushed she was, waiting until her mother went back into her own closet before she reached for a tissue on the shelf and dabbed it beneath her eyes, trying to keep her makeup from running.
Why was her mother being so cruel lately? She stared blindly at the bookshelf, trying to make sense of her mother’s change in attitude. She used to be all purrs and strokes, now she was claws and hisses. Just like...
The object before her blurred eyes came into focus. It was a bookend. Two slabs of ebony with a bright gold figure upon it. A lioness. She stood on her hind legs, one paw braced against the upright wall as she peered over the top, as if looking for her mate—
* * *
Galila sat up with a terrified gasp beside him, jolting Karim awake.
“What is it?” He reached out a hand in the dark, finding her naked back coated in sweat. The bumps of her spine stood up as she curled her back, hugging her knees protectively. Her heartbeat slammed into his palm from behind her ribs, drawing him fully out of slumber.
“Nightmare?” he guessed. “Come here. You’re safe.”
She only hugged herself into a tighter ball, tucking her face into her knees, back rising and falling as she dragged long breaths into her lungs, as though she was being pursued.
He came up on an elbow, and rubbed her back, trying to ensure she was as awake as he was. “Are you in pain?”
“Just a bad dream.” She didn’t let him draw her under the covers, though. She pressed a clammy hand to his chest and pushed her feet toward the edge of the mattress. All of her shook violently, her reaction so visceral, his own body responded with a small release of adrenaline. He caught at her arm, ready to protect her against frightening shadows and monsters under the bed.
“What was it about?”
“I need a minute. Let me—” She left the bed and found her silk robe, pulling it on before she disappeared into the bathroom.
He was sleeping inordinately well these days, thanks to their regular and passionate lovemaking. The sated, sluggish beast in him wanted to lie back and drift into unconsciousness again, but he heard water running.
Concerned, he rose and followed her into the bathroom where the light blinded him. She had turned on the tap and buried her face in a towel to muffle her sobs. The cries were so violent, they racked her shoulders.
His scalp tightened. This reaction was off the scale. “Galila.”
She hadn’t heard him come in and gasped, lifting a face that was so white, his heart swerved in his chest.
“You look like a ghost,” he said. Or she’d seen one. He tried to take her in his arms, but she wouldn’t allow it.
“I’m sorry. I can’t—” Her words ended in a choke. She set aside the towel and splashed the water on her face, then dried it only to hide behind the dark blue cloth again.
Her desire for distance surprised him. Stung, even. He was used to her turning to him for the least thing. He liked it.
“What was it about?” he insisted. “Tell me.”
* * *
She couldn’t. She was barely making sense of it herself. She wasn’t even sure if it was a genuine memory. Dreams were pure imagination, weren’t they?
Clenching her eyes shut, she tried to recall her mother’s boudoir. Her bookshelves. Was it possible the lioness she had pictured so clearly had been conjured by the curiosity that was plaguing her? She wanted to know who her mother’s lover had been, so she was inventing
scenarios in her sleep.
Or was it real? The palace of her childhood was full of objets d’art. Masterpieces in oil, ivory, ceramic and yes, some were sculptures cast in gold. Could she mentally picture all of them? Of course not, especially the ones that had been in her parents’ private rooms. She hadn’t entered those much at all.
But she had gone to her mother that one afternoon, ahead of the children’s hospital ball. That was a real memory. She distinctly remembered it because the ball had fallen right after her birthday. The pink gown had been a present to herself, one she had been certain her mother would approve of.
None of that was the reason she could hardly catch her breath, however.
What if it is true? What if her mother had owned the other side of Karim’s father’s lion bookend? Did that prove Karim’s father had been her lover? Or was it a bizarre coincidence?
“Galila.”
Karim’s tone demanded she obey him.
She opened her eyes and searched his gaze, but couldn’t bring herself to ask if it was possible. How would he know? He’d been a child. And the suspicion was so awful, such a betrayal to his mother, she didn’t want to speculate about it herself, let alone put it on him to wonder.
What would such an accusation do to this tentative connection they had formed? She couldn’t bear to lose what was growing between them. He had married her to be a link between their two countries, not the catalyst for a rift that couldn’t be mended.
With lashes wet with helplessness, she said very truthfully, “I don’t want to think of it.” She held out her hand. “Make love to me,” she whispered. “Make me forget.”
He was too sharp not to recognize she was putting him off, but he let her plaster herself across his front and draw his head down to kiss him.
Within seconds, he took command of their lovemaking, taking her back to bed where they were both urgent in a way that was new and agonizing, as if he felt the pull of conflict within her. Impending doom. He dragged his mouth down her body, pleasured her to screaming pitch and kept her on the edge of ecstasy, then rolled her onto her knees. She gripped the headboard in desperate hands as he thrust into her from behind, but even after she shuddered in release, he wasn’t done. He aroused her all over again, his own body taut and hotter than a branding iron when he finally settled over her and drew her thighs to his waist.