The Sheikh's Reluctant Queen: The Sheikh's Destiny

If only. With this avenging archangel, she was safer in that arena than she was in her currently all-female environment. A depressing thought if any ever was.

He pressed the remote and the door opened with the whirr of a perfectly oiled machine, belying its weather-beaten appearance.

Before he turned away, he belatedly commented on her wholehearted assertion. “Interesting.”

You can say that again, she thought, watching the receding streetlights paint shadows across his back as he forged deeper into the darkness, a sorcerer becoming one with his lair.

He left the lights off. On purpose, she was sure, to rattle her. Punishing her for behaving so “inappropriately”?

Too bad for him it wouldn’t work. Not only did she have no fear of darkness, it was true she’d fear nothing with him by her side. Maybe they did lack some knowledge of one another that closer interaction would have fostered, but she did know the essential him. His essence had touched hers so profoundly that he starred in her very first memory.

Deciding to call him out on his efforts to intimidate her, she said, “Let there be light, Rashid. Only so neither of us breaks a toe against a cabinet or something.”

At her mockery, there was light. Not a sudden burst, but a dawning of golden, sourceless illumination so gradual her vision didn’t have to adjust to take in her surroundings. A vast, 50-foot-ceilinged warehouse-to-loft conversion. There was one word for it: Spartan. She now truly knew what the word meant. It was this: a warrior’s dwelling. Sparse, utilitarian, austere. It was also more. A piece of ancient Azmahar, before oil and technology had transformed its distinctive heritage into yet another twenty-first-century Westernized hybrid. Every line and surface, and what little furniture there was, was steeped in Azmahar’s history, bearing the stamp of its authenticity in a muted palette of desert-inspired tones.

“Of course.” She realized she’d said that out loud when he turned to her. “Now that I’ve seen this place, I realize nothing else—and nothing less—could have suited you. Or… contained you.”

“Contained me?” His gaze swept the place before he leveled that bone-melting stare back on her. “Quite the bottle, isn’t it?”

A laugh burst out of her. “You do fit the genie profile. Especially with the way you materialized out of thin air tonight.”

Shrugging out of his coat, he moved deeper into the huge space. “I’m sure that satisfies your sense of dramatic license far more than the mundane explanation.”

Removing her coat as well and following him farther into the room, she faced him as he stopped before a fireplace and held out her arms for the logs he’d picked up. “I’ll do that. You sit down.”

“So it’s not ‘jump’ this time, but ‘sit,’ eh? What next? Roll over? Beg?”

A chuckle bubbled out as she tried to imagine him doing any of that. But the funny actions only turned to licentious images in her head. Oh, the images.

Trapping a moan, she grinned. “Maybe. And maybe I’ll ask you to jump to that mezzanine. I bet you can jump tall buildings in a single bound. But even superheroes need to put their feet up once in a while. As you’re going to do tonight.”

Without a shadow of a smile in return, he handed her the logs and left her to start a fire. He sank down on top of a woolen kelim woven in Azmahar’s national colors and motifs. Leaning on one of two huge complementing cushions, he proceeded to watch her like a black panther would contemplate a contrary gazelle.

His gaze made her more distressed with each breath; its touch unleashing impulses she’d believed would be forever banked with him forever out of her life.

As he would be after tonight.

But tonight was still here. As was she. And she would make the most out of this windfall.

With the fire going, she turned to him. “You’re hungry.”

“I am?”

“Judging by your size and muscle mass, you must require quite a lot of sustenance frequently. It’s been almost four hours since you came to my rescue. So yes, you’re hungry now.”

It could have been the play of firelight. But she could swear an obsidian flame started flickering in the depths of his eyes.

He inclined his head, casting his face in deeper shadow, depriving her of closer investigation. “So you don’t just order your males around, you tell them how they feel, too.”

“‘My males?’“ A laugh overcame her. “YaUllah, what a concept.” His intensity ratcheted up until she had to look away, had to walk to the open-plan kitchen at the far end of the gigantic space. “So… food. Please tell me I’ll find something more than water and dates in there.”

“I can still call someone to follow you home now rather than later.”

“No, thanks.” Arriving at the kitchen, she looked around. “You weren’t exaggerating, were you? No fridge? So how do you eat? Out? Or do you exist on takeaway? Or have a cook come in regularly?”

“No cook. I get fresh ingredients delivered daily, use them up, rinse and repeat.”

That actually sounded like a very healthy way to live. He was the picture of vigor and virility, so he was doing it right. Very.

She leaned across the island, luxuriated in watching him coming closer. “So where’s today’s consignment?”

He stopped before her. “I intended to have dinner out.”

“Until me.”

“Until you.”

The way he said those words… Was there tenderness in his tone, or was it her imagination again?

She cleared her tight throat. “So how am I supposed to feed you? You don’t even have dates, do you?”

“I have all kinds of dried fruits.” He pointed toward the cupboards behind her.

“I can use those. For dessert. For the main course, I bet you can get anything delivered at any time.”

He brooded at her for what felt like an hour.

Her gaze began to waver. He was going to outstare her and…

He suddenly looked heavenward, as if asking the fates just what they’d thrown in his path tonight. Then he inhaled sharply, exhaled as forcefully.

Wow. She’d done it. She’d dragged a full-blown reaction out of him. A human one, to boot.

Her internal celebration hiccupped as he recaptured her in the crosshairs of his focus. “Fine. I’ll have whatever ingredients you require delivered. What do you want to feed me?”

She barely managed not to jump and pump a fist into the air.

Another minibattle won!

Her smile was so wide she doubted her lips would revert to their former size. “What do you want to eat?”

In response, he produced his cell phone, called someone named Ahmad then handed her the phone.

As he walked away he said over his shoulder, “Surprise me. You’re superlative at it, after all.”

Four (#ulink_ad657907-938f-5ca1-be24-175695aa7d17)

Surprise had long given way to ever-expanding disbelief as Rashid watched Laylah prowling all over his place, “taking care of him.” She was now in his kitchen again, preparing him dessert.