The Sheikh's Seduction

“For all of them, Tareq. It doesn’t just affect my father.”

“What do you intend to offer me to balance what he’s done?”

“Offer?” The concept hadn’t occurred to her. No way could she compensate for whatever had been lost. ‘I...I’m sorry. I have no means to pay you back for...for my father’s mismanagement.”

“Mismanagement!”

Her heart leapt as he swung around. The vivid blue blaze of his eyes shot electric tingles through her brain, paralysing her thought processes. Her whole body felt caught in a magnetic field. Her stomach contracted. Goose bumps broke out on her skin. She couldn’t even breathe. Never in her life had she felt such power coming from anyone. She was helpless to do anything but stare back at him. His gaze literally transfixed her.

The initial bolts of anger transmuted into laser beams. It felt as though he was peeling back the years, remembering how she’d been at twelve, then piling them on again, rebuilding the woman she was now, studying her, seeing if she measured up to whatever he thought she should be.

Sarah struggled to reclaim her mind. He had changed. The shock of such blue eyes—an inherited gene from his English mother—against his dark complexion still held fascination but she saw no kindness in them, nothing to encourage hope. His strikingly handsome face had matured into harder, sharper lines, his softer youthfulness discarded. She knew him to be thirty-four, yet he had the look of a man who wielded power at any level and commanded respect for it. He was armoured, in every sense.

His mouth suddenly curved in a half-smile. “How can dark chocolate shine so brightly?”

They were the teasing words he’d used about her eyes the morning he’d invited her to ride with him on her stepfather’s estate in Ireland, she on a pony, he on a thoroughbred stallion. Sarah floundered in a wash of memories. She had no reply to the remark, any more than she’d had then.

“You haven’t learnt any artifice, Sarah?” he asked.

The abrupt change to a more personal line of conversation confused her. “I don’t know what you mean.”

The half-smile took on a cynical twist. “You’re a grown woman, yet I still see the child. The same rioting brown curls. The same appealing face, bare of make-up. Clothes that are nothing more than clothes. Perhaps that was intentional. Artifice in lack of artifice.”

She blushed at his dissection of her appearance and hated herself for letting him make her feel gauche. “Look! This isn’t about me,” she implored.

“The messenger always carries many messages,” he stated, his eyes mocking her assertion. “You’re a beautiful young woman. Beautiful women usually know and use their power.”

His gaze dropped to her breasts, making Sarah acutely conscious of the stretch fabric of her skivvy hugging their fullness. Then he seemed to mentally measure her waist, the wide leather belt she wore undoubtedly aiding his calculation. The curve of her hips and the length of her legs were inspected, as well, much to Sarah’s growing embarrassment.

His appraisal of her feminine power increased her awareness of the strong sexual charisma which, at twelve, she’d been too young to recognise in him. It was certainly affecting her now, so much so it prompted the realisation he was probably used to women throwing themselves at him. Wealth alone was considered an aphrodisiac. With his looks...

An awful thought occurred to her. When Tareq had asked what she intended to offer him, had he imagined a proposition involving sexual favours? Was he summing up her desirability in case she took that line of persuasion?

Sarah almost died of mortification. She wouldn’t even know how to go about it. Men hadn’t featured largely in her life, none in any intimate sense. As for Tareq...she was losing all her bearings with him.

. “The question is...how grown up are you?” he mused, the glitter of speculation in his eyes discomforting Sarah even further.

“I’m twenty-three,” she replied, fervently wishing everything could be more normal between them. She remembered feeling safe with Tareq all those years ago. She didn’t feel safe now.

“I know how old you are, Sarah. Your age doesn’t answer my questions.”

“I told you...this isn’t about me.”

“Yes, it is. It’s very much about you. How long have you been at Werribee?”

Was this a chance to start explaining? “Two years,” she answered, and it was as though she’d slapped him in the face.

She physically felt his withdrawal from her. There was the merest flicker in his eyes, a barely visible tightening of his jawline, no other outward sign. He remained absolutely still, yet she felt every thread of connection with her being ruthlessly cut.

“So...you’ve been assisting your father,” he said coldly.

Sarah realised he’d just cloaked her with her father’s sins, whatever they were. “Not with the horses. I’ve had nothing to do with them,” she rushed out. “I’ve been helping with Jessie. She’s ten years old, Tareq. My little half-sister. And she’s a paraplegic.”

A muscle in his cheek contracted.

Sarah plunged on, wanting him to understand the background. “Two years ago, Susan was terribly ill, being treated for breast cancer. Then Jessie was injured and Susan couldn’t cope. There were the boys, too...”

“Boys?”

“My half-brothers. Twins. They’re seven now but they were only five when I came back to Werribee to help.”

“You were asked to do so?”

“No. Susan wrote about Jessie.”

“Where were you then?”

“London. I’d just finished my finals at university.”

“And you dropped everything to help them?”

He made it sound incredibly self-sacrificing but it wasn’t. “I’ve always loved Jessie. How could I not come when she had to face never walking again?”

He frowned. “You stayed with her...all this time.”

“I was needed.” It was the simple truth.

His eyes bored into hers and she felt the reconnection. It was a weird sensation, as sharp and quick as a switch being thrown, making her nerves leap and jangle, an invasion she had no control over.

“The child belongs to its mother, Sarah,” he said quietly. “She is not the answer to your loneliness.”

Her heart pumped a tide of heat up her neck and into her cheeks; burning, humiliating heat. He knew too much about her. He was plucking at her most vulnerable chords. It had felt good to be needed. And wanted.

Her reluctance to cut herself off from those feelings had influenced her choice to stay in her father’s home longer than was strictly necessary, but she did realise it was time to move on. Though this latest disaster confused the issue.

“I can’t desert them now. Don’t you see?” she pleaded. “My father will be ruined if you take your horses away. What will happen to the children?”

“It is not your responsibility,” he retorted harshly. “Your father brought this outcome upon himself.”

“Did he? Did he?” she cried, and plunged into a passionate defence. “Was it his fault his wife got cancer? Was it his fault Jessie was crippled? There were astronomical medical bills and the house had to be renovated to accommodate a handicapped child, a special suite built on with all the aids for Jessie to learn to be independent, a special van bought to transport her. There were so many adjustments to be made, and the continual cost of physiotherapy, masseurs... Do you wonder that my father was distracted from doing his job properly?”

Sarah was out of breath from the frantic outpouring of words. Her eyes clung to Tareq’s, begging understanding. If he could see through her so easily, couldn’t he see this, too?

Or did he see an ongoing problem?

“But things are better now,” she hastily declared. “Susan’s been cleared of the cancer. She’s fine. No trace of secondaries. And Jessie has made fantastic progress. It’s amazing how much she’s learnt to do for herself. The boys have become good at helping her, too. So you see...my father no longer has so many worries on his mind. He could concentrate on the training if you’ll just give him another chance.”

Her plea seemed to be falling on deaf ears. There was no visible reaction to it on Tareq’s face, no trace of sympathy. She needed some response, some hint of whether he was reconsidering his stance or not.