At The Sheikh's Command

She couldn’t even look him in the face, couldn’t meet his eyes. And yet just seconds ago…

‘Your boss,’ Malik had said. He had thought that she was employed by her father—by the Cavanaugh family. She could only suppose that the appalling apron and her scruffy clothes had given him that impression.

He thought that she was only a servant and so fair game for him to waste time with, to flirt with heartlessly. To use for his pleasure and then discard when he felt like it.

‘I have to go,’ she muttered again, hoping it sounded more convincing this time. With her head down, her eyes burning with bitter humiliation, she turned for the door, moving as quickly as she could, just wanting to get away—get out of there.

She made it to the door, had turned the handle—opened it—when, to her shock and horror, he came after her. One strong bronze-skinned hand closed over her arm, imprisoning her wrist, holding her.

‘Wait!’ he said, his voice low and thick. ‘Wait!’

‘Wait for what?’

For further humiliation? For him to tell her that she wasn’t worth his time? That she had simply been an amusement with which to fill the minutes while he had been waiting for her father to return? Wasn’t that what men like him—sheikhs like him—had harems for? So that they could pick any woman they chose. Any woman who happened to catch his eye. Any woman he fancied mauling.

‘So that you can maul me again?’

‘Maul?’

He actually looked shocked. His proud dark head went back, brilliant eyes narrowing sharply.

‘Maul!’ he repeated on a deeper note. ‘You dare to call that mauling! Let me remind you, sukkar, that you wanted it every bit as much as I did—you still do.’

His cruel gaze dropped to where her breasts were still exposed. To where the tight, hungry points of her nipples betrayed the need she might try to deny with words—an unconvincing denial when her body spoke so eloquently against her.

‘And I still do.’

Malik’s voice was rough and thick. So he wasn’t quite as much in control as he pretended, Abbie realised. There was still a lingering rawness in his eyes and the hand that imprisoned hers was not quite as steady as she had first thought.

The realisation made her hesitate. She couldn’t move, either in or out of the open door. She could only stare up into the glittering darkness of his eyes and wait…

But then the footsteps—her father’s footsteps paused outside the door. She saw the handle turn…

And suddenly Malik’s hand came up to touch her face. He cupped her cheek in one hard palm, looked deep into her eyes as if determined to hypnotise her into total obedience.

‘Come to me tonight,’ he whispered softly, huskily. ‘Come to me at my hotel and we can finish what we started.’

She didn’t answer. She couldn’t answer. But she knew from his faint smile how he saw the change in her face, the one she couldn’t disguise. The one that meant acquiescence, whether it was wise or not.

He saw her face change and knew he didn’t have to say anything more.

‘The Europa,’ he said, the total confidence in his tone that of a man who knew he had won and there was nothing more to say. ‘The Europa at eight. I’ll be waiting.’

His mouth took hers for a hot, brief moment and then was gone.

Abbie didn’t know if she moved herself or if Malik pushed her, but either way it was only just in time. Somehow she was on the other side of the door, and with it firmly closed behind her. And in the library she heard the other door open and her father’s voice apologising for being so long.

‘Not at all…’

This time, Malik’s accented voice came clearly through the heavy wood that separated them. Cool and clear and totally unperturbed as if nothing had happened and he had simply been standing there, waiting for his host’s return.

‘I had plenty to think about. Plenty to occupy me while I waited. I never noticed the time at all.’

It was already turning dusk outside. Under cover of the gathering darkness, Abbie swiftly tidied herself up, adjusted her appearance. The wretched apron was ruined, torn beyond repair, so she pulled it off, crumpling it into a bundle and stuffing it out of sight behind a couple of plant pots. She would come back and retrieve it later tonight, when no one was likely to see her.

Later tonight. Tonight. The word hit home to her as she hurried along the shadowy path, heading for the kitchen door.

Tonight. Come to me tonight…and we can finish what we started.

He had been so sure, so confident that she would not refuse him. He would be waiting for her at eight, just as he had said.

Would she be there?

Even as the question entered her head, Abbie knew that the answer would push it straight out again, giving her no time to think. Not that she needed any.

Of course she would be there. She had no other choice. No alternative.

It was dangerous. It was crazy. It was probably the most stupid thing she would ever do—but how could she ever live with herself if she didn’t do it? How could she leave this stunning man, this devastating meeting, only half known, his lovemaking only half completed? The ache in her body, an ache that felt like a bruise right into her soul, told her that she couldn’t. She just couldn’t leave things like this.

The Europa at eight…

Malik’s confident voice rang inside her head.

He was so sure that she would be there.

Her footsteps slowed, coming to a halt in the darkness, and her fingers crept up to her mouth, pressing against her lips, thinking back, remembering how it had felt to have Malik’s kiss on her mouth. His caresses on her yearning body.

The Europa at eight…

And she would be there. Of course she would be there. How could she ever live with herself if she wasn’t?

CHAPTER FOUR

THE huge gilt clock in the foyer of the Europa hotel was striking the half hour as Abbie made her way to the reception desk.

She was exactly half an hour late—deliberately so. She had fully intended that Malik should have to wait for her. Or at least she had once she had finally decided that she was coming here tonight. Because the confidence of that first decision hadn’t lasted. She had barely got inside the house, closing the kitchen door and leaning back against it, before the doubts had assailed her.

How could she have ever been so stupid? she had asked herself. What was she thinking of, planning to go to him—to take him up on his invitation?

His invitation to seduction.

No, it hadn’t been an invitation. It was an order—a command from a man used to giving commands to everyone every day. Giving them and having people jump to obey them as soon as he spoke. He probably didn’t even have to ask most of the time, just click his fingers and he would be obeyed.

And was she going to jump to do his bidding too?

Not on her life!

No, she told herself as she made her way through to the hall again. His Royal High and Mightiness the Arrogant Sheikh Malik bin Rashid Al’Qaim could snap his fingers all he liked. She wasn’t going to be at his beck and call just because…