His smile froze, his face slamming shut. “Don’t say that again. Don’t even think it.”

“I need to tell you this.” She waited until he gave a difficult nod, then went on. “When I thought it was over, I thought that if I had a chance to do things over, or a second chance to put things right, I’d do what I really wanted to do, with no thought to obstacles or misgivings or consequences. Then you saved me. And I got cold feet.”

He didn’t ask her to elaborate. He just stared at her, seriousness seizing his face fully for the first time.

She knew this would lead nowhere. And it made no difference.

She loved him. A love that permeated her soul and traversed her being. A love forged in shared danger, fortified by the certainty of mutual reliance. And she was no longer letting anything stop her from expressing that love, from taking what she could with him, of him.

She rose from the low couch, her steps impeded by the ferocity of her emotions. She stopped before him, looked up into the eyes that meant everything to her. Then she made the leap.

“You told me you’d never do anything I didn’t want you to, didn’t beg you to do. So here I am, begging you. I want you, Harres. I want nothing but you.”

Ten

So this was temptation.

Unstoppable, irresistible. To die for.

This golden virago who’d invaded his being, occupied his mind and heart, conquered his reason and priorities.

She stood before him, open, offering everything. He could feel, in every nuance of his essence, the totality of her offer. It wasn’t only of her body and pleasures. She was bestowing all she had, all she was, on him.

And if he closed the gap between them now, he’d take all of her, consume her.

But how could he when he couldn’t give his all in return?

She did have all of him, Harres, the man, the human being. She had since that first night in the desert, when they’d been stripped to their essentials, when their souls had mingled in the most profound ways possible. If he’d had any concerns that the ordeal had augmented his feelings, influenced their depth and direction, the past ten days had erased them, had replaced them with certainty and wonder.

Added to how she’d awed him with the way she’d handled their trials, stood up to and beside him. She’d delighted him with every second of their stay in the oasis. After only a week, even with the language obstacle, she was already the more favorite among the inhabitants.

The day after the feast, she’d set up a clinic, offered her services. He’d thought those who’d relied on healing practices passed down through generations would shy away from her and her modern medical practices and instruments. But she’d anticipated that, offered only her medical skills and whatever the oasis provided of supplies and medicines. After a slow day, she’d been called to an obstructed labor, where she’d saved both mother and twin babies.

Then she’d become a legend. People had flooded in. They’d stood in queues from morning till sunset, when he, who acted as her assistant, insisted the doctor needed rest. She kept proving how she, too, needed nothing beyond her diverse skills to survive and excel anywhere, under any conditions. He told her she was the epitome of the Arabic proverb “A skilled woman weaves with a donkey’s leg” and teased her about being Dr. MacGyver.

She wasn’t just a healer, but a warrior and a protector like him. She shared his soul in all its breadth and peculiarities. He wanted, needed to share the rest of himself with her, for the rest of his life. There was no doubt in him anymore. Harres, the man, was hers. Forever.

And though Harres the prince had divided loyalties, that wasn’t what stopped him from proclaiming his love, his devotion. Only one thing did. Her grievance against his family. If everything she’d told him was the truth, she had legitimate reason to want to bring his family—which she perceived as a unit that worked to the same end of retaining power—to her brand of justice. What if he couldn’t secure her brother’s release and redemption? How could he take her, when he couldn’t promise that in return?

Turmoil ripped the bindings of his heart. And that was before she closed her eyes, her chin trembling as two crystalline tears escaped her luxurious lashes.

Then she raised glistening azure eyes and he nearly had a heart attack. “I thought you wanted me, too….”

He couldn’t bear it. Elal jaheem with the obstacles between them. He would obliterate them.

With a sob, she began to turn away. He grabbed her hand, placed it on his chest, felt as if his heart would ram through it to feel the touch of that hand that healed so many, that had saved him.

Her hand shook under his, each tremor an electric shock. Her words’ effect was more brutal.

“Just forget I said anything. I’ve put you in an awkward position, what with all the things that remain unresolved. And then you’ve probably been flirting with me with no intention of taking it any further, and I understand your motivation, totally—”

“Oh, shut up.”

Her mouth fell open at his growl, her eyes snapping wide, those eyes that glowed an unearthly blue in the vividness of the honey tan the desert sun had poured over her.

He looked down at her in that satiny dress that hung from her shoulders in relaxed pleats to the floor, another that the oasis women had given her in a shade that attempted to emulate the eyes that so fascinated them. The dress was by no stretch sexy. Not on anyone else. On her, it was the ultimate in eroticism.

She fidgeted, tried to escape his gaze. He wouldn’t let her, his other hand capturing her delectable chin.

“Do I have your attention, ya nadda jannati?” He waited until she raised moist eyes to him and gave a hesitant nod. “First, yes, ultimately major issues are unresolved.” She gasped, tried to wriggle out of his hold. He clung tighter, his hold growing gentler until she subsided in it, gave him her wounded gaze. He groaned. “But not where I’m concerned. My father once told me a man is granted one certainty in his life, one perfection. And it’s up to him to recognize it, to seize it, to let it bless his life. He wasted his, for reasons that seemed imperative at the time. My younger brother Shaheen just found his certainty, and learning from our father’s mistake, didn’t let anything stop him from seizing it. I thought my certainty was that I’d never have such perfection. I lived at total peace with that. At least, I did until I found it. Found you. So no, Talia, I don’t want you.”

The eyes that had been misting with an escalation of emotion jerked with stricken confusion. Eyes to bring a man, willingly, eagerly, to his knees.




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