Except for the rider on the black horse, Sophie had the beach to herself every
morning.
Just after dawn, with the sun climbing majestically out of the sea, she jogged
half a mile along the water's edge from the hotel to the rock and back again. In
the Barakat Emirates, she had discovered quickly, early morning was the only
time cool enough for exercise.
Every morning she saw the black horse and its stern-faced rider. He came
galloping down from the distant point while she was on her way up, and when she
had turned and was about halfway back to the hotel, he passed her again on his
return.
On the first morning, he had hardly seemed to notice her, galloping past in a
swirl of white robes and sand dust. On the second morning, he went by in the
water, sending up a spray of droplets that captured the rich sunlight and
surrounded horse and man with a glittering net. Sophie lifted a hand in
greeting. He responded with a regal nod.
On the third morning, he watched her from narrowed black eyes as he galloped
past, riding closer than before, his fierce gaze making her catch her breath and
stumble in the sand. He must have cut his usual ride short, because he turned
and came up on her again from behind, riding even closer and staring hard as he
went past, almost as if he meant to frighten her.
Sophie wondered if he resented her regular intrusion on his otherwise solitary
exercise. She asked again at the hotel and was told the beach was open to hotel
guests up to the big rock. So this wasn't trespassing, and she wasn't going to
go away just because the stranger wanted the world to himself.
It was hard to believe that no one else thought it worthwhile to come out to see
the sunrise. She knew there was little tourism in the Barakat Emirates, but such
solitude on a beach as beautiful as this was almost unbelievable.
Or maybe the dark rider's tactics scared everyone else off.
It was the most scenically stunning place Sophie had ever been, or could
imagine. The silken sea mysteriously changed from emerald green to rich
turquoise to sapphire, as if with shifting moods unrecognized by humans. Behind
the beach rose a tree-covered escarpment, whose lush green shadows would offer
solace from the burning, beating sun later in the day.
The beach was softest sand, packed and firm underfoot at the water's edge,
accepting the imprint of her feet for only a few minutes before the sea rushed
up to obliterate the signs of her passing.
The hoof prints of the horse were not so easily wiped away. Those marks went
deep into the wet sand, each hoof gouging out a little hillock of sand. When the
sea tumbled up over them, instead of destroying the little hollows scarring the
shore, the water was captured to form a thousand little pools in a pattern that
stretched all the way up to the distant point.
Every morning since the first morning she had had the urge to keep going past
the hotel's landmark, to follow the hoof prints to their source, to see where
the rider came from. Every morning she turned her steps with inner reluctance,
as if she were turning her back on something important.
On her journey back to the hotel, always her own oncoming prints had already
been washed away while those of the horse were still visible.
Today was different. This was her fourth morning, and she had almost reached her
turning point, but there was no sign of rider or horse. The beach was painted
with the rich red gold of sunrise, her shadow stretched out beside her, long and
narrow and reaching toward the trees. But there was no mark on the firm wet sand
ahead.
Maybe he did resent her presence. Was he exercising the horse somewhere else
this morning? She was disappointed without knowing it. She had enjoyed sharing
the beauty of the sunrise with the stranger, even if he was disapproving.
It was only a minute or two before she saw the black horse in the distance,
galloping hard. He would be on her soon. With the thought came quick foreboding.
Was she on private property now? What if he thought she was looking for him?
Sophie stopped and quickly turned back. The hotel landmark was not far, but even
if she made it before he reached her, her footprints would give the fact of her
trespass away.
The horse was coming closer. She felt the thunder of hooves in the sand under
her feet, felt the vibration shiver up her spine. Foreboding flooded her, and of
their own accord her legs shifted pace. She started to run in earnest, as if the
dark stranger were a hunter, and she his prey.
The rider galloped past her, so close she could hear the horse's breathing, then
abruptly pulled up, swinging around so that man and beast blocked her path.
Sophie stopped. For a moment they stared at each other, the silence broken only
by the shushing of the waves and her nervous heartbeat. She was still twenty
yards from the landmark.
"What are you doing here?" His voice was harsh, and it matched his face. He
looked like something chiseled out of hardwood with an axe.
His land or not, his tone annoyed her. How did he know she hadn't made an honest
mistake? "And who is asking?"
His teeth showed. "I ask! How dare you come here?"
She was a total stranger to the country and its customs. She had no idea what it
meant to trespass on private property in the Barakat Emirates. Or what an
owner's rights were when he found a trespasser. The way he was looking at her,
she told herself in grim humor, he might just have the right of life and death.
The thought sparked rebellion.
"If you want me to get off your land, move your horse out of my way," she said
rudely.
His dark head snapped up with almost regal fury. He was powerfully handsome,
with the air of a desert warrior. She could imagine him taking up a banner
behind the great Saladin and marching off to do battle with the infidel. She
shivered involuntarily as his gaze stabbed her.
"It is not wise for one such as you to use this voice with me," he said, with
harsh contempt. In spite of the increasing heat of the sun as it climbed the
sky, Sophie shivered.
"One such as me?" she repeated. "Is there something a little less than obvious
here, or does the mere fact of being a woman disqualify me from membership in
the human race?"
She turned to walk around the horse, but under its rider's instructions, it
moved to block her again. Sophie pressed her lips together and glanced along the
beach. No one.
"It is not being a woman which does that," he said coldly.
She was wearing gray exercise capris and a halter top, perfectly respectable at
home in Vancouver. But she was suddenly very aware of how snugly they fit, the
amount of flesh the outfit left bare.
Her heart began to pound in hard, heavy thumps. He spoke good English, which
must mean he was educated, but somehow when she stared up into his dark face all
she saw was absolute power. She turned again, and again he maneuvered the black
horse to block her path.
"Let me go!" she snapped.
"You should not have come here. Why did you?"
He sat easily on the horse, as if he had been born there, one hand holding the
reins almost negligently. But his hand would be firm enough when needed, she
thought involuntarily. His other hand rested arrogantly on his hip as he gazed
down at her, his mouth curling with disdain.
"Maybe you haven't noticed I'm trying to leave your precious land."
"I do not mean this beach, and you know it."
Sophie looked up. "You mean this isn't your land?" Her fear shifted gears. "Then
what's your problem? And what business is it of yours —"
He lifted his arm to point into the distance. "My property begins at the point.
You know it."
"Actually, that information wasn't included in the hotel's orientation pack,"
Sophie snapped. "Could it be you overestimate your importance?"
The dark stranger snorted with exasperation. Her insult hadn't even scratched
the surface, and Sophie longed to wipe the self-satisfied contempt off his face.
"If you're one of the lords of the earth, I'm one who never got the news. How
galling it must be," she added in mock sympathy.
"Stop playing this game!" he demanded roughly. "What did you hope to gain by
coming here and putting yourself in my way?"
"You're dreaming!" Sophie cried in outrage, but she was on shaky ground. She
hardly knew why she had continued on past the hotel's landmark, and maybe,
unconsciously, it was because she was hoping to meet the stranger. But she
wasn't going to admit that to him. She wondered how many smitten women he ran
off his land every week. It was infuriating that he now thought she was one of
them.
"What gives you the right to think I came here looking for you? Are you sure you
didn't come here looking for me?"
The horse moved its rump around to keep her prisoner again even before she moved
herself, so well did he understand her. Now she was standing by his knee,
staring up at him with an expression of mingled fear and outrage. Her hair was
flame red, and cut short, but she was beautiful still. The high, full breasts
were the same, and the rounded hips, the long, curving legs, the slender ankles
that he could span with one hand.
His gaze ran over her face. Her wide, dark eyes held a sweeter expression than
the mental image he carried. The full mouth was softer, kissed by innocence. No
wonder he had been taken in. Nothing of her real nature showed. She seemed all a
man could want, now even more than before.
"Of course I came here looking for you," he said through his teeth.
The simple, flat statement both startled and frightened her. Sophie stared up at
him. The sun was behind him now, and she was doubly blinded, first by the
burning expression in his eyes and then by a halo of sunlight.
"Wh-what?" she breathed, torn between fear and anticipation.
"I could not believe my eyes when I saw you. I ask again, why did you come?"
"What do you want?" she whispered.
His eyes went black as he looked at her. "You know what I want."
Her breath stopped in her throat. The sun was already hot, but a chill of
nervous excitement traveled from her heels to her head.
"And no doubt you think you've only got to ask!" she snapped, annoyed with
herself for her weakness.
"No," he said, with dry contempt. "But since you throw yourself so obviously in
my way, I have learned to hope that you want something in exchange. How much? I
warn you not to ask for the ridiculous sum you have doubtless calculated on."
Her mouth opened in the wildest indignation she had ever experienced. For
several seconds she simply could not speak.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" she growled. "And who do you think I am?"
"I know who you are, Sophie. Much more than I want to know."
If he had thrown ice water over her she could not have felt more disoriented.
Sophie gasped and jumped backward, panic flooding up inside her.
"Wh-what?" she babbled.
"Why do you pretend ignorance? Do you think to find me such a fool as that?"
Her breath came in with a long, slow, frightened gasp.
"Who are you?" she cried. "How do you know my name?"
He threw back his head and laughed, but the sound was not pleasant. It was a
laugh of pure outrage, and it was menacing.
"Leave me alone!" she shouted, and in pure animal instinct, she turned and ran.
Thought only caught up with her when she had passed the hotel's landmark. She
slowed and listened for the thunder of hooves, but the only sound was the cry of
some sea bird she did not recognize.
When she glanced back, the beach was empty.
"Hellooo," Zoe caroled over the phone. "This is a surprise! Are you having a
good time?"
Zoe always wanted everyone to have a good time.
"You were right, it's fabulous," Sophie told her. She was lying on the bed in
her sumptuous room in the Sheikh Daud Hotel. She had spent half an hour trying
to make sense of what had happened and then had phoned her sister in Vancouver.
"I suppose it's too much to hope you've lost your obsessive virginity already?"
Sophie only laughed. Zoe was far more obsessed about the state of Sophie's sex
life, or lack of it, than Sophie was. For her it was a simple question of
priorities. Sophie wanted sex to be meaningful. More than meaningful — she
wanted sex with her husband or her husband-to-be. No one else.
"Yup. Too much to hope," she said mildly. "Listen, Zoe, something very strange
has just happened."
"Oh, good! Was it a man?"
"Yes. This —"
"I always suspected that you'd be a pushover for one of those dark alpha males.
Tell me all!"
"Tell me something first…when you were here last year having such a brilliant
time, Zoe, who were you?"
The gurgle of laughter coming down the wire told her all she really needed to
know. Her twin was incorrigible.
"Have you found that out already? Did someone recognize you? I borrowed your
passport, Soph, I confess it."
"Honestly, Zoe, I wish you'd stop doing that!" Sophie exclaimed. "You don't know
how unnerving it is."
"No," Zoe agreed sadly. "Sometimes I think it would be kind of fun, though, if
you would impersonate me, do something outrageous, and then leave me to pick up
the pieces."
"I'd be a little stretched trying to come up with something you would consider
outrageous," Sophie pointed out dryly.
Zoe laughed again, acknowledging the hit.
They were an almost classic case of Good Twin – Bad Twin, except that Zoe wasn't
really bad, just very original. Zoe wanted to have a good time in life, and she
had understood very early that to have the time she wanted, she had to marry
rich. Her sights had lighted on a man nearly three times her age, one of
Canada's richest men, who late in life had decided to run for a seat in
Parliament. Fresh out of university, Zoe had gone to work on his election
campaign.
She married him, and when Hamilton Brougham won the election, Zoe was just where
she wanted to be. Except for the natural restrictions that came with the
position. She had promised Ham when she married him that, whatever she did in
private, she wouldn't embarrass him in public.
That was where Sophie came in. Every now and then, when Zoe simply had to kick
over the traces, she would pretend to be her sober, serious sister. And more
than once Sophie had found herself telling a journalist that yes, she was the
one in the photo dancing in the city fountain….
"So, exactly what pieces am I here in the lovely Barakat Emirates to pick up?"
Sophie demanded dryly now.
"Oh, honey, there's nothing like that!" Zoe protested. "I just wanted you to
have a holiday."
"I'm beginning to see why you were so determined that I should have a holiday
just here and just now. Was I a fool not to have figured this out for myself?
Yes," Sophie said.
"It's not like that at all. Who did you meet? What did they say? It's not the
hotel, is it? I paid for what got damaged, and very handsomely, too, so if they
say a word, darling, you can tell them —"
"Not the hotel, Zoe, they've been discretion itself. A dark, broody type down on
the beach. Black eyes, black horse, black mood."
She heard her twin's indrawn breath. "Aaaah. I'd forgotten the sheikh."
Sophie knew from her tone that Zoe hadn't forgotten the sheikh.
"Well, you'd better remember fast, and tell me what I'm on the hook for," she
said flatly. "What did you do to him?"
Zoe laughed, a long, slightly false peal that did nothing for Sophie's peace of
mind. "Do to him? Who could do anything to Sheikh Sharif Wahid ibn Arif al Farid?
He's got a heart of stone."
At the mention of the word heart, Sophie's eyes squeezed shut with horror. "Oh,
God, Zoe, you didn't!"
"Come on, Soph, you've seen him yourself. You must have noticed that he's too
good to resist."
"Zoe, this is — but — are you telling me the man thinks I've slept with
him?" Sophie cried.
"Tell me, did he show signs of wanting more?"
"He showed signs of wanting me off his land."
A small gasp. "Well, there's no need for him to be as hostile as that. He's a
Cup Companion, by the way. Did he tell you?"
"What's a Cup Companion?" Sophie asked, with a sinking heart.
"They're sort of like our cabinet ministers. Appointed by the prince. They
advise him on various areas of government. Very aristocratic, very influential.
That's why I had to be careful. We'd be news if it ever got out."
"Oh, great," Sophie said. "So it's goodbye, morning jog."
"Unless you want to pick up where I left off. But I advise you to choose someone
else. Sheikh Sharif, as you may have gathered already, is a bit hard to handle."
"Zoe, how did you make an enemy of him? Please tell me the truth."
Zoe's laughter didn't completely conceal her irritation. "Can you believe it? He
was deeply offended — quite fierce about it, really — to discover that I was
married. As if it was any of his business! I told him he was a prig, but he
didn't like that, either."
"Gee, I wonder why."
Sensing her twin's disapproval, Zoe added hastily, "I assumed that your new
hairstyle would put him off the scent, if he did happen to see you."
"The hell you did."
"Soph, if you do meet him again, please don't blow the whistle on me? Ham would
hate it, and you know he's in the running for a cabinet post."
Sophie suddenly understood the wild impulse that had driven her to cut off her
long blond hair and color it red. She was tired of taking the fall for Zoe. But
it wasn't going to help her avoid Zoe's sheikh, it seemed.
She heaved a sigh. "So not only does one of the most powerful and influential
men in the country think I've slept with him, he also thinks I cheated on my
husband when I did it?"
"Isn't it fun? And there you are a virgin!"
"Here I am, a virgin," Sophie agreed.
Sheikh Sharif al Farid flung himself down off the black horse and thrust the
reins into the groom's hands with a muttered word. Then he strode into the
house, his face so thunderous the manservant discreetly disappeared.
The sheikh moved restlessly to the far end of the elegant room and stood for a
long moment in front of an antique enameled cabinet, staring into space.
It was almost a year since he had first seen her, surrounded by bemused
merchants and urchins in the Sabzi Market, looking terrified. He had gone to her
rescue, not that she was in real danger, explaining to the crowd that she was a
foreigner, a tourist.
"They are not used to seeing hair like yours," he had told her later, in the
little café where he had taken her to calm her down. "Does not the hotel's
information pack explain that the souq is out of bounds?"
"I never obey rules like that," she had said. "They only want to spoil the fun."
He didn't know exactly what had drawn him, but she had not hidden the fact that
she had felt the pull, too.
"These gardens were endowed over sixty years ago by King Daud, to honor his
beautiful foreign wife, whom he named Azizah," the guide said.
Sophie was with a small group in the grounds of the famous pleasure gardens,
walking beside a series of pools and channels that descended in several small
falls as they walked and climbed.
"The name Bostan al Sa'adat means 'Garden of Joy.' The design took twenty
years to complete, and still has not reached the perfection that the designers,
who planned for the future as well as the continually evolving present,
envisaged…."
For two days she had avoided the beach completely, and by the third she was
seriously missing the exercise. But Zoe was right — there was a lot to see and
do in the Barakat Emirates, and if anything could take her mind off Sheikh
Sharif al Farid, it was the fabulous fountains and gardens of Sheikh Daud's
testament of love.
Sophie dawdled behind the rest of the group, entranced by a graceful,
multilayered fountain whose waters seemed to sing.
It annoyed her that she needed anything to take her mind off the man. But the
truth was, he haunted her. She couldn't prevent Zoe's sheikh constantly
surfacing in her mind, couldn't stop wondering whether she would run into him
again, and how she would face him if she did. The arrogance with which he had
assumed she was sexually available infuriated her, even though she knew it was
Zoe he thought he was talking to.
"Good morning, Sophie."
Sophie gasped as the dark figure stepped out from under a flower-draped archway
as if out of her thoughts, blocking her path while, ahead, the rest of the group
passed through a gateway in a high hedge. It was him. A thrill of fear zipped
through her as the last stragglers passed out of sight.
"Good morning, Sheikh al Farid."
His eyebrows went up. He smiled mockingly. "Time has improved your memory, I
see. But have you forgotten that you called me Sharif?"
She bit her lip. She couldn't imagine calling this forbidding pillar of humanity
by his first name, even to save Zoe's bacon. There were no statues in an Islamic
garden, she had learned, but Sophie privately thought that the sheikh was a
perfect stand-in. Just like a marble statue, he seemed to pulse with warm life.
But he would prove cold and immovable if she touched him.
Or maybe not. She wasn't sure which would be worse.
"It's not really appropriate now, is it?" she said.
His teeth flashed while his amused, mocking laughter rang out. She felt the
sudden force of his personality, and for a moment, on a primitive, unthinking
level, she understood Zoe's weakness. Not that she would ever be so weak.
"Are you now concerned with the appropriateness of things? You have changed more
than your hair, in that case."
"Leave me alone," was all she could say, stepping sideways to pass him. But one
strong hand moved and he caught her wrist. Sophie took a soundless breath and
closed her eyes. Then, fearing what he might read into that, forced them open.
For a moment they gazed at each other in the bright sunlight, and the only sound
was the music of the tumbling fountain. In the distance a groundsman wandered
among the plants. Otherwise they had the world to themselves.
"You do not run on the beach anymore, Sophie?"
"You approve the change, of course."
His jaw clenched. "Do you hope to drive the price up by these tactics? You will
not succeed. Beware. What is mine I take, by whatever means are necessary."
Sophie's eyes darkened as she stared into his, and his jaw tightened against the
stir of arousal as shock mimicked attraction in her brown eyes.
"What are you threatening?" she whispered.
Sharif was angry and discomfited. He had believed that when he met her again he
would see her for what she was. He had remembered the calculation in her eyes
and told himself that his own mind had manufactured the sweetness in her lips.
But instead of being less than what his memory had conjured up during the past
year, she was more. She was too desirable.
In retrospect he had told himself that she had used simple manipulation, playing
on his ego and her own tricky sexuality to convince him she had depth. Now he
saw that she was far more dangerous than that. No guile was apparent in her.
Even now, knowing what he knew, he thought he could see a pure heart, a deep,
honorable soul.
Last year she had stirred his interest, his appetites, and he had felt the faint
breath of some greater possibility. Today she aroused a deep, uncomfortable
possessiveness in him, and he heard the clear promise of something eternal.
He knew it for a lie. He would not be taken in.
But against his will, the clasp of his hand tightened, and he drew her toward
him.
"No," Sophie protested on a gasp.
But with the sudden harsh enfoldment of his arms her breath stopped in her
throat. She gazed up into his face. Just how angry was he? How deeply had Zoe
bruised him? And what was his idea of revenge?
Sharif's black eyes burned into her as he bent her back over that steel-sinewed
arm and lowered his mouth toward hers.
"No," she whispered again, terrified of what might happen if she gave in to the
uncomfortable, unfamiliar feeling that threatened her. Like a flash flood,
sweeping her away to a territory totally strange to her.
He glared at her with all the fury of desire denied. "No?" he rasped. "This is
not what you came for?"
"Don't flatter yourself that I came all this way to spend more time in your
bed!"
"Neither of us will be disappointed, then. What do you want this time, Sophie?
Will I find it worth the price?"
"Price!" she cried, as sudden anger flooded her. "How dare you! Let go of me!"
Sharif's passionate mouth thinned as he reined in his hunger and dragged himself
back to his senses. It was not what he had intended, and he was angry with
himself at this evidence of his weakness. He knew what she was. A cheat. A liar.
A thief. And completely unrepentant, or he would have heard from her long before
this.
He hadn't meant to make love to her. Until the moment when he had recognized her
on the beach, he hadn't thought of her for months. He had been convinced that,
having been made a fool of once, he was immunized.
But in spite of all he knew, she might still ensnare him, even more deeply than
before.
"You find me as much of a fool as the last time," he admitted cynically. "As
ready to fall into your trap as if I had never been there. But you mistake the
place. This is not quite the Garden of Eden, Sophie."
"And you aren't quite Adam!" Her eyes blazed at him. "Nice for the snake to
talk!"
"Whatever my own part, we seem to be agreed that you are Eve," he pointed out
with a glimmer of humor.
"Believe me, if I'm Eve, I have no apples to offer you!" she snapped.
Then she wished she hadn't spoken, because his eyes narrowed and his look
suddenly made her nervous.
"Do you think I forget so easily? You have — an apple, did you call it? — that
interests me very much. And believe me, I will not take no for an answer this
time."
Sophie blinked at him in dismay, and a treacherous little doubt beckoned. She
pushed it aside.
"I don't know what you're talking about!" she snapped.
All trace of humor had left his eyes now. "Do not add to your sins with more
lies," he said flatly. "You do know, Sophie. You must know that I know."
"What?" she cried, feeling goaded. What could her twin have done that she was
afraid to admit to her? Never before had Zoe failed to tell her about any of the
adventuring she had done in Sophie's name. "What do you imagine?"
He straightened and dropped his imprisoning arm, but his other hand's grasp of
her wrist was firm and unforgiving.
"Come," he said.
She thought she went for Zoe's sake. But afterward, looking back, she knew that
that wasn't her reason.
Half an hour later they were back at the sea, the sheikh's Land Rover pulling
through broad gates in a white wall that enclosed a terra-cotta–tiled courtyard.
The sheikh was driving. Sophie wasn't sure what she had expected — wild sports
car or expensive limousine — but the ordinariness of the dusty four wheel drive
had surprised her. Now, under the arches of a garage, she saw cars more in
keeping with her unconscious expectations — a Mercedes limousine and a classic
sports car among them.
Sheikh Sharif al Farid put his foot on the brakes and stopped the engine, and
for a moment Sophie stared around her. Palm trees shaded the courtyard, and
except for birdsong, sound seemed excluded. She sighed. After the drive through
the heat and noise of the Emirates' capital, the promise of tranquillity was
sweet.
He led her into the house and into a beautifully furnished room with a row of
arched windows facing a shadowed cloister. The house, Sophie saw, was built in
traditional Middle Eastern design, around a central courtyard where water and
plants in lush profusion softened the harshness of the desert climate.
Straight ahead across the courtyard, an opening under an elegant archway showed
her the sea.
"This is so beautiful!" she breathed.
All around her were the kind of antiques you normally only saw in museums or
magazine photographs — a group of richly jeweled swords and daggers, beaten
brass ewers on minutely inlaid tables, intricate paintings on ivory, tapestry
hangings, the finest Arabic calligraphy glinting with gold.
She gazed, breathless with wonder, from one to the other.
"You have admired my possessions before." His cold voice destroyed her
fascinated trance.
She flicked a nervous glance at him. Though Zoe hadn't said so explicitly, she
had probably spent the night here. How many nights? How familiar was she
supposed to be with the place? Sophie grimaced inwardly.
"Have I? Well, they're worth a second look," she said simply.
This wasn't the first time she'd had to be quick on her feet picking up after
Zoe, not by a long way, but somehow this time it felt different. She'd never
before felt the real brush of danger. But then, Zoe had never messed with a man
like Sheikh al Farid before. He looked like nobody's fool, and he made Sophie
nervous.
"And a third, and fourth," he agreed blandly, with an expression in his eyes she
couldn't interpret.
"What does that mean?" But Sharif al Farid was already turning to the servant
who had silently appeared, and was giving him some order.
She was unconsciously drawn to a magnificent oil portrait of a turbaned man with
darkly compelling eyes like the sheikh's.
"Oh!" she breathed, for the eyes did more than follow her. They seemed to see
right into her, with as much intelligence as living eyes. "Is he — a relative of
yours?"
Sharif al Farid smiled. "What if he is?"
"Go to hell!"
Sharif al Farid smiled a grim smile and shook his head. "Not for your sake, my
temptress."
Fear stabbed her suddenly. There was something here she didn't understand. What
exactly had gone on between Zoe and Sheikh Sharif al Farid? It was more than the
simple one night stand Zoe had implied, it had to be. Why had Zoe sent her here,
where she was sure to meet the man, sure to be mistaken for her twin?
"Why did you bring me here, Sheikh al Farid? If you have something to say,
please say it, because I want to get back to the hotel," Sophie said, in a flat
voice, struggling for calm.
The sheikh lifted his eyebrows in surprised disdain, as if there were something
obvious she was missing. "Back to the hotel?"
His chin moved in regal summons, and he crossed to the windows and opened a
door. Sophie saw that each of the arched windows along the length of the room
was in fact a door. When every door was open, the room would give onto the
cloister through a series of arches.
She followed him out of the air conditioned room into the sudden heat and then
along the shadowy cloister till he paused before another arched door. Sophie
couldn't help staring out at the profusion of plants and flowers that tumbled
over balconies, climbed around pillars, bowed and nodded over four perfectly
geometric channels feeding the magnificent fountain in the center of the
courtyard — water tumbling out of a graded series of bowls held up by stone
lions.
"Is that a copy of the fountain at the Alhambra Palace?" she asked, forgetting
everything except awe.
"This has an earlier date." His mouth moved in another humorless smile. "I see
you are better prepared than before. What else have you researched?"
She clenched her jaw. "What makes you so sure you know everything?"
"A year ago you knew nothing of the treasures of the Alhambra, Sophie. Have you
forgotten?"
She had no answer. Impossible to inform him that she had been majoring in Art
and Architecture while Zoe was deep in Political Science.
The sheikh opened the door and guided her through into the room beyond. Her skin
rippled with sensation as she stepped past him, in a mixture of turbulent
emotions — she could detect anger and fear — which she had never experienced
before.
Then she stopped as if she had hit a wall and stared around the room. It was
strewn with her belongings — her empty luggage lying open, the contents in neat
piles on the bed or hanging in the open wardrobe.
Someone had gone into her room at the hotel to get all her things, and had
brought them here. And then, by the look of it, had searched every pocket and
nook.
Shocked and disbelieving, she stepped back a pace, right against Sharif al
Farid's chest. She felt his hands clasp her upper arms with firm possession.
Suddenly she could smell the heady mixture of cologne and male sweat that was
already familiar to her senses as uniquely him.
She jerked to step away, but he held her. Sophie's head swam, and she had the
crazy conviction she might faint from fear, or whatever emotion was suddenly
enclosing her brain in its terrible mists. Her nerves were alive with tension, a
thousand electric currents chasing through her body and mind.
Questions tumbled over each other in her head without logical order.
"Why have you brought my things here? How did you get them?" she asked at last.
As if from a distance, she felt him lift one hand and carefully, firmly, force
her to turn in his grasp. When she was facing him, his hands closed on her upper
arms again. She looked up, her lips parting to give her empty lungs oxygen.
The sheikh's dark eyes ran over her face with a hunger that made her tremble.
With slow inevitability he drew her close against his body, and his arms wrapped
her. She put her hands on his chest to hold him away, but she might as well have
pushed a wall.
He muttered a helpless oath and his mouth came down on hers. Sophie struggled
briefly, and then, sensation flooding her, she closed her eyes and gave in to
the bone-melting pleasure of his kiss. For one moment of blissful forgetfulness,
she abandoned everything except pure feeling.
But only for a moment. Then a panicked voice in her warned, this is Zoe he's
kissing. He thinks he's already your lover, and he's got a grudge.
Though the heat of touching him seemed to burn her palms, Sophie pushed against
his chest, hard. But as if he, too, had come to his senses, Sharif was already
dropping his arms. She staggered back, and watched the rise and fall of his
chest as he regained his self-control.
"Did I call you Eve?" he wondered softly, shaking his head. "You are much more
dangerous than that. How do you maintain that fiction of untouched softness even
with a man who knows otherwise?"
A response rose to her lips, but she had to bite it back. "Don't touch me again,
Sheikh al Farid," she said instead. "What happened last year doesn't give you
the right to make assumptions about me now."
"If you have changed, there is a way to prove it," said Sheikh al Farid.
"If you've brought me here under the delusion that you're such a wonderful lover
I'd be happy to go along with a replay, I've already told you, I'm not
interested." She spoke firmly, but inside she was frightened. Not merely about
what he intended, but about what his kiss had showed her about herself.
"Are you such a fool as to imagine you are here for my pleasure?"
Sophie blinked. "You give a pretty good impression of it," she snapped.
"Your presence is no joy to me, Sophie. The sooner you leave, the better it will
suit me. I said that you are a temptress, but do not waste your time trying to
lower my guard again. Even if we made love a thousand times I would not trust
you again out of my sight. In this house you will be guarded every second."
If we made love a thousand times…
"About two seconds in all, then," Sophie retorted, striding to the bed and
beginning to throw her things into the open cases. "I want out of here, now!"
"And you are very used to having things your own way. But not this time, Sophie.
This time you will obey me."
Her head went up, but her hands did not pause in their task. "You know nothing
about me!" she cried furiously.
"Have no fear. What I don't know you will have the opportunity to teach me."
She shuddered. "What is it? What do you want?"
"I have told you," he said, with a smile that made her light-headed with
anxiety. "I want what is mine."
"I am not yours!" Sophie cried desperately, chills racing through her so that
her teeth almost chattered. "I told you before, I'm married! And if I didn't
make it clear, my husband is a very influential man, so if you —"
She broke off because of the cold, certain way he was smiling at her, his eyes
black with furious contempt.
"You?" he repeated with a disdain that set her teeth on edge. "What fantasy is
this? It is not you that I want, Sophie. You know very well what it is."
Sheikh Sharif strode back into the long sitting room pushing Sophie in front of
him, one hand hard on her upper arm. She was aware of reluctant curiosity.
Whatever Zoe had done, it could not be very bad, so either he was making a
mountain out of a molehill or he was completely mistaken.
He stopped in front of a beautiful antique enamelware cabinet in deep ruby red
inlaid with delicately formed black, white and green leaves outlined in gold. He
let go her arm and reached out to open the two central doors. Inside she saw
another display of treasures, too small or perhaps too precious to be set in the
open, each on its own plinth or bed. A tiny, perfectly formed gold horse. A
fabulously jeweled miniature dagger and sheath. A delicately painted bowl. A
ruby pendant.
One plinth stood high in the center of the display, as if to offer the prize of
the collection. It was empty.
The sheikh gave her a moment to gaze at his treasures, then turned to her, one
eyebrow high. A half smile curled his lips, but it was a long way from showing
amusement. For a moment his eyes blazed such anger Sophie took an involuntary
step back.
"Now," he said, and his voice was grim, "it is not among your possessions here,
and not in your safety deposit box at the hotel. I know that you came here with
the thought of selling it back to me. I am willing to pay you a reasonable sum,
as I said, for its return. Where is the Jade Bowl?"
Furious emotion flooded up in her. She was filled with angry disappointment,
though she didn't let herself see it. She laid it all at the door of righteous
indignation. She could believe many things of Zoe, but that she had stolen
anything from this house Sophie would never accept. She glared at him.
"Are you accusing my — me of theft?"
He almost laughed. "Are you denying it?"
"Yes, I deny it! Of course I never stole your bowl! What kind of a bowl is it,
anyway?"
She wished he would stop smiling in that damned superior way. Sophie was
suddenly furious with Zoe for putting her in this intolerable position with a
man like him. They both made her sick.
"You did not admire it as much as other treasures, I remember. You were
surprised that it was considered my family's prize heirloom. A carved jade bowl
commissioned by my ancestor from the greatest artist of a golden age made no
impression on your mind beside the solid gold horse of a much lesser artisan.
"But you knew enough to take it. Was simple punishment in your mind? The loss of
the horse would have meant little to me. The Jade Bowl is irreplaceable. Or was
gain the motive? Did you sell it, Sophie?" the sheikh asked silkily. "I hope you
understood its value."
Shivers of danger played up and down her spine in a discordant symphony.
"I never touched your damned bowl!" she said again. "I have no idea where it is!
You probably mislaid it yourself!"
He ignored that as if it wasn't worth a response. "Well, you will have time and
leisure to remind yourself."
Something in his tone made her stiffen, feeling that the danger that threatened
was right outside her door. "What does that mean?" she demanded, choking so that
her question was hardly audible.
With a sideways glance at her, the sheikh closed the cabinet doors. He turned
and put his hand on her arm, then, as if the touch burned him, broke the
connection. Sophie put up her own hand to rub her arm. It ached as if in the
aftermath of an electric shock.
"Isn't it obvious? You are an educated, intelligent woman. You should not have
to be told that you will not leave this house until I have in my possession
again that which is mine."
Late that night Sophie lay sleepless and uncomfortable in the strange bed.
It had been a day tossed between dream and nightmare. The house and garden were
more beautiful than Sophie could have conjured up in her wildest daydreams, but
a constant cloud of suspicion hung over her, turning the mildest expression of
admiration into a declaration of intent in Sharif al Farid's eyes.
And his eyes were always close, always watching. Not satisfied to put one of his
servants as a guard on her, he shadowed her himself. She went nowhere without
him, except to her own room. The internal door was firmly locked. Sharif sat
outside the door to the courtyard waiting, watching, so that she couldn't rest
and was driven back outside into his presence.
She hated it. His constant nearness drove her crazy. Her skin twitched, as if
she were in a force field. It was like being on the receiving end of a constant
static electric shock. Even her hair seemed to stand on end, refusing to obey
her comb.
And when she complained, he only repeated it remorselessly, like a mantra: "If
you do not like it, you know the solution."
In spite of what he had said about not wanting her, when his black gaze rested
on her, her blood churned up as if in response to his desire. Then she would
remember his words. If we made love a thousand times. She told herself it
was not Sophie, but Zoe, he wanted. He was remembering their lovemaking, that
was all. Zoe was probably a brilliant lover, and if Sophie ever did give in to
the attraction, he would find her a huge disappointment.
Sophie, realizing the direction her thoughts had taken, sat up and angrily
plumped her pillow. Give in to the attraction? What attraction? She felt
nothing for Zoe's sheikh but totally justified anger! And even if he was
attractive, she hadn't kept her virginity all these years to throw it away on
someone who despised her, and himself for wanting her.
She sank back into the bed again. What was killing her was the knowledge that he
was sleeping — if he was sleeping — in the next room. The door was slightly
ajar, but she could hear nothing. Was he listening to her toss and turn? Did he
imagine she was sleepless for his sake?
How long could this go on? He had told her the hotel believed she had gone on an
extended tour of the country and would be away several nights. If that was true,
she could expect no help from that source. No one would call the Embassy to
declare a Canadian citizen missing when a Cup Companion vouched for her
whereabouts, she was sure.
He would not let her make a phone call, and as long as she could not call Zoe,
she could tell him nothing. Although she had at moments been torn with
indecision, she knew she could not risk telling the sheikh the truth. Because
whether Zoe had or had not taken his damned Jade Bowl, and Sophie didn't believe
for a second that she had, the opportunity for this to cause Hamilton Brougham
trouble was huge.
When she asked him how he was so sure she had taken the bowl, he only gazed at
her from those condemning black eyes and shook his head.
"You know how I know, Sophie," he said. "When you finally understand that you
cannot get away with protestations of innocence, then we will start to get
somewhere."
In spite of everything he said, she was certain he still wanted Zoe. But however
much he yearned to have her back in his bed, Sophie understood that he would not
make love to her knowing she was married to someone else. It was part of his
personal code of honor. For once Sophie was glad of one of Zoe's lies. Being
thought married might be the only shield she had against Sharif al Farid.
She frowned as the thought stirred an idea.
Early the next morning she showered and dressed in a deep green and black Lycra
jogging suit. It hugged every curve like skin, and the black markings on the
suit bottom were placed as if to mimic a tiny black thong.
She was hoping to catch him still in bed, but the door to the courtyard opened
when she turned the handle, and Sharif was waiting as she emerged, a small towel
around her neck, water bottle strapped against her hip.
"I want to go for a jog on the beach," she said. "I haven't exercised for days
on your account, and I'm getting soft."
"Never that," he said cynically.
It was too late to jog comfortably, the sun was already getting hot, and she had
been expecting no more than a violent argument. But when he shrugged and turned
to walk across the courtyard, of course she followed. Barefoot and in
dust-colored shorts and shirt, he wasn't dressed for jogging, and she wondered
what he intended. He led her through the arched opening and out to a wide, open
terrace overlooking the sea.
The house was high on the escarpment, and the view was panoramic. She could see
all the way down past the point towards the city, Barakat al Barakat, and
thought she could even pick out the white of her hotel against the cliff. The
smell of the sea came to her on a cooling breeze that probably would not be felt
down on the beach.
The cliff face was impossibly steep here, dropping sharply down for twenty feet
before the incline became easy enough to allow trees to cling. Any attempt to
escape this way would be perilously stupid.
She wondered for a moment if he intended to have her exercise here, on the
terrace. Well, she would argue that. She was going to be as much trouble as she
could to Sheikh Sharif al Farid. If he thought she would be an easy hostage, he
would soon revise his ideas.
But he led her to a heavy, steel-barred wooden door in the high estate wall,
unlocked it and went through. A few yards along the cliff edge, he paused, and
Sophie looked down the steepest and longest staircase she had ever seen.
Without a word, Sharif started down.
Forty-five minutes later, sweating and gasping, Sophie staggered up the
staircase again. Her hair was black with sweat, her suit was soaked, her towel
was dripping. Her water bottle was empty. He had jogged beside her, barefoot and
easy, down to the point and back up again.
Sweat made his dark skin glow, his eyelashes glisten. Every toned muscle of his
arms and legs gleamed. Sophie, on the other hand, felt and looked wrecked.
Round one to the sheikh.
"You're happy just to keep me here forever, are you?" she asked irritably that
night as they sat over dinner. It infuriated her that he insisted on treating
her as a guest, blandly offering her a drink and discussing food with her.
"As happy as you are to stay," he observed. "Abdul asks how you like your steak
cooked."
"If that's true, then you hate it," Sophie said bitterly, and realized only when
the words were out that the implication wasn't true. She didn't hate being here
with him. She only hated the fact that he regarded her with suspicion and
mistrust. She lowered her eyes lest he see the truth in them, and proceeded to
hide from it herself.
"Why won't you let me go?"
"The solution is in your hands. When you tell me where the Jade Bowl is, you may
leave. Medium?"
"Don't you think if I knew where the blasted thing was I would tell you?" she
exploded.
"No doubt you hope to drive up the price. Do you prefer rare?"
"Oh, for God's sake! I don't care if he burns the damned thing to a cinder! How
long do you imagine you can keep me here? My plane leaves in under a week!"
"Then you will want to take steps to make sure it doesn't leave without you."
For several days they were at an impasse. They were days in which Sophie learned
to love the wonderful house, the heat, the passionate beauty of her
surroundings. Only the sheikh, like the serpent in Eden, had the power to
destroy her pleasure. In his presence she felt jumpy, edgy, as if the place were
too close to a power station.
But even that was not a constant. When she could forget why she was here, she
enjoyed being with him. More, much more, than she would admit. In such moments
she sometimes felt she was in a dream of Paradise. But feelings like that only
frightened her when she became aware of them, made her more desperate to get
away.
She grew more and more anxious, but the sheikh showed no signs of impatience.
Sharif was convinced that she would crack sooner or later, it seemed, and he did
not mind which it proved to be.
"Don't you have a job to do?" she asked once. "This must be a comedown, a Cup
Companion acting as guard dog!"
"The Cup Companions of a prince are expected to be more than ordinarily
flexible," he returned blandly.
"Flexible?" she sneered. "How much flexibility does it take to insist you're
right no matter what?"
He raised his eyebrows at her, inviting more. Foolishly, driven by her
conflicting emotions in his company, Sophie went on.
"If you'd said deaf now, I could see it! Are Cup Companions required to
be deaf to anyone's else's opinions or professions of innocence?"
"Not in the usual course of events," he replied mildly, as if her question had
been a real one.
"Oh, what a pity!" Sarcasm was getting the better of her, but Sharif only
watched her, placidly chewing. "That seems to be your strongest suit."
Sharif shook his head. "My strong suit is patient watchfulness. When the mouse
comes out of the hole at last, I will be there. You have nothing to gain from
these delaying tactics, Sophie, be sure of that."
But the way his eyes looked at her in unguarded moments belied him. Sophie was
almost certain that he found her presence here as much of a strain as she did.
He was faking it to convince her that he could outwait her. It was a war of
nerves.
But Sophie had other weapons in that war.
She hadn't watched Zoe's flirting all these years without learning how it was
done. She never used her sister's tricks herself, because she was too aware that
she would not follow through. But nothing like that had ever bothered Zoe. If
a man is foolish enough to believe it, that's his problem, Zoe had explained
her philosophy once. The men so treated usually reacted in one of two ways —
either they danced around Zoe like puppets, or they disappeared completely,
unable to stay near what they knew they could not have.
Sophie's plan was rather vaguely formulated. It went like this — Sharif wouldn't
make love with 'Zoe' now that he knew she was married. But he obviously was
still attracted. All Sophie had to do was play up that attraction till he found
the strain unbearable. Then he would either do whatever she wanted — let her go
just because she asked — or want to get out of her orbit because he couldn't
stand it. Either way, she would be a free woman.
She was ignoring the still small voice that warned her that Sheikh Sharif al
Farid wasn't the kind of man with whom she could play a game like that. Equally
dangerously, she lacked the consciousness of her own deep motivation. Sophie's
instinctive femininity had been aroused by Sharif al Farid's powerful
masculinity, and unconsciously it was urging her to challenge him to prove
himself.
Sharif al Farid had his own motivations, both conscious and unconscious. He was
unlikely to turn away from such a challenge. At least, not one coming from
Sophie.
Rarely in the history of feminine wiles had there been a plan more likely to
backfire.
Sophie sat up in the bed, listening. It was the night of the new moon, and the
darkness was almost total. Outside the open windows, beyond the deeper shadow of
the cloister, starlight kissed a half-closed blossom, trembled on the still
water.
Some night insect or bird was calling monotonously. Though a faint breeze
stirred through the window, the night was warm: a thin sheet was her only
covering. Moving as carefully as possible, for Sharif had warned her he was a
light sleeper and she believed him, she reached for the water glass on the
little table beside her bed, and dipped her fingertips into it. Then she
massaged the water into her scalp, all around the hairline, dipping her fingers
again and again.
She poured water into her palm and splashed it on her chest above the little
silk tank top she wore as a pyjama top. Then the back of her neck, her forehead
and cheeks. For good measure she sprinkled water into the center of her pillow.
When she was satisfied, she carefully felt for the carafe of water and refilled
her glass. Then she set both down where they had been and lay down again. Now
the problem was, to pitch it so that the maid would not hear her when Sharif
did.
She moaned softly, and began to kick the sheet.
Sharif lay awake in his bed for an hour, listening to her soft stirrings in the
room next door, tormented by indecision and confusion. What a fool he had been
to bring her here. Only now that he was caught in the toils of his own making
did he understand how fatally mixed his motives had been.
She had proven long ago how unworthy she was. Laughing and mocking him in
furious rage when he had condemned her. When she had disappeared with the Jade
Bowl he had written it off to experience. He had been convinced that he had
forgotten the incident.
But that had been before she returned. Now he saw that he could never kill his
passion for her, nor the irrational conviction that she must be his.
Why had he brought her here? Not merely to learn the whereabouts of the family's
most significant heirloom, he now realized, though that was what he had told
himself. Not even so that close proximity would let him see through the cracks
of her facade and into the shallow soul beneath, killing his love with
knowledge.
He had brought her here for one reason only — because in his heart she was his.
Never again would he have the right to call any man fool.
He fell asleep at last only to dream of her. In the dream she was all she seemed
on the surface, her outward beauty a match for the beauty of her soul. His heart
burst with need and cherishing.
He stirred from the dream with her soft cries ringing in his ears. Then suddenly
he was wide awake. The cries were real, though scarcely audible, coming from
Sophie's room. He sat up in darkness as thick as a blanket and stared at the
clock.
Two o'clock.
"No," she begged softly. "Oh, please don't!" He heard a whimpered breath, as if
she were crying. "Please!"
He swung to his feet and listened intently. Silence. "Sophie?" he called
hoarsely, but what came out of his stifled throat was only a rasping whisper.
No answer. Only another muted cry.
He knew there could be no intruder here, but still — he made it to the
connecting door in perfect silence and record time.
His eyes had already grown accustomed to the darkness. He sidestepped the little
brass-topped table just inside the doorway, and a moment later he was bending
over her. She whimpered again in her sleep.
"Sophie," he said with quiet firmness, his hand on her shoulder.
He sank down onto the bed beside her and flicked on the light. Her face and the
spiky red hair were damp with sweat, and she had kicked the sheet off, revealing
one long, neatly muscled leg.
"Sophie," he murmured, on a different note.
Her eyelids fluttered and then her eyes were wide open, staring into his. And as
they gazed deep into each other, past all the defences that were so strong
during the daylight hours, he knew that he was seeing the truth of her clearly
for the first time. He clenched his jaw and swallowed, his gaze raking her soul,
determined to know everything.
Sophie had planned for two contingencies. If Sharif tripped on the strategically
placed little table, sending the brass tray flying, she would scream the house
down, bringing, she hoped, every member of his household staff onto the scene.
How humiliating for him!
If instead he made his way to the bed, she would cling to him and sob out her
dream, pretending she thought he was her husband, getting him thoroughly
sexually aroused. Then she'd "wake up" and push him indignantly away.
Either way, he was bound to start to feel she was more trouble than his precious
Jade Bowl was worth.
But when he sank on the bed beside her in the dark — big, and masculine, and
way, way too close for comfort, Sophie lost her nerve. As the bedside lamp went
on, she instantly "woke up". Her gasp at seeing him so close wasn't an act.
She could have screamed then. But as his gaze probed her, as deep as anyone had
ever seen her, the impulse died in her throat. She gazed up at him, and saw her
future written in his eyes.
"What's the matter?" she cried, sitting up and sliding away from him till her
back was against the wall. "What time is it? What do you want?"
"Calm down," he ordered quietly. "You were having a nightmare."
"A nightmare? Was I?" She felt stifled. Her heart was beating hard enough to
choke her. Sweat broke out for real on her forehead. What a fool she was to have
started this!
His eyes were darkly intent, burning across her skin, as if being wakened so
roughly had stripped away a discipline she had only distantly understood he was
exerting over himself. Sophie's breath came in little gasps. No one had ever
looked at her before with such blatant passion.
She seemed to have too much blood suddenly. It pounded through her body and into
her head, till she thought it might explode. Her mouth was desperately dry and
she licked her lips in an attempt to soften them. She couldn't seem to get the
air she needed, and parted her lips to breathe.
One shoestring strap of her top fell down over her upper arm, and her breath
caught as if at a caress, making her breasts tremble behind the pretty silk. She
suddenly realized that she had kicked the sheet into such a tangle that one long
tanned leg was naked to her hip. The delicate lace of her brief pyjama bottoms
made a pale stitchery on her bronzed thigh. She froze, afraid to move to cover
it, afraid not to.
Sharif's gaze burned along the length of her body, paused on her mouth and came
to rest at her eyes.
"Or perhaps it was not quite a nightmare," murmured the sheikh.
His hand, looking darker and much more powerful in the soft lamp glow, moved to
imprison her fine-boned ankle in a warm, pulsing shackle. Rivers of sensation
exploded up her leg at the lightly possessive touch. His eyes watched her face,
drinking up every whisper of feeling that was recorded there.
"Sharif," she whispered, half protest, half invitation.
He did not smile. His hand released her ankle to flatten against the sole of her
foot, and his heat burned up through her whole body. Then he began to massage
her toes, gently, so gently.
She was hypnotized. No man had ever started at her feet before, and she was
completely unprepared for being so powerfully overwhelmed so quickly. She
watched his hand massage her instep, then make its slow, determined way along
her ankle again, her calf, her knee.
"Aren't you — aren't you forgetting something?" she whispered at last.
He smiled at her, the first genuine smile she had had from him, and it melted
her. Her heart cried out that it wasn't fair that she had met him under totally
false pretences. Might she have had a chance to mean something to him, if he had
met her as herself?
"What am I forgetting?"
"I thought — I thought you didn't sleep with married women."
His hand was on her thigh now, melting her into honeyed softness, making her
yearn for the might have been.
"You are too much temptation," he murmured throatily. "Besides, we are already
lovers, are we not? One more night, Sophie. That is all I ask. Then you will go
home to him, and we will forget."
She felt a twist of sorrow, knowing that Zoe had won again. He was not the first
man who had bent his principles for Zoe, but he was the only one whose bending
would break Sophie's heart.
"Forget?" she murmured, her heart clenching. "Will we?"
"Do you doubt it? When we met on the beach, you had forgotten me."
She sighed sadly. "So you just want to get me out of your system?"
His hand was on her arm now, and his other arm reached to draw her toward him
and into his embrace. She could not fight the delight she felt in his touch,
body and soul. He drew her upper body across his legs and bent down to gaze into
her face.
She saw in that look all she would ever want in a man — passion, tenderness,
humor, true nobility, honor, and integrity — and a deep, deep hunger for her.
His arms held her with a fierce knowing that touched her deeper than she had
ever been touched, and her heart burned and twisted with the contradiction of
desire and pain.
"Get you out of my system?" he repeated, as if that were a ridiculous
impossibility. Her heart leapt, but he smiled, and she knew she had mistaken his
meaning. "Yes, Sophie, let us taste love just once more."
Her lips parted in protest and invitation, and as if he could wait no longer he
bent and smothered her mouth in a passionate, drowning kiss. Flames leapt up all
around her, tiny hot lashes of white heat that flicked her in every pore.
He was murmuring endearments that thrilled her soul. "Sweet, sweet…you are my
heart. You are my soul." His hands were embodied flame now, enclosing her head,
her back, her breast, trembling over her face. "You are mine, Sophie. Say it.
Tell me you are mine."
Sophie swooned and sighed. How often had she wondered if it would ever happen
for her. And here was her answer.
But it was an answer tinged with sorrow. Sharif had compromised his principles
for passion's sake, but did that mean she could?
To ask the question was to answer it. Sharif only wanted a one-night stand. He
did not mean what he was saying in any serious way.
The way she felt about him was serious enough. She had only known him a few
days, and once, a long time ago, she had believed only months or years would be
enough to understand love well enough to know that it was real.
But she had been wrong about that. Love could happen in an instant. You could
know from the first moment. Even on that first morning, watching him gallop by
on the black horse…even then she had somehow known.
But loving him was not enough. Could she go through with this, make love to him
with all her heart, when all he wanted was her body for one night of lovemaking,
when he despised her — or thought he did — in his soul? However sweet that
lovemaking promised to be, could she betray herself in such a way?
His mouth, with tender and delightful caress, was murmuring over her throat, her
cheek, her ear. For one long, bittersweet moment Sophie gave herself up to it,
thrilling to his touch and the firm intent she felt in him.
"My Beloved," he murmured. "Ahsheqi." Her heart leapt with convulsive
pain for what could never be. Then she sighed and struggled, and when he
released her, sat up.
"Sharif," she said quietly. "I have something to tell you."
He was watching her expectantly, no surprise evident in him, only a kind of
satisfaction. She wondered distantly if he thought she was about to confess the
whereabouts of the heirloom.
In the deeper understanding that had come to her over the past few minutes she
saw that Zoe must pay for her own sins, if payment was necessary. Sophie could
not save her sister from consequences now. She could not merely give him a "no."
The price was too high.
"I'm sorry, but I can't make love with you," she began. She wondered if he would
think what was coming just another lie, another attempt at manipulation. "I know
you think we've done this before, but we haven't. I'm not married, either. I'm
not who you think I am. And I'm…I'm a virgin."
She felt the tension rush up inside him, felt it in the convulsive clenching of
his arms and jaw, the tightening of his grip on her. For a moment of what looked
like white-hot anger, he stared at her, and she knew that if his passion got the
better of him now, she was lost. She would not have the strength to say no a
second time to what she was so desperate to experience.
And for a wild, drunken moment she wanted that fate, preferred it over the empty
future she foresaw otherwise.
"A virgin?" he repeated, in a voice like gravel.
Sophie swallowed. She couldn't say another word. She could only gaze at him,
half hypnotized. His eyes widened and then narrowed with an emotion she couldn't
read. She had never seen black flame before. Black heat, she thought, gazing
into his eyes.
Her heart kicked and leapt. Too late Sophie understood that he was a man who had
been made a fool of twice. And she understood him enough to know that he would
not take that lightly.
"How is this possible?" Sharif demanded.
"I'm not who you think I am," Sophie said. "Last year you met my sister."
"Sister," he repeated, with a grim smile. His gaze still pierced her. "Which of
you is Sophie?"
"She's Zoe. We're twins. I cut and colored my hair because…" But there was no
need to tell all of Zoe's secrets.
His head was close to hers, his eyes searching. As if unconsciously, his grip
was still firm. Possessive. But she knew it could not last. When the truth sank
in….
"She sent you here? Why?"
"For a holiday, she said. But I'm not sure what was really on her mind." Sophie
took a deep breath and looked into his eyes. "You didn't guess?"
"Guess? I guessed things could not be as I had imagined. I knew that there was
some mystery to be understood. You were not the woman I remembered. The longer I
was with you, the clearer that became. Either you had changed more than your
hair, I thought, or — or you had lied to me before."
His hand moved on her arm in a hypnotic caress that sent shivers of need into
her blood. "Then tonight I saw the truth. I knew you were a different woman."
Sharif's jaw clenched, and with a wrench of regret that made her gasp, she felt
his grip loosen.
I should have taken the chance when it was on offer, her heart cried, too
late. She had passed up forever her chance to taste that burning passion in
herself and him. To touch that place of deep connection in her soul. She knew
that she was right in what she had always believed — such deep feeling is a once
in a lifetime kind of thing. Even if it wasn't reciprocated, you should have
taken your chance when you had it, she told herself, in bitter reproach.
Sharif al Farid would have been hers for one night, if she had been brave enough
to take the taste of paradise fate had offered.
She had tossed the cup away without a sip.
His eyes still burned her with accusation and blame. As he opened his mouth to
speak, on the bedside table, the clock numbers flicked.
She couldn't bear to hear his condemnation. Sophie said quickly, "It's yesterday
afternoon in Vancouver. I want to phone Zoe and ask her about the bowl."
"It will change nothing," he said harshly.
But she couldn't believe that. If at least she could prove that Zoe had not
stolen the Jade Bowl, it must change something.
Zoe giggled and gasped. "What, that old green bowl of his? My God, do you mean
he's been imagining that I stole it all this time?"
But her voice betrayed her.
"Where is it, then?" Sophie asked firmly, and Zoe laughed outright, the way she
always did when she was caught out in a prank.
"Think of the Purloined Letter, Soph," she said tantalizingly, and then, when
Sophie didn't bite, said, a little sulkily, "It's in the kitchen. On the top
shelf, I think, behind some bigger bowls. I don't think much of his housekeeper
if she hasn't found it after more than a year!"
"Is that why you sent me here?"
"I confess I was a little worried about the bowl. I didn't really understand how
much it was worth till I got back here and looked it up. It's worth an absolute
fortune, and I did start to think maybe the kitchen wasn't the best place for
it. But I couldn't risk going myself, not with Ham in the situation he's in.
Someone might have got hold of the story if they'd seen us together."
"Oh, Zoe! "Sophie couldn't help complaining.
"Don't tell me you're sorry. It hasn't escaped me that you're having this little
heart to heart with the sheikh in the middle of the night there. Tell me, did he
overcome his precious scruples with you? Did he make love with you thinking you
were me? I hope it taught him a lesson!"
"What lesson? What did you do it for?"
"He was so damned self-righteous," her twin returned. "How was I to know I
shouldn't mention my husband? Your darling sheikh practically kicked me out of
bed. I've never been so insulted in my life. So what's it like with him? Did I
miss the unmissable?"
"You threw her out of bed?" Sophie asked in a kind of awe. No man had ever done
that before, she was sure.
"Your sister exaggerates," Sharif said, with a smile. "As I remember the moment,
she was sitting on the sofa, and kicked off her shoes with the casual remark
that her husband had bought them for her and they didn't quite fit."
"Oh!"
They lay side by side on her bed, the light a soft glow enclosing them. She had
never felt so safe.
"She seemed to have no idea that her being a married woman would make any
difference to me. She was very angry that it did. So angry that when I saw you
on the beach I was half suspicious that you had returned to sell the bowl back
to me at the price of my principles."
Sophie gave vent to a little laugh. That was probably not far off what Zoe had
imagined doing, but of course she wouldn't follow through — not with Ham's
career as the price.
"Would I have succeeded?" Sophie asked.
"I was not happy to discover how tempted I was," Sharif admitted.
"And yet you brought me here."
"Perhaps because I am a self-deluded fool. But I would rather think that
unconsciously I knew the truth. The first time I kissed you, my heart insisted
you were innocent," he told her softly. His hand caressed her cheek, her arm,
with a self-control that made him tremble.
His mouth was tight with contained desire, his eyes blacker than ever. The flame
of his need touched her, heart, and body, and soul. Sophie's whole self trembled
at the brink of need like a bottomless chasm at her feet.
"Yet I knew the opposite was true. I was determined to be on my guard. So I
discounted the intuition that promised me you were the one I have been waiting
for, all my life. That you belonged to me."
A tremulous smile pulled at the corners of her mouth. "You were so angry and
suspicious that I thought nothing could ever come of my feelings. There didn't
seem to be any point in telling you the truth. But tonight…."
His arm was strong and tender against her back, a hold whose possession she
could never break. "Tonight, I I looked into your eyes and knew the truth about
you," he murmured, and now his fingers toyed with a short, bright curl, sending
whispers of electricity over her scalp. "It had been there to see from the
beginning."
"You didn't show any hint of that. 'Only one more night', you said."
"I said that to drive you to confess the truth. I knew that you would not make
love to me as part of a lie."
Sophie smiled dreamily and curled her body into his. "Not as part of a lie, no,"
she whispered, and had the satisfaction of feeling his blood leap.
He bent and kissed her, and delicious melting rippled through her. But he lifted
his mouth too soon.
"Sophie, I will not put pressure on you," Sharif said. "I know that you need
time. My love for you is already certain, but it is only natural that you will
want to be sure. Will you trust me to wait until you are sure of me, and of
yourself?"
"I trust you, Sharif," she said softly. "With all my heart. With everything I
am, or hope to be." Smiling, she reached up her hand to draw his head down again
for her kiss. "And I'm sure."
"The green bowl?" murmured Umm Abdullah, the cook, next morning. "Ah, yes! So
pretty. I never saw anything so delicate! It was a pity to leave it there,
collecting sand dust. It got into all the little petals."
"What did you do with it?" asked Sheikh Sharif al Farid.
"Why, I took it down to use it, of course! It is too small for a mixing bowl,
but I have set it here, where I can admire it. You see that it is just large
enough to hold a head or two of garlic."
"Yes, I see," said Sharif.
"It is the prettiest thing! Look at the rose he has carved, Lord. You can almost
smell it! I admire it often while I cook. Do you know who carved it? If you are
going to take this one, I would like to pay him to make me another."
"You're letting her keep it in the kitchen?" Sophie asked in bemusement.
"It holds her garlic," Sharif explained blandly.
"But you —"
"It is my fate to have been taught important lessons from unexpected sources
just recently," Sharif said.
"And what lesson did Umm Abdullah teach you?"
"That a true eye will always see worth, whatever hides it. When I go to the
kitchen and see the Jade Bowl there now, it will remind me not to overlook the
jewel I am searching for when it is right before my eyes."
His eyes told her what jewel he meant. Sophie laughed a tender laugh, and his
mouth covered hers, and her laughter sparkled in his blood.
The End