Passion

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Tilda braced a hand on the wall and pushed herself away from him with a lack of coordination that infuriated her. She was trembling, maddeningly aware of every fluid shift of his lithe, powerful body so close to hers. Her mind threw up a dangerous image of Rashad pushing her back against the wall with the passion that was so much a part of him, the passion he so rarely freed from restraint. The knot of tension in her pelvis tightened and she recognised it for the hunger it was. The fact that her hostility didn’t stop her responding to him shook her up badly.

Rashad shot her pale, taut profile a glittering appraisal and closed a shapely brown hand over hers. ‘Let me show you the harem.’

‘I can hardly wait.’ Although colour now mantled her cheeks, Tilda lifted her head high. She remembered his dark sense of humour so well. She remembered how he had once teased the life out of her. A sharp pang of regret gripped her for that lost time and had the effect of simply hardening her resolve.

‘I didn’t tip off the press,’ she told him afresh.

‘So you say.’ His audible indifference to such a plea incensed her.

‘And five years ago, I didn’t sleep with anyone else.’

Rashad expelled his breath in a long-suffering hiss. Why did she keep on reminding him of her infidelity? He did not want to be reminded. Why did she not appreciate that every denial merely acted as a prompt to unsavoury memories?

Mounting a vast stone staircase by his side and determined to ignore the discouraging silence that had met her valiant claim, Tilda swallowed hard. ‘I’d like to see the proof you said you had of my so-called misdemeanours.’

‘Some day I will let you see it.’ Rashad flashed her an impatient look. As she could have no idea how conclusive his proof was she was probably hoping to argue her way out of the evidence of her deceit. Unhappily for her, he had complete faith in the source of the information he had received.

‘Why not now?’

‘I have heard enough of your lies. Silence is preferable.’ His lean, darkly handsome face was resolute. ‘In time, I expect you to accept the futility of lying to me.’

Tilda yanked her hand forcibly free of his. ‘So you intend to make it impossible for me to defend myself. I’m damned if I do speak up and damned if I don’t. But why would any man want a lying, cheating gold-digger?’

Rashad made no answer. He refused to rise to the bait. He was beginning to appreciate that whenever she was most desperate to keep him at a distance she started fighting with him.

Aggrieved by his lack of response, Tilda murmured dulcetly, ‘Maybe you only like bad girls.’

At that crack, Rashad surveyed her with pure predatory appreciation. Where she was concerned that was true. When he looked at her, when he thought about her, her sins were never at the forefront of his mind. His desire ran too hot and strong to be denied. With her turquoise eyes as vivid as polar stars, she glowed with beauty and quicksilver energy. The ache at his groin came close to pain. Never had he felt such powerful need to possess a woman. Suddenly all his patience just vanished. He strode forward and swept her up off her feet and headed for his bedroom.

‘What the heck are you doing?’ Tilda launched at him in astonishment.

‘We’ve waited long enough to be together.’ Rashad thrust at a door with a broad shoulder to force it wider and kicked it shut in his wake.

Tilda spread a decidedly panicky glance round the echoing bedroom, which seemed to her to have very little else in it beyond the highly ornate four-poster bed that sat on a dais. ‘I thought I was going to get a tour of the harem!’

‘Some other day, when I have the strength to resist you.’ Rashad lowered her to the floor and stripped off her coat, an imprisoning hand splaying across the soft swell of her hips in case she dared to stray anywhere out of his reach. He bent his arrogant dark head, golden eyes smouldering over her like tiny flames, and tasted her soft full mouth.

It was as though every time he touched her he sent another brick flying out of her wall of defence, leaving her more at risk and less able to hold out against him the next time. His insistent kiss jolted her like a bolt of lightning shooting down her spine and made her go back for more. Her heart raced and her body quivered against the hard, masculine promise of his. He pried her lips apart for the erotic plunge of his tongue. Her tummy flipped with sheer excitement. She could not withstand her need to touch him. Her hands slid beneath his jacket to trace the warm, hard contours of his powerful chest beneath the fine shirt.

Rashad raised his head, luxuriant ebony lashes lifting to frame golden eyes alight with hunger. He eased her dress off her narrow shoulders and let it slide down to her feet in a heap. She was startled, for she had not realised that he had already unzipped the garment. Suddenly feeling very exposed in her flimsy bra and briefs, she wrapped her arms round herself.

‘Don’t embarrass me by acting as though you are shy,’ Rashad derided, long brown fingers enclosing her wrists to uncross her arms again. Such pretence from her hit the rawest of nerves and his annoyance with her was intense. ‘I hate anything false. Fake modesty leaves me cold. Why would I even want you to be a virgin?’

Tilda jerked back from him in a defensive movement.

Why would I even want you to be a virgin? That scornful demand faded the pink from her cheeks. He recognised the hollow light in her clear eyes and, disturbed by that awareness, he reached for her again, determined to break through her resistance.

‘Did you think that pretence is what I want from you?’ Rashad demanded in a roughened undertone. ‘It was not my intention to cause you pain. But this time I want only what is real from you.’

Tilda was shaken that he had noticed that he had hurt her feelings, because she had believed she was better at hiding her feelings. He framed her face with his lean hands and took her mouth with ravishing sweetness and spellbinding sensuality. She stopped thinking and let her response take over. He curved her slender, unresisting body to his, drinking in the scent of her creamy white skin and the telling unsteadiness of her breathing. Lifting her onto the bed, he stood back to discard his tie and unbutton his shirt.

Her limbs felt heavy where they lay on the crimson silk spread and there was a liquid heat burning low in her belly. She could not take her eyes off the light golden slice of male torso he had revealed: muscle rippled across the solid wall of his chest as he took off the shirt, and black whorls of hair dusted his pectorals and arrowed down in a silken furrow across the flat slab of his stomach. Her mouth ran dry.

Rashad surveyed her with smouldering appreciation and the mattress gave under his weight. Tilda rolled away. Rashad laughed and hauled her back to him with easy strength. ‘You are so beautiful,’ he told her thickly, tasting her luscious mouth again, dipping his tongue between her parted lips with a dark sensuality that left her trembling. ‘You want me, too.’

She shut her eyes for fear that he could read that truth there. The tiny moments when he wasn’t touching her were already a torment. Like a doll, she was incapable of independent action and it was the very strength of her desire for him that kept her trapped. He pressed his hard, sensual mouth against the tiny pulse going crazy below her collar-bone and she gasped and arched her narrow spine. He pulled her back against him to unclasp her bra. A groan of male satisfaction sounded in his throat when her small, high breasts tumbled free. He teased the swollen pink peaks with skilful fingers, before he bent over her and used his mouth to toy with the straining buds. Every bitter-sweet sensation darted straight as an arrow to the hot damp pulse between her thighs and increased the ache there.

‘Rashad … oh, please …’

Rashad looked down at her with heavily lidded eyes, lashes so long they almost hit his superb cheekbones. Somewhere outside he heard the sharp crack of rifles releasing a hail of bullets and he frowned.

‘What’s that?’ she mumbled breathlessly, her fingers delving into the luxuriant depths of his black hair.

‘Someone has probably got married and the guards are showing their appreciation.’ Although that was the most likely explanation, Rashad was tense as only a former soldier could be in such circumstances. Then he heard the drone of aircraft. As he leapt off the bed and snatched up his shirt a jet flew overhead. Barely twenty seconds later, he heard the heavy whop-whop of more than one helicopter approaching.

‘Rashad? What’s happening?’ Tilda prompted apprehensively.

‘Get dressed.’ An urgent knocking sounded on the door. The noise was almost drowned out by the ear-splitting whine of another jet flashing over the palace.

Rashad answered the door.

‘Please forgive the intrusion, Your Royal Highness,’ a senior manservant delivered anxiously, ‘but I have been asked to inform you that the Prime Minister is about to arrive. He most humbly requests an audience with you.’

Every scrap of colour in Rashad’s lean, strong face ebbed. He turned the colour of burnt ashes, because he could only think that something had happened to his father. For what other reason would the Prime Minister come to see him without having organised the visit in advance?

‘Rashad?’ Tilda pressed worriedly.

Rashad looked through her as if she had suddenly become invisible. At speed he donned his tie and jacket. ‘Do not on any account leave this room, or speak to anyone, until I return.’

CHAPTER SIX

RASHAD had only got as far as the landing when he recalled his mobile phone, which he had switched off, and he immediately put it on again. He cursed the selfish streak of recklessness that had caused him to ignore the phone’s demands barely thirty minutes earlier. Almost immediately, the ringtone sounded again and he answered it. Informed that his royal parent was waiting to speak to him, he was bewildered.

‘My son,’ King Hazar boomed on the line as if he were addressing a packed audience chamber, ‘I am overjoyed!’

‘You are in good health, my father?’ Rashad breathed in astonishment. ‘Of course.’

Rashad was still shaken by the fear that had seized him. ‘Then, why has the Prime Minister flown out to the desert to speak to me?’

‘The occasion of your marriage is of very great importance to us all.’

Rashad came to an abrupt halt at the head of the stone staircase. ‘My … marriage?’

‘Our people do not wish to be deprived of a state wedding.’

‘Who said that I was married, or even getting married?’ Rashad managed to ask in as level a voice as he could muster.

‘A journalist contacted your sister, Kalila, in London and showed her a photo taken at the airport. Kalila contacted me and e-mailed that picture of Tilda for us all to see. She is very beautiful and a magnificent surprise. I should have sat up and taken more notice the day I heard you were having the old palace refurbished!’

Rashad was thinking fast and realising that so many facts were already out in the family and public arena that he could not simply dismiss the story out of hand. He had been frankly appalled by the presence of the paparazzi at Heathrow—the rumours must have been flying around about his relationship with Tilda before he’d even got his jet off the ground in London! So much for discretion and privacy! He was even more taken aback by his father’s hearty enthusiasm at the news that his son had married a woman he had never met.

‘When you proclaimed that Tilda was your woman and required no visa, old Butrus almost had a heart attack until it dawned on him that you must already be married to her to make such an announcement. And, even had you not been—’ the king chuckled in the best of good humour ‘—according to the laws of our royal house once you declared Tilda yours before witnesses, it was a marriage by declaration. The statute that saved your grandfather’s skin was never repealed.’

Rashad found it necessary to lean back against the wall for support. A marriage by declaration—a law hastily trotted out to clean up the scandal after his licentious grandfather had run off with his grandmother with not the slightest intention of doing anything other than bedding her. It was still legal? He felt as if the bars of a cage were closing round him.

‘My father.’ Rashad breathed in deep.

‘As if you would bring any woman other than your intended bride into Bakhar!’ the older man quipped. ‘No man of honour would sully a woman’s reputation. I had only to hear Tilda’s name spoken and at once I knew she was your bride and that we had a wonderful celebration to arrange. Was she not the woman who gained your heart five years ago?’

As the king waxed lyrical on the subjects of true love and lifelong matrimonial happiness Rashad grew a great deal grimmer at his end of the phone. There might be sunlight beyond the window, but a giant dark cloud was now obscuring his appreciation of it. He had broken the rules only once and now he was to pay the price with his freedom. What insanity had seized him when he had taken the risk of bringing Tilda into Bakhar? It had been an act of utter recklessness and, in retrospect, he could not fathom what had driven him to the point of such incredible folly.

Rashad went downstairs to greet the Prime Minister and his entourage. He accepted hearty congratulations, elaborate greetings and compliments for his bride and the news that a two-day public holiday had already been declared at the end of the month to mark the occasion of his state wedding. He did not even pale when he was informed that formal announcements had been made on the state television and radio services and that bridal good wishes were pouring in from every corner of Bakhar.

It was a full hour before he was in a position to return to Tilda. He was still suffering all the outrage and disbelief of a male who had never put a foot wrong in his life, but now had made one fatal error. He had no doubt whatsoever that Tilda would be ecstatic at the news that she was not a concubine but a wife, and that at the very least they would have to stay married for a year.

Fully dressed, Tilda was pacing the floor. Sporadic outbreaks of gunfire and the extraordinary amount of air traffic had frightened her into wondering if the palace was under attack. When silence had fallen, she had finally succumbed to the most sickening fear that Rashad had not reappeared because he had been taken prisoner, wounded or killed. Her response to that suspicion was much more emotional than she would have liked to admit and had informed her that her hatred ran only skin deep. While it was perfectly all right to loathe Rashad when he was in front of her and enjoying full health, when she was assailed by a vision of him lying somewhere hurt and unattended she felt sick and wanted to rush to his aid. For that reason, she was on the very brink of disobeying orders and leaving the room when the door opened.

‘Where on earth have you been all this time?’ she shot at Rashad in instant fury at his reappearance, when it became immediately obvious that her fears had been nonsensical: not a strand of his luxuriant black hair was out of place and his superb tailored suit was immaculate. ‘I’ve been frantic with worry!’

‘Why?’ Rashad asked, ebony brows pleating.

‘The gunfire … your instructions … all those jets and helicopters flying in and round about!’ Tilda slung at him shakily.

‘There is no cause for alarm. Natural caution urged me to ask you to stay here. But the outbreak of excitement was a celebration and the result of a misapprehension.’ Rashad shrugged a broad shoulder with something less than his usual cool. ‘The misunderstanding is entirely my fault. The whole country thinks that I have brought you back to Bakhar as my wife.’

Tilda was so taken aback by that information that she simply stared at him, noting that his lean, strong face was unusually pale and taut. ‘For goodness sake, why would anyone think something like that?’

‘Circumstances have conspired to make it the only acceptable interpretation of events,’ Rashad pronounced with great care. ‘I acknowledge that I did wrong in bringing you here. No woman has ever travelled home to Bakhar with me before. The intervention of the press in London and their awareness of our previous relationship only added strength to the rumour that you are, at the very least, my intended bride.’

Tilda blinked. ‘So what now?’

Rashad frowned. ‘According to my father we are already married in the eyes of the law, because I referred to you as my woman in front of witnesses.’

Puzzled by the first part of that explanation, Tilda easily picked up on the second part and slung him an angry look of disdain. ‘You called me that? When?’

‘Before we alighted from the jet. But I can put my hand on my heart and swear on my honour that I intended no insult to you.’

‘Of course you did—you described me as your woman as though I was a possession! It’s medieval!’

‘You feel as though you belong with me. I meant that you were part of my life,’ Rashad growled. ‘Now you are in truth a part.’

‘In the eyes of the law … we’re already married?’ Tilda parroted in sudden shock as his original meaning finally sank in on her. ‘How can that be?’

‘Many years ago, my grandfather abducted my grandmother and created a huge scandal. He always acted first and thought afterwards. To smooth matters over it was considered necessary to pass a law that allowed him to claim that she was his wife from the moment he said she was in the presence of witnesses. That law relates only to the royal family and it has not been repealed.’

‘But such behaviour and laws of that sort are still downright medieval! With relations like that, I’m amazed that you had the nerve to criticise my family.’ Tilda shook her head in a daze, her thoughts tumbling about in turmoil while she attempted to reason with clarity. ‘Well, the obvious solution to all this ridiculous confusion is that you just tell the truth. You are, after all, very fond of telling me that lies are always unacceptable to you.’

As that proposal was made, a tiny muscle pulled taut at the corner of Rashad’s unsmiling mouth. ‘The truth would now appear to be that, according to Bakhari law, we are legally married.’

‘If that is so, I really do think that it would serve you right,’ Tilda admitted helplessly. ‘But, as I wouldn’t stay married to you even if you had a gun to my head, the divorce can’t come quick enough!’

‘This is a serious matter.’

A bitter edge had already entered Tilda’s thoughts and coloured them. She was remembering how madly in love she had been five years earlier. In those days she would’ve made any sacrifice to marry her desert prince. Were they really and truly married? No doubt that fact explained why he was as grave as though he were attending a funeral. She was obviously the very last woman alive that he would have willingly chosen to be his wife.

‘I expect it is serious. But if I’m married to you, then I must have some rights.’ Her beautiful eyes concealed by her lashes, she turned her head away from him, determined not to reveal that she was upset. ‘Or have you got another list of threats to hold over me to ensure that I do exactly as you want me to do?’

That candid question hit Rashad like a bucket of icy water on hot skin. Until she had come back into his life, he had never threatened a woman, nor ever dreamt that he might do so. Now he was confronted head-on with his harsh treatment of Tilda. Once, she had betrayed his trust and inflicted a wound for which he had never forgiven her. But that, Rashad acknowledged heavily, was no defence for a misuse of power to mete out punishment. His father’s talk of marriage and the photo of Tilda with Jerrold had reawakened Rashad’s bitter anger and encouraged him to pursue what he believed to be justice. But from the instant he had seen Tilda again, far less acceptable motives and desires had powered him. No longer could he marvel at the disastrous consequences that he had unleashed on both of them.

‘No. There will be no more threats.’ His lean and darkly handsome face sober, Rashad surveyed her with dark, unreadable eyes. ‘I should never have used coercive tactics.’

Surprised by that total turnaround, Tilda lifted her pale blond head. ‘You’re admitting that?’

‘I can do nothing less when I look at the situation I have created. I was in the wrong and for that I apologise.’ Voicing those words of sincere regret cost Rashad a great deal of pride for he had never had to apologise before. ‘I harboured anger from the past and it blinded me to what was right.’

Tilda could only think of her own anger, nourished and kept alive by hurt. She thought of the fact that she had never let any man so close to her again. She thought of how she had felt just minutes earlier when she had been afraid that he might have been injured. A giant tide of fear engulfed her at that point as she appreciated that her feelings for Rashad ran much deeper than was safe or sensible.

‘I will never threaten you again,’ Rashad promised her levelly. ‘Instead, I am asking you for your co-operation.’

‘Are we really and truly married?’ Tilda prompted uncertainly.

‘Yes,’ Rashad confirmed.

‘But I expect you’ll do whatever it takes to get us out of the marriage as fast as you possibly can,’ Tilda remarked in a tone that was a tad brittle.

Rashad studied the wall to one side of her with frowning attention. Divorce would entail her departure from Bakhar. He discovered that that prospect had no appeal for him whatsoever. Surely, he reasoned, a hasty marriage and an even hastier divorce would only compound the errors he had made? A marriage was a marriage, no matter how it had been entered into. In the same way a wife was a wife, deserving of his support and respect. He should at least try to make a success of their alliance, he decided with sudden purpose. He would have to learn to put all memory of her past behind him.

‘A quick divorce is not an option I would wish to choose.’ Rashad rested dark golden eyes, gleaming with renewed energy, back on her. ‘There is no reason why we should not attempt to make the best of our predicament.’

‘Meaning?’ Suddenly maddeningly aware of the smouldering appraisal resting on the swollen contours of her pink mouth, Tilda tensed. Without warning she found that she was reliving the melting pleasure of his hungry mouth roaming over her breasts and the pulsing ache at the secret heart of her body. She sucked in a fractured breath, embarrassed by her susceptibility.

Taut with arousal, Rashad made a valiant attempt to overcome the barrier of his fierce pride and build a bridge that might take him from coercion to acceptance. He moved closer. ‘Waking or sleeping, you are in my every thought. My hunger for you is no greater than yours for me. I want to be with you.’

Tilda swallowed the lump in her throat and hated herself for being tempted. But he was only interested in getting her into bed. That was all he had ever been interested in, she told herself wretchedly. Yet her body still tingled with the sexual responsiveness that only he could awaken. It incensed her that she knew exactly what he was talking about. Every day, every hour, her every thought was centred on him, to the point of obsession. But that was a truth she despised and would never admit to him.

In any case, she had much more important things to worry about. Within the space of an hour every seeming certainty had vanished. It seemed shameful to her that she should long to walk into his arms and forget everything both past and present because of passion. What would sharing a bed with Rashad fix or clarify? Where were her pride and her common sense? First and foremost, she was in Bakhar for the sake of her family. She reminded herself that she had yet to see evidence that the threat against their security had been lifted.

‘What I need right now is the assurance that that eviction order has been cancelled,’ she murmured tautly.

A faint rise of dark blood marking the angular line of his classic cheekbones, Rashad fell still. ‘It has been.’

As the tense pool of silence gathered Tilda worried uncomfortably at her full lower lip. ‘And the house—has it been signed back to my mother?’

‘Of course.’

‘The outstanding loan has been settled?’

Rashad inclined his proud dark head in immediate acknowledgement.