Sleeping with the Sheikh

“It is for the best,” he kept repeating to himself as he had during dinner, quite possibly the last meal he would ever share with his son or Andrea.

The finality sat heavily on his heart as he began to pack the rest of his belongings. He’d saved the most significant for last—the baseball, Paul’s graduation gift to him, even the pair of tattered jeans he had left behind before. All mementos from the past that he would cherish throughout his future. Yet when he opened his suitcase once more, he found lying atop his clothing a souvenir that captured the present.

The photograph was much the same as the one of him, Andi and Paul except Chance had replaced his uncle. Tess had taken it earlier in the week, but he had no idea when she’d had it developed or how it had ended up among his things. Perhaps she had placed it there when he had returned to the stable for one last look after the evening meal. Perhaps it wasn’t Tess’s doing at all. If his instincts served him correctly, Andrea had left the keepsake, another precious gift she had given him.

Andrea.

He wanted desperately to go to her, to take her in his arms one final time, to spend a few more moments in her presence, to make love to her as he had desired to do the past week. He would deny himself that pleasure for he did not deserve her attention. And more than likely she would refuse if he dared make the offer tonight.

He picked up the photo and studied it a moment longer, admiring the faces of the woman he had always loved, of the child he had grown to love. Tomorrow he would say goodbye to them both and wish them well, then return to his homeland and pretend that nothing had changed. Yet everything had changed, especially Sheikh Samir Yaman.

“It’s a nice picture, isn’t it?”

His hands froze on the framed photo at the soothing sound of Andrea’s voice coming from behind him. After carefully tucking the photo beneath a few garments to protect it, he closed the suitcase and closed the chapter on what could never be.

Slowly he turned to face the woman who had so easily secured his heart years ago. “I will cherish it always,” he said. “Thank you.”

She took a tentative step forward and stopped at the end of the four-poster bed. “It’s the least I could do.”

“It is very much appreciated.”

As a heavy silence hung between them, she pushed her red-gold hair away from her face but failed to look directly at him. Finally she walked forward and stood face-to-face with him, so close that he could see that her heartache had settled in her beautiful blue eyes. He opened his arms to her, and she moved into his embrace.

Andi settled her cheek against Sam’s chest, not certain whose heart was beating more rapidly, his or hers. But her heart was in the process of totally splintering.

On that thought she kissed his whisker-rough jaw and gathered all her courage to tell him the one thing she had avoided until now. “I love you, Sam.”

He touched her face with tenderness and gently kissed her brow. “As I love you.”

She experienced an overwhelming joy that raced to her soul and settled on her wounded heart. “Then stay with me. Be a part of our lives.”

“You know that I cannot do that.”

She stared at him in frustration. “Then you don’t really love me.”

His rough sigh echoed in the silent room. “Yes, I do, more than you will ever know. But that does not change my situation.”

“It could if you wanted it to.”

“If only that were true.” He guided her to the edge of the bed and seated her next to his side, then took her hands into his. “I also love our son, which is why I have decided that he need never know I am his father.”

Exactly what she’d feared. “But what about when you come back?”

He glanced away but not before revealing an abiding sadness in his stoic expression. “I will not be coming back.”

Andi’s heart started another descent. “But you have to come back. Chance needs you. I need you.”

“You need to resume your life without me. You need to find someone who will care for you and our son. Someone who is deserving of your love.”

“I don’t want anyone but you,” she said, warm tears now raining down her cheeks in a stream of sorrow.

“You say that now, but you will change your mind once I am gone.”

He pulled her tightly into his strong arms. If only Andi could absorb some of that strength. If only she could have foreseen where this would lead. In reality she’d known all along what would happen, that he would leave her again, but she had chosen to believe that somehow, some way, it would be different this time. That he might actually change his mind, that she would change his mind. How foolish she’d been.

She had no choice but to claim the sadness, to accept defeat. But she didn’t know how to accept his leaving. “I don’t know how to let you go.”

“You must.”

She raised her head and looked at him straight-on, determined to try one more time to make him see things her way. “Even if you give up your wealth, your status, just look at what you’d be getting in return.”

“How well I know this.”

“Then why does it have to be this way? Why do you have to go? Why? And what is it you’re not telling me?”

He remained silent for a moment before drawing in a deep, cleansing breath. “I am to marry another.”

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