At the Sheikh's Bidding(19)

‘If you allow me to  take Kazim back to Ingledean, I promise I will   bring him back to Qubbah  for regular visits,' Erin said in a quieter   tone. ‘You deliberately  deceived me about your father's state of   health, and if you continue to  prevent me from taking Kazim I will   appeal to the King. I can't believe  he asked you to lie about him. He   is an honourable man, and I'm sure he  would not stoop to "playing   dirty",' she added, recalling Zahir's  unashamed confession that he   would go to any lengths to get his own way.

Zahir  felt his anger ignite at her implication that she believed his   father  to be honourable but that he, Prince Zahir bin Kahlid al   Muntassir,  lacked that most valued virtue. ‘I suggest that you keep   away from my  father-unless you want to suffer the full force of my   anger,' he growled  furiously. ‘Despite what you think, the King is no   longer physically  strong. He hates anyone to know it, and has only   allowed me to take on  some of the workload of running the kingdom after   considerable  persuasion. I will not allow him to be troubled by a   hot-tempered,  violent gold-digger,' he continued in that same hard   voice, ignoring  Erin's outraged gasp. ‘At Ingledean I offered you a   considerable sum of  money to give up Kazim.'

‘Money that I refused,' Erin said  sharply. ‘I agreed to bring him   myself, in good faith, believing that it  was only for a short visit.'

‘But Kazim is happy here, and you  cannot deny that. If you return to   England alone and sign over full  custody of him to me I will treble the   offer I made to you.'

Nausea  surged in Erin's stomach, and her face twisted as she swallowed   the  bile in her throat. How could she possibly be so attracted to this   man?  It was said that the eyes were the mirrors of the soul, and   Zahir's eyes  were cold and so pitiless that she shivered.

‘You don't get it,  do you?' she grated, her throat feeling as if   someone had taken a piece  of sandpaper to it. ‘I wouldn't part with   Kazim if you offered me the  moon and the stars and the whole world.   Kazim is my son. You can keep  your filthy money-he is not for sale!'   She jumped to her feet, breathing  hard at his assessment of her   character as a hot-tempered, violent  gold-digger. Oh, she was   hot-tempered, all right-and as for violent!  Acting on impulse, she   snatched up the heavy paperweight on his desk and  flung it at him. ‘I   hate you-do you hear me?' And she hated herself  more, for her   humiliating fixation with him.

Her anger  intensified when he caught the paperweight with insulting   ease and set  it carefully back down on the desk. ‘I honestly think you   could be  insane. You're certainly unbalanced,' he hissed, his eyes   flashing fire  as he closed in on her. ‘As for hating me … ' His laugh   grated on her raw  nerves and his mouth curved into a cynical smile as   he watched her step  back until her legs hit the edge of the chaise   longue and she realised  she had no way of escaping him. ‘Our mutual   dislike of each other is not  in dispute, Erin-but neither is the sexual   hunger that torments us  both. I know from the dark shadows beneath   your eyes that you didn't  sleep last night, and I know what kept you   awake-because I too tossed  and turned between the sheets and fantasised   about doing this … '





CHAPTER FIVE




ZAHIR'S  dark head swooped and his mouth sought hers with unerring   precision.  His tongue skilfully traced the contours of her lips, but   she twisted  her head and braced her hands against his chest, despair   sweeping  through her when her senses reacted to the sensual heat of his   body and  the subtle musk of his cologne. She could not let him kiss   her-not  again, no way, never!


‘You're mistaken,' she muttered. ‘I  don't feel anything for you-and the   only reason I didn't sleep last  night is because I'm desperate to  take  Kazim and leave here.'                       
       
           



       

‘Liar,'  Zahir drawled lazily. One hand cupped her chin and forced her   head up  while the other anchored in her hair to hold her fast. ‘You   assure me  you want to leave, but your body tells a different story.' He   trailed  his eyes down her body to the visible peaks of her nipples   straining  beneath her blouse and gave a satisfied smile.

She looked so prim  and proper in the high-necked blouse and long skirt   she'd worn for her  meeting with the King, but her demure appearance   only inflamed his  hunger for her. He knew damn well that her air of   innocence was an  illusion, and he preferred his lovers to be confident   and experienced  rather than timid virgins, but when she blushed and   stared at him with  her huge, faintly stunned grey eyes he felt a   primitive need to claim  her as his woman and his alone, to make love to   her with such fierce  passion that she acknowledged him as her master.

‘I know what you  want, Erin.' His voice had thickened and his warm   breath fanned her  earlobe, sending a shiver of delicious sensation down   Erin's spine. ‘You  want me to strip the clothes from your body,  spread  you beneath me and  take you hard and fast, drive us both to the  edge  of reason and the very  heights of sexual ecstasy.'

‘No!' She valiantly tried to shut  her ears to his seductive voice, to   shut her mind to the stark images in  her head that his whispered words   evoked. His fingers tightened on her  chin, forcing her head round so   that he could claim her mouth, and with a  strength born of desperation   she kicked him hard on the shin. ‘I'd  rather go to bed with a   rattlesnake than with you.'

He swore  savagely and loosened his grip-but only momentarily. ‘You   vicious little  vixen-it's time you were tamed,' he growled, catching   her around the  waist when she tried to dart past him, and pushing her   down onto the  chaise longue. He immediately covered her body with his   own, his weight  pinning her to the cushions, and the feel of his   rock-hard erection  jabbing into her belly caused liquid fire to pool   between her thighs.

‘Let  me up, you barbarian.' She beat her fists on his shoulders until   he  captured her wrists in one of his big hands and forced her arms   above  her head so that she could inflict no further damage.

‘If my father knew what a wildcat you are, I'm sure he would not be so eager for me to marry you,' Zahir muttered grimly.

The  shocked silence that followed his astounding statement was   shattered by  the sound of Erin's hysterical laughter. ‘Your father   wants us to  marry? And you say I'm insane? Why on earth would he make   such a  ridiculous suggestion?' she demanded, refusing to be cowed when   he  glared down at her, his eyes glittering with anger.

‘For Kazim's  sake, of course-what other reason could there be?' Zahir's   jaw hardened  when he recalled his lunch-time conversation with his   father, during  which the King had referred to Erin's statement that she   had no plans to  marry again. She'd vowed to devote herself to Kazim,   and as Zahir had  pledged to be a father to the little boy a marriage  of  convenience  between him and his brother's beautiful young widow  seemed  highly  sensible-and indeed his duty.

Besides, it was time he settled  down, King Kahlid had pressed, when   Zahir had muttered something along  the lines of ‘over my dead body'. He   was thirty-six, and in a few years  from now, perhaps less, would be   the interim ruler of Qubbah. He needed a  wife-and who better for him to   marry than the mother of the future heir  of the kingdom?

Nothing would sway the King from his belief that  marriage between his   remaining son and his dead son's widow was an  excellent plan, and   Zahir's hints that Erin might not be quite as  saintly as she appeared   had brought only a heavy frown from his father.


‘I  am convinced that her love for the boy is genuine, and that is all   that  matters,' King Kahlid had stated, with a finality that had ended    further argument.