“What else could it be?” She had to force her voice to work, yet she still sounded wheezy, as if she’d sucked in too much air.
Dangerous. The word whispered through the air around her, caressed her skin, slipped between her ribs and into her chest to grip her heart. Kadir was very dangerous, and not in that usual impersonal way he was when she’d observed him taking down an opponent. This was deeply personal and very intense.
And it was all directed at her. Her tongue grew thick and her breath short.
He reached over and threaded his hand into the hair at her nape, very deliberately, and pulled her gently toward him. “What else indeed?”
CHAPTER SEVEN
“WE HAVE A deal!” Her voice came out as a squeak and Kadir stopped, his gray eyes darkening as he stared down at her. They were inches apart now, and she could feel the heat rolling from his body, the whisper of his breath across her lips.
Her heart slammed against her ribs and she started to see spots.
But Kadir let her go abruptly and she wilted back against the seat, sucking in a deep breath and trying not to shake. When she glanced over at him, he was looking out the window. Oddly, a wave of regret buffeted her.
The tension in his shoulders was evident and she found herself wanting to reach out and soothe him. Which was completely contrary to the way she’d just reacted. What was the matter with her? Why was she so damn hot and cold around him?
Because he was Kadir, that’s why. Because she’d watched him seduce women for the past four years. She knew he was good at it—and she knew she couldn’t be one of those women. She was afraid she would like it too much. She was afraid of losing control.
“Yes,” he said, not turning around, his voice utterly cool. “We have a deal. And I will honor it.”
She didn’t know how he managed it, but he suddenly made her feel as if she’d wronged him. Emily put a hand to her head. Everything was wrong. Backward. Upside-down. Why’d Lenore have to be so spectacularly stupid so quickly? If not for that little scene yesterday morning, Emily would be riding along in the other car while Kadir and his new wife sat in this one. It wouldn’t be her playing this role and trying so desperately not to get lost in it, but Lenore Bradford, a woman who’d already been sleeping with Kadir and wouldn’t act like a timid virgin whenever he made the slightest motion toward her.
And yet the thought of Lenore in Kadir’s arms made Emily’s stomach twist in a way it had not only yesterday. She didn’t like Lenore, certainly. But she didn’t care who Kadir slept with. She never had.
Really?
Emily gritted her teeth together. She did not care. Everything was backward and confusing, that’s all. She did not want him, even though he seemed to have the ability to make her heart pump and her body ache in spite of her belief otherwise.
It was sensual deprivation, nothing more. She hadn’t had sex in so long she’d forgotten what it was like.
Emily stared out her window for the remainder of the trip. Soon they were boarding Kadir’s jet. It would take roughly six hours to reach Kyr, and Emily did not know what she was going to do with herself for the duration of the journey.
Always in the past, she had worked on something for Kadir. And then she ate and slept and worked some more, depending on the length of the flight. This time, she followed Kadir up the jet bridge and onto the plane with nothing more than a chic handbag and a magazine she’d picked up on their trip through the airport.