Prince Nadir's Secret Heir(74)
‘Not just sex.’ His eyebrow rose in a sexy slant. ‘Hot sex.’ He kissed her. ‘Great sex.’ Another kiss. ‘Phenomenal sex.’ His smile was sinful and Imogen buried her face against his neck.
God, she had nearly made an utter fool of herself by blurting out what was in her heart and he was talking about sex!
‘I’ve made you blush.’
She forced herself to laugh softly because what else could she do?
‘You feel the same.’ There was a deep satisfaction in his voice and Imogen pushed her feelings aside. She raised a small smile because she knew this wasn’t a love match and to his credit he had never pretended it was. And what would telling him how she felt achieve anyway? It would only make her feel awkward around him and probably him around her as well.
No, it was better if this was her secret to deal with alone.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
IMOGEN CAME AWAKE slowly and felt the sun on her face before she opened her eyes. She felt blissfully relaxed right up until she realised that she was alone in Nadir’s bedroom; the only sound she could hear was a hawk calling periodically outside her window.
Nadir had gone again. He’d woken early and left her. Still unused to having help with Nadeena, she sprinted out of bed and only paused long enough to pull on a robe behind the door on her way out. It was Nadir’s robe, of course, and it smelt of his special blend of male and spice. Trying to ignore the way his scent made her tingle all over, she padded quickly down the marble hallway and into the living room.
When that was empty she headed for the outdoor terrace.
Expecting that she would find the same scene as she had the last time, Imogen heard the sound of Nadeena’s infectious giggles. She waited for the sight of the devoted Maab playing peekaboo with Nadeena when her heart all but flew into her mouth as she discovered that it wasn’t Maab or Tasnim entertaining her daughter, but Nadir—in the pool. The sight of his bronzed torso stopped her in her tracks and she drooled at the way the sun glinted off his skin and turned it to burnished copper.
Pausing in the doorway and half hidden by a massive potted palm, Imogen watched Nadir throwing Nadeena up in the air and catching her just as her toes flittered across the top of the water, his biceps stretching and bulging in a fascinating display while Nadeena squealed with delight and clung to his neck.
She watched quietly for a moment, completely unnoticed as father and daughter frolicked in the sunshine. It seemed impossible that only a few days ago he had been a single-minded playboy who worked and played to excess and she could hardly fathom that he could be just as at home presiding over a boardroom full of world leaders as he was blowing raspberries on a baby’s stomach.
His handling of Nadeena as he turned her onto her stomach and floated her across the top of the water, speaking to her softly in his native tongue was gentle and tender. But then she’d always known he had the capacity for that because she’d experienced it herself fifteen months ago in Paris.
And after last night she knew he was a man who felt things deeply and she felt awful. Awful for the tragedy he had endured and for the fact that he believed he had created it and awful because she had kept Nadeena’s birth from him and had never planned to tell him. In her defence, she had believed that she was acting in the best interests of her daughter but watching the two of them together over the past few days had shown her that she had been wrong.
It seemed bizarre that a week ago she would have said that he was not father material and yet her own father had been held up as a wonderful family man in the community and she didn’t have one memory of him holding her and playing with her as Nadir was doing with their baby now.