Awakened by Her Desert Captor (17 page)

Sylvie's mouth fell open and the dog squirmed to be free, so she let him out of her arms to go sniffing at something exciting nearby. ‘But...but I can't take him. My apartment is tiny, and Giselle is allergic to animal hair.'

Arkim frowned. ‘Giselle?'

Sylvie waved a hand. ‘My flatmate. Arkim...why are you doing this?'

He rose lithely from his seat on the floor, his chest dark under its smattering of hair in the golden light. He came over to her and held out a hand. Sylvie took it and he pulled her up. He led her over to a seat and sat down, pulling her into his lap. He smoothed her trailing hair over one shoulder.

She felt extremely unsure of her footing, and vulnerable. ‘Arkim—'

‘That day...' he interjected.

She nodded.

‘I regretted sending you away like that.'

Sylvie's heart palpitations were back. ‘You did?'

He nodded, his black eyes on hers, not letting her look away. ‘I was a coward. You were getting too close... I asked you if you'd thought we were going to stay there for ever, but the truth is I think that's exactly what
I
wanted. Never to leave. And it just hit me: I had a life to get back to and I'd almost forgotten it existed. That
I
existed outside of that place. I honestly haven't been able to stop thinking about you. We're not done, Sylvie... I need more time with you.'

‘What exactly are you saying, Arkim?' Sylvie didn't like the unpalatable questions being thrown up by his choice of words.
‘I need more time with you...'
It sounded finite. Definitely finite.

‘I want you to move in with me. Stay with me for as long as...'

‘For as long as what?' she asked sharply, tensing all over. Because she very badly wanted him to say,
For as long as you want. For ever.

‘For as long as this lasts...this crazy, insatiable desire.'

Finite. Definitely finite.

She pulled away from Arkim and stood up before he could see how raw she felt. The puppy sniffed around her feet and she picked him up and held him against her, almost like a shield. How could Arkim manipulate her like this? Give her a reminder of the exquisite pleasure he could wring from her body...tell her he regretted the way he'd behaved...the puppy...and now this. When her defences were down.

Because this is the man who all but kidnapped you and held you in his castle at his pleasure when he wanted revenge.

She pushed aside the memories crowding her head. She needed to lay it out baldly for herself. ‘So you're asking me to become your mistress? Is that it? And the dog is meant to sweeten the deal?' She made a sound of disgust and turned round to face the window. How could she have been so stupid...so—?

She was whirled around again to face Arkim, looming tall and intimidating.

‘
No
...it's not like that. I mean...yes, I want you to stay—but as my lover...not as a mistress.' He sounded almost bitter. ‘Believe me, I know by now that you would never languish idly at someone's beck and call. And the dog... I hadn't even consciously realised I wanted him for you, but I got your address from Sophie and I brought him with me. I don't take mistresses,' he said. ‘I thought you'd know me well enough by now to know that I don't indulge women like that. I don't do frills or niceties.'

No. He didn't.
He could tear a woman's heart and soul to shreds just by being him. Raw. Male. Uncompromising. Tortured, but with a deep core of emotion that made her heart break.

‘You were right, you know,' he said heavily.

Sylvie finally found her voice. ‘About what?'

Arkim grimaced. ‘About my motivations for agreeing to marry Sophie. She represented something to me—something I'd always craved. A respectable family unit.'

And that just confirmed for Sylvie what she'd already guessed. Some day Arkim would find a woman worthy of being his perfectly respectable wife, and then he
would
do frills and niceties. She didn't doubt it.

The hatred she felt for that future woman shocked her. But it also made her see her own weakness. She wanted more too. She wanted to take every atom of what Arkim was offering and gorge herself before he cast her aside again. Or—if she had the strength—gorge herself so that she could walk away before he could do it for her.

She lifted her chin. ‘If I stay with you and we...we do this, I won't give up my job.'

Arkim was very still. ‘I wouldn't expect you to.'

Sylvie felt a spurt of relief mixed with pain. As long as she stayed in her ‘job of ill repute' she'd remember who she was—and so would he. There would be no dangerous illusions or dreams, no fantasies that things could be different. Because they never could be. She was
not
the woman who would share Arkim's life and mother his children. And she needed to remember that.

She forced a lightness to her voice that she wasn't feeling and said, ‘Well, then, if this dog is really mine I'd better think of a name.'

* * *

‘That's a
good
boy, Omar...'

Arkim stood at the door and watched Sylvie hand the puppy a treat from her pocket as she lavished him with praise, rubbing him behind his floppy ears. As far as he could tell the dog wasn't doing anything that vaguely resembled obeying commands, but Sylvie was too besotted to care.

He recalled the spontaneous urge he'd felt to take the dog with him when he'd been leaving the oasis, obeying some irrational impulse because it had been the last thing Sylvie had touched. And then he'd spent a month tripping over the damn thing in London, talking to it as if it could understand him.

An alien lightness vied with a familiar surge of arousal just to see her sitting on the floor, her hair in a plait down her back. She was obviously just back from work, still dressed in leggings and a loose top. Arkim was used to women in couture creations and the latest ready-to-wear casuals. Yet Sylvie would blow them all out of the water with her inherent grace and elegance, dressed just like this.

She insisted on taking the Métro every day, refusing his offer of a driver and car. And he hadn't even realised that his kitchen functioned until he'd come in one evening and found Sylvie taking a Boeuf Bourguignon out of the oven. Far from making him break out in a cold sweat at the domesticity, he'd found it surprisingly appealing. He'd never known what it was to come home to a cooked meal, and he'd found himself laughing out loud at Sylvie's wry tales of learning to cook when she'd first arrived in Paris.

When she'd told him that she regularly baked for the members of the revue, he'd found his conscience smarting at the thought of how badly he'd misjudged her from that first moment he'd laid eyes on her. Because at first glance she'd epitomised everything he'd grown up to despise in a lewd, over-sexualised world.

In fact she was anything but. He'd been wrong about her.
So
wrong.

It had been two weeks now since she'd moved in...and just like before, the more Arkim had of her, the more he wanted her. It made him nervous. This...this lust he felt was too urgent. Desperate, even. He couldn't let her go.
Yet.

She looked up then and saw him standing there. Her eyes widened, brightened, and she smiled. But then the smile slipped slightly and a guarded look came over her beautiful face. It made Arkim want to haul her up and demand that she...
What?
asked a small voice.
Stop shutting you out?

Ever since that night when she'd agreed to stay Sylvie had locked a piece of herself away from him. She was careful around him—there was some spark he'd come to expect in her missing.

Except for when they made love... Then she could hold nothing back, in spite of herself.

But when they were finished she would curl up on her side, away from him. And Arkim would lie there and clench his hands into fists to stop himself from reaching for her—because he didn't do that, did he? That would send the wrong message...that this was something more than a transitory slaking of mutual lust.

Except it wasn't being slaked. It was being stoked.

* * *

‘A function?' Sylvie felt a flicker of trepidation. So far she and Arkim had spent their time confined to his stunning apartment. They met here after work and indulged in satisfying their mutual lust until they couldn't move. Then they got up, went to work and repeated the process.

Every morning Sylvie woke up praying that this would be the morning when he didn't affect her so much...to no avail. And when they'd had dinner the other night...dinner she'd made...it had felt far too easy...seductive. She couldn't do that again.

Arkim was leaning against the doorframe, looking edible in a dark three-piece suit, his jaw stubbled after the day.

‘It's a charity benefit thing...to raise money for cancer awareness. I thought you'd have an interest.'

Sylvie was shocked that Arkim obviously remembered her telling him that her mother had died of cancer.

‘Well, of course I do... But... I mean, I didn't think you'd want to be seen with me. In public.'

Some fleeting expression passed over his face and then he came over and pulled her up from the floor, his hands resting under her arms. ‘The reason we haven't gone out together is because the minute I see you I need you. And I need you now.'

Everything in Sylvie exulted. She felt exactly the same. The insatiable desire to cleave herself to this man.

She was barely aware of Omar—she'd named him after Al-Omar—pawing her calf, looking for attention.

‘What about the function?' The thought of going out in public with Arkim was alternately terrifying and exciting.

‘We're still going... But first...a shower?'

Sylvie hid her reaction to the fact that he was prepared to be seen in public with her and said, mock seriously, ‘I think your dedication to water conservation is to be commended.'

Arkim snorted and tugged her to the bedroom, shutting the door firmly on Omar, who skidded to a stop outside the closed door and proceeded to whine pitifully and unnoticed for the next half an hour.

* * *

‘Are you sure I look okay?'

Arkim was the epitome of civilised style in a black tuxedo. Sylvie hated feeling so insecure, but the full magnitude of what this public outing meant was sinking in—and not in a good way. She was nervous of people recognising him, recognising
her
, and the inevitable scrutiny.

He reached for her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. ‘You look amazing. Just think of this as one of your father's events...you looked pretty confident to me in that milieu.'

She fought back a blush to think of how forward she'd been and plucked at the silky emerald-green material of her dress. The dress was gorgeous—a slinky column of pure silk—it covered her from throat to wrist to ankle but, perversely, it felt more revealing than anything she'd ever worn before, skimming close to her curves and cut on the bias.

It had been waiting for her in a silver embossed box when she'd emerged from her shower with Arkim, barely able to walk after his
very
careful ministrations. Every feminist principle in her had risen up to refuse it...but she'd taken one look and fallen in love. It reminded her poignantly of a dress her mother had owned—which Catherine had inevitably thrown out—and so, like a traitor, she'd accepted it.

She'd styled her hair into movie star waves and hoped that it wasn't too much. She knew how snobbish these events were, and if anyone recognised her... She gulped.

‘Relax... I know how you feel—believe me.'

Sylvie was jolted out of her introspection and she looked at the wry expression on Arkim's face. Of course he knew. He was the son of one of the most infamous men in the world. When she thought of how proud he was... Her heart felt ominously achy at the thought of people looking at him and judging him.

As he did you
, she reminded herself. And even though she could understand his motives now the hurt still lingered.

The car was drawing to a smooth stop outside one of Paris's most iconic and glamorous hotels. Arkim got out, and Sylvie drew in a deep breath as he opened the door and held out a hand for her. They joined a very glitzy throng of beautiful people entering the foyer with lots of expensive perfume and air-kissing. Arkim held Sylvie's hand, and she found she was clinging to him.

She reminded herself that she needed to be vigilant around him. She didn't want to lose herself again so easily. So she forced herself to relax and took her hand out of his, ignoring his look as she squared her shoulders and entered the massive ballroom where the function was being held.

His hand stayed on the small of her back, though, as waiters offered them drinks and they navigated their way around the room, constantly stopping when Arkim was recognised by various people.

Sylvie found, much to her relief, that she was usually given a quick once-over and then summarily dismissed. She didn't mind. She preferred that to scrutiny or recognition any day of the week.

When they were momentarily alone again Sylvie asked curiously, ‘When do they announce dinner?' She was beginning to feel hunger pangs after their earlier activity.

Arkim grimaced slightly and gestured with his head to where a waiter was passing, with some teeny-tiny hors d'oeuvres that looked more like art installations than food. ‘That's dinner, I'm afraid, I think most people here haven't eaten in about ten years.'

Sylvie grinned at his humour—and then her stomach growled in earnest and she blushed, ducking her head with embarrassment.

Arkim slid an arm around her waist and pulled her into his tall, hard body, creating a wave of heat that slowly engulfed her. When she looked at him again he said, ‘Isn't there some leftover Boeuf Bourguignon at home?'