The Sheik's Secret Bride (30 page)

His expression tightened and turned unreadable. “I will not love you.”

“You’re afraid to admit it. Maybe just to
me,
or maybe to yourself as well. I understand that you had a lot of horrible things happen to you. I’ll even give you time to heal and to learn to trust me more. But you will have to bend on this one eventually.”

“Never.”

This time she was the one to stand up and look down at him. She crossed her arms over her bare chest. “It’s very simple. If you love me back, I’ll change the world for you. If you don’t, you’ll lose me forever. I won’t go away, but I’ll die a little inside until the very heart of me is gone.”

“Women put too much stock in emotions,” he told her curtly. “I’ll be a good husband. Measure me by my actions, not my words.”

Fatima
had said almost the same thing, and for a while Liana had believed it would be enough. But now she knew it wasn’t.

Malik’s
foul mood lasted more than a week. He didn’t understand women or their constant need for reassurance.

“Why won’t she give in?” he asked
Bethany
as they walked to the stable.

But the nine-year-old refused to take his side. “Mommy says she needs to know that she can trust you to always be there for us.”

“Of course I’ll be here. Where else would I go?”

Bethany
stopped in front of the stable door and looked up at him. Shadows darkened the skin under her big, blue eyes. She suddenly looked small and impossibly fragile.

“
Malik
, you gotta tell her you love her,” she insisted. Her rosebud-shaped mouth pressed into a thin line. “Mommies and daddies always say they love each other. That’s how they have babies together. If you don’t love Mommy, she can’t have a baby brother or sister for me. Don’t you want that?”

“Of course.
But loving her or not isn’t relevant to that issue.”

Bethany
shook her head mutinously. “You gotta love people,
Malik
.” She paused,
then
frowned. Her face paled. “I love you. Don’t you love me back?”

She’d stabbed him with a large sword, and there was nothing he could do to get out of the way. “
Bethany
,” he said, dropping to one knee and pulling her close. “You are very special to me. You know that. I enjoy our time together, and I’m very glad to have you in my life.”

For the first time since he’d met her,
Bethany
pushed him away. Tears spilled from her eyes and her mouth quivered. “You don’t,” she accused, her voice cracking with pain. “I thought you loved me. I thought you were different from my daddy, but you’re just like him. You don’t love me either.”

Before he could stop her, she turned and ran away. He heard her sobs and started to go after her, but then he stopped. What was he going to say?

He stood in the center of the path for several minutes, then stormed into the palace and headed for the harem. Once there, he pounded on the golden doors until his grandmother opened them.

“It’s just a word,” he growled. “They’re all insane, expecting me to talk of flowers and love. I’m a prince. I don’t have time for this. You must speak to them and explain the situation.”

Fatima
regarded him thoughtfully. “I assume you’re speaking of Liana and
Bethany
?”

“Yes. Liana agreed to stay,
then
in the next breath demanded that I tell her I love her or I will lose her or some such nonsense. It’s been nearly a week, and no matter how I insist, she won’t let it go. You have to fix this.”

“Actually, I don’t.” She stepped into the hallway and closed the harem door behind her. “You see,
Malik
, for a long time I agreed with you. I counseled Liana to see your side and to give in. But now I’m not so sure.” She traced her pearl necklace with her thumb and forefinger. “I assume she has confessed her feelings.”

He thought about that night more than a week ago when she’d told him she loved him and that she would stay. All his fears had drained away as if they’d never been. He’d been relieved and happy and he’d wanted to lay the world at her feet. The emotions had threatened to overwhelm him. Rather than letting her see that, he’d kept his feelings to himself and had talked of their future. It was safer that way.

“She had indicated she cared for me and was willing to stay.”

Two perfect eyebrows
raised
slightly. “Cared? Was that her exact word?”

“No,” he said between gritted teeth. “She said she loved me.”

“Ah. But you don’t love her. I can see that might be a problem.”

Love?
What did he know of the emotion? He knew that he needed Liana more than was safe or even sane. Without her, he was nothing—an empty shell living in an absolute void. Without her, he would go through the motions of living, but there would be no joy. Just endless gnawing pain and the promise of more of the same until death released him.

“I have honored her by making her my wife. That is enough.”

Fatima
shook her head. “Your father and his ministers might have turned you into a leader, but as far as knowing how to make a woman happy, you’re a complete fool. Give in, grandson. The date palm that bends before the wind lives to bear fruit another season. The date palm kept straight with pride, breaks and dies alone.”

“I will never give in on this.”

Her eyes filled with sadness. “Then I am sorry for you,
Malik
. Because you can’t be a great king until you learn
compassion,
and you can’t experience compassion without first knowing how to love. She is everything you’ve ever wanted. She brings you the offer of peace and a wonderful little girl who thinks you are the sun and moon in one. Yet you would lose them because of your pride or your fear or maybe both.” She turned away. “I can’t fix this for you. I can only tell you to admit what you already feel in your heart. If you don’t, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

The worst of it was that Liana continued to share his bed,
Malik
thought several days later as he stepped from his morning shower and grabbed a towel. Every night he expected her to order him to go away, even though she was in his room, and every night she held open her arms. It was too easy to lose
himself
inside her, and he had the feeling that when they made love he gave away a part of himself. In time, all that he was would have been given over to her, and then he would be empty inside. Yet he wasn’t so sure that being empty would be any worse than the darkness before her arrival.

He found himself thinking about her throughout the day. Not just sexually. Instead he found himself remembering conversations, smiling over shared humor, thinking about what he wanted to tell her that evening. Her intelligence allowed her to grasp things quickly and he found himself interested in her opinions.

She said nothing about loving him or expecting him to love her back, but her watchful gaze told him she had neither forgotten nor given in. The issue still loomed between them—a large, living creature whose hot breath burned against his neck.

Fatima
was just as bad, only she didn’t keep her thoughts to herself. His grandmother expressed her opinion at every opportunity, telling him that he was a fool, and he would lose Liana if he didn’t mend his ways.

To make matters worse,
Bethany
no longer rode with him. Although he’d tried to explain the situation to her, all she could say was that he didn’t love her. When tears filled her eyes, he knew that if he still had a working heart, it would be breaking for her.

He hung the towel back on the rack and walked toward his dressing area. Liana was already up and sitting on the edge of the bed. She’d pulled on a nightgown after they’d made love the previous night. The low-cut silk garment exposed creamy cleavage that made him think about filling his hands with her breasts and kissing them until she moaned and writhed, so close that it only took the lightest touch to send her over the edge.

Her hair was mussed, her face pale, but he still thought she was lovely. Just looking at her now as she poured herself a glass of water from the carafe on the nightstand made him want her again. He could feel himself hardening. No matter what, he always wanted her.

He was about to say something by way of an invitation when she pulled a small plastic container from her nightstand drawer and popped out a tiny pill. He frowned. Was she feeling ill? Was there a problem he didn’t know about or had she—

Truth slammed into him. She was taking birth control pills.

Without bothering to dress, he stalked into the bedroom. “I thought we were going to discuss starting a family.”

She swallowed her pill then looked at him. No humor or desire lurked in her eyes. Instead she looked incredibly sad. “Be realistic,
Malik
. There aren’t going to be any children.”

Her words were enough of a blow to send him nearly to his knees. Only by supreme force of will did he remain standing. “We talked about them,” he said, his voice low and strained. “You agreed.”

“I agreed to a lot of things I shouldn’t have.” Tears filled her eyes, but she didn’t give in to them. Instead she raised her chin and blinked them away. “I was wrong to say I would stay with you, because I can’t. Bethany and I are leaving.”

He couldn’t speak, he couldn’t breathe. The darkness approached like a judgment from God, and he could only endure the chilling emptiness and know that it would last forever.

She set her glass back on the nightstand. “I was too young when Chuck and I married. Actually we both were. We grew up and learned hard lessons. One of the most important for me was that I have to feel as if I’m an equal partner in my marriage. I was never that with Chuck. He didn’t want a partner—he wanted to do things his way and have sex available. He wasn’t interested in responsibilities or any future past next weekend’s big race.”

“I’m nothing like that,”
Malik
told her, although he knew it wasn’t going to do any good. She was leaving and he didn’t know how to make her stay.

“You’re right,” she admitted. “You’re not Chuck. Instead you’re a prince and one day you’ll be a king. Because of that, you and I will never be on an equal footing as far as making decisions on how we should live our lives. But that makes it even more important that there is give and take in our personal relationship. It can’t be one-sided.”

Frantic need filled him. He had to find a way to make her understand. “Do you want to return to teaching? I’d let you do that. Or you can go to college or work in the palace. You’re not trapped here.”

She brushed away a single tear. “You still don’t get it.
Malik
, I don’t need you to let me do anything. Not return to teaching or even give me a child. I already have that. What I need is for you to care about me and my daughter. I need you to love us.”

She stood up and faced him. “I would have risked it for myself,” she said. “I meant what I told you before. I do love you and I would be willing to stay. But I can’t now. I’m not the only one who lost her heart to you.
Bethany
did as well. As a grown woman I can take a chance on you changing your mind and admitting your feelings. As a mother, I can’t let you continue to hurt my daughter. You’ve destroyed her,
Malik
. She thinks you’re just like Chuck.
That you made her promises that you’re not going to keep.
It’s ironic. I came halfway around the world to find a man so like my ex-husband.”

“I am not him,” he growled, insulted by her comments. “I’ve kept every promise I made to your daughter.”

“But you won’t tell her you love her, and that was an implied promise. I hoped you would be able to remember what it was like when you were young and project those feelings on to her. Like the time you broke your arm and one of the ministers thought you were being a crybaby. You were sent to your room and not taken to the doctor until the next morning.”

The memory threatened, but he pushed it away. “I would never do that to her.”

“I know, but she needs more than responsible parenting. She needs to be loved. The way things are now, I could hire a nanny to do what you’re doing with her.”

He took a step toward her. “How dare you insult me in this way?”

She didn’t back down. “How dare you hurt my child? I would have forgiven you everything. I would have waited. But the day you made her cry was the day I knew we had to leave.”

The bottomless abyss threatened, but he ignored the cold fear tickling the base of his spine. He turned his back on her. “Go if you must. I don’t give a damn.”

“I know,” she whispered. “That’s the point.”

Malik
stood at the top of the palace and watched the black limo pull away. The rooftop garden retreat had changed from the last time he’d seen it.
Probably because of Liana.
He’d heard that she’d taken to spending part of her afternoons up here.

As the dark car disappeared around a curve in the driveway, he tried to find some part of her presence still lingering near him, but she was truly gone, and there was no way for him to bring her back.