‘We can work through this, Ammar.’
He dropped his hands from her face, took a much-needed step away. ‘I don’t want to work through anything.’
She blinked. ‘You don’t want things to change?’
God, yes, he wanted everything to change. ‘What I don’t want,’ he said shortly, ‘is to have this conversation.’
‘There seem to be a lot of conversations you don’t want to have.’ She cocked her head, studying him so he felt like some wretched specimen. ‘You haven’t been celibate your whole life,’ she said slowly. ‘That much I know. You’ve been with plenty of other women, I’d guess.’
‘Enough,’ he allowed.
‘How?’
He said nothing. He wasn’t about to tell her about the sordid, soulless encounters he’d had that passed for relationships in his sorry life.
‘I suppose,’ Noelle said after a moment, ‘you’ve been able to separate it in your mind. Sex and emotion. Sex and love.’ Still he didn’t answer. ‘I tried to do that, you know,’ she said softly. ‘After … after our annulment. I wanted to feel desired, and so I went searching for it in a bunch of empty relationships. Flings.’
Jealousy flared through him, burning white-hot. He hadn’t expected her to have stayed a virgin for ten years, but it still hurt. He certainly hadn’t been celibate, although the women he’d been with had never meant anything to him at all. He made sure they didn’t, always kept it a mutually pleasurable and meaningless transaction. Mind firmly disengaged. Only Noelle had opened up the emotion and yearning inside him, and also the memories. The fear.
‘All of it made me feel worse than before,’ Noelle said quietly. ‘Emptier than ever.’
He nodded tersely. He knew how that went. Both of them had been searching for the one thing they could only find in each other. And still didn’t have. Frustration burst through him at the thought.
‘I knew I wanted something more, but I was afraid to try for it.’ She took a breath. ‘The only man who has ever made me want to try is you.’ She tilted her face up towards him, her expression so unbearably open and searching. He knew she was waiting. Waiting for those three words.
I love you.
He opened his mouth. Nothing came out. He saw disappointment flicker in her eyes and he took a step back. ‘I should do some work.’ A completely lame excuse, but he couldn’t think of anything better.
Noelle didn’t challenge him. She just nodded slowly, and Ammar wondered if that flicker of disappointment was already turning to defeat. Swallowing, he took another step away and then hauled himself out of the pool.
Noelle remained alone in the water, Ammar’s silence echoing through her. She’d thought he was going to tell her he loved her, but of course it wasn’t so easy or quick. Had she actually thought that she could solve everything in the space of an afternoon? She still was ridiculously naïve.
She let out a long, slow breath, unsure what to do now. She had a feeling Ammar needed some space and maybe she did, too. Glancing around at the tranquil pool, she decided she might as well swim.
Fifty laps later, she was exhausted and freezing; the sun had set and the desert night air was sharp with cold. At least she’d blanked her thoughts out for a little while. Not thinking had been its own relief, just like she supposed it was with Ammar. She hauled herself out of the pool, surprised to see a thick terry cloth robe lying on one of the deckchairs. She hadn’t brought it, so someone else must have while she was swimming. Had Ammar? Or one of his staff who slipped through the house like ghosts, tidying and cleaning the only signs they’d been there at all?
She slipped it on, grateful for its warmth, and headed back towards the French windows that led into the music room. She came to a surprised halt as she rounded a bend in the path; a small table, flickering with candlelight and set for two, had been brought out into the private little garden. Ammar stood there, dressed in a white button-down shirt and dark grey trousers, looking incredible and so very sexy as he opened a bottle of wine.
‘What—’
‘I thought you might be hungry.’ He looked tense, but still he gave a small smile as he poured two glasses.
‘I am,’ Noelle admitted. She was touched, and thrilled really, that Ammar had thought to provide such a romantic setting for their meal. She’d been bracing herself for another tense confrontation, and it meant so much that he’d chosen this instead. ‘It looks wonderful,’ she said. ‘I just need to get dressed.’
‘I’ll be waiting.’
She practically flew upstairs, stripping off the robe and bikini and searching through the racks of clothes Ammar had bought for something suitable to wear. She pulled on a white cotton blouse and pale green linen skirt; like the other clothes, they were too big but she didn’t have much choice and she wanted to hurry. She was afraid if she took too long downstairs would disappear like a mirage; Ammar would blow out the candles and retreat back into his cold, autocratic self. Grabbing a brush, she decided she’d tackle the wet tangle of her hair later.
As she stepped through the French windows she saw, with a dizzying wave of relief, that it was all the same. The wine, the candlelight, Ammar. The candlelight flickered over his face, the lean planes of his jaw and cheek, the scar lost in shadow. He’d left the top two buttons of his shirt open, and Noelle’s gaze was helplessly drawn to the brown column of his throat, the sculpted lines of his chest so warm looking in the candlelight. She swallowed dryly, every thought flying from her head. How, she wondered dazedly, could you want someone so much?
Ammar turned and, although he remained still, she saw something flash in his eyes, turning them to gold. She held her breath, felt tension and desire snap through the air, and then he gestured to her hand. ‘Let me,’ he said, and belatedly Noelle realised she was still holding her hairbrush and her hair was in wet rats’ tails about her face. Lovely. She must look a sight, breathless and unbrushed. She had no make-up on and her feet were bare.
‘I hurried,’ she muttered, and Ammar took the brush from her hand.
‘I’m glad.’
He tugged on her hand and she let him lead her to one of the chairs. She closed her eyes as he worked the brush through her hair, his touch so tender and gentle it would have brought tears to her eyes if she wasn’t already pulsing with desire.
‘I’ve always loved your hair,’ he said, his voice an ache. ‘A thousand shades.’ She felt his fingers on her neck, massaging the tense muscles, and she let out a breathy sigh of pleasure.
‘Do you remember,’ she asked, her eyes closed, the touch of his fingers so mesmerising that she had to fish for each word, forming them slowly, ‘when you brushed my hair before?’
Ammar didn’t answer for a moment, just kept brushing her hair with long, sensuous strokes, his touch deft and sure and gentle, each stroke of the hairbrush seeming to blaze down Noelle’s back, igniting her with need, even as a wonderful languor flowed through her veins. ‘I remember,’ he finally said in a voice that throbbed with the memory of it.
Neither of them spoke, the moment seeming to spin on and on between them. She could hear each breath he drew, felt the heat of his body so close to hers. It felt incredibly intimate, even though she couldn’t see him. It felt as if each stroke of the brush released the memories and fear they both had, the pain and hurt and shame, a tender act of both healing and hope.
‘There,’ he finally said and, setting the brush down he carefully moved her hair aside and pressed a kiss to the nape of her neck, just as he had once before. Noelle let out a shuddering breath as his lips lingered on her skin. ‘I love you,’ he said softly, and her heart expanded so it seemed to fill her whole chest. She couldn’t breathe.
‘I