Noelle shrugged. ‘I work in the fashion industry. You’ve got to be thin.’
‘I liked you better before. You were softer then.’
Her eyes flashed sudden fire. ‘Funny, but I could say the same thing about you.’
He let out a surprised, rusty laugh. She smiled and for a moment he felt lighter. For a moment he could let himself just be, enjoying the sight of a beautiful woman in a bikini. A woman he loved.
Terror clutched at him again and she shook her head. ‘Stop thinking so much, Ammar.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘I can see it in your eyes. You start to look like a trapped rabbit—’
‘Are you,’ he growled, ‘comparing me to a rabbit?’
‘Yes.’ Her smile deepened, her eyes gleaming. ‘At least your eyes.’ Her gaze wandered slowly, deliberately over his bare chest and then lower. ‘Not the rest of you.’
His body responded to her obviously appreciative gaze. She slid off the side of the pool and waded towards him. When she was just a handspan away—so close he could inhale the sweet fragrance that he knew didn’t come from any soap or perfume but was just her—she lifted her hand and trailed one fingertip down the length of his chest, leaving goose bumps in its wake.
Ammar froze. Now he felt trapped, as trapped as a damned rabbit, caught between desire and that old instinctive fear. She was so close and he wanted her closer, even as he craved that distance and safety.
‘I want to help you,’ she said, and she might as well have poured ice cubes down his back. Into his heart.
‘I don’t want your help,’ he snapped, and she fell silent.
‘Help was the wrong word,’ she said quietly. ‘I want to love you, Ammar.’
She gazed up at him, expectant, hopeful, her eyes wide and clear, reflecting every emotion. Ammar said nothing. She bit her lip, taking its lush fullness between her teeth in a way that felt like a kick to the heart. He wanted to tell her he loved her, knew she needed to hear it, yet the words lodged in his chest, burning a hole in his heart.
I love you. Why couldn’t he say it? Three silly little words. Except there was nothing silly about them because he meant them utterly, with every fibre of his being. I love you. The last time he’d said those words, the woman on the receiving end had laughed in his face. Told him, the naked, naïve fourteen-year-old boy that he’d been, that she was only here on his father’s orders. He’d been devastated, of course he had, but he should have got over it. Should have moved on like any normal man would.
When he’d fallen in love with Noelle, when he’d drawn her to him and felt the explosion of fear in his chest, he knew he hadn’t. He’d thought it would be different when they married. He’d still so desperately wanted to believe he could have it all. Have her. Then his dreams had all come crashing down when his father had confronted him on what he’d hoped would be the happiest night of his life.
You will show your wife her place. And if you don’t, I will. Why do you persist in these naïve schoolboy dreams?
He’d known then just how weak he was. Too weak to admit the truth to Noelle. Too weak to let her know of his fear, his shame, the kind of life he’d lived. Too weak to risk it—or to stand up to his father.
‘Ammar.’ Noelle placed her hands on either side of his face and reached up on tiptoe to brush her lips against his own. He didn’t respond, felt everything inside him shut down, every response a big blank. What kind of man was he?
Hopeless.
‘I don’t think you realise,’ she said softly, ‘how much it means to me, that you told me—’
‘Don’t—’ Numb as he was, he knew he couldn’t stand her pity.
‘That you were never rejecting me,’ Noelle continued. She was smiling, although he could see tears shimmering in her eyes. She still held his face in her hands, his heart. He couldn’t move. ‘That you never actually found me undesirable or ugly.’
He swallowed, his throat so tight it hurt to get the words out. ‘You’re the loveliest woman I’ve ever seen.’
A tear slid down her cheek. ‘I believe you now,’ she whispered. ‘I believe you completely, and that’s the most wonderful feeling in the world.’
‘Is it?’ His voice came out in a hoarse whisper. His throat ached. His body ached. Everything inside him hurting.
‘You set me free, you know, with the truth. Free to love you without fear.’
He’d never thought of it that way. He had, he knew, only been thinking about his own shame and pain and weakness, and hiding it from her. Not what she might be feeling. What it might make her believe about herself. Carefully he brushed the tear still sliding down her cheek with his thumb. ‘I’m sorry.’
She shook her head, another tear spilling down her cheek. He caught it with his other thumb, his hands now cupping her face, his palms sliding against the exquisite softness of her skin. ‘Don’t be sorry. Not about—’
‘Don’t.’ Don’t pity me, he almost said, but he couldn’t bear to say the words.
‘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,