Sheikh's Forbidden Conquest. Chantelle Shaw

builds up.’

      ‘Do you have a date this evening? And there I was thinking you had worn that very sexy dress especially to meet me,’ Kadir drawled.

      Lexi flushed. ‘It is not a sexy dress,’ she said tightly. ‘It’s a cocktail dress suitable for a cocktail party to celebrate my sister’s engagement.’ The idea that the Sultan assumed she’d dressed up for him was infuriating but, to her shame, she felt a frisson of awareness shoot through her when his dark eyes gleamed with a hard brilliance.

      ‘Surely you don’t have to leave just yet if the party doesn’t start for another two hours?’ To Lexi’s consternation, he sprang up from the sofa and walked over to her, moving with the speed and grace of a jungle cat. He was too close and towered over her so that she had to tilt her head to meet his intent gaze. Heat radiated from his body, or maybe the heat came from her, making her feel flushed and flustered and acutely aware of her femininity.

      Desperate to hide the effect he had on her, she launched into an explanation. ‘The journey to Henley-on-Thames, which is where my sister’s fiancé’s parents live, will take over an hour, and I daren’t risk being late and upsetting Lady Fairfax.’

      Lexi frowned as she recalled how tense her sister had sounded on the phone. Athena had confided her worry that Charles’s parents did not approve of their son’s choice of bride because they had hoped he would marry someone with a similar aristocratic pedigree to the Fairfaxes. ‘The engagement party is my chance to prove that I can be a good wife to Charlie and a sophisticated hostess when he invites business clients to dinner,’ Athena had said earnestly.

      Lexi had struggled to picture her accident-prone sister as a sophisticated hostess, but she had kept her doubts that Charles Fairfax was the right man for Athena to herself.

      Her thoughts scattered when Sultan Kadir spoke. His deep, dark voice curled around her like a lover’s caress. She caught her breath as he lifted his hand and brushed the back of his knuckles oh-so-lightly down her cheek. It was a blatant invasion of her personal space but her feet seemed to be rooted to the floor and she could not step away from him.

      ‘I am disappointed that you must rush away before we’ve had a chance to discuss my proposal. Perhaps we can arrange to meet again at a more convenient time?’

      She licked her dry lips and told herself she was imagining the predatory gleam in his eyes. ‘Your Highness...’ Her voice sounded strangely breathless.

      ‘Please call me Kadir, Lexi.’

      The way he said her name, with that soft huskiness in his voice, was too intimate, as if he had stroked each syllable with his tongue.

      Lexi felt as though she was drowning in his molten gaze, but a tiny part of her sanity remained and asked why she was letting him get to her. He was a notorious womaniser, and in the past when other men like him had tried to come on to her she’d had no trouble shooting them down.

      Of course she would not allow herself to be seduced by the Sultan, she assured herself. But she could not deny that his interest was flattering and a salve to her wounded pride after Steven’s betrayal. Without conscious thought, she swayed towards Kadir, bringing her mouth even closer to his. Her heart pounded and her eyelashes swept down as she waited, tense with anticipation, for him to brush his lips over hers.

      ‘You’ve been a long time in the shower. I’ve been getting bored waiting for you.’

      Lexi froze and jerked her head towards the petulant female voice. Shock slithered like an ice cube down her spine when she saw a woman standing in the doorway that connected the sitting room and bedroom. Through the open door she could see a big bed with rumpled sheets. The woman—girl—was no more than seventeen. Lexi recognised she was Tania Stewart, daughter of the local yacht club president Derek Stewart, who also owned the Admiralty Hotel.

      Tania frowned at Lexi. ‘What are you doing here?’ She turned her wide-eyed gaze to the Sultan and allowed the sheet that was draped around her body to slip down, revealing her bare breasts. ‘Don’t keep me waiting any longer, Kadir,’ she murmured in a sex kitten voice that somehow emphasised how painfully young she was.

      ‘Go and put some clothes on, Tania.’ In contrast, Kadir spoke in a clipped tone that was as coldly regal as his expression, Lexi noted, when she looked at him.

      She instantly grasped the situation—it didn’t take a genius to work out what was going on—and she felt sick at her stupidity. How could she have almost been taken in by the playboy prince’s charisma? It stung her pride to realise that she had no more sense than the silly girl who had just crawled out of his bed.

      She glanced at Tania and back to Kadir. The reason he was half undressed in the afternoon was now abundantly clear and she supposed she should be thankful that he had pulled on a pair of trousers before he’d opened the door to her.

      ‘Forgive me, Your Highness, for not staying around to discuss your proposition, but I’m not into threesomes,’ she said, her voice as biting as a nuclear winter.

      His only response was to lift his eyebrows as if he found her reaction amusing.

      Lexi’s temper simmered. She looked at Tania, who had at least draped the sheet more strategically around her naked body, and back at Kadir. ‘You bastard. She’s just a kid. Is that how you get your kicks?’

      His eyes glittered with anger, but Lexi did not give him a chance to speak. She despised him, and at that moment she despised herself for her weakness. Dear heaven, she had actually wanted him to kiss her! Even now, as she wheeled away from him and marched across the room, her legs trembled and she had to fight the urge to turn her head and look at him one last time, to imprint his outrageously gorgeous facial features on her mind. Pride prevailed and she walked out of the door, closing it with a decisive snap behind her.