“The jury will remain out on that.” He leaned more comfortably against her door frame, as if preparing to spend hours hanging around until he achieved his “objective.” She looked pointedly at the foot strategically placed across the threshold. “But I still advise you to leave now. You need your beauty sleep to deal with what awaits you here. I heard you were approached for a job. The top job.”
His expression remained unchanged, but she could feel his surprise. And dismay. He had hoped that was still a secret. Why?
He finally jerked one formidable shoulder. “News still travels faster than a speeding bullet around here. As well as rumors, exaggerations and fabrications.”
“This isn’t any of those. It’s why you’re here.”
His lips quirked. “And if I tell you I’m here for you?”
“I’d say that’s bull. I’ll also issue you further advice. My neighbors are always coming and going and receiving tons of visitors at all times. You’re a famous figure, and I bet if someone sees you standing on the doorstep of a woman in a bathrobe—one who’s leaving you standing there, to boot—the footage will be on the internet in minutes and will go viral in hours. Not a prudent way to start your campaign for the throne.”
He pretended to worry for a moment before he grinned again. “See? You progressed to giving me strategy advice. You can do that much better when we slip into a more comfortable … environment.”
She exhaled. “Very mature. Go away, Haidar.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “Why?”
Why? “You want the reasons alphabetized?”
“Just pull out a random one.”
“Because I want you to.”
“We already established that’s a false claim.”
“I have no interest in what you established, and no intention of arguing its merit.”
“Your prerogative. Mine is waiting until you give me a reason I can accept.”
“Who says you have to accept anything?”
He cocked his head, his steel-dawn eyes taking on a thoughtful cast. “Still getting back at me for ‘summoning you like a lackey’ and daring to presume I have a ‘claim’ to you?”
She balled her fists. “Use that infallible memory of yours and remember that there was nothing to get back at you for. It just …”
“Put you off. Aih, I remember. But you can’t have been cringing ever since. And you’re not doing so now. This is the very healthy reaction of the hot-blooded spitfire I was afraid had disappeared, from all reports of the imperturbable goddess of analysis and mediation you’ve become.”
This was so unfair. That he could debate as superlatively as he did everything else. But she was no slouch in that department.
Before she could find anything to say to back up that claim, he said, “With that out of the way, repeat after me. ‘It’s all in the past, and will you please come in, Haidar?’”
“It’s all in the past, and will you please go away, Haidar?”
He unfolded his arms, braced his hands on his hips. “You think it’s a possibility I will? I’m beginning to lose faith in the clarity of your insight and the accuracy of your projections.”
She gritted her teeth. Exchanging barbs was like quicksand. The more she said, the further she sank. She’d say no more.
He gave her one last brooding glance. Then he turned around.
He—he was … leaving?
She watched him walk away, got a more comprehensive view of his … assets as he receded. Just looking at him had longing clamping her chest.
He was messing with her. Haidar didn’t give up. He didn’t know how.
But he was now at the far end of the hall that led to the elevators. He was really leaving.
Before he made the left that would take him out of sight, he stopped. Her heart revved a jumble of beats. Would he …?
He turned, rang the bell of her farthest neighbor.
What the hell …?
Without stopping, he continued retracing his steps, stopped by the second-farthest apartment, ringing its bell, too. Without slowing down this time, he did the same at her closest neighbor’s.
Then he moved to the middle of the hall, semifacing her, calmly sweeping his gaze across all the doors.
Before his actions could sink in, one door opened. Two seconds later, another did. The last followed.
Then her neighbors—and, just her luck, the female components only—stood staring at Haidar. Their wariness at having their bells rung without a preceding intercom alert turned to amazement as recognition dawned.
Haidar let them marinate in it before he said, “Sorry for disturbing you, ladies. I wasn’t sure which apartment I wanted.”
Roxanne’s jaw dropped. Or dropped farther. Where had that accent come from? He sounded like a redneck!
“Oh, my God! You’re him!” Susan Gray, the forty-something CEO of the Azmaharian branch of a multinational construction company, babbled like a teenager. “You’re Prince Haidar Aal Shalaan!”
Haidar shook his regal head, making his mane undulate in a swish of silk—on purpose, she was sure. “Oh, I’m just his doppelgänger. I was paid five grand online by some lady who wants to act out her fantasy of dominating him. I usually come for less, but I charged extra since she wants to get real kinky. I was given this address, the floor, but not the number of the condo. So which of you has a thing for this Haidar guy?”
Her neighbors gaped at him, at each other, then finally, at her. She was the one in the bathrobe, after all.
Her brain was too zapped to function. But she had to. If she didn’t do something, this … this … madman would demolish her image. And his own.
She staggered out of her apartment, her perspiring bare feet making her advance on the polished marble precarious.
He watched her with feigned uncertainty. “Oh, it’s you?” His gaze swept her with what looked like earnest assessment. “I somehow thought you wouldn’t be a babe. So why can’t you find guys to dominate the regular way? Hey … you’re not nuts, are you?”
He looked to her neighbors for confirmation as she stumbled the last step to him, grabbed him by the lapel of his jacket.
He pretended to ward her off. “Whoa, lady. The deal is degradation in private. Public displays will cost you extra.”
She grimaced at her neighbors, expending all her restraint on not thumping the huge lout. “Sorry, ladies. Haidar is an old friend, regretfully. I left him eight years ago without a sense of humor, but it seems he’s contracted some terminal prankster disease. He thinks this is a fun way to say long time no see.”
She was dragging him toward her apartment while she talked, for the second time in her life wishing grounds yawned open and swallowed people. The other time had also involved him.
He resisted her, looked back at her neighbors imploringly. “I don’t know this dame. Is she dangerous?” She smacked him hard on the arm. “Hey! We agreed on domination, not abuse!”
The son of a literal royal bitch was making the situation worse with every word out of his mouth.
Who was she kidding? It was irretrievable already. God.
She could think of nothing to say but “Shut up, Haidar.”
He looked down at her, eyes morphing from vapid porn-actor