‘You came!’ he said, the impact of that rich honeyed voice hitting her senses hard all over again. ‘Welcome!’
Had he really questioned that she would appear? Privately, Abbie took the liberty of doubting that he had thought any such thing. Men like Malik never even considered that there was any likelihood that they would not be obeyed, and obeyed without question.
But then she remembered the stunning news that her father had given her over dinner. The news that had totally changed her mind when it had been set against coming here at all.
She had decided that she was going to be sensible. That she couldn’t take the risk of doing as Malik had asked, no matter how much her foolish heart had pleaded with her. And then her father had said that he had something to discuss with her.
‘It’s Andy, isn’t it?’ she’d said apprehensively, seeing the way his face was set into lines of strain, his blue eyes shadowed with concern.
‘The Sheikh has told you something—what has he said? Will they let him go?’
‘There is a chance,’ James Cavanaugh had responded. ‘But it’s going to be difficult.’
‘However difficult it is, you have to do it!’ Abbie had declared. ‘You have to. You can’t leave him there in that jail, locked up for…’
Her words had faltered nervously, dying on her lips as her father shook his head, his expression sombre.
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ she’d asked. ‘What does he want? What is it you’re not saying?’
‘It isn’t a question of my doing something,’ her father had told her solemnly. ‘The only person who can help your brother is you. You’re the one who has it in your power to help him, but I don’t know if you can possibly agree to what’s been asked…’
‘Come and sit down…’
Malik was moving towards her, his hand outstretched. Without even really knowing that she was doing it, Abbie pushed her own hands into the pockets of the blue-and-white dress she wore, putting them securely out of reach. If he was to touch her, she didn’t know what her reaction would be. Just being in the room with him was bad enough.
She had told herself that she hadn’t been thinking straight. That she had been so desperately on edge all day—all week!—worrying about her brother, fearful of the moment that the all-powerful sheikh would arrive, dreading the thought of the demands he might make to free Andy. She must have exaggerated the stunning impact this man had had on her.
She had to have exaggerated it. No man could have launched such an assault on her senses, driven her so out of her mind that it had left her shaking with reaction long after she had left him.
But Malik had. And she hadn’t overstated a thing! Even now, when he was still several metres away from her, she could feel her senses start to react, like a flower unfurling in the sun, turning towards the heat and the light, drawn irresistibly to what it needed most.
Her heartbeat had already quickened and her pulse was throbbing. The clean masculine scent of his body was in her nostrils, making her quiver in response.
At some point he had changed his clothes and now here, in the privacy of this huge suite, he was surprisingly casually dressed in jeans and a clinging T-shirt, black as his hair and eyes. And seeing him like that seemed to dispel the thought that he was a sheikh, a prince, the ruler of his desert country. Instead he was just a man. A devastatingly attractive man. An incredibly, hotly sexy man.
And a man who had made it plain how much he wanted her.
‘Abbie?’
He had reached her side and his hand touching her shoulder to draw her attention startled her into new awareness. The heat of his hand seemed to burn through the material of her dress, scorching the skin beneath so much that she didn’t know whether she most wanted to lean into it or pull away sharply.
Hot colour flared in her cheeks and she swallowed hard to relieve the uncomfortable pressure in her throat.
‘Thank you…’
There was a sense of release in walking away from him. Release from the heated tension that had tightened every muscle, release from the stinging sensitivity to everything about him. But as soon as she moved she knew that she wanted it back again, longed for him to come close once more.
It wasn’t easy; it wasn’t comfortable. It didn’t feel safe or relaxing. The truth was that it knotted her nerves tight with tension and uncertainty. It made her stomach twist just to think of it—but at the same time it was thrilling and exciting. It was the most wonderful thing that had happened to her. It brought her alive in a fizzing, crackling way. So alive that it was as if she had only been sleepwalking through her life before.
And on top of that it made her feel so completely, gloriously feminine. She had never felt so much of a woman as she had in the few short hours she had known this man and he had made his desire for her so obvious.
And more than his desire, if what her father had told her was right.
‘Can I get you a drink?’
Malik stood beside her as she sank down into the soft comfort of the leather-covered settee, his height and strength so much more imposing from this lower position.
‘Please…’
She had to find some way of speaking in more than monosyllables! Abbie reproved herself. But simply being in this man’s presence seemed to have tied her tongue into knots and scrambled her brain so that she couldn’t think straight.
‘Wine? Or mineral water—or something stronger?’
‘Mineral water, please.’
She would do well to keep a clear head and not muddle her thoughts even further with alcohol.
Or perhaps some alcohol would relax her.
‘No—wine, please—red. Anything, really. I don’t mind. Whatever you’ve got will be fine.’
Well, at least she was talking in sentences of a sort, but now there was the risk of her tongue running away with her. Clamping her lips shut, Abbie tried again for control, only to find that any hope of it eluded her as she saw the small, almost unconscious hand gesture that Malik made, the automatic inclination of his head towards a dresser on which a selection of bottles and glasses stood.
And the immediate move into action that was the result.
She had barely even noticed the man who had been standing at the far side of the room. He had been so still and silent that he had almost blended in with his surroundings, his navy blue shirt and jacket toning with the dark velvet of the ceiling to floor curtains. But now he moved forward, a result of Malik’s brief, almost imperceptible summons.
Silent and smooth, he moved to the tray of drinks, opening bottles and pouring without another word needing to be said, then handing them to his prince with a bow.
This was what it would be like all day every day for Malik, Abbie thought on a wave of shock. This was what he was used to, what was normal to him. He was accustomed to be waited on hand and foot, his slightest whim attended to, almost before he had even realised it.
And this would be her life too if…
No, she couldn’t think of that now! It would destroy the little composure she had managed to gather together.
But of course it was totally impossible that she could not think of it! It was all that had been spinning round and round in her thoughts ever since the moment that her father had told her the conditions that had been offered to enable Andy’s release.
‘The Sheikh of Barakhara needs a wife. He has chosen you to be that wife. If you say yes, then he will drop all charges against Andy and free him as soon as it can possibly be managed.’
Her