But his imagination was stubborn tonight, the moment passed, and he saw her again.
Tonight, she wore a dark brown, long-sleeved kaftan made of simple cotton with leggings of the same color underneath. She had always been simple in real life, too, never allowing him to splurge on her, never allowing him anything he had wanted to do with her, for that matter.
Like kiss her, or touch her or possess her.
And yet, he had been her slave.
Her hair, a silky mass of dark brown, was tied back into a high ponytail in the no-nonsense way she had liked. Leaving her golden skin pulled tightly over her features.
A high forehead that had always bothered her—a symbol of her intelligence—almond-shaped copper-hued eyes, which were her best feature, her too-long nose—a bit on the strong side—and a wide pink-lipped mouth. If one studied those features objectively and separately, as he had done for innumerable hours, there was nothing outstanding about any of them.
And yet all together, she had the most beautiful face he had ever seen. It was full of character, full of laughter and full of love.
Or being a naive, arrogant young fool, so he had thought. Until his love for her had destroyed him, shattered him to pathetic pieces.
Leaning over the side of the lounger he was sitting on, Azeez extended his right hand. The movement pressed his hip into the chair and a sharp lance of pain shot up through it. Reaching the bottle of scotch, he took a quick sip.
The fiery liquid burned his throat and chest, making his vision another notch blurrier.
But the image in front of his eyes didn’t waver. In fact, it became much more focused, as if it had been amplified and brought much closer for his very pleasure.
Because now he could see her long neck, the neck he had caressed with his fingers so long ago. The cheap, well-worn cotton draped loosely over her breasts, losing the fight to cover up their lushness. The fabric dipped neatly at the curve of her hip.
Wiping the back of his mouth with his hand, he grabbed the bottle with his other hand and stood up abruptly.
White-hot pain exploded in his right side, radiating from his hip, traveling up and down. He had been sitting for way too long today and had barely exercised since his brother had locked him up here in the palace.
Gritting his teeth, he breathed through the throbbing pain. He leaned against the pillar and looked up.
The sight that met his eyes stole his breath. The intense throbbing in his hip was nothing compared to the dark chasm opening up in his gut.
Because, now the mirage was torturing him.
The woman had tears in those beautiful eyes. Her lips whispered his name. Again and again, as though she couldn’t help it, as though her very breath depended on saying his name.
In the mirage, the woman he had once loved more than anything else in life, the woman who had eventually destroyed him, was standing within touching distance. And for a man who had almost died happily, only to discover that he was alive, and a cripple at that, it was still the cruelest punishment to see her standing there, teasing him, tormenting him.
With a cry that never left his throat, he threw the bottle at the mirage, needing it to dissolve, needing the torturous cycle of self-loathing to abate.
Except, unlike all the other times he had done it, the woman flinched. Even as the bottle missed her, shattering as it hit the floor with a sound that fractured the silence.
Her soft gasp hit him hard in the gut, slicing through the drunken haze in his head. Shock waves pulsing through him, he moved as fast as his damaged hip would allow.
His fingers trembled as he extended his hand and touched her cheek. Her skin was as silky soft as he remembered. Bile filled his mouth and he had to suck in a harsh breath to keep it at bay. “Nikhat?”
Fear and self-loathing tangled inside him, his heart slamming hard against his rib cage.
The sheen of liquid in her beautiful dark brown eyes was real. The tremble in those rose-hued lips was real.
Azeez cursed, every muscle in his body freezing into ice. And before he could blink again, she was touching him, devouring him with her steady copper gaze.
She caught his roughened palm between hers, sending a jolt of sensation rioting through his body. It was as though a haze was lifted from his every sense, as though every nerve ending in him had been electrocuted into alertness. “Hello, Azeez.”
He pushed her away from him and jerked back. Leaning against the pillar, he caught his breath, kept his eyes closed, waiting for the dancing spots in front of him to abate. He heard her soft exhale, heard the step she took toward him.
Suddenly, utter fury washed through him, ferociously hot in contrast to the cold that had frozen his very blood just a few minutes ago. “Who dared to let you in here? I might be a cripple but I’m still Prince Azeez bin Rashid Al Sharif of Dahaar. Get out before I throw you out myself.”