“It’s not a picture of an anchor or an eagle,” she quipped. “It’s a profound statement. Of course it was inspired by something.”
He was quiet, and she wondered if he was going to answer. Then, as she moved around to his back, sponging his flesh there, marveling at his firmly muscled skin, he spoke. “After my father’s death.”
She sighed. “It was devastating.”
“He’d been sick a while,” Malik murmured.
“Yes,” Sophia swept her eyes shut, remembering what that sickness looks like. “But that doesn’t make it any easier.” Her fingers curved to his hips and around to his front. He stilled as the loofah brushed the ridges of his abdomen, low down, curving close to his powerful erection.
His hand curved over hers, holding it for a moment, and her breath jammed in her throat. “You were a child when your father died?”
She nodded, but he couldn’t see her, so Sophia cleared her throat. “Yes.” She moved around to his front, their eyes locking. “And darkness was everywhere.” She sponged his shoulder, memories of that time heavy in her mind.
“It was very sudden, with your father,” he murmured, lifting a hand and stroking her hair, the gesture surprising her.
“It was.” Her lips pulled into a small grimace. “Mercifully so.” His hand dropped to her shoulder. “I was only a child but I remember feeling like the walls of my world had crashed down on me, like I’d never be the same again. He was so dynamic; so incredibly special.” She sighed softly. “I couldn’t understand how someone could simply cease to exist.”
“I have felt the same each time I have lost someone I loved.” He focused on a point over her shoulder, his expression grim. “With my father, he was such a force of energy.”
“That’s the perfect way to describe him.”
Malik’s eyes dropped to hers, and something fired in her belly – desire and need, certainty and a billion questions that bubbled just beneath the surface.
“When he was young,” Malik murmured, “the country was very different. There had been civil war in his lifetime, and he’d seen the ravages of that on our country. He was a skilled statesman and a clever politician.”
“And a wonderful man,” she added, her expression wistful as she blinked away from Malik, smoothing the loofah over his flat, toned belly. “I adored your father.”
“I know.”
There was something in those words, something that spoke almost of disapproval. “You were like a daughter to him.”
“He used to call me Amyrat Saghira.”
“Did he?” The question came from deep inside of him, the words flecked with disapproval.
She blinked, wondering at the strength of his response.
“As a child, I just thought they were pretty words. They used to chase each other around my head like an incantation of a dance.” She smiled distractedly. “But then, as I got older, I understood.” She placed the loofah on the shelf, her hands bare. “What he wanted, what my father wanted…”
“And that was for you to marry into this family, to become a part of Abu Faya?”
She nodded slowly, a frown creasing her brow. “Yes.”
“And what did you want, Sophia?”
It was one of the first times he’d used her name, instead of the title Sharafaha. It did something strange to her body, making her spine tingle and her knees weak. He said it softly, with an emphasis on the first syllable, like “soff-eah.”
She liked it, more than she wanted to.
“I loved this country from the first time I visited,” she said quietly. “But it was Addan who made it feel like another home.”
Something flickered in his gaze, emotions that were dark and forbearing, yet she barely registered them.
“I felt like I lost everything when dad died. My mother became distant and Bella went to live in Spain with her godparents. I went from having thi
s incredible family to being quite alone.”
“Except for Addan?” Malik murmured, the question cold.