‘Tell me about him.’
She looked down at his hand enfolding hers, then away. ‘He’s the most important thing in my life.’
‘As he will be in mine,’ he vowed.
Startled eyes flashed to his. Ashraf felt the shock of contact, read the flare of...was thatfear? Then Tori looked away. This time she slipped her hand back into her lap, curving her other hand protectively around it.
* * *
Tori looked into those gleaming eyes and her heart stuttered. Had she ever seen a man so intent?
Yes. The night she and Ash had made love, finding solace in each other’s arms. Finding rapture.
For so long she’d wondered what it would be like if Ash hadn’t died. If he’d been at her side through the pregnancy and birth, and later to care for Oliver. The thought was a secret refuge when the burdens she’d faced grew too heavy.
Now she discovered her fantasy was real—too real, given her response to him. And Tori had to remind herself that he wasn’t the embodiment of her exhausted daydreams but a man with his own agenda.
A shuddery sigh began deep in her belly and travelled up through lungs that contracted hard, stealing her breath, making her turn away.
Ash had done that to her fifteen months ago—stolen her breath, her senses, her self-possession. Now he was doing it again, without trying.
She was in deep trouble. If she’d learned one thing about him, it was that he followed through. When he determined to do something he did it.
Now he’d staked a claim on his son.
Herson. Her precious Oliver.
Suddenly, as if she’d taken an unwary step and plunged off a precipice, Tori was out of her depth.
The working part of her brain told her she should be used to that by now. After her kidnap and escape. After childbirth alone and unsupported by anyone except the competent, kind midwives who’d delivered her son. After relocating to the far side of the country to build a life for her darling boy free of her father.
But this time it felt different. Perhaps because what she shared with Ash was so personal. Not merely her body and her passion, but her son.
Did he expect her to give Oliver up? She knew little of Middle Eastern culture but guessed fathers might have more authority there than mothers.
Her gaze slewed back to Ash to find him watching her with a stillness that did nothing to assuage her nerves. It was the stillness of a predator.
Tori dragged in a deep breath. She was overreacting. Ash wasn’t a bully. He was...
She didn’t know what he was.
‘You’ll want to see him.’
Even saying it sent a wobble through her middle, as if she was walking a tightrope and one misstep would send her tumbling.
He inclined his head. ‘Of course.’
‘That’s why you came.’
Now it became clear. If he’d hired investigators to find her they would have discovered she’d travelled to Western Australia accompanied by her infant son.
Tori wrapped her arms around herself.
One dark eyebrow climbed that broad forehead. ‘I was searching foryou, Tori. And when I discovered you’d given birth to a child nine months after the night we spent together...’ His straight shoulders lifted in a fluid shrug. ‘Of course I wanted to come myself. To hear your explanation.’
Explanation.As if she’d done something wrong—namely deprived him of his child. Was he here to punish her for that? Perhaps by taking Oliver from her?
No, that was unfair. Nothing she’d learned about Ash that night indicated he was anything but decent and admirable. Besides, would she have liked him if he’d learned about her baby and ignored the fact? If he’d shied away from responsibility?