‘Test what?’ Her voice was husky, but reassuringly even. She’d had years of practice at perfecting a façade that hid her feelings.
Those powerful shoulders shrugged nonchalantly. ‘Our physical compatibility.’ He paused, his gaze capturing hers as he continued with conscious deliberation, ‘Or lack of it.’
Deep, deep inside, in that place where she’d once locked her secret hopes and cravings, something crumpled and withered. There was an instant of shearing pain, like a knife-jab to the abdomen. Then it morphed into an unremitting ache that filled her from scalp to toe.
He’d kissed her like that as anexperiment?
Safiyah wanted to scream and howl. To pummel that granite-hard chest with her fists. But that would achieve nothing except further embarrassment.
A new kind of fire bloomed within her and seared her cheeks.Shame. Shame that she’d responded to this man who now surveyed her with such detachment. Shame that she’d ever been attracted to him.
Swallowing the tangled knot of emotion clogging her throat was almost impossible. Finally she managed, though it physically hurt.
Pain was good, Safiyah assured herself. Pain would make it easier to strip away the final fragments of feeling she’d harboured for Karim.
She’d repressed her feelings for years, told herself she couldn’t possibly still want this man who’d rejected her. Whose abandonment had devastated her and branded her with a bone-deep disdain for him and his callous ways.
Yet once in his arms, once his mouth had met hers, she’d responded with an ardour that had been nothing short of embarrassing.
Even now part of her protested. Hehadresponded. He’d wanted to follow that kiss to its natural conclusion just as she had.
Then her brain began to work. People pretended all the time. Hadn’t she pretended enthusiasm for Abbas in her bed even when she’d far rather have slept alone? Just because Karim’s kiss had been passionate, it didn’t mean he’d felt anything but curiosity.
The inequality of their experience told against her. She’d only kissed two men in her life: Karim and her husband. And no kiss before today had awakened such a powerful response in her. Whereas Karim had had women following him, sighing over him and trying to capture his interest for years. No doubt he’d kissed hundreds of women and could feign sexual interest.
He wasn’t interested now.
Safiyah’s mouth firmed. ‘IfI were to marry you…’ her words dripped acid ‘…it wouldn’t be for the pleasure of your company.’
Let him read what he liked into her response. She refused to admit anything. After all, she could claim that, like him, she’d been experimenting, searching but not finding a spark between them.
Except she’d never been a liar. The knowledge of her complete submission to Karim’s demanding kiss devastated her. She wanted to turn tail and hide.
‘Then whywouldyou agree to marry me?’
It was a timely reminder, and it stiffened her wobbly knees. She met Karim’s stare head-on. ‘For my country and my son. I’m afraid of what might happen to both if Shakroun becomes Sheikh.’
Slowly he nodded. ‘I understand. I’ve been hearing more about him this evening.’
Relief made her shoulders sag. Karim sounded like a man who’d changed his mind. If he took the throne Tarek would be safe.
‘But what I’ve heard only reinforces what I said earlier. He’s from a powerful clan. If I became Sheikh I’d need to do everything I could to shore up local support. Like marry you.’
Karim’s deep voice and narrowed eyes held nothing soft. His needle-sharp scrutiny grazed her skin and her pride. Safiyah might have let him make a fool of her years ago, and again just now, but no more. Enough was enough.
‘IfI were to marry you…’ How the thought appalled. But Safiyah would sacrifice her freedom ten times over for her son’s life. ‘I’d expect you to take your pleasure outside the marriage bed.’ She almost choked on the word ‘bed’, but forced herself to carry on as if unfazed by that kiss. ‘Discreetly, of course.’
‘Would you, indeed?’ Something dark flashed in Karim’s eyes. ‘And where would you…takeyourpleasure?’
Safiyah stood as tall as she could, lengthening her neck and calling on all the lessons in dignity she’d learned in the past few years. ‘That needn’t concern you. Rest assured I won’t cause any scandals.’
Because sex with Abbas hadn’t left her with a burning desire for more. And the one man who’d had the power to wake her libido was staring at her now as if she were something he’d picked up on the sole of his shoe.
Safiyah blocked the jumble of hurt and indignation writhing within, shoving it away with all the other hurts and disappointments she couldn’t afford to think about. Instead she concentrated on playing the part of Queen, as her dead husband had taught her. And instead of her usual composure, she aimed for a touch of Abbas’s condescension. Presumably it worked, for Karim’s dark eyebrows climbed high.
‘And if I want pleasurewithinthe marriage bed?’
The silky words drew her up short, made her pulse accelerate wildly.