His own response was emotionally muted, as if he was the antidote to her anger. But that only stirred up Cora’s emotions. “You really want to discard me, after what we’ve shared?”
Something flashed now in the depths of his eyes. “You are the one who ended it. Nothing about last night changes that reality. I was clear on that score before you came to my room.”
“Yes, you were crystal clear. Silly me for thinking you might have some emotions in there making this hard for you.”
A muscle jerked in his jaw. “You were the one who ended it,” he repeated. “If my brother had not died, you would not be here.”
“And we’d never have seen each other again? That’s really okay with you?”
He compressed his lips. “Then, it wasn’t. Then, I couldn’t believe you were ending something that was so great. But now? I have no choice, Cora. We cannot be friends, because I cannot be in a room with you without wanting a hell of a lot more than your friendship.” She’d succeeded in rousing his emotions and now they took her breath away with their intensity. “How can we be friends? To talk to each other, to laugh together, but never to touch again? Can you see any future in which that is a viable option?”
She flinched, because he was right, and it broke her heart.
“You know I must marry,” he said quietly. “The position I am in now requires it of me—and it must be soon.”
Her world was shattering apart. She’d had this thought many times since she’d heard the news, but having it wrap around her from Samir’s lips, in his voice, pulled her apart.
“How would our friendship work if I was married? Or if you were? Could I ever be in a room with you and your husband without wanting to kill him for having the pleasure of being with you when I could not?”
She gasped.
“How could my wife bear it, to know that every time I looked at you it was with enough longing to make my soul ignite?”
Cora squeezed her eyes shut. So much for not crying in front of him.
“We cannot be friends, Cora. We were not friends before, we will not be now. There is too much between us for that.”
“But surely something is better than nothing,” she whispered, even when her heart was twisting because he was right—their friendship would be made untenable by what they’d shared and what he must do next. Marriage. She twisted her hands in front of her tummy, trying to come to terms with this.
“We cannot fix this. What I want from you, I can never have, and what you want from me, I can never offer. It is as you said, in Athens. There is no future here but the one we already started to walk—separate lives. I cannot see you again.”
“Would it really be so awful if we were together?” She whispered, because leaving him was now the worst fate she could imagine. Far preferable to cope with all the publicity and condemnation than walk away from Samir.
He stared at her long and hard, his eyes boring into hers, his look taking her breath away, and she stood there, breathless, waiting, shivering with hope and expectation. But then, he shook his head once, just a little, and spoke in a measured voice. “It would never work.”
“Why not?”
“It simply wouldn’t.”
She spun away from him but not before he saw the hurt that shattered her features.
“I am the last Sheikh in my family. Everyone will be looking at me to marry. If it were to be known that I was dating you, the outcry would be profound. You would be torn to shreds, and I couldn’t bear it.”
She sobbed. “I can cope.”
“But I cannot. I will not have you drawn back into the public eye when avoiding it has been your life’s work. Not for a few more months, which is the most I could delay an engagement by.”
She groaned softly, because it evidently hadn’t even occurred to Samir to contemplate marrying Cora. He’d misunderstood and was simply talking about extending their ‘sleeping together’ arrangement.
She really must have been a glutton for punishment not to end the conversation there. “We could keep it a secret, like we did before.”
So much for pride.
“You don’t understand. My focus now has to be on my country and my people, my mother who’s just lost her son. I loved every minute we spent together, but it’s a part of my past now, Cora, a part of a man who no longer exists. You must leave Al Medina today, and never come back. Do you understand? I cannot see you again. Promise me,promise methat you will honour this.”
* * *
A month later,Cora laughed because she didn’t have any tears left to cry. She laughed at the absurdity of it all, of fate’s idea of a joke. Staring back at her were two very clear lines on a pregnancy test, and if she’d doubted the veracity of the results, she had the non-stop queasiness as additional confirmation.