and spin before landing hard.
“Have we arrived at first names, Kasim?” It was a deliberate lob back, not unlike when she played tennis with her siblings and she was so well matched she had to throw everything she had into each swing of her racket.
This man! She had spent years developing a shield against the world and he brushed it aside like it was a cobweb, making her react from a subterranean level. It was completely unnerving.
His lashes flinched at her use of his given name.
Good.
“Your insolence toward me is unprecedented. Take extreme care, Angelique.”
Her fingernails were digging into her own upper arms, she was so beside herself. She used the sharp sting to keep a cool head. She had training for this type of negotiation, she reminded herself. He thought he was holding a small fortune in seed pearls and silk hostage, but he was actually holding a knife to the throat of her sister’s happiness along with the debt their family owed to Sadiq.
Given that, there was no way Angelique wanted to jeopardize the wedding arrangements or cause a long-term rift.
Listen. That was the first step, she reminded herself as her ears pounded with her racing pulse. Apparently Kasim felt he wasn’t being heard.
“To be clear,” she said with forced calm, “you believe I’ve orchestrated this to put Sadiq into my debt?”
“Perhaps not financially. His family is wealthy in resources and political standing as well as actual gold. You’ve managed to neutralize yourself in my sister’s eyes, so she couldn’t possibly see you as a threat if you were to move in at a later date for whatever Sadiq was deemed useful for.”
“Can I ask how you concluded that I’m so cold-blooded? Because even the online trolls don’t accuse me of this sort of thing.” She was nice! Her family regularly told her she was too nice.
“If your heart was involved, you would have refused this commission altogether. If you wanted to retaliate for a broken heart, you wouldn’t be trying so hard to please Hasna. No. I’ve told you, I’ve had mistresses. I understand exceedingly practical women. This is an investment in your future. I accept that on a philosophical level, but not when it risks my sister’s happiness. That I cannot allow. So.” He nodded decisively at the card he’d left on the desk. “Send me the bill. Do not contact him again.”
He made as if to leave.
“Wait!” She leaped forward and grabbed his arm.
He froze, gaze locking onto her hand on his sleeve for one powerful heartbeat before he lifted his eyes. His face was filled outrage and something else, something glittering and fiercely masculine.
“Have we arrived at that level of familiarity, Angelique?” He pivoted in a swift move to face her, taking her own arm in his opposite grip.
It was the sudden dive and snatch of a predatory bird catching prey in its talons.
They stood like that in what seemed like a slowdown in time. Her heart pounded so hard her lungs could barely inflate against it.
“We’re not finished t-talking.” Her voice came out painfully thin. She knew she should release him and step back, but she was quite blown away by the masculine interest that flared to life in his gaze.
She wasn’t falsely modest. She knew she was beautiful. It was one of the reasons camera lenses so often turned on her. Men looked at her with desire all the time.
There was no reason she should react to this man’s naked hunger. But she did.
A very animalistic sexual reaction pierced deep in her loins, flooding her with heat and... Yes, it was reciprocal desire. He was looking at her as if he found her appealing and she certainly found him as attractive as they came. There might even be something chemical here because her gaze dropped involuntarily to his mouth. Longing rose within her.
His lips quirked.
She knew he was reading her reaction and was amused. It stung. She felt raw and gauche. It was the bane of her existence that she couldn’t always stop whatever feelings were overtaking her. This was so intense it was unprecedented, touching her at all levels. Physical, mental, emotional... He held her entire being enthralled.
“We are finished talking,” he said, while his arm bent against her grip. His hand arrived at her waist, hot and sure. His other hand tightened slightly on her arm, drawing her forward a half step, commanding, but not forcing. “If you would like to start something new, however...”
Don’t, she ordered herself, but it was too late. His mouth was coming down to hers and she was parting her lips in eager reception.
HE KNEW HOW to use that sexually explicit mouth of his, firmly capturing her lips in a hot, hard kiss. He slid a hand to the back of her head, rocked his damp mouth across hers, and damn well made love to her mouth like he had the absolute right!
She knew immediately that he was punishing her, but not in a violent way. He wanted her response, wanted to make her melt and succumb to him, to prove his mastery of her and this situation.
And he was doing it, sliding right past her resistance, ready to make her his conquest.
Hard-learned shreds of self-protection rallied. She had trained to meet any attack with an attack of her own.
She kissed him back with all the incensed outrage he had provoked in her, all the frustration that he affected her this powerfully.
She didn’t accept his kiss. She matched it. She stepped into his space so the heat off his body penetrated the silk she wore, branding her skin through it. Then she scraped her teeth in a threat across his bottom lip and stabbed her own fingers into his hair. It was completely unlike her to be sexually aggressive, but how dare he come in here with his accusations and intimidations?
Did this feel like she was daunted? Did it?
She felt the surprise in him, and the hardening as he grew excited.
His reaction fed hers. The quickening of arousal in her swelled, rising like a tide that picked her off her feet, washing her in heat, sensitizing her skin and making her hyperaware of her erogenous zones. Her back arched to crush her breasts against his hard chest. Her pelvis nudged into the shape behind his fly, inciting both of them.
His arms tightened around her and he kissed her harder. Not taking control so much as pressing his foot to the accelerator so they burned hotter and faster down the track they were on. His hand slid down to her backside, possessively claiming a plump cheek through silk.
The sensation was so acutely good, the moment rushing so fast beyond her control, Angelique pulled back to release a small moan and gasp for air.
He growled and ran his mouth down her throat, now angling her hips into his so he ground himself against her with blatant intention.
She let him, completely overcome by the moment. She was used to being treated somewhere between a trophy and a revered goddess on a pedestal. No man had ever kissed her like a
