he liked the woman floating in his arms.
“You’ve made a couple of comments that implied it did.”
“Mere observations on differences are not an accusation of unacceptability.”
“Sometimes, they feel like they are.” “Feelings are not fact.”
“True.”
“Emotions cannot be trusted.” That reality had been drilled into him from childhood as he trained from his earliest memory to take over leadership of the kingdom of Zohra.
“Perhaps that is true sometimes, Zahir, but the lack of emotion can be just as bad.”
“To control one’s emotions is to control the negotiation.”
She sat up, unexpectedly sliding away from him in the water. “All of life is not a political negotiation.” She settled on the underwater bench opposite, her gaze searching, her expression earnest. “Don’t tell me you use those tactics when dealing with your family?”
“Not telling you would not make it any less true.”
Her lovely brown eyes widened and then narrowed. “You mean that.”
“I do not make it habit to lie.”
“You hid your relationship with Elsa Bosch for years.” An expression of chagrin came over Angele’s features before she bit her lip, clearly wishing she had not said that.
Nevertheless, he would answer the implication. “I kept it private. This is a necessary survival tactic for those of us who spend the majority of our lives in the public eye.”
“Discretion is minimal, subterfuge preferred,” she said quoting something he knew his uncle often said.
“Sometimes subterfuge is necessary, but that does not make me a liar.”
She looked away, her brows drawn together, but then she sighed. “So, you treat your parents like competing world leaders?”
While it was hardly a subtle way for her to change the subject, he did not call her on it. He had no desire to discuss one of the major mistakes of his life.
“My father especially. I successfully negotiated for my first horse.” He smiled at the memory. “I lost the negotiation for a private family-only birthday party when I was ten, though.” “You were shy?”
“Timidity is not an acceptable trait in a world leader.”
“You were ten.”
“Nevertheless, I was not shy.”
“Then why no other children?”
“That option was not on the table for negotiation.”
Her brow wrinkled charmingly. “I don’t understand.”
“I lobbied for a party with my siblings. My father insisted on a state dinner.”
Her gasp was far too adorable. Perhaps even he could be influenced by the emotion of the moment the first night with his bride.
“You mean you weren’t allowed to have a children’s party at all?”
He shrugged and admitted, “I was seven when I had my last children’s party.”
He had continued to try to negotiate for one until his twelfth year, when his father had informed him he was a man and had to put away childish things. It was the way of things for someone in his position. He knew his cousin in Jawhar had been raised with a similar set of ideals.
“That is terrible.”
He shook his head. “You are too softhearted.”
“No child of mine would be forced to have a state dinner for his birthday celebration.” She sounded like she was discussing some form of torture.
And he could not help chuckling. “I learned the importance of my role and responsibilities.”
It had been an effective lesson in putting the needs of his people before his personal desires.
“You learned that you were not allowed to be a child.” Her tone implied she had just discovered something of importance about him. “It wasn’t the same for your brothers.”
“Naturally not.”
She glided back toward him through the water. “Tonight, no one else is here. This is not about duty and obligation.”
Suddenly a stricken expression took over her features. So, she remembered she had made this night a condition of the ridiculous “offer” she had made to let him out of their families’ agreement.
He was tempted to let her flounder simply because the entire premise to this night was so very ludicrous.
However, she was right. “Making love to you in no way feels like a duty.”
Her gaze searched his, as if trying to ascertain the truth of his statement. He knew she would find what she sought. For he spoke the truth.
Which was something of a relief for him, though he would never admit it.
The brilliance of her smile was worth his admission. “Tonight you are simply Zahir, not Crown Sheikh.”
He was never anything less than what he was, leader and servant to his people. Not even during his time with Elsa, though for those stolen hours he had come closest to being simply a man than any other.
It was not a thing Angele could comprehend. Even had she been raised among their people. To know from birth that an entire country depended on you for its well-being was a circumstance known by only a handful in the entire world. And from those he had met, he knew not all were raised from infancy with the sense of responsibility to their people that his father and mentors had instilled in Zahir.
He would not shatter Angele’s beliefs however and they were not entirely false. While not the entire truth, either. This night, he was as far removed from his position as dutiful sheikh as he could allow himself to be.
Fully cognizant he needed to make the night special so Angele would lose her fear of intimacy between them, there was still no denying that making love to her in this way—without the benefit of an official wedding—was not the action of a dutiful, responsible sheikh of his people. An internal voice, that sounded suspiciously like one of his mentors, chided him. Telling him there were other ways he could have allayed Angele’s fears.
The simple truth, as unexpected as it had been to realize, was that Zahir wanted Angele. He found her more sexually desirable than he’d ever allowed himself to realize. The years they had waited to formalize their engagement, much less marry, had taken a toll on him as well. Though he had not known it.
He had forced himself never to think of her sexually. At first, because she had been so young and later because that part of his psyche was reserved for Elsa.
He now accepted that Angele was the ideal woman to share his bed
