devoted mother, Tariq. You needn’t worry that I’ll embarrass you by falling for another man after we’re married.’ Bile swirled in her stomach and she tasted its bitterness on her tongue. ‘I’m not my mother, for ever pining for romantic love. I learned from her mistakes, and my own.’
‘You don’t want love?’ His words were sharp, his gaze intense as he leaned forward. His raised eyebrows signalled surprise, perhaps disapproval. She guessed he was used to women falling at his feet.
Samira’s lips twisted. ‘Would I be here if I did? If my mother’s example weren’t enough, my experience with Jackson Brent cured me of any romantic ideas.’
Jackson Brent. The name no one spoke around her. The man who’d taken her dreams and her innocence and had smashed them in the cruellest way.
She read understanding in Tariq’s expression. The whole world knew the story. Samira looked away, pressing her palms to her churning stomach.
Jackson Brent, the sexy film star, had taken one look at Samira, the ridiculously inexperienced princess living away from home for the first time, and decided to have her. Samira, swept off her feet and dazzled by what she thought was love, had believed it a fairy-tale romance come true.
They’d been feted and adored by the press and the public. Until the day Jackson had been found in bed with his beautiful co-star by her vengeful husband.
Samira’s cosy world had blown apart, her dreams shattered as she’d been forced to see Jackson as he really was. Not Mr Right, but a feckless, selfish opportunist who’d played on her longing for love to get himself cheap sex and great publicity.
Guessing at her anguish, the press had hounded Samira to the verge of a breakdown—intruding on her privacy, rummaging through her trash, interviewing her friends and turning her heartbreak into fodder for the masses. Till her brother and the woman who’d later become her sister-in-law had helped her get back on her feet, stronger and determined to put the past behind her.
Was it any wonder, after the misery of a childhood watching her parents’ marriage teeter from one crisis to another, that she’d finally come to her senses and seen she wasn’t cut out for romance? Like her mother, she couldn’t trust herself to make the right choice when her heart was involved.
‘Samira?’
She turned back, her hands falling to her sides as she registered the concern on Tariq’s features.
Instantly she shored up her resolve, locking her knees and straightening her shoulders. She was no longer a victim. She’d dragged herself out of the dark hole of loss and grief that had almost destroyed her.
Tariq didn’t need to know those details. About the baby she’d lost before it had even been born. About the grief she carried in her very pores and always would.
Samira blinked and forced herself to concentrate.
‘If you’re worried about me doing anything scandalous to harm you or your family, don’t. My one brush with notoriety was enough.’ She might have been the innocent party in the Hollywood scandal but it didn’t feel like it, with the press ravenous for every detail.
‘You regret the relationship with Brent? You would change the past if you could?’
Samira caught her breath, her fingers threading tightly together. Tariq’s directness pulled her up short. Everyone else tiptoed around that episode in her life.
‘Oh, yes. I’d change the past if I could. Though...’ she paused, remembering that all-too-short period when she’d carried her precious baby ‘...I can’t regret all of it.’
She set her jaw, reminding herself to move on. ‘I wouldn’t suggest marriage if you were looking for a first wife. But you already have two sons. You can consider taking on a wife who doesn’t quite meet all the traditional requirements.’
‘Who isn’t a virgin, you mean?’
Samira blinked. She couldn’t recall Tariq being quite so blunt. The young man she’d known half a lifetime ago had changed since becoming monarch.
Yet she appreciated his frankness. Honesty was the best policy between them. They didn’t need misunderstandings.
‘All the world knows I once had a lover.’ She swallowed over the tight knot in her throat. ‘Just as it knows you have lovers.’
Tariq had never been short of female companionship. Since his wife had died he’d been again dubbed one of the world’s most eligible men and, according to the whispers Samira heard, there was no shortage of women on hand to ease his broken heart.
‘You’re very direct.’ His eyebrows bunched and she shrugged, refusing to apologise.
‘I thought you’d appreciate my honesty, as I appreciate yours. That’s what I’d expect in a marriage.’
‘Honesty?’
Samira took a half-step forward, drawn by the intensity of his stare.
‘Honesty and respect.’ She licked her dry lips before continuing. ‘I assumed you’d want something similar. That you wouldn’t look for love in a second wife. I thought you’d want someone capable, loyal and committed. Someone who could help raise your sons.’ Samira paused. ‘Was I wrong? Are you looking for romance?’
‘Who said I was looking for anything?’ His stare was enigmatic, giving nothing away.
Samira spread her hands. ‘You have two children under two and a country to run. Your schedule must be manic. But I know you well enough to understand you’ll want the best for your boys.’ She looked straight into his eyes and was rewarded with the slightest of nods.
‘I’m sure you’ve hired the best staff available to help with them.’ Again that infinitesimal nod. ‘But no nanny can replace a caring mother. A mother who’s committed to being there for them all their lives.’
She drew in a quick breath, knowing her breathing was too shallow, her heart racing, now they came to the crux of it all: the reason she’d braved this almost-stranger and proposed marriage.
‘I’ve always loved children; you know that, Tariq.’ Even in her teens she’d taken every opportunity to be with youngsters, getting into trouble for spending too much time playing with the servants’ babies in parts of the palace princesses weren’t supposed to know existed. ‘I’d make a good mother. You can rely on me.’
* * *
Tariq wondered if Samira had any idea how appealing she looked, her dark-honey gaze earnest, her expression serious, her hands clasped in unconscious supplication before her.
Unconscious?
Could any woman so beautiful not be aware of her allure?
Yet Samira wore a conservative suit, not a low-cut dress. Her make-up was barely there, her hair neatly up at the back of her head.
And he knew an overwhelming urge to see her panting and flushed, her rich, dark hair in lush abandon around her shoulders, her body bare and inviting.
Desire hammered him, turning muscle and soft tissue into beaten metal, hard and uncompromising.
