for the present, the opening round was over. Rashid had pulled back to his corner, expecting Haidar to crush his peace offering underfoot as he stomped to his. Instead, he would get informed. He needed knowledge to convince Rashid to call off the fight. Now that he knew Rashid believed he had somehow been party to whatever had happened to him, he would pay any price to learn the truth.
Until then, he had other struggles to handle.
Roxanne. Jalal. Azmahar and its empty throne. Business conflicts with Rashid at their core … ya Ullah, Rashid …
He hadn’t thought anything could be worse than what had happened with Roxanne. Or Jalal. Or their mother. This was. This won the category of heart-wrenching developments, hands down.
He found himself entering the ballroom. Seemed he’d continued his path on Auto. The expansive space, decked like an Arabian Nights bazaar, only peripherally registered in his awareness.
Then something sharpened his focus. A decrease in the overlapping voices and clinking utensils, the cessation of melancholy Azmaharian music. He zeroed in on the cause.
Roxanne.
She was walking up the stage. Straight, brisk, no shadow of hesitation or self-consciousness, no hint of a sway or curves to distract from her purpose or undermine her efficiency. She was dressed sedately, the flame of her hair subdued in a twist at her nape, her face made up in neutral colors that downplayed her vivacious coloring and the sensuality of her features. How different from the mass of passionate fire he’d lost his mind over eight years ago. Or the bathrobe-decked firebrand he’d done the same with a couple of days ago. This facet of her still aroused the hell out of him.
Seemed she dialed the password to his libido no matter what.
It was incredible for someone of her youth and looks to be taken this seriously in a patriarchal society where chauvinistic tendencies survived to this day. Here it remained accepted that certain roles were male exclusive or dominated, with women like Roxanne being exceptions.
And what an exceptional rarity she was. He luxuriated in her every nuance as she took the podium, addressed the now pin-dropping-silent crowd, cordial, confident, in control. Something thrilled inside his chest. Admiration, pride …
He gritted his teeth. He didn’t have to like or appreciate her to give in to his hunger for her. Those sentiments could actually dampen his lust, hamper his plans to satisfy it. This insidious softening had to be curbed. Starting right this second.
He moved out of the shadows. Instead of keeping to the periphery, he cut right through the tables. Might as well get all the staring and exclamations out of the way en masse.
Sure enough, his passage caused a wildfire of buzzing and bustling to sweep through the ballroom.
His progress was unimpeded until he passed by a table populated by his recruiters. Elation replaced their surprise too soon. They pounced on him, eager to show everyone that he was on their coalition’s side. He answered them by insisting he was here to perform independent research, impatience rising as opposing brands of passion and compulsion burned into him. Rashid’s from the entrance, Roxanne’s at the podium.
People rushed to make a place for him at the table closest to her, flipping rabid curiosity between them as if watching an unfolding candid-camera show. She waited in seeming calmness for the disturbance to die down and for him to take his seat. But he sensed her fury.
He would have relished it if he wasn’t too raw to enjoy more hostility, even one fueled by a hunger as vast as his.
He had to deal with it. Just as she had to with his presence.
She did, glossed over the disruption he’d caused, resumed her opening address before turning over the mic to the first speaker.
He watched her descend the stage, walk to the end of the ballroom. She took a seat aligned with his view of Rashid, who stood alone at the entrance like a demon guarding the mouth of hell. Very symbolic.
He cast each a look, was hurled back a hail of antipathy.
All he needed now was for Jalal to walk in, and the triad of wrath and rejection would be complete.
He exhaled, tried to focus on the proceedings. Though what he hoped to achieve here, he no longer knew.
The people who had mattered most to him hated his guts. He didn’t think his transgressions against each warranted that level of acrimony. Seemed just being himself was enough to earn it.
And he thought a whole nation would want him?
Another major point was they—even Rashid with his scars and transformation—were prospering with him gone from their lives.
Maybe that should tell him something. That there was no escaping his mother’s legacy. That all he could ever be was a malignant influence. That redemption was out of the question and the best thing he could do for Azmahar was stay the hell away.
He turned one last time to the two who thought that was a given. At the confirmation in their eyes, a conviction took root.
He turned around, giving them his back, one thing settled.
He’d prove them and everyone, starting with himself, wrong.
Three hours of moderating the self-important, conflicting, anachronistically tribal so-called elite would have been enough. But to do it while being subjected to Haidar’s burning focus had shot Roxanne’s nerves.
She and her team had worked hard to get all major movers and shakers in the kingdom together, find out their positions and see how they’d mix. She was supposed to come out with a firm idea of who could be part of the solution, and who’d better be sidelined.
Then Rashid Aal Munsoori had walked in.
She’d thought the introduction of that superpower this early would disrupt a balance that hadn’t yet been found. The man seemed like such a force of … darkness; he’d swayed people just by showing up. And scared them. She’d thought he was the worst thing that could have happened. Then, enter Haidar.
It had been his presence that had polarized reactions, incited passions and generally disturbed everything.
Seemed his effect on people was universally consistent. And that when he’d only sat there silently watching.
She’d barely stopped the situation from devolving into a mess.
Avoiding eye contact with anyone, she strode to get out before people could corner her with questions she couldn’t or wouldn’t satisfy. Before Rashid could cut his way through his detainers to her. Most important, before …
“So the question is—what was the point of all that?”
And she’d almost made it!
She just stopped herself from stomping her foot and screeching a chagrined no. From running the hell out of there. Right after taking off her high heels and hurling them at Haidar.
Unable to give their audience any indication of how much she’d like his head on a stick, she slowly turned. And almost toppled over.
He’d
