he ever wanted a woman this badly?
Then he identified the flavour of her kiss. As he pulled away she clung like a limpet, a very soft, warm, inviting limpet, but he gritted his teeth. He knew that if he let it go on a moment longer he wouldn’t be able to stop. And when he made love to his wife he wanted her not just willing but awake and sober!
He studied her flushed face, the bright, almost febrile glitter in her eyes. He had seen the same look in the eyes of a friend who, after pulling three consecutive all-nighters before an exam, had fallen asleep halfway through the actual exam. Hannah was seriously sleep deprived, and more than a bit tipsy.
As a rule he thought it was nice if the person you were making love to stayed conscious. He gave a self-mocking smile. Being noble was really overrated—no wonder it had fallen out of fashion.
‘You’ve been drinking.’
She blinked at the accusation, then insisted loudly, ‘I’m not drunk!’
The pout she gave him almost broke his resolve. ‘We won’t argue the point,’ he said wearily. ‘I think we should sleep on this. Goodnight, Hannah.’
And he walked away and left her standing there feeling like...like...like a woman who’d just made a pass at her own husband and got knocked back. So not only did she now feel cheap, she felt unattractive. Rejected by two fiancés, and now a husband, but she couldn’t summon the energy to care as, with a sigh, she fell backwards fully clothed onto the bed, closed her eyes and was immediately asleep.
TOO PROUD TO ask for help, Hannah was lost. She finally located Kamel in the fourth room she tried—one that opened off a square, windowless hallway that might have been dark but for the daylight that filtered through the blue glass of the dome high above.
Like the ones before it, this room was massive and imposing, and also came complete with a built-in echo, and her heels were particularly noisy on the inlaid floor. But Kamel didn’t look up. The hawk on its perch followed her with its dark eyes while her master continued to stare at the screen of his mobile phone with a frown of concentration that drew his dark brows into a straight line above his aquiline nose.
Choosing not to acknowledge the strange achy feeling in the pit of her stomach, she walked up to the desk and cleared her throat.
When his dark head didn’t lift she felt her temper fizz and embraced the feeling. If he wanted to be awkward, fine. She could do awkward. She felt damned awkward after last night.
‘Is this your doing?’ Realising that her posture, with her arms folded tightly across her stomach, might be construed as protective, she dropped them to her sides.
Kamel stopped scrolling through his emails, looked up from his phone and smiled. ‘Good morning, dear wife.’
Kamel did not feel it was a particularly good morning and it had been a very bad night. He felt tired, and more frustrated than any man should be after his wedding night. A cold shower, a long run and he had regained a little perspective this morning. But then she walked in the room and just the scent of her perfume... He wanted her here and now. The difference between want and need was important to Kamel. He had not allowed himself to need a woman since Amira.
He needed sex, not Hannah. And the sex would be good—his icy bride turned out to have more fire in her than any woman he had ever met. But afterwards he would feel as he always did—the escape from the tight knot of brutal loneliness in his chest was only ever temporary.
Hannah’s lips tightened at the mockery but she did not react to it; instead she simply arched a feathery brow. ‘Well?’
‘I feel as though I am walking into this conversation midway through. Coffee?’ He lifted the pot on the desk beside him and topped up his half-filled cup and allowed his gaze to drift over her face. ‘Hangover?’
‘No,’ she lied. The delicious aroma drifted her way, making her mouth water. She felt shivery as she struggled to tear her eyes off his long brown fingers. ‘I don’t want coffee.’
‘So can I help you with something?’
She emitted a soft hissing sound of annoyance. Without looking back, she pointed to the open doorway where a suited figure stood, complete with enigmatic expression and concealed weapon. ‘Did you arrange for him to follow me?’
Kamel stood up from the desk and walked past her towards the open door. Nodding to the man standing outside, he closed it with a soft thud and turned back to Hannah, though his attention appeared to be on the lie of his narrow silk tie that lay in a flash of subdued colour against his white shirt. The jacket that matched the dove-grey trousers was draped across the back of the chair.
‘For heaven’s sake, you look ridiculously perfect.’
Her delivery lacked the scornful punch she had intended, possibly because the comment was no exaggeration. The pale grey trousers that matched the jacket were clearly bespoke and could have been cut to disguise a multitude of sins if he’d had any, but there was no escaping the fact that physically at least he was flawless.
He raised his brows and she felt her cheeks colour. ‘I despise men who spend more time looking in the mirror than I do.’
‘Rather a sexist thing to say,’ he remarked, his tone mildly amused and his eyes uncomfortably observant. ‘But each to his own. I’m sorry I don’t measure up to your unwashed grunge ideal.’
Having dug herself a hole, she let the subject drop. He could never fail to live up to any woman’s ideal, on a purely eye-candy level, of course. ‘I do not require a bodyguard.’
‘No, obviously not.’
Her pleased smile at a battle so easily won had barely formed when his next words made it vanish.
‘You will require a team of them.’
‘That’s ludicrous!’ she contended furiously.
The amusement in his manner vanished as he countered, ‘It’s necessary, so I suggest you stop acting like a diva and accept it.’
‘I refuse.’
His glance slid from her flashing eyes to her heaving bosom, lingering there long enough to bring her hand to her throat. ‘Refuse all you like, it won’t alter anything. I appreciate this is an adjustment and I’ll make allowances.’
That was big of him. ‘Allowances! This is a palace! How do I adjust to that?’
‘I have been to Brent Hall and it is hardly a council flat,’ he retorted, thinking of the portrait that hung above the fireplace in the drawing room. Had Hannah Latimer ever possessed the dreamy innocence that shone in the eyes of her portrait, or had the artist been keen to flatter the man who was paying him?
She opened her mouth to retort and then his comment sank in. ‘You’ve been to my home?’
He tipped his head. ‘I stood in for my uncle on one social occasion, actually two. I predict you will adjust to your change in status. After all, you have played the pampered princess all your life. The only difference now is you have an actual title, and,
