Australia: In Bed with a Sheikh!. Emma Darcy

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СКАЧАТЬ from his keeping things from her and his arbitrary withdrawals that drove her into a deep trough of frustration. This confrontation wasn’t really about her father. It was about attitude and honesty and the direction of this journey they were supposed to be taking together.

      “I’m not a child, Tareq,” she protested. “I’d rather be faced with the truth than be protected from it.”

      The moment the words were out, Sarah was struck by the realisation that Tareq had been treating her like a child all along, a grown-up one to some extent, but still to be indulged and protected as though she were a complete innocent.

      “What good would it have done?” he asked.

      “I don’t need you to make judgments for me. Nor decisions,” she retorted, smarting over how many things had been arranged for her—without discussion—by her self-appointed keeper. “It’s so intolerably patronising!”

      “Sarah…” he chided.

      “Don’t use that tone of voice to me,” she exploded, hating the sense of being relegated to some lesser level of understanding. “What right do you think you have to take over my life as though you know best?”

      That stopped him from giving his soothing little smile. His eyes glowered, some dark emotion climbing over sweet reason. “I have tried to do my best by you, Sarah,” he growled. “If you don’t appreciate it…”

      “Why don’t you try appreciating I can think for myself?” she retaliated, cutting off his self-serving argument, finding it so intensely provocative, she stormed off around the room, savagely muttering, “Doing his best for me. Doing his best. Doing his best.”

      It didn’t matter that it was probably true. It was what a parent said to a child. Her frustration with their relationship boiled over. She glared at him—this man who held himself back from her while subtly laying siege to her heart—and the need to strip him of his formidable control clawed through her.

      “You obviously see me as a little girl to be pampered and given treats,” she mocked, her hands flying around in scornful gestures. “Never mind that I’m twenty-three years old and a hardened survivor. I’m probably still twelve in your mind.”

      That straightened him up from the desk and whipped some tension through him. A primitive satisfaction zinged through Sarah. She wished she could rip his clothes off, get right down to the naked truth of how he felt about her. The remembered image of his almost-bare physique played through her mind, stirring a wanton excitement, a wild desire to goad him into action, any action that involved touching.

      “You are being ridiculous!” he said tersely.

      “Am I? You don’t credit me with a woman’s needs, a woman’s feelings, a woman’s desires. ‘Don’t play with fire, Sarah,’” she mimicked. “Just stand by and watch the sophisticated grown-ups like Dionne Van Housen play with it because they understand it and you don’t.”

      His face darkened with an angry rush of blood and Sarah exulted in having reached and plucked a sensitive chord. It flashed through her mind she wasn’t being completely fair, but she was on a wild, non-stop roller-coaster, her nerves screaming with frustration, heart pumping with rushes of adrenalin, thoughts careering down the track he had chosen for her, the track that kept her at arm’s length from him.

      “Then there was Washington,” she plunged on, gesticulating with mocking emphasis as she interpreted his actions. “Trotting me out like a young debutante, protecting me from other men, saving me from any little awkwardness, watching over me like a father.”

      His mouth compressed.

      To Sarah, it denoted she’d hit the nail on the head and she heedlessly hammered it further, furious he’d denied her the maturity she knew she could lay claim to. “You even dictated when I should go to bed, saying goodnight when it suited you. Same in New York. And here, of course, you’ve had the relief of adult company with Peter Larsen. It’s a wonder you haven’t given me dolls to play with.”

      “Are you quite finished with this absurd tantrum?” Tareq demanded, his eyes glittering with barely suppressed anger.

       Tantrum…

      The word stopped Sarah in her tracks. She shuddered in revulsion. A child threw tantrums. She had delivered a tirade of truth. Close enough to truth anyway. For Tareq to interpret it as a tantrum…

      She drew in a deep breath. Her eyes stabbed him with daggers of pain as she made the only decision she could make. Then with all the passion of her womanhood, she replied, “I’m finished with you, Tareq. Since you treat me as though I haven’t reached the age of consent, our bargain is null and void and I am out of here!”

      Having flung down the gauntlet she turned her back on him and marched to the door.

      “Wait!” he thundered.

      “What for?” she flung back at him, throwing out dismissive hands. “I don’t need another father. I’ve already had three. Between them they’ve done a fine job of ripping away any innocent illusions I might have had about life, so you don’t have to worry about me being hurt. Henceforth I am a cynical woman of the world who doesn’t believe in anybody.”

      She twisted the knob and pulled the door open. Before she could step out of the library an arm reached past her and slammed the door shut. Startled, she did nothing to stop the strong brown hand from dropping to the knob and activating the locking device. Her mind grasped the consequence though, and in the next instant she was whirling around to contest it, rebellion rampaging through her heart.

      “I will not be your prisoner!” she yelled, her hands slamming against Tareq’s broad chest in violent rejection of any more domination from him.

      “Shut up!” he retorted fiercely.

      The shock of it snapped her eyes up to his.

      “You want raw truth?” he demanded, his voice harsh, his nostrils flaring, the windows to his soul revealing chaotic conflict. “I’m a man with a man’s needs. And those needs don’t come wrapped in finer feelings. How ready are you to accept that, Sarah?”

      Dark turbulence enveloped her, sucking the strength from her mutiny, swirling around her thwarted desires, fanning them into a ferment of need, tearing at the feelings that had made being with him a torment, transforming them into something more intense, overwhelming, flooding her with a warm, liquid weakness, and she knew she would accept anything of him. Anything…

      Somehow he saw what was happening to her, recognised it, and his arms swept her strongly against him, and the tremulousness inside her gathered a hunger for his strength. She pressed closer, her hips against his, needing, wanting, her hands sliding up over his shoulders, around his neck, her breasts pushing into soft, no hard, harder contact with the pulsing wall of his chest, pursuing the need, the want as a whirlwind of beating, throbbing sensation travelled through her.

      The storm in his eyes was rent by a blaze of blue lightning, electrifying the air, tingling her skin, her lips, jolting her heart. Her mouth fell open, gasping for breath. Her mind seized on the image of his face, his beautifully sculptured face, coming nearer, nearer to hers. Her fingers raced into his hair, clutching, grasping, pulling his head nearer still. Every atom of her energy was focused on drawing him to her, reaching into him.

      Then his mouth covered hers, softly СКАЧАТЬ