Desert Sheikhs Collection: Part 1. Jane Porter

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ to get her completely out of his system, he decided grimly, and there was one surefire way to do that.

      But this time Lara would fight him all the way, he recognised, and somehow that sharpened his senses even more. He gave a slow smile of anticipation as he wrapped a towel around his narrow hips and sauntered back into the bedroom.

      She was lost in the book she had been reading, but at the sound of his footfall she automatically looked up and her mouth dried. ‘Oh, I see you’ve bothered to put something on,’ she observed caustically, even though her heart was thudding away like a piston.

      His fingers hovered provocatively over the knot of the towel at his hip and he raised his eyebrows mockingly. ‘Is that disapproval I hear in your voice, Lara? You’d prefer me to lose it, would you?’

      She swallowed down the infuriating desire to say yes. ‘I’ll just carry on reading my book while you get dressed,’ she said, then glanced at her watch. ‘Better hurry up,’ she added sweetly. ‘Khalim is not a man who should be kept waiting.’

      She saw him shrug and then stared unseeingly at the words on the page, listening while he pulled on his clothes, not saying a word. The silence seemed to grow until it became huge and unwelcome. And suddenly all Lara’s doubts and fears and uncertainties began to nag at her. She was angry at him for all kinds of complex reasons, but deep down she feared that her main motive was self-seeking. Wasn’t she angry because he had shown a decided lack of interest in her as a person—because she had started to fall for him in a big way and he clearly hadn’t reciprocated her feelings? And wasn’t that a rather shameful reason for helping to maintain this sizzling undercurrent of tension between them? What good was that going to do any of them?

      Maybe it was up to her to try and make peace.

      She waited until he had slipped his shoes on, and then looked up to see him running his fingers through still-damp hair.

      ‘Darian?’ she said quietly.

      The look he gave her was deliberately impartial—but then he wasn’t foolish enough to get himself worked up into a state of sexual desire just before dinner, not when there wasn’t enough time to see it through to its ultimate conclusion. ‘Yes, Lara?’

      She closed the pages of the book and put her fingertips on the soft leather which bound it. ‘I’m sorry that I deceived you.’

      ‘Sorry that you deceived me?’ he questioned tonelessly. ‘Or just sorry that I found out?’

      ‘But it was inevitable that you would find out!’ she argued. ‘You must understand why I wanted to get to know you before I decided what action to take about the letter—why, you could have been any kind of maniac, for all I knew!’

      ‘As opposed to a red-hot stud, you mean?’

      ‘You flatter yourself, Darian.’

      Their eyes met, his gaze boring into her until her cheeks began to burn. ‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ he said softly. ‘You may be an actress, Lara, and a very good one at that—but I know enough about women to realise that you weren’t faking it.’

      She slapped her palms to her hot cheeks. ‘Don’t!’

      ‘Don’t speak the truth? No, I can see that might bother someone with your morals.’

      This was just getting worse instead of better. She drew a deep breath, hoping to appeal to his sense of reason—to something…anything that would make him stop looking at her with that reluctant desire which made her feel so small.

      ‘Surely you can understand why I didn’t mention anything to you, Darian? At least not until I’d spoken to Khalim? I’ve known him and Rose for a long time—I didn’t know you at all!’

      ‘But you sure knew me better after dinner, didn’t you?’ He gave a low and insulting laugh. ‘Did you want to make sure that the brother to the Sheikh fulfilled all the criteria for being a man?’

      Her temper snapped. ‘Now you are wilfully twisting everything I say! I had no intention of letting you make love to me that night. It just…it just…happened,’ she finished lamely.

      ‘Does it happen a lot for you that way?’ he enquired, with the sardonic air of someone asking an unnecessary question.

      ‘Never!’ she retorted. ‘I told you that at the time!’

      ‘So it was just me,’ he mused. ‘In which case—I should be flattered.’ He lowered his voice to a sultry promise. ‘It was pretty good for me, too, Lara, if you really want to know—which makes me wonder why you’re being so unnecessarily prim. After all, if you had sex with me when we barely knew each other, then I should have thought you would be eager to repeat the experience now that we’re so much better acquainted.’ He smiled as he let his gaze travel to the huge brocade-covered bed. ‘It seems a bit of a waste of a good opportunity otherwise, don’t you think?’

      He couldn’t have made it sound more mechanical if he had tried—a man and a woman who were fiercely attracted to one another—simply making use of the facilities on offer! But while Darian might have a heart of stone Lara was simply not made that way.

      She opened her mouth to tell him that he was the last person on the planet she would ever get intimate with after what he had said to her, but at that precise moment there was a light rap on the door.

      Darian raised his eyebrows. ‘Shall we continue this fascinating conversation later?’ he drawled. ‘I think we’re being summoned to dinner.’

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      THE table was set in a small banqueting room—a surprisingly intimate table, even though it was laid with plates of solid gold which gleamed beneath the light from the dazzling chandelier overhead. Heavy crystal glasses threw off rainbow lights, and overblown crimson roses were crammed into low golden bowls.

      ‘Isn’t it beautiful?’ Lara breathed automatically.

      Darian turned to look at her, at the elegant little curve of her nose and the way her soft lips had parted. She had clipped some of her hair back—he had never seen it like that before. The rampant curls had been subdued, emphasising her long, elegant neck, and the overall impression was to make her look rather pure and innocent. But then, she was an actress, he reminded himself. A chameleon. She wore so many different masks.

      ‘Exquisite,’ he said curtly, his head turning as Khalim walked into the room accompanied by a retinue of servants, most of whom he dismissed immediately.

      He had changed from his Western suit into one of the garments tradionally worn by the Marabanesh—only his was fashioned from the finest silk, denoting his royal status. It was a fluid and flowing robe in a silvery colour which made Lara think of a river. He indicated for them to take their seats and ran a finger reflectively over a rose in one of the bowls, rather in the way that Lara had done in her room, earlier.

      ‘You know, it is a strict rule at the palace to have only roses placed on the table at royal functions,’ he said gravely as he took his seat, though his black eyes were glinting with mischief. ‘In honour of my darling Rose.’

      Lara frowned as she unfolded the heavy linen napkin. ‘Won’t Rose think it strange you haven’t told her I’m here, Khalim? Won’t she be upset?’

      ‘Why СКАЧАТЬ