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“About what?” she demanded, her temper growing hotter.
“As a crown prince, the boy will need a very special education. He will require challenging coursework, intensive study of languages and exposure to European and Eastern cultures.”
“He’s three. Practically a baby!”
“I was sent to England not much older than Ben is now. It’s better if we begin preparing him for his duty soon—”
“No!” The protest was wrung from her, her voice strangled. “I will never send him away. I will not have strangers raise my son.”
Slowly he pivoted to face her, his gold gaze narrowing, black lashes lowering as he studied her reclining figure. Her knees, her pale bare thighs, her tummy, the rise of her breasts. “The matter’s out of your hands. We’re in Zwar. Your opinion holds no weight.”
She sat upright, anger jackknifing in her middle. “If you think I’ll bow and scrape like Lalia then you’ve another think coming, Sheikh al-Assad. I might be back in Tiva, but I’m not the clinging, fragile girl you married all those years ago. I’m stronger, and this time I have a voice.”
In the hours since she and Kahlil had been parted at the airport, her husband had showered and changed, leaving Western clothes behind to dress in a traditional robe. He looked distant, detached. “If you had a voice, wouldn’t I hear it?”
Confusion made her stop and think. “Yes…”
“Then why didn’t I hear it earlier when you screamed?”
He’d heard her this afternoon, heard her cry and ignored it. Brilliant pain, hot and blinding, shot through her. Cupping a handful of water, she threw it at him, and again, liberally splashing him.
Kahlil leaned over and hauled her out of the bath onto the cool, slick marble floor. “You’ve done it now.”
Goose pimples covered her flesh. “Be mad at me, but don’t take Ben away. I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but it’s not fair, and it’s not right.”
He dragged her against him, hip to hip, thigh to thigh, their bodies pressed lightly. “This isn’t a game. The games are over. The consequences begin.”
Hot, cold, she felt feverish and sick. “Punishing Ben isn’t fair.”
“I’m not punishing Ben, I’m punishing you. You lied to me, deceived me, stole from me—”
Fear filled her limbs like cold wet cement. “If you’re talking about the jewelry—”
“I’m talking about my son. He is mine, isn’t he?”
“Of course he’s yours. Just look at him! Your eyes, your nose, your mouth. He’s you all over.”
“Then my actions are justified.”
Closing the last bit of distance between them, he pressed her naked, shivering body more tightly to him and covered her mouth with his. It was a soul-searching kiss, drawing her breath from her lungs, drinking her protests into him.
He kissed her until her legs buckled and tiny yellow spots danced against the darkness of her mind. She was trembling, clutching his robe, feeling the rapid thud of his heart through his chest.
“I am sorry,” he murmured, lifting his head, his golden eyes filled with a silent pain he couldn’t, wouldn’t articulate. “I have to do this for my country, and my people. There is no other way.”
His body was warm, the hard planes of muscle curving tautly beneath the press of her palms. She felt him against her, felt his heat and strength and remembered what it had been like to lie with him, and love him, and be loved by him. “If you try to take him from me,” she choked, “I will fight you for him, every second of every hour of every day.”
“And you will lose.”
“I have no choice but to fight. He is my hope.”
“Mine, too.”
CHAPTER SIX
BRYN couldn’t stop pacing her bedroom floor, replaying the scene in the bathroom over and over in her mind, trying to forget the feel of his lips against hers, the strength of his body. He’d kissed her to punish her and yet his mouth had been anything but hard, his touch anything but unkind. She felt the old desire flicker there and burst into flame. He still wanted her but this time he wanted her for revenge.
She shivered, appalled by her response to him, and the fact that she could be attracted to a man who could wrest her son away from her. But Kahlil wasn’t just any man. He was her husband. Ben’s father.
Ben’s father.
Oh God, what had she done? How could she have thought she’d get away with keeping Ben’s parentage a secret? Kahlil was one of the wealthiest, most powerful men in the world. He was bound to find out. If not now, then later, when Ben was older and pressing to know more about his birth father. Children wanted to know these things. They had a right to know these things.
Bryn felt fresh guilt and concern. She knew instinctively that Kahlil would never hurt Ben…at least never consciously. But could he do so unconsciously? Unwittingly?
Arguing with Kahlil had always been difficult. He was intelligent, quick, eloquent. He mashed her words. Turned her arguments around so that in the end she was just contradicting herself, flustered and tongue-tied.
But now, Kahlil wouldn’t even argue. He stated his opinions as facts and expected her to submit. But this wasn’t the Middle Ages and she wasn’t a woman raised in a harem.
She understood Kahlil’s anger and frustration. She realized he needed time to sort his emotions out. But she wasn’t about to allow Kahlil to strip her out of her rights.
Ben was her son. He was only three and even though he was a bright, adventurous little boy, he was also quite sensitive. He must be wondering where she was. He must be anxious to see her.
If Kahlil wouldn’t bring Ben to her, then she would go to him.
The palace was dark. Serenely still. Bryn felt a thrill ripple down her spine as she tiptoed past Lalia’s cot in the outer room and into the shadowy hall.
Moonlight dappled the marble floor and Bryn crept from the women’s quarters to the main reception rooms and down another wing to the guest quarters. She was sure Kahlil had sent Ben there. There weren’t many options. The men’s quarter, the women’s, the guest rooms, and then the sheikh’s private suite.
She slowly opened the first door and peered into the room which was lit only by moonlight. The window was unshuttered and the large, low bed was empty.
Carefully she closed the door, moved to the next and repeated the inspection. Empty room. Empty bed.
At the third door she felt a tremor. Her senses were taut, her anxiety high. It was more frightening creeping around the palace than she’d anticipated and for a moment she had the unnerving sensation of being followed.
Ridiculous. Everybody was asleep. No one stirred.
Bryn pushed the door wider. The room looked inky and full of shadows. With the curtains drawn she could just make out a shape. She caught a sudden movement from the corner of her eye and her instincts screamed for her to run.
Lights flooded the spacious bedchamber, unusually bright lights blinding her. Hands clamped on her forearms, lifting her off her feet.
“Let me go!” Bryn swung out with her arms and legs, kicking, elbows flying. “Put me down!”
“Stop it, Bryn. You’re only making this worse.”
With a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach, she heard the rasp of Kahlil’s voice and caught a glimpse of his profile. His jaw was shadowed with the beginnings of a beard. “How…what…?”
“Motion detectors,” he said shortly, making sense of her incoherence, even as he dragged her past a bevy of palace guards clustered in the doorway. Another cluster of guards stood at the far end of the marble hallway watching. “State-of-the-art security. The moment you left your room my surveillance camera turned on.”
Mortification flooded her veins with fresh adrenaline. He’d watched her tiptoe through the palace. He’d watched her search through the rooms. “You’re a Peeping Tom!”
“And you’re a sneak,” he retorted grimly, his white robe parted revealing far more skin than Bryn was comfortable with.
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He looked raw and primitive and incredibly male—which is exactly what had gotten her into trouble five years ago. “I wouldn’t have to sneak around if you’d just let me see my son!”
“I have never met such a disobedient woman in my life.”
“I’m sorry you’ve been so sheltered, but I have to tell you there are hundreds—thousands—of women who are certain to be more difficult than me.” Bryn yanked on her arm, struggling to free herself. “Now let me go!”
“Not an option.” He swung her into his arms and clasped her firmly against his chest. “I cannot sleep with you wandering the palace, and my guards will get no rest if I return you to your room. You’ll stay with me tonight. And I promise you, you’ll go nowhere.”
Kahlil kicked the door shut behind him. The tall tapered candles in the wall sconces flickered, casting dancing shadows on the smooth plaster walls and center columns. She shivered, feeling as though he’d carried her back in time. “Candles?”
“More restful.” He dropped her on his bed, the midnight-blue velvet coverlet creasing, the dark velvet gleaming like water beneath the moon.
It crossed her mind that she was truly in trouble now.
Kahlil would never hurt her—she trusted him with her life—but being alone with him like this was incredibly dangerous. She’d never been able to resist his warmth, nor his strength.
Bryn swallowed and grabbed handfuls of the velvet coverlet, crushing the soft fabric against her skin. “What do you intend to do?”
