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Acid started to burn in her throat even as tears strayed down her cheeks. “I…this can’t be happening.”
“Baby,” Margey said. “I don’t know what’s going on over there, but it’s just wall to wall. You need to come home, and we’ll figure this all out. I’m so sorry. I know that I encouraged everything with the sheikh, but just get back and we’ll figure it all out.”
“I’ll do that,” she gasped out, hating how tinny and thin her voice sounded.
Standing up, she clicked her phone off and rushed out of the bedroom. She just needed to confront him. She stomped through his quarters until she finally came to his office. He was on the phone, speaking in rapid-fire Arabic with someone. When she got there, she noticed that he had the TV tuned to one of the infotainment channels, where there was a scrawl at the bottom of the screen about both of them.
“Did you do this?” she demanded, her body shaking with her anger.
Amir flinched at the sight of her and finished the conversation quickly. Then he crossed the room to her. “Are you okay?”
“No! How long have you known about this? Do you sneak pictures and video from your casino cam of all your conquests?” she demanded, reaching back to slap him. This time, unlike the first out on the balcony, Amir was distracted and her hand thudded against his cheek and beard with a heavy smack.
Amir’s head snapped back and he rubbed at his face. “I didn’t. Someone in my video security team is extremely fired. I’m trying to figure out which bastard did it, leaked that to the tabloids for cash. When my legal team is done with him, he won’t have anything to his name.”
She stilled, relieved that he seemed to be telling the truth. The way that his nostrils were flaring and the vein was throbbing in his forehead, the reaction was just too genuine. Amir was as surprised and pissed as she was. Yet all of this was her fault too. She’d been swept up in passion, in his touch, and then she’d made a fool of herself for the whole planet to see.
It had to be all the stress from being demoted, all the fears of Jackson’s creeping presence. She let herself want something for once, just one thing with Amir, and now she’d ruined her reputation. As good as she’d felt last night, as much as the ecstasy had washed over her in unremitting waves, none of it was worth this.
She stumbled and fell into his arms, and again she was confronted with his scent, with the sandalwood and pure masculinity that he seemed to emit from every pore. Her heart was racing, but it had less to do with her fears and anger and more to do with what her traitorous body wanted her to do.
But she couldn’t do that again.
Her life had been based on loss and suffering, and something as harmless as a romantic fling abroad was turning out to be too much for both of them.
“Look,” he said, staring down at her with those intense amber eyes of his. “I’ve called my press agent. I’ve got damage control on all of that. Stay here with me, and we can work through all of this.” His hand reached out and threaded through her hair, and it was just a hint of the intimate caresses they’d shared just hours ago. “We can fix this, together.”
“I barely know you,” she admitted, even though the passion felt like more. She knew he’d revealed a big part of himself by talking about his lost sister. She’d opened up to him as well—she hadn’t expected to tell him about the investigation with Jackson. Fun was one thing, or so she’d been told, but there was more between them. Amanda couldn’t afford that. Holding her shoulders back, she glared back at the screen. “They’re calling me a whore, and frankly, blurred or not, if I saw some woman on a tape the way I see myself there, I’d probably think the same thing.”
“We can fix this.”
“No,” she said, pulling away from him. She felt anxious to collect her clothes from the bedroom. “We can’t. Besides, there’s nothing to fix.”
Chapter Eight
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Sinclair,” Harris stated, his tone as gravely as ever. Idly, she wondered how many cigars the man had smoked in his life in order to have achieved a voice like that. “I truly don’t. You were sent to Abu Dhabi to cover the opening of a casino. The next thing I know, I have every editor in the city calling to laugh in my face about how much life you’re living on the Life and Style beat.”
Amanda felt her cheeks flush with the shame creeping over her. “I know.”
“Good. Then can you explain what happened? Because I feel like an alien has taken over someone I care about.”
“It’s not like that.”
Harris shook his head and raked a hand through what was left of his thinning hair. “You’re one of the most promising reporters I have here. First, you rush to press without me, without consulting me all the way or letting me brace a legal team against Jackson’s onslaught. Then you take an assignment you couldn’t care less about and turn it into a sex scandal for the Sentinel.”
“Yes.”
“I’ve had the owners on the phone with me all day, Amanda. They’re beyond angry.” He shook his head again.
“I can’t even imagine,” she said, thinking of how awful everything had turned out. She’d been a fool not to think of cameras herself, to be so loose. “What’s the verdict?”
“You know what it has to be. You are an amazing journalist, but there’s no place for you here anymore, and I swear to God, Sinclair, that eats me up.”
“I know, chief,” she said, her voice thick with emotion. Head aching, she stood up and picked up her messenger bag. “I know what I did, and I can only take responsibility for that.”
“I knew your mother.”
Her heart stilled, and she turned back to look at him. “Well, DC is a small enough town. I guess you crossed paths with her at the Post.”
