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Numb.
His hand tightened on the window.
“Your Highness, Miss Taylor is asking to see you.”
He whirled around to see Hassan, his chief of staff, in the doorway of his office.
“Send her in,” he said abruptly, then silently jeered at himself. So much for willpower and staying away from her.
Hassan briefly bowed his head, but as he turned to go, he hesitated, then turned back. “If I might ask your advice, Your Highness...would you think it inappropriate if I were to ask Miss Taylor to accompany me to the party after your sister’s wedding—”
“You are forbidden.” The hard words came out of Sharif’s mouth before he even realized what he was saying. Hassan’s eyes widened with shock.
“I see,” he said slowly. “Is there some reason that you—”
Sharif tried to be calm. To be cool. But a visceral fury went through him that he could not control and he whirled a fierce, black glare on his trusted friend that would have decimated a lesser man.
Hassan blinked.
“Ah,” he said quietly. “So that’s the way of it. Does she—”
“No,” Sharif said tightly. “She doesn’t know and she never will. Once my sister is wed, Miss Taylor will return home. That’s the end of it.”
“I see.” He paused. “The staff love her, sire. Though she was not born in Makhtar, it’s clear she loves this country. Your people would joyfully serve her, I think, if you were ever to decide that she—”
“My engagement to Kalila Al-Bahar will be announced next week,” Sharif said flatly.
“Oh.” Hassan stared at him. He didn’t have to say how the palace staff felt about Kalila. After two disastrous visits in the past, Sharif already knew.
“No one must ever know my true feelings for Miss Taylor,” he said quietly. “Least of all her. She cannot know. It is bad enough that I do.”
“I am sorry,” Hassan said. He hesitated. “Shall I still...send her in now?”
Sharif looked at him and shook his head. “It’s all over your face.” His lip curled. “Go out the back. I will let her in.”
Once alone, Sharif took a deep breath. He realized his hands were trembling, so he took a moment to clear the emotion from his heart, from his mind, from his expression. Then he went to open the door.
Irene looked beautiful, he thought, like everything any man could ever want. She was wearing a simple sheath dress in pale pink, the same color she’d been wearing the moonlit November night they’d met. Her hair was twisted into a thick topknot. Her only makeup was red lipstick. Even her new dark-rimmed glasses made her look, in his current demented state, like a sexy librarian.
“You’re wearing glasses,” was all he could manage in the way of intelligent conversation.
“I know,” she said mournfully. “I lost a contact lens this morning. I’ve ordered a new pair, but they won’t get delivered until later today.”
“To what do I owe this pleasure?”
She looked at him, then her expression hardened. “You have to call off this wedding.”
How did she know how ardently he’d been wishing that same thing? How had she guessed? In a harsh voice he said, “I cannot. It has been a long-held promise...”
“Not that long,” she pointed out, frowning. “Just six months, Aziza said.”
Six months? It had been nearly twenty years. It had...
He realized Irene was speaking about his sister’s marriage, not his. He’d very nearly blurted out something that would have told her everything. He shook his head, trying to clear the fog from his brain. “Aziza wanted you to speak with me? That’s why you rushed away when you saw me at the window?”
“She begged me.” Irene’s cheeks turned a tantalizing shade of pink. “She felt that...you might listen—to me.”
Sharif exhaled. His sister was no fool, though sometimes she liked to pretend to be one. If she already knew the influence that Irene had over him, how long would it be before everyone knew—including Irene herself?
“We’ve been through this already,” he said.
“She’s realized all those gifts you bought her in Dubai are meaningless, compared to throwing her life away! She should be in college, Sharif. She’s a bright girl. She should have the chance to—”
“The wedding is in a week. It’s too late.” Sharif folded his arms, glaring at her. “So if there’s nothing else...”
She sighed. “I need to go anyway, or else I’ll be late for—”
She bit down hard on her lip.
“Late to where?” he demanded.
