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“Perfectly so. I don’t intend to suffer from hypothermia because of the situation you imposed on me.”
“I made you come out here?”
“Yes, you did.”
“And how did I do that?”
“You made escaping the curiosity, not to mention the jealousy, of all present a necessity.”
“Jealousy!” His eyebrows disappeared into the layers of satin hair the wind had flopped over his forehead.
“Every person in there, man or woman, would give anything to be in my place, having your private audience.” She gave an exaggerated sigh. “If only they knew I’d donate the privilege if I could with a sizable check on top as bonus.”
His chuckle revved inside his chest again and in her bones. “That privilege is nontransferable. You’re stuck with it. So before we convene, what shall I get you?”
“Why shouldn’t I be the one to get you something?”
His nod was all concession. “Why shouldn’t you, indeed?”
She nodded, too, slowly, totally unable to predict him and feeling more out of her depth by the second for it. “Be specific about what you prefer. I hate guessing.”
“I’m flabbergasted you’re actually considering my preferences. But I’ll go with anything nonalcoholic. I’m driving.” Considering he’d placed his order, she started to turn around and he stopped her. “And, Kanza…can you possibly also make it something nonpoisoned and curse free?”
Muttering “smart-ass” and zapping him with her harshest parting glance, which only dissipated against his force field and was received by another chuckle, she strode away.
On reentering the reception, she groaned out loud as she immediately felt the weight of Johara’s gaze zooming in on her. She’d no doubt noticed Aram marching behind her across the penthouse and must be bursting with curiosity about how they’d met and why that older brother of hers had gotten it into his mind to follow her around.
Johara just had to bear not knowing. She couldn’t worry about her now. One Nazaryan at a time.
She grabbed a glass of cranberry-apple juice from a passing waiter and strode back to the terrace, this time exiting from where she’d left Aram. As soon as she did, she nearly tripped, as her heartbeat did.
Aram was at the railing, two dozen paces away with his back to her. He was silhouetted against the rising moon, hands gripping the bar, looking like a modern statue of a Titan. The only animate things about him were the satin stirring around his majestic head in the tranquil breeze and the silk rustling around his steel-fleshed frame.
But apart from his physical glory, there was something about his pose as he stared out into the night—in the slight slump of his Herculean shoulders, dimming that indomitable vibe—that disturbed her
. Whatever it was, it forced her to reconsider her disbelief of his assertion that he’d never felt worse. Made her feel guilty about how she’d been bashing him, believing him invincible.
Then he turned around, as if he’d felt her presence, and his eyes lit up again with that potent merriment and mischief, and all empathy evaporated in a wave of instinctive challenge and chagrined response.
How was it even possible? That after all these years he remained the one man who managed to wring an explosive mixture of fascination and detestation from her?
From the first time she’d laid eyes on him when she’d been seventeen, she’d thought him the most magnificent male in existence, one who compounded his overwhelming physical assets with an array of even more impressive superiorities. He’d been the only one who could breach her composure and tongue-tie her just by walking into a room. That had only earned him a harder crash from the pedestal she’d placed him on, when he’d proved to be just another predictable male, one who considered only a woman’s looks and status no matter her character. Why else would he have gotten involved with her spoiled and vapid half sister? Her opinion of him would have been salvaged when he’d walked away from Maysoon, if—and it was an insurmountable if—he hadn’t been needlessly, shockingly cruel in doing so.
Remembered outrage rose as she stopped before him and foisted the drink into his hand. It rose higher when she couldn’t help watching how his fingers closed around the glass, the grace, power and economy of the movement. It made her want to whack herself and him upside the head.
She had to get this ridiculous interlude over with.
“Without further ado, let’s get on with your preposterous retrial.”
That gargantuan swine gave a superb pretense of wiping levity from his face, replacing it with earnestness.
“It’s going to be the fastest one in history. Your indictment was unequivocal and the evidence against you overwhelming. Whatever her faults, Maysoon loved you, and you kicked her out of your life. Then when she was down, you kicked her again—almost literally and very publicly. You left her in a heap on the ground and walked away unscathed, and then went on to prosper beyond any expectations. While she went on to waste her life, almost self-destruct in one failed relationship after another. If I’d judged your case then, I would have passed the harshest sentence. In any retrial, I’d still pronounce you guilty and judge that you be subjected to character execution.”
Four
Aram stared at the diminutive firebrand who was the first woman who’d ever fetched him a drink, then followed up by sentencing his character to death.
Both action and indictment should have elated the hell out of him, as everything from her tonight had. But the expected exhilaration didn’t come; something unsettling spread inside him instead. For what if her opinion of him was too entrenched and he couldn’t adjust it?
