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He was gone when she emerged only a short time later, but when she lay on the bed, she could smell him, she could feel him. The phantom of Raffa remained, and he tortured her in her dreams, so that she awoke tired and cranky.
Her mood didn’t improve when the day’s temperature sky-rocketed, making it impossible to head out of the palace and explore. Even if she’d wanted to, her six maids were doing their best to dog her every step, so she was never alone, never unwatched.
Her mood worsened.
By the evening, she was ready to snap.
Mid-way through a history of one of the eastern provinces of Ras El Kida, she’d re-read the same page at least four times before she gave up and dropped the book onto the bed in a huff.
At home in Seattle, she would have gone for a run, or she would have gone to see a movie on her own, buying a huge box of popcorn and a gallon of soda, curling up in the back row and losing herself completely in someone else’s life for a while.
She had no such getaway here.
Her charity work was her best distraction, but even that hadn’t filled the void for her today.
That evening, when a knock sounded on the door, she stood, preparing to greet Aysha and the tray she habitually brought to Chloe at this time.
Only Aysha wasn’t alone when he entered. Raffa was there, his expression impossible to read as he walked behind Aysha and forestalled the servant from serving their meals.
“That will do,” he clipped, nodding towards the door.
Aysha bowed low and departed, pulling the door closed behind herself, so they were alone once more.
“Does it ever occur to you to say ‘thank you’?” Chloe asked, hiding the torrent of emotions that he invoked behind a mask of cool indifference.
He eyed her thoughtfully but didn’t take the bait. “You wanted to get to know me,” he said instead, crossing to the table and holding a chair out for Chloe. She frowned but eased herself into it.
He was close, though, and as he pushed her chair nearer to the table, she inhaled, catching his masculine, uniquely ‘him’ aroma and her nerve endings quivered in response.
“So I thought we would have dinner together,” he concluded, taking the seat opposite, and watching her with undisguised interest.
He was trying to understand her, she realized. She’d surprised him, and a whole day later, he had no idea how to manage her. Good!
“Fine.” She reached for her napkin, laying it in her lap then fixing him with a cool gaze that didn’t falter, despite the knots forming in her stomach.
A frown passed his face. “I know everything about your brother,” he said, reaching for a bottle of wine and half-filling her glass before doing the same to his own. “But surprisingly little of the woman I married.”
“You’re one of his closest friends,” she admitted. “Apollo thinks highly of you.”
“And I of him.”
“You’re very similar.” Her tone was clipped, so it was impossible to know if she meant it as a compliment or not.
“In what ways?” He handed her a serving spoon, watching as she lifted it into some of the spiced rice and lay it carefully onto her plate. She added a little of the green mango chutney then a single piece of fish.
“Well, you’re both smart, driven, confident to a fault,” she remarked, sitting back in her chair.
“You’re all those things,” he responded, taking the serving spoon and easily tripling on his own plate what she’d served herself.
“Hardly!” She refuted, but clamped her lips together before she could make a self-deprecating comment on her own intelligence, or lack thereof.
“I think we’re different. Apollo and me,” he clarified. “More than we are alike.”
“Perhaps you can’t see it clearly because you’re too close to the subject matter.”
“I am your husband and he is your brother – do you claim to have the requisite distance to be objective?”
She frowned. “He’s my half-brother,” she corrected thoughtfully. “And you are…”
