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He lifted a hand and wrapped it around her wrist. “I waited for you.” The admission was a throaty husk. “I waited for you to come last night. And somewhere before dawn, I realised that I am prepared to do for you what I have done for no other woman.”
She was shivering. “What’s that?” Her words were a whisper. A snatch of doubt.
“Beg.”
Cassie lifted her pale blue eyes to his face. “What do you mean?”
“I want you in my life. I cannot offer you any more than this small stretch of time. Beyond that, this will all be over. Finished. But for now, I need you. I believe you need me, too. I beg you Cassie, to be fair to both of us.”
Her heart turned over in her chest and she sucked in a shaking breath. “I don’t want to need you.”
“But you do.”
She stared into his dark eyes, and felt an ancient connection that seared her very core. “Yes,” she mumbled, dropping her gaze before the truth of the situation could make her panic. “But it makes no sense. I don’t know you.”
He didn’t say what he was thinking; that she knew him better than most. Instead he lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Come. I want to show you something.”
She took a step beside him, knowing that she wasn’t simply walking with him in that moment. She was agreeing to so much more than that.
The guard she hadn’t even been aware of opened the door and Layth strode into the flower-strewn corridor. “This is so beautiful.”
He eyed the flowers. “I barely notice them now.”
“How can you not?” She breathed in the heady scent with a small smile. “I don’t recognise so many of these flowers.”
“They are flown in each week from Takisabad.”
“They are?” Her breath caught in her throat. It was yet another example of his phenomenal wealth; the world he inhabited that was vastly at odds with hers.
“They are some of our most celebrated flowers. These are called Silenias. They grow rampantly in the valley near my palace. At sunset, they seem to almost glow.”
“Amazing,” she smiled up at him, shy suddenly. His admission had been humbling and confusing. For a man such as Layth Sati to beg for her to spend time with him; she knew what that must have cost him. He was a proud man, and yet he’d been braver than she.
She moved towards the spikey flowers she’d admired earlier. “And these?”
“Phalistremona.” His accent was almost as magical as the flowers. She leaned closer and breathed in their fragrance. “You like them.”
“Yes.” She shrugged. “They look pre-historic.”
“They are ancient.” He nodded. “In our earliest writings, reference is made to these plants. They grow in the desert, in big clumped bushes.”
“They’re stunning.” She squeezed his hand, her doubts fading as they always did when they were together.
“When the first Sheikh of Takisabad died, every single bloom in the desert was cut. How could such beauty grow in the face of such loss?”
Cassie’s heart turned over. “A beautiful legend.”
“Since then, the Phalistremona has been a symbol of life, and loss. It is displayed at both weddings and funerals.”
“That’s interesting; usually what’s appropriate for one is shunned for the other.”
“Yes. Love and loss are mutually dependent. You cannot have one without the other. Everyone who loves eventually must grapple with loss, and loss cannot sting without the presence of love.”
Cassie wanted to say something light hearted, but how could she? “Yes,” she said finally, her voice rich with emotion. “Though sometimes loss is a blessing.” She thought of her mother and stepfather and shivered. “Absence can be a gift.”
He was watchful. “You know such an absence in your life.”
“I think everyone probably does.” She looked up at him and felt the jolt of connection. “Don’t you?”
