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sed he was there.
“Oh!” She lifted her eyes to his face with a look of complete confusion. “Ra’if?” She visibly schooled her features into an expression of nonchalance, but it was not a great impersonation. Her features were too emotive. Her eyes still showed her hurt. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m sorry about the other night,” he said immediately.
She pursed her lips and nodded, focussing on a point over her shoulder. “It’s fine. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does though.” He reached down and laced his fingers through hers. “It was rude of me to leave as I did.”
“I understood.” She pulled her hand away and stepped back, crossing her arms over her chest. “It’s been a long time since I’ve … I mean … I never dated. Not someone like you.” She swallowed. “You’re so sophisticated and I was going on about …”
“No.” He swore in his own language and closed the distance between them. “I should never have let you imagine that I wasn’t interested in you.”
Melinda’s heart was hammering hard against her ribs. Could he hear it? The thump thump thump thump that pounded with every single one of her silly fantasies?
“It’s okay,” she murmured. “It was just dinner. I’m still very grateful to you for what you did in the alley.”
“You don’t understand.” He dug his hands into his pockets to stop from touching her again. “But I’d like to explain it to you.”
She swallowed, her eyes locked to his. “I’m on my way out.”
Jealousy launched in his gut. “I can walk you?”
“I’m taking the train.”
“Let me drive then,” he murmured. “My car’s over there.”
She bit down on her lip, following his gaze. “Look,” she said after a long moment. “I’m not sure why you’re here. Maybe you feel sorry for me. Maybe you felt rude or whatever…”
“You don’t know what I felt?” His control snapped. He stared at her in frustration and brought his lips down on hers, claiming her with every single cell in his body.
She froze, shocked, and then melded her body to his, her arms wrapping around his back, her face tilted to welcome as much of him as he wanted to give. He kissed her hard, demanding, as though she did this all the time. As though she were used to handsome virtual-strangers launching an all-out assault on her senses. “Ra’if,” she groaned into his mouth, her hands coming to his chest and stroking his abdomen.
“This is why I’m here.”
She jerked her head back, her breathing rushed, her eyes confused. Milky, from pain. “For sex?”
“No!” He laughed, a hoarse sound. “Though that would obviously be … pleasant.” He shook his head ruefully. “I’m here because I can’t stay away. I don’t know if I’m what you need in your life, Melinda, but in my country, we believe things happen with a hand of fate. I met you that night and something clicked inside of me. I want to get to know you.” He grimaced. “That’s actually a very clinical way to describe what I want.” He brought his mouth back to hers and sucked her lower lip between his teeth before releasing her and dragging his mouth to her ear lobe. He whispered throatily, “I want to get to know everything about you. I want to know how you think and feel. I want to touch every single part of you and kiss every single part of you with every single part of me.”
Melinda’s pulse was on fire. Her body was burning up; desire was haemorrhaging her system. “Ra’if,” she shook her head, but what had she wanted to say. Wasn’t it everything she’d needed to hear?
“I stayed away because I am daunted by the intensity of what I feel. I am older than you are. Considerably more experienced. That I might hurt you makes me wish I didn’t feel this.”
She tilted her head back, exposing the column of her neck, and he kissed it now. Tiny little butterfly kisses that made her stomach roll hungrily. “You won’t hurt me.”
“I’m not right for you,” he said with complete confidence.
“I’m not looking for Mr Right,” she responded quickly.
Her words splintered his resolve. A temporary affair? A fling? Was that a way to have his cake and eat it too? To enjoy a relationship with Melinda knowing he could walk away before it became too serious? Before she needed to know the truth about his own relationship with drugs, not to mention his royal lineage?
“Come upstairs.”
“You’re going out,” he murmured, already following her to the apartment.
“It’s not important,” she promised. “Please.”
He nodded. Every sensible thought was put on hold in his brain. This was bigger than them. As soon as they were inside her Christmas grotto and she’d flicked on the lamp by the door, he pulled her closer. She smelled so good. Like cinnamon and cherries. “There’s no future for us. There can’t be,” he said, his eyes locked to hers, holding himself just enough apart to retain a skerrick of his will-power.
