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‘Okay,’ she said slowly. ‘I’ll meet you.’
‘Five minutes,’ he clipped, and hung up.
Pausing only to brush her teeth, telling herself that she would have done the same no matter who she was meeting, she slid on a pair of old flip-flops and let herself out of the house, wondering where he was waiting.
She didn’t have to wonder for very long. A shiny limousine with tinted windows was parked at the end of the road—presumably because the road was so narrow it could go no further. In front of it and just to the rear were two leather-clad outriders on powerful motorbikes. It was like a scene straight out of a film, and Sienna could see a couple of curtains twitching as she walked towards it.
My neighbours will never look at me in quite the same way she thought, as a chauffeur stepped out of the driver’s seat and opened the door for her.
Telling herself that she could hardly be rude to Hashim’s employee, she had no choice but to slide into the soft-cushioned luxury of the back seat. It took a few seconds for her eyes to become accustomed to the dim light, but she could see Hashim sprawled negligently on the back seat, watching her.
Today he was wearing Western clothes—not a shimmer of soft silk in sight. An immaculately cut dark suit, with a snowy shirt and a tie which gleamed dully in the reduced light. Sienna could feel her heart begin to pound.
‘Nice of you to get out of the car yourself,’ she said.
‘I was thinking of your reputation.’
‘Liar.’
He laughed. ‘Your assessment of me is wholly and completely wrong, Sienna—my honesty has at times been described as almost brutal.’
Brutal. Yes. There was a brutal side to his nature. And yet it contrasted with the extraordinary gentleness he had displayed when she had lain so helplessly in his arms. She felt the drying of her lips, and as if he had read her thoughts he leaned forward and touched his mouth to hers in a barely-there kiss which started her senses sizzling.
‘Don’t,’ she said weakly.
The same cold skill and calculation which made him a world-class poker player made him kiss her for long enough to hear her sigh, and then he stopped and leaned back against the seat to study her. He pressed a button by his side and said something she did not understand. The car began its powerful acceleration.
‘Where are we going?’ she questioned, in alarm.
‘Just driving around—we will draw less attention to ourselves that way—this car tends to attract sightseers.’
‘Why don’t you travel in something less ostentatious, then?’ she questioned acidly.
‘Because I cannot,’ he said simply. ‘It needs to be bullet-proof.’
And—perhaps for the very first time—Sienna allowed herself to see the downside of his life. Hadn’t there been part of her which had somehow thought that the bodyguards which accompanied him were simply for show? As some kind of indicator of his power and lofty position? She had never actually stopped to think that someone might want to shoot him, and now that she had she found her stomach twisting over in anxiety.
‘Now, let us both be honest,’ he said quietly. ‘Can you do that?’
‘You don’t take any notice of me when I am.’
But he shook his head. ‘No, Sienna—I am talking about real honesty. I do not mean that you should say what you feel you ought to say, but what is truly in your heart.’
‘Then I’m at a disadvantage—for you don’t have a heart!’
He paused, for it was not the first time this accusation had been flung at him. ‘Have you thought of me?’
She opened her mouth to say no—but something in his eyes stopped her. ‘Yes.’
He nodded his head. ‘And for me it is the same. I have thought of little else. The way you felt in my arms. You haunt me, Sienna—for I cannot forget the great gift which you gave to me.’
‘Which you took, you mean,’ she corrected him quietly. ‘You set me up and seduced me—as you had intended to do right from the start.’
‘Yes,’ he said bitterly. ‘Of that I am guilty—I robbed you of your greatest virtue. But I would not have done it had I known that you were innocent, and that innocence has changed everything.’ He paused, studying the lush fullness of her mouth, and when he spoke his voice was almost reflective. ‘What passed between us was not enough—not for me, nor for you. You were beautiful and responsive, but your initiation into the pleasures of the body should not be limited to a single session on a cold floor, our bodies not even naked.’
She was glad then for the dim light, for she began to blush and he saw. His eyes narrowed and she wondered if he was remembering—as she was—that very first blush such a long time ago. ‘It’s over,’ she said, aware of how lacking in conviction her words sounded. Was that because she didn’t want it to be over?
