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Her olive skin was luminous and her dark-fringed eyes were a bright shade of blue. A ponytail of black hair hung almost to her waist—hair so shiny that it looked as if she might have spent the morning polishing it. Despite the silky trench coat, he could see that her breasts were neat and her legs so long that she would have been at home on any international catwalk.
Her face remained impassive as he looked her over, as if she was no stranger to submission. Only the faintest flush of pink in her cheeks gave any indication that she might be finding his attention unsettling. But what did she expect? If you burst into a strange man’s bedroom and demanded refuge, then surely the normal rules of conduct flew right out of the window.
‘They’ve gone,’ he said shortly.
‘So I heard.’ She hesitated. ‘Thank you.’
He noticed the way her gaze kept flickering towards his bare torso and then away again. As if she knew she shouldn’t stare at him but couldn’t help herself. He gave a grim kind of smile. It wasn’t the first time he had encountered such a problem.
‘I think you owe me an explanation,’ he said. ‘Don’t you?’
‘Sure.’ She bent to pick up her briefcase, and as she straightened up she did that not-quite-looking thing at his chest again. ‘Just not...not in here.’
Was the intimacy of the setting too much for her? he wondered. Was she aware that beneath the tiny towel his body was beginning to respond to her in a way which might make itself embarrassingly obvious if he wasn’t careful? He could feel the hot pump of arousal at his groin and suddenly he felt curiously vulnerable.
‘Go through there,’ he said abruptly. ‘While I get dressed.’
The stir of his erection had subsided by the time he’d pulled on some jeans and a T-shirt and walked through to the sitting room to see her standing with her back to him. She was staring out of the panoramic windows which overlooked the city of Simdahab, where golden minarets and towers gleamed in the rich light of the late afternoon sun. But Gabe barely noticed the magnificent view—his attention remained captivated by the mystery stranger.
She had removed her trench coat and had slung it over the back of one of the sofas—was she planning on staying?—and suddenly there were no more concealing folds to hide her from his eyes. His gaze travelled to where denim clung to the high curves of her bottom, to where her dark ponytail hung down her back like a dark stream of satin.
She must have sensed that he was in the room because she turned round—the ponytail swinging in slow motion—and from this angle he thought the view was even better. She looked at him with those clear blue eyes, and suddenly all he could see was temptation.
He wondered if she had been sent to him by the Sultan—a delicious package for him to open and enjoy at his leisure. Another lavish gift, just like the others which had been arriving at his hotel suite all morning. It was said that, despite his relative youth, the Sultan was an old-fashioned man and this might be a very old-fashioned gesture on his part. Mightn’t the powerful potentate have decided to sweeten up Gabe with a woman? A submissive and beautiful woman who would cater to his every whim...
‘Who are you?’ he questioned coolly. ‘A hooker?’
Her face showed no reaction to his crude question, but it seemed to take for ever before she spoke.
‘No, I’m not a hooker. My name is Leila,’ she said, and now her blue eyes were watchful.
‘Pretty name, but I’m still no wiser.’
‘Mr Steel—’
Gabe shook his head in faint disbelief. ‘How come everyone in this city knows my name?’
The woman smiled—her lips softening into cushioned and rosy curves. And even though he had never paid for sex in his life, in that moment he almost wished she were a hooker. What would he get her to do first? he wondered. Unzip him and take him in her delicious mouth, and suck him until he came? Or lower those narrow hips and bounce around on him until he cried out with pleasure?
‘People know who you are because you are the guest of the Sultan,’ she was saying. ‘Your name is Gabe Steel and you are an advertising genius who has come to Qurhah to improve our global image.’
‘That’s a very flattering summary,’ offered Gabe drily. ‘But I’m afraid that unsolicited flattery doesn’t really do it for me and it still doesn’t explain why you’re here. Why you burst into my hotel room uninvited and hid in my bathroom...Leila.’
For a moment there was silence.
