Chapter Four #2
‘Well, because if the rumours of your appearance were true,’ if even half of what her siblings had teased her about him had been true, ‘then I didn’t want you to see any kind of negative reaction from me when we first met,’ she tried to explain. ‘I didn’t want you to be…upset,’ she finished.
He stared at her as if he were shocked.
‘You did it to protect my feelings?’ he said slowly.
‘Yes,’ she replied. Surely that was obvious?
‘And had the rumours been true, you would have married me anyway?’
‘Of course,’ she replied. Again. What about this was he finding so difficult to understand? The sheikh was supposed to have the fiercest of intelligences, but he seemed to be finding this all a little difficult to understand.
Malik blinked at the woman in front of him, utterly unable to wrap his head around what she was telling him. She’d done that for him? To make sure that she wouldn’t have embarrassed him by her first reaction to his appearance?
Clearly, like most people, she believed that the rumours about his flaws, his damage, were skin deep just as his father had intended, following the burn caused by his seizure by the fire.
But instead of refusing to marry him—this hideous monster he was rumoured to be—she’d wanted to be prepared for him?
Then Hana shivered and this time it rolled all the way across her shoulders and down her body. He cursed. He’d not been joking about them getting out of their wet clothes before they got ill.
‘We’ll come back to this, because I’m not finished with it, but for now, we really need to get warm and dry,’ he said, trying to fill his mind with anything and everything he could not to imagine her undressing.
It was hard enough now that the long thick ropes of her hair were soaked and pushed back from her face, showing just how naturally beautiful she really was.
He bit back a curse at how innocent she appeared, tension radiating from his body as if he were ready to hold himself back from doing something so monumentally stupid as to touch her.
‘The shower in the master bedroom, down there,’ he said, pointing to the corridor, ‘has several bathrobes. You should change into one of them when you’re done in the shower.’
She looked torn and he felt guilty. He knew that it was wrong for her to be seen with such little clothing.
‘It’s better than you getting ill. And hopefully the storm will pass and we will be rescued before anyone can find out about it.’
She nodded reluctantly and left for the master suite without another word.
He swallowed, standing in the kitchen long after she’d gone, reconciling himself with what had just happened.
The only person who had never seemed to have any trouble with his scar—or the illness that had caused it—was his brother. It was almost inconceivable to him that Hana might not have an issue with it.
It would never have been a problem had they married, because he’d intended for a marriage in name only. So she would never have seen the marred flesh of his shoulder and arm, and would never need to know about the epilepsy that had stalked his childhood.
The drip of water from his fingertip hitting the floor, reminded him that he too could catch a cold just standing there.
He cast his gaze to the fireplace in the living area.
The villa would have no need of any other heating and he was just thankful that there was a basket of wood, kindling and firelighters beside it.
He checked the chimney was clear before starting a fire, knowing that Hana could be back at any minute.
He shook his head. He still couldn’t credit that she’d broke into the spa to protect his feelings. He couldn’t remember the last time that someone had spared a thought for something as unimportant as his feelings.
Leaning forward he blew gently on the small flames, watching as they caught and spread, hungrily consuming the kindling and small log that he’d put on top.
His mind went back to the food. He’d not even thought about it.
He was used to forgoing food when he was either focused on a civil matter, or out in the desert travelling to the Bedouin encampments he needed to visit now and then.
But she was a sheikha, a princess. He’d presumed that she’d be pampered and spoiled.
And yet without a word, she had gone to ensure that they had food to eat.
She had gone out in that, he thought, noting that the storm had only increased in its violence.
She was either brave, or unaware. The branches of the trees in the distance were pushed into unnatural angles and the winds whipped around the villa that was situated on one of the highest points of an island that was beautiful but utterly impractical.
A little like your princess, a voice in his head said, sounding very much like his brother.
She’s not mine, he shot back. She’s—
The imaginary conversation came to a screeching halt, when Hana returned dressed in a thick white robe that covered her from shoulder to ankle and fastened tightly around her waist. She was drying her hair with a towel and for the first time he realised how long it was, the wet ends reaching the knot in the robe’s tie.
It left her face exposed. Open. And he could no longer ignore the high cheekbones that shaped perfectly balanced features.
The black of her hair was not that cold, near-blue colour but instead a rich, endlessly warm kind of black in a length that he could have wrapped around his hand twice over at least. Her nose was small and slightly, just slightly, turned up at the tip, giving her face more of an impudent than spoiled tone.
Her lips, once again, reminded him of a rosebud, soft, delicate, a deep blush colour.
Her skin, he was pleased to see, had a nice fresh heat beneath the tawny bronze, much better than the pallid blue undertones caused by the frigid weather outside.
He forced his gaze back to the fire when he realised that he was staring.
‘May I sit?’ she asked, her tone unsure.
He gestured behind him to the sofa and when he turned, he found her sitting, her back painfully straight and her hands in her lap.
The way she was trying to maintain the picture of prim perfection was so comical he had to fight a smile.
As if she were trying to be something she wasn’t.
As if she had even a hope of containing all that chaotic energy that surrounded her.
And once again she reminded him of a jinn.
Most would probably scoff at such fanciful notions.
But anyone who had spent more than a handful of days in the desert knew not to mock such things.
Jinn were as powerful as they were capricious.
And no matter how erratic she appeared, she had still managed to kidnap the leader of a not inconsiderably sized country.
And it was entirely possible that this ‘chaos’ was simply an act.
No, of all the things he’d learned about Hana, the most important had been not to underestimate her.
Hana had the strangest feeling that Malik was trying not to laugh at her, but she couldn’t explain why she felt that way.
She wanted to get closer to the fire, but that would mean getting closer to him and instinctively she knew that wouldn’t be a good idea.
Every time she did, her pulse would begin to pound, and she’d get flushed and tongue-tied.
But the warmth of the fire and the twists of the flames were addictive, even after the blessedly hot shower that had brought heat back to her numb bones. She shivered just from the memory.
‘Are you still cold? Sit here,’ he said, pointing to the place beside him as he reached for a pillow for her to sit on.
She bit her lip and his gaze dropped down to her mouth and flicked back up to her gaze before sliding away.
‘Thank you,’ she said, awkwardly standing from the sofa and coming to sit beside him by the fireplace.
She forced her gaze away from the man beside her, even though she had already seen how the flames danced along the planes of his face, the proud brow and high-cut cheekbones, the stubborn set to his cruelly sensual lips. How anyone could think him anything other than handsome was beyond her.