Читать книгу Royal Sins: Bound to the Warrior King / Protecting the Desert Heir / Pursued by the Desert Prince - Maisey Yates - Страница 14

CHAPTER SIX

OLIVIA WAS RESOLUTE in her decision to stay away from Tarek when he was shirtless. Because every time he stripped down, he seemed to cast her common sense to the floor right along with his clothes. She was at war with herself. Somewhat horrified by her actions while at the same time feeling completely justified in them. If he was going to be her husband, they would have to come to an agreement on this. But she would feel more comfortable if she wasn’t half as invested in the agreement. If she didn’t feel quite so out of control of her actions when he was near.

If she didn’t want him quite so much. That was the part that horrified her. Not because she was ashamed of wanting him, but because it was exposing to desire someone like that. And to show them that you did.

She knew better than that. You played games to protect yourself. Acted a little bit coy to make sure that the man felt the same. Even when she and Marcus had been married she’d played those games. But he had, too.

She had loved her husband very much, but they had their own lives. Their own bedrooms. There were things about him she didn’t know, things she didn’t want to know.

She kept herself guarded. Which was just good sense.

Because she knew the alternative far too well.

Still, for some reason, keeping guarded with Tarek was difficult.

Which confounded her, since she had loved Marcus. Known him. In that way you could know people. She had none of those things with Tarek. She had a fascination for his body. So different from her husband’s. Which was a thought that made her deeply uncomfortable.

She supposed, had she had a list of lovers, the temptation to compare wouldn’t be present. But as she had been with only one man, the sight and feel of another man’s body was more exceptional than it might have been otherwise.

And today was speechwriting day. She was torn between the desire to spend time with Tarek, to try to understand the man she had agreed to marry, and the desire to avoid him to stop herself from making any other stupid moves.

Today, there would be no avoiding. Today, there was a speech to consider.

She smoothed the front of her plum-colored sheath dress, then patted her blond hair, neatly secured in a bun. She looked much more collected and calm than she actually was. She had ensured that was the case before she left her quarters. She took a fortifying breath, pushing open the doors to Tarek’s office. He was expecting her. She didn’t see the point in knocking.

When she saw him standing there in front of his desk, his head bent low, his expression one of intense concentration, she wished that she could go back and allow herself a few more moments to fortify herself. To prepare herself.

His suit, apparently, was ready. And he was wearing it. Fitted perfectly to his broad shoulders, narrow waist, muscular thighs.

She had been right—there was no amount of expert tailoring or expensive fabric that could make him look the part of royalty. He did not look like an aristocrat. He looked like a man who had risen straight from the desert. And yet, something about the attempted civility made him appear all the more dangerous. Highlighted the ruthless lines of his face, accentuated the fearsome strength in his muscles.

“You look like you’re ready to tear out someone’s throat,” she said, attempting to diffuse the tension that was rioting through her. A tension he was likely oblivious to.

“Always,” he said. “I do what I must.”

“Terrifying, Tarek. Very terrifying.” She was being dry, and yet she sensed his words were true.

The thought sent a shiver through her body, and she couldn’t work out whether it was one of fear, or one of arousal. There was a thin line separating the two when it came to Tarek. She found it unnerving.

“Unless you mean to harm my country in some way, you have nothing to fear from me.”

Somehow she very much doubted that. Somehow she felt that she might have quite a bit to fear from him. She wasn’t sure where that came from, why she knew it all the way down to her blood. Only that she did.

She shook off the foreboding sensation. “Then, we should be fine.”

“I am uncertain about the speech.”

“I am here to help you be certain.”

That statement resulted in her having a stack of papers thrust in her direction. The words on the page were handwritten, and it was obvious that wielding a pen was not as familiar to him as wielding a sword.

“You couldn’t have typed this?” she asked. She supposed that was a ridiculous question. The man had not thought to use the phone sitting on his desk to reach members of staff.

“No.”

“I’m sorry. Do you know how to use a computer?”

“I haven’t done so in a great many years.”

“Well, the thing about technology is that it changes. It’s likely you will have to learn to do it all over again.” She perused the papers in her hand. “But that isn’t important right now. This is important. One thing at a time.”

The speech wasn’t eloquent. She couldn’t lie. There was no point.

“Okay. I think this is a decent guideline for what you might want to say. It is your heart. It’s what you want to do for the country. And I have spoken to you, and you speak well. So.” She handed the papers back to him. “You can use this if you get lost. But I want you to just tell me what you want for Tahar. What your plans are for the future. Make it brief, because people have limited attention. And you don’t want to overpromise. Better to overdeliver.”

“I don’t know how to speak in front of people.”

“I bet that isn’t true. You...” She searched for the right words. “You commanded men. You had to rally them before you went into battle. Didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“This is the same thing. It’s a rally cry. For your people. Things might look bad now. They might seem hard. But nothing is impossible. You have faced down enemies and triumphed. You will triumph now. And so will they.”

He arched a brow. “I feel that perhaps you should give the speech for me.”

“Too bad it’s never the spouse they want to hear from. Unless it’s a garden party. Perhaps the opening of the children’s hospital.”

“More things I must manage, I take it.”

“No,” she said, tempted to touch him. Knowing she shouldn’t. “I’ll be your softer side. You sound the battle cry.”

“That sounds doable. Oftentimes none of this does.”

“That’s marriage. I’m your other half. No, we don’t love each other. But I don’t think we have to in order to fulfill that. I have skills you don’t. And you carry this country in your blood. You’re a warrior. So many things I could never be. But together we will make this work.”

Just saying the words made her feel as if things were locking into place inside her. Gave her a sense of completeness, of rightness. Being a part of something instead of sitting alone in the dark.

He looked up, his dark eyes meeting hers. “I need you to be more than half right now,” he said. “Because I feel I have little to contribute.”

“That’s okay,” she said, swallowing hard, the lingering emotion from her earlier realization making her ache. “Sometimes you might have to be more than half for me.”

“Should that ever arise, I swear that I will.”

It wasn’t passionate. It wasn’t romantic. It was nothing like the declaration of love she and Marcus had shared over a dinner on his family yacht, followed by a brilliantly orchestrated proposal. And yet, she felt the weight of it.

There was meaning in it.

The girl she’d been five years ago wouldn’t have felt anything in those words. Would have found all of this dispassionate and unexciting.

The woman she’d become felt the binding quality of his vow down to her core.

“If you can promise the country what you’ve just promised me, I think your speech will be just fine,” she said.

“I’m good with vows,” he said slowly. “I kept my word to my brother for fifteen years. I devoted myself to my country. I gave aid when it was required. I never once saw my own pleasure above the safety of the nation. Unlike my brother, I am not a pleasure seeker. There is much more to life than that. When everything in a man’s life is stripped away, the only thing he has left is his purpose. If a man has put his faith in things that burn, then when the fires of this world consume, there will be nothing left behind. But if a man puts his faith in rock, no matter how hot the blaze rages, it cannot be consumed. This country is my rock. If I am left with nothing else, I will fight for that to my dying breath.”

Olivia looked to the intensity in his black eyes, and for just one moment she wished he could be speaking about her. Why couldn’t someone treasure her that much?

You don’t need that kind of ridiculousness. You don’t need to depend on anyone.

She swallowed hard. “Say that. When you get up to speak, that’s all you need to say. Yes, eventually policy will need to be addressed. But that can always be done with press releases. This nation is wounded, and I think those are the words that will heal it. You’re the man who will heal it.”

The man who might heal me.

The moment those words flitted through her mind she rebelled against them, panic fluttering in her breast like a terrified bird, raging at the cage of bone and flesh it was trapped in. She didn’t want thoughts like that. She must be insane. Attaching some kind of emotional meaning to his words was foolish. Marcus had loved her, but he hadn’t healed her.

Why do you suddenly think you need to be healed?

Really, her brain needed to calm down. Stop asking her questions she didn’t have the answers to.

“I will simply have to trust you,” he said.

“I’ll do my best to make sure you don’t regret that,” she said, trying to lighten the mood.

His expression remained stone, and she wondered why she bothered to try to inject humor into any exchange with Tarek.

“I will do the same,” he said finally.

“I have no doubt.”

“I have procured a ring for you,” he said after a small amount of hesitation.

Her heart scampered into her throat. “You have?” Why was she reacting to this? She was sitting in a man’s office, in a very average day dress, about to be presented with a ring that was more the seal on a business agreement than anything else.

Her heart was pounding as though she was back on that yacht. With roses and champagne. A man that she loved.

She fought against the urge to close her eyes and turn away, because that would only make her look crazy. She was being crazy. Maybe because while this was a business arrangement in many ways, it was one that would involve sex. Closeness.

Only as much as you want.

That was what frightened her. How much she wanted.

He moved behind his desk, opening a drawer and producing a little box, placing it on the wooden surface.

She walked forward, pausing on the other side of the large piece of furniture. It stood between them, and for that she was grateful. Otherwise she might do something ridiculous, like touch him again. There really was no telling.

She reached out, touching the top of the jewelry box and sliding it toward herself. “Who chose this?”

“I did.”

She looked at him, unbearably curious about what would make a man like him select a piece of jewelry over another. If it had anything to do with her, or with something else. It was like studying a rock wall for secrets.

And he wasn’t going to tell her. Of course he wasn’t.

She picked up the ring box and opened it slowly.

Her indrawn breath settled in the back of her throat, never making it all the way to her lungs. It was a simple ring, with a large square-cut stone the color of the crystal-blue water in the pristine lakes found in Alansund. An oasis in this desert. She couldn’t help but see it that way.

She had removed her engagement ring and wedding band before leaving Alansund, because there was no point wearing them when she was anticipating wearing another man’s ring. Still, the idea of putting on one that was so different in style was both strange and a relief.

She wanted to ask him why. Why this ring?

But she didn’t.

Instead, she took it out of the box without ceremony and slipped it onto the fourth finger of her left hand. “Even fits,” she said.

“An accident.”

“Or a sign,” she said.

“If you believe in such things.”

“I suppose,” she replied. The man was impenetrable. And he refused to allow her to form a connection, no matter how small.

“There is much to prepare before the party.” His forehead wrinkled. “I cannot quite fathom that I am attending a party.”

She couldn’t help but laugh, and it was a relief. There’d been too much tension inside her. “I can see that you aren’t the most party oriented of men.”

“I don’t know how to have fun,” he said, sounding completely mystified by the concept.

A scene flashed through her mind, unbidden, of her hands moving over his bare back, her legs wrapped around his hips as he drove in deep. That, she had a feeling, would be fun. She swallowed hard. “I’m sure you know some ways. Or at least some ways to relieve stress.”

“I am fond of spending a few hours a day doing drills with my sword.”

She blinked, biting the inside of her cheek. “Is that a euphemism?”

“I am speaking of an actual sword. What were you thinking?”

Her face got hot. “Nothing.”

“I often feel we are speaking a different language sometimes.”

“That could be because we’re usually speaking your second language.”

“I do not think that’s it,” he said, his black eyes intense on hers.

She sensed it was her opportunity to push for information, but she withdrew. Because she was tired of pressing only to be pushed away.

“It’s a beautiful ring anyway. See, you did that well. No language barriers.” She determinedly lightened things.

“It will send the proper message, one hopes,” he said. “That we are moving forward unified, as a couple. For the sake of the nation.”

“I think it will. I will handle coordinating the staff to organize the menu planning, music, things like that. You just focus on...smiling when people smile at you.”

He put his hands into his pockets and he smiled. It was the saddest attempt at the facial expression she had ever seen. She found herself helpless to do anything but smile right back. And in that moment, the twist of his lips changed into something much more genuine. And her heart fluttered.

“Good,” she said, the word tight, rushed. “Very good. You’re going to be fine. All of this will be fine.”

She wasn’t sure if she was saying it for his benefit or for her own.