The Sheikh's Princess Bride. Annie West

were aroused.

      ‘Don’t sound so fierce, Tariq.’ She even managed a tiny smile. The sight of it and the sadness in her eyes squeezed his chest. ‘I don’t want to take them from you.’

      She took a step forward, then another, and a waft of light scent filled his nostrils: warm cinnamon and sugar, innocently sweet yet improbably alluring.

      ‘I want to share them with you, look after them, grow to love them and support them.’

      ‘You want to marry me for my children?’ His mouth firmed. After a lifetime being chased by women, his pride smarted. Was anything designed to puncture a man’s ego as much as that?

      Did she have any idea of the insult she offered?

      He might be a father but he was a red-blooded male in his prime. A man, moreover, used to being the hunter, not the prey.

      Samira stepped closer again, apparently unaware the movement brought her into his personal space. She was so close he felt the warmth of her body, saw the fine-grained perfection of her skin and the tiny shadows beneath her eyes that make-up didn’t quite conceal.

      ‘Not just the children, Tariq. I want a family. Someone to belong to. And I can’t think of a man I’d rather trust myself with than you. You’re decent and honourable.’

      Competing emotions battled in Tariq’s gut. Pleasure at her belief in him. Annoyance that she saw him as some sort of comforting protector who conveniently had the kids she wanted. And a shudder of carnal pleasure at the sound of his name on her lips, which inevitably led him to imagine her crying it out in the throes of passion.

      But she was wrong. He sifted all she’d said, realising it wasn’t really him she wanted, but some emasculated version of himself that existed only in her mind.

      She didn’t know him, had never really known him.

      If she had any idea of the darkness within him, or of the urges he suppressed right now—none of them decent or honourable, all of them primitive and utterly indecent—she’d run a mile.

      It was time to stop this.

      Tariq looked into her eager, open face. ‘You honour me with your offer, Samira. But the answer is no. I won’t marry you.’