The Desert King / An Affair with the Princess: The Desert King. Michelle Celmer

was merciful that she contributed her own deterrent as she now made a dismissive, derisive gesture in his direction.

      “That they’ve stooped to settling on you is the loudest possible statement that this world is going to hell in a handbasket. Judarians must be mourning not only their king’s death, but their once-great nation’s future.”

      There they came again. The insults. White-hot pokers designed to prod him into an uncalculated response.

      He bit into the surge of tingling in his lower lip, into the urge to retaliate, to override.

      So, that had changed, too. Her methods. Her approach. There’d clearly be no more breathless adulation spilling from those deep rose lips. Instead she seemed bent on bombarding him with condescension and contempt. And she was letting him know right off the bat, in lieu of the greeting they didn’t owe each other. She had even before she’d laid eyes on him, coming all the way here only to turn around and hurl his parting words back at him, and through his men, too, just to make sure the slap landed effectively.

      He’d bet she’d calculated, even counted on that to ratchet up his interest. That had remained the same, then. The masterful manipulation. In the past, her machinations had worn the guise of erratic spontaneity and had wrung the same response from him. She’d just changed her strategy to suit their tarnished status quo and the new poised creature she was now projecting.

      And b’Ellahi—it was working. Spectacularly. When it shouldn’t. When he shouldn’t let it.

      He could do nothing else. She’d walked in here training those fathomless eyes on him, her gaze familiar yet someone else’s, throwing his own choice of cruelty back in his face and taking the wind out of his sails. Worse, she’d knocked him off course.

      He’d intended to railroad her, unilaterally charting the rest of their regretfully unavoidable union. He’d summoned her here to inform her of his plans, and her role in them: to abide by them.

      But she’d thrown down the gauntlet. And he could no more not pick it up than he could stop breathing.

      It was beyond him not to engage her.

      Shaking off the last of his paralysis, realizing he was about to hand her a measure of control, he twisted his lips, let his gaze run in enraged delight down her new ripeness.

      “I agree. It did take desperate times to make me recant my decree of never laying eyes on you again.”

      Those strong, supple shoulders jerked with an incredulous huff, bringing thick, undulating locks of the gleaming mahogany that had grown to a waist-length waterfall splashing over breasts snug and full in her cream jacket. “Recant your decree? Better watch it. You’re a breath away from having a hyperpretentious crisis and falling into a pompous coma.”

      He wouldn’t. He couldn’t.

      But it was no good resisting. Amusement surged to his lips, tugging them into a painfully grudging smile. But it didn’t stop there, burst forth in a guffaw.

      Ya Ullah, she was yanking at his humor, as well as his hormones. The witch was still the only one who knew what to say and how to say it to appeal to his demanding sense of the absurd.

      The one thing that cooled the heat of his chagrin at his helpless response was its effect on her. Her gaze wavered, her body language losing its confrontational edge. A laugh had been the last thing she’d expected, too. So what had she expected?

      In answer to his unvoiced question, confusion flooded her eyes, her stance, spreading something too akin to mortification in his chest. And he knew what she’d expected. What she’d been trying to initiate. A fight. Dirty and damaging.

      She’d expected him to tear back into her, more vicious than she’d been, to give her carte blanche to go all-out in turn. She’d expected this to spiral into another confrontation echoing the savagery with which he’d severed their liaison. But she’d intended to be an equal opponent this time, had drawn first blood, had intended to leave the battleground bloody yet victorious.

      He should oblige her. Should let her show him what she had. Then he would show her, once and for all, who had the upper hand, that this was no democracy, that he’d settle for nothing less than total and blind obedience and that he would get it. He should let her know she had no say, no choice, could only save herself the indignity of being cowed by giving in first.

      What he should do, and what he wanted to, were poles apart.

      Without volition, he found himself moving toward her, in what thankfully must look like measured, tranquil steps when in reality they were impeded by the upheaval she’d kicked up inside him.

      Her eyes widened as he approached her, and he almost groaned as her every detail came into sharper focus, the incredible mix of her Middle Eastern and Caucasian genes conspiring to form a beauty like no other.

      The heart-shaped oval of her face still boasted that masterpiece bone structure, if it looked far less chiseled now that flesh softened contours that had been more skin over bone in the past. Her nose seemed less sharp, its slightly turned-up end even more overpoweringly elegant. Her lips, which had once spread so easily in eager smiles, looked even fuller, more ripe. But it was her eyes, as always, that struck him most and held his focus. Those mesmerizing eyes of hers, fringed by an abundance of black silk, their shape unique, their color even more so, chocolate fueled by the sun. Brand names had paid fortunes to have those eyes look out at the camera in dozens of high-profile ads. But they were far more hard-hitting now that they’d lost that intense, hungry look they’d been famous for.

      He wouldn’t even look below her neck. His general look from afar had caused enough damage.

      He found himself two steps away from her, looking down the inches between them. In two-inch heels, she stood a glorious six feet high. A rush of pleasure filled him at not having to stoop to look into someone’s eyes, into a woman’s.

      Aih, lie to yourself. You’ve only missed this—her height, her presence, her eyes looking back at you. Her.

      It was better to acknowledge his weakness, to deal with it, rather than fight it and lose more to its dominion. This encounter wasn’t going as he’d intended, so he’d better go with it wherever it intended to go and improvise along the way.

      He cocked his head at her. “Got whatever baggage you have against me off your chest? Or do you need a few more minutes of uninterrupted abuse?”

      She raised her eyebrows, now dark, dense wings when once they’d been plucked to about one third of their true exquisite shape. “Baggage? Try a load of justified antipathy. And statement of fact can’t be categorized as abuse.”

      His lips twitched again. “Watch it. You’re on that slippery slope to pompous coma yourself.”

      Her lips twitched in answer, twisting his guts with the need to crush them beneath his. “I’m not the one who slipped and fell on a throne and had its fumes of grandeur go to his head.”

      His smile widened, fatalism setting in this time. There was no point resisting the inevitable. “I assume the grandeur dig is about sending royal guards to fetch you?”

      “Actually it started a bit earlier than that. With a subjectless e-mail graced with another of those decrees of yours. You’re one of a few living men who can literally be called a royal pain.”

      He huffed a chuckle. His brothers shared that opinion, but even they hadn’t put it so succinctly. “You’re a royal, too—and a pain among other things—even if you choose to disregard the fact. So you still object to the royal treatment?”

      Her gaze ran over him again, sweeping aside another portion of his restraint. “Once upon a time I thought you did, too. But I was a space cadet back then. I would have believed anything. I’ve long since landed on terra firma.”

      He stared at her. Into her eyes. And realized what was so different about them. Their pupils. Those used to expand and constrict almost constantly,