The Royal Collection. Rebecca Winters

Tarek’s veins had soaked into the earth here. Had bound him, not to his brother, but to his nation. To his people.

      He would not stray from that now.

      “I do not like this place,” he said.

      A servant bustled into the room. “Is there anything I can get you, Sheikh Tarek?”

      “Coffee. And bread.”

      The woman looked at him as though she feared for his sanity, but said nothing as she nodded and then left again. Only he and Olivia remained. He didn’t sit; rather, he began to pace the length of the room. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. “You know I didn’t sleep,” he said, turning to face her. “Tell me.”

      Her blue eyes widened, pale brows arching upward. “How do you know that?”

      The edges of his mouth curved upward. He might have no experience of women, but he could read this one. “You become very still, very smooth when you are holding back an avalanche. There is much beneath the surface, I think. A very diplomatic woman, but occasionally you slip. You have a very sharp tongue. When you’re holding it in check this well I assume it’s because there is much to withhold.”

      The color in her face deepened, and a sense of pleasure curled itself around his stomach. Unfamiliar.

      Satisfaction, he supposed.

      And why not? So often he felt out of his element in this place. It was immensely rewarding to have the sense that he had claimed a victory.

      To go from being the master of his domain, a man who conquered the desert, who thrived in it, to a man who could scarcely sleep. A man who was caged... It was jarring indeed. There was nothing he despised more than a sense of helplessness. And that sense of helplessness had pervaded his being from the moment he had stepped back within the palace walls. That considered, he celebrated this small victory slightly more than was necessary.

      “You sleepwalk,” she said, her words straightforward. Succinct. “Naked. With weapons.”

      Something about that word on her lips sent a burst of heat through his veins. He wasn’t sure why. And yet again he was back in unfamiliar territory. Not just because of what she’d said, and how it made him feel, but because he was...doing things he didn’t remember.

      Out of his own control.

      That settled far beyond disturbing.

      “I was not aware,” he said, keeping his tone flat.

      “It would account for why you don’t feel rested in the morning,” she said. “Why don’t you sit?”

      “I’m not in the frame of mind to sit. I have business to attend to.”

      “It won’t hurt you to eat breakfast,” she said, a small smile playing at the edges of her mouth.

      “What is so funny?”

      “We already sound like a married couple.” She put her hands flat on the tabletop, looking down at them. “My husband never took time for breakfast. He would eat something terribly unhealthy while he drank a coffee on his way into the office.”

      She looked sad, and he did not know what to do with that. “He sounds as though he was suited to this kind of life.”

      “He loved his country. Though he was often in a hurry in the morning because he had stayed up too late at a party the night before. And he was rushing to catch up from the moment his feet hit the ground to the moment he lay back down. He was very young, with a lot of weight on his shoulders.”

      “I am not so young, yet I find it quite the weight.”

      “How old are you?”

      “Thirty. I believe.”

      Little lines of concern wrinkled her brow. “You aren’t sure?”

      “I lose track. It isn’t as though anyone has ever baked me a birthday cake.”

      She frowned, the expression creating deep grooves by her mouth. She seemed, in his estimation, unduly distressed by his lack of baked goods. “No one?”

      “Perhaps,” he said, battling against a memory that was pushing against his brain. “But I would have been much younger.”

      It would have been when his parents were alive. And he never could remember back that far. Sometimes...sometimes he saw his father’s face... So serious. So earnest. And he was speaking. But the words were muddled. He could never hear them properly.

      He never tried.

      Mostly because accessing those memories required him to wade through the ones that immediately preceded them. The years spent in the palace before he had been sent to the desert.

      The years that had turned him to stone.

      “I always had a birthday cake. Though I didn’t always have anyone there to share it with me. When I was older I would go on trips with friends. Cruises and things. I made sure I didn’t lack for company when I got older.”

      “Why didn’t you always have people to share with when you were young?” He found he was interested.

      “My parents were busy,” she said, looking away. “I’m twenty-six. If you were curious.”

      “I wasn’t.” It was the truth. He was curious about her, but age meant little to him.

      “I suppose since you aren’t exceptionally curious about your own age, I can’t be surprised.”

      “Is age something people care about?”

      Her forehead wrinkled. “How long have you been out in the desert?”

      “Since I was fifteen, I would say. Not solely in the desert. Primarily. I returned to the palace periodically to speak to my brother. But I rarely stayed overnight.” He did not like this place. He had not liked to be in close quarters with Malik.

      He had the dark thought that he liked the entire world much better now he didn’t have to share it with his brother’s soul.

      “I’m amazed you can carry on a conversation as well as you do.”

      “I spent a lot of time with various Bedouin tribes. Off and on. Mostly I’ve lived alone. I don’t dislike it.”

      She tilted her head to the side. “Did you dream when you were alone?”

      Tarek frowned. “I don’t think so.”

      “Did you dream last night?”

      He tried to remember, but everything was fuzzy again. “It wasn’t a dream. Something else. Something woke me. Pain.” Memory. Not dreams. But he didn’t want to tell her that.

      Just then a servant appeared with a cup and an insulated pitcher, along with an assortment of rolls in a basket.

      Olivia arched a brow. “Have a seat.”

      It hit him then, one of the things that seemed so strange about her. “You are not afraid of me.” He took a seat where his food had been placed and set about pouring a cup of coffee.

      “Last night I felt afraid,” she said. “But you had a sword.”

      A sharp, hot pain lanced his chest. “I did not hurt you or threaten you, did I?”

      “Would you feel bad if you had?”

      He turned her question over slowly. “I have always taken the protection of women and children seriously. I would not like to hurt you. Or cause you fear.”

      “You speak like a man,” she said, “but I wonder if you feel things like a man.”

      “Why?”

      “You’re very deliberate in your responses. Most people would know right away how something made them feel.”

      “I have not spent much time examining my internal workings.”