Jennifer Lewis - The Desert Prince / The Playboy's Proposition - The Desert Prince / The Playboy's Proposition

Every now and then she thought she saw a shadow of it, but maybe she was just imagining things.

Something had died in her, too, the day he’d told her their relationship was over—because he’d married another woman. Just like that, over Christmas break, while she was sitting at home penning dreamy letters and looking forward to seeing him again.

“How come you never married again?” The question formed in her mind and emerged from her mouth at the same time.

She regretted it instantly, and waited for his brow to lower. But it didn’t.

He picked up his glass and held it, clear liquid sparkling in the candlelight for a moment. “I never met anyone …”

“As wonderful as me?” She spoke it on a laugh, sure he’d respond with a jab.

But now he frowned. Stared at her with those impenetrable onyx eyes. “We did have something, you and I.”

Her belly contracted. “I thought so, at the time.” Her voice had gone strangely quiet, like the life force had been sucked out of her.

“The marriage wasn’t my idea, you know.” He put down his glass and wove his fingers together. “My father sprang the whole thing on me without warning.”

“You could have said no.”

He shook his head. “I couldn’t.” That odd look in his eyes again. A flash of … something. “Not then, anyway. I was still the eldest son, the dutiful one, my father’s heir.”

“So you had to do what he said, regardless of what you wanted.” She frowned as a strange thought occurred to her. “Perhaps your marriage was doomed from the start because of the abrupt way you were forced into it.”

“You mean, because I hadn’t gotten over you?” Again, a gleam in those normally lightless depths.

What was she thinking? She’d never seen anyone so totally over her as the man who’d told her there would be no further contact between them— ever.

She waved her hand, dismissive. “Oh, I’m just rambling. As you said, you always knew your father would pick your bride, so it wasn’t a surprise to you.”

“You’re right, though.” His voice had an edge to it, almost as if his own thoughts took him by surprise. “I wasn’t over you. I had to end our … relationship …” The word seemed to stick in his throat. “The way one snaps the shoot off a growing plant. Maybe it stunted the way I grew after that. I couldn’t be the husband my wife needed.”

He leaned forward, frowning as he stared into her eyes with breath-stealing intensity. “Because I couldn’t forget you.”

Celia almost fell off her chair. Except she couldn’t move at all, because the blood drained from her body, leaving her brain empty, sputtering.

“I’ve shocked you.” Salim sat back in his chair. “With the wisdom of hindsight I can now admit I couldn’t love my wife. Maybe we could have grown into it slowly, as many people do, but she couldn’t stand that I wasn’t. romantic.”

He inhaled deeply, chest rising beneath his shirt. “How could I be, when my heart still belonged to someone else?”

Two steaming plates of grilled yellowfin tuna materialized in front of them. Celia blinked at hers.

“Come on, eat. The past is the past and there’s nothing we can do about it.” Salim picked up a fork and speared his fish.

Celia managed to pick up her knife and fork and slice a piece of the tender flesh. She struggled for a way to turn his stunning revelation back into a normal conversation. “Does that happen a lot here, where arranged marriages are common? You know, people having romantic relationships with someone they can’t marry, then having to go marry someone else?”

“Sure.” Salim nodded and chewed. “All the time. But it’s usually restricted to a quiet flirtation at a coffee shop, or in the poetry section of a bookstore, not the full-on, sleeping together kind of arrangement we had. That’s simply not possible here.”

“Do you think that’s better?” She kept her eyes carefully on her plate.

“It certainly would have been in my case. I might have been a happily married father of four by now.”

“You could still marry again.” She spoke casually, as if to reassure him that she didn’t care one way or the other.

“I intend to.”

Celia’s eyes widened. Salim simply took a bite of fish.

Why had he invited her to dinner and brought up the past? Her breathing was shallow. What did he want from her?

“The thing is—” he lifted his glass “—I’m honor-bound to continue the family name. I don’t have a choice but to marry again.”

“You’d marry just to have a child?” Celia worked hard to keep her voice even.

He nodded, his dark gaze unwavering.

You already have a child.

If there was a perfect moment to tell him, this was it. She glanced around. Several tables were within easy earshot, and Salim’s staff hovered all around.

No way could she drop a bomb like that here. She had no idea how he’d react.

“You think me old-fashioned.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “But the failure of my marriage is my one big regret. I spend my days building a hotel empire, but if I died tomorrow, there’d be no one to hand it to.”

“Hardly a big worry.” She concentrated on her food, afraid to show him the panic in her eyes. “I’m sure you have a long life ahead of you. You’ll have the heir you hope for.”

She frowned. Would he consider a girl—illegitimate and American born—to be his heir? Probably not.

“Your confidence in me is inspiring. But then it always was.” His soft gaze made her belly shiver. “Shame I didn’t live up to it.”

The confession—his admittance of guilt—touched her deeply. She had a sudden, typically feminine urge to smooth any ruffled feathers and reassure him. “What nonsense. You’re one of the most successful men on the planet.”

“You did say I’d succeed in business. I wasn’t at all sure. I didn’t speak English nearly as well as my brothers since I was educated at home while they went to school abroad. I wasn’t comfortable around strangers.” He rested his elbows on the table and studied her face. “But I grew very comfortable with you.”

His voice lowered with what might be mistaken for a hint of suggestion.

She racked her brain for something to diffuse the tension thickening in the air. “I’ll take some of the credit for improving your English. We used to stay up half the night talking.”

“We had a lot to talk about.” A hint of suggestion flickered across his striking features.

“True. I’d never met someone who read the entire New York Times from cover to cover every day. That’s a lot of material.”

“And you showed me that there’s more to life than what you can read in the papers.” A smile lit his eyes. “Do you remember the time you took me to the circus?”

She laughed. “How could I forget? You said the camels reminded you of home.”

Salim’s eyes narrowed. “They did. And when I was with you I forgot my home. I didn’t think about where I came from. I was busy discovering new worlds and exploring them with you.”

Celia blushed. “We were both virgins. Funny, isn’t it?”

“Not really. I don’t suppose that was as outrageous as we were led to believe. It did mean the first time was special for both of us.”

His soft voice and tender words pulled at old chords of emotion. “Very special. And funny, too, considering that we’d approached it like explorers, armed with an illustrated Kama Sutra and a list of suitable positions.”

Salim chuckled. “We did have a tendency to over intellectualize everything.”

“We thought we were so darn smart, and that we could understand everything if we just thought about it and talked about it long enough.”