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pale pink dress. Her long legs had been displayed to perfection, enhanced by the nude-colored high heels she’d worn. He’d imagined those legs wrapped around him as he thrust into her body.
    It had taken every ounce of control he’d possessed not to press her. Because he’d known that she still wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her.
    Her body wanted him, but her heart did not. And that was what had stopped him, both then and today.
    He squeezed the pen he held until it cracked, its jagged edge slicing into his finger. A drop of blood welled on the tip. He grabbed a tissue from the box sitting on his desk and swiped the blood away.
    Sydney Reed—Sydney Al Dhakir, he corrected—was so beautiful, so very luscious, so bad for his control. From the first minute he’d seen her, he’d wanted her. She’d been aloof … but only at first. When he’d finally gotten her into his arms, she’d burned so hot he’d known that once with her wasn’t enough.
    She probably wasn’t the most beautiful woman he’d ever known, but he couldn’t actually remember another being more compelling to him. Her skin was as pale as milk, her hair the color of the red dunes of the Jahfaran desert. Her eyes were like a rain-gray sky, the kind of sky one often found hanging over Paris in winter.
    While others might find rain depressing, he found it unbearably lovely.
    Especially when it was reflected in her eyes.
    Malik swore softly. He’d known, when he’d impulsively married her, that it could not last. Because he’d married her for all the wrong reasons, not least the utter dismay it would cause his family. That, and he’d wanted her with a fierceness that had shocked him.
    The phone clanged into the stillness, making him jump. Though he could let his secretary get it, he preferred the distraction to his chaotic thoughts.
    “Yes?” he barked into the receiver.
    “I hear that your wife arrived today,” his brother Adan said.
    “That’s correct,” Malik replied somewhat stiffly. “She is here.”
    He’d kept her away from Jahfar for a reason. Now that she was here, he had no choice but to share her with his family. Though he’d thought there might be a bit more time before that happened. Malik frowned. His brothers would be polite, but his mother certainly would not.
    “And do you plan on bringing her to the palace?”
    Malik ground his teeth. He hadn’t told Adan why Sydney was here. He hadn’t told anyone. “Perhaps in a few days. Or not. I have business in Al Na’ir.”
    “Surely you can spare an evening. I wish to meet her, Malik.”
    “Is that a command?”
    There was no pause whatsoever. “It is.”
    How very easily Adan had slipped into power. He hadn’t been the heir to the throne, just as Malik had not been a part of the ruling family, until their cousin had died in a boating accident and Adan suddenly found himself the heir to their uncle. When their uncle died a year later, Adan had ascended the throne as king.
    He’d been a good king. A just king.
    “Then I will bring her. Though not today. She is tired from the journey.”
    “Of course,” Adan replied. “We will see you for dinner tomorrow night. Isabella looks forward to it.”
    “Tomorrow night then.”
    Their goodbyes were stiff, formal, but Malik had expected nothing different. They’d had such a barren childhood, with nannies and a kind of rigid formality that was not conducive to warmth between them. Oh, Malik loved his brothers—and his sister—but theirs was not an easy relationship.
    He wasn’t quite sure why. There’d been no huge trauma, no major falling out. Just a quiet distance that seemed impossible to breech. The more time moved on, the wider the chasm.
    Perhaps that was why he’d been so drawn to Sydney. She’d made him feel less alone, and he’d been addicted to that feeling. But that was before she’d betrayed him, before she’d proven she was no different than anyone else in his life.
    Malik checked his watch. It