Read Sheikh's Ex-Girlfriend (Khayyam Sheikh Series #1) for Free Online Page B

she had slapped him. “Ella, my god, how could you believe that? When we broke up …”
    “We didn't break up,” she said miserably. “We … we just sort of ended. That night with your family, do you know that I don't really remember the fight at the table? No, what I remember is what I felt right before. I remember feeling as if I were becoming a part of your world, as if you were letting me see a part of you that most didn't. It felt like I was becoming your family, and when I realized that was all a sham …”
    “It wasn't, Ella—” he said urgently, but she cut him off with a sharp gesture. If she didn't get all of this out, a part of her might still think it was a good idea to be with him, to take him at his word and to do what every part of her seemed to scream at her to do.
    “It was,” she said, making sure that her voice was low and steady. “It was. I left, and we exchanged a few more words, and after that, nothing. We didn't break up. We didn't even really end. What was left was ashes and wreckage, and after that, I had to sort everything out. It hurt, Nasim, more than anything.”
    “Then let me make it up to you.”
    His calm words struck her to the heart. The man she had known before might have given her an impassioned plea, or he might have been coldly rejecting. This was different. This was a Nasim who knew that he had done wrong, and now he was trying to make amends.
    “What do you mean?”
    “I am a different man now, Ella. I look back on the days before I was sheikh with a kind of distaste. I was very young, but I did many things that I would not do now. I never wanted my brothers to die, but they did, and the result was that I truly had to become a different man. When I look back on the days that came before, all I want to bring forward is the love that I had for you.”
    “Not my love for you?”
    He smiled a little wryly. “When a man has given such great offense, he can never ask for such a fine gift again. However, he might say that he would humbly welcome that gift if it should ever come again, and if it does, he will never again treat it so poorly.
    “No, the only thing that I take pride in from those days is the love I had for you. It was love given to a woman who was everything, who was strong, and bright, and fierce. Loving you made me a better man, and it is something that I have regretted losing every day.”
    “Every day?” Ella couldn't keep a touch of sharpness out of her tone. “It has been five years. It occurs to me that if you regretted it every day, that perhaps I might have heard about it.”
     Nasim's hand squeezed hers, a strangely poignant gesture.
    “I was ashamed,” he said, his tone oddly naked. “I thought that I had driven you from this region that you loved so well. I thought my world would bring you nothing but pain. Imagine my surprise when you appeared again.”
     Ella knew that she should let go of Nasim's hand, step back, leave, but she found that she couldn't.
    “You couldn't destroy my love for this region,” she said softly. “I have always loved the literature of Khayyam, the UAE, this entire place. I want nothing more than to bring it to the rest of the world, and that means being in Dalal for the time being.”
     Nasim's smile was brilliant. “That is what I have always adored about you. When you love, you love with all your heart.”
    “Nasim, …”
    “Hear me out. Come with me, stay on my arm, let me keep foul suitors away. Let me put my world at your disposal, and let me show you the Dalal that only I know. I want you with me, but I know that at the moment, you see nothing that you want.”
    That's far from right, Ella thought, but she let it go. There was no need for him to know that she wanted him, his arms, his mouth, his body rising over hers again …
    “I have brought you pain, but perhaps I can soothe it. I do not expect you to come back to my arms, but I know that you are an intelligent woman. You want to know every inch