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work.
    â€œGood,” he whispered, lowering his head and kissing her.
    She slid her hands to his chest, reveled in the feeling of his muscles beneath her palms. He was everything she’d ever fantasized about. He was…Taj. And even though so much of what she wanted from him was going unmet, she knew that for now, for this moment, she would give everything.
    One moment to lay herself bare, in a physical sense, to hold nothing back, before she retreated behind her emotional protection. She couldn’t love him for their whole marriage, not without his love. It would destroy her.
    But she would do it right now. Unreservedly.
    While his guard was down. While he was unprotected, too.
    He pulled off her robe, then her flimsy top. The cold air hit her bare breasts and she gasped. Taj laughed and bent his head, drawing a tightened nipple into his mouth. She clutched his shoulders, his name on her lips, her body on fire with need for him. All of him.
    She pushed her pants down her thighs and kicked them off while Taj worked to free himself of his own clothes. When his skin pressed against hers, she sighed in relief. How did he feel so essential? How did being with him make her feel like something that had been missing all her life was present in a profound way?
    He lowered his head and kissed her neck as he settled between her thighs, sliding into her slowly. A short sigh of pleasure escaped her lips and he caught it with his, the kiss deep and sensual, working with his thrusts.
    She kept her eyes open, locked with his as she rocked against him, driving them both higher until they reached the peak together. He held her against him, his heart thundering, his skin slicked with sweat.
    She felt empowered by it. By the fact that she’d affected him. By the fact that she wasn’t in it alone. She’d wondered if it had all been in her head. For so long she’d wondered that. If she’d been the only one who’d felt anything. If he’d had to close his eyes and think of Rahat when he kissed her back in Texas.
    But she knew now, knew it with even greater certainty than she had that night in Santina. She knew that while he might not love her, he desired her. That it was the kind of desire that went beyond simple lust and set out to drive a person crazy.
    She knew, because she felt it, too. Because she recognized that what she felt lived in him, too.
    She could hold on to that. She could forget about the love thing and pretend that lust was all that mattered. She closed her eyes tight and tried to cling to the lie.

Chapter Eight
    â€œThe wedding will take place in two weeks.” Taj walked into Angelina’s quarters and a hard slug of arousal hit him in the gut.
    They’d stayed out in the garden until the sky had started turning pink at the horizon line, bleeding up into the inky blackness, washing it clean. He’d held her until he was certain they would be missed, and possibly discovered, naked on the divan, covered only in her robe.
    Then he’d sent her back to her room, and he’d gone back to his. And his body had burned. He’d ended up in an ice cold shower, gritting his teeth as the water hit his skin like a thousand needles and his erection ached, finding absolutely no relief.
    He’d ended up shivering and horny.
    What was it about her? How was it she’d managed to burrow her way under his skin all those years ago? It was as though she lived in him. A strange thought. A foolish thought, and yet it seemed the only explanation for what he felt when he was around her.
    Angelina looked at him, her lush lips shaped into a perfect O. “What? Why so soon?”
    He looked pointedly at her stomach.
    â€œOh,” she said. “Well, I won’t start showing for a while. I mean, I knew you wanted to marry quickly but…two weeks? In the States I would have a hard time getting a wedding cake on two weeks’ notice!”
    â€œYou underestimate the power of