7
“You have received your payment, I trust?” the Sheikh asked her.
Kathryn blinked and nodded. She hadn’t been told of any payment, but of course she figured there would be. It would go to the CIA’s slush fund, she supposed. Though it was strange that he was already talking about payment. He’d only just chosen her. Then it dawned on her: Every woman in that room had already been paid. And something told her they’d all been paid the same before he ever laid eyes on them. Did the other women all know that? They must have. After all, if they each got a fat check or a silver briefcase stacked with crisp currency, they must have figured that everyone had been paid beforehand. So why were so many of the women so nervous around him? Why were some of them close to tears when it was clear he wasn’t going to pick them? They were getting paid anyway, weren’t they? Did they want more? Did they want it all?
Oh God, that’s it. All these women came here thinking—hoping—that this would turn into something more, that this would turn into their fairy-tales, their “Pretty Woman” ending where the whore becomes the princess, the harlot becomes the queen.
Fair enough, Kathryn thought, because that’s why I’m here, isn’t it? Kinda, at least.
That chill came rushing back, and Kathryn tried to gather herself, swallowing hard and looking straight at the Sheikh as he stood before her. He was taller than her by almost a foot, his shoulders so broad she didn’t think she’d be able to get her arms around him if she tried. Those high cheekbones were a vision, his green eyes like searchlights boring through her.
“Your name,” he said dispassionately, like this was an interview.
“Kathryn,” she said. She’d had so many “real” names over the years it didn’t matter. Kathryn Krane was no one. If he’d had her vetted beforehand—which certainly he must have—they’d have learned that Kathryn Krane was a mildly successful real estate agent from Birmingham, Alabama. Never married. No children. A medical school dropout. End of story.
“What do you think is going to happen here over the next ten days, Kathryn?” the Sheikh asked, his voice softening, that coldness melting, a warmth coming in that was somehow disconcerting.
Kathryn swallowed. It had been a while since she’d done anything meaningful with a man. Hell, the closest she’d come to sex in the past year was teasing Yuri Gorka with her breasts. And even he'd said he couldn't cheat on his wife.
“Who cares,” she said without thinking. “I got paid, and that’s why I’m here.”
The Sheikh cocked his head, his eyes narrowing. But it wasn’t anger in those green eyes. It was surprise. Perhaps something else. “Ah, so it was just the money? But surely you must have known that the payment would be the same whether you were chosen or not. Every other woman knew that.” He stepped back and rubbed his chin. “Let us see now. Numbers Two, Four, and Five had no interest in being selected. Once they realized they would be paid regardless, they were content to take the money and run.” He casually flicked his wrist, glancing at his gold-plated watch and then back at Kathryn. “Common whores,” he said quietly. “They might believe otherwise, because they did not do anything with me. But whether they know it or not, they proved themselves to be common whores.”
Kathryn stared at the Sheikh dumbstruck. Immediately she knew he was right. She could picture the faces of the second, fourth, and fifth women. Shit, he was right. Kathryn could read people, and although she wasn’t looking for it when she’d scanned the other women, she’d seen it too. Those women weren’t interested in being chosen. Once they realized they were getting paid anyway, they were outta there. Just like he said. So in a way they were all about the cash. Common whores, just like he’d said.
“And the others?” she asked, blinking and doing her best to keep her gaze steady. A part of her wanted to see if her eye-movement trick would work and bring him under a mild hypnosis, but she held back. She might need that trick later. Hell, she might need all her tricks later.
The Sheikh smiled. Perfectly aligned teeth, white and gleaming like polished ivory. He shook his head and rubbed his heavy jawline again. “No, Miss Kathryn. You tell me about the others. Start with the first.” He paused, his eyes narrowing, that smile disappearing. “And end with you.”
What the hell was this? Did he suspect something? Or was this another one of his riddles? Who the hell was this guy? Should she back off before she got too far into it to get out? Should she say no thank you, Your Highness. I’ll take my cash and head back to Alabama, thank you very much?
And that would prove I’m a common whore, wouldn’t it? So he’s trapped me already. If I leave now, I’m a common whore. So what am I if I stay?
“The others,” Kathryn said, her eyelids fluttering as she ran through the images of the other women. The sharp, analytical part of her kicked in, the part of her that had made her a top student in her psychology program, a top recruit in her CIA class, a top agent in her work. “Well,” she said, authority in her voice as she touched her hair and started to pace. “Numbers One and Seven wanted validation, more than anything. Numbers Three, Six, and Eight . . . well, they wanted more.” She stopped and glanced at him. “They wanted you.”
“Incorrect,” the Sheikh said sharply. “They did not know me, so they could not have wanted me. Try again.”
Kathryn swallowed and blinked as a tingle ran up and down her spine. She felt like a schoolgirl suddenly, innocent and wide-eyed. The sensation took her by surprise, and she felt her buttocks tighten beneath those loose black harem pants. He’s drawing me in, she realized as she felt the color rush to her round cheeks. Into his game. Into his riddle. Into . . . him.
“They wanted . . .” Kathryn began to say, her voice trailing off as she cocked her head slightly and looked up at him. “They wanted what they thought you were. What they thought you represent.”
“That’s better,” said the Sheikh. “And what do I represent?”
Kathryn shrugged, a subtle confidence rising up in her. She folded her arms beneath her breasts, pushing up her heavy globes, showing a healthy crack of cleavage without really meaning to. She caught him glancing down and then quickly looking back up, and she almost smiled. This wasn’t a man who’d normally be shy about looking at a woman’s breasts, but something had made him flinch. If this was a game, score one point for her.
“What do I represent, Kathryn?” he asked again. “Not to you. To those other women.” He grinned, raising his chin and glancing down. “We will get to the question of you later.”
Kathryn took a breath. “Well, you represent . . . wealth. Power. Mystery.” She took another breath as a shudder went through her. “Fantasy,” she said. “Excitement.” Another long pause. “Danger,” came the last word.
The Sheikh’s green eyes were riveted on her, and Kathryn could have sworn they were shining like emeralds in the yellow light. For a moment she had no idea where she was, and she blinked and wondered what the hell was happening. Was he hypnotizing her instead?
“Why danger?” he said, beginning to slowly circle her like a beast circles its prey. With every breath she could smell his dark musk. His broad frame cast a shadow on her as he silently brushed against her, his circles drawing smaller until he stopped behind her. Right behind her. So close. So damned close. “I represent danger to you?” he whispered.
“Not to me,” Kathryn snapped, the words coming out quick as she tried her best not to turn. She knew if she turned to face him now, he’d see right through her. Her guard was down. Her defenses shaky. He was getting to her, and she had no goddamn idea why! “We’re not talking about me, remember? The others. I mean—”
“You know better than that, Ms. Kathryn Krane,” the Sheikh whispered, and she could feel his hot breath against her bare neck. Goosepimples broke out across her shoulders and arms, and she shivered but not because she was cold. She wasn’t cold. She was hot as hell. “You left medical school before taking your degree, but you studied enough psychology to know that we are always projecting our own feelings onto others, imagining that others see what we see, feel what we feel, want what we want.”
Kathryn gasped when she felt the slightest of movements against the thin, loose cloth of her red harem pants, right at the apex of her buttocks. He was hard, she suddenly realized. He’d gone hard and erect fast, right behind her. She could feel it in the subtle way his breathing changed. She could sense it in the way his body stiffened behind her. He hadn’t touched her yet, and a burning anticipation suddenly ripped through Kathryn as she felt movement beneath her own clothes as her nipples stiffened, her back arched, her sex tingled as those dark hidden lips opened to release their secret wetness into her panties.
She wanted to speak but she couldn’t. She wondered if she should turn and try to bring him under hypnosis, but she didn’t trust herself to pull it off. Successfully hypnotizing someone depended as much on the hypnotist’s state of mind as anything else, and Kathryn’s mind was a hot mess right now. Her mind, and her body.
“You’ve done your research on me,” she said, blinking and fighting the urge to back up against his hard body, rub her soft buttocks against his peaked crotch. Keep talking, she told herself, ignoring the sudden panic that whipped through her, mixing with the arousal to bring her to a heat that made her head spin.
“A little,” he grunted moving closer but still not touching her. “The most important research is yet to be done.”
Kathryn snorted. “Now that’s a one-liner worthy of a king. You come up with that yourself, Your Highness?”
Kathryn felt his breath catch behind her, and suddenly he grabbed her by the waist and spun her around, his other hand sliding into her thick hair, fingers gripping her brown tresses by the roots and holding her firm. “You know,” he growled, his green eyes sparkling with mischief. “In my kingdom I expect everyone to laugh at my jokes or else I have them flogged in the streets.”
Kathryn held the gaze even though electricity was shooting through her body at the way she’d been spun and how she was being held by her hair, firmly under his physical control. “Then your kingdom must see a lot of floggings, Great King,” she said. “Because your jokes are terrible.”
The Sheikh stared at her, his grip on her hair tightening to where she could feel the pressure on her roots and scalp. But she stayed locked into his eyes, and she held the gaze until finally he couldn’t control himself and the smile broke on his handsome face, those perfect teeth showing themselves like shining ivory against his dark lips. Then the Sheikh laughed, a booming, hearty laugh that seemed to shake the sandstone floor. “By Allah, yes,” he said, grinning wide and shaking his head. “It is basically a flogging festival every weekend in the kingdom of Sehaar. Prayers every Friday. Camel hunting every Saturday. And then on Sunday we do forty lashes each for the humorless bastards who don’t get my jokes.”
Kathryn scrunched up her face. “Camel hunting? Now is that where you hunt camels? That’s a little odd. I thought you desert folk rode camels.”
“We do,” said the Sheikh, holding a deadpan look. “But the camels of Sehaar are shifty buggers. Always hiding behind sand dunes. It takes all day Saturday to hunt them down and saddle them up so we can ride them during the week.”
“Huh. So it’s more like camel hide-and-seek,” said Kathryn, her smile matching his grin as she stepped away from his grasp and folded her arms beneath her breasts again, standing back on her heels and looking up at him. “I guess camels do sort of blend into the sandy landscape. What with camels and sand both being yellow.”
“Actually, the camels in the fantasy-land of Sehaar are bright pink,” the Sheikh said with a straight face. “The problem is, the sands of our desert are bright pink as well.”
Kathryn laughed. “Sounds like the fantasy of my ten-year-old niece.”
Hyder folded his arms across his broad chest, and Kathryn blinked when she saw how thick his forearms were as the half-sleeves of his white linen shirt moved up to reveal biceps bigger than her goddamn thighs. And her thighs were most certainly not petite.
“What’s that tattoo say?” she asked, touching his bare arm with her finger, right where a faded swirl of black stood out. The touch made her heart pound, and she swore she felt Hyder stiffen at the contact.
“It is a birthmark,” he said, glancing down at her hand, his gaze following her smooth bare arm all the way up to her shoulders, his eyes sweeping across her creamy skin, taking in everything from her naked shoulders to the curve of her breasts beneath that black tank top. “Show me yours.”
“Show me my what?” Kathryn said, blinking and suddenly feeling self-conscious at the way he was looking at her. He wasn’t just checking her out. There was something else. Something more.
“Your birthmark,” he said, reaching out and running his fingers along her bare arm, sending up a line of goosepimples once again. Carefully he ran his fingers beneath the strap of her top, tugging gently.
“What?” Kathryn said, gasping as she pulled away, instinctively covering her chest. Not that he could see the birthmark. That little raised dark red swirl on the underside of her left breast. Nobody had seen that birthmark in years. Nobody who was still alive, anyway. Other than Mel, of course. “How? I mean, how can you know?”
“Why so surprised?” The Sheikh said, his voice low, his gaze steady. “You read my file, did you not? It is only fair that I read yours.”