Find Aziza a companion? The situation seemed hopeless. He needed a woman who was both young, for Aziza’s sake, and old, for his. He needed someone he could trust, someone who wouldn’t jump into Sharif’s bed, someone who would be professional enough to put Aziza’s needs before everything else. Someone who...
Sharif’s spine snapped back as his eyes went wide. He picked up his phone again. He read through business emails, made a few additional calls. Without hurry, he dressed in his traditional Makhtari garb and, leaving others to pack his suitcases, he went down to the breakfast room, bodyguards falling into line behind him.
He walked straight through the pale yellow room, ignoring all the women who tried to catch his eye. He offered an absentminded “good morning” to the host and hostess, then saw the person he’d been looking for. Pushing past all the rest, he went straight to Irene, who was sitting at the table with a plate loaded with pastries and scrambled eggs as she poured a great deal of cream into her coffee. He stopped right in front of her.
“I want you to come work for me,” he said. “At my palace in Makhtar.”
* * *
Irene’s eyes still felt scratchy from a night of crying. She’d prayed she’d never have to face Sharif again. Foolish hope.
It had taken her hours to fall asleep, hours of running worried circles in her mind about the choice she’d make today. Would she take her first-class flight back to Paris, where she had only a few days left of paid rent, and then the open-ended economy ticket back to Colorado, to the rickety house on the wrong side of the tracks? Would she go back in penniless humiliation to the place where Carter had told her she’d never be remotely good enough for a man like him?
Or would she ask Emma to find her a job in one of her husband’s luxury hotels around the world—using a friendship for her own financial gain?
In her darkest hour, Irene had bitterly regretted her pride, which had made her spurn Sharif’s lavish gift of the diamond necklace. If she’d kept it, she and her family could have been wealthy—set for life!
But at what cost?
No. She’d done the right thing. He’d made her want him. Dazzled her with romance. But she’d resisted the temptation, and she’d never see him again. So the damage wouldn’t be permanent, either to her heart, or to her soul.
So how could she abandon her principles now, and ask Emma to arrange a job for her?
But how could she not?
Anxious and unsure, feeling exhausted and alone with her heart still aching over the coldhearted way Sharif had tried to seduce her, the way he’d kissed her, Irene had finally gotten out of bed. She’d taken a shower and dressed. No fancy designer clothes this time, but her own plain cotton T-shirt and hoodie and jeans fit for traveling. Going down to the breakfast room, she’d filled her plate with a mountain of food. She’d numbly sat down alone at the table.
Then she’d felt a shiver of awareness behind her. Without turning, she knew who’d just come into the breakfast room. A dark shadow came across the table in front of her.
“I want you to come work for me. At my palace in Makhtar.”
It was the same husky voice that had haunted her dreams. Irene looked up from her plate of food. A shiver went through her body as she met Sharif’s dark eyes, a hard aching tingle across her lips, which he’d bruised every bit as thoroughly as her heart.
He was once again dressed in his full sheikh regalia, with his bodyguards hovering behind him, the full presence of the Emir of Makhtar. And he’d never looked so handsome. The ultimate male figure of every woman’s romantic fantasy. Or at least hers.
Wrong, she told herself fiercely. Her ultimate fantasy was a smart, funny, loyal man who would mow the lawn of their little cottage, read books to their children and love her forever. A man who would notice if a little neighbor child walked past the house, crying after her first day of school. A man who would roll up the sleeves of his old shirt, pull down his cap and go up to the school to make sure it never happened again. Her mother hadn’t done it. She’d never known her father, either. Irene had been an accident, a mistake. Her mother had told her that all her life. Stupid condom didn’t work. Don’t know which one.
But after the first day of kindergarten, Dorothy Abbott had been the mother who’d comforted her, Bill Abbott the father who’d protected her. That was the house Irene wanted to live in. The parents she would someday give her own children.
There would be no accidents. Because until she met the right man, there would be no sex. No matter how she might be tempted.
“Work for you?” Irene repeated. She hated the weak sound of her voice and tossed her head, intending to give a sharper retort along the lines of Immature as you are, your worshipfulness, I don’t think you exactly need a nanny, then she remembered all the eyes upon them. That type of banter was private, between her and Sharif, not between Irene Taylor, the American nanny, and the Emir of Makhtar. The banter was in the past, anyway. It was when Sharif had wanted to seduce her, and when she’d nearly given him the chance.