“Everything. I screwed up your meeting.”
He smiled. “Livened it up, you mean.”
“And I’ve put you at odds with Ahmet.”
“I’ve always been at odds with Ahmet.”
“Yes, but now…Is he angry? Because you and I are…because he thinks you and I are…”
“On the contrary.” His smile tilted. “He’s gained respect for me. I’ve got the girl he wanted.”
That put an answering smile on her face.
“Better?” he said softly.
She nodded.
“No more tears, then.” He plucked a silk scarf from the back of a chair and gently blotted her eyes. “A woman shouldn’t weep on her wedding night.”
“Actually…” She gave a little laugh. “Actually that’s the reason I was crying.”
“I understand. When you agreed to come to Suliyam with me, you never imagined you’d end up being forced into marriage with a stranger.”
“You’re not a stranger,” Megan said quickly. “In some ways, I feel as if I’ve known you all my life.” She took a breath. “I was crying because I was thinking back a few weeks. One of my brothers just got married and the ceremony was, you know, filled with emotion.”
“Ah. I understand. Our ceremony had to be an alien—”
She silenced him by putting her fingers lightly across his mouth. “You don’t understand.” Her voice softened. “It was a wonderful ceremony.”
Caz’s eyebrows rose. “Yeah?”
She smiled. A minute ago, he’d sounded like the exalted sheikh of Suliyam. Now, he sounded like a guy she might have met in the States.
“Yeah,” she said gently. “The words that sounded so solemn, the bells, the dancers, and then, at the end, all those people sending up that wild cry…”
“They were happy for us.”
“I know.” Her smile dimmed. “And that’s why I was crying, you know? I thought of how happy everyone was at my brother’s wedding, and how happy they were at our—at the wedding today, and I felt, I don’t know, guilty, maybe, because what happened wasn’t real and…”
“You’re a good and generous woman, Megan O’Connell.”
“I’m a woman who’s complicated your life.”
Caz tilted her face up to his. “You’ve enriched it,” he said softly. “And you honored me enormously by becoming my bride.”
“I am, aren’t I?” Megan whispered. She could feel her blood humming. “Your bride, Caz. Your bride for this night.”
They stared at each other. The sounds of the night, the sigh of the wind…everything faded away. There was nothing on the earth but this room. This moment.
“Caz?” Her voice flowed over him like liquid silver. “Do you want me?”
“Want you?” He made a sound that was half groan, half laugh. “Kalila, you’re all I think about. You fill my mind, my soul, my heart.”
“Then take me, Caz. Make me your wife tonight.”
He looked down into her face and thought of a dozen reasons to kiss her and put her from him, to walk out of here and into the chill mountain night. He was a king. A man of honor.
But he’d never wanted a woman as he wanted her. And on this one night, he would be a man, not a king.