She met his gaze, her heart in her throat. “Will you give it to me if I wanted it?”
He lifted her up and carried her out of the stables. “No. I have cast off what little honor I possessed, Zohra. Now you are bound to me forever, damned to this life right along with me.”
Lacing her hands around his nape, Zohra hid her face in his chest, an intense sadness weighing her down. Just as he had said, she had entered this relationship knowing what she was getting herself into. And yet suddenly, she realized with a sinking feeling, that it was not going to be enough.
Her heart wanted everything.
CHAPTER TWELVE
AYAAN WALKED INTO the suite assigned to him in the Siyaadi palace and stared at Zohra’s sleeping form in his bed. Familiar desire and something else—a fierce longing—wound through him at the sight of her.
He should have known he would find her here waiting for him, refusing to let him avoid her, refusing to let him hide.
But then, he still couldn’t get used to the fact that she shared her body, her mind, her life with him willingly.
Restlessness that was becoming second skin scoured through him. He paced the perimeter of the bed, his gaze constantly straying toward her.
He had been fighting the cloud of awareness that had been coming at him for the week he had spent here in Siyaad. But this time, he was not enough to stop it, he could not hide from what he became, what he was changing into because of Zohra.
Because of the woman who deserved the best any man could give.
He had understood, been fascinated by, Zohra’s strength from the moment she had stormed into his suite and stood by him through his nightmare. But this past week she had become something truly magnificent, she had become a princess. And she hadn’t needed anything from him.
She had been a lioness when defending her brother and sister from the manipulative clutches of her extended family, a clever, quick study in her understanding of the immediate state affairs that needed to be organized, a formidable opponent to anyone who had dared question her role in King Salim’s affairs.
She had been a sight to behold when she had addressed the nation of Siyaad after her father’s funeral.
Ayaan had finally understood why King Salim had pushed for this marriage. He had thought marriage to the crown prince of Dahaar would achieve for Zohra her rightful place in the world, remove the stigma of her birth.
And yet, in just a week, Zohra had proved how wrong her father had been. She had needed neither the weight of the Dahaaran crown behind her nor Ayaan’s support—either as her husband, or even as a man who could validate her place in Siyaad, in the way their archaic culture dictated.
But the primitive instinct in him that had somehow been nurtured by his madness of five years had risen to the forefront again. Why else would he feel things an educated man, a man supposed to lead his nation on a path of progress should be ashamed to even think?
Her strength in the week following her father’s death, her confidence in taking on any number of challenges without quaking, the conviction of her own beliefs—Ayaan had been alternately amazed and weighed down by it, the worst of his fears crystallizing into undeniable truth.
Resentment was an acrid taste in his mouth, followed by utter shame at the level he could sink to.
He was a worse man than he had ever thought that he had indulged, even if for a few seconds, the idea of Zohra being a weak woman, of Zohra needing his help, of Zohra leaning on him for strength.
Even growing up with archaic customs that elevated a man while downplaying a woman’s role, he still had never looked down on a woman. How could he when he had grown up surrounded by his mother’s quiet strength, Amira’s cutting wit and incredible confidence?
And yet Zohra’s strength had only brought out his inadequacy, the bone-deep chill that said she deserved so much more than he gave her.
After knowing the resentment and sheer indifference Zohra had faced for so long, after hearing the echo of that pain still reverberating in her words, this conflicting whiplash of his own emotions, the wave of his intense desire and the crest of his self-condemnations, this was what he had to give her?
Caught up in his own personal pain, he had retreated from her, instead of standing by her. Of course, he had been by her side for all the public ceremonies and state functions. But he had not once inquired after her as a husband, had not offered a moment’s comfort as a lover, had not even extended the minimum courtesy of meeting her eyes.
Because he had been terrified that she would see the truth in his eyes.
And still she came to his bed, she still sought him out, she still wanted to share his nightmares.