The Sultan's Choice

CHAPTER THREE

24 hours later

‘I’M not going to marry you.’

Sadiq’s mouth was open and he was already smiling urbanely in anticipation of the Princess’s acquiescence—already thinking ahead to buying her a trousseau and getting her out of those unflattering suits. Her bottom had barely touched the seat of the chair opposite him. He frowned. Surely she couldn’t have just said—

‘I said I don’t want to marry you.’

Her voice was low and husky, but firm, and it tugged somewhere deep inside him again. Sadiq’s mouth closed. She sat before him like a prim nun, hair pulled back and dressed in a similarly boxy suit to the one she’d worn yesterday. This one was just a slightly darker hue of blue. Not a scrap of make-up enhanced those pale features or those aquamarine eyes. Disconcertingly, at that moment he noticed a splash of freckles across her delicately patrician nose.

Freckles. Since when had he noticed freckles on anyone? Any woman of his acquaintance would view freckles with the same distaste as acne. Something nebulous unfurled within Sadiq, and he sat back and realised that it was a surprise—because it was so long since anyone had said no to him. Or been so reluctant to impress him. Princess Samia’s chin lifted minutely, and for a second Sadiq could see her innately regal hauteur. She might be the most unprepossessing princess he’d ever met, but she was still royalty and she couldn’t hide it.

The thin line of her mouth drew his focus then, and bizarrely he found himself wondering how full and soft those lips would be when relaxed … or kissed. Would they be pink and pouting, begging for another kiss?

Samia could see the conflict on the Sultan’s face, the clear disbelief. That was why she’d repeated herself. It had been as much to check she hadn’t been dreaming. She was trembling all over like a leaf. She’d tossed and turned all night and had kept coming back to the stark realisation that she really did not have a choice.

But when faced with Sadiq again, and the clear expectation on his face that she was there to say yes, she had felt some rebellious part of her rise up. This was her only chance of escaping this union. She crushed the lancing feeling of guilt. She couldn’t worry now about the fallout or she’d never go through with it. The thought of marrying this man was just so downright threatening that she had to do something—no matter how selfish it felt.

Sadiq’s voice rumbled over her, causing her pulse to jump. ‘There’s a difference between not marrying me, and not wanting to marry me. One implies that there is no room for discussion, and the other implies that there is. So which is it, Samia?’

Samia tried to avoid that searing gaze. He was sitting forward, elbows on his desk, fingers steepled together. The way he said her name made her feel hot. She was already unravelling at the seams because she was facing this man again, even though the heavy oak desk separated them. Even the threat to her sister wasn’t enough right now to make her reconsider. She’d cross that bridge if it came to it.

He hadn’t kept her waiting today. He’d been waiting for her. Standing at his window like a tall, dark and gorgeous spectre. And now he was utterly indolent—as if they might be discussing the weather. He wore a shirt and no tie. The top button was undone, revealing the bronzed column of his throat. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up, showing off muscled forearms more suited to an athlete than a head of state. Samia felt unbearably restless all of a sudden.

Abruptly she stood up, wanting to put space between them. She couldn’t seem to sit still around this man, and she couldn’t concentrate while he was looking at her like that—as if she were under a microscope. So clinically.

She went and stood behind the chair, breathing erratically. ‘Discussion …’ she finally got out. ‘Defintely the discussion one.’

Great. Now she couldn’t string a sentence together—and what was she doing, encouraging a discussion with one of the world’s greatest debaters? She paced away from the chair, feeling constricted in her suit. She’d never been as self-conscious about what she wore as she had been in the last thirty-six hours. Samia had always been supremely aware of her own allure, or more accurately the lack of it, and was very comfortable with a uniform of plain clothes to help her fade into the background. Or at least she had been till now.

She avoided his eye. ‘Look, I know you need a wife, and on paper I might look like the perfect candidate—’

Sadiq cut in with a low voice. ‘You are the perfect candidate.’ He stifled intense irritation. She was the only candidate. After carefully vetting potentially suitable brides from his world and dismissing them, she was the only one he’d kept coming back to. And once he’d set his mind on something he would not rest until he had full compliance. Failure was not an option.

Samia turned back to face him, and quailed slightly under the glowering look he was sending her. ‘But I’m not! You’ll see.’ She searched frantically for something to say. ‘I don’t go out!’

‘A perfectly commendable quality. Despite what you’ve been led to believe, I’m not actually the most social of animals.’

Samia forced her mind away from that nugget of information. This man and a quiet evening in by the fire just did not compute. ‘You find it commendable that I don’t have a life? That’s not something to applaud—it’s something to avoid. How can I be your queen when the last party I was at was probably yours? You must have parties every week—you move in those circles. I wouldn’t know what to do … or say.’

Samia’s tirade faltered, because the Sultan had moved and was now sitting on the edge of the desk, one hip hitched up. She swallowed and wished he hadn’t moved. Heat was rising, and dimly she wondered if he had any heating on.

‘Of course you’d know what to do and say. You’ve been brought up to know exactly what to do and say. And if you’re out of practice you’ll learn again quickly enough.’

Samia choked back her furious denial. She ran a hand through her hair impatiently, which was something she did when she was agitated. She forgot that it was tied back and felt it come loose but had to ignore it.

She faced him fully. ‘You really don’t want me for your wife. I don’t like parties. I get tongue-tied when I’m faced with more than three people, I’m not sophisticated and polished.’ Like all your other women. Samia just about managed not to let those words slip out.

Sadiq was watching the woman in front of him with growing fascination. She wasn’t sophisticated and polished—and he suddenly relished that fact for its sheer uniqueness. She was literally coming apart in front of him, revealing someone very different from the woman she was describing. He agreed with absolutely everything she was saying—apart from the bit about her not being a suitable wife.

‘And yet,’ he drawled, ‘you’ve been educated most of your life in a royal court, and your whole existence has held within it the potential for this moment. How can you say you’re not ready for this?’

Samia could feel the unfashionably heavy length of her hair starting to unravel down her back. Her inner thermostat was about to explode. With the utmost reluctance she opened her jacket, afraid that if she didn’t she’d melt in a puddle or faint.

Before she could stop him Sadiq was reaching out and plucking the coat from her body as easily as if she were a child, placing it on the chair she’d vacated. Too stunned to be chagrined, Samia continued, ‘You need someone who is used to sophisticated social gatherings. I’ve been in libraries for as long as I can remember.’

The ancient library in the royal Burquat castle had always been her refuge from the constant taunting of her stepmother, Alesha. She started to pace again, disturbed by Sadiq’s innate cool.