Hidden in the Sheikh's Harem: Christmas at the Castello

She stopped, suddenly realising she was about to tell him that there was someone on his staff who was supplying the outer tribes with contraband medical and educational goods.

Great going, Farah, she admonished herself. What a way to get a man fired—or, worse, killed.

His eyes narrowed. ‘When what?’

She brushed sand off her legs. ‘Never mind. Why did you kick me?’

‘I didn’t kick you. I nudged you.’ His deep voice made her insides feel unsteady. ‘And I wouldn’t be Probus in your little fantasy. I’d be Aurelian.’

Aurelian, who had captured Zenobia and ended her reign as queen. She made a rude noise at his arrogance. ‘You wish,’ she muttered, half under her breath.

He stopped in front of her and she stared at his dusty boots and the way his jeans—so foreign in her part of the world and yet so sexy in the way they moulded to his legs—hung over the top. ‘I captured you, didn’t I?’

Instant annoyance hit her at his words and she threw her head back to glare at him—only something black and alive dropped to the ground beside her and she let out a blood-curdling scream. The scorpion took off into a nearby crevice and Farah went from paralysed inertia to violently brushing at her clothing in seconds.

Suddenly large hands grasped her upper arms and lifted her to her feet. ‘Keep still.’ The prince scoured the ground for the offending visitor and released her. ‘It’s gone.’

Something crawled across her shoulder and she nearly hit the cave roof. ‘More! There’s more.’

‘No, there’s not.’ The prince’s voice seemed to come from far off before he gripped her arms again and shook her gently. ‘It’s your imagination.’

‘My hair,’ she gasped. ‘They’re in my hair.’ It was one of those irrational fears she’d struggled to master since her mother’s death all those years ago.

With an exaggerated sigh, the prince gently knocked her hands away from her head and turned her around.

* * *

Zach’s eyes swept over dark chestnut tresses that a bird would think twice about before nesting in. It was long, thick and matted with sand, half of it still in the braid that hung down her back.

Carefully he scanned it for anything moving. ‘There is nothing.’

‘There is. I can feel...’ She shivered and turned towards him. Her eyes were huge in her face and moist from where she held tears at bay. She was afraid he realised; truly petrified. Something inside his chest pulled tight and before he could question the move he dug his fingers into her hair. She stood stock-still but he caught the small tremors of fear racing through her and the need to comfort her overwhelmed everything else.

Smoothing her hair back from her face, he moved behind her to unwind her plait. The dark waves parted beneath his fingers and he found himself studying the lightly tanned skin of her neck. It looked smooth and supple, not unlike the body he had curved around the night before.

Reminding himself that she was as bloodthirsty as her father, he ignored the underlying silky texture of her hair as he combed his fingers through it. Again his body responded to the fact that he was touching her, which only elevated his already soaring stress levels. He should be focused on getting home, not on saving a woman he couldn’t care less about from desert insects.

Roughly he turned her back to face him. ‘You’re clear.’

She stared up at him with those guileless chocolate-brown eyes and he felt a jolt go right through him. Bedroom eyes, he decided, his gaze automatically dropping to her slightly parted lips. Bedroom eyes and soft, kissable lips...

Time seemed to stop as he imagined doing all sorts of unholy things to those lips, starting with his mouth and ending with... The hair on his forearms stood on end and it wasn’t the only thing that did.

Hell.

He stepped back and took himself in hand—metaphorically speaking.

* * *

Farah stiffened as the prince moved away and grabbed hold of Moonbeam’s halter.

She shook off the lethargy that had invaded her limbs as soon as he had touched her, as soon as he had looked at her mouth—as if it were the ripest peach and he couldn’t wait to sink his teeth into it. For a tense moment she had thought he might kiss her, and she was ashamed to admit that she had wanted him to. But how could she when he was the kind of man she had vowed to avoid? A man who walked all over others in order to further his own interests. Not to mention the reason behind the situation they were in. ‘He needs water,’ she muttered, knowing it must be true because her lips were as dry as the desert itself.