In Too Deep_ Husband Material & the Sheikh's Bargained Bride - Brenda Jackson [43]
“I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you. Please, be careful.”
He pressed her closer. “I always am. But I now have more reason than ever to be so.”
She felt her consciousness receding. She was swooning, like a heroine from a Victorian novel. Before she’d met Adham, she’d suspected she might be really frigid, as many men had accused her. If those small-minded, vicious men could see her now.
A discreet cough came from behind Adham. Jameel.
Adham half turned to him. Their exchange in Arabic was rapid. She didn’t get one word. Then he turned to her, his lids still heavy with desire but with an apology on his lips. “I’m sorry, ya ameerati. Urgent business has come up. Please stay, mingle some more. Jameel will drive you home when you’re ready.”
Disappointment spread through her but she smiled at him. “Oh, no. You attend your business and I’ll go home now. I’ll…I’ll wait for you.”
“As you wish.” He swept her around and walked her out of the tent, nodding to everyone who seemed more curious than before, if possible. She’d sure given them a spectacle worthy of curiosity. The blushing bride who now had plenty to blush about.
Thirty minutes later, she was back in the Hamptons residence. She had no idea how long his business would take, but she rushed to get ready for his return.
An hour later, she’d bathed and dressed in what she hoped was an irresistible creation.
Two hours later, she called him. His phone went straight to voice mail. She didn’t leave a message.
What was going on? Where was he? What could possibly keep him away after the enchanted day they’d shared?
She tried to tell herself that she’d married a businessman and a man of state, and that his time wasn’t his to control.
It didn’t work. While all that was true, a simple call would have allowed her to go to sleep knowing that their marriage was not a mirage that could appear and disappear at his whim. His reverting to the man who didn’t bother to tell her where he was or what he was doing tossed her back into her former state of turmoil.
The last thing she knew before she succumbed to exhaustion was that Adham hadn’t come home.
Her nightmares throughout the night said he never would.
Four
She woke up alone. As she had all her life.
The first thing that came to her was a conviction: that she’d wake up alone for the rest of it, too.
She’d also gone to bed alone. As she had since she’d married Adham.
She’d thought after that first day in the Hamptons that the inexplicable hands-off phase had passed.
It hadn’t. The past week had followed the same pattern. He’d be all over her during the day, then would disappear at night, every time with one excuse or another.
She dragged herself out of bed. She felt as if the silky sheets and downy covers were spread with thorns.
The room was swathed in cool, dark silence. She knew out there another day blazed with heat and light, bustling with the sounds of Adham’s housekeepers tirelessly keeping this place immaculate. Blackout blinds and soundproof doors and windows shielded her from it all. The room echoed with isolation. Inertia.
She felt as if she’d been on a roller coaster without a harness, one that catapulted her up, made her feel she was soaring, only to crash her to the ground, leaving her stunned and crushed, only to start all over again.
If it weren’t for that one night, when he’d proved he was as over-endowed sexually as he was in every other way, she’d have thought his lack of interest in intimacy stemmed from some deficiency. But since his potency was indisputable, she’d feared he’d somehow lost interest in her. Yet over the past week, he’d showed her proof, physical and verbal, of his need to possess her. But he’d left her alone again, every night, and now she feared he might be accepting those women’s offers.
She couldn’t really believe that, but she’d run out of excuses for his behavior. Not wanting to rush her after her bereavement no longer made sense. Preoccupation