Then he broke away from her.
She felt as if he’d backhanded her, fell back onto her pillow, gasping, her eyes gushing her misery.
He was panting, his face taut with agony. Then the words shuddered out of him. “Nothing has changed, ya hayati.”
A sob overcame her as she tried to reach for him again. He resisted her. This time his rejection clamped her chest with the frost of suspicion.
Stone cold, she got out of bed on unsteady legs. “You’ve researched me, haven’t you? You’re afraid getting involved with me, even temporarily, an illegitimate daughter and half-sister to Damhoorian men of ill repute would be too damaging …”
He exploded to his feet, his rage rattling her teeth.
“Enti majnoonah?” he thundered. “Are you totally crazy, or is this the drugs talking? You think I’d care if you were Al Shy’taan’s—Satan’s—daughter? And afraid of getting involved? The whole kingdom is certain you are my mistress. I spent a night in your hotel room. The whole mission saw me weeping and roaring for you. I brought you here, put you in my bed. And you think I care what the world says or thinks? You think I’m denying you and myself for those petty reasons?”
“Then why?” she cried. “The only other reason I can think of is you don’t want me any more.”
He advanced on her, forcing her to stumble backward with his insistent momentum, until he had her plastered to the wall. Then he showed her just how huge his desire was, how much he wanted her.
“Is this proof enough for you, ya majnoonah? And beyond going insane with lusting for your every inch, I worship you, I crave your every glance and word and thought and emotion—everything that makes you you.”
She clung to him and he stepped away, thwarting her. She cried out her confusion, “Then why won’t you have mercy on me?”
“Because I still don’t have the right to choose my wife.”
Wife.
And it came to her. Fully formed. What she’d never allowed herself to even think about. The images, the daily details, every sensation and thought and common occurrence of an existence as his wife. It brought a fresh wave of anguish. She sobbed as if her heart would break.
He snatched her up in his arms, carried her to bed, curved himself around her. “Domoo’ek aghla men hayati—your tears are more precious than my life, ya galbi, argooki, don’t cry.”
It was only on account of hearing his voice about to fracture that she found the control to leash in her anguish.
“I never thought I was qualified to be your wife—” she started.
He cut her off with a snarl. “You are my wife. In my heart and soul. But because I can’t choose you, I can never have one. And I won’t.”
The way he’d said that … ! “You mean …?”
“I’ll take the crown but I will not take a wife.”
“B-but how can you not? The heir you need, the expectations of the whole kingdom.”
“I’m not having a child if it isn’t with you. Let the crown go to someone else after me.”
This was—was too much. Too much. Too huge.
She felt shock relinquish its choke hold on her every cell, heard herself stammering, “But i-if you d-decided that, how can you say that nothing has changed? Everything has!”
“Nothing has. I still can’t take you as my wife.”
“You don’t have to! I only ever wanted to be with you for as long as you didn’t have a wife. And if you won’t, I can be with you forever …” She stopped, mortification rising at her presumption. “F-for as long as you want me.”
“And what will I give you in return? Will you accept sharing my privileges?”
Her lips pursed. “We’ve covered this, once and for all.”
“So if you won’t accept my support and protection, what do I have to offer you? My love? My body?”
A giggle of incredulity ripped out of her chest. “Is there anything more this life can offer?”
“No, Janaan. You of all people need more than someone who says he loves you and never delivers.”
“If you’re alluding to my father, there is just no comparison. My father deserted my mother and me for—what did you call them? Self-preserving, petty reasons. While you—”
His growl interrupted her. “It doesn’t matter how grand my reasons are. I can’t let you invest yourself, body and soul, as I know you would, in a relationship with no future. You need a man who can give you the family you never had, the family you of all women were born to nurture and cherish. Damn the day I was born, but I can’t be that man.”
Jay felt her sanity ebbing. Malek was in her arms, telling her he’d never take another woman, that he’d love her forever, but he wouldn’t be hers either.
“You think you’re protecting me? Don’t you see you’re hurting me, destroying me?”
“The pain of an hour rather than that of every hour, as we say here. You may never forgive me for being unable to be with you, for crushing your heart as I crushed mine, but you’ll remember I didn’t compound your involvement, your addiction.”
She struggled out of his arms, looked at him with tears pouring down her face. “I could have died, Malek.”
His reaction was spectacular. As if she’d shot him point-blank in the chest.
And it all gushed out of her. “I could have died without having lived. I haven’t lived, Malek, because you won’t let me, because you won’t make me yours. What if I die tomorrow? Be gone in seconds, like Majd? Won’t you let me live now?”
Jan’s words showered Malek like shrapnel. He could swear he heard them slashing the last of his control, snapping it.
He surged up, blind, out of his mind, reliving the agony of fear, of helplessness, of rage and regret. He caught her to him, filled his hands with her, honey and sunlight and unconditional love made flesh, made woman, all woman. His woman.
“Ana ella ensan,” he growled in her mouth, between tongue thrusts that breached the sweetness she surrendered with such mind-destroying eagerness. “I’m only human …”
He tore his lips away and she whimpered. He only sank worshiping kisses all the way down to her ample cleavage.
“You’re not pulling away?” she gasped.
“Never again,” he groaned, suckling her honeyed flesh. “There’ll be no turning back. I’ll worship you, brand you, give you all of me, turn your body into an instrument of ecstasy, yours and mine. You’re mine to pleasure as I will, aren’t you?”