Read Online Forged in the Desert Heat by Maisey Yates - Free Book Online Page A

own hands.
    Or perhaps not so indirectly.
    “That I was what?” he asked.
    “Here. But he didn’t mention you were busy.”
    “You thought I was in here reclining, perhaps?”
    “No. But...maybe fencing or something. Not...boxing...with yourself.”
    “This is how I keep fit. I hang the bag inside my tent when I travel.”
    “That tiny thing?”
    “The bag or the tent?”
    “The tent. The bag isn’t tiny.”
    “The tent I had the night I acquired you is not the one I normally travel with.” He turned and wiped the sweat from his forehead, then started unwinding the tape that was around his fists.
    “Well, to what did I owe the pleasure of the mini-tent experience?” Her perfect, pale cheeks darkened, a pink stain spreading over them. And that blush, the acknowledgment that there was something in that night that might make her blush, threw his mind right back there.
    To what it had felt like to have her in his arms. Soft. Petite.
    Sweet.
    So not for him. Not under any circumstances. Not even if she were just a woman he met on a city street. Even then, she wouldn’t be for him. All he could ever do with a flower was bruise the petals.
    A flower would wither and die out in the desert. And he wasn’t just from the desert; the desert was in him. And his touch would only burn her.
    A good thing, then, that she was not just a woman on the street. A fortunate thing that she was off-limits for a million reasons, because if the only reason were her well-being... Well, he simply wasn’t that good a man.
    But with the fate of a nation resting on whether or not he kept it in his pants? He could keep them zipped.
    “I saw no point in carrying the extra weight. I traded with a man I met on the road. A smaller tent, food. And it’s fortunate for you I was able to trade or I might not have had the money to buy you.”
    “Ransom.”
    “If you like.”
    She frowned. “I thought we agreed it was a lot less demeaning.”
    “It makes no difference to me.”
    “One makes you the hero...the other makes you a bastard.”
    “You say that like you think I might have a preference between the two.”
    “I...don’t you?”
    He lifted a shoulder. “Not particularly. I don’t have to be good, Ana, I just have to win. In the end, Al Sabah has to win. The rest...the rest doesn’t matter.”
    “And you’ll do anything to win?”
    “Anything,” he said.
    Ana believed him. There was no doubt. The way he said it, so dark and sure and certain, sent a shiver through her body, down into her bones. And yet it didn’t repel her. It didn’t make her want to run. Perversely, it almost made her want to get closer.
    The shock of fear that ran through her body was electric. It sent ripples of warning through her body, showers of sparks that sent crackling heat along her veins.
    She felt like a child standing before a fire. Fascinated and awed by the warmth, knowing there was something that might make it all dangerous, but not having any real concept of the damage it could do.
    Even having that moment of clarity, she didn’t draw back. She did take a step toward him, though. Zafar, in all his shirtless glory.
    She’d thought him arresting in his robes. Handsome in the linen tunic, moisture clinging to him from his shower. Without a shirt, his long hair escaping the bonds of the leather strap that normally kept it bound, his body glistening with sweat, a bead of it rolling down his chest, down his abs, sliding along the contours of his hardened muscles...well, just now he defied reality.
    He was unlike any man she’d ever seen. All hard, harsh, assaulting masculinity. There was nothing soft about him, nothing to put her at ease or make her feel safe. He bound her breath up in her body, kept it from escaping. Made a rush of feeling whisper over her skin that she couldn’t identify or deny.
    She knew attraction. She was attracted to Tariq. He was handsome; he gave her butterflies in her stomach. He was a great kisser, though, admittedly