LITMIR.BIZ

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still fixed on Bella as he spoke. He then turned toward the door and drew the hood back up over his head.

      Panic rose in her chest. He was leaving because of her! He’d taken one look at her sitting too close to his private table and he’d drawn his line in the sand.

      The maître d’ shot her an angry scowl as Tariq’s bodyguard reopened the door and ushered the sheik out.

      Tongues of panic licked fiercer. She couldn’t, wouldn’t let him leave. Not without talking to him, trying to explain why she’d tried to ambush him. Because this might be her one and only shot at approaching him, and it was blowing up in front of her eyes.

      * * *

      The restaurant door swung shut behind him. Tariq sucked the icy winter air deep into his lungs, trying to calm himself. Rain was turning to snow, fat flakes separating from diaphanous mist, wafting to the ground and winking out on the slick cobblestones at his feet. He strode up the street to his waiting limousine, focusing fiercely on controlling his limp, his visible weaknesses.

      He should never have started coming into the village, or dining at the restaurant. Why he’d done it he wasn’t sure. Maybe there was a distant need still buried somewhere deep inside him, a need for human connection.

      But he had not anticipated the fierce lust that had gut-punched him at the sight of that woman in the restaurant. Tariq’s hands fisted. Seeing her in that figure-hugging, black jersey dress, knee-high boots, long legs, her mass of dark curls giving her that just-risen-from-bed allure...it reminded him he was not a cold, numb ghost of a man at all. Rather, he was a disfigured, damaged, sorry echo of what he’d once been, with all the old needs still pumping hot and hungry in his blood.

      His mind went to her face, so pale against the black liner she’d applied around her huge crocus-colored eyes. Eyes like an oasis. Something he wanted to drown himself in. And not once had her steady gaze left his.

      She’d been sitting too close to his alcove in a restaurant that was basically empty. And he’d not failed to notice the distinctive label on the bottle of wine near her fine-boned hand, either. Chateau Luneau cabernet franc—the same wine he ordered every Tuesday night. The wine that came from the Loire Valley estate that had been in Julie’s family for centuries.

      His pulse quickened as he neared his vehicle. The startling fist of arousal that had slammed into him at the sight of her disturbed Tariq, as did the accompanying rush of adrenaline. He did not want to feel. Anything.

      A cold anger calcified around his heart as he reached his limo, his guard stepping forward to open the door.

      She’d positioned herself to ambush him. And Tariq knew why, at least on the surface. His men had done their digging.

      She was Estelle Dubois’s new housekeeper and dog sitter. She was also an author. Her name was Amelie Chenard. She came from the States, spoke good French, and had told Estelle Dubois that her great-grandmother’s family hailed from this region. She was supposedly writing a gothic novel set on Ile-en-Mer, featuring the abbey and its ghost. And she wanted a tour of his estate.

      She also did not have a work visa, had little money. Gossip around town had it that Madame Dubois was paying her under the table, which was not unusual for Madame, apparently. The old woman marched to her own drum, and always had.

      On the surface Amelie Chenard’s story seemed feasible, thought Tariq as he got in the limo, but he trusted nothing. And no one.

      The limousine had been Omair’s idea. Hide in plain sight, his brother had said. Make the image fit. He could hear Omair’s words now.

      The more important and mysterious you seem, the more these islanders will respect your privacy and keep their distance. The less likely they’ll be to discuss you with outsiders.

      Omair had been right about the islanders. Amelie Chenard was another story.

      Suspicion snaked deeper into him.

      Know your enemy. Keep him close.

      Those had always been his father’s words.

      Tariq inhaled deeply as he leaned back into the limo seat. Again his brother Omair’s words sifted to mind.

      Tell me at once if anything unusual happens...our family, our country, our kingdom is at stake.

      This was not just about him. Tariq’s secret was also his family’s secret. If Amelie Chenard was after something more than the abbey ghost... Bitterness filled his mouth and he cursed. He needed to face her, deal with, then dispose of her if necessary.

      As his bodyguard climbed into the car he said, “Go tell that woman to be at the abbey tomorrow, 5:00 p.m. sharp. I’ll see her then.”

      His man looked at him, a brief hesitation crossing his face.

      “Now!” Tariq snapped.

      If she gave him cause to suspect her motivation further, he’d ask Omair and his military intelligence team to investigate her. She’d be sorry she ever came prying.

      * * *

      Bella pushed through the restaurant’s heavy wood door and rushed out into the frigid night. Frantically scanning the street, she saw his vehicle parked a short way up the hill, exhaust smoke beginning to puff white into the cold air, one of the doors still open. She began to run toward the car, aiming to apologize, explain, anything that might stop him from leaving, stop him from shutting her out permanently. She’d come so far for this story already, she would not let it die here in this cold cobblestone street.

      But as she ran, a man suddenly appeared out from the shadow at her side, his huge form blocking the pale light from the streetlamp.

      Bella froze, her mind hurtling back to the attack in D.C. She spun around to flee. But the man lurched forward and grabbed her arm in a viselike grip. She bit back the scream rising in her chest as the lamplight caught the man’s face and she registered the raw-boned, dark features of the second bodyguard.

      Air whooshed out of her.

      “What in hell do you think you’re doing!” she hissed, jerking her arm free, heart thumping loudly against her rib cage.

      “Monsieur Du Val wanted me to inform you that if you wish to see him he will be available at the abbey tomorrow at 5:00 p.m.” The man spoke French with the rolling r’s of Arabic and his right hand hovered close to his hip where Bella had seen a gun the other day.

      Her gaze flashed to the waiting limousine. “He said what?” She wasn’t sure she’d heard right.

      “Report to the security gate at five, ring the bell, and someone will bring you in.”

      Before she could open her mouth again, the man turned and strode up to the waiting limo.

      Incredulous, Bella stood rooted to the spot, watching him climb in. She heard the door slam. The vehicle pulled out into the narrow street. Brake lights flared bright at the top of the hill. The limo rounded the corner, then disappeared.

      Silence pressed down.

      Snowflakes wafted thicker around her and Bella began to shiver. The fog was coming up from the harbor dense and damp. She made her way back to the restaurant, feeling like an Alice who’d slipped into some strange alternate reality, because nothing felt real. But at least now she had her invite, if she could call it that.

      * * *

      Tariq leaned back in the dark interior of his vehicle as they headed up toward the deserted windswept side of the island. Snow was coming down very heavily at the higher elevation, blowing vertically. The wipers struggled to clear arcs across the windshield.

      “What did she say?” he said quietly to his bodyguard in Arabic. “Is she coming?”

      “I believe so.”

      Tariq closed his eyes, his tension increasing as they neared the spiked iron gates of the monastery.

      This was his lair, his private home. He’d been forced to invite

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