To Touch a Sheikh by Olivia Gates Page A

it?
    That was what Amjad wondered again as he watched Maram puttering in the kitchen, humming perky melodies in her smoky-silk voice.
    How would he survive having her permeate his every breath, overwhelm his senses and chip away at his good sense, for as long as it took to see his plan through?
    His original plan had been to keep her father here until he was willing to negotiate. He’d estimated one night of isolation with him in the desert, aided by the unrelenting sandstorm outside, would bring him around. Yusuf Aal Waaked wasn’t a strong man, physically or mentally. Amjad had no doubt he would cave.
    That knowledge convinced him Yusuf wasn’t the mastermind of the conspiracy. Amjad sensed a more complex, ruthless mind behind it. Probably the informer who’d lured Talia Burke into Zohayd.
    Said informer had exposed Yusuf to Talia, Amjad’s brother Harres’s seductress and future bride, probably because he doubted Yusuf would not go through with the dethroning according to the informer’s preferred timetable.
    This informer had counted on Talia running to the press with Yusuf’s identity and the news of the jewels’ theft to get back at the Aal Shalaans, whom she’d then believed had been behind her own brother’s arrest and imprisonment. Once exposed, Yusuf would have been forced to fall in with the informer’s wishes, which seemed to be not to wait for Exhibition Day.
    But they’d thwarted the informer. Talia had revealed Yusuf’s identity only to Harres, and they hadn’t even confronted him.
    Yusuf, secure his plans were safe and bound on pursuing his original timetable, had accepted Amjad’s annual invitation. Once he’d arrived, Amjad would have taken it from there.
    That had been his best-laid plan.
    Now he had Maram instead, even though he preferred braving the sandstorm naked and on foot rather than risk prolonged exposure to her.
    His new plan was to call her father in a few days, when he was sure to be desperate for news, and dictate his terms. The moment Harres and Shaheen confirmed the return of the jewels, he would ride to the nearest town with Maram, have a helicopter fly her back to her father. She’d never know she’d been his hostage. He’d advise Yusuf for future self-preservation to never let her suspect anything.
    In essence, he’d keep his word. Nothing would harm her.
    And now that she believed her father had been reassured of her safety, that this was an adventure, she was enjoying the situation to no end. He wasn’t.
    This haboob would last days. And if her father hadn’t relented by then, he would have to keep her here, unaware of what was really going on, until he did.
    It had only been six damn hours.
    Two if he didn’t count the four hours she’d slept.
    But he did count them. Knowing she was sleeping in his bed, wearing his shirt, with nothing but that wisp of a panty drying on her hot flesh had made him unable to acknowledge his own exhaustion, to get the rest that would put everything back inperspective. He’d kept worrying she might suffer some delayed effect of the brutal ride. But he couldn’t check on her and see her asleep either. What he’d seen of her legs, of her body where the shirt had clung to the panties’ dampness, had been enough. He couldn’t risk seeing more.
    He’d come to adopt her view of eternity. It felt as if they’d been there that long.
    And that was before she woke up. All tousled and creamy and recharged, the vibes she emanated even in her sleep ratcheting up, deluging him, making him forget the tumult raging outside.
    At least now she was fully dressed.
    He busied himself around the place, fixing shorted-out light sconces, filling and lighting the oil lamps that Maram said she preferred in the sitting/dining area, making an inventory of the pantry’s contents, tagging each. All through, she was in every cubic inch of air in this