Free Sheikh With Benefits by Teresa Morgan Page A

instead.
    He grasped her by her upper arms, steel in his grip. "You gave yourself to me."
    Just then, a rattle, coming from the doors to the ballroom, interrupted.
    Rapping at the locked doors with a vicious look on his face was her father. Oh crap, she thought, fear of his disapproval racing through her. Then she made herself pause. What did she have to fear from him? She didn't care what he thought of her. He'd certainly never cared about her, not really. He'd spent the last twenty years encouraging her to be silent, invisible. The perfect slave to his career. Perhaps he couldn't stand that he'd once stepped out of his diplomat role to marry her mother, and then she'd died. But that hadn't given him the right to resent his daughter, to erase her from her own life.
    And he could go hang.
    Apparently the palace guards thought so, too. A pair of burly men on either side of him slid their gazes to Javad for silent orders as they approached the former ambassador. Javad lifted his chin slightly. She watched as a guard touched her father on the arm. He tried to shrug the big man off.
    It didn't work. The guards got insistent. As they practically dragged him away, he glanced over his shoulder at her, begging with his gaze.
    "I should—" Go to him, she meant to say. An automatic reaction.
    "You will stay with me," he informed her. "You gave yourself to me."
    "You said that before. But last time, you said something before it. There were two or three words, then 'and'," she prodded, not bothering to fight the feeling of hope inside.
    "Ah, I think that was..." A rakish half-smile quirked his beautiful mouth. The mouth she wanted to kiss so badly it was painful. "I love you."
    "Oh, thank God," she said, her relief spilling out of her. "It would kill me to go through all that again with another man."
    "Never." His voice was all grit. "You will be with me, and only me."
    She grabbed the lapels of his tux and pulled him down to her. His lips against hers, his tongue invading her hidden places, it made her blood scorch through her veins like wildfire. The kiss could have gone on forever and she never would have tired of it. But the sensation of his hot hands on the night-chilled skin of her back made her forget to breathe. Eventually, she had to let him go, or suffocate. When they pulled away, they were both gasping.
    One lock of Javad's normally perfect hair hung down over his eye. It was so sexy she nearly combusted on the spot. When she caught her breath, she repeated, "Oh, thank God."
    He tightened his arm around her waist. They couldn't be any closer without removing clothing. Everyone in the ballroom was probably trying to see through the gauzy curtains. But Javad had his back to them, hiding her from their view.
    "Those are not the three words I want to hear from you."
    No, she knew it. He wanted to hear her say she loved him.
    "I should drag this out. I should play games with you and drive you wild by holding back. I know I should make you work for my love. But I can't. Of course I love you. Why wouldn't any woman love you?" She took his hand. Warm and dry, it dwarfed her own. She lifted an honest gaze to the face she wanted to look at for the rest of her life.
    "I'm so tired of hiding and lying and pretending to pay attention to some diplomatic treaty or trade agreement when I really want to talk about smart you are, your kindness to me, and how you have the hottest ass in Ulai." As the words, and her true feelings, escaped the prison where she'd locked them, they took with them a great weight she'd barely realized she'd been carrying around. Very seriously, she added. "I'm afraid the truth is that I'd like to take a big bite out of it."
    He seemed to consider that for a moment before saying, "I would be open to such a thing, but perhaps a bit later, man jigaram ." Literally, the words meant 'my liver,' which sounded strange to Western ears , but it was a term of endearment no Farsi speaker threw around casually. Everything in her