He did.
His fingers took careful hold of the strap before pushing it down bit by bit until I felt it fall over my shoulder. And still his fingers went on pushing, down, down, down until the silk slipped lower and lower and—
KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK!
I woke up.
My eyes flew open, and I jerked up to a sitting position on my bed. For more than a few seconds, I could only stare blankly around me, unable to comprehend why the other half of my bed was empty.
KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK!
The heavy sound of knocking on my door tore through the haze that still clung to my mind, and I nearly gasped out loud.
I had dreamt about the sheikh that way.
Again!
KNOCK, KNOCK, KNOCK!
This time, the heavy but rapid rapping on the door was followed by the sheikh’s voice, which was tinged with exasperation.
“Aurora?”
The sound of his voice, even tinged as it was with exasperation, made me cringe and blush at the same time, and I had to clear my throat before I could trust myself to speak. “I’m comi—” I stopped abruptly.
Eep.
The words ‘I’m coming’ suddenly had a whole new meaning, but while I was still struggling to find something else to say, the door had already opened, and an impatient-looking Mik’hail was striding inside my room.
“I’ve been knocking for five minutes, brat.”
I couldn’t answer. I was too busy making sure that my expression didn’t give me away. I knew I should be used to his looks by now, but I wasn’t. It was almost like he grew even more gorgeous in my eyes with every day that passed, so much so that there were times the sheer gorgeousness of him almost felt unbearable.
He was dressed, like always, in the kingdom’s traditional robe, with the loose flowing cloth emphasizing the impressive breadth of his shoulders and the muscular expanse of his chest. I loved him most when he was like this, and by the time he reached my bed, I could barely breathe.
He was just so impossibly attractive, and I had to make a show of yawning just to buy myself time while I fought to steady my reeling senses.
“Good morning,akh.” My voice shook only the smallest bit. It wasn’t always like this before, and I wasn’t sure when it started. It just felt like one day I simply woke up to the knowledge that I wanted him...and the sheikh wanted me back.
Mik’hail frowned down at me. “Did you stay up again?”
“Umm...no?” It was a lie, of course. Last night, I overheard the palace maids gossiping about how the sheikh had been out visiting Lady Rissah, a widow who supposedly had an eye on becoming the sheikh’s wife.
And technically, there wasn’t anything wrong with that. Over a year had already passed since the accident. Although Aretha’s body still hadn’t been found, there was little evidence to go by that would let us hope she was still alive.
As far as even the royal laws were concerned, Sheikh Mik’hail, the King of Layla, was free to marry anyone...and it was this that had kept me up the whole night.
I just wanted to know...
“Are you even listening, brat?”
Oops.
The sheikh’s exasperated tone cut into my thoughts, and I quickly glanced up, intending to apologize—
But then I noticed it.
For so many days now, I had caught signs of how the sheikh’s body responded whenever I was around. The way his robes would shift. The tension in his stance. The way he’d angle himself away from me, as if trying to hide something.
