Fareed looked as if he was signing away his life.

Sinking deeper in misery, she signed, wishing she could sign her own. If only he’d take it, she would have.

One of the female servants let out a zaghrootah, a shrill, festive ululation. Rose—who thought this was all real in spite of the irregular circumstances she was just beginning to understand—was highly intrigued and tried to replicate the sound. Ryan was delighted and did his own ear-piercing imitations. Gwen felt her head might split open at any moment.

Fareed looked as pained at the unbridled mood as sharbaat ward—rose essence nectar—was distributed to those present in celebration of the happy marriage. But he endured it all with a stiff smile. He was the one who’d organized it after all.

She wondered why? It couldn’t be because he was treating this as a real marriage. He’d told her in mutilating detail not to expect anything from him. Except everything she didn’t want, that was. His status, his name, his wealth, in life and death. His heart had never been on offer. His passion, his ease and humor were things of the past. She wouldn’t even have his companionship. She could only expect his presence where Ryan was involved.

She would have preferred it if he’d been enraged and outraged that she’d lied to him all this time. At least those would have been emotions, something to make her hope anything he’d felt for her survived, even if wounded. But he’d just turned off, as if he’d never felt a thing, not even on a physical level.

He hadn’t even suspected her motives for hiding the truth. Didn’t doubt she could be hiding even more. He’d just accepted her announced reasons, then proceeded to trust her with the sum total of his life and achievements.

But that wasn’t for her, as he kept pointing out. That was for Hesham’s woman, for Ryan’s mother.

He was now probably putting on a show for those present, so they’d spread news of their marriage’s authenticity. All for Hesham’s memory, for Ryan’s future.

None of it was for her.

And if he knew the whole truth, she’d lose even the crumbs he’d been forced to give her.

Tranquil waves frothed on the shore, erasing the names Fareed kept inscribing in the sand.

Gwen. Ryan. Gwen. Ryan.

He felt as if his world had emptied of anything but them.

It had been a week since they’d come here. He’d been away only to go the center for a few hours a day. When he returned, he hadn’t been able to stay away from either of them all their waking hours. He had nothing but those. Longing for her kept him up nights, his mind and body on fire. He’d only slake it inside her, in her passion. And that was forever gone, too.

He might have survived it if he hadn’t known what it was like with her, the pleasures that had enslaved his brother before him.…

His thoughts convulsed on a torrent of regret. Jealousy and guilt were slowly poisoning him. And he could do nothing but let the emotions corrode him.

But at least his objective had been secured. He’d called every favor he was owed worldwide, had thrown money and influence at every obstacle in his path, and he’d gotten Ryan’s adoption finalized. Gwen had been stunned when he’d told her in the morning.

Then this afternoon, she’d come out of the villa for the first time with Ryan, followed him as he’d paced the beach.

What had followed had been an unexpected torment, a simulation of the times they’d spent together as the family he’d thought they’d been forging. A glimpse of what might never, probably would never be. But then, whatever spontaneity and warmth he’d thought they’d shared had had probably been both of them responding to Ryan’s delighted discovery of his surroundings, his tireless demand that they join him in frolicking in the sand and sea. Left to her own devices, she’d probably avoid him for life.

She would have.

Suddenly her scent carried to him even over the tanginess of the open sea. He braced himself, hating his weakness, the molten steel of ever-present desire that poured into his heart and loins.

“Ryan is finally sand-free.”

He turned at her breathless declaration. She seemed to be floating to him in a full-length dress the sunlit color of her hair. It molded to her, accentuating her willowy splendor as if made for her. Seemed he could translate his obsessive knowledge of her every dip and curve and swell to ultra-precise fit. It was one of the dresses he’d had delivered for her because she’d left her belongings in his mansion. He’d never thought he could buy a woman clothes. Visualizing, fitting and buying them for her could turn into an addiction. As everything concerning her had.

She stopped before him, her skin and hair reflecting the radiance of the setting sun, her eyes the endlessness of the sky. Her warmth enveloped him, her hesitant smile pierced his vitals.

Then she reached out, almost touched him.

He wouldn’t be able to resist such a brutal test. If she touched him, he’d drag her to the sand and take her. And she’d beg him to do everything to her. Then after the mindlessness of abandon, she’d sink into that misery that had so baffled him, that he now understood. He couldn’t survive that of all things.

He caught her hand in midair, his jaw, his whole being rigid fighting the need to drag her by that supple hand, crush her beneath his aching flesh, ride her.

He hurt. Inside and out.

She pulled her hand away, her smile as shaky. “You have sand in your hair. Ryan bathed us both in it.”

He gestured to her glowing cleanliness. “You’re sand-free.”

“Took a lot of heavy-duty scrubbing. The sand here is incredibly fine, like powdered gold.”

He bit back a groan as the images and sensation bombarded him. He could almost feel his hands running down the smoothness of her slippery body as he lathered her, kneaded her under a steady jet of warm wetness, as he drove inside her tight, fluid heat, over and over until she climaxed around him, singed him with her pleasure. Then he would rinse her, caress and fondle her, whisper to her how she felt around him, what more he’d do to her as he brought her down from the pinnacle of pleasure, had her simmering for the next ride.…

He exhaled forcibly, trying to expel the encroaching madness. “I’m glad Ryan enjoys the beach. Activities on the sand and in the sea are the best natural form of physiotherapy for him.”

She bit her lower lip, made him feel she’d sunk those white teeth in his own, in his heart. “I never even took him to the pool. I was afraid to expose him to physical stress because I had no way of knowing if I’d be harming him. So it was his first exposure to the sea, and as you saw, he went berserk with delight.”

He had been as thrilled as he could be in his condition with Ryan’s joy. “We’ll come here as often as possible, then.”

She gave him such a look, hesitant, anxious, as if asking him what was to become of them, what kind of life they’d have.

What did she expect? They’d come here, they’d be together everywhere, where he’d be Ryan’s father and her parenting partner, but never again her lover. They’d never be a real husband and wife and just a simulation of a family.

B’Ellahi, why was she here? Trying to smile and make small talk and shake sand out of his hair? Did she think he could be her easy companion now as he shared Ryan’s upbringing?

Or was she considering resuming their intimacies because they were now married, for worse or worst?

Would he want this, if this were what she was after?

No. He’d either have all or none of her, couldn’t share…

“Fareed, there’s something I need…I have to confess to you.”

His focus sharpened on her. Her incandescent beauty was now gilded by the lights emanating from the villa. The spasm of sheer love he felt for her, the enormity of it, suddenly crystallized one irrefutable fact.