The Royal's Obsession (13 page)

Once she got to the bar, however, she was dismayed to realize that it was one of the fashionable tall bars that were making their way around the city. The bartenders did their job from a platform that was raised three feet off the ground, the bar itself was even taller, and there were even small stirrups that allowed people to climb up onto the tall chairs.

What had started out as a defiant gesture against her usual evening habits was turning into an experience in humiliation. A reasonable woman might have given up right then, but Angie had a stubborn streak to her. She had said that she was going to get a drink, and by heaven, she was going to get a drink.

Clamping her small purse under her arm, she determinedly set her foot in the stirrup to hoist herself up. At least, that was the idea. The issue was that she was wearing shiny flats that had absolutely no traction on the slippery chrome stirrup, and at that moment, the DJ chose to blast something truly loud.

Just as she was about to swing into the chair, her balance was disrupted, and Angie could feel herself falling. As she fell, she did have a moment of weird satisfaction that if she was going to die, at least she wasn't going to do it alone and in her Brooklyn apartment. At least she was going to do it at a fashionable club, albeit one that she had no business attending.

Before she could topple over entirely, however, a large warm hand steadied her by pressing against her lower back, while another lightly clasped her wrist to help her keep her balance. The touch was somehow more shocking than falling all the way to floor, especially when the stranger boosted her the rest of the way up into the seat.

Angie spun the stool around to see her rescuer, and for a moment, her mouth went dry.

She had lived in New York most of her adult life. She was used to men who were handsome, men who actually made their livings off of their looks. However, this man was different.

He was tall with hair that seemed a touch long for fashion. There was a darkness to his skin that made her think of the Middle East, and his dark eyes were lively with humor. When he grinned, he showed off sharp white teeth that made her slightly shiver.

"Are you quite all right?" he asked. "I was afraid that you would hurt yourself."

"I probably was," she said, shaking her head. "Thanks, that would have been … embarrassing to say the least."

"Think nothing of it," he said with old-world gallantry. "I live to serve the beautiful and the righteous."

His line was so over the top that she found herself laughing instead of being irritated.

"Wow, are you ever in the wrong place," she chuckled. "Come on, with a line like that, and for the rescue, I definitely owe you a drink."

He raised one dark brow, but he took his seat next to hers. As tall as he was, she noted with a tinge of jealousy, he settled himself into the stool quite easily.

"I'll admit I didn't expect you to offer me a drink …"

"Oh? A little startled when a woman offers to pay?" she asked teasingly.

He shook his head. "Not at all. I suppose I just thought that you might be too worried about your fake ID to chance it."

She sputtered for a moment, because he had managed to hit squarely on one of her sore spots. As someone who had always been shorter and smaller than the rest of the people around her, the comments about her height, her innocence—true or not!—and her sweetness, could be saccharine. She hadn't taken it from her friends and her teachers, and she would be damned if she would take it from a random stranger, even one who was good at quick saves.

Before Angie could build up a good head of steam, however, he realized his misstep and held up his hands.

"All right, that was tasteless of me. How about if I say instead,
and then I realized what a beautiful woman you were and sorely repented of my mistake
?"

She eyed him suspiciously, but she could see that he meant it. He was sorry he had offended her, he had made amends, and now she could buy him a drink in good conscience.

When she flagged down a bartender, she did have to show her ID, which she did with a stony silence, deliberately ignoring the man next to her. 

"Ginger ale for me," she said with dignity. "And what will you have?"

"Gin and tonic, I think. I'll stick with the classics tonight." He tilted his head at her drink choice. "Are you someone's designated driver?"

"Oh, the ginger ale? No, I was supposed to meet someone here, but it looks like they never showed. I decided I wanted a drink, but that I may not be all that interested in getting something alcoholic when I'm all on my lonesome."

He gave her a look until she realized what she had done.

"And I totally just told a strange man that I am all alone with no one here with me. Wow. I'm doing well tonight, aren't I?"

"Well, if it helps, I'm not a violent criminal who is here to prey on innocent women who only need a little help with the bar stools," he said with a grin. "Your secret is safe with me, miss …?"

"Angie," she said, omitting her last name for the moment. "Just Angie. This encounter isn't going to last long enough for you to get my last name."

At the hint of a challenge, his eyes narrowed a little, a slight spark in their dark depths sending an answering spark through her belly. God, how long had it been since someone looked at her like that? She stuffed the thought back down where it came from, because it would lead to bad, bad ideas.

"Oh? And what would happen if I told you that my name is Majid ben Yusuf al Said?"

"I would say … your name is longer than mine?" she said with a grin.

"It is. It's a very old name and one that is well-known throughout the world."

"Really?" Angie said, feigning wide-eyed fascination until she couldn't keep it up another moment. She laughed, shaking her head. Much to her surprise, Majid laughed with her, and her esteem for him inched up. She had decided recently that she couldn't bear people who took themselves too seriously, and that included people who were overly handsome as well.

"Sorry, sorry," she said between chuckles. "But really, you're in Manhattan. I can see movie stars out walking their dogs, and a few months ago, I saw the French president taking in the sights. You're really going to have to go a little further to impress me."

"Ah, maybe you are not impressed because your world geopolitics is so poor. What if I told you that I am a prince?"

"Do I also need to remind you that New York is full of liars?" she asked. Their drinks had arrived, and she sipped on her ginger ale, letting one foot dangle down against her stool. She wondered suddenly if she was flirting with this man, and she decided that she definitely wasn't. The most she was doing with him was verbally sparring, and there was nothing wrong with that. She was simply … having a good time with a man she knew she would never see again.

"Are you calling me a liar?" he asked challengingly.

"I am telling you right now that I don't care one way or the other," she said. "Though if you don't know this already, you don't have to. Your looks are definitely good enough that you can get by without lying."

The words had popped out of her mouth without her thinking of them at all. The moment they were out, she felt a blush rise on her cheeks. That was alleviated at least a little by the dumbstruck look on Majid's face.

"Well, that's not something I expected to hear tonight," he said musingly. "I'm not sure how to take that."

"Um, as a joke from someone who hasn't really talked to anyone new in a while?" she offered.

"I find that hard to believe," he said, looking her up and down. "You look like you belong here, and I can't imagine you being shy at all."

"Ah, well, you have caught me on a very odd day, my prince," she said with a sigh. "I'm sort of … between … things at the moment. There's a lot going on, but I figure there's something big coming down the line for me soon."

"Ah, and why do you think that?"

"Because if it doesn't, I'm very much afraid that I am going to go crazy!"

The moment the words were out of her mouth, she realized that she had been far too truthful with a complete stranger. In that awkward moment, she felt vulnerable, oversensitive, and overwhelmingly sad. Those were all emotions that she had seen altogether too much of over the last few months. Now she was left feeling like a peeled carrot as this man looked at her with eyes that she could not read.

She started to blurt out an apology, climbing down from the stool to make her getaway as discreetly as possible, but he set a gentle hand on her bare arm, halting her. The gentleness of the gesture and the warmth of his skin against hers made her pause more than anything else.

"I think I've been there," he said. "You're going along and going along, and suddenly, you realize that you need a change."

"Yes," she said, surprised. "I need a change. I want … I need to go back to doing what I'm good at, and what I haven't done in what feels like a while. I've been hanging on to this idea for the last few months, and I want to … I want it more than I think I want anything else."

"Whatever has driven you here, it must have been very difficult," he said. "You don't look like you back down from much."

"I was defeated," she admitted. She wouldn't get into her breakup now, the event that had sent her into a deep tailspin, but she could feel it shadowing her, giving her thoughts a bit of darkness, her words a bit of cynicism. She had fought off the worst of it, but she knew it lingered.

"Ah, but you were not," he said firmly, and now it was her turn to raise an eyebrow.

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, you are here now, aren't you? Wearing a beautiful dress, buying a prince a drink and having a good conversation that you did not expect to have. You are still alive, you are still breathing. I wouldn't call that defeat."

She laughed a little at his optimistic words.

"Well, I'm not sure that I think much of your standards for defeat and success, but thank you …"

"Well, it's the first step, anyway, isn't it?" he asked, sipping from his drink. "After all, the best victory any of us can have is living well."

Now that was something that she could get behind, though she wasn't going to say why to this man. After all, when Peter had left her, she felt as if she was going to die. The walls had closed in, she felt as if in every direction she could go, there was only failure and disappointment. That was a terrible thing, but the truth was at least it had only lasted for a few days. After that had come the big rush to deal with all of the arrangements, to cancel what could be canceled and to see what could be made of the rest.

"Living well …" she said thoughtfully. "I guess that is the next step, isn't it?"

"And if living well ends up meaning that you follow a man who is enchanted with you back to his hotel room, then perhaps that is what you should do."

She eyed him sharply over the rim of her drink.

"That's really what you're opening with?" she asked drily.

He shrugged, his expression still amused and engaged above all. She had known plenty of men who had lost that sense of humor when they were turned down. She was pleased that he hadn't.

"I thought I would try, anyway. Would you prefer me to be more direct? I think you're beautiful, and I would very much like for you to return to my hotel with me. I think we could have a fine time, and I could show you all about living well."

The weirdest thing was that she was considering it. There was something more than a little engaging about this man, something that captured her imagination as well as her curiosity. Her mother hadn't raised any fools, however, and she knew better than to make snap judgments over the course of a single ginger ale.

"Hmm, that's not really doing it for me at all," she said. "What's next, are you going to try to pay me?"

"Certainly not," he said. "Unless that's a fantasy that excites you? We could pretend, if you wanted. You could be the gorgeous woman who comes to me with a problem that only I can fix …"

"Oh. Oh, ugh, no. No thank you."

"All right, no role-play then. Well, after that, I'm all tapped out," he said with a good-natured shrug. "I suppose what I'm left with is offering you my card and hoping you come to a decision that is more favorable to me at some point."

She shook her head.

"I'm afraid I am going to have to pass," she said. "I think we're a case of wrong time, wrong place. I'm really not in a spot where I can think of anything like that, and I really wouldn't want to lead you on."

He sighed. "All this, and honest too. Sometimes, I feel like I have been blessed in the morning to be cursed in the evening."

"Now that's far too dramatic for a man who's going to move on to the next pretty woman in just a few minutes," Angie said teasingly.

His dark eyes locked with her blue ones. For a moment, she felt like a bird caught by a snake's eyes. She couldn't look away. She didn't want to.

"No," he said, his voice a velvet purr. "If I can't have the best, I might as well call it a night as well."

"When you say it like that, I almost believe you," she said.

"You should."

She didn't know what it was. She couldn't name it perversity or lust or anything else sensible. Instead, it was an impulse so profound that she had to give in to it. The stools didn't make them the same height, but it at least took some of the disadvantage away as she leaned over to kiss him. He tasted of the juniper and sharpness of his gin and tonic, he tasted male, he tasted delicious. She had taken him by surprise. For a few moments, he froze, but then one hand cupped the back of her neck, holding her still as he kissed her back.

Angie fell into the kiss, and for a moment, she felt like exactly what he had called her. She felt beautiful, she felt desired. She felt like the best in the room.

She pulled herself away. For a moment, she thought he would lean in to kiss her again, but instead he only watched her, his eyes as black as obsidian and intense.

"I'm heading out," she said, tossing some cash on the bar for their drinks. "I … this has been lovely, thank you."