One Hot Desert Night Read Free Page B

unattached.”
    Sunny held up both hands, palms forward. “Stop right there. I’m not in the market for a man, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
    “I’m thinking you could use a diversion after the idiot left you high and dry.”
    “It’s too soon, Piper. Cameron and I haven’t been apart that long.” And her internal wounds resulting from the attack had yet to heal. Wounds she had yet to reveal to her twin.
    “And by your own admission, Sunny, you loved Cameron, but you weren’t
in love
with him.”
    She’d argued those points with herself, but that hadn’t eased the hurt. “Color me gun-shy.”
    Piper’s features softened into a sympathetic look. “Maybe it’s time you make a sincere effort to rejoin the land of the living, Sunny. I’m not suggesting you sleep with Rayad. I’m suggesting you use your skills to find out what he’s all about and leave all options open. A challenge of sorts to get your mind off your troubles. And lucky for you, he’s staying in the room right next door.”
    She found that somewhat odd, and a little disconcerting. “Doesn’t he have a house of his own?”
    “Since he’s undoubtedly rich as sin like the rest of the family, I assume he does. But Maysa told me that Rafiq insisted he stay here while he’s recovering from an injury he sustained during some kind of incident.”
    He’d looked perfectly healthy to Sunny. Very healthy. “What did he injure?”
    Her sister grinned. “I’m not sure. Why don’t you ask him? Better still, why don’t you request he show you?”
    “Not interested,” she said, worried that she might never be able to experience true intimacy again. “Besides, I’ve never really been drawn to the strong, macho, silent type.”
    Piper barked out a laugh on her way to the door. “Yeah, right, Sunshine. Aside from Cameron, that’s the only type that’s ever held your interest.”
    Bristling from the truth, Sunny trailed behind her sister and prepared for a debate. “Don’t you dare do anything stupid like try to fix me up, Pookie.”
    Piper spun around and scowled. “You promised you wouldn’t call me that.”
    “You promised, too.”
    “Okay, you’re right. No more Pookie or Sunshine.”
    “It’s a deal.”
    “And I also promise not to play cupid,” Piper continued, “although Madison tells me Rayad’s a really nice guy if you can get past all that machismo. Just something to consider between now and the evening meal.”
    After Piper closed the door behind her, Sunny perched on the edge of the mattress and toed out of her flats. She’d already surmised Rayad Rostam was a testosterone-ridden military man, and that should be all she needed to know. Yet her innate inquisitiveness urged her to learn more about him. She craved peeling back those personality layers to reveal the man behind the steely persona. She truly needed to investigate him further, from a solely journalistic standpoint, of course. Even if she proved to be drawn to him on a physical level, a virile man like Rayad wouldn’t want the closed-off, fearful woman she’d become. Not even a nice guy could handle that—case in point, her former lover, Cameron.
    Rayad Rostam a nice guy? She frankly had her doubts about that.

Two
    M acho Man had a squirming toddler in his lap, and he didn’t seem to mind.
    Seated across from Rayad Rostam at the lengthy dining table, for the past ten minutes Sunny had witnessed his remarkable patience with brown-haired, chatty, two-year-old Cala, daughter of the former playboy prince, Zain Mehdi, and his wife, Madison, the resident palace fixer of all things scandalous. The patient sheikh didn’t seem concerned that the little girl had dotted his T-shirt with cheese cracker remnants. He didn’t appear to care when she poked at his mouth, as if it held some sort of magic. Sunny suspected it probably did. The tolerant sheikh simply kept his lips sealed against the intrusion and gently extracted her hand from his face, followed by a