Craving Beauty

One

“With this bond, I take my life and put it in the keep­ing of Marc Pierre Bordeaux. Forever and eternity." Hira's heart shattered into a thousand pieces as she re­peated the ritual words.

Smiling, the elder lifted the trailing edge of the silken red ribbon tied around Hira's wrist arid fed it through the lacy aperture atop the wall dividing the men from the women. The marriage ceremony was almost complete—soon she'd be wife to a man with ghost-gray eyes.

What should've been the most wonderful day of her life was instead marking the destruction of her dreams. Dreams of love, dreams of family, dreams of tenderness. Because instead of being wooed and won, Hira Dazirah had been part and parcel of a business agreement.

Her wrist jerked as the ribbon went taut. At the same time, the elder said, "He is bound."

On the other side of the wall, a single voice rose in the haunting cadences of the blessing chant.

Per the customs of her homeland, Zulheil, in a few more seconds Marc would be her husband. Marc with his slow smile and eyes full of temptation. Marc with his war­rior's face and hunter's walk. Marc, who'd demanded her father seal their business deal with his daughter's hand.

She'd thought him different. From the first, his ob­vious strength had attracted her, as had the way he had of looking at her as though she was precious. Then he'd smiled at her in that slow, sexy way. Unable to resist, she'd softened inside and out, responding to the glitter­ing passion in his eyes.

Believing that their shared smile augured the begin­ning of something priceless, she'd waited for him to court her. For the first time since Romaz had trampled on her heart, she'd felt the bloom of new hope.

Two days later he'd offered for her hand, without having spoken to her, and her illusions about her Amer­ican stranger had shattered. Instead of wanting to know the woman, Marc had been entranced by the shell of her body, the beauty of her face. The staggering pain of her bewilderingly intense disappointment had yet to leave her. It sat like a heavy rock on her heart, crushing and unable to be ignored.

"It is done," her mother, Amira, said. "The blessing chant has been completed. You are married, daughter."

Hira blinked and nodded, none of her anguish show­ing on her face. They sat in a sumptuous room filled with the women of the Dazirah family, women whose sharp eyes missed nothing. She would never shame her mother by coming apart at the seams.

Amira stroked her cheek. "I know this is not what you wanted for yourself, but it will be all right. Though your new husband is scarred, he doesn't appear cruel."

Not unless cruelty could be defined as inciting hope and then crushing it. "No," she whispered. "He doesn't."

But that told her nothing. Romaz hadn't appeared cruel, yet he'd ripped out her heart and laughed at her while he'd done it. She'd thought herself in love, so much so that she'd left her home and ran to him, ready to marry him without her father's consent.

It had been the only time in her life that she'd con­sidered an action that would've brought the scorn of society on her proud family. That fateful day, her hap­piness had been as iridescent as a summer rainbow, joy­ous and pure.

The minute he'd seen her in the doorway of his hum­ble apartment, Romaz's dark-lashed eyes had lit up in surprise. "Hira. What are you doing here?" He'd glanced over her shoulder, as if expecting an entourage.

She'd walked in, brushing past him, sure of her wel­come. After all, he'd told her that he loved her. "I have come to stay," she'd said, excited and a little afraid but so glad to be with the man she loved.

He hadn't embraced her as she'd anticipated. "Your family?" he'd asked, a frown on his handsome face.

She'd thought his reserve sprang from displeasure at her forwardness and had been sure that once he heard what she had to say, he'd forgive her for taking the ini­tiative. "They won't miss me till dinner. We have time to marry. They cannot stop us after that."

Some of her nervous joy had started to fade at his continued lack of a response. "Romaz?" She'd glanced at the still-open door, wondering why he didn't shut it so they could have privacy to make their plans.

He'd given her a strained smile. "Your father will dis­own you. You must think this through."

"I have! He'll never agree to our marriage. Never. Al­ready he seeks other matches for me." She'd wanted to touch him, but there had been an unfamiliar hardness in his eyes that had stopped her. "We don't need my fa­ther's money. You work hard and I'll get work, too. We'll survive."

The bitter smirk on his face had confused her. "You? You wouldn't know honest work if it hit you in the face."

Shocked, she'd stood there, unable to understand his anger. "Romaz?"

"Do you think I'll be able to keep you in the style to which you're accustomed?" He'd glanced dismissively at the bracelets around her wrists and the baubles in her ears.

His response sprang from male pride, she'd thought, relief shooting through her body like cool spring rain, bringing renewed hope. "None of it belongs to me. It is the family's." Stupidly she'd thought that that would re­assure him. "I don't need such things if I have your love." She'd been so earnest in her desire to nurture his self-confidence.

"Well you might not, but I do," he'd snapped.

Later she'd realized it was the very naiveté of her statements that had caused his charming veneer to crum­ble.

Her attempt at salvaging his pride had instead proved the futility of his courtship. Financially Hira was worth nothing without her family.

"What's the use of marrying you if I don't get access to the Dazirah coffers?" He'd raked her body up and down.

"You might be beautiful, but in the dark, one fe­male body is the same as another."

She'd been so badly wounded by that unexpected blow that she'd frozen, her feet rooted to the floor. "You won't marry me unless I come with my father's money?"

He'd shrugged. "How else do you expect me to move up in life? Unlike your wealthy family, I have only one asset—my looks." He'd pointed to a face so handsome it routinely caused women to stop and stare in the streets. "I intend to use them to my advantage. I don't want to labor all my life like my father."

His sneer had destroyed her final illusions about him, for his father was a respected and skilled man. His fam­ily wasn't as rich as hers, but they weren't poor, either. Zulheil looked after its own, but no man could expect to gain wealth without work. Her father, too, spent much time "laboring" in his businesses.

Yet, even after Romaz had said those horrible things, even after she'd seen the truth of his nature, she hadn't wanted to give up the tattered remains of her dreams. Hadn't wanted to admit she'd made such a horrible mis­take. She'd been so foolishly innocent of the ways of the world, so untutored in deceit. "But. . .you said you loved me."

His expression had turned into a leer. "Any man would love a body like yours. Of course, I'll take that part of you if you're offering it without charge. Marriage is too high a price to own just you."

He'd crushed her with that dishonorable proposition. Barely able to function, she'd run from his apartment, wandering the quiet back streets for three hours. Just before darkness fell, she'd returned home by the same se­cret route she'd used to leave, and no one had ever learned of her attempted elopement. They just knew that suddenly all the fight had gone out of her. In one afternoon Romaz had achieved the outcome her father had been aiming for, for twenty-four years.

Now, almost six months after Romaz had cast her aside because her body alone wasn't enough, it was the greatest irony that she found herself married to a man who cared nothing for her money and only for her body.

"Daughter?"

She jerked up at the sound of her mother's voice. "Yes."

Amira smiled. "Come, it is time for you to wait for your husband."

Time to allow a stranger to touch her, Hira thought, anger spiking. Fascinated with him from the first, his act in bargaining for her like an object had turned her bud­ding desire into fury. How dare he reduce her to noth­ing more than the sweetener for a business deal?

As she followed her mother up the stairs, her eyes nar­rowed. Marc Bordeaux might've married her, but he would not have her. Not like this. Not without joy and ten­derness. Not until she knew the heart of the man he was.

Marc leaned in the open doorway, his body thrum­ming with, anticipatory tension. "Why the face? It's your wedding night, not an execution." He tried to keep his tone light, but it was hard when temptation sat right in front of him.

Hira occupied the middle of a canopied Arabian bed that screamed decadence. Hung with rich velvet curtains in a warm gold and made up with sheets of silken white, it invited sin and seduction. The luxurious hangings whispered softly in the heavy heat of the desert breeze wafting in through the open balcony doors, full of mur­murs of welcome.

It was as if Zulheil itself was urging him to indulge his hunger for his wife. To complete the invitation, her slender feet rested on pale-pink rose petals, petals that echoed the delicate pink of her wedding garments.

She should've looked like a dream. His dream.

But instead of welcome, there was only cool dis­tance in her eyes. The woman who'd captivated him with a single smile was subsumed under the crystal hardness of icy sophistication.

One aristocratic eyebrow rose. "What did my father promise you in the deal? Tell me and I'll deliver." That cultured voice with its exotic accent swept along his bloodstream, inciting him without intent. Her voice flared at the end, a stab of heat that was quickly smoth­ered by the ice, leaving him uncertain that it had ever appeared.

He clenched the fists he'd shoved into the pockets of his tuxedo pants, a feeling of dread infiltrating the joy with which he'd begun this night. "You agreed to this marriage, princess." What could've been an endearment came out as a taunt, her coldness stoking his temper. "I never wanted a wife who wasn't happy to be mine."

He'd starved for this moment since he'd first seen her on the balcony of her family home in Abraz, Zulheil's biggest city. Her face had been upturned to gaze at the stars, a wistful and somehow hungry smile gracing that lovely face.

"Your father refused to let me date you," he told her.

"You must know how old-fashioned he is. It was mar­riage or nothing, and you were asked your choice." He'd been startled by Kerim Dazirah's decree that no man was going to be allowed near his daughter without the ties of marriage, but had made his choice in an instant.

Driven by feelings he barely understood, he'd agreed to a marriage without courtship, chanced forever on the strength of one shared smiled, one instant of pure hap­piness. No woman had ever made him react with such impetuousness. No woman but Hira.

"Yes," she said softly, her strange light-brown eyes fixed on a point beyond his shoulder. "I had a choice. As much as any woman does when she has no indepen­dent means of income, no way to fight for her freedom, no chance of escape." Her tone was as emotionless as a doll's. "You were better than the alternative." The final line was heavy with disgust.

"Who?" He didn't like the idea of her with some other man, though he hadn't known of her existence until barely a week ago. From that moment, she'd be­come his. Only his.

Her full lips twisted. "You've met him. Marir."

"He's a relic." Marc recalled his one encounter with the oily merchant who was a crony of Hira's father. He'd disliked the man on sight because his eyes had kept straying to Hira, who'd been acting as hostess for Kerim's banquet. Marc had almost been able to see the old lech fighting the urge to lick his lips.

Simmering with possessive anger he hadn't then had any right to, he'd barely walked away without punch­ing Marir in his florid face. "Why would your father consider him a suitable match?" In spite of his lack of a beautiful face, Marc knew he was of value to the Dazirah family because of his wealth and business status.

"He has royal blood. Many times removed, but pres­ent nonetheless." Her mouth curved in a humorless smile. "My father always wanted to claim royal connections."

Another blow against him—he was no more royalty than the lowest bayou rat. "Then why did he accept me?"

"In my father's eyes, you are American royalty. As well as being a man of considerable wealth, you do business with our sheik and are welcome in his home—close enough to royalty to please him."

Marc clenched his hands even tighter, frustrated and angry. And hurt. Why did it hurt that this beautiful woman was rejecting him? Why did he feel like some­thing indefinably precious was slipping out of his grasp? "So that was all that was going for me? I wasn't old and fat?" He didn't spell out what they both knew. He might not be old and fat, but he was disfigured.

Scars ran in fine white lines down the left side of his face. His body bore far deeper marks. He'd become used to them long ago, his confidence founded on more substantial things, but this beautiful ice princess would surely have noticed. When she'd agreed to his proposal, he'd thought that the scars didn't matter to her. Now he saw that he'd been deluding himself. There was no wel­come in Beauty's eyes for this particular Beast.

She gave a regal nod and the shimmering light from the tiny, perfectly detailed chandelier caught on the di­amonds dripping from her ears. "I do not know you. You are a stranger. My father may have refused to allow a courtship, but you didn't even try to talk to me once!"

In fact, Marc had asked to speak to her several times before the wedding but had accepted her father's expla­nation that such things were not done in Zulheil. Unfa­miliar with the marriage rituals of this country, he'd been wary of giving offence and losing his chance to claim Hira. Not that that was any excuse, he thought harshly. He should've tried harder.

"Are your feelings going to change as we get to know each other?" Despite everything, he continued to ache for the gift of warmth she'd tantalized him with just once before. But he had no intention of taking something that wasn't freely given. Not even when desire was digging into him with razor-sharp talons and his body was heavy with passion so hot, it was al­most pain.

A sudden shadow dulled the almost-golden brilliance of her eyes. "I once loved a man." Her long lashes low­ered. "And I don't think I will ever love again."

Her words formed an arrow aimed at dreams he'd barely acknowledged but now knew were vital to his ex­istence. "Why did you marry me, then? Why make us both miserable?"

She raised her head and he caught a glimpse of red-hot anger in those changeable eyes. "My father said you wouldn't sign the agreement unless I married you. The deal with you is very important to the clan."

He swore under his breath. "The central agreement was signed and sealed before I asked for permission to date you. Nothing but the most minor ancillary matters remain." He wondered if she'd believe him, this beau­tiful, dusky desert rose. It was his word against her fa­ther's.

To his shock, he thought he saw a glimmer of tears in her eyes. "I thought he cared for me a little. . .but my worth to him has always been determined by my looks." The pain in her was so tightly controlled, it wounded him just to hear her. "Now I know he feels nothing for me, if he can so cold-bloodedly manipu­late me into marriage with a man he wishes to do busi­ness with."

Marc couldn't stand to see this proud woman so hum­bled. This was not how his haughty beauty was meant to sound, lost and alone. Striding to the bed, he sat down beside her. When he reached out to touch her cheek, she froze. "I have no intention of doing anything against your will, so stop looking like a deer caught in the headlights."

Her head jerked up. "Don't snap at me like that."

This was the woman he'd fallen for—this woman of fire not ice. Desire flared again, deep and heavy. With­out conscious intent, his fingers trailed down her face to rest on the delicate skin of her neck. She shivered at his touch, and hope blazed inside him. Driven by dreams he'd never thought to experience, he found himself lean­ing forward to taste her.

Harsh reality intruded when she turned her head away in sharp refusal, giving him her profile.

He dropped his hand and got off the bed. Walking to the door, he tried to tell himself it didn't matter that she'd rejected him. "Do you even desire me, Hira?" It was a question without subtlety, but he needed the truth, and from the lush look of her and her confession of in­volvement with another man, he knew she had to be experienced.

He hated the idea of those long, sun-kissed limbs intertwined with another man's, though he'd never been a man who judged a woman on her sexual history. He was no hypocrite. Except, it appeared, with this woman. Tonight had been full of unwelcome surprises.

Eyes wide, his new wife looked up from her intense pe­rusal of the white-on-white embroidered bedspread, her fingers crushing a single fragile petal. The sweet scent of roses shimmered into the air. "All you know of me is my face and my body—there is nothing more to tie us together. I don't believe in lying with a man unless there is emotion between us." Her voice almost trembled at the end.

And she'd said she would never love again. The pain in his chest was nearly overwhelming. “You expect me not to touch you all our married life?" He wanted to be very sure of her meaning, very sure of what he'd surrendered to his inexplicable but raging need to possess the woman he'd glimpsed by the light of a delicate sickle moon.

She continued to crush rose petals in her elegant fin­gers. "My father had another woman always. Can Amer­ican men not do the same?"

He rocked back on his heels. "Is keeping a mistress common in Zulheil?" He'd thought that this was a land of honor and integrity, a land where a man could find a woman who'd be loyal as well as beautiful, a woman who could find beauty in the night sky and in a scarred man's face.

"No." Hira's acknowledgment only gave him a mo­ment's relief. "It's considered dishonorable, and most of our women will not stand for it. If they cannot fight for their right to be honored as a wife, their clan will fight for them, even if that means dissolving the marriage." Her eyes met his, fierce in defense of her country.

Yet when she smiled, it was a parody of beauty. "But it's done in my family. My mother's clan does not help her because she does not ask. My father has her well under his thumb. He only lay with her long enough to gain heirs—my two brothers. You can do the same." Ice coated every word.

It was a blow to the most masculine core of him. "You obviously have no desire to be with child." He ran his eyes down her perfect form, something she'd hate to lose to a belly swollen with his child.

What a fool he'd been. Even after his long-ago emo­tional mauling at Lydia's hands, he'd married a beauty thinking that something far more precious, something the lost boy from the bayou had been searching for all his life, was hidden beneath the outer layer. Instead he'd gotten exactly what he deserved. "Don't worry. I won't need heirs for a while."

Turning, he tugged open the door with unnecessary force. He was so disgusted with his own folly that he didn't trust himself in the same room as her. Or perhaps it wasn't his anger he was afraid of but the dangerous sliver of hope that continued to dig into his heart, in­sistent that he fight for his wife. That sliver wouldn't let him end this marriage, not until he'd discovered the truth about the woman he'd married.

Who was the real Hira? An icy sophisticate or a warm-hearted innocent who'd once looked at him with shy welcome in her eyes?

Hira stared after her husband, her stomach in knots, her uncaring mask threatening to crack at any moment. The instant his footsteps faded, she jumped up and locked the door with trembling fingers, almost blinded by the light reflected off the diamond bracelets around her wrists.

Only when the bolt slid home did she crumple to the floor, stuffing her knuckles into her mouth to muffle her sobs. Tears streamed down her face, but she didn't bother to wipe them. Who was there to see if beautiful Hira Dazirah looked less than perfect?

You obviously have no desire to be with child.

Marc's—her husband's—disgusted pronouncement ran through her mind over and over. Like every other man before him he'd wanted her for her body and yet he blamed her for it. Even worse, he blamed her for something that was untrue.

She'd once dreamed of having as many children as her body would allow, with a husband she'd love. A hus­band who'd love her back. Those thoughts had belonged to a young girl full of hope and joy, a girl long since bur­ied under the pain of a heart crushed so completely she wasn't sure if it would ever heal.

Her experience at Romaz's hands had left her easy prey for her father's machinations. Kerim had used her sense of family honor to get her to marry, saying that they couldn't afford to have Marc renege on the deal. From what her new husband had said, clearly it had been Kerim who'd pushed for marriage, not Marc. Her father no doubt believed that Marc would favor family in matters of business; Hira already knew that the man she'd married would never succumb to such manipulation.

Kerim's lies had achieved no purpose but to bind her to a man who didn't want her now that he had her. She wasn't even to have the comfort of thinking he'd fallen for her with one glance.

So why had Marc acquiesced to her father's wishes? Only one answer came to her—he wished to own her. It didn't matter to him what kind of woman she was, whether she had a good heart or mind. He'd seen the outer package and liked it enough to go along with Kerim's demands.

Her father had sold her to cement an alliance, and Marc had bought her because he liked the look of her.

Between them, they'd reduced her worth from woman to chattel. She wasn't surprised at her father's actions. No, it was Marc whom she was angry at. Marc who'd be­trayed the awakening thing between them by marrying her without courtship or romance. According to all she knew, he hadn't even tried to get around Kerim's orders.

There had been more than simple desire between them the night they'd first met, but with his act, Marc had crushed that wild and tender emotion.