“I’m surprised you have time to check in on me at all, considering the busy life you lead. All the travel . . . parties.” Giselle. “You really shouldn’t be bothered.”
A crease formed between his eyes and he took that full, sumptuous bottom lip between his teeth. Photographers from New York to Milan loved that look. I’d seen it sell a hundred products over the years. Once upon a time, that look had belonged to me and me alone.
“Your life, your happiness, it’s not a bother to me. It makes me happy.”
I swallowed, some of the fight draining from me. What was the point of this? “I . . . appreciate that. I want you to be happy too, Zakai. But please, let’s not do this again. You shouldn’t have come. We both know how this ends.”
He gave a slow, troubled nod, his eyes drinking me in.
A woman with a tray of champagne approached us, her smile dissolving at the apparently unwelcome expressions on our faces as we both turned her way. She inclined her tray. I took a glass but Zakai shook his head. “No, thank you,” he said. She nodded, and left us where we stood.
Zakai turned back to me. “Can we . . .” He looked around as though searching for somewhere more private.
I exhaled a breath, meeting the eyes of a woman I didn’t know gazing curiously at us, the woman beside her doing the same. Stares. I hadn’t liked them then and I didn’t like them now. “There’s a patio right out that door,” I murmured, walking past Zakai and toward the outside area. He followed me as I exited the ballroom, taking a deep breath of the mild spring air when we reached the small patio surrounded by newly budding trees. I focused on the tinkling sound of a fountain nearby. The brick paved area was deserted, as most of the guests were still eating dinner inside.
I set the full glass of champagne down on a nearby table, turning to Zakai and meeting his eyes in the dim light of the space. “Why did you come here? What do you want?” I whispered.
He moved toward me slowly, leaning a hip against the low wall that looked out upon the garden area. “Don’t you know?”
A zing of panic rang within me. But a quick assessment of his serene face told me my specific fear was unfounded. I drew in a steady breath. “How could I? I haven’t spoken to, nor seen you, in three years. Other than in all those ads plastered on billboards.” I heard the edge of pain in my own voice and cringed internally. I’d called him. He’d chosen to ignore me. I’d accepted it, but God, why did it still have to hurt so badly?
I’d be strong, I’d promised myself that. But I also acknowledged the cost.
He watched me silently for a moment. “That’s not me. Those are just images.”
I gave a small laugh but even I could hear the lack of humor. “I wouldn’t know the difference between that version and this one,” I said, sweeping my hand toward him.
He shook his head sadly. “That isn’t true and you know it. All those parties, all those pictures of happy, carefree people, it’s nothing more than illusion. Just like Sundara.”
Sundara.
The word hit me as though something heavy and sharp had been tossed my way. Something I hadn’t been prepared to catch and had instead slammed into my gut. I clenched my eyes shut. “I don’t want to think about Sundara.” Not tonight. Not with you.
He took a step toward me, and then another. Slowly. Fluidly. Not pouncing, as he’d done the last time we were alone together. But prowling. Perhaps agreeing to be alone with him had been a poor judgment call. When he stood directly before me, he reached up, running a finger over my bare shoulder, watching as the goosebumps rose in the wake of his touch. A look of satisfaction lowered his lids and made his jaw muscle tighten. He liked that he could predict my body’s response to him. Still.
“No? I do,” he murmured. “I think about it all the time now. I dream it. I dream that you’re beside me. I reach for you in those half-lit hours. Still.” The words surprised me, but so did his expression. He appeared thoughtful, not distressed. For so long, the word Sundara had caused his eyes to spark with bitterness or glint with barely suppressed rage.
“I was different then,” I breathed. “Whoever you reach for, it isn’t me. I’m not that girl anymore.”
But Zakai’s expression remained calm, almost wistful, as he continued, ignoring what I’d said. “Sometimes I even smell it.” He closed his eyes and inhaled. “Silt and jasmine.” His gaze met mine and he smiled, as soft as the poppy petals that grew along the wall of our long-ago home.
I turned away, placing my hands on the stone wall. “Stop, please,” I begged.
I felt his heat behind me as he stepped nearer. “I still remember the way the sugary dates tasted on your lips, and sometimes feel the blaze of the sun on my skin.” He paused and though I wanted to run, my muscles did not react to the command. This was the old Zakai, not the one I’d come to hate. Not the one who hated me. “Sometimes I even want to go back.”
“Back?” I choked, turning toward him again, finding his face close to my own. “How can you say that?”
His gaze burned my flesh, my soul, as white-hot as the desert sun he’d just spoken of. “Yes. Back. Back to the place where you loved me.”
And then his lips met mine, the nectar of his mouth making me suddenly mindless as his body pressed against me, our molecules merging. Igniting. Two halves of a fallen star, connecting. Flaring with sudden light. Too bright to bear. I held on and let it consume me as I always had because I was made for this—for him—one word reverberating through my head as I spun across an ocean, over a desert of gilded sand, back, back, back to Sundara.
Sundara.
Sundara.
Once we were starlight
Two halves of a whole
Fiery atoms
And radiant soul
A celestial collision
Separation unplanned
Our heaven shattered
As we fell to the sand
CHAPTER ONE
Seven Years Ago
He approached me slowly, his image wavering in the dim candlelight. His gaze was trained on my naked flesh, those obsidian eyes lined in kohl, like mine, so we appeared more similar. It should have made him look feminine, I suppose, but it didn’t. Instead it highlighted the sharp angles of his face and intensified his startling male beauty. And oh, he was beautiful. Sometimes it still caught me off guard. Me, who had looked upon him every day since I could remember.
His hand moved down my thigh and he leaned toward my ear, his breath hot and cinnamon scented. I exhaled, my muscles becoming pliant, relaxed. He was with me, and my heart beat with the love that filled every cell in my body, and cascaded through the river of my soul. “The man by the wall looks like a demented frog,” he whispered so only I could hear. “Don’t smile now,” he said, brushing his mouth against mine, hiding the curve of my lips. “It won’t provide a good show,” he breathed as his nimble fingers dipped between my legs. I moaned, letting my head fall back over the edge of the bed, which was set upon a platform. A dozen eyes watched, filled with hunger and curiosity. “Look ashamed, little star. They like that, don’t they? Kiss me. Kiss your brother.” And I did.