CHAPTER THIRTEEN

      IMOGEN CAME AWAKE slowly and felt the sun on her face before she opened her eyes. She felt blissfully relaxed right up until she realised that she was alone in Nadir’s bedroom; the only sound she could hear was a hawk calling periodically outside her window.

      Nadir had gone again. He’d woken early and left her. Still unused to having help with Nadeena, she sprinted out of bed and only paused long enough to pull on a robe behind the door on her way out. It was Nadir’s robe, of course, and it smelt of his special blend of male and spice. Trying to ignore the way his scent made her tingle all over, she padded quickly down the marble hallway and into the living room.

      When that was empty she headed for the outdoor terrace.

      Expecting that she would find the same scene as she had the last time, Imogen heard the sound of Nadeena’s infectious giggles. She waited for the sight of the devoted Maab playing peekaboo with Nadeena when her heart all but flew into her mouth as she discovered that it wasn’t Maab or Tasnim entertaining her daughter, but Nadir—in the pool. The sight of his bronzed torso stopped her in her tracks and she drooled at the way the sun glinted off his skin and turned it to burnished copper.

      Pausing in the doorway and half hidden by a massive potted palm, Imogen watched Nadir throwing Nadeena up in the air and catching her just as her toes flittered across the top of the water, his biceps stretching and bulging in a fascinating display while Nadeena squealed with delight and clung to his neck.

      She watched quietly for a moment, completely unnoticed as father and daughter frolicked in the sunshine. It seemed impossible that only a few days ago he had been a single-minded playboy who worked and played to excess and she could hardly fathom that he could be just as at home presiding over a boardroom full of world leaders as he was blowing raspberries on a baby’s stomach.

      His handling of Nadeena as he turned her onto her stomach and floated her across the top of the water, speaking to her softly in his native tongue was gentle and tender. But then she’d always known he had the capacity for that because she’d experienced it herself fifteen months ago in Paris.

      And after last night she knew he was a man who felt things deeply and she felt awful. Awful for the tragedy he had endured and for the fact that he believed he had created it and awful because she had kept Nadeena’s birth from him and had never planned to tell him. In her defence, she had believed that she was acting in the best interests of her daughter but watching the two of them together over the past few days had shown her that she had been wrong.

      It seemed bizarre that a week ago she would have said that he was not father material and yet her own father had been held up as a wonderful family man in the community and she didn’t have one memory of him holding her and playing with her as Nadir was doing with their baby now.

      A lump formed in her throat. Yes, Minh had played with Nadeena and there was no doubt he was a wonderful male figure whom she hoped would stay in their lives for ever but he wasn’t Nadeena’s flesh and blood and why would she want to substitute that when Nadir obviously cared for their baby so much already? Yes, he could change his mind one day; yes, he could walk away, but maybe he wouldn’t either.

      ‘Imogen! Habibi.’

      Catching sight of her, Nadir moved towards the edge of the pool and Nadeena bounced in his arms with excitement as she smiled and stepped outside. ‘I’ve been teaching the kid to swim and she’s a natural.’

      Imogen grinned as he called her the kid. ‘She’s five months old—you can’t possibly tell.’

      ‘I can tell. And I read that the earlier you get a child used to water the better they are and she loves it.’

      She also loved him, by the look of glee on her chubby face, and it only drove her feeling of guilt deeper. ‘Does she need feeding?’

      ‘Maybe.’ His gaze swept over her and she realised how dishevelled she looked. ‘You come straight from bed, habibi?’

      The way he said bed made her blush and she was constantly surprised by her visceral reaction to this man. All he had to do was look at her like he was now and she would happily let him do whatever he wanted as frequently as he wanted. Was it any wonder she had fallen for him again? She knew she’d been a fool to think that she could spend time with someone so utterly virile and not crave more.

      ‘Are you hungry?’ he said, climbing out of the pool with Nadeena lifted high against his shoulder. ‘There’s pastries and fresh fruit on the table and also a pot of tea, although it might need reheating.’

      ‘Thanks.’ About to take Nadeena from him, she was startled when he dropped a sweet lingering kiss on her lips. ‘Sabah el kheer. Good morning, beautiful,’ he said with a sexy grin.

      Imogen swallowed the lump that hadn’t quite disappeared from her throat. ‘Good morning to you too.’

      She settled into an outdoor chair and put Nadeena to her breast while Nadir sat beside them and fielded calls on his phone. He hadn’t bothered to put anything else on in the heat and she couldn’t take her eyes off his long lean form in black swimming trunks and nothing else.

      When Nadeena had finished he made a joke about her burping technique and walked Nadeena around until her stomach had settled.

      Knowing there was no easy way to say what needed to be said, Imogen decided to just bite the bullet. ‘Nadir, I’m sorry I didn’t try to contact you when she was born. It was wrong of me. I see that now.’

      Nadir stilled as if he hadn’t been expecting her apology and why would he? It was only this morning she’d really understood how wrong she had been.

      He looked at her. ‘I wasn’t exactly at my best at the time I found out you were pregnant.’ He rubbed his stubbled jaw and gave her a crooked grin. ‘And I don’t blame you at all for running when you did. Hell, I probably would have as well.’

      Imogen hated that he still thought she had run from him but then she realised with a flash of insight that that was exactly what she had done.

      She had run.

      She had done what she had so often begged her mother to do when she’d found her crying over her father yet again.

      ‘That’s nice of you but in hindsight I should have hung around to have at least talked to you.’

      ‘But I wasn’t there, habibi, and I didn’t tell you when I’d be coming back.’

      She sighed. ‘I know, but...’

      He moved closer to her and slipped the arm not holding their daughter around her waist. ‘It’s I who owe you an apology, Imogen. I was the one who failed you in your time of need.’

      ‘No...’ She shook her head and he leaned in and kissed her. Nadeena clapped her hands and Imogen’s smile turned watery.

      ‘Yes.’ His voice was rough with emotion. ‘I should not have walked out on you. It was cowardly.’

      ‘You were in shock.’

      ‘So must you have been.’

      Imogen bit her lip and studied him. ‘You don’t think I did it deliberately, do you? You don’t think I tried to trap you?’

      He shook his head. ‘At first I thought all types of things like that. But I don’t any more. I know you would never do something like that.’

      Imogen smiled, wondering how it was that she felt better when she’d wanted to make him feel that way.

      ‘What was her birth like?’

      His gruff