The Sheikh's Unforgettable Lover (The Sharqi Sheikhs Series Book 1) (3 page)

Karim leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, enjoying the feel of the air conditioning. Rubbing his head, he stared at the pile of papers strewn across his desk. Groaning, pinched the bridge of his nose and then looked back at the papers, which hadn’t moved since the last time he looked at them. He had so much to do before the shareholder meeting and it was becoming overwhelming.

He had spent the last several hours reading everything they had on the larger shareholders, the previous meeting notes and what he would need for this meeting. It was not in his nature to do anything halfway and he wanted, no
needed
, everything to be perfect for this meeting.

Suddenly the door opened and Kim walked in. Karim watched her walk cautiously towards his desk. Normally, he was good at figuring women out, but Kim had been a puzzle to him from the moment he met her.

Maybe it was because she was American, although he had met the Tazeem women and, admittedly, he couldn’t understand how such steadfast bachelors could fall in love. Love was for the weak and those who didn’t have shareholder meetings.

“Anyone ever tell you that it’s rude to enter without permission?” he asked her as she narrowed her gaze at him.

“I’m rude? Me?” Biting down her anger, Kim took a deep breath. “One of the maids mentioned that you had missed dinner. Since I was about to grab some dinner for myself, would you like anything to eat?”

“No.” He noticed that she was holding a math textbook and determined that she was probably coming back from tutoring at the orphanage. Amare had mentioned something about it but Karim had not enquired further.

“Fine,” she replied, turning to leave.

“Wait. Are you good with figures?” he asked abruptly.

“Kind of.” Kim nodded hesitantly.

“I have some stuff I need sorting out.” That was the closest he could come to asking her for help. He was usually giving orders and demanding things. He was definitely not used to asking for help or needing it.

Crossing her arms, she looked at him, “Anyone ever tell you that it’s rude not to say please?”

Staring at her, he couldn’t believe her cheek as she continued to stare back. He finally managed to ground out, “Please.” Nodding her head, Kim placed her book on his desk and picked up the sheets of paper to study them.

Since her head was down, he openly looked at her taking in her casual dress. Karim could tell that she had no regard for her image, as it didn’t seem as if she put much effort into it. She had very long brown hair that hung straight down her back and complemented her pale complexion. She had piercing blue eyes that he found intriguing. Her figure was more boyish than womanly, but it all seemed to suit her.

“If you don’t mind?” Kim asked, as she pointed to his desk. 

“By all means,” Karim said, pulling the chair out for her as she walked around to sit down. Grabbing a pen and a pad of paper, she began to scribble away as he watched her work out the figures.

The problem that Karim was having was that the business accounts were outdated. His father was stuck in his ways and hated change. While Karim himself was traditional in many ways; he believed that some modern conveniences were necessary, especially when running a global business. Some change was good. For example, these outdated files, it would have been good if they had been updated and put in Excel spreadsheets.

Karim was surprised that Kim was working on the documents with such ease. She did not seem to have any difficulties. Sure, he knew that she was smart; otherwise, she would have never been tutoring Amare. His family only ever hired exceptional tutors; however, he was still surprised at how quickly she worked. He caught her biting at her lower lip as his focus shifted from the ledger sheets to her lips.

Kim started explaining the formulas to him but he found himself unable to concentrate on her words. He had never noticed how full her lips were as he wondered if they were as soft as they looked. They were just so inviting. Yet, he had to decline the invitation, as hard as it was.

“Okay,” Karim said as he nodded. He decided to listen to what she was actually saying instead of focusing on her lips.

“So it is simple really,” she said. “It would be the same with these figures. Let me show you.”

As Karim stared at Kim, he noticed that she was quite pretty. Her face had an appealing symmetry. Her skin looked so soft that he wanted to reach out and run his hand along her skin to test exactly how soft it was...

Karim shook his head. What was he thinking? Kim was Amare’s tutor. Furthermore, she was a western woman. He started wondering why he was even allowing her to help him. He was fully capable of sorting everything out by himself.

“Actually, I can take it from here,” he blurted out as she looked up at him in surprise. Her lips were slightly parted and her eyes were shining brightly. He knew that he was curt but he was not bothered.

“It’s okay, I do not mind helping,” she said.

Why was she always wanting to help him? Karim asked himself. She strolled into his office in her nightclothes the night before and offered her help. He couldn’t figure out why she had offered. It was not as if he did not have things under control. He was perfectly fine doing things himself, his way, as he had always done.

“It is fine. You may leave,” he dismissed her as she looked at him with her jaw hung open.

“You just asked me for help and now you are dismissing me?” She put the pen down and shook her head. “Unbelievable.”

Standing up, Kim walked around his desk and stalked toward the door. Karim could not understand what was so unbelievable about that.

Just as Kim was walking out the door, she tripped on her own foot. She stumbled forward slightly but quickly righted herself and kept walking. He raised his eyebrows and shook his head. That was not the first time he had seen her tripping over her own feet and he found that it amused him.

Karim chastised himself for looking at her so lustfully. She was not his type. And while it was clear that she wanted him, he didn’t want anything to do with her. He could remember her watching him while he was working out and felt his body grow warm at her interest. Shaking himself, even if she wanted him to, he was not going to take her. Because of her, Amare was doing better than he ever had before. She was needed as his brother’s tutor. Complications from an amorous female that he paid too much attention to, he did not need.

Women always seemed to have more feelings for him than he did for them and the word
love
would often come up, which had Karim ending the relationship often before it started. He could never understand what it was with women and love. This “love” did not exist. It was nothing more than an infatuation. Women always confused hormones with emotions, he thought.

No doubt, Kim was one of these people. Western women were the worst when it came to this “love” thing. They were always looking for their so-called Prince Charming and he had no interest in being
that
man.

Karim sighed and returned to his work. It was not going to do itself. He wanted to make a good impression on their shareholders and in order to do so; he needed to understand his father’s ledger. Something he could do without Kim’s help. He just had to convert the documents over to modern spreadsheets.

Brought up by a father who ruled with an iron fist, Karim was taught that the only way to get things done was to do it yourself and to depend on a woman for assistance was tantamount to disaster. Their mother had died when Amare was only a few months old and the brothers were raised by a man who blamed their mother for dying and leaving them.

Unable to accept the loss of his wife to cancer, Saeed Sharqi raised his sons not to depend on women because they would only leave you in the end. Love, like all other emotions, was for those who didn’t have businesses to run and money to make.

At twenty-five, Karim had embraced many of his father’s traditional ways, but as he stared at his archaic accounting sheets, not for the first time did he question some of his father’s beliefs.

Looking at the notes Kim had made, he knew that it would go much faster with her help, but he was certain that if he asked for it now, she would make him beg out of some sort of need for self-satisfaction. While he still didn’t understand her motives, he knew that they couldn’t be altruistic.

It was late afternoon and Kim and Amare had finished early for the day. He had been worried about his English exam and since he did so well, Kim decided to give him the rest of the day off and he had left to hang out with his friends.

After watching Zara pointedly ignore her, she decided that she wanted to get out of the house. Slipping into a sundress and her flats, she grabbed her hat and her books and went downstairs to find the driver to take her over to the orphanage. Unfortunately, he had decided to remain near Amare and would not be back for several hours. Sighing, Kim contemplated walking, but determined that it was much too hot to attempt that distance in this weather.

Hearing an engine, she looked up to see Karim driving around the corner toward the driveway. Waving to him, she realized that he was intentionally ignoring her, so she stepped in front of his car, forcing him to stop. Pasting a smile on her face, she ran around to the passenger side of his roadster, opened the door and jumped in.

Karim stared at her, opening and closing his mouth as he clutched at the steering wheel.

“What? Should I have knocked before opening this door too?” she asked cheekily as she waited for him to speak.

“Exactly, what do you think you are doing?” he finally asked her.

Reaching for the seatbelt, she fastened it around her, “The driver is out with Amare and I need a ride to the orphanage,” she answered him.

“I am not going that way.”

“The orphanage is on the way to every major road. You
are
going that way,” she answered emphatically.

“No. I turn
before
the orphanage.”

“Oh please, it’s less than ten miles. If it’s that much of an inconvenience, I would be happy to reimburse you for your gas,” she offered.

“You will not,” he told her through clenched teeth. Throwing the car into gear, he exited the driveway and headed toward the orphanage.

“Could we have some music?” she asked him, as she reached over to turn on the radio. Sitting back, she listened quietly to the traditional strains of Arabic music that must be coming from a CD. While Kim could appreciate different styles of music, she found the lack of any type of particular rhythm coupled with the harsh sounds from the violins too much for her frazzled nerves and she popped the CD out and tuned into a modern radio station. “Sorry, it’s a bit too grating for me today,” she told him as she settled back and began to tap her foot to the pop song.

“And this isn’t?” he demanded.

Shrugging her shoulders, “Maybe but not in the same way. While I like some of the more modern artists, I find that the traditional music lacks any sort of comprehensive beat.”

Squeezing the steering wheel as he drove, “It has been around considerably longer than this pop music,” he replied as he sped up. The sooner he dropped her off and got away from her, the better.

“Don’t get me wrong, I like many of the traditional beliefs that still exist in Saudi Arabia, but I’ve had a rough week and I’m not interested in listening to cats yowling as they scratch their nails across a chalkboard.”

Slowing down, Karim took the next turn a bit too fast as Kim grabbed onto the door to hold on. Looking toward her, he realised that she was wearing a sundress and he could see her pale mounds poking out the top of her dress as they heaved up and down as she breathed.

Momentarily distracted, he looked back up as Kim cried out, “Look out!” Swerving, he narrowly avoided the oversized truck as the car left the asphalt and briefly rolled onto the hard packed sand.

He swore when he heard a loud noise that sounded much like a gunshot and quickly stopped the car. Looking at Kim, “Are you all right?” Unable to answer, Kim nodded her head before he got out of the car to check the damage. Walking around the car, he found the blown tire and kicked at it angrily. Moving to the back of the car, he opened the trunk and moved the contents out of the way to get to the spare tire.

Dropping the tire on the ground, he unhooked the jack and brought it around. Bending down, he placed the jack under the car and began to lift the car. He didn’t realise that Kim had exited the car until he saw her bare legs come stand beside him.

Looking up, she had pulled her hat tightly down on her head as she watched him work. Before he could finish, there was another loud noise as the jack released and the car came crashing back down.

Slapping her hand over her mouth, Kim coughed as she masked her laugh.

“This is
not
funny,” he told her as he replaced the jack and began again.

“Of course not,” she told him as she snorted in amusement.

Suddenly the wind picked up and Kim’s dress lifted showing off her legs as she squealed and pulled her dress tightly against her. Looking up, Karim wasn’t sure which was more enticing, the view he got of her thighs or how tightly she currently had the dress moulded against her body. Turning back to the task at hand, he finished jacking up the car and reached for the wrench. As he was about to loosen them, Kim interrupted him.

“Um, aren’t you supposed to loosen the lug nuts before you jack the car?” she asked him.

“Must you question
everything
I do?” he demanded as he slipped the wrench on a lug nut and went to loosen it. As he tried to loosen the nut, the tire turned causing him almost to lose his balance. Swearing loudly, he realised that he had forgotten to do just that at the same time she knew that she was right. Her laughter was better than any music as she began to laugh.

“Okay, while before, that was a little funny. This…this is a lot funny,” she told him as she continued to laugh.

Closing his eyes, he got to a count of five before he realised that the wind had shifted. Standing up, he looked at the sky.

“We have to find shelter,” he told her as he scanned the horizon for a safe place for them to seek refuge. “There’s a storm coming.”

“That’s impossible,” she told him. “I would have gotten a storm alert on my phone,” she added as she pulled her phone out. Holding it up, “See, no alert.”

Resisting the urge to throw the offending phone at the nearest rock, he tried for patience. “Look at the sky,” he started as he pointed to the darkening clouds. “The wind that was just blowing, it has disappeared. We need to find shelter and we need to find it now.”

Seeing that he was serious, Kim quickly pulled up a map of the area and found a shelter station less than a quarter mile from their location. Pointing it out to him, he went to the car to pull out his bag before grabbing her hand.

“Come on,” he told her as he began to run across the sand. Moving as quickly as they could, they arrived at the shelter station as the sandstorm hit. Rushing inside, he slammed the door behind them as Kim turned on the flashlight on her phone. Grabbing it from her, he shined it around the room and chose a location far from the door and any windows. Taking her by the elbow, he escorted her over as she sat down on a bench.

Still using her flashlight, he searched the building for supplies but saw that it was empty. Hoping that the storm wouldn’t last too long, he sat down in a huff and handed her back her phone. Seeing a smirk on her face, he tried to ignore it, but couldn’t.

“What is it,” he asked resignedly.

“Oh, nothing,” she answered before giggling.

“Clearly that isn’t the case.”

Laughing, “I’m marvelling at how well we were able to meld traditional,” she said as she motioned to the building they were in, “With modern,” she finished as she waved her phone at him.

Scoffing, “If it wasn’t for this
traditional
structure, we might not survive the storm,” he told her as he crossed his arms.

“And if it wasn’t for my phone, we wouldn’t have known
about this traditional structure
,” she told him as she gloated.

“You know, we wouldn’t even be here if you hadn’t jumped in my car,” he told her.

“No, we
might
not,” she shot back. “You, on the other hand, might well be stuck on the road somewhere with no idea where to find shelter.”

“I could have stayed in the car,” he told her realising that he sounded as though he was sulking.

“As if that was any safer. Your tiny little sports car would be battered around like a balloon.”

“I would have been fine.”

“No, you would not.”

“Why must you disagree with everything I say?” he demanded as he surged to his feet.

“Why must you act like a Neanderthal?” she shot back as she jumped up.

Grabbing her by the shoulders, he yanked her roughly toward him as she slammed against his chest. He stifled a groan when he felt her breasts swell against him. Gripping her chin between his thumb and forefinger, he tilted her head up toward him and stared down at her.

Kim’s mouth was open as she gasped for breath. Biting her lower lip, she stared back at him, refusing to back down. She watched as his gaze shifted and he focused on her lower lip. With his finger, he rubbed back and forth along it causing tingles to spark throughout her body as she felt her knees begin to give. Sliding one arm around her waist, he easily held her against him as he continued to rub her lip.

Dipping his head down, he captured her lower lip between his and worried at it as she made small noises. Swiping his tongue between her lips, he easily delved inside sampling what she had to offer as she collapsed against him. Holding her tightly to him, he continued to kiss her as her hands found their way around his neck and tangled in his hair.

He tasted as good as she imagined, she thought to herself as she tentatively twined her tongue with his and smiled at his answering groan.

Reaching for the hem on her dress, he rubbed his hand up the outside of her leg before sliding around to cup her ass cheeks, kneading them as she began to make mewling noises of encouragement into his mouth.

As he was about to pull her dress over her head, he heard the sound of car doors slamming and his name being called. Breaking the kiss, he stepped back as Kim lost her balance and collapsed back onto the bench behind her. Staring up at him in surprise, it took her a moment before she heard the voices calling Karim’s name.

Within moments, Amare and the driver walked through the door, both looking relieved to see him. Turning his head, Amare was surprised to see Kim with his brother and she appeared to be upset.

“What is going on?” he asked them looking from one to the other.

Shrugging his shoulders, “No doubt you saw my car?” Karim asked. At Amare’s nod, he continued. “I was driving Miss Atkins to the orphanage when the flat occurred. It looked as though a storm was coming, so we took shelter.”

Turning his head, Amare waited for Kim to confirm the story as she nodded her head in response. Smiling, he turned back to his brother, “Is that all that was going on?”

“What do you mean?” Karim asked.

“Well, the storm never came, so I’m wondering what you might have been doing not to realise that,” he said with a grin on his face.

“Nothing. At. All.” Karim replied as Kim looked away. She didn’t want to be involved in this conversation because they were very much doing something and she was disappointed that it had been interrupted.