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Despite Rashid’s thrilling warning about her spending the night, nothing had happened

In fact, what she’d feared most had occurred He’d treated her like an inapproachable charge in his custody

This gigantic residence turned out to have separate areas, even though none had any doors since the place was made for one person’s privacy One area was in thewall, which was used as his bedrooht

The huge room was even sparser than the rest of the place, with only a skylight, a built-in wardrobe and a nine-by-nine-foot ht, the connecting bathroo and sleeping quarters were a throwback to his life as a survivalist, where hygiene was involved, Rashid had succumbed to state-of-the-art luxury

He’d offered her so to replace her stilettos, he’d encouraged her to go barefoot, assuring her he kept the floors spotless Then, without so ht, he’d left her

And here she was, sitting on his “bed,” flooded to the knee in his sweatshirt and unable to sleep

Not because he’d let her stay the night with him, but not really with him at all But because now that she’d had time to think, she realized the real reason behind her earlier desperation to stay She’d sensed so With him

She had felt it, heard it and seen it while he’d been ripping her attackers apart That volcanic rage that had incinerated his reason Far beyond anything an ordinary man would feel about scu uncontrollable, consu Terrible

The effort she’d felt hi his violence under control, the volatility she’d felt hile with so he could appear stable under her scrutiny, had singed her with its intensity This hadn’t been a new reaction ignited by tonight’s events This was old And iine what had spawned it But she knehatever it was continued to prey on hi him, body and mind, was just beneath the surface

And even before she’d analyzed all that consciously, she hadn’t been able to let that demon consume the man she loved any further, not when it had manifested in full force this ti what she felt for hier the same man she’d had a crush on all her life? He was now far er-than-life,than anyone she’d ever met Even under normal circumstances, she would have been disturbed at the prospect of allowing herself any eraded Rashid But she saw no reason for caution or trepidation nohen she never had before She wouldn’t have to deal with the consequences of emotions that would no doubt remain unrequited Rashid was driven, self-contained and off-limits He had no place in his life for a woht her peace to accept her emotions, even revel in them To know the one man she could love existed, and why exactly she loved him, and would never be with another

It wasn’t as pathetic or melodramatic as it sounded She’d even call it wise, since that was learning from others’ experiences and es that had been made without love and how disastrously they’d ended, or worse, continued She also had the exaes that had flourished because they’d been based on the kind of love that caainst all odds That kind of love she’d feel only for Rashid It was unwise, even self-destructive, settling for less But ere the odds he’d reciprocate her eht have let her “influence” hiht, but only as an extension of his chivalry Maybe the old tiantuan sense of honor After all, he’d once gone to uniths to pay the debts of a iven him when the already motherless Rashid had become a coh her