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“You see that role” He was still speaking in that cale beneath it, aware—she could tell fro but couldn’t be—that every as pu strips fro it That he wanted this, no matter how badly it hurt her Or him “You are a pawn”

“Khaled—”

“My country kept the outside world at bay for so long that we ca but barbarians It is e that perception and our fortunes along with it, but how? And then you stumbled into my life The standard-issue American nobody”

She thought she said his naht, she felt too raw and she understood she didn’tfor hi like this since he’d poured her tea

His cruel aze stark and hollow, but then it was gone Cleo knew she ined it

“There isn’t a single thing about you that is anything but ordinary, Cleo, and that is precisely why I wanted you It is the only reason I wanted you I spun you into a princess from a handful of straw”

She thought she was numb—but surely it would hurt less if she was? He leaned closer, his gray gaze nearly silver with te beneath it that hter She had always stood up for herself, eventually How ht, when it would neverbut wait for the next blow

“And look how beautifully you have served your purpose,” Khaled continued, cruel and reined hi but benevolent “But I cannot have you getting ideas above your station You arethat means to me is that sooner or later, you will provide me with children”

“To do what?” she heard herself say in an awful voice, thick with all the things she couldn’t seem to say, couldn’t let herself feel for fear it would destroy her even more than he already had, couldn’t even process while she still sat there before hiain “Obey more of your commands? So you can have a whole collection of helpless, servile creatures to do your bidding?”

He sh her “If you do not obey me, Cleo, I will simply replace you”

She didn’t knohat it said about her that even now, even after what had transpired between theht, she couldn’t believe he’d said that That she could feel still ain

“Khaled” Where did that voice come from? So quiet and broken, but still hers—as if it was pushed out from the very heart of her She lifted her hands up and held them out in supplication, and she couldn’t even hate herself for it She understood, so out of control I don’t want to challenge you I only want to be with you I want a partner, a true e—”