Chapter Forty Five: Revenge Plans

She looked in shock at the vulnerability in his eyes. Since she had known him, she had never seen him that way before. Something had changed in him somehow, she thought.

The warm, generous man sitting across from her in exotic Moroccan garb seemed very different from the cold tycoon in a black suit she’d met in Hawaii. Had the desert really made him so different? Or was it just that she knew too much about the man

behind the suit?

“I don’t like that you lied to me about Illyra,” she said slowly. “Or that you brought me out here against my will. But,” she sighed, taking a bite of

the tajine as she looked at the sunset, “at the moment it’s a little hard for me to be angry.”

He swallowed. Reaching across the table, he briefly took her hand. “Thank you.”

"It's just a lot that you're apologizing. I didn't think you would ever do that."

She shivered as their eyes met. Then he released her as the servant returned with a samovar of filigreed metal. He left it on the table in front of

Viktor ,