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‘Well, then,’ he said impatiently. ‘Where do you keep your candles?’
Livvy couldn’t think straight. He might as well have asked her where the planet Jupiter was in the night sky. Because the sudden loss of light and heating were eclipsed by the realisation that she had been on the brink of losing control. She’d nearly gone to pieces in his arms, because his touch had felt dangerous. And inviting. It had only been the briefest of embraces, but it had been mind-blowing. She hadn’t imagined feeling the unmistakable power of his arousal pressing firmly against her. And the amazing thing was that it hadn’t shocked her. On the contrary—she’d wanted him to carry on holding her like that. Hadn’t she been tempted to turn around and stretch up on tiptoe, to see whether he would kiss her as she sensed he had wanted to? And then to carry on kissing her.
‘Candles?’ he prompted impatiently.
She swallowed. ‘They’re...in the kitchen,’ she said. ‘I’ll get them.’
‘I’ll come with you.’
‘You don’t think I’m capable of finding my way around my own house?’
‘It’s dark,’ he ground out. ‘And we’re sticking together.’
Saladin caught hold of her wrist and closed his fingers over it, thinking that if only he had been accompanied by his usual bodyguards and envoys, then someone would now be attempting to fix whatever the problem was.
But he had undertaken this journey alone— instinct telling him that he would have a better chance of success with the Englishwoman without all the dazzle of royal life that inevitably accompanied him. Because some people were intimidated by all the trappings that surrounded a royal sheikh—and, in truth, he liked to shrug off those trappings whenever possible.
When travelling in Europe or the United States, he sometimes got his envoy Zane to act as a decoy sheikh. The two men were remarkably similar in appearance and they had long ago discovered that one powerful robed figure wearing a headdress in the back of a speeding car was interchangeable with another, to all but the most perceptive eye.
In Jazratan he sometimes took solo trips deep into the heart of the desert. At other times he had been known to dress as a merchant and to blend into the thronging crowds of the marketplace in the capital city of Janubwardi. It gave him a certain kick to listen to what his people were saying about him when they thought they were free to do so. His advisors didn’t like it, but that was tough. He refused to be treated with kid gloves, especially here in England—a country he knew well. And he knew that the dangers in life were the ones where obvious risk was involved, but the ones that hit you totally out of the blue...
He could feel her pulse slamming wildly beneath his fingers.
‘Let me go,’ she whispered.
‘No. You’re not going anywhere,’ he snapped. ‘Stick close to me—I’m going first. And be careful.’
‘I don’t need you to tell me to be careful. Don’t you have a phone? We could use it as a torch instead of stumbling around in the dark.’
‘It’s in my car,’ he said as they edged along a corridor that seemed less dense now that his eyes had started to accustom themselves to the lack of light. ‘Where’s yours?’
‘In my bedroom.’
‘Handy,’ he said sarcastically.
‘I wasn’t expecting to be marooned in the darkness with a total stranger.’
‘Spare me the melodrama, Livvy. And let’s just concentrate on getting there without falling over.’
Cautiously, they moved along the ancient passage. The flagged floors echoed as she led him down a narrow flight of stairs, into a large windowless kitchen that was as dark as pitch. She wriggled her hand free and felt her way towards a cupboard, where he could hear her scrabbling around—before uttering a little cry of triumph as she located the candles. He found himself admiring her efficiency, but noticed that her fingers were trembling as she struck a match and her pale face was illuminated as the flame grew steady.
Wordlessly, he took the matches from her and lit several more candles while she melted wax and positioned them carefully in tarnished silver holders. The room grew lighter and the flames cast out strange shadows that flickered over the walls. He could see the results of what must have been a pretty intensive baking session, because on the table were plates of biscuits and a platter of those sweet things the English always ate at Christmastime. He frowned as he tried to remember what they were called. Mince pies, that was it.
‘What do you think has happened?’ she questioned.
He shrugged. ‘A power line down? It can sometimes happen if there’s a significant weight of snow.’
‘But it can’t!’ She looked around, a touch of desperation in her voice. ‘I’ve still got so much to do before my guests arrive.’
He sent her a wry look. ‘Looks as though it’s going to have to wait.’
A sudden silence fell and he noticed that her hand was trembling even more now.
‘Hadn’t you better go, before the snow gets much worse?’ she said, in a casual tone that didn’t quite come off. ‘There must be someone waiting for you. Someone who’s wondering where you are.’
Incredulously, he stared at her. ‘And leave you here, on your own? Without electricity?’ He walked over to one of the old-fashioned radiators and laid the flat of his hand on it. ‘Or heating.’
‘I’m perfectly capable of managing on my own,’ she said stubbornly.
‘I don’t care,’ he said. ‘I’m not going anywhere. What kind of man would walk out and leave a woman to fend for herself in conditions like these?’
‘So you’re staying in order to ease your own conscience?’
There was a pause, and when he spoke his voice had a bitter note to it. ‘Something like that.’
Livvy’s heart thundered as she tried to work out what to do next. ‘Don’t panic’ should have been top of her list, while the second should be to stop allowing Saladin to take control. Maybe where he came from, men dealt with emergencies while the women just hung around looking decorative. Well, perhaps it might do him good to realise that she didn’t need a man to fix things for her. She didn’t need a man for anything. She’d learned to change a fuse and fix a leaking tap. She’d managed alone for long enough and that was the way she liked it.
She walked over to the phone, which hung on a neat cradle on the wall, but was greeted with nothing but an empty silence as she placed it against her ear.
‘Dead?’ he questioned.
‘Completely.’ She replaced it and looked at him but, despite her best intentions, she was starting to panic. Had she, in the rush to buy the tree and hang the mistletoe and bake the mince pies, remembered to charge her cell phone? ‘I’ll go upstairs and get my phone.’
‘I’ll come with you.’
‘Were you born to be bossy?’
‘I think I was. Why, does it bother you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Tough,’ he said as he picked up a candle.
But as they left the kitchen Saladin realised that for the first time in a long time he was feeling exhilarated. Nobody had a clue where he was. He was marooned in the middle of the snowy English countryside with a feisty redhead he suspected would be his before the night was over. And suddenly his conscience and his troubled memories were forgotten as he followed her up the large staircase leading from the arched reception hall, where the high ceilings flickered with long shadows cast from their candles. They reached her bedroom and Saladin drew in a deep breath as she pushed open the door and turned to him, a studiedly casual note in her voice.
‘You can wait here, if you like.’
‘Like a pupil standing outside the headmaster’s study?’ he drawled. ‘No. I don’t like. Don’t worry, Livvy—I won’t be judging you if your room’s a mess and I think I’m sophisticated enough to resist the temptation to throw you down on the bed, if that’s what you’re worried about.’
‘Oh, come in, if you insist,’ she said crossly.
But it was with a feeling of pride that she opened the door and walked through, with Saladin not far behind her. The curtains were not yet drawn and the reflected light from the snow outside meant that the room looked almost radiant with a pure and ghostly light. On a table beside the bed stood a bowl of hyacinths, which scented the cold air. Antique pieces of furniture glowed softly in the candlelight. It was a place of peace and calm—her haven—and one of many reasons why she clung to this house and all the memories it contained.
She walked over to the window seat and found her phone, dejectedly staring down at its black screen.
‘It’s dead,’ she said. ‘I was sending photo messages to a school friend when the snow started and then they delivered the Christmas tree...’ Her words tailed off. ‘You’ll have to go out to the car and get yours.’
‘I will decide if and when I’m going out to the car,’ he snapped. ‘You do not issue instructions to a sheikh.’
‘I didn’t invite you here,’ she said, her voice low. ‘We’re here together under duress and in extremely bizarre circumstances—and I think it’s going to make an unbearable situation even worse if you then start pulling rank on me.’
He looked as if he was about to come back at her with a sharp response, but seemed to think better of it—because he nodded. ‘Very well. I will go to the car and get my phone.’
He left the room abruptly, and as she heard him going downstairs she felt slightly spooked—a feeling that was only increased when the front door slammed. Everything seemed unnaturally quiet without him—all she could hear was the loud tick of the grandfather clock as it echoed through the house. She stared out of the window to see the sheikh’s shadowy figure making its way towards a car that was now completely covered in white. The snow was still falling, and she found herself thinking that at least he’d had the sense to retrieve his cashmere coat and put it on before going outside.
She could see him brushing a thick layer of snow away from the door, which he was obviously having difficulty opening. She wondered what would happen next. Would crack teams of Jazratan guards descend in a helicopter from the snowy sky, the way they did in films? Doubtfully, she looked up at the fat flakes that were swirling down as thickly as ever. She didn’t know much about planes, but she doubted it would be safe to fly in conditions like this.
Grabbing a sweater from the wardrobe and pulling it on, she went back downstairs to the kitchen and had just put a kettle on the hob when she heard the front door slam, followed by the sound of echoing footsteps. She looked up to see Saladin standing framed in the kitchen doorway and hated the instant rush of relief—and something else—that flooded through her. What was the something else? she wondered. The reassurance of having someone so unashamedly alpha strutting around the place, despite all her protestations that she was fine on her own? Or was the root cause more fundamental—a case of her body responding to him in away she wasn’t used to? A way that scared her.
Despite the warm sweater she’d pulled on, she could feel the puckering of her breasts as she looked at him.
‘Any luck?’ she said.
‘Some. I’ve spoken with my people—and the roads are impassable. We won’t get any help sent out to us tonight.’
Livvy’s hand trembled as she tipped boiling water into the teapot. They were stuck here for the night—just the two of them. So why wasn’t she paralysed with a feeling of dread and fear? Why had her heart started pounding with excitement? She swallowed.
‘Would you like some tea?’
‘Please.’ His voice grew curious. ‘How have you managed to boil water?’
‘Gas hob,’ she said, thinking how domesticated this all sounded. And how the words people spoke rarely reflected what was going on inside their heads. She looked into the gleam of his eyes. ‘Are you hungry? I’ll put some mince pies on a plate,’ she said, in the kind of babbling voice people used when they were trying to fill an awkward silence. ‘And we can go in and sit by the fire.’
‘Here. Let me.’ He took the tray from her, aware that this was something he rarely did. People always carried things for him. They ran his bath for him and laid out his cool silk robes every morning. For diplomatic meetings, all his paperwork was stacked in symmetrical piles awaiting his attention, even down to the gold pen that was always positioned neatly to the left. He didn’t have to deal with the everyday mechanics of normal life, because his life was not normal. Never had been, nor ever could be. Even his response to tragedy could never be like other men’s—for he’d been taught that the sheikh must never show emotion, no matter what he was feeling inside. So that when he had wanted to weep bitter tears over Alya’s coffin, he had known that the face he’d needed to show to his people must be an implacable face.
His mouth hardened as he carried the tea tray to the room where the bare Christmas tree stood silhouetted against the window and watched as she sank down onto the silky rug. And suddenly the sweet wholesomeness of her made all his dark thoughts melt away.
The bulky sweater she was wearing emphasised her tiny frame and the slender legs that were tucked up neatly beneath her. The firelight had turned her titian ponytail into a stream of flaming red, and all he could think about was how much he wanted to see her naked...
So make it happen, he thought—as the pulse at his groin began to throb with anticipation. Just make it happen.
CHAPTER FOUR
‘WE HAVE A long evening ahead of us, Livvy. Any idea of how you’d like to fill it?’
Livvy eyed Saladin warily as he drawled out his question, thinking that he was suddenly being almost too well behaved, and wondering why. She almost preferred him when he was being bossy and demanding, because that had infuriated her enough to create a natural barrier between them. A barrier behind which she felt safe.
But now?
Now he was being suspiciously compliant. He had drunk the tea she’d given him and eaten an accompanying mince pie—declaring it to be delicious and telling her he intended to take the recipe back for the palace chefs, so that his courtiers and guests could enjoy the English delicacy. He had even dragged a whole pile of logs back from the woodshed and heaped them into the big basket beside the fire.
Despite the thickness of her sweater, a shiver ran down her spine as she watched him. His body was hard and muscular and he moved with the grace of a natural athlete. He handled the logs as if they were no heavier than twigs and somehow made the task look effortless. Livvy was proud of her independence and her insistence on doing the kind of jobs that some of her married school friends turned up their noses at. She never baulked at taking out the rubbish or sweeping the gravel drive. She happily carried logs and weeded the garden whenever she had time, but she couldn’t deny that it felt like an unexpected luxury to be waited on like this. To lean back against the cushioned footstool sipping her tea, watching Saladin Al Mektala sort out the fire for her. He made her feel...pampered, and he made her feel feminine.
She considered his question.
‘We could always play a game,’ she suggested.
‘Good idea.’ His dark eyes assumed the natural glint of the predator. ‘I love playing games.’
Nobody had ever accused Livvy of sophistication, but neither was she stupid. She’d worked for a long time in the testosterone-filled industry of horse racing and had been engaged to a very tricky man. She’d learned the hard way how womanising men flirted and used innuendo. And the only way to keep it in check was to ignore it. So she ignored the flare of light that had made the sheikh’s eyes gleam like glowing coal and subjected him to a look of cool question. ‘Scrabble?’ she asked. ‘Or cards?’
‘Whichever you choose,’ he said. ‘Although I must warn you now that I shall beat you.’
‘Is that supposed to be a challenge I can’t resist?’
‘Let’s see, shall we?’
To Livvy’s fury, his arrogant prediction proved correct. He won every game they played and even beat her at Scrabble—something at which she normally excelled.
Trying not to be a bad sport, she dropped the pen onto the score sheet. ‘So how come you’ve managed to beat me at a word game that isn’t even in your native tongue?’ she said.
‘Because when I was a little boy I had an English tutor who taught me that a rich vocabulary was something within the grasp of all men. And I was taught to win. It’s what Al Mektala men do. We never like to fail. At anything.’
‘So you’re always triumphant?’
He turned his head to look at her and Livvy’s heart missed a beat as she saw something flickering within the dark blaze of his eyes that didn’t look like arrogance. Was she imagining the trace of sorrow she saw there—or the lines around his mouth, which suddenly seemed to have deepened?
‘No,’ he said harshly. ‘A long time ago I failed at something quite spectacularly.’
‘At what?’
‘Something better left in the past, where it belongs.’ His voice grew cold and distant as he threw another log onto the fire, and when he turned back Livvy saw that his features had become shuttered. ‘Tell me something about you instead,’ he said.
She shrugged. ‘There’s not very much to tell. I’m twenty-nine and I run a bed and breakfast business from the house in which I was born. My love life you already seem well acquainted with. Anything else you want to know?’
‘Yes.’ His hawklike features were gilded by the flicker of the firelight as he leaned forward. ‘Why did he jilt you?’
She met the searching blaze of his black eyes. ‘You really think I’d tell you?’
He raised his dark brows. ‘Why not? I’m curious. And after the snow clears, you’ll never see me again—that is, if you really are determined to turn down my offer of a job. Isn’t that what people do in circumstances such as these? They tell each other secrets.’
As she considered his words, Livvy wondered how he saw her. As some sad spinster who’d tucked herself away in the middle of nowhere, far away from the fast-paced world she’d once inhabited? And if that was the case, then wasn’t this an ideal opportunity to show him that she liked the life she’d chosen—to show him she was completely over Rupert?
But if you’re over him—then how come you still shut out men? How come you must be the only twenty-nine-year-old virgin on the planet?
The uncomfortable trajectory of her thoughts made her bold. So let it go, she told herself. Let the past go by setting it free. ‘Do you know Rupert de Vries?’ she asked slowly.
‘I met him a couple of times—back in the day, as they say.’ His mouth twisted. ‘I didn’t like him.’
‘You don’t have to say that just to make me feel better.’
‘I can assure you that I never say things I don’t mean, Livvy.’ There was a pause. ‘What happened?’
She stared down at the rug, trying to concentrate on the symmetrical shapes that were woven into the silk. She pictured Rupert’s face—something she hadn’t done for a long time—fine boned and fair and the antithesis of the tawny sheikh in front of her. She remembered how she couldn’t believe that the powerful racing figure had taken an interest in her, the lowliest of grooms at the time. ‘I expect you know that he ran a very successful yard for a time.’
‘Until he got greedy,’ Saladin said, stretching his legs out in front of him. ‘He overextended himself and that was a big mistake. You should always keep something back when you’re dealing with horses, no matter how brilliant they are. Because ultimately they are flesh and blood—and flesh and blood is always vulnerable.’
She heard the sudden rawness in his voice and wondered if he was thinking about Burkaan. ‘Yes,’ she said.
‘So how come it got as far as you standing at the altar before he got cold feet?’ Black eyes bored into her. ‘That’s what happened, isn’t it? Didn’t he talk to you about it beforehand—let you know he was having doubts?’
Livvy shook her head as her mind raced back to that chaotic period. At the time she’d done that thing of trying to salvage her pride by telling everyone with a brisk cheerfulness that it was much better to find out before the wedding, rather than after it. That it would have been unbearable if Rupert had decided he wanted out a few years and a few children down the line. But those had been things she’d felt obliged to say, so that she wouldn’t come over as bitter. The truth was that the rejection had left her feeling hollow...and stupid. Not only had she been completely blind to her fiancé’s transgressions, but there had been all the practical considerations, too. Like paying the catering staff who were standing around in their aprons in the deserted marquee almost bursting with excitement at the drama of it all. And informing the driver of the limousine firm that they wouldn’t be needing a lift to the airport after all. And cancelling the honeymoon, which she’d paid for and for which Rupert had been supposed to settle up with her afterwards. He never had, of course, and the wedding that never was had ended up costing her a lot more than injured pride.
And once the initial humiliation was over and everyone had been paid off, she had made a vow never to talk about it. She’d told herself that if she fed the story it would grow. So she’d cut off people’s questions and deliberately changed the subject and dared them to continue to pursue it, and eventually people had got the message.
But now she looked into the gleam of Saladin’s eyes and realised that there had been a price to pay for her silence. She suddenly recognised how deeply she had buried the truth and saw that if she continued to keep it hidden away, she risked making herself an eternal victim. The truth was that she was over Rupert and glad she hadn’t married him. So why act like someone with a dirty secret—why not get it out into the open and watch it wither and die as it was exposed to the air?
‘Because I allowed myself to do what women are so good at doing,’ she said slowly. ‘I allowed myself to be wooed by a very persuasive man, without stopping to consider why someone like him should be interested in someone like me.’
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