The Brides of Amrah Kingdom

CHAPTER TWO

RASHID watched the Hon Emily Coolidge finger the large diamond nestled against her rather bony chest and felt a familiar wave of boredom wash over him. This was his mother’s country, the country in which he’d received much of his education, but he felt very little affinity with it. Or with the people who lived in it.

It felt empty. Soulless. Emily had to know he’d never choose her, or anyone like her, as the mother of his children. It made her behaviour inexplicable.

The brunette’s finger moved again across the cool plains of the diamond droplet. There’d been a time, not so long ago, when that unspoken offer would have been appealing. In fact, he wouldn’t have stopped to think about it. He’d merely have lost himself in mindless pleasure, content that Western women seemed to view these things differently.

‘Will you be in London next week?’

Rashid twisted the champagne glass between thumb and forefinger, concentrating on the play of light on the liquid in his glass. He really hadn’t thought much about who the mother of his children would be. It was always something for the future. Something far distant.

But now things were changing. He felt a mortality that had never touched him before. There had to be something inbuilt that made a man long to pass on his genes. To feel that he would go on…

Was that it? Was that what this gnawing dissatisfaction with his life was about? A wanting to set his place in history? To find meaning?

‘I’m returning to town after this evening.’ Again the brunette moved her hand suggestively across her low décolletage. ‘Wouldn’t it be fabulous if we could spend some time together before you fly back to Amrah?’

‘No.’ And then he cursed himself for what had been a staggering lack of good manners. His shoulders moved in an apologetic shrug. ‘My father…’

Rashid let the sentence hang unfinished. The doctors, he knew, would do everything they could, but neither he, nor any man, could hope to foresee what the next few months would bring.

Emily leant forward and touched his hand, outwardly concerned.

Rashid studied her face. She didn’t care. There was no genuine emotion in her painted eyes.

And he couldn’t be bothered.

The truth of that slid into his brain like a dagger through silk. He wanted to shake these people off, move away, find space to breathe. And yet he had the responsibility of a guest towards his host’s friends. A responsibility he was shirking.

It was a relief when a loud crack ripped across the general murmur of conversation. He looked out towards the formal gardens stretching down to the ornamental lake and at the white firework cascading down like some overblown pompom.

‘Oh, my God, how lovely.’ Emily unwound her overly long body and stood, hand raised to shield her eyes as though that would somehow make it easier to see what was happening out in the landscaped gardens. ‘Fireworks! Oh, Rashid, how beautiful.’ She turned her long neck so she could look directly at him.

Another sharp crack, followed by a hiss and sizzle, and he caught sight of a particularly spectacular cascade of golden shards.

‘I love fireworks!’

Vaguely, very vaguely, he was aware of the movement around the table. Chairs scraped back and then Nick’s hand touching his arm. ‘Coming to see?’

Rashid shook his head. He looked up and met his friend’s understanding blue eyes. Nick knew why he was here and would be tolerant if his behaviour wasn’t quite as it should be.

Rashid’s head jerked upwards as he felt the spurt of anger flicker deep inside him. Under any other circumstances he wouldn’t be here. Given half a choice he’d be back in Amrah, ready to spend precious time with his father if he was sent for. And he’d have been watching his brother’s back, holding off the factions that were all too eager to turn recent events to their advantage.

His friend smiled and deftly manoeuvred the rest of the party outside. Rashid pulled a weary hand across his face and then let his eyes wander along the panelled walls. So different from home, but no less beautiful. Shelton Castle was a place of wealth. A little shabby, but in the English style of conserving all that was old regardless of fashion.

He’d come hoping to understand—and he didn’t. The fifteenth Duke of Missenden was feckless and without honour. He fully deserved the destiny he had created for himself, Rashid thought, and if he’d scared him by coming here, so much the better.

Rashid was distracted by a flash of peacock-blue dipping in and out of the black-dinner-suited men clustered by the doors to the terrace. He sat back in his chair and watched Miss Pollyanna Anderson weave her way through the tightly packed throng watching the fireworks.

She was his one uncertainty. Where did she fit into all this? Last night he’d finally accepted Nick’s statement that the dowager duchess and her daughter were not accepted by the late duke’s children and therefore unlikely to be complicit in anything underhand.

But Pollyanna was too confident. She’d worked the room tonight with the assurance of someone who knew she belonged.

It had been Pollyanna who’d orchestrated the staff so they were largely inconspicuous. Pollyanna who’d managed the minor fracas earlier. He couldn’t see her as someone passive. She appeared strong and capable.

So, given all that, was he prepared to accept Pollyanna Anderson’s sudden desire to come to Amrah was a mere coincidence? His strong mouth twisted. And if it were not a coincidence, what he wanted to know was what she hoped to gain. And by what means did she intend to gain it?

His eyes narrowed. Did she hope to coerce him into silence by distorting what she saw in his country? Or was she some kind of a honey trap? Set to embarrass him and discredit his evidence?

That didn’t feel right. She moved gracefully enough, but she didn’t walk in a way that suggested she expected to be looked at. Her dress was a stunning colour, which brought out the deep blue of her eyes, but he doubted it had been made by any of the designers the women he’d spent time with would have deemed worthy of notice.

She was attractive, he conceded, but in a very English way. Wide blue eyes, pale alabaster skin and hair the colour of desert sand. But no femme fatale. And, baring the fact he was certain she’d known exactly who he was and where he was to be found at any given time this evening, she’d not tried to approach him.

She’d been too busy working, controlling the events of the evening with a skill born of practice. He watched her as she paused, looking back towards the fireworks with a slight smile. Then she raised a hand to rub her neck and turned away. Her movements were rapid and she walked with obvious purpose across the highly polished floor towards a narrow door in the back wall.

It was the small furtive glance she made back across the now almost empty ballroom that had Rashid on his feet. Curiosity had always been his besetting sin and this was beyond temptation.

Rashid sidestepped the table and followed her across the ballroom. The door she’d walked through opened easily and he slid quietly into what appeared to be an intimate but ornately furnished sitting room. Gilt mirrors hung on the opposite wall and the furniture looked as if it belonged in a museum rather than a family home. All with a faded air of grandeur befitting one of England’s foremost stately homes.

It took less than a second to locate Ms Anderson. She was sitting at right angles to the fireplace on one of a pair of brocade sofas, as yet completely unaware he’d come in. Via her reflection he watched her slip off her shoes and reach down to rub at her toes.

The rhythmic movement of her fingers over stockinged feet was unexpectedly sensual and his eyes were riveted. Even more to the tantalising glimpse of her full breasts as the front of her dress gaped.

Rashid forced himself to look away and his eyes snagged on the back of her neck, with the two soft tendrils of honey-gold hair that had escaped the tight twist she’d favoured. It was the kind of neck made to be kissed. Long. Soft.

Maybe he’d underestimated her success as a potential honey trap? Pollyanna possessed a natural sensuality.

‘Ms Anderson, my name is Rashid Al Baha.’

Her head snapped round to look at him and her mouth formed an almost perfect ‘o’. ‘Wh—?’

‘I apologise,’ Rashid said, moving farther into the room, ‘for disturbing you.’

She hurriedly returned her feet to the torturous-looking heels she’d been wearing and stood up, letting the soft folds of her dress mass around her ankles. ‘No. That is, I…’ One agitated hand twisted the loose curls back into her chignon. ‘I’m sorry, did you need something?’

Rashid stopped a few feet away from her. ‘I’m no great lover of fireworks.’

‘Oh.’

Again that almost perfect oval. His eyes flicked across her flushed face and over a body that he knew Western convention would deem too curvaceous. She was not a conventional beauty, perhaps, but he felt a vague sense of disappointment that she was not a consolation prize.

Centuries ago he might have taken this woman in recompense for her stepbrother’s sins. Maybe there’d been wisdom in that. It was just possible that a few weeks in the arms of Miss Pollyanna Anderson might go some way to dissipating his anger.

He watched the tremulous quiver of her full lips and felt a renewed rush of sexual awareness. Rashid clenched his teeth and forced himself to look at the famed Rembrandt hanging over the ornate fireplace.

‘I thought this might be a good opportunity to talk,’ he said, looking back at her, determined to regain control.

‘Talk? I…’ Her hand smoothed out the front of her dress, drawing attention to her curves.

‘Or are you not aware your request to film in my country has been passed to me?’

‘W-we did think it might have been.’ And then she smiled.

She had an amazing smile. Rashid felt the full impact, particularly when it was combined with the feel of her hand in his. ‘It’s really kind of you, Your Highness.’

‘Rashid, please.’

The beating pulse at the base of her neck was the only indication he had that she wasn’t entirely comfortable. She had such pale skin. So white.

‘Rashid,’ she repeated obediently. ‘And I’m Polly.’

It took him a moment to catch up. A moment he spent remembering that he needed to let go of her hand.

‘Minty suggested I try to speak to you about it tonight, but I doubt I’d have had the courage.’

‘Minty?’

‘Araminta Woodville-Brown. She’s the producer.’ Polly hesitated. ‘Hasn’t she been in contact with you? I thought…’

Had she? Faced with a pair of clear blue eyes looking up at him he wasn’t sure that he remembered.

‘I thought that must be why you wanted to talk to me.’

‘I’ve merely seen the paperwork,’ he said in a voice that sounded overly formal. He couldn’t seem to help it.

‘Oh. Well…’ she moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue ‘…Minty thinks…that is, she believes it would make a good programme and I…’

She broke off again and took a deep breath. Then she smiled. Her blue eyes glinting with sudden laughter. ‘I’m making a real hash of this, aren’t I? I’m so sorry.’

If she’d been hoping to deliver a polished presentation in support of the application sitting on his desk she certainly was, but at this precise moment he was more inclined to approve it than he would have believed possible.

She took another deep breath and Rashid found himself watching the rise and fall of her breasts. The fact they were now demurely covered made it more erotic than anything the Hon Emily Coolidge had managed in a dress practically slashed to her navel.

‘Perhaps I could get you something to drink and we could start again?’

‘I need nothing.’

‘D-do you mind if I pour myself some water?’

‘Not at all.’

Polly walked over to the mahogany bow sideboard and lifted a glass from the top of the water jug, chinking the two together. The noise was loud in the quiet of the room. Behind her, Rashid stood perfectly still. He was like some great big black spider. Motionless, and poised to strike.

Did spiders strike? Not that it really mattered. Rashid Al Baha looked as if he might strike. And, honestly, the reality of him was unnerving enough without adding the curse of her imagination. Tomorrow morning, the minute she opened her eyes, she was going to ring Minty and tell her the next time she had a good idea for smoothing out a bureaucratic hiccup she was to do it herself.

‘I—I always keep some water in here in case I need it,’ she said, trying to regulate her voice. Her hand shook slightly as she poured and a splodge landed partly on the tray and partly on the wood.

Everything slowed to half speed as the water spread out on the highly polished surface. ‘Oh, God, please no!’ she said, swiping at it with her hand. ‘Oh, help!’

This was like a waking nightmare and it couldn’t be happening to her. It couldn’t. What was it about her karma that sent everything around her into free fall? Her fingers made no impact on the puddle of water and she turned round, looking for something that would be more effective.

‘Here.’ Rashid stepped forward, holding out a clean, starched white handkerchief.

She grabbed it and started to mop up the water, then carefully wiped the underside of the glass. ‘Thanks. I’m not usually that clumsy.’ And then, ‘Actually, I am. I’m jinxed,’ she said, handing back his handkerchief. ‘But, look, no permanent damage. I live to destroy another day.’

She looked up and caught the waft of something tangy on his skin. A clean masculine smell. And she could see the dark shadow on his chin.

Powerful. That was the only word to describe Rashid Al Baha. It was apt for everything about him. Hard, masculine features, a honed physique that confirmed everything she’d read about his predilection for dangerous sports and a steady blue gaze that was startling against the black of his hair.

‘Th-that sideboard came to Shelton in seventeen ninety-two.’ Polly could feel the heat burning in her cheeks. ‘It would be dreadful if I was the first person in all that time to put a mark on it.’

Rashid smiled. He’d smiled before, politely, but this was something different. For the first time it reached his eyes. Maybe he was human, after all? Wouldn’t that be a surprise?

‘I’m sorry. Please take a seat.’ She pulled at the chain around her neck. ‘I should have said that before. I’m afraid I’m a little nervous.’

That devastating smiled widened. ‘There is no need to be.’

‘You clearly don’t know Minty. I’m no good at this type of thing.’ Polly took her water with her and sat back down in the corner of the sofa. ‘She’d do this so much better than I can.’

Rashid chose the sofa opposite. His eyes were still firmly resting on her face. It was unsettling. And that was putting it mildly.

‘Take it to him.’ Minty’s final words to her were echoing in her head. She was fairly sure her friend hadn’t factored in spilling water over a valuable antique, tripping over her words and generally not being able to think of anything anyway. Her mind was a complete blank.

And all the while those blue eyes watched her. Polly looked away and gently chewed at her bottom lip.

‘I would be interested to know how you come to be involved?’ he prompted, as though he knew she was never going to be able to get started alone.

He had an amazing voice, too. His accent wasn’t so dissimilar to the ones she heard every day, but the way he put his words together, the stress he placed on the syllables was certainly different. Unmistakably foreign despite his English-public-school education.

‘I suppose it’s because it was my idea. In a way. Although I didn’t expect it would happen.’ She raised her eyes back up to his face. ‘Minty’s the film-maker. She wants to make an hour-and-a-half programme which could be broken up into three half-hour slots. Something like that.’

His feet moved and Polly found herself looking down at his highly polished Italian shoes. She was sure they were Italian. Expensive and very beautiful. Everything about him screamed an understated wealth. The kind of wealth that could buy a racehorse like Golden Mile as an individual rather than as part of a consortium. Even in her stepbrother’s world that was unusual.

And here she was, sitting in the North Sitting Room with her heart in her mouth and her future, it would seem, resting on her ability to convince this man it was a good idea.

‘With you presenting?’

‘Yes, that’s the idea.’

Rashid inclined his head. He was like a panther. The thought slid into her head. That was a far better analogy than a spider. He was all contained power, unpredictable and dangerous.

‘I know we’d be the first film crew allowed into Amrah—’

‘The second.’

‘Second?’

‘When my grandfather became King he was eager to open our country to the West. Fourteen years ago he allowed a programme to be made and the result was deeply offensive to both my family and our people.’

Talk about wanting the ground to open up beneath you. ‘I didn’t know that.’

Any other man and she’d have asked what had been offensive about it, but she didn’t feel she could. There was an impenetrable barrier around Rashid Al Baha.

Polly moistened her lips and tried to find the words that would convince him that their intention was not to offend. Not in any way.

‘Our programme would focus on Elizabeth Lewis’s journey across Amrah in the late eighteen eighties. We’d like to retrace her steps, see some of the things she describes.’

‘Such as?’

‘The desert. Fortresses.’ This was so difficult. She was floundering and she knew it. She hadn’t thought much about what she would see as the decision wasn’t hers. ‘Camel-riding. Maybe even camel-racing. I believe she did that at one point.’

Rashid sat back on the sofa. ‘An important part of Amrah’s culture, but not one that is generally looked on favourably in the West.’

‘But the king has forbidden child jockeys by law. It—it was that,’ she struggled on, ‘which people found difficult to accept. Over here, I mean.’

Was she imagining a hint of a smile in those cold blue eyes? He really was the most unfathomable man. But, if his reputation with women had any basis in reality, he must be able to use that smile to good effect sometimes.

What would that feel like? If Rashid Al Baha looked at her with desire? With wanting? She felt a slightly hysterical bubble of laughter start in the pit of her stomach and spiral upwards. If His Highness Prince Rashid bin Khalid bin Abdullah Al Baha turned his notorious playboy charm on her she’d run in the opposite direction. He was an absolutely terrifying man.

‘I see. It is helpful to have it explained.’ The smile in his eyes became more definite.

Polly just hoped she’d wake up in a few minutes and realise this whole conversation had never happened.

Of course he didn’t need her to tell him what the international community thought about child jockeys. He was a highly educated man. A leader of men. He’d probably even been instrumental in implementing the ban.

She could feel the heat rise in her face and a dry, nervous tickle irritate the back of her throat. Just wait ’til she got Minty on the phone tomorrow. If it turned out she had known about the ‘offensive’ programme made earlier Polly was going to personally shoot her.

‘What I meant to say was that we wouldn’t be saying anything…contentious. It’s more a human-interest type of thing. A personal journey.’

‘Personal?’

‘Yes. Well, yes. That’s the plan.’

‘But not yours?’

She shrugged. ‘Only in as much as Elizabeth Lewis is my great-great-grandmother.’

‘Your great-great-grandmother?’

‘On my father’s side.’

A frown snapped across his forehead. ‘That wasn’t in the paperwork.’

‘I suppose because it’s not really relevant, is it?’

For a moment Rashid said nothing. ‘Her legacy is still remembered in Amrah.’

Polly risked a smile. ‘I still don’t know very much about her, but I gather she was…ahead of her time.’

This time she was left in no doubt that his eyes were smiling, but his voice was still dry. ‘An unusual woman.’

Did he consider that a good or a bad thing?

‘That’s it, really. Minty and I made a short programme on Shelton Castle about two years ago—’

‘I’ve seen it.’

‘You have?’ she asked, her eyes nervously flicking up. ‘Anyway, it was fun—and quite successful in ratings terms so Minty found it easy to get the funding for this one. And, well, th-that really is it…’ She tailed off lamely. ‘She’s put it all together and I know she’ll be more than happy to talk it over with you. I’m just there to provide a personal connection to the subject.’

And because Minty was quite determined her friend would find a life for herself away from Shelton. There was no need to mention that. It made her sound incredibly wet.

Besides, Minty might change her mind when she heard how this conversation had gone. If Rashid had even the slightest inclination to open his country to a film crew again he’d want to be sure the resulting programme would be well executed and she hadn’t done much to instil him with confidence.