The Sheikh Who Loved Her: Ruling Sheikh, Unruly Mistress / Surrender to the Playboy Sheikh / Her Desert Dream
- -
- 100%
- +
‘Are you pregnant?’ Razi demanded, stealing the initiative.
His instinct shocked her to the point where she couldn’t speak for a moment. ‘Yes, I’m pregnant.’ She would never deny the existence of her child.
‘You’re pregnant?’ Razi’s voice had taken on a new and frightening tone as if he had hit her with the most extreme reason he could think of for her coming to Isla de Sinnebar and had only just realised it might be true.
Lucy’s hands flew to protect her womb as Razi stared at her and for one glittering moment the prospect of having Razi al Maktabi as her protector and the hands-on father of her child was a heady prospect, but then she accepted reality. He would never acknowledge a foreigner who was virtually a member of his kitchen staff as an equal and a royal child would never be allowed to leave the country. She had told him the truth and was damned. If she hadn’t told him she would have been equally damned, for then she would never have been able to look her child in the eyes and tell that child the truth about her father.
‘So that’s why you fell into a faint at my feet—and why you looked so pale when we arrived in the desert.’ Razi’s expression darkened. ‘Have you no sense of responsibility? No concern for anyone but yourself? Don’t you care about your child? Or—’
‘You?’ Lucy interrupted. She had paled beneath Razi’s onslaught, but rallied to defend the truth. ‘I care about you more than you know.’
Even as he exclaimed with disbelief she saw a look in his eyes she’d never seen before. It spoke of a fierce pain—a pain from the past that still had the power to hurt him. ‘I’m pregnant, Razi,’ she said quietly, ‘and that’s a fact as well as a cause for rejoicing. I’m afraid you’ll just have to get used to it—I have.’
Get used to it? He was already changing. A baby? He was ice. He was fire. He didn’t dare to hope. ‘A baby or our baby?’ he demanded, fuelled by unbearable suspicion.
‘My baby.’
‘That doesn’t answer my question, Lucy,’ he told her coldly. But he could tell it was a baby she had loved from the first moment she had realised she was pregnant. He didn’t question Lucy’s maternal instinct. She would defend her child to her last breath. He envied her that depth of feeling. But all Lucy’s thoughts were centred on the baby and on her duties as that baby’s mother and this passionate new love had blinded her to reality and to the world outside her own cosmos. She could have no idea of the repercussions inside a country like Isla de Sinnebar if the news leaked out. ‘How do you know it’s our child?’ he said, feeling calmer now his mind had cleared to make way for this most crucial of tests.
‘Because there hasn’t been anyone else,’ she said, appearing more vulnerable than ever as she made this innocent admission.
He closed his heart to her. ‘How do I know that? How do I know I can trust you?’
Her steady gaze shamed him, but still he drove on to seek the truth. ‘How do I know that I’m not one of many guests you … entertained?’
He stopped the flat of her hand before it reached his face, holding her wrist in a non-negotiable grip.
‘Let go of me!’ she insisted, struggling to break free.
His answer was to bring her closer so he could stare into her wounded eyes. ‘I’ll release you when you calm down and tell me the truth—and I mean all of it.’
This wasn’t the civilised man she had met in Val d’Isere, but a warrior king, who was burning up inside with pain and fury. ‘Let go of me. Of course it’s our baby. I’ve never been with anyone else. If you need proof we can have a DNA test once the baby is born.’
Razi held on to her, his gaze unwavering.
‘Do you really think I would fly halfway round the world,’ Lucy demanded, throwing Razi’s taunt back at him, ‘without knowing it was your baby? I don’t lie.’
She stared down at his hands on her arms and he released her. ‘I also have a bank statement, showing that I set up an account exclusively for the money you left at the chalet, and that I never touched a penny of it.’
‘So you put your plans for a restaurant first, your child second and telling me about our baby a very poor third?’ He threw up his hands in disbelief.
‘I’m not saying that.’ This was all going horribly wrong. She had never meant to lie to him.
‘When, Lucy? When did you intend to tell me?’
‘When I returned to England,’ she confessed steadily. ‘I came here thinking you were Mac—a businessman—only to discover you were the ruling Sheikh—’
And a man who clearly mistrusted women, believing them incapable of love. Lucy only had to look into Razi’s eyes to know that his inner scars went a lot deeper than she had previously supposed. Some long-held wound was festering inside him. She couldn’t know the details, but she could feel the effect, and while part of her was filled with compassion for his pain, the part of her that was a mother—and that part was swiftly becoming all of her—was terrified at the thought that the ruling Sheikh of Isla de Sinnebar’s only interest now was to secure custody of their child.
And what power did she have to stop him? Once Razi had done that she’d be his captive for life, for she would never abandon her child to the care of strangers. Razi lived on an island halfway across the world from where she lived. How would that work? When would she see her baby? How could she bear her child to live so far away from her? She couldn’t. And Razi wouldn’t want her here.
It was a problem to which there was no solution, and in this case the only form of attack was defence. ‘Why did you bring me to the desert? To show me a valuable ecological site? I don’t think so, Razi. You brought me here to get me away from the city and prying eyes. You brought me here because you’re ashamed of me.’
‘I’m not ashamed of you,’ he insisted. ‘Why did you come to the Isla de Sinnebar if not to trap me in some way?’
‘What? That’s absurd. How would I do that when you’re an all-powerful king?’
‘That’s what I want to find out.’ He raked his thick black hair with angry fingers. ‘Has it occurred to you that a scandal like this could rock my country? No—I didn’t think so. If I acknowledge this child it will be seen as my first act in power. How will that look to my people? And the mother of that child a foreigner in this, the most traditional of countries.’
He made her feel as if she had done something wrong—and there was no mention of a baby to love, just a country to be ruled with a rod of iron, heartlessly, like a company meeting targets to be approved by the ruling Sheikh. ‘It seems to me you support all the antiquated beliefs you have sworn to eradicate. And as for me—I don’t want anything from you.’
‘Well, that’s clearly untrue,’ Razi informed her coldly, ‘or you wouldn’t be here.’
‘I thought you should know, that’s all. I’m not trying to trap you into anything. I’m quite capable of standing on my own feet without your help.’
‘So you plan to have the child and I have no say in the matter?’
‘That’s not it at all—’
‘It must be one or the other,’ Razi insisted coldly. ‘Which is it, Lucy? Blackmail? Or sob story?’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
LUCY drew on her inner strength. ‘The man I knew in Val d’Isere would never have said that. And let me tell you something else,’ she added without giving Razi chance to speak. ‘You say you care about a country. I don’t believe you. How can you care about anything if you’re incapable of love? And if you’re incapable of love, I don’t want you to have anything to do with my child—’
‘Our child,’ he reminded her fiercely. ‘Or so you say—’
‘Yes, I do say,’ Lucy insisted, bracing for battle. Where her child was concerned she was fearless.
He had never felt such wild emotions. He wanted to hug Lucy and rejoice—yet also turn his back on her and never see her again. He rued the day he’d met her and yet longed for her to stay. She had to stay if she was having his child. The realisation that he was about to become a father had left him drowning in happiness, while the thought that anyone, even Lucy, might imagine she could keep him from that child was an abomination he refused to consider. The memory of a child living in lonely isolation, waiting for his brother’s visits to break the monotony of being cared for by strangers, was still too raw for that. If she was having his child he would not be denied the joy of seeing that child grow up. The thought of anyone but him protecting the baby, loving it as he would, was unthinkable. He wouldn’t stand on the sidelines for Lucy—for anyone.
‘Will I embarrass your wife?’
‘My wife?’ The red mist of anger was still on him as he refocused dazedly.
‘I presume there’s got to be a wife soon,’ she said, turning from shy supplicant to virago in a moment. ‘Tell me,’ she insisted. ‘I have to know. I have to protect my child. I don’t imagine you’d want me here in Isla de Sinnebar muddying the water when the time comes for you to choose a wife—’
‘There is no wife,’ he roared, stopping her, ‘or ever likely to be a wife.’ The face of his cousin Leila flashed into his mind. He had sent her back to university where she so dearly wanted to be and then had dispatched her greedy father with a flea in his ear and a cheque large enough to keep him off Leila’s back.
‘So, you’re married to duty?’ Lucy suggested, taking another tack.
‘And what if I am?’
‘That isn’t what I want for my baby, Razi. And if you’re closed off from love what good are you to a country?’
‘Let me be the judge of that,’ he snapped. ‘I’m interested in cold, hard fact—like what do you want for your child, Lucy?’ He was already calculating the amount.
Her wounded gaze said no child of hers could ever be bought. ‘I want my baby to be loved,’ she said quietly.
‘Yet you think me incapable of love?’
She didn’t answer. She didn’t need to and as his own doubts kicked in he turned on the person least deserving of his anger. ‘You should have told me the moment you knew you were pregnant. We could have arranged something.’
‘Like what?’ she exclaimed fearfully, lifting her arm almost as if she was shielding her face from so much pain. ‘Don’t say any more, Razi,’ she begged him. ‘Don’t say things I know you don’t mean.’
He took himself aside until he was calmer. ‘I mean I would have supported you and the baby,’ he said then.
‘If I were discreet? If I bowed my head—hid my child?’
‘Did you really think this was something you could keep from me?’
‘It’s why I’m here.’
‘And you think I’d be happy to have no say in my child’s life? How little you know me.’
How true, Lucy thought. They had shared the ultimate intimacy, but they were still two strangers facing up to one of life’s major turning points together. They had everything to learn about each other—everything to learn about how they would go on from here. But they had to go on from here and she had to make Razi listen. ‘I wasn’t keeping anything from you. I waited for three months to be as sure as I could be that the pregnancy was safe.’
His reaction shocked her. Wheeling away, Razi put his head in his hands as if for once there was a problem he couldn’t solve. She gave him space, sensing the renewed onslaught of his pain, though in some ways it was a relief to see such a passionate response from a man who had grown so cold.
Razi was a warrior, exotic, fierce and passionate—while she was a chef, neat and tidy—cautious, some might say; at least, she had been cautious up to meeting Razi. They both had so much to offer their child if only they could put their differences behind them. They must do that because only then could they start to build a future for their baby. But right now Razi was at his most untouchable, his most remote, with every sinew and muscle in his body stretched tight.
There had never been a moment when she had been frightened of Razi, but she was frightened now, yet this was the very moment when she must reach out to him, while the pull of duty was warring with his warmer, human side. For all her ignorance of such weighty problems, one thing she did know—a country run for the sake of duty would be a cold and barren place. She touched his arm, expecting him to send her away—or, worse, ignore her. She was used to being invisible, but that didn’t mean she liked it. You never got used to that sort of thing. It always hurt. She stood quietly, feeling foolish as the silence dragged on, but then the miracle she’d hoped for happened. Razi turned to stare at her. He didn’t speak, but the fact that he had responded at all was enough for now.
There was a world of questions in Lucy’s eyes, any one of which he could pick and break her heart. ‘I have decided that this is the way forward,’ he said instead, planning his words carefully.
He had no reason to mistrust Lucy, not if he made himself remember her innocence at the chalet. So he was already considering the timing for acknowledging Lucy’s baby in public. He would sell the concept of an unmarried ruling Sheikh who already had a child to the older tribesman as proof of his fertility, turning disapproval into approval at a stroke. Yes, he was a cynic; business had made him that way. Before accepting the Phoenix throne he had founded an empire largely on his wits. For sure there had been no help from his father, the ruling Sheikh. Plus, he had vowed to revise the antiquated laws of Isla de Sinnebar, bringing them into line with the modern world—so this would be his first act and he would turn it into a positive act.
He would stop at nothing to make a better job of parenting than his own absentee parents, but he wanted the throne too—and not for selfish reasons, but because he knew he could bring progress and benefits to his people. With good management and careful husbandry of the land and indigenous species, Isla de Sinnebar would thrive. There would be justice for all, a first-class healthcare system and the best education his money could buy. This was both his goal and his passion. He existed for no other purpose than to serve Isla de Sinnebar. He had not bargained for the additional blessing of a child, but as he outlined his plans for Lucy he realised it wasn’t a question of wanting to take the child from her, but more a matter of security for both Lucy and their baby. He expected her to fight him when she heard his proposals. He expected her to feel disappointed that she couldn’t be anything more to him than the mother of his child, but he was confident she could only be reassured when he told her what he meant to do to secure her future.
Lucy listened as Razi spelled out her glittering new life. The biggest surprise of all was his intention to acknowledge their child. She was so stunned she didn’t hear everything he was saying and had to ask him to repeat things.
Her eyes widened with disbelief. She hadn’t come to Isla de Sinnebar for this. She was to have a wonderful home of her own choosing in England—a country estate with stables, if she liked. She would have an income appropriate for the mother of a royal child, and a private jet at her disposal so she could visit their child—within reason—whenever she wanted to. There was no mention of joint parenting—joint anything. It was a clean cut. It was a life according to the old saying—beyond the dreams of avarice—but greed she had none, just a longing for the family life she had always dreamed of, where children would thrive and grow in the full knowledge that they were loved. ‘You’re very generous,’ she said politely when Razi had finished laying out all the benefits that would accrue from being, not even a royal mistress, but a royal brood mare.
He made a casual gesture, as if paying a king’s ransom to keep her out of sight was more than worth it.
She couldn’t leave it here. She had to find a way to touch him. ‘And you, Razi—what part do you intend to play in our baby’s life?’
He looked at her as if she were mad. ‘A full part, of course.’
‘And you’ll have time for that? You’ll have time to be a full-time parent?’
He waved his hand dismissively. ‘You don’t understand the life I lead.’
‘Clearly.’
‘I have over a thousand staff working for me in Isla de Sinnebar alone.’
‘Staff,’ she said quietly. ‘Is that how you were brought up, Razi? By staff?’
She could not have predicted the look in his eyes. She could never have guessed they would fill with pain. She knew immediately the cause of Razi’s seething anger and her heart went out to him, but where her own child was concerned it did not soften her by one iota. Her baby was not going to suffer the same fate as its father—and if that meant there would have to be some big changes in her own life, so be it. ‘I’m going to stay,’ she said.
Razi could not have looked more shocked. ‘You can’t stay,’ he argued.
‘Of course I’ll stay,’ she insisted. ‘And I don’t need a big house—just somewhere safe where I can bring up my child happily. You can visit any time you like. I would never keep you from your baby, Razi, just as I would never expect you to deny me access to my child.’
He stared at her in silence. Was that because he couldn’t believe what she was offering? Lucy guessed she was very different from Razi’s mother. He might not have spelled out the details of his childhood—he didn’t have to: it was all there on his face. His mother had been compliant, she guessed, and most probably petted and pampered for falling into line. But then the old Sheikh had tired of her and she had been ignored.
Well, Lucy Tennant was prepared to do none of this. She would make her own way in life. ‘I’m offering to stay without condition or expectation,’ she explained when Razi remained silent. ‘With your permission, I imagine I’ll be allowed to open a restaurant.’
‘What?’ he cut across her.
‘A restaurant,’ she said patiently. ‘It seems the obvious thing.’
‘To you, maybe, but I cannot allow you to work.’
Lucy frowned. At a stroke Razi had forbidden her to have a career.
She must be reasonable, she warned herself. She could see that maybe she’d made a blunder—fronting a restaurant would be too high profile. ‘I could be a silent partner—I could run things from the kitchen without ever showing my face. We have to find a solution, Razi. We must. We have to make this work.’
As he stared at her he realised that before this moment he hadn’t believed a woman capable of a selfless act, but Lucy had proved him wrong. She had proved herself in so many ways even he didn’t think it was fair she had to continue doing so. It seemed some people were always fighting with their backs against the wall, while others had it handed to them on a plate. With Ra’id’s help he had fought his way up and there was nothing lacking in his life, while Lucy was completely at his mercy.
She stood facing him, expecting nothing, asking nothing. He touched her cheek almost reverently, growing increasingly aware of her sacred role. ‘I’ll make sure you’re well taken care of.’
By whom? her steady gaze asked him.
‘Surely you can see the sense in my proposals?’ he demanded, tightening his grip on her arms.
He had not expected her eyes to fill with tears, but having all the strength and every advantage he let her go. ‘Don’t look so downcast. I’ll buy you two homes—one here and one in England, but you can’t work. It wouldn’t be—’
‘Appropriate?’ she supplied softly. ‘I haven’t come here looking for handouts, Razi. I don’t want anything from you in the material sense. All I ask is your promise never to part me from our child.’
‘And to change centuries of tradition?’
‘If women don’t work here, don’t you think you’re wasting a valuable resource? If traditions have been in place for centuries, maybe they’re due an update. Sorry,’ she said, seeing his face tense. ‘It’s really none of my business.’
As he stared at her he found himself wishing that it were her business.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
RAZI shook his head in despair. At Lucy’s naivety at thinking he could change centuries of tradition? She only wished she could tell him everything in her heart: how she loved him, how she wanted him—and not for his power or for his wealth, or even his good looks, or for any of the other obvious advantages a man as deeply layered and endlessly fascinating as Razi possessed, but for the simple pleasure of being in his company. She couldn’t conceive of a palace grand enough or jewels big enough to compete with a glance from him when that glance was full of warmth and connection between them.
‘What if I promise never to part you from your child?’ he said. ‘Is that enough?’
‘It’s all I’ve ever wanted.’
‘In that you are unique,’ he admitted, his lips tugging with just the faintest show of the old humour.
It might be all she’d ever wanted, but it wasn’t everything. She wanted Razi’s love too, but that was a fantasy too far. She settled for, ‘I promise I won’t embarrass you, Razi. I’ll live a quiet life out of the public eye. I’m not missing anything. I’ve always been a backroom girl with no idea about fashion or moving in society—’
He cut her off with a laugh that sounded achingly like Mac’s.
‘What’s so funny?’ She knew deep down inside. She would never be exposed to society, or have any need to learn about fashion; the life she had planned out—the future they had practically agreed on—included none of that. She would live somewhere in the country where he could visit discreetly.
She gasped as Razi cupped her chin and made her look at him. ‘I’m laughing because you’re funny,’ he said, his glance slipping from her eyes to her lips. ‘Your ideas are funny. Your notion of how I live and what’s important to me is so far off the mark, it’s funny.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be.’
A world of possibilities opened up as Razi’s thumb caressed her jaw. She could do this … She could do just about anything to be with him …
Razi’s smile was slow, and confident enough to make her believe anything was possible. Her breath sounded ragged in the silence as she waited, suspended somewhere between hoping things were changing and knowing deep down they could never change enough to make all of her dreams come true.
She was right. The tension between them subsided and he let her go. His next words proved that while she had been desperate to believe in a fantasy Razi’s quick mind had covered all the bases. Every conceivable facility would be made ready for the expectant mother of the royal child. Lucy and her baby would want for nothing. Name it, and she could have it. If she preferred a different consultant—a different nursing team—anything—everything—too much of everything—was hers for the asking, while the one thing she wanted and longed for so badly, which was a normal family life, could never be hers. But as her emotions welled, so did her longing for Razi—one more night of pretending they could be together and she could cope with anything. One night of love to last a lifetime didn’t seem so greedy. One more night of knowing how it felt to be loved …
With his senses so keenly tuned to Lucy he knew almost before she did when she surrendered her ideas to his. He was still coming to terms with the miracle of new life and the fact that Lucy was carrying his child and felt a great sense of wonder. There was also the urge to stake his claim again.
‘This is crazy,’ she murmured, shivering with desire as his lips brushed her mouth.
‘That’s the weakest protest I ever heard,’ he observed, slowly backing her towards the entrance to the pavilion.
‘I must be crazy,’ she protested, reaching up to rest her hands on his shoulders.
‘A little crazy goes a long way with me,’ he murmured, giving her waist a reassuring squeeze.
Razi lowered her onto cushions that supported her frame and yet moulded themselves to her body in the most comfortable way. The curtain over the entrance was still drawn back to allow streamers of moonlight to decorate their cushioned bed. The interior of the pavilion was shaded and lit by two brass oil lamps and an incense burner. She was surrounded in a haze of delicious scent and refreshing night-time breezes kept her cool, but even in Razi’s arms she was restless. There was so much to be decided yet and maybe this was a mistake. ‘This is wrong.’