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A shiver rolled through her, pulling her flesh tight. In that instant she was sucked straight back to those long nights of terror, waiting to be called before the Emir, to do whatever he commanded.
Yet now Lina felt that, if this man smiled and spoke to her in the smoky, caressing tone he’d used a few minutes earlier, she’d go to him willingly. She might be nervous about learning first-hand about sex, but her shimmy of excitement hinted she’d be avid to learn if Sayid Badawi taught her.
The realisation stopped her tongue.
‘However,’ he said, his voice serious, ‘you’re now my responsibility. I can’t send you back to your family, since they treated you so badly.’ His eyes flashed and, despite his even tone, she realised he was very, very angry. With her aunt and uncle? The grim line of his jaw accentuated the heavy beat of a pulse in his throat and she was struck with the idea they would suffer for bundling her off here.
Lina felt her eyes grow round and her mouth sag open. She knew because she’d overheard them speaking, that her aunt and uncle believed sending her to the palace would not only remove her from their sons but gain them favour with the Emir.
The old Emir. Not the new one. Sayid Badawi was not cut from the same cloth as his uncle.
‘Given the circumstances in which you arrived, you can’t stay in the palace. People would misconstrue your...role.’
Lina wasn’t exactly sure what misconstrue meant. She assumed the Emir didn’t want people believing she was his concubine.
After all, she was nothing but an uneducated provincial. Even a woman as inexperienced as Lina understood that this man, with his power, wealth and chiselled looks would have his pick of stunning women. He’d only have to click his fingers and they’d flock to him like doves to grain.
Why, he probably already had a lover, perhaps secreted here in the palace.
Heat flushed Lina’s cheeks as she remembered where her mind had wandered last night as she’d thought about the Emir, his kindness and his charisma. His cedar wood and bitter orange scent that made her feel curiously giddy. That zing of awareness when she touched him.
Of course he had a woman. It was ridiculous to think he’d ever want someone like her. Someone who didn’t even know how to hold a book the right way up!
‘I’ve decided to treat you as my ward.’
‘Your ward?’ She looked up and found herself snared by dark-as-night eyes. Another tiny shiver scudded down her spine.
‘I will be responsible for you until you can make your own way in the world.’
Slowly Lina nodded, biting down a question about how she was meant to do that when she only had domestic training.
‘Like an uncle,’ he added, as if to clarify.
Lina blinked. Anyone less like an uncle she couldn’t imagine. He was far too young for a start. Closer to her age than her uncle’s. Besides, she couldn’t imagine what she felt for the Emir was at all appropriate between niece and uncle.
‘You understand?’
Did he think her dim-witted because she couldn’t read the words in his precious books?
‘Yes.’ She clasped her hands before her. ‘You will act as my guardian.’
‘Precisely.’ He nodded, then sat back in his chair as if pleased that point was understood. ‘Now what would you like to do?’
‘Sir?’
‘What would you like for the future?’
Lina tried not to gape and probably failed.
No one ever, in her whole life, had asked what she wanted her future to be. It had always been assumed that her father would find her a suitable husband and she’d devote herself to looking after him and the family they’d have. Or, if her aunt were to be believed, she’d become a dancing girl or worse, pandering to the desires of men.
The enormity of the question stole her voice.
Eventually he spoke again. ‘You must have some desire. Some dream.’
Suddenly Lina remembered those childish hopes she’d once harboured. Hopes encouraged by the foreign archaeologists who’d worked for years near her home. They’d been entertained in her house when she was young, and, to her delight, there had even been women archaeologists. Lina had spent years tagging along behind them, before she was considered too old for such freedoms.
‘Lina? What is it you want?’ That deep voice yanked her back to the present.
The foolishness of those old hopes hit her anew. She could never do what she’d dreamed. And yet, here she was, sitting with the man who ruled Halarq, a man who’d brought peace to her nation, and he was asking her what she desired. Asking. Surely anything was possible here with this extraordinary man?
‘I want to learn,’ she said before she lost her nerve. ‘To read and go to classes and find out about the world.’ Her throat constricted at the daring of what she asked but she hurried on. ‘And I want to visit France and America.’
There. It was out. Her breath came in rough little pants and her fingers trembled against the carved wooden arms of the chair. She knew she’d been too daring. But she’d been unable to resist.
‘Why those countries?’ Instead of berating her for not requesting something sensible, like an apprenticeship to a seamstress, the Emir leaned forward as if curious. ‘It would be hard when you don’t speak the language.’
‘But I do!’ She beamed at him. ‘At least I used to. I spent time with the foreigners digging up the past in the old city ruins beyond my town. I have a good memory and they said I’m quick with languages.’
Clearly he wasn’t convinced. Yet nor did he dismiss her claim. Instead he sat in brooding silence, his elbows on the desk and fingers steepled beneath his chin.
Lina barely dared to breathe for fear of disturbing him as time stretched from seconds into long minutes.
‘Very well.’ Finally he sat back. A smile skated across his face and Lina caught her breath. In repose his face was serious yet handsome. But when he smiled it felt like angels danced in her soul.
‘I won’t promise America or France, but I can give you the opportunity to learn.’ He paused as if considering. ‘My secretary will arrange a teacher. If, by the end of a week, that teacher confirms you’re working hard and willing to learn, you will have the opportunity to go to school.’
Excitement was the buzz of a thousand bees in her bloodstream. ‘Sir, I can’t thank you enough. I—’
His raised hand cut her off. His expression turned serious. ‘It’s inevitable that gossip will get out about how you came here and about our...relationship.’
He said the word as if he tasted something unpleasant and instantly Lina’s warm glow subsided. ‘Given that, if you show promise, you will attend school outside Halarq.’
Lina nodded, torn between delight and the need to pinch herself to check she was awake. ‘But won’t it be expensive?’
Instantly his gaze, which had fixed on a spot in the middle distance, zeroed in on her. Once more Lina felt that keen scrutiny, as if he looked at her but saw more than anyone else ever had.
‘Fortunately I can afford it.’ A ghost of a smile hovered around his firm mouth. ‘If you work hard, I will sponsor your education.’
‘But how will I repay you?’ The words erupted before she could hold them back.
The Emir’s eyebrows rose. In surprise because she continued to speak without being invited? Yet he didn’t seem angry. Was that approval in his gleaming eyes?
‘You cannot simply accept this gift?’
Lina bit her lip, considering carefully. His Royal Highness the Emir of Halarq was a powerful man, accustomed to having his every word obeyed. Yet her conscience—or was it the pride her aunt complained of?—told her she had to set limits to this kindness.
‘I would be honoured, sir. Yet that same honour compels me to acknowledge my great obligation to you. It’s an obligation I must repay. We aren’t kin. I have no call on your charity.’
Lina’s heart thudded in her chest, her pulse rushing so fast through her body she felt light-headed.
For what seemed an age those piercing eyes, darker now and unreadable as polished obsidian, bored into her. Then, abruptly, he nodded.
‘So be it. If this turns out as I hope, you’ll be a shining example of change in Halarq. I intend to modernise our country through education, among other things. Work hard, learn, and on your return you can repay my generosity by helping to promote the value of education in those areas where people still refuse to send their daughters to school.’
He glanced at his watch and shoved his chair back from the desk.
Instantly Lina scrambled to her feet before sinking into a low bow, her heart swelling fit to burst. ‘I promise to study hard, sir.’ She’d make him proud, no matter what it took.
‘Excellent.’ With that he turned and strode from the room.
* * *
Four and a half years later Lina stepped off the plane a different woman.
Which was apt since the country she returned to had changed too.
The airport had expanded for a start, with a new streamlined terminal building and space for many more planes. The road into the city was a revelation—wide, straight and well-surfaced. It was even lined with rows of date palms and other trees.
A new hospital sat in spacious landscaped grounds at a major road junction and a university was under construction nearby. Across the city cranes testified to a programme of renewal.
The driver who’d met her kept up a flow of informative chatter in response to her queries. That marked a change too, for when she’d left Halarq she couldn’t imagine a male driver speaking more than was absolutely necessary to a woman. Though, to be fair, her experience was limited. She’d grown up in a rural province before her uncle had brought her to the capital. She’d rarely been in a car before she’d left her homeland. And this wasn’t an ordinary car but a limousine with the Emir’s crest on the door.
Lina felt a rogue shiver of heat through her insides at the thought that he’d sent one of his drivers to collect her.
Had he personally arranged it? Or had one of his staff done it without being asked?
Did the Emir even remember her?
In all those years years he’d sent not a word, though she knew the school staff had sent regular reports to the palace. For the first year, homesick and overwhelmed by the changes in her life, she’d have given anything for a word from him. In her loneliness the Emir had grown in her imagination, filling the empty places in her soul. He was protector, hero, saviour...and something else she couldn’t put a name to.
In the years she’d been away, bombarded with new experiences and places, new people and ideas, he’d remained a constant. A lodestar, the single reference point connecting her to Halarq and the world she’d left behind.
Which, she realised with a grimace, was dangerous. She was nothing to him. Once she’d fulfilled her end of their bargain she’d never see him again.
Pining over the Emir and wondering whether he approved of her choices and achievements wasn’t sensible.
He’d probably forgotten her. No doubt his officious secretary kept a watching brief on the little social experiment that was Lina. For though His Royal Highness had been kind, she understood he’d only looked for a solution that would remove her from the palace and feed into his plans to modernise Halarq. He simply hadn’t wanted her.
Nothing new there. To her father she’d been a disappointment because of her gender. To her aunt and uncle an inconvenience. To the Emir a problem to be solved.
Tangled emotions knotted Lina’s stomach. Anxiety definitely. Though she’d survived and eventually thrived in her Swiss school, she knew what it was to be utterly alone. She longed for connection. To belong, to a place and to people, or at least one person.
Savagely Lina cut off that thought.
She’d daydreamed of the Emir, so tall and handsome, for too long. She was no teenager now. There’d be no swooning over him, or for that matter, any man.
Once her obligation to the Emir was fulfilled, she had a career to build. An income to earn. A life to enjoy.
The limousine turned off the teeming street and onto the private road that led up from the old town to the citadel. Above, its coral-coloured walls rising from the sheer rock, rose the Emir’s palace. A silver and blue banner over the gate whipped in the breeze, proclaiming the Emir was in residence.
Lina clasped her hands tight in her lap, trying to still the rising tide of excitement and trepidation that quickened her pulse.
She’d thank him for the wonderful thing he’d done in giving her an education. She’d throw herself into whatever PR tasks he devised to promote education and, as soon as she could, remove herself from his orbit.
She smiled. That was settled.
Except, as so often in life, it didn’t work out that way.
* * *
Sayid exchanged farewells with the fiercely bearded provincial leader then watched him and his entourage bow themselves out through the wide doors of beaten copper.
Rolling his head back, he tried to relieve the stiffness of too many hours sitting in the formal audience chamber. It had been a long afternoon.
He disliked this echoing room with its lavish decorations and raised dais that set him apart from everyone. But he’d made so many reforms in such a short time, he listened when his aides advised he should retain the traditional space for meetings with provincial sheikhs. He worked hard to steer them into change on significant issues. Where he worked was not, to his mind, important. If retaining a show of the old customs made them more comfortable, so be it.
He was getting to his feet when the chamberlain appeared in the doorway. He wasn’t alone.
Sayid sank back on the jewelled throne, his hands curling over the gilded lion heads on the arms.
Suddenly alert, his eagerness to go dissipated as he took in the figure walking beside the chamberlain. Slim, curvaceous, delectably feminine, though her fitted skirt and jacket in jade green covered her from neck to knee.
Late afternoon sun lit her from behind, which had the twofold effect of making it difficult to read her features while highlighting her lush curves in loving detail.
High heels tapped demurely across the inlaid floor and Sayid had time to note her glossy dark hair was pulled severely back and up.
She halted in the middle of the room. Her eyes were downcast, as was traditional in Halarq on meeting the Emir. Yet it was rare for westerners to know that. She was well-prepared.
He sat forward, intrigued that a lone western woman should seek an audience.
‘You may approach.’
The pair walked slowly towards him and Sayid found himself watching with appreciation the gentle undulation of her hips as she paced in those high heels. She wore no jewellery but that only accentuated the purity of her sculpted beauty. High cheekbones, eyes set on an intriguing slant, full lips, slender throat.
Heat crawled up from Sayid’s belly to clog his chest. A blast of fire shot straight to his loins. His hands tightened on the carved chair as she stopped before him, still with downcast eyes. She was one of the most beautiful, elegant women he’d ever seen. And Sayid had known many.
Yet something about her feathered his nape with a cold brush of warning.
Here, he sensed, lay trouble.
The chamberlain spoke. ‘Sire, I am pleased to bring before you...’
The woman’s jaw tipped high, her gaze rising to meet his and the chamberlain’s words were lost in the heavy thrum of Sayid’s pulse as he looked down into eyes as velvety as a drift of mountain violets. Holding his gaze, she dipped into a curtsey that was the epitome of grace.
Shock hammered. His blood rushed, drowning all noise.
Lina. Little Lina.
Sayid remembered her as pretty. Had told himself imagination had embroidered her charms. It had been the forbidden piquancy of finding himself her master, free to do as he wished with her, that had turned a passably attractive teenager into something special in his mind.
He’d been wrong. She was something special. More, she was extraordinary.
Not just because of her beauty. The way that clear-eyed stare met his, the hint of boldness behind the mask of politeness, communicated directly with him on a personal level. A level that made his belly tense and his calm crack.
‘Welcome back to Halarq.’ He kept his voice as grave as his expression. She might have knocked him sideways for an instant but Sayid would never let that show.
‘Thank you, sir.’ She bowed low in a move as formal and graceful as that of any courtier.
He refused to let his eyes track her trim frame, but it was too late. Her image was imprinted on his brain. ‘You’ve grown up.’
Her gaze met his, setting off a buzz of response at the base of his spine. Then her lips twitched into a far too appealing half-smile and she shrugged. ‘It happens to all of us.’ She paused, as if waiting for him to respond. ‘I just turned twenty-two last week.’
Better, far better than seventeen.
The sly voice in his mind was full of insinuation. Of anticipation. But he’d set himself up as her protector, her guardian. Because she had no one else.
Sayid knew what could happen to women who had no one to champion them. Especially beautiful, desirable women.
It was why he’d sent Lina away. Not only to pursue her education, but to keep her out of reach. He might be changing his country, one step at a time, to ensure all his people had the rights of free citizens, but he was still a man.
A man with a formidable appetite for pleasure.
Knowing that was a family trait, seeing its devastating effect on his uncle, who’d never learned to resist temptation, Sayid had striven to contain that side of his nature.
Yet he looked at Lina and something raw and ravenous stirred in his belly. Something uncivilised and unrepentantly greedy that spoke of want and the need to possess. It was a burn in his gut. A sharpness on his tongue. A tightening of his body.
Just like that! As if the rules he’d set for himself no longer existed. As if she wasn’t in his care.
Damn!
Years before he’d done what he could to protect her. According to Halarqi custom, since she’d been given into his keeping, Lina belonged to him. From that moment he was the head of her family. In his people’s eyes, and the law’s, he was her lord. Her master. Potentially her lover.
To his shame, the idea still sent an illicit thrill through him.
Yet, to his credit he’d done what a decent, civilised man would do—embracing his responsibility and becoming her guardian, sending her away.
He’d forgotten she was due to return today. Plus he’d assumed the years would be enough to sever this startling, impossible tug of desire. That he’d have become immune or she’d have grown ordinary.
Neither had happened.
Surely it was a malicious, mocking Fate that had allowed him to send away a child, only to receive in return a woman so flagrantly desirable.
Sayid forced a smile. ‘Congratulations on reaching such an advanced age.’ He stood, turning to the chamberlain. ‘That will be all for now. My ward and I have matters to discuss.’
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