The Sheikh's Guarded Heart
Liz Fielding
“Why? Why are you doing this?”
Lucy didn’t wait for one of his enigmatic replies, waving it aside before Hanif could tell her that it was traditional courtesy to a stranger in need. This was more than that.
“You could have sorted all that out at long distance, Han…” Her voice wobbled on his name. The man was the son of the emir, local royalty, and she was talking to him as if he were someone she’d known all her life. “Why did you bring me here? You did not have to take me in. Look after me yourself.”
“Maybe,” he said, after a stillness that had seemed endless, “I needed to do it.”
Lucy opened her mouth, then closed it again, and not just because the question that had rushed to her lips—Why?—seemed insensitive, intrusive. As his forehead creased in a frown, she sensed that his response had been in the nature of self-revelation and, for once, this desert lord appeared almost vulnerable.
When an ordinary girl meets a sheikh…
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The Sheikh’s Guarded Heart
Liz Fielding
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Liz Fielding was born with itchy feet. She made it to Zambia before her twenty-first birthday and, gathering her own special hero and a couple of children on the way, lived in Botswana, Kenya and Bahrain—with pauses for sightseeing pretty much everywhere in between.
She finally came to a full stop in a tiny Welsh village cradled by misty hills, and these days mostly leaves her pen to do the traveling.
When she’s not sorting out the lives and loves of her characters, she potters in the garden, reads her favorite authors and spends a lot of time wondering, “What if…?”
For news of upcoming books—and to sign up for her occasional newsletter—visit Liz’s Web site at www.lizfielding.com.
Harlequin Romance® is thrilled to present another wonderful book from award-winning author
Liz Fielding
Liz Fielding will keep you captivated for hours with her contemporary, witty and feel-good romances.
The Valentine Bride (#3932)
Part of the exciting new miniseries
THE BRIDES OF BELLA LUCIA
RITA® Award-winning author Liz Fielding “gets better and better with every book!”
—Romantic Times BOOKclub
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
LUCY FORRESTER wasn’t fooled for a minute. The insubstantial shimmer of green was a mirage.
She’d read everything she could about Ramal Hamrah, the desert. Mirages, she’d learned, were not the illusions of thirst-maddened travellers, but occurred when refracted light mirrored distant images—oil tankers, cities, trees—making them appear where they had no business to be, only for them to evaporate as the earth revolved and the angle of the sun changed.
It happened now, the momentary vision of eye-soothing green vanishing before her eyes. But even a mirage was enough to distract her from her unthinking rush to confront the man who’d betrayed her. Just because there was no traffic—no road—didn’t mean that there were no hazards.
She checked the satellite navigation system, adjusted her direction slightly, then forced herself to relax her white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel a little. Look around, take her bearings.
Not that there was much to see apart from the mountains—clearer, sharper now that she was on higher ground away from the coast. There was nothing green here, only the occasional scrubby, dust-covered bush in an otherwise dry and empty landscape.
Her eyes, seared and aching from a sun that mocked her delicately tinted sunglasses, felt as if they were filled with sand and she would have welcomed another glimpse of the cooling green. Even an illusion would do.
Dehydrated, hungry, she should have realized that she’d need more than rage to sustain her, but her bottle of water had long been empty. And, shaken to bits by her charge across the corrugated surface of the open desert, her entire body felt as if it had been beaten black and blue.
She didn’t understand it. According to the map, it was no more than a hundred and fifty miles to Steve’s campsite. Three hours, four at the most. She should have been there long before now.
She closed her eyes momentarily, in an attempt to relieve them. It was a mistake. Without warning the 4x4 tipped forward, throwing her against the seat-belt as the ground fell sharply away in front of her, wrenching the wheel from her hands. Before she could react, regain control, the front offside wheel hit something hard, riding up so that the vehicle slewed sideways, tipped drunkenly, and after a seemingly endless moment when it might, just, have fallen back four-square on the ground, the rear wheel clipped the same unseen rock and the world tipped upside down.
Only the bruising jolt of the seat-belt against her breast-bone, shoulder, hip, stopped her from being tumbled around the interior like washing in a drier as the vehicle began to roll.
It didn’t stop her arms from flailing uncontrollably, bouncing against the wheel, the roof, the gear stick. Didn’t stop her legs from being pounded against the angles of a vehicle built for function, rather than comfort. Didn’t stop everything loose from flying around, battering her head and neck.
It seemed an eternity before the world finally stopped turning and everything came to a halt.
For a while that was enough.
When, finally, she managed to focus on her surroundings, the world was at an odd angle, but the silence, the lack of any kind of movement, was deeply restful and Lucy, glad enough to rest quietly in the safety cage of her seat-belt, felt no urgent need to move.
At least the green was back, she thought. Closer now. She tried to make sense of it through the crazing of the safety glass.
Trees of some kind, she decided, after a while. It was the fact that they were upside down that had confused her. That they were below, rather than above a high wall.
Had she stumbled across the Hanging Gardens of Babylon?
No, that couldn’t be right. Babylon wasn’t in Ramal Hamrah. It was… Somewhere else.
Maybe she was dead, she thought dispassionately.
Heaven would be green. And quiet. Although the gate she could see set into the wall was not of the pearly variety promised in the fire-and-brimstone sermons preached at the church her grandmother had attended, but were carved from wood.
But then wood was, no doubt, more precious than pearls in a place where few trees grew.
Wall and door were both the same dull ochre as the desert. Covered with centuries of wind-blown dust, they were all but invisible unless you were looking directly at them or, as now, intense shadows cast by the lowering sun were throwing the carvings into relief.
The angel looked real enough, though, as he flew down to her on wings of gold.
Gradually tiny sounds began to impinge on her consciousness. The ticking of the engine as it cooled. Papers fluttering. It was her diary, she saw, lying amongst the jumble of stuff thrown from her bag, the pages riffling in the wind, blowing her life away. She closed her eyes.
Moments, or maybe it was hours, later she opened them to a pounding beat that sounded oddly familiar but which she couldn’t quite place. And the slow drip, drip, drip of something leaking.
Coolant or brake fluid, she thought.
She ought to do something about that. Find the hole, plug it somehow or she’d really be in trouble…
Stirred from her dazed torpor, she began to tug feebly at the seat belt but was brought to an instant halt by a searing pain in her scalp. Confused, in pain as a hundred smarts, bruises and worse were jolted into life, she kept still, tried to focus her energy, find the strength to reach the release catch, free herself, without tearing her hair out by the roots.
Then the smell of petrol reached her.
Petrol dripping on to hot metal…
It was a wake-up call to the danger she was in; forget heaven, she was at the gates of hell and raw, naked fear overrode pain as she struggled to twist herself around to hit the seat belt release.
Her sweaty fingers slipped as she tried to make contact and, as the smell of petrol grew stronger, she panicked, throwing herself against the restraints—
‘Hold still, I’ve got you.’
She heard the words, but they didn’t penetrate the thinking part of her brain as she fought to break free.
‘Don’t move!’
It wasn’t the harsh order that shocked her into motionless silence, or the fierce, hawk-like features of the man who gave it. It was the gleaming knife blade, so close to her face that she could almost taste the metal at the back of her throat.
It was one shock too many.
Hanif al-Khatib cursed as the woman fainted dead away, then braced himself to catch her as he cut her free from the seat belt, trusting to luck as to whether he did more damage as he hauled her dead weight up through the open window of the 4x4 and on to his saddle. The smell of petrol filled the hot air and there was no time to waste doing the thing gently as, holding her limp body tight against him with one arm, he urged his horse to safety.
When the vehicle burst into flames he was still close enough to feel a flare of heat that made the desert air seem momentarily icy.
Time passed in a blur of pain. Lucy heard voices but could not understand what they said. The only comfort was in the dusty cloth beneath her face, the steady beat of a human heart, soft reassuring words. Someone was holding her close, not letting go. With the part of her brain that was still functioning, she knew that as long as he held her she would be safe.
Nothing short of an emergency would have induced Hanif al-Khatib to set foot in a hospital. He hated everything about them—the smell, the hushed careful voices of the staff, the high-tech sound of machines measuring out lives in bleeps rather than heartbeats. Announcing death in a high-pitched whine that drilled through the brain.
The overwhelming sense of guilt…
His aide had done his best to keep him away from the emergency room, to persuade him to remain in the desert, assuring him that he could manage.
He didn’t doubt it; Zahir was more than capable, but he came anyway, needing to assure himself that everything necessary was done for the woman. And because a lone foreign woman driving across the desert as if the hounds of hell were after her had left him with the uneasy suspicion that there was more to it than a simple accident.
Since he hadn’t delayed to change his clothes and they, and the keffiyeh wound about his face, bore the dust of a day’s hunting, no one had realised who he was and that suited him well enough. The last thing he wanted was to attract the attention of local media; he valued his own privacy and the young woman he’d rescued was unlikely to welcome the attention, speculation, that being brought into casualty by the son of the Emir was likely to arouse.
He’d left all direct contact with the hospital staff to Zahir, staying in background, content to be thought nothing more than muscle brought along to carry the woman pulled from the wreck of her vehicle.
Nevertheless, the arrival at the hospital of a helicopter bearing the Emiri insignia would have raised more than passing interest and he was eager to be away. Just as soon as he satisfied himself that the woman was not seriously injured, would be properly cared for.
He turned from the window as Zahir joined him in the visitors’ room. ‘How is she?’
‘Lucky. They’ve done a scan but the head injuries are no more than surface bruising. At worst, mild concussion.’
‘That’s it?’ He’d feared much worse. ‘She was fainting, incoherent with pain in the helicopter,’ he pressed.
‘She’s torn a ligament in her ankle, that’s a world of pain, and she took quite a battering when the vehicle rolled.’
‘That’s lucky?’
Zahir pulled a face. ‘But for you, Excellency, it would have been a lot worse.’
‘I was simply the nearest. The first to reach her.’
‘No one else would have risked riding straight down the jebel as you did.’
The boy did not add that no one else had had so little regard for his own safety, although he was clearly thinking it. Not true. With a broken neck he would have been no use to her.
‘The woman owes you her life.’
He dismissed the idea with an impatient gesture. ‘Is she being kept in the hospital?’
‘That won’t be necessary,’ Zahir said. ‘She just needs to rest for a few days.’ Then, ‘I’ve informed the pilot that we’re ready to leave.’
Hanif had done his duty and now that he knew the woman would make a full recovery there was nothing to keep him. Except that she had looked so fragile as she’d struggled to free herself.
‘You’ve spoken to someone at Bouheira Tours?’ he asked, pushing the image away. ‘They have contacted her family? Someone is making arrangements to look after her, get her home?’
Zahir cleared his throat. ‘You need not concern yourself, Excellency,’ he said. Then, forgetting himself in his anxiety to leave, ‘We need to go, Han, already rumours are flying around the hospital—’
He didn’t ask what kind of rumours. A foreign woman had been brought to the hospital in a helicopter used by the son of the Emir. What they didn’t know, they’d make up.
‘Put a stop to them, Zahir. The girl was found by a hunting party, my staff offered humanitarian aid. I was not involved.’
‘I’ll do what I can.’
‘So?’ he persisted. ‘Who is she? Does she work for this company? Or is she just another sand-surfer, tearing up the desert as if it’s her personal playground?’
He hoped so. If he could write her off as some shallow thrill-seeker, he could forget about her.
‘The tourist industry is becoming an important part of our economy, Excellency—’
‘And, if so, why was she travelling alone, in the wrong direction to anywhere?’ Hanif continued, ignoring Zahir’s attempt to divert his attention.
Too inexperienced, too young to hide what he was thinking, his young cousin hesitated a moment too long as he decided just how much to tell him. Just how much he dared leave out.
Hanif moved to the nearest chair, turned, sat down with a flourish that no one could have mistaken for anything but regal and, with a gesture so slight as to be almost imperceptible, so imperious that not even a favoured cousin would dare ignore it, invited the boy to make up his mind.
‘Sir—’ Zahir swallowed, saw there was no help for it and finally admitted the truth. ‘Bouheira Tours say they have no idea who this woman might be. She does not work for them and they were adamant that she could not be a client. They have no women in any of the parties booked this week.’
‘Yet she was driving one of their vehicles.’ He waited. ‘Their logo was emblazoned on its side. Desert safaris, dune-surfing,’ he prompted.
‘I made that point.’
‘Who did you speak to?’
‘The office manager. A woman called Sanderson. The man who actually owns the company, Steve Mason, is in the east of the country, guiding a party of archaeologists who have come to look at the ancient irrigation systems.’
‘She was heading too far north to have been joining them.’
‘She may have been lost.’
‘Surely their vehicles are fitted with satellite navigation equipment?’ Zahir made no comment. ‘So, what explanation did this Sanderson woman have for the fact that a woman she’d didn’t know was driving one of their vehicles?’
‘She didn’t. She said we must be mistaken. That none of their vehicles is missing. She pointed out that there are other companies running desert trips. That, since the vehicle was burned out, we may have been mistaken.’
‘You were there, Zahir. Do you believe we were mistaken?’
Zahir swallowed. ‘No, sir.’
‘No. So, when you assure me that our casualty is to be looked after, what exactly did you mean? That the hospital will contact her embassy where some official will draw up a document requiring her to repay them the cost of medical treatment and repatriation before they’ll do a damn thing to help her?’
‘I assumed you would wish to have her treatment to be charged to your office, sir. Other than that—’
‘Always assuming that she can prove her identity,’ Hanif continued as if he hadn’t spoken. ‘Her nationality. It might take some time, since everything she was carrying with her was incinerated. Who will care for her in the meantime?’
‘You saved her life, Han. You have done everything required.’
‘On the contrary, Zahir. Having saved her, I am now responsible for her.’ A situation he would have otherwise, but to wish that he hadn’t become involved would be to wish her dead and that he could not do. ‘Who is she?’ he demanded, as keen as anyone to see an end to this. ‘What’s her name?’
‘She gave her name as Lucy Forrester.’
‘Did she say where she was going?’
‘No. It was because she seemed so confused that they ordered a scan.’
‘And the doctor says she can be discharged?’ Then, on his feet and at the door before Zahir could open his mouth, he said, ‘Never mind. I’ll speak to him myself.’
‘Sir!’
Hanif strode down the corridor, ignoring the boy’s anguished plea.
‘Excellency, it is my duty to insist—’
As he turned on him the boy flinched, stuttered to a halt. But he bravely stood his ground.
‘You’ve done everything that is required,’ he repeated. ‘There can be no doubt that she’s British. Her embassy will take care of the rest.’
‘I will be the judge of when I have done everything required, Zahir.’ Then, irritably, ‘Where is he? The doctor?’
‘He was called to another emergency. I’ll have him paged for you.’
‘No.’ It wasn’t the doctor who held him where he least wanted to be, but his patient. ‘Where is she?’
There was another, almost imperceptible, pause before, apparently accepting the inevitable, Zahir said, ‘She’s in the treatment room. The last door on the left.’
Lucy Forrester was looking worse, rather than better than when he’d carried her into the A and E department.
In his head, he was still seeing her in that moment before she’d fainted, with long hair spread about her shoulders, fair skin, huge grey eyes. Since then the bruising had developed like a picture in a developing tank; her arms were a mess of ugly bruises, grazes, small cuts held together with paper sutures and there was dried blood, like rust, in her hair.
The hospital had treated her injuries—her right leg was encased below the knee in a lightweight plastic support—but the emergency team hadn’t had time to do more than the minimum, cleaning up her wounds, but nothing else. Presumably that was the job of the ward staff.
For now, she was lying propped up, her skin clinging to fine bones, waiting for someone to decide where she was going. She looked, he thought, exhausted.
Her eyes, in that split second before she’d lost consciousness, had been wide with terror. Her first reaction now, starting, as if waking from a bad dream, was still fear and, without thinking, he reached for her hand. Held it.
‘It’s all right, Lucy,’ he said. ‘You’re safe.’
Fear was replaced by uncertainty, then some other, more complex, emotion that seemed to find an echo deep within him.
‘You saved me,’ she mumbled, the words scarcely distinguishable through her bruised, puffy lips.
‘No, no,’ he said. ‘Lie back. Take your time.’
‘I thought… I thought…’
It was all too clear what Lucy Forrester had thought, but he did not blame her. She’d been hysterical and there had been no time for explanations, only action.
He released her hand, bowed slightly, a courtesy that would not normally be afforded to any woman other than his mother, his grandmother, and said, ‘I am Hanif al-Khatib. You have friends in Ramal Hamrah?’ he asked. Why would a woman travel here alone except to be with someone? ‘Someone I can call?’
‘I—’ She hesitated, as if unsure what to say. She settled on, ‘No. No one.’ Not the truth, he thought. Not the whole truth, anyway. It did not matter.
‘Then my home is at your disposal until you are strong enough to continue your journey.’
One of her eyes was too swollen to keep open. The other suggested doubt. ‘But why—?’
‘A traveller in distress will always find help, refuge in my country,’ he said, cutting off her objection. He was not entirely sure ‘why’ himself, beyond the fact that he had not rescued her from death to abandon her to the uncertain mercy of her embassy. At least with him, she would be comfortable. And safe. Turning to Zahir, he said, ‘It is settled. Make it happen.’
‘But, Excellency—’
Hanif silenced him with a look.
‘Go and find something warm for Miss Forrester to travel in. And send a nurse to clean her up. How could they leave her like this?’
‘It may be a while,’ his cousin said, disapproval practically vibrating from him. ‘They’re rushed off their feet in A and E.’
Lucy watched as her Samaritan impatiently waved the other man away before turning to the cupboards where dressings were stored, searching, with growing irritation until he finally emerged with a stainless steel dish and a pack of cotton wool. He ran water into the bowl, tearing off chunks of cotton and tossing them in to soak.
‘I’m not a nurse,’ he said, turning to her, ‘but I will do my best to make you more comfortable.’
‘No,’ she said, scrambling back up against the raised head-board. ‘Really, there’s no need.’
‘There is every need,’ he said. ‘It will take Zahir a little while to organise the paperwork.’ He didn’t smile, but he was gentleness itself as he took one her hands, looking up in concern as she trembled. ‘Does that hurt?’
‘No,’ she managed.
He nodded, as if that was all he needed to know, and began to gently wipe the damp cotton pads over her fingers, her hands, discarding the pads as each one became dirty.
And it was, after all, just her hands.
It was nothing, she told herself. She wouldn’t object to a male nurse doing this and the man had saved her life. But his touch, as he carefully wiped each finger as if they were made of something fragile and fine, did something unsettling to her insides and a tiny sound escaped her. Not nothing…
He glanced up enquiringly and she managed to mouth, ‘It’s okay.’
Apparently reassured, he carefully washed away the dirt and dried blood from the bruised back of her hand before turning it over to clean the palm. He moved to her wrist, washed every bit of her arm with the same care.
Then he began again on the other hand. Time was, apparently, of no importance.
He emptied the bowl, refilled it. ‘Fresh water for your face,’ he said, and she swallowed. Hands, arms were one thing. Her face was so much more personal. He’d have to get closer. ‘I… Yes…’
‘That’s too hot?’ he enquired, as she jumped at the touch of a fresh pad to her cheek, let out an incoherent squeak.
‘No…’ The word seemed stuck in her throat but she swallowed it down and said, ‘No, it’s just…’ It was just that her grandmother’s brainwashing had gone deep. Bad girls let men touch them. In her head she knew that it wasn’t like that, that when people loved one another it was different, but even with Steve she’d found the slightest intimacy a challenge. Not that he’d pressed her.
He’d assured her that he found her innocence charming. That it made him feel like the first man in the world.
Innocent was right. No one but an innocent booby would have fallen for that line.
While she knew that this was different, that it had nothing to do with what her grandmother had been talking about, it didn’t make it any easier, but she managed a convincing, ‘It’s fine…’ refusing to let fall tears of rage, remorse, helplessness—a whole range of emotions piling up faster than she could think of words to describe them. After a long moment in which the man waited, apparently unconvinced, she said, ‘Truly.’
‘You must tell me if I hurt you,’ he said, gently lifting the hair back from her face.
All she wanted was for him to get on with it, get it over with, but as he gently stroked the cotton over her skin it was just as it had been with her hands, her arms. He was tenderness itself and her hot, dry skin, dehydrated and thirsty, seemed to soak up the moisture like a sponge.
‘I’m just going to clean up your scalp here,’ he warned. ‘I think you must have caught your hair when you were struggling with the seat belt.’ It stung a little. Maybe more than a little because he stopped, looked at her and said, ‘Shall I stop?’
‘No. Really. You’re not hurting me.’ Not much anyway.
Pride must abide.
Words chiselled on to her scalp.
He lifted her long tangled hair, holding it aside so that he could wash the nape of her neck, and she gave an involuntary sigh. If she could only wash her hair, she thought, she’d feel a hundred times better.
‘Later,’ he said. ‘I will wash your hair tomorrow.’
She was smiling into the soft wool keffiyeh coiled around his neck before she realized that he’d answered her unspoken thoughts. She considered asking him how he’d done that. Then waited. If he was a mind-reader she wouldn’t need to ask…
There was a tap on the door and someone called out.
He rapped out one word. He’d spoken in Arabic but the word was unmistakable. Wait. Then he laid her back against the headrest and she whispered, ‘Shukran.’ Thank you.
She’d bought a teach yourself Arabic course, planning to learn some of the language before joining Steve. She hadn’t just want to be a silent partner. She’d wanted to be useful. A bit of a joke, that. She’d served her usefulness the minute she’d so trustingly signed the papers he’d placed in front of her.
Hanif al-Khatib smiled at her—it was the first time, she thought. The man was so serious…Then he said, ‘Afwan, Lucy.’
Welcome. It meant welcome, she thought. And she knew he meant it.
In all her life, no one had ever treated her with such care, such consideration, as this stranger and quite suddenly she was finding it very hard to hold back the dam of tears.
Obviously it was shock. Exhaustion. Reaction to the accident…
She sniffed, swallowed. She did not cry. Pain, betrayal, none of those had moved her to tears. She’d learned early that tears were pointless. But kindness had broken down the barriers and, embarrassed, she blinked them back.
‘You are in pain, Lucy?’
‘No.’
He touched a tear that lay on her cheek. ‘There is no need to suffer.’
‘No. They gave me an injection. I just feel sleepy.’
‘Then sleep. It will make the journey easier for you.’ Then, ‘I will return in a moment,’ he said.
She nodded, her mind drifting away on a cloud of sedative. She jerked awake when he returned.
‘I hope you will not mind wearing this,’ Hanif said, helping her to sit up, wrapping something soft and warm around her, feeding her arms into the sleeves.
She had no objection to anything this man did, she thought, but didn’t have the energy to say the words out loud.
‘How is she?’
Hanif had left Zahir in Rumaillah to make enquiries about his guest and now he roused himself to join him in the sitting room of the guest suite.
‘Miss Forrester is still sleeping.’
‘It’s the best thing.’
‘Perhaps.’ She’d been fighting it—disturbed, dreaming perhaps, crying out in her sleep. It was only the sedatives prescribed by the hospital keeping her under, he suspected. ‘What did you discover in Rumaillah? Was the embassy helpful?’
‘I thought it better to make my own enquiries, find out what I could about her movements before I went to the embassy. If you want my opinion, there’s something not quite right about all this.’
‘Which is, no doubt, why you tried to dissuade me from bringing her here,’ Hanif replied, without inviting it.
‘It is my duty—’
‘It is your duty to keep me from brooding, Zahir. To drag me out on hunting expeditions. Tell my father when I’m ready to resume public life.’
‘He worries about you.’
‘Which is why I allow you to stay. Now, tell me about Lucy Forrester.’
‘She arrived yesterday morning on the early flight from London. The immigration officer on duty remembered her vividly. Her hair attracted a good deal of notice.’
He didn’t doubt it. Pale as cream, hanging to her waist, any man would notice it.
Realising that Zahir was waiting, he said, ‘Yes, yes! Get on with it!’
‘Her entry form gave her address in England so I checked the telephone number and put through a call.’
‘Did I ask you to do that?’
‘No, sir, but I thought—’
He dismissed Zahir’s thoughts with an irritated gesture. ‘And?’ he demanded.
‘There was no reply.’ He waited for a moment, but when Hanif made no comment he continued. ‘She gave her address in Ramal Hamrah as the Gedimah Hotel but, although she had made a booking, she never checked in.’
‘Did someone pick her up from the airport, or did she take a taxi?’
‘I’m waiting for the airport security people to come back to me on that one.’
‘And what about the vehicle she was driving? Have you had a chance to look at it? Salvage anything that might be useful?’
‘No, sir. I sent out a tow truck from Rumaillah, but when it arrived at the scene, the 4x4 had gone.’
‘Gone?’
‘It wasn’t there.’
‘It can’t have vanished into thin air, Zahir.’
‘No, sir.’
Hanif frowned. ‘No one else knew about it, other than the woman at Bouheira Tours. What did you tell her?’
‘Only that one of their vehicles had been in an accident and was burnt out in the desert. She was clearly shaken, asked me to describe it, the exact location. Once I had done that she said that I must be mistaken. That the vehicle could not belong to them. Then I asked her if Miss Forrester was a staff member or a traveller booked with them and she replied that she’d never heard of her.’
‘She didn’t want to check her records?’
‘She was quite adamant.’
‘Did you tell her that Miss Forrester had been injured?’
‘She didn’t ask what had happened to her and I didn’t volunteer any information.’
‘Leave it that way. Meanwhile, find out more about this tour company and the people who run it. And Zahir, be discreet.’
CHAPTER TWO
THE room was cool, quiet, the light filtering softly through rich coloured glass—lapis blue and emerald, with tiny pieces of jewel-bright red that gave Lucy the impression of lying in some undersea grotto. A grotto in which the bed was soft and enfolding.
A dream, then.
Lucy drifted away, back into the dark, and the next time she woke the light was brighter but the colours were still there and, although she found it difficult to open her eyes more than a crack, she could see that it was streaming through an intricately pieced stained glass window, throwing spangles of colour over the white sheets.
It was beautiful but strange and, uneasy, she tried to sit up, look around.
If the tiny explosions of pain from every part of her body were not sufficiently convincing, the hand at her shoulder, a low voice that was becoming a familiar backdrop to these moments of consciousness, assured her that she was awake.
‘Be still, Lucy Forrester. You’re safe.’
Safe? What had happened? Where was she? Lucy struggled to look up at the tall figure leaning over her. A surgical collar restricted her movement and one eye still refused to open more than a crack, but she did not need two good eyes to know who he was.
Knife in his hand, he’d told her to be still before. She swallowed. Her throat, mouth were as dry as dust.
‘You remember?’ he asked. ‘The accident?’
‘I remember you,’ she said. Even without the keffiyeh wound about his face she knew the dark fierce eyes, chiselled cheekbones, the hawkish, autocratic nose that had figured so vividly in her dreams.
Now she could see that his hair was long, thick, tied back at the nape with a dark cord, that only his voice was soft, although the savage she’d glimpsed before she’d passed out appeared to be under control.
But she knew, with every part of her that was female, vulnerable, that the man who’d washed her as she lay bloody and dusty on a hospital couch was far more dangerous.
‘You are Hanif al-Khatib,’ she said. ‘You saved my life and took me from the hospital.’
‘Good. You remember.’
Not that good, she thought. A touch of amnesia would have been very welcome right now.
‘You are feeling rested?’
‘You don’t want to know how I’m feeling. Where am I?’
Her voice was cracked, dry, and he poured water into a glass then, supporting her up with his arm, held the glass to lips that appeared to have grown to twice their size. Some water made it into her mouth as she gulped at it. The rest dribbled down her chin, inside the collar.
He tugged on the bow holding it in place and removed it, then dried her face, her neck, with a soft hand towel.
‘Should you have done that?’ she asked nervously, reaching for her throat.
‘Speaking from experience, I can tell you that the collar doesn’t do much good, but the doctor advised keeping it in place until you were fully awake.’
‘Experience? You crash cars that often?’
‘Not cars. Horses.’ He gave a little shrug. ‘Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that they crashed me. Polo makes great demands on both horse and rider.’
‘At least the rider has the choice.’ Then, ‘Where am I? Who are you?’ His name and ‘safe’ told her nothing.
‘When I lived in England,’ he said, ‘my friends called me Han.’
‘When I lived in England…’
Her brain felt as if it was stuffed with cotton wool, but she was alert enough to understand that this was his way of reassuring her that he understood western expectations of behaviour. Why would he do that unless she had reason to be nervous?
‘What do your enemies call you?’ she snapped back, pain, anxiety, making her sharp. She regretted the words before they were out of her mouth; whatever else he was, this man had saved her from a terrible death. But it was too late to call them back.
His face, his voice expressionless, he replied, ‘I am Hanif bin Jamal bin Khatib al-Khatib. And my enemies, if they are wise, remember that.’
Her already dry mouth became drier and she shook her head, as if to distance herself from what she’d said. Gave an involuntarily squeak of pain.
‘The doctor prescribed painkillers if you need them,’ he said distantly.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’ She was finding it hard enough to think clearly as it was and she needed all her wits about her. Needed answers. ‘You told me your name before,’ she said. Only this time there was more of it. Steve had explained about the long strings of names and she knew that if she could decipher it she would know his history. ‘Bin means “son of”?’
He bowed slightly.
‘You are Hanif, son of Jamal, son of…’
‘Khatib.’
‘Son of Khatib, of the house of Khatib.’ The name sounded familiar. Had Steve mentioned it? ‘And this is your home?’
Stupid question. Not even the finest private room in the fanciest hospital had ever looked like this. The carved screens, folded back from the window, the flowered frieze, each petal made from polished semi-precious stone, furniture of a richness that would have looked more at home in a palace…
‘You are my guest, Miss Forrester. You will be more comfortable here than in the hospital. Unless you have friends in Ramal Hamrah with whom you would rather stay? Someone I could contact for you?’ he continued. ‘We tried calling your home in England—’
‘You did?’
‘Unfortunately, there was no reply. You are welcome to call yourself.’ He indicated a telephone on the night table.
‘No.’ Then, because that had been too abrupt, ‘There’s no one there.’ No one anywhere. ‘I live alone now. I’m sorry to be so much trouble,’ she said, subsiding into the pillows, but not before she’d seen the state of her arms. The cuts had been stuck together, the grazes cleaned, but the effect was not pretty.
‘Don’t distress yourself. They’ll heal very quickly. A week or two and they’ll be fine.’ Then, ‘Are you hungry?’
‘I don’t want to put you to any more trouble,’ she said. ‘If I could just get dressed, impose on you to call me a taxi.’
‘A taxi?’ He frowned. ‘Why would you need a taxi?’
‘To take me to the airport.’
‘I really would not advise it. You should take a day or two to recover—’
‘I can’t stay here.’
‘—and it will undoubtedly take that long to replace your passport, your ticket. I’m sorry to have to tell you that everything that you were carrying with you was destroyed in the crash.’
‘Destroyed?’ Without warning she caught a whiff of petrol amongst the mingled scents of sweat, dust, disinfectant that clung to her. ‘They were burned?’ And she shivered despite her best effort not to think about how close she had come to being part of the conflagration. ‘I need to see someone about that,’ she said, sitting up too quickly and nearly passing out as everything spun around her.
‘Please, leave it to my aide. He will handle everything,’ he assured her. ‘They will be ready, insha’Allah, by the time you’re fit to travel.’
‘Why are you doing this?’ she demanded. ‘Why are you being so kind to me?’
He seemed surprised. ‘You are a stranger. You need help. I was chosen.’
Chosen?
She put the oddity of the expression down to the difference in cultures and let it go, contenting herself with, ‘You pulled me out from the car wreck. For most people that would have been enough.’ Then, realising how ungrateful that must have sounded, ‘I know that I owe you my life.’
That provoked another bow. ‘Mash’Allah. It is in safe hands.’
For heaven’s sake! Enough with the bowing…
‘I’m in no one’s hands but my own,’ she snapped back.
She might owe him her life, but she’d learned the hard way not to rely on anyone. Not even those she’d had a right to be able to trust. As for the rest…
‘We are all in God’s hands,’ he replied, without taking offence, no doubt making allowances for her injuries, shock, the fact that sedatives tended to remove the inhibitions. Her grandmother hadn’t held back when she’d finally surrendered to the need for pain relief. A lifetime of resentment and anger had found voice in those last weeks…
‘I’m sorry,’ she said carefully. ‘You’re being extremely kind. I must seem less than grateful.’
‘No one is at their best when they’ve been through the kind of experience you’ve endured,’ he said gravely.
This masterly, if unintentional, understatement earned him a wry smile. At least it was a smile on the inside; how it came out through the swellings and bruises was anyone’s guess.
‘You need to eat, build up your strength.’
She began to shake her head and he moved swiftly to stop her. ‘It would be better if you did not do that,’ he cautioned, his hand resting lightly against her cheek. ‘At least for a day or two.’
She jumped at his unexpected touch and he immediately removed his hand.
‘What can I offer you?’
What she wanted most of all was more water, but not if it meant spilling half of it down herself like a drooling idiot.
Maybe she’d said her thoughts out loud, or maybe he’d seen the need in her eyes as she’d looked at the glass, because he picked it up, then sat on the edge of the bed, offering his arm as a prop, but not actually touching her. Leaving the decision to her.
‘I can manage,’ she assured him, using her elbows to try and push herself up. One of them buckled beneath her and all over her body a shocking kaleidoscope of pain jangled her nerves. Before she fell back he had his shoulder, his chest, behind her, his arm about her in support, taking all her weight so that her aching muscles didn’t have to work to keep her upright.
‘Take your time,’ he said, holding the glass to her lips. Raising her hand to steady it, she concentrated on the glass, avoiding eye contact, unused to such closeness, such intimacy. He did not rush her, but showed infinite patience as, taking careful sips this time, she slaked what seemed to be an insatiable thirst. ‘Enough?’ he asked when she finally pulled back.
She nearly nodded but remembered in time and instead glanced up. For a moment their gazes connected, locked, and Lucy had the uncomfortable feeling that Hanif bin Jamal bin Khatib al-Khatib could see to the bottom of her soul.
Not a pretty sight.
Hanif held the glass to Lucy’s lips for a moment longer, then, easing her back on to the pillow, turned away, stood up. Her body had seemed feather-light, as insubstantial as gossamer, yet the weight of it had jarred loose memories that he’d buried deep. Memories of holding another woman in just that way.
Memories of her dark eyes begging him to let her go.
From the moment he’d cut Lucy Forrester free of the wreck she’d been attacking his senses, ripping away the layers of scar tissue he’d built up as a wall between himself and memory.
She smelt of dust, the hospital, but beneath it all her body had a soft, warm female scent of its own. He’d blocked it out while he’d held her safe on his horse, cradled her as she’d whimpered with pain, drifting in and out of consciousness in the helicopter, other, more urgent concerns taking precedent. But now, emergency over, he could no longer ignore the way it filled his head. Familiar, yet different.
He could not tell if it was the familiar or the different that bothered him more. It did not matter, but he clung to the glass as if it was the only thing anchoring him to earth as he took a deep steadying breath.
He was no stranger to the sick room, but this was more difficult than he’d imagined. Dredging up the poignant, painful memories he’d worked so hard to obliterate from his mind.
She is different.
And it was true. Noor had been dark-eyed, golden-skinned, sweet as honey. The unsuspected, unbreakable core of steel that had taken her from him had lain well hidden within that tender wrapping.
Lucy Forrester was nothing like her.
The difference in their colouring was the least of it. His wife had been strong, steady, a rock in a disintegrating world, but this woman was edgy, defensive, troubled, and he sensed that she needed him in a way that Noor never had.
The glass rattled on the table as he turned back to her. ‘I’m sure you would enjoy some tea,’ he said. ‘Something light to eat?’
‘Actually, right now, all I want is the bathroom. A shower. To wash my hair.’
Lucy Forrester shuffled herself slowly up against the pillows, obviously finding it painful to put weight on her bruised elbows, but determined to have her way.
He knew how she felt. He’d taken hard falls back in the youthful, carefree days when he’d thought himself indestructible. Had chafed impatiently through weeks laid up with a broken leg.
‘That’s a little ambitious for your first outing,’ he suggested. ‘Maybe if I brought a bowl of water, you could—’
‘I’m not an invalid. I’ve just got a few bumps and bruises,’ she said, then let out an involuntary cry as she jerked her shoulder.
‘That hurt?’ he enquired, with an edge to his voice he barely recognised, annoyed with her for being so obstinate.
‘No,’ she snapped. ‘I always whimper when I move.’ Then, ‘Look, I know you’re just trying to help, but if you’ll point me in the direction of the bathroom I can manage. Or did you want to come along and finish what you started in the hospital?’
‘I apologise that there are no women in my household to help you. If you think you can manage—’
‘Too right, I can. I’ll bet you wouldn’t allow your wife to be washed by some strange man, would you? Probably not even a male nurse.’
There were men he knew, members of his family even, who would not allow their wives to be examined by a male doctor, let alone be touched by a male nurse. He had long since passed that kind of foolishness.
‘I would willingly have let my wife be cared for by a Martian if I’d thought it would have helped her,’ he said.
Would have? Past tense?
Oh, no, Lucy thought, she wasn’t going there…
‘Look, I know you’re just trying to help and I’m grateful, but I’ll be fine once I’m on my feet.’
He looked doubtful.
‘Honestly! Besides, it’s not just a wash I need and I’m telling you now, you can forget any ideas you might have about trying out your bedpan technique on me.’
‘You are a headstrong woman, Lucy Forrester,’ he said. ‘If you fall, hurt yourself, you may end up back in the hospital.’
‘If that happens, you have my full permission to say I told you so.’
‘Very well.’ He glanced around as if looking for something, and said, ‘One moment.’ And with that he swept from the room, dark robes flowing, the total autocrat.
Oh, right. As if she was planning to hang around so that he could enjoy the spectacle of her backside hanging out of the hospital gown.
Sending encouraging little you-can-do-it messages to her limbs, she pushed the sheet down as far as she could reach. Actually it wasn’t that far and, taking a moment to catch her breath, she had to admit that she might have been a bit hasty.
Ironic. All her life she’d been biting her tongue, keeping the peace, not doing anything to cause a fuss, but the minute she was left to her own devices she’d done what her grandmother had always warned her about and turned into her mother.
Impulsive, impetuous and in trouble…
If Hanif bin al-thingy hadn’t been passing she’d have been toast, she knew, and it wasn’t worth dying over.
Money.
She’d been broke all her life and when she’d had money she hadn’t known what to do with it. At least Steve had given her a few weeks of believing herself to be desired, loved.
He might be a cheat, a liar, a con man, but he’d given value for money. Unfortunately there were some things that she couldn’t just chalk up to experience and brush aside. Which was why she had to get out of here…
Everything was going fine until she swung her legs over the edge of the bed and tried to stand up. That was when she discovered what pain really was.
She didn’t cry out as she crumpled up on the floor. She tried, but every bit of breath had been sucked out of her and she couldn’t make a sound, not even when Hanif dropped whatever he was carrying with a clatter and gathered her up, murmuring soft words that she didn’t understand; the meaning came through his voice, the tenderness with which he held her.
Idiot! Han could not believe he’d been so stupid. He was so used to total obedience, to having his orders obeyed without question, without explanation, it had never occurred to him that Lucy would ignore his command to stay put until he found the crutches, the ankle splint, which had been tidied away by someone as he’d dozed on the day bed in the sitting room.
Over and over he murmured his apologies and only when she let her head fall against his shoulder and he felt her relax, did he gently chide her.
‘You could not wait two minutes, Lucy?’
‘I thought I could manage. What have I done?’ she asked into his shoulder. ‘What’s wrong with me?’
‘You’ve torn a ligament in your ankle, that’s all.’
‘All?’ She looked up.
‘I know,’ he sympathised. ‘It is an extremely painful injury.’
She remembered.
At the time it had all happened so quickly that she’d felt nothing. It had been just one pain amongst many. Now, though, she was reliving the moment in slow motion…
He was holding her, supporting her, holding the sheet to her mouth before she even knew she was going to need it, but there was nothing to throw up except water…
By the time her stomach caught up with reality and gave up, she was sweaty and trembling with weakness. He continued to hold her, offering her water, wiping her forehead, her mouth—so gently that she knew her lips must look as bad as they felt.
‘You’re very good at this,’ she said, angry with him, although she couldn’t have said why. Angry with herself for having made such a mess of everything. ‘Are you sure you’re not a nurse?’
‘Quite sure, but I took care of my wife when she was dying.’
His voice, his face, were wiped of all emotion. She wasn’t fooled by that.
She’d become pretty good at hiding her feelings over the years, at least until Steve had walked into her life; he’d certainly cured her of that. But when you knew how it was done it was easy to spot.
‘I’m so sorry…Han,’ she said, trying out the name he’d offered, as near as she could get to an apology for behaving so badly, so thoughtlessly, when all he was doing was trying to help her. When he was clearly reliving all kinds of painful memories.
‘Nausea is to be expected,’ he said distantly.
That wasn’t what she’d been apologising for and she was sure he knew it. Questions crowded into her mind, but she had no right to ask him any of them and she let it go. Better to keep to the practicalities.
‘Didn’t they explain your injuries to you at the hospital?’
‘They tried. I didn’t understand most of what they were saying. I was just so confused. By everything.’ She looked up, appealing for understanding. ‘I saw a mirage,’ she said, trying to make him see. ‘At least I thought I did. Then, after the crash there was an angel. He had gold wings and he was coming to get me and I thought I was dead—’
‘Hush, don’t distress yourself—’
‘And then you were there and I thought… I thought…’
She couldn’t say what she’d thought.
‘You drifted in and out of consciousness for a while. The mind plays tricks. The memory becomes uncertain.’
‘You’re speaking from experience again?’ she asked, trying a wry smile, but suspecting that it lost something of its subtlety in translation from her brain to her face.
‘I’m afraid so.’ Then, ‘They did a scan at the hospital,’ he said, wanting to reassure her. ‘There was no head injury.’
‘Just my ankle? Really? Is that it?’ she asked. ‘No more nasty surprises?’
‘Lacerations and bruising.’
‘Cracked ribs?’
‘No one mentioned anything about cracked ribs,’ he said, finally showing some emotion, if irritation counted as emotion, although not, she thought, with her. ‘Are they sore?’
‘Everything is sore. So, tell me, what’s the prognosis?’
‘The bruises, abrasions, will heal quickly enough and you’ll need to wear a support on your ankle for a couple of weeks, use crutches. That’s where I went. To fetch them for you.’
‘Oh. I didn’t know.’
‘Of course you didn’t. I should have explained.’ His smile was a little creaky, as if it needed oiling, she thought. ‘I’m so used to being obeyed without question.’
‘Really? I hate to have to tell you this, Han, but western women don’t do that any more.’
‘No? Do you want to take a shower?’
‘Please…’
‘Then you’re going to have to do as you are told.’
‘What…?’ Catching on, she laughed and said, ‘Yes, sir!’
‘Hold on,’ he said and she didn’t hesitate, but grabbed at his shoulders, bunching the heavy dark cloth of the robe he was wearing beneath her fingers as he lifted her back up on to the bed.
Her laughter caught at him, tore at him, and he did not know which was harder, taking her into his arms or letting her go so that he could fasten the support to her ankle. He reached out to stop her tipping forward when she was overcome by dizziness.
‘I’m fine,’ she assured him. ‘Just pass me the crutches and give me some room.’
He didn’t try to argue with her, but he didn’t take any notice of her either, Lucy discovered. The minute she had the crutches in her hands, had settled them on the floor ready to push herself up, she found herself being lifted to her feet.
She would have complained, but it seemed such a waste of breath.
He didn’t let go either, but just leaned back a little, spreading his hands across her back to support the shift in weight. Strong hands. Hands made to keep a woman safe.
He was, she thought, everything that Steve was not.
A rock, where the man she’d married in such haste was quicksand.
Light-headed, drowning in eyes as black as night, her limbs boneless, she knew that if she fell into Hanif al-Khatib’s arms the world would turn full circle before she needed to breathe again.
‘Lucy…’
It was a question. She thought it was a question, although she wasn’t sure what he was asking.
She swallowed, shocked at the thoughts, feelings, that were racing through her body—struggled to break eye contact, ground herself.
‘I’m all right.’ Breathless, her words little more than a murmur, he was not convinced. ‘You can let go.’ Then, when he still didn’t move, ‘I won’t fall.’
She looked down and slowly, carefully, felt for the floor beneath her one good leg, took her weight. Then she leaned on the crutches. Still he held her, forcing her to look up.
‘Please,’ she said.
Han could not let go. It was as if history was repeating itself, that if he stopped concentrating, even for a moment, she would fall, be lost to him.
Stupid.
She was nothing to him.
He was a man without feelings.
Yet from the moment her dust trail had caught his eye his world had become a torrent of emotions. Irritation, anger, concern…
He refused to acknowledge anything deeper.
‘We’ll do it my way,’ he said abruptly, taking a small step back, without removing his support. ‘Or not at all.’
‘It’s that instant obedience thing again, isn’t it?’ she said.
‘Try it. You might like it.’
She blew a strand of hair from her face, took the weight on her hands and swung forward a few inches, barely stopped herself from crying out in pain. For a moment his entire body was a prop for hers, her forehead against his cheek, her breast crushed against the hardness of his broad chest, her thighs, clad in nothing but a skimpy hospital gown, against the smooth, heavy cloth of his dark robes. And, as he held her, for one giddy moment she felt no pain.
‘This is harder than it looks,’ she admitted after a moment.
‘You are not ready,’ he said, tucking the loose strand of hair behind her ear, doing his best to ignore the silky feel of it.
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I usually wear it tied back. I really must get it cut the minute I get home.’
‘Why?’ he asked, horrified. ‘It’s beautiful.’
‘It’s a damned nuisance. I meant to do it before…’
‘Before?’
She shrugged. ‘Before I came to Ramal Hamrah. Okay, I’m ready. You can let go now.’
Against his better judgement, he took another step back, still keeping a firm hold of her.
In this manner, her persistence wearing down his resistance, they crossed the room one step at a time until they were standing in the bathroom with the wall at his back. ‘This is as far as we go.’ Then, when she was slow to respond, ‘Enough, Lucy,’ he said impatiently. ‘You’ve made it to the shower. You can drop the crutches. I have you. You won’t fall.’
Lucy’s leg was shaking from the effort, her hands, arms, shoulders, back, shrieking in agony. It wasn’t that she wouldn’t obey Han, it was because she couldn’t. Her fingers were welded to the crutches and she was unable to straighten them.
‘I can’t,’ she said.
Looking down, he saw her problem and, muttering something she did not understand, but was sure was not complimentary, he caught her around the waist and, propping her up against his body, eased the crutches from her grasp.
‘You’ve done enough for today,’ he said.
Lucy, the hot grittiness of her skin made all the more unbearable by the very nearness of relief, persisted. ‘I’m not leaving here until I’ve had a shower.’
He shook his head, smiling despite himself. ‘I have to give you ten out of ten for determination, Lucy Forrester.’
‘Yes, well, no one ever accused me of being a quitter. And look, the shower has a seat. Easy. Just turn it on, give me back the crutches and leave me to it.’
He did as she’d said, testing the water until he was certain it was not too hot or cold, making sure that she had everything she needed to hand before turning to go. ‘Do not,’ he said, ‘lock the door.’
‘Got it,’ she said—as if she had the energy to waste on that kind of nonsense. Then, clutching hold of a handrail, ‘If I need you I’ll scream. Deal?’
‘Deal.’
‘Oh, wait. Um, can you unfasten the bows at the back of this thing?’
Keeping his gaze fixed firmly above her head, he tugged the fastenings loose on her hospital gown. ‘Anything else?’
‘No. Thank you. I can manage.’
It was an exaggeration, but she did what she had to, then settled herself in the shower, keeping her splinted foot propped out of the way of the water as much as she could. The warm water seemed to bring her back to life, but washing her hair was more than she could manage and by the time she’d struggled into the towelling robe he’d laid out for her she was almost done.
‘Han?’
He was there almost before the word was out of her mouth.
‘Thanks,’ she said, swinging herself through on willpower alone. ‘I would have opened it myself, but I had my hands full.’
‘You, Lucy Forrester, are a handful,’ he said. ‘Come, there is food, tea. Eat, then you can rest.’
Hanif had hoped for a few minutes alone walking the quiet paths of the ancient garden surrounding the pavilion where Lucy Forrester lay resting.
Fed by a precious natural spring that irrigated the orchards, guarded from the encroaching desert and wandering animals by thick, high walls, they had been laid out centuries earlier as an earthly reflection of heaven and he’d come here hoping to find some measure of peace.
In three years he hadn’t found it but today it wasn’t his own guilt and selfishness that disturbed him. He’d barely reached the reflecting pool before an agitated Zahir came hunting him down.
‘Sir!’
Han stopped, drew a deep breath then turned, lifting his head as the tops of the trees stirred on a windless day. Knowing what Zahir was going to say before the words left his mouth.
‘Sir, I’ve had a signal from the Emir’s office.’
No one had been here in months so this was no coincidence; it had to be something to do with Lucy Forrester.
‘Who is it?’ he asked. ‘Who is coming?’
Was it the man—he was certain it would be a man—she’d been so desperate to reach?
‘It is the Princess Ameerah, sir.’
Not her lover, then, but nevertheless Lucy Forrester was the direct cause of this invasion.
‘I am to have a chaperon, it would seem. You wasted no time in reporting last night’s event to my father, Zahir.’
‘Sir,’ he protested. ‘I did not. I would not…’ Then, ‘Your father is concerned for you. He understands your grief but he needs you, Han.’
‘He has two other sons, Zahir. One to succeed him, one to hunt with him.’
‘But you, Han…’
‘He can spare me.’
Zahir stiffened. ‘You were not recognised at the hospital, I would swear to it, but the removal of Miss Forrester by your staff would not have passed without comment. Sir,’ he added, after a pause just long enough to indicate that he did not appreciate his loyalty being doubted. ‘It was only a matter of time before news of it reached your father.’
‘He will want to know why the news did not come from you.’
‘You undertook a simple act of charity, Excellency. I did not believe the incident was of sufficient importance to interest His Highness.’
‘Let us hope, for your sake, that His Highness takes the same view,’ Hanif replied wryly, briefly touching the young man’s shoulder in a gesture that they both understood was an apology. ‘I would hate to see him replace you with someone less concerned about bothering him.’
Or was that what Zahir was banking on? Did he consider the chance of returning to the centre of things worth the risk of irritating the Emir?
‘I think I should warn you, Zahir, that the arrival of the princess would suggest otherwise.’
‘It may be a coincidence.’
‘I don’t believe in coincidence.’ Undoubtedly his father was making the point that if he could take in and care for some unknown foreign woman, he could spare time for his own daughter. He turned away. ‘Make the necessary arrangements to receive the princess.’
‘It has been done, Excellency.’ Zahir raised his voice as the helicopter appeared overhead, shaking a storm of blossom from the trees. ‘Will you come and greet her?’
‘Not now. She’ll be tired from her journey. Maybe tomorrow,’ he said when his cousin looked as if he might press the point.
He’d had three years of tomorrows. One more wouldn’t make any difference.
CHAPTER THREE
LUCY had refused the painkillers Han offered, but he’d left the two capsules beside the bed with a glass of water in case she changed her mind, and a small hand bell that she was to ring if she needed anything, before leaving her to rest.
She was, she had to admit, feeling exhausted, but it wasn’t just the effects of the accident. She hadn’t slept since the second credit card statement had arrived. The first she’d assumed was a mistake, had emailed Steve and he’d said he’d sort it out. When the second one had arrived a couple of days later she’d known that the mistake was all hers.
Her body jabbed her with irritable reminders of what she’d put it through with every movement, but for the moment she’d chosen what passed for clear-headedness over relief.
She needed to think, try and work out what to do. How much to tell Hanif al-Khatib. She didn’t want him to get into trouble, but neither did she relish the thought of being turned over to the authorities, which was what he would have to do once he knew the truth.
Her research on the Internet at the library had informed her that Ramal Hamrah was a modern state that paid due respect to human rights; what that meant in terms of punishment for car theft, justifiable or otherwise, she had no idea. And actually she was finding it hard to convince herself that her actions were justifiable.
Gran wouldn’t have thought so, but then she’d taken an unshakeable Old Testament line when it came to sin. Thou shalt not…
The only certainty in her own life these days was that she’d behaved liked an idiot. If she’d gone to the police, instead of taking off after Steve like some avenging harpy, she wouldn’t be in this mess. Now she’d lost the moral high ground, had put herself in the wrong.
Maybe a good lawyer could get her off on the grounds that the balance of her mind had been disturbed, she thought. Hold him responsible for everything. Make a counter-claim against him, at least for the fraud.
But what good would that do? Even if she could afford a lawyer, Steve wouldn’t be able to repay her if he was in jail.
Besides, it was no longer just about the money.
That was what was so unfair. When she’d taken the 4x4 and set off to look for him it hadn’t been herself she’d been thinking of. All she’d wanted was for him to put things right…
As if.
That was the point at which she decided that a clear head was not so very desirable after all but, as she reached for the painkillers, she realised that she was not alone.
‘Hello.’ Lucy forced her swollen face into a smile. The tiny girl, exotic in bright silks, half hiding behind the open door, didn’t move, didn’t speak, and she tried again, using her limited Arabic. ‘Shes-mak?’ What’s your name? At least she hoped that was what it meant since the child’s only response was a little gasp of fright before she took off, tiny gold bangles tinkling as she ran away.
Her place in the doorway was immediately taken by a breathless figure, a lightweight black abbeyah thrown over her dress, who paused only long enough to gasp her own quickly muffled shock before murmuring, ‘Sorry, sorry…’ before disappearing as fast as her charge.
Did she look that bad?
There must have been a mirror in the bathroom—there was always a mirror above the basin, even in her grandmother’s house where vanity had been considered a sin.
Maybe some inner sense of self-preservation had kept her from examining the damage but now she wondered just how grotesque she looked. Was she going to be permanently scarred?
She raised her hands to her face, searching for serious damage. Everything was swollen—her lips, her eyes, the flesh around her nose. None of her features felt…right, familiar.
Han had moved the crutches, the plastic splint, had propped them up out of the way on the far side of the room. It didn’t matter, she had to know the worst. Putting her sound foot down, she heaved herself upright, grabbing the night table for support.
For a moment every muscle, every sinew, every bone, complained and it was touch and go whether the table would fall or she would.
She didn’t have a hand to spare to catch the painkillers as they spilled on to the floor, or the glass which followed them, toppling over, spilling water as it spun before falling on to the beautiful silk carpet. Then the bell succumbed to gravity, landing with a discordant clang, followed by the crash of the telephone.
There was nothing she could do about any of it; all she could do was hold on tight and pray.
Apparently that was enough.
After a moment the room stopped going round and, since she wasn’t sure what would happen if she put her weight on her damaged ankle, she used her good one to hop across the room, hanging on to the table, the wall, the door, jarring every bone in her body, but gritting her teeth, refusing to give up.
Once she reached the door, however, she was on her own. It seemed an unbridgeable distance to the basin, but she wasn’t about to give up now and, with desperate lurch, she reached her goal.
It was only when she finally recovered her breath sufficiently to turn and confront her reflection, that she realised all her effort had been for nothing.
There had once been a mirror over the basin—the fittings were there—but it had been removed.
Did she look that bad?
Without warning her legs buckled beneath her and, still hanging on to the basin, she crumpled up in a heap on the floor. For a moment she sat there in shock. Then, as she tried to move, haul herself back up, she discovered that she hadn’t got the strength to do it, which left her with two choices.
She could shout for help or crawl back to bed on her hands and knees.
She was still trying to get herself up on to her knees when Han folded himself up beside her.
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