by Kim Lawrence
The pause before the sheikh spoke was ample time for Tair to say there was nothing more he would like in the world than to marry her. But of course he didn’t and stupidly she felt totally bereft.
‘It really does not matter what Tair wants,’ Tariq explained soberly. ‘He knows his duty.’
The sheikh looked sympathetic but his manner was unyielding as he added by way of explanation, ‘My grandson has insulted, not just you, Molly, but your family. He will do the right thing, the only thing that is possible in this situation for a man of honour.’
Molly’s hands balled into fists. ‘I’m not being married off like a piece of damaged goods. People,’ she exploded, ‘do not get married just because they’ve had recreational sex!’
For the first time since this conversation had begun Tair’s expression of stoic calm slipped and Molly was shocked by the blaze of white-hot anger in his incandescent eyes.
On some level Tair knew his rage was irrational, but that level was deeply buried under layer upon layer of gut-clenching fury. But for some reason hearing her reduce what they had shared to a sordid, shallow level felt like a betrayal, which he knew was ridiculous.
Almost as ridiculous as the fact that last night had been the most intense experience in his life.
‘You will not speak in that manner,’ he said, glaring at her.
The autocratic decree sent Molly’s chin up a belligerent notch. ‘I will speak in whatever manner I damned well please,’ she growled back. ‘And if it wasn’t recreational, Tair,’ she challenged, ‘what was it? True love?’ she taunted.
Tariq spoke before Tair responded to her jibe. ‘Molly,’ he reproached. ‘You are being unreasonable.’
Her jaw dropped. Tariq of all people was siding with Tair—talk about male conspiracy.
‘How is it everyone else can discuss my sex life but me?’ she demanded shrilly.
‘I’m sorry, Sheikh,’ Tariq said, turning to the older man who had gone rigid at her outburst. ‘My sister doesn’t understand.’
Eyes blazing, Molly turned on her brother. ‘Don’t you dare apologise for me.’ Taking a deep breath, she struggled to regain her control as she turned to Tair’s grandfather. ‘I’m sorry, Sheikh, but I didn’t mean to offend you.’
The sheikh read the genuine remorse in her eyes and nodded his head graciously. ‘You appear to be a creature of strong passions, young lady.’
Molly gave another grimace of apology. ‘I respect your customs and your beliefs,’ she promised. ‘I really do, but you have to see they’re not mine.’
When he nodded his head she took it as encouragement.
‘The thing is the only connection I have with this…’ glancing around the exotic and utterly foreign surroundings ‘…is the fact my mother married a king, couldn’t hack it and ran away. Genetically speaking I’m probably the worst woman in the world to marry a prince.’
‘Young lady, you are forgetting the fact that your brother will be King of Zarhat and that you are under the cloak of his protection.’
‘I don’t need protection.’ Molly struggled to get her point across even though she sensed she was losing the battle.
‘It is not a question of what you need.’
‘I’m not royal, I’m an ordinary teacher,’ she said, a hint of the desperation she was feeling in her voice. ‘I’m like thousands of others. I don’t eat off gold plates, I eat microwave meals, I watch soaps, I cycle to work…’
The sheikh looked sympathetic but remained firm. ‘My grandson abducted you and stole your innocence. Honour decrees…’
Molly covered her ears with her hands and closed her eyes. She stayed that way until someone took hold of her wrists and brought her hands down.
Even before she opened her eyes she knew it was Tair. ‘Go away!’ she pleaded. When Tair was near her common sense went out the window. Things flew out of her mouth that were as much of a shock to her as anyone else, and they got her into trouble. Who was to say she wouldn’t agree to marry him, just as she’d said yes to making love with him?
She needed to keep in very close contact with her common sense right now because a small part of her, the insanely optimistic part that had read too many romances, thought she could make him love her and wanted to say yes to this crazy proposal.
‘Just calm down and listen!’
The request drew a low moan from her throat. ‘I’ve listened long enough. You’re all insane!’ she cried, her glance encompassing all the men in the room. ‘And look at you!’ she said to Tair, thinking how she could look at him for ever and it would never be enough.
His air of studied cool was fooling nobody, least of all Molly. The signs of strain in his lean face were obvious.
‘When I get married I don’t want my bridegroom to look as if he’s attending a wake. I don’t want to be a man’s penance. I want to be his love.’ Tears stung her eyes as she sniffed and added bitterly, ‘I simply can’t believe you’re suggesting a shotgun marriage and I’m not even pregnant!’
‘Romance is all very well, Molly, but arranged marriages have been working for generations.’
‘Like the arranged marriage you have with Bea, I suppose. I have heard a lot about honour, but not a lot about common sense. And, for the record, Tair did not abduct me.’
Tariq’s brows meshed. ‘What are you talking about, Molly?’
‘He said that because he was trying to protect me.’
In the periphery of her vision Molly was conscious of Tair staring at her.
‘I asked him to take me with him.’
‘No, she didn’t.’
Molly flung him a frustrated look. Couldn’t he see she was trying to help him out here? She tried to send him a message with her eyes.
It was a message he either didn’t hear or chose to ignore.
‘I abducted her.’
The sheikh, looking impatient, waved a bejewelled hand. ‘Well, whoever abducted who, the fact is she was an innocent—’
‘No, I wasn’t.’ She felt their eyes on her and lifted her chin. She felt more comfortable with the lie than the subject.
Tair shook his head. ‘She was a virgin.’
They all acted as though they were discussing nothing more intimate and private than the price of a barrel of oil.
Molly felt the colour rise up her neck until her face was burning. They didn’t have an ounce of sensitivity between the lot of them!
‘That’s what I told you!’ she choked.
The mask slipped and Tair’s anger showed through. ‘You told me nothing!’
‘Would it have made any difference?’
‘No.’
Their eyes locked, Molly’s chest tightened and her eyes stung as a jumbled mass of contradictory emotions rose inside her as she got to her feet.
‘I wasn’t living under the protection of the royal family, and Tair didn’t seduce me. That was my idea too. So you see there is no crime of honour. Besides, this is academic.’ Molly adopted a cool manner that befitted the voice of reason in this room of crazy people.
‘You can plan as many weddings as you like, but it doesn’t alter the fact that you can’t have a wedding without a bride and I’m not marrying anyone.’ Her façade fell away as she turned her gaze on Tair and, in a voice that shook with loathing, said, ‘Especially you!’
‘This is something that will happen.’
‘There you go again, thinking something will happen just because you say so. Well, maybe that’s worked for you before but not with me.
‘When I get married it will be to someone who asks me because I’m the most important person in the world to them. Unrealistic, I know,’ she added. ‘But I’m willing to hold out and if he never comes along—fine, I’ll make do with loads of recreational head-banging sex!’
Tair was aware of little but the dull roar in his ears, his hands curled into fists at his sides. The thought of Molly sharing as much as a kiss with anyone but him, let alone the sex she spoke of, put a hot flame under his cont
rol.
She continued defiantly. ‘I’m not settling for second-best just to appease your warped sense of medieval family honour. I’m sorry if you don’t like it, but that’s the way it is.’
Outside the light was fading. It was a similar scene to the one she had arrived to the previous evening. Molly could hardly believe how much had happened to her since then. The campfires around the encampment had been lit and their smoke mingled with the cold night air. Molly walked towards one, drawn by the glow.
She stood, watching the sparks dance.
A woman sitting close by left the family group she was with and came across to Molly. With a smile she offered her a plate filled with delicious-smelling spicy food.
Molly smiled but shook her head.
They left her alone, as if sensing that she needed the solitude. The incredible hospitality of the desert people was something that she would never forget.
That and other things.
‘That was quite an exit.’
She ignored Tair’s voice behind her and resisted the temptation to lean back into the solid warmth and strength she could feel inches away. You couldn’t cosy up to a man when you’d virtually just said you’d prefer to extract your own wisdom teeth than marry him. Not if you wanted him to believe it.
‘The desert is actually rather beautiful.’
‘I thought it scared you.’
‘It’s growing on me. My mother hated it—it scared her.’
‘It doesn’t scare you?’
No, you do, she thought.
‘Marry me, Molly.’
She closed her eyes and shook her head. ‘Why?’
‘Because, though modern society does not acknowledge it, there is such a thing as the right things and duty and service.’
And love and romance.
‘Obviously such an offer is tempting…’
‘Some women might think so.’ Some women might not consider he was second-best.
‘Then marry them.’
‘Why are you being so unreasonable?’
She turned suddenly, appeal shining in her eyes as she caught hold of his hands within hers. ‘Couldn’t we go back to the way we were? I could be your mistress…It was what you wanted.’
An expression of baffled frustration mingled with outrage settled on his face as he looked at her. It might have been amusing under other circumstances.
‘You want to be my mistress but not my wife? Is that what you’re saying?’
‘I suppose I am.’
‘You must see that is no longer possible. That I would take a woman who is the sister of the future king to bed but not marry her would not be tolerated.’
She threw up her hands in seething frustration. ‘I thought you were the royal rebel who slipped the leash of petty protocol whenever possible? How is it all right to marry someone you don’t love but it is not all right to make love to the same person?’
‘This is not what it’s about.’
‘So you’re saying if I won’t marry you…’
‘It is marriage or nothing.’
Tears stood out in her eyes as she stared at him outlined against the desert night sky. ‘My God, you and your damned ultimatums, Tair,’ she said quietly. ‘It has to be nothing.’
Without a word he turned and strode away into the darkness.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
MOLLY’S little flat was in a village about five miles from the school where she taught. The village boasted a small shop-cum-post-office, a pub and a tea shop.
It had escaped the development that had changed many similar areas because of a generous landowner who had inserted a strict covenant when he’d left the park and woodland of his ancestral home to the local community, thus effectively preserving the area.
On a Saturday morning Molly was in the habit of taking a run in the park, but this was the third week she had forgone her run and settled for a walk and cup of tea and a scone in the teashop.
Molly was approaching the tree-lined avenue that led to the wrought-iron park gates, her thoughts very much concerned with the other alterations that she would shortly be forced to make to her lifestyle, when someone tapped her on the shoulder.
‘Beatrice!’ Molly exclaimed, her eyes opening to their fullest extent as she recognised the glamorous red-headed figure. ‘What are you doing here? Is…?’ She looked around, half expecting to see her brother, her feelings at the prospect mixed.
‘No, don’t worry, I’m quite alone—except for Sayed, of course.’ As if hearing his name the figure who had been standing half concealed in the shadows stepped out. ‘And Amid is parked around the corner.’
‘Don’t you find it weird? The bodyguard thing?’
‘I did,’ Beatrice admitted, ‘but you get used to it.’
Molly doubted she ever could, but then a few months ago she would have been equally sceptical about the possibility she could fall in love with an Arab prince. She’d lived, learned and suffered.
Molly shut her eyes and tried to block the arguments that had been going around in her head ever since she had read that blue line on the test stick.
Essentially nothing had changed, she reminded herself for the millionth time.
Tair still didn’t love her, and this time if she accepted the inevitable offer of self-sacrificial marriage there would be no get-out clause because Molly knew that, unlike her own mother, she could never leave her child to be brought up in another country.
But she was equally sure that Tair was the love of her life—her soul mate—and that she would never find what she had with him with anyone else.
It was not surprising that her internal debate never progressed beyond a bad headache.
She pinned on a belated smile of welcome and felt the start of another headache as she said, ‘You look fantastic, Bea.’
It was the truth. As she hugged the glowing princess, whether illusion or not, Molly felt the warmth of the contented glow the new mother projected.
She was not surprised when Beatrice did not return the compliment. Molly knew she looked wretched. Her mirror told her that every time she consulted it.
Some mornings just dragging herself out of bed was an effort. So far her colleagues at work had accepted the story that she had contracted a nasty stomach bug while travelling during the summer break, but she knew the excuse had a shelf-life.
‘Motherhood must suit you,’ she added. Beatrice made a very good advertisement for the role.
‘You didn’t see me at the two o’clock, three o’clock and five o’clock feeds. I’m suffering from chronic sleep deprivation.’
‘Well, you hide it well. How is the baby?’
Beatrice’s beam of contentment went off the scale at the mention of the new arrival. ‘He is gorgeous and already shows signs of being a child prodigy, much like his auntie.’
‘I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.’ Being set apart from his or her peers was not something Molly would want for any child of hers. ‘Not that I can see any child of yours and Tariq being considered a geek.’
Then, because she didn’t want Beatrice to think she was canvassing the sympathy vote—whining was not to her way of thinking an appealing quality—she changed the subject.
‘You still haven’t said—what are you doing here? And where is your gorgeous baby?’
‘I left him with Tariq in London. It’s the first time so it feels really strange,’ Beatrice admitted. ‘But I wanted a little chat with you—alone, Molly.’
Molly’s brow furrowed warily. ‘Me…?’
‘First, how is your father?’
Molly smiled. ‘He’s fine.’
She had arrived home to find that her father had already had his heart surgery. She had been pleased but puzzled about how things had happened so fast. Did waiting lists vanish overnight?
Her equally mystified sisters, who had met her at the airport, had also not been able to offer an explanation as to how their dad had leap-frogged his way to the top of the waiting list in such a spe
ctacular fashion.
Some sort of government health initiative, I think someone said, was Rosie’s response to Molly’s enquiries.
Rosie hadn’t been able to remember who this someone was and Sue’s response to Molly’s questions had been impatient.
‘Why the interrogation? Who cares? It worked and Dad’s better and that’s all that matters. Now he doesn’t have all those weeks worrying that every time he feels a twinge it’s another attack. And wait until you see the hospital, Molly. It’s incredible and the staff are lovely.’
When Molly went to visit her father she realised that her sister had not been exaggerating. The private clinic set in woody grounds was more luxurious than many five-star hotels.
The moment she saw the place she knew what must have happened and it turned out she was right.
The hospital, when taxed, admitted that her father was a private patient, but they had refused to reveal the name of the anonymous person who was footing the bill. Molly, however, had known immediately who it must be.
Now Molly took Beatrice’s hand and squeezed it in silent gratitude. ‘Thank you to you and Tariq for arranging the private treatment. I’m sure Dad would have been fine anyway, but the waiting and uncertainty was getting unbearable.’
She felt tears of emotion in her eyes that were triggered these days by any little thing, and blinked them back before saying huskily, ‘I know that Tariq wanted to be anonymous, but could you let him know how I feel?’
Beatrice looked at her blankly for a moment and then said, ‘You think Tariq arranged for your father’s operation?’
‘Well, didn’t he?’
‘He would have, if he thought of it, I’m sure, but he had a lot of other things on his mind around that time, like the baby coming four weeks early.’
Molly shook her head in bewilderment. ‘But I don’t understand—if it wasn’t…then who…?’
Beatrice lifted her brows and the colour rushed to Molly’s face as realisation hit like a stone.
‘Tair…?’ she asked in a small voice.
‘Unless you know of any other candidates, I’d say he’s a safe bet. Did he know about your dad being ill?’