Still, it was a risk he had to take. The Sheikh was at an information disadvantage here, and as a dealmaker and negotiator he knew that the best way to play that hand is to bluff. Bluff with everything you’ve got, and trust you have the balls to stick it out until your opponent folds under the pressure.
“Alim,” said the Sheikh when they were out of earshot. “Alim, look at me.”
“Yes, brother. Speak. Please, I am all ears. I am desperate to understand what is happening. We are sitting here like cartoon characters with fake wives and a game of musical thrones—and somehow that is the least confusing and alarming part of all this! Please, Rahaan. If there was ever a time I was ready to hear a lecture, it is now.”
The Sheikh nodded. “First, I need to ask. Have you had any strange or particularly memorable dreams over the past two months? Especially over the past few weeks, leading up to the time Di contacted you in New York.”
Alim blinked and furrowed his brow. Then he shook his head slowly. “No, brother. Nothing that stands out.”
Rahaan sighed. “What about any physical changes in yourself. Your hair and eyes are the same, but it could be something else. Anything?”
Alim frowned and rubbed his eyes. “You mean like . . . like have I grown a tail? Is there a strange new mole on my left buttock? Do I have an extra testicle? I do not even understand your question, Rahaan! Is there some health risk in the air? What physical changes do you mean?”
“I mean like this!” the Sheikh snapped, holding up his arm and showing him the tattoo, those childlike scribbles that were once Arabic letters that said, “Always a King.”
Alim squinted and cautiously touched the black tattoo on his brother’s arm. “How in Allah’s name did you get this done? A removal and then another tattoo? Or did they modify the original? And what is this gibberish, anyway? It makes no sense to me.”
“No, it does not make sense,” Rahaan said, sighing when he realized his frustration was mostly to do with my own inability to explain the madness of what had brought all of them to this point. “And it will make less sense if I attempt to explain it. But Alim, look at me. I am not insane. There is something happening here that defies logic and reason but is real as the sun and the moon, real as flesh and bone, real as these sandstone pillars and marble domes. You have been pulled into it unwittingly, and I am sorry it has happened. But I need your help to find our way out. I need your help, and your trust.”
Alim was quiet for a moment, and then he nodded, his face glowing, as if he was delighted that Rahaan was looking to him for help. “Of course, Rahaan. I was foolish to question you. Anything. I trust you completely. You know it.”
“OK,” said the Sheikh, glancing towards the two benches in the distance. Hilda had stepped away, it seemed—which was good, Rahaan thought: Hilda had sensed she needed to back off and disengage from Di. Yes, although the Sheikh hadn’t said a word to her about what he was planning, she seemed to pick up on how to best let it play out. Ya Allah, she is a sharp one, is she not? She will make a fine queen, will she not?
Suddenly it hit Rahaan that, by God, she was his queen, was she not? In all this fake marriage and parallel lives chaos, their bond had only grown stronger even as their hold on reality felt weaker. She was pregnant with his child. She was wearing the ring he gave her. By Allah, this fake marriage was more real than anything else in this mixed up world, was it not?
The Sheikh heard his brother call his name, but his mind was spinning as back-and-forth feelings of Hilda and Di, himself and Alim, joy and apprehension, optimism and dread, panic and peace whipped through him as he considered his options. He could see that the wheels were turning in Di’s head too right now, and the Sheikh was reminded again that he was at a disadvantage against her because he still did not grasp her deeper motive beyond just jealousy or some misplaced desire to be with him.
He thought about it for a moment, and soon it occurred to Rahaan that Di’s reaction to his presence was dramatically different now as compared to their first meeting at the café, when he was certain she was going to jump him right there at the table, in front of her damn husband. Yes, she had been shamelessly flirting with him then, almost like she couldn’t help herself. But now . . . now his presence seemed to barely register on her, like he was no longer an object of desire, perhaps not even an object of focused anger or scorn. Instead she’d looked at him like he was just another pawn in her game . . . her own game. But what game? If not love and passion, then what else is there?
Power.
By God, that is it, yes? Rahaan thought as he watched Di’s lips move as she muttered something to herself in the distance. The rejection, the arranged marriage to the lesser prince . . . all of that had been subsumed and consumed by the soaring ambition of Princess Diamante. She no longer wanted the king. She wanted the kingdom! His kingdom! She wanted to be queen! By God, they were all pawns, were they not? Pawns to the one who would be queen! After all, in chess the most dangerous piece is not the king but the queen, is it not?
And by Allah, the chessboard is set up just right for her to become queen, the Sheikh realized almost immediately as he thought of the odd political situation in Kolah. The Ministry of Elders still needs to formally reverse the decision that I forced them into last week when I sent them official word of my marriage to Hilda. So right now it is still actually Alim who is Sheikh, in some sense! Of course, Alim’s own fake marriage will now force the Ministry to reverse themselves again and put me back on the throne, but the formal decision will still take a few weeks, given the pace at which the Elders work.
Which means that if . . . he started to think as he caught Di finally look over towards him, her eyes cold, face calm, like she had thought through it already, perhaps gotten there already.
By Allah, he realized. Could that woman possibly be so far gone that she’d consider it? Consider the unthinkable? Why not? Although Professor Norm was alive and well in this world, the fact remained that the woman sitting calmly on that old wooden bench had very much murdered him, in flesh and blood, in a world as real as any other. And that was a man she must have actually cared about! The three of us mean nothing to her, yes? Alim, Hilda, myself . . . just pawns, ready to be sacrificed so the dark mare with the golden hair can be crowned queen!
Yes, it could play out in her favor with terrifying simplicity, the Sheikh thought. She is technically the wife of the Sheikh of Kolah right now, albeit temporarily. But if I were eliminated before the Elders formally reverse their decision, then Alim would remain Sheikh, which would mean Di would indeed be just one step away from being the sole and supreme ruler of Kolah! Of course, Alim would immediately void his marriage. But what if he does not get the chance? If I am dead and if Alim dies before he annuls his marriage . . . then the game is hers, the throne is hers, everything is hers! Ya Allah, she is two royal deaths away from giving Princess Diamante the ending for which she has reached across time!
And so Hilda is in danger too, the Sheikh thought. Because Hilda carries my heir. Yes, even if both Alim and myself are somehow killed while Alim is still Sheikh, the Elders may consider Hilda to be the rightful queen simply because she carries a child of royal blood, the last of the Royal Kolah bloodline! It is not clear because there is no precedent for such a complex situation, but all the more reason to leave no doubt, yes? So yes, if I were Di, if I were Diamante, if I were playing this game with all the seriousness of the universe, then I would take out all three pawns and clear the path, would I not? Has she thought this far? Is she capable of it? Can she pull it off?
I cannot take the risk, the Sheikh thought as he caught sight of Hilda emerging from the palace, her pretty round face glowing as she stopped to talk to one of the attendants, who was so shocked and pleased he almost swooned at her graciousness. No, I cannot take the risk. In all likelihood Di thought this far ahead before she even got in touch with Alim. After all, her marriage to Alim was pitched as a way t
o actually remove him from the throne, yes? Which means that if becoming sole queen is indeed her endgame, then she would have realized she only has a short window of opportunity to clear her pathway to power. By God, she may already have a plan to eliminate all three of us! I must order Di to be detained immediately! Then I must convince Alim to void his marriage and support my decision to imprison Di and not overrule it as Sheikh. In a sense that is unjust, because Di has not legally done anything wrong in this world! I would be detaining her immorally, perhaps even illegally! But what else can I do?
You can trust her, came a whisper from inside him as the Sheikh watched Hilda stop in the wide corridor to admire a portrait of Rahaan’s mother, the painting completed just three days before the old queen’s death in that fated oil rig disaster.
Trust her to finish it, came that whisper again, and the Sheikh almost turned to see if someone else was around. But no, the voice had come from inside somewhere, perhaps from across somewhere . . .
Rahaan stared at Hilda, blinking as a new idea began to form, an idea that chilled him to the core, burned him up inside, made his hands clench into fists, turned his eyes to green stone. He looked at Di now, then back at Hilda. Back and forth once more, and then he knew what had to be done. It was reckless. It was dangerous. It was bloody insane! But that was about par for the course, was it not?
He turned to Alim and spoke quickly, with authority, making sure he said the words before he had a chance to question his own decision.
“You know what, Alim? This is over,” he said. “You have won. Your fake marriage has out-faked my fake marriage, and I will accept defeat in our little private game of passing-the-throne. In a week or two the Elders will finally emerge from their lumbering deliberations and announce that Rahaan is Sheikh again and Alim is demoted back to Prince, and then life will return to normal. In a sense you have learned something, I suppose, yes? And so have I. It is done.”
Alim blinked and stared at his brother as if wondering if Rahaan was serious. The Sheikh held his sincere, relaxed expression, and Alim finally exhaled and clapped his hands in relief. “Ya Allah, brother! Thank God! I was seriously beginning to question whether we had all ingested the hallucinogenic desert root of the Bedouin gypsies! Wonderful. Come, let us go back to our pretend-wives and tell them the news, yes? Perhaps we celebrate for a week! Shall we organize camel races for the people? A street festival of kebabs and Arabian sweetmeats? Traditional dance shows? Demonstrations of tapestry-weaving?”
The Sheikh shook his head and squeezed his brother’s shoulder. “I am afraid not. In a week I need to be back in New York, and so while I am in the Middle East I want to oversee the finalization of this new oil rig. I want the opening ceremony to occur on the full moon of this month, I have decided.”
Alim frowned. “That is in five days, Rahaan! I thought you gave them another six weeks! How can they possibly—”
“Father used to say that if you set an impossible deadline, the strong ones will rise to the challenge. Hilda and I will stay in the royal quarters on the oil rig itself. That should add some fuel to Yusuf Iqbal’s flame. Five days, Alim. And then you will join me and Hilda on the rig. As you may have guessed, Hilda and I are starting to enjoy one another’s company. I think you will like her too when you spend a little time with us. Come at sunrise on the fifth day for the opening ceremony. It will be fun. The three of us!”
“Three? What about my fake wife, Rahaan?” Alim said with a snort.
The Sheikh shrugged. “Oh, well, of course you can bring her if she wants to join. I assumed that since the game has been played out, she might simply choose to return to the United States. But please do inform her of our plans so she can decide for herself.”
Now you have done it, Rahaan, the Sheikh told himself as he patted Alim on the arm and walked over to where Hilda still stared into his dead mother’s painted eyes.
Yes, now you have done it. You have set up yourself, Hilda, and Alim as bait, laid the trap, presented Di with a mouth-watering opportunity to take care of all three of us with one strike, one blow, one boom!
“Boo,” he whispered into Hilda’s ear as he came up behind her and slid his arms around her waist. He kissed her cheek as she pushed her soft body back against his hard frame, and he thought once more about what he’d just done, what he was about to ask Hilda to do, what he was trusting Hilda could in fact do.
46
“You want me to do what?”
Hilda stood with her back to the portrait of the old queen, her brown eyes blazing as she glared at Rahaan. They were too far for Di and Alim to hear—which was good, because Hilda was pretty close to the boil.
“It is the only way, Hilda,” the Sheikh said. “We have to force her hand. Just like in war, there are times for diplomacy and maneuvering, trickery and negotiation. But sometimes the best strategy is to clearly set a date, choose a battlefield, and engage the enemy.”
“Engage the enemy,” Hilda repeated, running her fingers through her hair as she felt the desert heat rising up around her in a way she hadn’t noticed earlier. “You mean Di.”
The Sheikh nodded. “Hilda, the woman was able to pull all of us into a parallel world in which she changed some major events in her own past. She has merged the emotional energy of Diamante with her own scientific knowledge of the mechanism of time travel. We are at a severe disadvantage if we try to engage her face-to-face in this world. The rules no longer apply. Even if I order her locked up right now, who is to say if she can somehow intentionally change her timeline again, just like she did with Norm and Alim! We could lock her up a hundred times, but what if she could undo it all just like she has somehow un-murdered Norm! I do not know how much control and power she has, but clearly it is considerable. More than us, unless we pull her into a battlefield where you have the power to face her.” He took a breath and rubbed his forehead. “Hilda, for all my wealth and authority, my stubbornness and strength, I am still powerless if whatever I do gets undone by Diamante pulling us into another parallel world.”
“But I don’t understand what you want me to do,” Hilda said. She could see the strain behind those steady green eyes of his. He was terrified for her safety, she could tell. But at the same time he was conceding that he needed her help, needed her gift, needed her strength. “How do I engage with Di? Where? What battleground?” she asked, the answer already clear in her mind even as the Sheikh spoke.
“The battleground of your dreams, Hilda. Our shared dreams. Di may have found a way to merge her consciousness with Diamante’s. But that is just one of the parallel threads of our shared love. You have the power to access all three of those parallel lives. You are more powerful, whether you believe it or not. I do not think Di has the gift you do, Hilda. You can go back there and—”
“And do what? Di isn’t even part of two of those lives, yeah? How am I supposed to engage her?!”
“You don’t engage Di. You engage yourself, Hilda! That is how you strip away her power! So far when you accessed those parallel lives in your dream state, you were merely an observer, were you not? You could feel the emotions, witness the events, bring back the story. But you were still just part of the audience. Now you need to take it a step further, Hilda. You must use your strength, your power, your goddamn will to write the endings to those stories, to step out of the audience and join in the play, step into those women’s minds, their bodies, their very souls . . . those women who are all you, Hilda! Take your gift, take what you know, take my love and strength and unwavering support, and finish this for us!”
Hilda sighed as she understood. She touched his face and took a breath. “Step out of the audience and into the play, huh? All right. I can do drama.” She feigned an over-the-top look of anguish, clutching the sandstone pillar and reaching towards the imaginary stars. “You’re our only hope . . .” she cried dramatically.
She swatted at Rahaan when it was clear h
e didn’t get the Star Wars reference. “Don’t you know anything about American mythology?” she teased.
“Oh, I got it,” he said very seriously, feigning an over-the-top frown. “But I could not laugh because it reminded me of how you Han-Solo’d me on the plane when I told you I loved you. Who replies to an I love you by saying I know?!”
“Oh, was that a real I love you?” she asked, matching his frown and touching her lip. “It’s so hard for me to tell what’s real these days, what with two fake marriages, one imaginary murder, our immaculate conception, and you setting up some cosmic trap on an oil-rig in which we are bait. And why the oil rig, anyway?”
The Sheikh didn’t answer, and Hilda immediately saw that he couldn’t really answer. Not in a way that made logical sense. Not in a way that would sound even remotely rational. And as she stared into his eyes she thought she saw stars, as if the universe was winking at her through those green orbs of his, reminding her that just because something cannot be explained does not mean it isn’t real. And by definition a mystery is something that cannot be explained, yes?
But Hilda tried anyway, mysterious universe be damned. “It’s because of the oil-rig explosion that killed your father and his queens. You think that’s the missing piece, don’t you? That by gathering all of us at a re-creation of this one event, you’ll be able to tap into your own unresolved emotions. You'll access your own emotional power. Perhaps somehow combine it with mine? You’re risking it all for a chance to give me your strength as well.”
Stars for the Sheikh_A Royal Billionaire Romance Novel Page 18