The Sheikh's American Baby (The Sheikh's Every Wish Book 5)

by Holly Rayner

  He sensed her hesitation, and strode forward, confidently. Her misgivings at taking his arm didn’t seem to faze him in the slightest, although if wishful thinking could be indulged, Lucie thought she saw just the slightest tinge of disappointment on his face.

  So she followed him, off into the moonlight.

  “So, I think I know where your interest in archeology came from,” she said, when they had gone along for a while, engulfed by the sweet scents of the desert garden.

  “Oh, yes,” he said, as though he’d already forgotten it. “The tunnel.”

  Lucie laughed. “I was going to say Indiana Jones, actually, just based on the torch.”

  Her laughter, joined quickly by his, carried out over the still night.

  “I guess that’s fair. I can’t say that wasn’t what it was. I don’t remember all that much from early on. My early childhood is all a bit of a blur.”

  He said the words simply, as though he didn’t recognize the minefield just beyond them. Lucie did, but she wandered in, anyway.

  “Because of your mother?”

  His stride drew a little slower, and a little closer to her.

  “Yes. But not just her. It was… it was more than that. To lose her and my sister in the same day…”

  Lucie nodded, though more for a lack of knowing what to do than because she understood what it must have been like. She didn’t think she could understand.

  Lucie had never lost anyone important to her. In that way, she figured, she’d always been blessed. When she’d looked into the modern history of Al-Brehoni, she had come across an article about the queen and the only princess of the royal family having died of a quick-acting fever, some twenty-five years before she’d read about it. It had been a perfunctory article, written on the anniversary of their deaths. Just a remark on how much time had passed, and how the nation still mourned, etc. etc.

  But meeting Abdul, the truth of those few sentences, read on a dreary afternoon, finally hit home.

  “They wanted to have many children,” Abdul said, drawing still closer. “My father told me that once, when I’d asked why I didn’t have more brothers and sisters in such a big house. He said they were going to have them, but they were both so young. They thought they had time.”

  They walked along towards the palace, their steps now very slow and in sync.

  “It’s a beautiful home you have,” she said, looking up at him. “But it is very big.”

  He nodded, and then directed his glance forward, back at the building ahead.

  They went in silence for a while.

  “It’s good to speak,” he said eventually. “It’s good to be able to talk.”

  The words were simple, but Lucie thought back to how she had felt talking to him all that day and all that night, and she knew exactly what he meant.

  They were so close, now, she could have sworn she had taken his arm back by the entrance to the tunnel after all, were it not for the electric tension she felt between his skin and hers. They were so close, and yet, held so far apart by the impossibility of connection.

  She couldn’t touch him. It would be inappropriate. It would be unacceptable. If it ever came out, she’d be a laughing stock. She’d never be taken seriously in her career if she was seen as the type of girl who fell for the rulers of the countries she worked in.

  She knew all of these things, and frantically held on to them in her mind, afraid that, if she didn’t, they would evaporate and leave her with no reason to keep herself from reaching out and slipping her arm through his, the way he had offered just a few minutes ago.

  But then she felt his touch, his fingers grazing her forearm. It was a thoughtless, accidental movement, and he withdrew immediately as she froze in her tracks. But it was too late. It was like he had sent an electric shock straight from his fingers to her heart, which had begun beating wildly and out of control. Her palms felt wet and her face felt hot.

  People like him got what they wanted. They always did. They got the houses, and the fame, and the fortune. Things were easy for them. She could never have what she wanted. Not really. Not with him.

  But she could kiss him, just this once.

  She stepped forward, already in shock of the boldness of her own impending action. But the wheels were in motion and she could not stop them. She raised up onto the tips of her toes, and put her hands firmly on his shoulders, leaning her whole body forwards and bringing her lips to his.

  The same electricity that had run through her with the touch of his fingers ran through her again, only so much more. Her mind was consumed with the white-hot electricity of the connection, and when she closed her eyes, she swore she could see fireworks behind them.

  And then, like the ballast on a balloon, the gravity of her actions weighed on her and brought her back to earth. The mantra she’d been repeating just moments before began yelling in her ears. She mumbled something. An apology, she meant it to be. But she could barely hear over the thumping of her heart and her own sickening regret.

  She turned sharply and began moving quickly towards the palace. She took the path in long, panicked strides, picking up speed and putting as much distance between her and the man she had embarrassed and wronged.

  She couldn’t think. She couldn’t breathe. She’d never been the kind of girl to act thoughtlessly. She’d never been the kind to throw all good sense into the wind and ruin everything in one action.

  And now she had.

  “Lucie!”

  She heard him, calling her name from somewhere far away, and ignored it.

  “Lucie!”

  Only he wasn’t so far away. His voice was in her ear.

  She stopped short, startled. She stopped so quickly that he came tumbling into her. For a long moment, she felt herself falling.

  But then she felt his arms grip her tightly, and pull her up. She felt his breath on her cheek as his face came closer to hers.

  And then, just like that, he was kissing her. His lips were soft, but fervent. She felt herself melting into him, like the soft pull of the honey liquor. It felt irresistible. Before she knew it, the chorus of doubt in her mind had faded away to nothing, leaving only the two of them, standing there in the moonlight, arms around one another, their hearts entwined.

  NINE

  She woke up slowly. Softly. It happened so gradually that Lucie didn’t even realize what was happening at first. She was only dimly aware of a lightening around her, and the way she began to feel her face and body bathed in soft sunlight.

  Her eyelids fluttered open, and then closed again. She’d never done that before. All her life she’d been catapulting herself out of bed, driven by a great big list of things she needed to learn that day.

  But today was different. Today, she felt too warm, too pleased and satisfied to feel there was anything that needed to be done so badly that it would mean getting out of this bed.

  She reached her arm out, wanting to feel Abdul’s skin. She’d spent the whole of the night feeling him close to her, luxuriating in how it felt to have his heart beating so deeply and strongly so close to her ear.

  But she didn’t feel him there.

  She reached out, trying to find him in the huge bed, cluttered with a soft mess of sheets and blankets. But still, she found nothing.

  A seed of panic began to form, bringing imperfection into what had been, until then, the best morning of her life. She opened her eyes and began looking around, searching for the man she had been certain would be there when she woke.

  “Ah, you’re awake.”

  Relief flooded through her as Abdul walked towards her, straightening his tie. Lucie grinned; it seemed like such a common, domestic thing for him to be doing after what had felt like such an uncommon, mysterious ride these last few hours.

  “You’re already dressed,” she observed as he walked over to her.

  He didn’t answer, only leaned over and planted a kiss on her lips.

  No sooner had their lips parted she lifted her face
up again to his, stealing a second kiss where he had offered one.

  He smiled. “I am,” he said. His voice sounded like sadness was trying to poke its way through, but couldn’t quite make it.

  “I have some business in the capital that I need to attend to. There are some people who wish to oppose one of my new initiatives… nothing unexpected. I’d have scheduled it for another time if I’d known there was going to be somewhere I’d rather be today.”

  He was sitting on the edge of the bed now. It felt like they had felt the day before. So close. But he had to go.

  She laughed, and pushed him gently. “Go! Go meet your men. You’re going to make me late to the dig site, anyway. The storm has passed, hasn’t it?”

  “It has. I’ll meet you there later, yes? I’m sure I’m due for a tour.”

  He kissed her again, and then reluctantly stood. Lucie brought a hand up to her own face. She was grinning from ear to ear. It hurt a little bit, but she couldn’t stop.

  “I can’t wait to show you round,” she said.

  And, just like that, he slipped out the door, and Lucie was alone in the royal suite.

  Now that the Sheikh had gone, there was nothing to keep her in the hazy little bubble she’d woken into. She felt the energy and the excitement for her work building up in her again, and practically had to stop herself from jumping out of bed. If anything, the joy that her night with the Sheikh had brought her only made her more excited to get back to the site.

  She walked quickly to her room. It all looked much different now, in the light, than it had when they’d stumbled back there, arms around each other. She was a little afraid of running into anyone, but knew she didn’t have to worry about the servants’ discretion. If Abdul didn’t think they were to be trusted, he surely wouldn’t have left her in his bed.

  Back in her suite, Lucie showered and dressed in a frenetic hurry, then practically skipped downstairs to breakfast.

  Zach was there, looking very much as though he’d managed to down an entire bottle of the honey liquor before going to bed last night. How he’d gotten it, Lucie didn’t know, and she didn’t want to ask.

  She also found she wasn’t quite so annoyed at the idea of talking to him as she had been the previous day.

  “How are you, Zach?” she opened.

  He looked at her, suspicion in his gaze. “Did you sleep well?” he asked, rather than answer her question.

  “I did,” she said, spreading butter on her toast, appreciating the fact that even in the midst of wanting to show them his country, Abdul had catered to any homesickness by providing them with a proper American breakfast.

  “The beds here are wonderful, don’t you think?”

  “Well, I’ve only tried out the one,” he sniped, watching her face carefully, as though she might give away whatever had happened after he’d left her and the Sheikh to their own devices.

  On another day, Lucie might have been disturbed by the implication. She might have tried, for the millionth time, to talk to Zach about boundaries. But today, she found that nothing he said could bother her, and she only shrugged.

  “Well, my bed was wonderful. Have they told you if we’re going to the site soon? Do you know if work is going to resume today?”

  He was about to answer when a butler entered and told them that the car was ready to take them back to the dig.

  Now that she didn’t care in the slightest about giving Zach the wrong impression, she found it was much easier to talk to him. It was easier, in fact, to make him listen to her thoughts on what she hoped to find at the dig site than it would have been to try and hold it all in. So the whole ride to the camp, she found herself babbling on about the day ahead.

  As soon as they arrived, however, Lucie realized just how far her hopes were removed from reality.

  She’d heard about sandstorms before. But somehow, when she’d pictured them, she’d always imagined them like tornadoes—wreaking havoc on some things and leaving others untouched.

  Not so, it appeared, for the previous night’s storm: everything they could see was covered in a thick layer of sand and dirt. It was like another ten years had just been dumped on their site, and would have to be cleared away—and because of the importance of preserving the historical record, they would have to be just as careful in digging it all back out again.

  So they set to work. It wasn’t easy, but then, Lucie had always excelled at hard work. And she was glad of the opportunity to get to know her fellow archeologists better. The more she spoke to them, the more certain she became that they were her kind of people. And between that, and the joy that was hanging on her from the night she’d just had, her spirits were still high.

  But as lunch came and went, she began to worry. The Sheikh hadn’t said exactly when he would come to visit, but as the afternoon drew on, it seemed to become less and less likely that he would be coming to the site that day.

  She began to make excuses to hold back the crushing doubt attacking her mind. His business might have taken longer than expected, she reasoned. Maybe he’d gotten caught up in town. None of this was a reason for concern. The man who had kissed her good morning would want to be here. Why would he have said so if he didn’t?

  As the afternoon shifted towards evening, one possible reason began to take hold in Lucie’s mind. Perhaps, she thought, he’d told her that so that he could leave without her making a fuss.

  When an official-looking envoy pulled up to the camp, she dismissed her fears out of hand—but it wasn’t the Sheikh who got out. Instead, it was a servant—a nameless official that Lucie didn’t recognize—informing her and Zach that the Sheikh had hoped to host them again that night, but had had other plans come up most unexpectedly. The official explained that he had brought their bags so that they could stay out at the camp as originally planned.

  Then he unloaded their bags, and was gone again, lost to the desert.

  And with that, any defense Lucie had against the sea of emotion that was beginning to creep over her was gone. She was awash in anger and grief.

  And, worst of all, Zach saw it. The earlier Zen-like attitude she’d had towards him, unable to be annoyed at anything he said or did, evaporated with her hopes of seeing the Sheikh again. It took all the self-control she had not to snap as he tried to make conversation on their walk from the site to the camp that would be their home for the remainder of the trip.

  He was prying, trying to find out exactly what had happened between her and the Sheikh. Well, Lucie thought, that was a good question. So, now, did she.

  TEN

  The rest of the week passed without major incident. There were no more sandstorms; nothing to break up the monotony of digging out the sand deposited by the storm and trying to uncover the work the team had already done beneath it.

  As for Lucie, she didn’t mind the monotony. Even though there was little chance of anything new being uncovered, she knew of cases in the past when extreme weather had knocked loose discoveries that otherwise never would have been uncovered. It wasn’t much, but it kept her from being too frustrated at the lack of progress she was making with her dissertation research.

  Over the days that followed, her admiration for the people she was working with—Zach excepted—only grew. And she was reassured by the fact that some of them—many of them the best and brightest in their field—had come from circumstances not unlike her own.

  But even in this there was some sadness, as the realization that all the archeologists at the dig were of such high personal and professional caliber only served to remind Lucie of the man who had personally selected them. Even this little home she had found was tainted by the memory of him, and the great chasm between what she had thought he felt for her, and what he actually had.

  The Sheikh still reigned supreme in her mind, and she hated the power he had over her. One stray thought of him, and suddenly an hour was spent wondering where he was; remembering, touch by touch, the night they had spent together.

  It ju
st made no sense to her. She had always trusted her instincts with people, and had seldom been led astray. She’d always prided herself on that, growing up, and it had saved her from a lot of trouble.

  How had she been so wrong about this man? If the Sheikh was really so dispassionate that he didn’t even want to come and see her one more time, how had he seemed so tender and intimate with her that night? Why had it felt that they had made a real connection?

  This question, above and beyond the feelings of betrayal and rejection that she felt, was what occupied her the most. It was this question that made her feel hesitant to leave the country without seeing him one more time.