by Liz Fielding
Which was all very well for him to say, but ever since that kiss it was as if she’d been wired up to jump leads—one touch and her feet left the ground—but, aware that they were the centre of attention, she whispered, ‘So messy, melting...’
‘Rabi—’ Fathia and Nadiya converged on her, grinning as they shooed Bram away. ‘Come and sit with us,’ Fathia said, taking her hand and leading her towards a sofa. ‘We want to hear exactly how you met Bram.’
‘And how you got a man who swore he would never marry to put that gorgeous ring on your finger,’ Nadiya added.
Swore never to marry? She turned, met his gaze and Bram shrugged.
‘She’s the best temporary PA in London,’ he said. ‘Hugely in demand. The only way I could ensure she stayed was to marry her.’
‘You expect her to work for you?’
‘Of course. In fact, I have a pile of emails that need attending to,’ he said, disengaging her from his sisters. ‘We have to go.’
Shocked, Nadiya said, ‘But that’s—’
‘He’s teasing,’ Fathia said, grinning. ‘Let them go.’
‘Oh...’ Nadiya blushed.
‘Tomorrow,’ Fathia said, smiling, ‘we’ll pick you up and take you shopping for honeymoon clothes while Bram spends the morning talking politics with Abbi and Hamad.’ She leaned forward and in a loud mock whisper said, ‘We’ll have lunch and you can tell us everything.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘THANK YOU FOR rescuing me from the third-degree back there.’
‘A brief postponement, no more,’ Bram said as, hidden within the dark-tinted windows of the limousine, they were driven back to the harbour. ‘I thought you might welcome a break.’
After dinner there had been a seemingly endless round of visitors who wanted to welcome him home. Congratulate him on his marriage. Wonderful though it had been to see everyone, he was glad to escape to the peace and quiet of the boat.
To be alone with Ruby.
‘I had a practice run with Violet and Leila,’ she assured him. ‘Your mother stepped in before your sisters could get started but if by “everything” they mean what I think they mean I’m going to need time to get my imagination in gear.’
‘Just say if you need a refresher course.’
He anticipated one of her smart rejoinders but instead she caught her breath, lowered her lashes, turned to look out of the window and, without warning, he was the one struggling to breathe.
‘Ruby...’
‘I think I can remember the basics,’ she said as she turned back to face him, breath almost back to normal, but her eyes, dark and deep as space, betrayed her. He was not alone... ‘Your mother, I’m happy to say, was more interested in my antecedents than how we met.’
Melt... He’d told her she should melt but right now he was the one in meltdown, longing to hold her, kiss her, once more taste those lovely lips. Every cell in his body was responding to the look in her eyes. She was fighting it and he’d made her a promise but he was the one taking a slow, steadying breath before he said, ‘My mother was ignoring the fact that we should not have met without her approval.’
‘And family is far more important than romance. I understand that. Fortunately, although I’m short of the living variety, I do have centuries of ancestors to call on.’
She pulled at her lower lip with her teeth and he felt a more urgent tug of heat...
‘I’m afraid I dropped names left, right and centre.’
‘Names?’ he repeated, hanging onto reality by a thread.
Her smile widened. ‘You don’t hang onto your estates through war and revolution for as long as our family did without making yourself useful to whoever wears the crown. My three times great-grandfather might have raised eyebrows with his chorus girl bride but his son was an aide to King George V.’
He tried to concentrate on what she was saying, but all he could think of was how her mouth had tasted. How it could become an addiction...
‘Impressive. Safia—’ think of Safia ‘—must have been praying very hard for you to have walked into my life at the exact moment I needed you, Ruby.’
‘I gave her your message.’ She frowned and he barely restrained himself from reaching out to smooth it away.
‘What did she say?’
‘Nothing. She was just shocked, I think, but she didn’t have time to say anything before I was grabbed by your sisters.’ She looked up. ‘I won’t be able to lie to your mother, Bram. If she asks me the direct question.’
‘If she asks you the direct question do not hesitate to tell her the truth,’ he said, reaching for her hand, meaning only to offer a reassuring touch, but somehow it was curled into his, a perfect fit.
‘She’ll be terribly shocked.’
‘On the contrary. She will tell you that all great marriages are arranged for the good of the family and the state. The fact that we arranged it ourselves may be unconventional, but the result is the same.’
‘Hardly great. It’s going to be the shortest marriage in the history of Umm al Basr.’ Was that regret? ‘Perhaps I should have told her about my parents. Made myself a little less suitable so that she’ll be relieved when you divorce me. But I wanted your homecoming to be a happy day.’
‘Then you achieved your wish.’
He’d sat with his family, enjoying the teasing conversation that he could only have with those who’d known him from a baby, but his eyes had been constantly drawn to Ruby.
She’d fitted in so easily. He’d watched as one of his nieces clutched at her knees with sticky fingers. Totally unconcerned about her dress, Ruby had lifted her onto her lap for a cuddle, accepted a wet kiss, pretended to nibble on the half eaten biscuit the infant had thrust at her.
His mother, catching his eye, had smiled her approval and he had felt his wizened heart, so long deprived of all he loved, expand and fill with longing for this to be real.
Only Safia, unconvinced, had been quiet, distant, excusing herself early to see to her baby. She’d caught his eye once, a desperate, what-have-you-done? question blazing out of her eyes, but then only she and Hamad knew that he had been warned. Suspected that this marriage was a sham.
‘Your mother showed me the sea glass,’ Ruby said. ‘She told me how you put it in your treasures box and gave it to her when you were a little boy.’
‘Did she tell you what she wrote when she sent it to me?’ She nodded, her eyes suddenly liquid. ‘Is that a tear?’ he asked.
‘Just a little one,’ she said, blinking hard but failing to catch it. Touched by this evidence of her empathy, he took his hand from her and wiped the stray tear from her cheek with the pad of his thumb, before cradling her cheek as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Because it was.
For a moment she continued to look up at him, eyes glistening, her mouth temptingly soft, with only an anxious little frown to mar the smooth perfection of her skin. He wanted to kiss it away, reassure her, tell her that she’d been amazing. That he couldn’t imagine a more suitable wife if his mother had lined up every single one of the well-born daughters of Umm al Basr for him to choose from.
The way she’d walked beside him through the majlis, had spoken to his father. She’d been like a rock at his side...
‘You should have given it to her yourself but it was a clever move,’ she said. ‘It got us both over that first awkward moment.’
‘That was my intention,’ he said, lifting his arm and putting it around her, drawing her close. She didn’t resist, but let her head rest against his shoulder. No doubt she was tired. She couldn’t have slept much for the last two nights and it had been another long day.
‘How was your father?’ she asked.
‘In very good spirits. He’s brought me home without having to submit to the Khadris’ demands—’ in pr
ivate the old man had scarcely been able to contain his delight at besting his old enemy ‘—and he’s anticipating the swift arrival of a grandson to keep them out of the succession altogether.’
He saw the gentle ripple of her throat as she swallowed. ‘I’m sure, given time for Safia to recover, your brother will do his best to ensure that doesn’t happen.’
‘That would be the diplomatic solution,’ he agreed, ‘and my brother is nothing if not a diplomat.’
‘And he has a three-girl start on you.’ She looked up at him, looked away again quickly but not before he saw the tinge of pink darken her cheeks. ‘So today went as well as you could have wished,’ she said quickly.
Not exactly, he thought, as her hair brushed against his cheek. His plan had been very simple. A paper marriage and a swift divorce. The marriage had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams but every minute he spent with Ruby made the divorce part of the deal less and less appealing.
‘Everyone is happy,’ he assured her.
‘Except the Khadris.’ She gave a little shiver and he drew her closer.
‘They’ll get over it.’
‘What about you, Bram?’ She turned her head to look up at him. ‘Are you happy?’
‘Happy... That’s a very shallow word to describe the way I’m feeling at this moment.’
Sitting with his arm around this amazing woman... There was only one thing that would make him happier, but there was no rush. He had until the autumn to make their legend, all those stolen moments they had invented, a reality. To convince her to stay.
‘I was happy when I escaped the palace as a boy, playing polo, risking my neck on ski runs.’ Right now he felt as if he was on the verge of something new, life-changing. ‘Maybe I was born too late. As a young man my grandfather was battling the Khadris for grazing and water, protecting our traditional fishing grounds and pearl beds from their raiding parties, stealing their daughters.’
‘So you looked for other ways to risk your life. Will you go back to the mountains now you’ve served your penance?’ she asked.
‘It’s been too long. Downhill racing demands total dedication.’
‘I don’t understand why you gave it up.’
‘Don’t you? You gave up riding. It wasn’t just the press, was it?’
She shook her head. ‘I’d lost everything I cared about. I had no heart for it.’
‘But you will ride Rigel?’
‘Will you ski for fun?’
He’d never thought of skiing as anything other than a demanding sport but the idea of fooling around in the snow with Ruby was very appealing and she hadn’t had any fun in a long time. ‘It’s getting a bit late in the season, but maybe we could spend the New Year in Switzerland?’
He held his breath, waiting for her answer.
‘Skiing is just an expensive way to break a leg,’ she said. ‘Besides, you’d be bored to death teaching a falling-down beginner.’
‘Picking you up will be a great deal more enjoyable than avoiding once-a-year skiers on crowded slopes.’ She hadn’t reminded him that the cut-off date for their marriage deal was September. She hadn’t said no... ‘However, for a woman expected to win equestrian gold at the Olympics, you appear to have a very high aversion to risk.’
‘Or maybe a well-developed sense of self-preservation.’
‘We can stick to making snowmen until you’re begging to get out on the slopes.’ He held his breath.
‘Snowmen I can do.’
‘In the meantime, how do you feel about scuba diving?’
‘Scuba diving? That’s not in the job description,’ she said.
‘Your job description, as I recall, is “whatever is necessary”. Right now that’s being my bride, and my sisters all wanted to know where I was taking you for our honeymoon.’
‘And you told them you were going to dress me up in rubber and take me underwater?’ she mocked, but he knew now why she did not like the sea. ‘What did they have to say about that?’
‘When I told them I was taking you to the Maldives they all just sighed. However, since there’s nothing to do there but lie in the sun and make love, I thought perhaps we would need a distraction.’
‘No...’
She struggled to sit up but his arm was about her waist and her weight against him was a pleasure gained that he was unwilling to relinquish.
‘You would not be alone, Ruby, staring into the cold water of the North Sea, betrayed by the man you loved, your life in shreds. Your hand will be in mine as we swim in the warm blue waters of the Indian Ocean,’ he said, ‘and I will keep you safe.’
‘Bram...’ Her eyes were troubled, her lips trembling.
‘I saw the picture of you outside your office with the man you could not bring yourself to tell me about. He was pointing at something so that you would be looking across the street, into the lens of the photographer who was lying in wait for you, but you were looking up at him. Had eyes only for him.’
‘Jeff.’ She swallowed. ‘He’d been at a client site that day but someone called to warn him what was going around the office and he’d found the story on the Internet. He thought he knew me, Bram—’
‘Don’t make excuses for him, Ruby. No matter how angry he was, a man with any kind of a backbone—’
‘Bram.’ His name was so soft on her lips that it felt like a newly minted word and as she looked up at him, took her hand from his and laid it against his chest, the breath caught in his throat. ‘I’ve seen how a man with backbone reacts when confronted with an unexpected revelation. How he stands by her. Protects her.’
‘Ya habibati,’ he murmured, completely undone. ‘Ya rohi...’
The kiss—so wrong, so right—was a breath away. A hand slipped to her neck, his fingers tangling in her hair. He could feel her breath on his lips...
‘Workplace relationships are never a good idea,’ she said, holding him off.
‘I could fire you.’
‘Or I could resign.’
‘I accept,’ he said, lowering his lips to hers, with the same nervous uncertainty of a boy kissing a girl for the first time. He was shaking with the hugeness of it, the knowledge that nothing would ever be the same again. That he would never be the same...
Her lips were soft, yielding sweetly until, catching her breath, she drew back a little to look at him, her eyes molten silver, black velvet, searching his face.
Trust me...
His head was booming with the words and he wanted to shout them to the skies, but they were hollow, meaningless in the heat of desire. They were spending so much time together, sharing secrets, growing closer but trust was something that had to be lived every day, every hour, every minute.
There had been moments when it would have taken no more than a look, a touch to ignite the tension that sizzled between them, set it ablaze. Always conscious of the deal they had made, he’d taken a step back and he would do it again and again for as long as Ruby needed to trust him, trust herself...
Ruby had been so certain that she could do this. She’d shied away from the possibility of any kind of entanglement for so long that, despite the undeniable attraction, she was sure she could play the part of Bram’s wife for his family, for all the world, while keeping her distance in private.
She had been fooling herself.
The knee-melting heat of desire had been there in that first shocked moment when he’d appeared wearing nothing but a towel and, dry-mouthed, she’d watched water trickle down his broad golden chest. When she’d stumbled on the steps and breathed in the warm male scent of his body as he’d caught her, held her. In that moment when she’d been unable to stop herself from reaching up to touch the scar on his cheek.
He’d taken her hand then and it had felt like a perfect fit.
She knew it was the i
ntimacy of co-conspirators that made the air thrum with tension when they were in the same room. That the only reason he caught her eye to share a private smile, touched her shoulder as he passed, was to convince the world that they were a couple. But the wedding had felt so real. His kiss had felt so real.
Now he was talking about a honeymoon, about keeping her safe. And he was kissing her, not like a man confident of his power but a man for whom this was the most important moment in his life. Giving her time to choose where this would go. Step out of the shadows and take the risk...
With no secrets between them, nothing hidden, she closed her hand over his robe, bunching it in her fist, closed her eyes and said, ‘Ya habibi.’
His hand, cool, gentle, cradled her face. His lips brushed her eyelids, her cheek, and as they touched her mouth she felt herself melt against him, boneless, holding her breath, waiting for more, desperate for more. He took his time, cradling her head, his thumb against her jaw, his finger sliding through her hair, tilting her head back, brushing against her neck.
He paused to look down at her for a long moment before taking the kiss to another dimension; his tongue sliding over her lower lip before slowly, thoroughly, he took possession of her mouth, lighting up all the longing, need, that she’d suppressed for so long.
It was the impatient hooting of dozens of car horns that finally broke through the mist of desire and Bram drew back a little, kissed her again and then reached for the intercom switch. He exchanged a few words with the driver and then said, ‘Someone’s been rear-ended. It will be hours while they argue who’s to blame.’
‘Hours?’
‘You’re in a hurry to get somewhere, ya habati?’
He didn’t wait for an answer but opened the door and they tumbled out, laughing, as they began to run, dodging around the cars until they reached the harbour.
The gangway bounced beneath their feet as they ran up it and then, as soon as they were aboard, he pulled her into the dark shadows of the bulkhead, took her in his arms. ‘Are you sure about this, Ruby?’