Your date is organised. She typed the address and time she’d agreed with the restaurant. I hope you enjoy yourself. By the way, I was wrong. Turns out, I am a quitter. Or at least, I am now.
She sent it without a moment’s hesitation, and then switched her phone off.
She was so tired. She couldn’t have handled his response. Worse, she couldn’t have handled it if he hadn’t replied. And so she chose blissful unawareness.
Her apartment was devoid of life.
The small orchid she kept above the microwave had died. It was hot and stuffy despite the coolness of Autumn.
She moved through it, switching lights on, opening windows, tossing out the enormous collection of junk mail that had been dropped through the slot in her door.
Home, dirty and cluttered or not, was home.
She was too tired to shower.
Instead, she climbed into bed, and pulled her teddy bear to her chest. It was the same bear she’d been hugging to sleep every night for the past twenty two years – a gift on her second birthday from her mother, she’d loved him instantly.
Even now she took comfort from his furry nearness.
Sleep, the healer of all ills, came to her swiftly. Being home had the power almost to render the previous two and a half weeks a bad nightmare. It took some of Zamir’s power away.
She slept deeply, and might have slept through the entire night, if a sound in her room hadn’t woken her.
She blinked her eyes open, momentarily disorientated, until they landed on the familiar features of Zamir. At first, she smiled. It was an instinctive reaction, brought on by what he had come to mean to her.
But quickly, she remembered everything else.
Every reason she had not to smile at him.
His treatment of her.
His coldness to her.
The date he’d arranged through her.
And her eyes flew wide when she began to comprehend that somehow he’d traced her to her home, and he’d broken in.
She sat up sharply, bear still clutched to her chest.
“What are you doing here?” Her voice was high-pitched. Her hair was in disarray around her face.
He felt a smile twitching at the corner of his lips. “You were not answering your phone. You did not reply to my emails. What choice did I have?”
“My phone is off. I was napping.”
“So I see.”
“How dare you be here?” She demanded, her indignation not staged.
“How could I not be? You quit. I had to speak to you.”
“No, that’s why I quit.” She spoke slowly, as though addressing someone of very average intelligence. “I quit because I couldn’t bear to talk to you.”
“Why?” He pushed.
“Because you’re an idiot,” she snapped, pushing the blankets off and moving out of the other side of her bed. When she realised she was still holding Bear, she laid him gently against the pillows.
“Yes,” he agreed conversationally.
She jammed her hands into her pockets and stared at him darkly. “What are you doing here?”
“I just told you. We must speak, Olivia.”
“What about?” She said, her voice saccharine sweet. “Was there a problem with your date?”
“Yes,” he said with frustration. “There was, actually.”
Her temper spiked. “And you actually came here to talk about that?”
He laughed. “Yes.”
“I don’t work for you anymore. Why don’t you get Marook to sort it out?”
“Oh, believe me, he tried. But no one could do anything except you.”
And again, her professionalism began to assert itself. “Everything was confirmed. Your evening should have gone like clockwork.” She tilted her head to one side and pretended to consider him. “Though, if that had been the case, no doubt you’d be having meaningless sex with your quarry, instead of being here with me.”
His eyes flashed at her insolence. “My thoughts exactly.”
“What went wrong?” She asked the question despite the fact she knew the answer might very well kill her.
“She did not arrive.”
Olivia was childishly glad. “Well, I can’t do anything about that.”
“Wrong again.” He stood up and prowled towards her. “You did not arrive.”
“Me? Why the hell would I come and watch you with another woman?”
He shook his head. “Not another woman. You. You were to be my date.”
“What?” Her heart pounded in her chest. “What the hell do you mean?”
“Marook messed up my careful plan.” His expression was sardonic. “I asked him to handle the details. He evidently decided to delegate to you. I did not know, until you emailed me, that he had done this.”
Olivia squeezed her eyes shut. “So what? What was your plan?”
“To take you for dinner. To speak with you. To make you understand.” He clasped her hands in his and lifted them to his lips. “Most importantly of all, to apologise to you.”
Her eyes were still closed but she could feel his breath, warm against her temple.
“I acted like a spoilt, rude, arrogant fool. You gave me something beautiful and special, and it is a gift I will always cherish. In return, I was petulant and unkind.” He kissed each of her fingertips, all ten of them. “I have regretted it every day since.”
She blinked up at him, his genuine explanation doing something strange to her insides. “I would never trick you into getting me pregnant.”
“I know.” He shook his head. “It was a stupid accusation that I made simply because I couldn’t understand how and why you were inexperienced.”
She tilted her head to the side and he cupped her cheek gently. “I have been taught to believe in others’ ulterior motives. I have been raised to seek hidden meanings in all that is said to me. Only a few people, like Marook and Ra’if, do I take at face value.”
“I understand that your upbringing was different to mine. You and I are worlds apart. But I am not a liar.” She swept her eyes shut again. “I was so close to telling you. But,” her cheeks heated in response to the confession she knew she had to make, “I wanted you so very badly. If I told you, and you put a stop to what we were doing, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to manage.” She swallowed convulsively. “It was selfish. But I … had to …”
“It was not selfish. If I had bothered to look beyond your obvious assets, I would have spoken to you more about your experience. I looked at you and I saw a woman who is uniquely desirable, and I therefore decided you must have had a long line of men before me.”
“It’s not like I haven’t had opportunities,” she said haltingly.
He laughed quietly. “I believe you.”
“But everyone does what you did. People look at me and think that biology must equal inclination. It doesn’t. Big breasts and long blonde hair don’t equal slut.”
“I know.” He shook his head. “As I have said, I was wrong.”
“I got sick of going on dates with guys who expected me to go home with them straight away. Like I must be desperate to jump into bed with them.” She shrugged her shoulders, too embarrassed to meet his eyes. “Nothing is more off-putting than feeling like a guy you’re seeing just wants to get straight to the end-game.” She gnawed at her lower lip. “That’s what I liked about you.” She cleared her throat. “You were the one who put the brakes on. You told me you wanted me to be ready. That it needed to be my decision. No one had ever done that before.” She spun away from him. The memories, and how wrong she’d been, were too hard to process. “You were the first person who made me feel like you wanted to get to know me. That you enjoyed hanging out with me, not just because you thought sex was inevitable.”
Regret was acid in his chest. “I craved our tea dates as much as I craved you,” he promised earnestly.
“But you don’t.” She sat down on the edge of the bed, and stared at the carpeted floor. “You discarded me as soon
as you’d slept with me.”
“Discarded you?” He crouched in front of her. “I have been trying to get through to you but you’ve built a wall up around yourself. You’ve locked be out.”
“Only after you …”
He held up a finger to her lips. “I know what I did. I know what I said. But I felt, and I feel, the opposite.” He ran his hand over her hair. “I can’t give you anything more now than I could then.”
“Meaningless sex?” She pushed, her eyes flashing at him.
“No. Nothing about us is meaningless. But I do not belong in Vegas, and you do not belong in Dashan. While I am here though, I want you by my side.”
“I quit, remember?”
“Yes, good. I do not want you to work for me. I want you to stay with me. As my lover, and my confidante.” At her sharp intake of breath, he knelt higher. “I cannot offer you more than this, Olivia, but rest assured, it is far more than I have ever offered another woman.”
“And if I say no?”
He scanned her face with a strong sense of certainty. “I had not thought that far ahead. But I will devise a plan if necessary.”
“Your plans don’t seem to work out so well.”
“Don’t they?” He kissed her gently, and felt the moment she gave in to the intimacy and relaxed against him.
“Well,” she murmured, “perhaps this one turned out okay in the end.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
“What is it like in Dashan?” Olivia’s fingers were drawing figures of eight against his chest; Zamir smiled as each movement tickled him almost unbearably.
“It is hot,” he responded after a brief pause. “But quite stunning.”
“That tells me nothing,” she chided lightly.
“What do you want to know, beautiful Olivia,” he pushed, catching her hand and lifting it to his lips.
“What do you do there? What are the people like?”
“The people are good. Our culture is ancient, and very superstitious. Religion is a big part of life in Dashan. We have sacred temples and people live with peace in their hearts. We are fortunate that much of the war that is common to our region does not touch us.”
“Why do you think that is?”
His smile was cynical. “We do not have veins of oil beneath our sand. But we have diamonds. Diamonds and gold are everywhere. They bring us great prosperity, but no interest from any other country. We are left to govern in the best interests of our people.”
“I’m intrigued,” she said.
“Careful. I could speak about Dashan all evening,” he warned thickly. “For I am very proud of my country.”
“I would like to hear about it,” she responded truthfully.
“My great, great grandfather founded a university in each province. He was a very educated man, sent to study in England. A rumour, though perhaps it is just a rumour, that my father likes to repeat, is that he was friends with Mr Tolkien.”
She arched her brows. “A truly awesome claim, if true.”
“Yes, you may guess that I have never investigated it fully for fear of discovering it to be just a fantasy.”
She smiled.
“He believed our nation would prosper only when each of our citizens has access to the kind of education he received. And so he poured money into schools and libraries, and we now have one of the highest rates of graduations in the world.”
“I didn’t know that,” she said truthfully.
“We are modest,” he said with a joking shrug of his shoulders.
“Oh, yes, very modest.” She pushed off the mattress and came to straddle him. Despite having spent the morning in bed, she felt a need for him that was insatiable and unquenchable.
“And what about your grandfather? Your father?”
“Both truly impressive men.” He ran his hands down her arms. “My grandfather had a similar devotion to learning. My father brought balance to our Kingdom. He invested heavily in military, recognising that we had become a nation that was vulnerable and enviable. He also gave our educated youth a purpose. Many join the military as a way to give back to the country that has helped them.”
“You make it sound so idealistic.”
“Yes,” he nodded. “For me, it is.”
“What about your mother,” Olivia said softly, leaning forward and putting a hand on either side of his face so that he couldn’t look away.
“What about her?” It was a subject he didn’t welcome, but because Olivia was broaching it, he did not shirk away as he otherwise might have.
“You don’t talk about her, but I know you think of her often.”
“How do you know this?”
Her smile was enigmatic. “Because I know you.” She ran her finger over his lips. “And because I too have lost a mother, and I know how impossible it is to get through a day without something or other reminding you of her.”
“Yes,” he agreed, exhaling a slow breath. “I was only four when she died, and yet I can see her in my mind’s eye as clear as if I was with her only yestserday.”
“I’m so sorry you went through that.”
He took her words and stored them in his heart. “Thank you.”
“It must have been very hard.”
“Yes.” His eyes were almost mocking when they met hers. “I don’t know what you wish me to say, habibi. I am not being deliberately evasive, only most people do not cope well with grief. Do you want me to lie, and tell you that I got over it? That it was not the worst thing that could have happened?”
“No,” she said simply.
“Fine. It was very difficult. I was always at my mother’s feet. And my mother was not like her predecessors.”
“In what way?”
“Royal women are traditionally very hands-off in the raising of their children. It was believed that there are far more suitable people to care for future princes and princesses than their mother. Nannies, tutors, governesses. We had all of them, but our mother spent a good portion of every day with us. When she wasn’t engaged in her royal duties, she was playing with us. Cooking with us. Reading to us. My father used to tease her, I remember, but he loved how she adored her children. He told her she was spoiling us, and on reflection, he was right. Had we never known the brightness of her love, we would never have suffered so badly with its removal.”
Olivia swallowed. The tears in her throat were painful. “But you wouldn’t be the man you are today, with this enormous heart and propensity for good.”
“But perhaps Ra’if would not be shackled in a hospital, recovering from years spent trying to blot out his inner-pain with whatever drug he could find.”
“Your mother could never have known she would leave you.”
“No,” he agreed. “I have come to accept that.”
“And her love for you was a blessing. I still believe, no matter how hard you have found it to live without her, that you were better served by the short years she was able to lavish you with affection and attention.”
“I have never reached that conclusion with any certainty,” he said honestly. “But I defer to your wisdom, Olivia Henderson.”
“My mother died almost five years ago.” She cleared her throat. “It will be five years this Christmas.”
He was very still beneath her. Despite their growing closeness, Olivia had steadfastly stayed silent on matters to do with her family. He waited impatiently for her to continue.
“She was an incredible woman. I don’t think I ever saw her sit still for longer than five minutes. She ran our vineyards, and when we were a little older, she built accommodation on site for tourists. She cooked like a dream, and she sang beautifully, which is strange, because my sisters and I are all tone deaf. She also loved to swim, and dive. The water was like a second home to her.” Olivia sighed. “There was nothing unusual about the day we lost her. She’d done the dive hundreds of times. She was after Crays for the weekend guests.”
“Crays?” He interrupted softly.
“A
type of shellfish.” She swallowed. “Anyway, she went out early, and when she wasn’t back at her usual time, we knew something was wrong. My sisters and I went down to the water. There was no sign of her.”
He waited silently.
“They found her body the next morning. Locals went in and pulled her out. She’d got caught between two rocks. They must have shifted while she was in there.” Olivia shivered. “Even an experienced diver like mum would have panicked. You go through your air real fast once you start to stress.”
“A terrible waste. I am saddened for you to have experienced this.”
“Thank you,” she repeated his earlier response back to him.
“So you were nineteen?”
“Yes.”
“And your father?”
“We don’t know anything about him.”
“How is this possible?”
Olivia kissed him gently, her body beginning to ache for more than conversation. “Because he was a horrible pig of a man who cheated on his wife with our mum. She didn’t know. She was young and in love. She never questioned him.”
“I see,” he said slowly. “And he never tried to contact you?”
“Not that I know of. He gave mum a heap of hush money and she used it to start a new life for herself. She was happy. We were happy. He’s just the man who gave us life. Nothing more.”
“You’re not remotely curious about who he might be?”
“No.”
“You might have other sisters and brothers out there …”
“So?” She smiled, but it was practiced. He could tell, because her real smile transformed her face into a glowing beacon of delight. This was far more staid. “I already have two sisters and believe me, that’s enough.”
He kissed her back, because he knew she needed it. He understood that her pain was something she preferred to cover with an easy smile and an air of calm. That she needed distraction in the same way he had when he had first propositioned her.
The Sheikh's Convenient Mistress: What he needed from her went well beyond the call of duty... (The Henderson Sister Series Book 2) Page 7