The Sheikh's Last Seduction

by Jennie Lucas

  * * *

  Long after the limo had disappeared past the palace gate, Sharif remained immobile, staring at the clouds of dust on the road. He closed his eyes, still seeing Irene’s tear-stained face as it had looked through the rear window. He knew he’d never see her again.

  “Your Highness?”

  He opened his eyes bleakly to see Hassan standing in the side door of the palace. “I have the head of the top Makhtar PR agency on the phone,” he said. “He’s saying he received an urgent message. I can of course take a message if you—”

  “No,” Sharif said, and barely recognized his own voice. Kalila must have called them immediately—but then, she knew all the angles. She’d probably already announced their engagement on her social media accounts, making it all sound romantic, making everyone envious of their great love. “Ask him to come to the palace at once. We’re going to announce our engagement.”

  “You and Miss—”

  “To Kalila,” he cut him off.

  “But—Miss Taylor?”

  “I sent her home.”

  “But you...I thought...” He hesitated. “When the rumor swept through that you’d rushed to see her in the women’s hammam, the whole staff greatly hoped...”

  “Speak to me no more of Miss Taylor,” he said harshly. He turned away. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “Get what over with, exactly, Your Highness?”

  “My engagement. My wedding.” My life.

  After they returned to the palace, his chief of staff and bodyguards went their separate ways, as each man’s duty required. And so did Sharif.

  He walked slowly down the hallway, back toward the dining room. But with every step farther away from Irene, the strength seemed to leave his body. He felt like an old man. No. He felt as if he’d already died.

  He stopped.

  Irene. Her name was like a prayer in his heart. He pressed his fists hard against his eyes. She would have everything he could not give her. A man who would love her, marry her, have children with her. All her dreams would come true, even without him. He had to believe he’d done the right thing. Loving her, remembering the brief moments they’d shared, would have to be enough to sustain him for the rest of his life. The memory of her, and the knowledge that she’d someday be happy with someone else...

  Bleakly, he went back to the dining room. It was empty. His sister had left. His servants had cleared the table.

  Only one person remained, standing by the open window, smoking a cigarette. She turned to face him.

  “So you tossed her out,” Kalila said. “I confess you surprised me. I did not expect you to let this one go so easily.”

  “What do you want, Kalila?” he said wearily.

  She gave him a hard smile. “Your assurance that, after we are wed and I give you your heir, you will leave me alone, with all the same rights to play that you have.”

  Sharif stared at his future bride in the shadows of the empty dining hall. “We are not yet wed, and you are planning how you wish to be unfaithful?”

  She gave a cold laugh. “Don’t take that outraged tone with me. I’m not one of your doe-eyed little virgins.” She took another elegant drag off her cigarette. “Not like her.”

  He jolted. “You knew we were never lovers?”

  “Of course, I could tell. Stupid little virgin, hanging on your every word, staring up at you with those big needy eyes.” She took another puff. Her fingers were almost as thin and white as the cigarette. “Have her, if you want. And I intend to have my own fun. I don’t care if you hate me. Our marriage is about power, not love.”

  She made the word a sneer. Just as he once had.

  “When you are my queen,” Sharif said tightly, “I expect you to rule with respect and dignity for our customs and laws.”

  She shrugged her skinny shoulders. “I’m no fool. I’ll be discreet.”

  “This I doubt.”

  She snorted. “More than you have been,” she said pointedly, “sneaking around with your sister’s companion. Even if you weren’t lovers, I heard whispers about your—relationship—all the way to New York. My father was the one who called me.”

  Sharif’s lips twisted sardonically. “So that is why you raced here? Because you feared I wouldn’t keep my word—that I would marry her?”

  Kalila looked away abruptly, then lifted the cigarette to her lips with trembling fingers. “I should have nailed this down a long time ago.” Looking out the window, she said in a low voice, “I won’t let one mistake keep me from everything that should be mine.”

  Sharif’s eyes narrowed. “She wasn’t a mistake.”

  “What? Oh. Yes. Miss Taylor. But she’s gone now. And we understand each other, do we not?” She jerked her chin with glittering eyes. “We’ll be wed next week in your sister’s place. Then we will consummate the marriage...as often and frequently as we must...”

  He tried not to flinch.

  “Once you get me pregnant, I do not care what you do. Bring your precious Miss Taylor back. Install her in your bed, for all I care.” Kalila abruptly put out her cigarette on the windowsill, leaving a burn mark before she dropped the cigarette carelessly to the floor. He watched the lingering ashes fall against his tile floor like gray snowflakes. “It means nothing to me.”

  Staring at her, Sharif had a sudden flashback to shining brown eyes. When I marry, it will only be for love. And our wedding night will be truly about making love. The kind that will last forever. He remembered the tremble of Irene’s voice just an hour before, when she’d told him she loved him.

  “Our marriage is nothing but a means to an end,” Kalila said. “Something to endure, and ignore, until we both are dead.”

  He abruptly focused on her face, on those black eyes with fake black lashes, beautiful, yes, but so cold, with an almost reptilian stare. So different from loving, warm brown eyes that glowed at you with the heat of summer, like the warmth of an embrace. He looked at his fiancée’s hollow cheekbones, so different from the healthy rose-dusted cheeks that blushed with modesty or shyness or even anger.

  Kalila didn’t seem to feel anything, care about anything, so long as she had two things: money and power. She wanted the prestige of being Her Highness, the Sheikha of Makhtar, the mother of the future heir—and the pleasure of enjoying herself with any man she pleased during the length of their marriage.

  She was shallow. Terminally shallow.

  And once, Sharif suddenly realized, he’d been just like her. Oh, he’d always cared about doing his duty by his country, and by his family. But other than that, he’d cared for nothing and no one. He’d wasted endless days on meaningless love affairs, trying to distract himself from his own empty soul.

  Then he’d had the grace and fortune to meet Irene. It was the miracle of his life.

  And the tragedy.

  “Not a word in reply?” Kalila took a step toward him, frowning. “What has changed in you, Sharif?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You’re different somehow. You...” She sucked in her breath, covering her hand over her mouth with an astonished giggle. “But wait. Don’t tell me you’re actually in love with her?”

  “Be quiet,” he snapped.

  “Your sweet virgin. So tender. So true...”

  “She’s worth a thousand of you,” he said.

  “You love her.” Kalila cackled a laugh. “The great Emir of Makhtar is chained down at last. How very amusing to see you caught this way. Just like—”

  “Like what?” he said, expecting an insult. She looked away.

  “Nothing,” she muttered. “It’s just funny, that’s all. Your precious Miss Taylor—”

  He grabbed her wrist.

  “Don’t ever,” he said in a low, dangerous voice, “speak her name aga
in.”

  Kalila blinked, then gave another low laugh. “Have it your way.” She ripped her bony arm from his grasp. “Keep your sweet memories. I will take my throne.” Her eyes were feverishly bright. “I think this marriage will suit me very well.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  FIVE DAYS LATER, Irene was in Colorado, kneeling on the ramshackle porch of her old house, boxing up the last items to take north to their new place in Denver. There was surprisingly little to pack. Some of her family’s old possessions, worn clothes like her mother’s pink terry hot pants with the word Tasty emblazoned across the backside, had gone straight into the trash. A few other things had gone to the local charity shop. But her sister and her mother had already taken the things they cared about when they’d left here four days ago.

  Her sister, Melissa, was already unpacking boxes in the brand-new condo in Denver that Irene had leased, right between the local community college and Colorado’s best private rehab facility, where their mother had checked herself in two days ago. Melissa was studying to take her GED test, to compensate for never having graduated from high school, and looking eagerly through the college course book. A rough road might still lie ahead, Irene knew, but it was going to work out. They were going to be settled and secure, and have the chance to be happy.

  “Thank you, baby,” her mother had said, openly weeping when she hugged Irene close, the last moment before she went into rehab. “I wanted to be a good mother to you. I tried. But I didn’t know how.” She wiped her eyes hard. “I’m going to learn.”

  Melissa had cried, too—when she first saw the luxury condo on a lovely, tree-lined street in Denver, and the college book sitting on the kitchen counter. “You remembered how I used to talk about becoming a dental assistant?”

  Irene nodded.

  “Do you know how much they make per hour?” Melissa demanded, then she, too, wiped her eyes. “Plus, they hang around with handsome single dentists all day...”

  “You’d be a great assistant. Or you could be a dentist yourself.”

  “Me?”

  “Sure.” Irene had shrugged. “Let all the sexy male dental assistants come to you.”

  “You think I could?” her sister had breathed as if considering the idea for the first time. “And you’d pay for me to go to dental school?”

  “Any kind of school you want.” Irene had reached out and taken her sister’s hand. “I believe in you.”

  Melissa blinked back tears. “I always thought you judged me...”

  “I did,” Irene said. “I did and I’m sorry. I didn’t understand then how powerful sex and love can be. Or that sometimes, no matter how hard you try—” she looked down “—dreams don’t always come true...”

  “Dreams don’t come true?” Melissa’s voice changed. She shook her head. “You’re wrong about that, Reena.” She smiled, her eyes shimmering with tears. “Just look around me right now.”

  The words still rang in Irene’s ears when she’d driven back to Lone Pine today, to finish packing and close down the house. Her last stop on the way out of town would be to return the key to the corpulent landlord, who’d be sad to see the two older Taylor women leave after twenty years of paying him rent, not always in cash. Irene had been taping up the last box when the air in the tiny house, with its stained carpets and peeling wallpaper, had suddenly become thick with the haze of neglect and poverty and bad memories. Putting a hand to her throat, she’d run outside, onto the crooked wooden porch to take a staggering breath of cool, clear air.

  Now, leaning against the rough wood, Irene stared out at the dark spring night. On the edge of town, between the railroad tracks and the forest, patches of snow still lay on the ground. In the distance, she could see the roof of the tiny house where the Abbotts had once served her cookies after school. Irene pulled her cashmere cardigan a little tighter over her body. She told herself she’d been lucky, really, to have known love, even for such a short time. But if she was lucky, why did it hurt so much?

  She’d gotten six different calls from Makhtar since she’d left, all of them from different members of the palace staff who were desperate to have Sharif’s wedding to Kalila called off. Well, get in line, she thought. But the latest call had been particularly painful. Aziza had called her at three that morning, waking her up.

  “How can I be happy,” she’d wailed as greeting, “when both of you are going to be miserable forever?”

  “We’re not miserable,” Irene had lied. “We’re fine, and—”

  “Fine? You should see my brother right now!”

  Irene’s throat had ached, and she closed her eyes against the flash of blinding pain. “There’s nothing I can do.”

  “But you said you loved him. How could you love him, and leave him to that woman?”

  “He gave me no choice.”

  “You haven’t even called him! Even Basimah is surprised. She told me, since you didn’t call after my wedding was canceled, you must not love Sharif at all.”

  The knife twisted a little deeper in Irene’s heart.

  “Aziza,” she’d gasped in the dark, empty bed of her condo, “please...”

  “No, forget it!” she’d snapped. “Don’t even try to save him—just enjoy your life and forget all about us!”

  She’d ended the call, leaving Irene weeping for the next three hours in the dark.

  She missed Aziza, and Makhtar, and everyone in the palace. But most of all, she missed Sharif. His absence was a hole through her body, leaving everything hollow and devoid of meaning. She felt as if she was dying without him.

  Irene’s gaze fell on her car.

  Her last suitcase had arrived from Makhtar yesterday. It was still in the trunk of her rental car. She hadn’t wanted to open it because once she did, the last possible link between her and Sharif would be gone. As long as she didn’t open it, she could hope he’d left her some note, some letter to read and treasure for the rest of her life. She’d tried to put it off as long as she could.

  She couldn’t wait another minute. Grabbing her suitcase from the car, she dragged it up to the porch. With a deep breath, she flung it open.

  All she saw were the clothes she’d left behind. Clothes. Just clothes. Kneeling forward, she started pawing through them more desperately.

  Then she saw it.

  A note.

  With a gasp, she picked it up. She opened it. Her heart pounded as she recognized his jagged handwriting. But the note had only two words: Unpack thoroughly.

  * * *

  That was it? She looked at the back. Blank. That was it?

  Still on her knees, she crushed the note to her chest. All that hope for nothing. She leaned her head against the rough, splinter-covered wood of the porch. She wanted to burst into sobs.

  “I heard you were back in town.”

  Irene looked up through a shimmer of tears to see Carter Linsey standing in front of the ramshackle cottage, wearing a dark vest over a white shirt. Carter, the crush of her teenage years, the supposed heartache that had driven her abroad.

  “Carter?” Wiping her eyes, she rose unsteadily to her feet. “What are you doing here?”

  “I wanted to see if it was true about you. And it is.” He rubbed his jaw, looking her over. “Wow. Your time in Paris really...wow.”

  Irene looked down at her pearls, sleek cashmere sweater set and slim-fit gray trousers. A little dressy for packing up boxes, but since she hadn’t wanted to open that last suitcase, she’d had nothing else clean to wear today. She wore contact lenses instead of glasses now, and she’d probably lost weight, too, since she’d lost her appetite beneath the weight of her grief. She suddenly realized she looked different from the girl who’d left over two years ago. Maybe even fit for the Linsey Mansion, as she’d once dreamed. “Um. Thanks.”

  “So, your family
is really moving, huh?” He tilted his head, his eyes smoldering in the way that had once made her heart beat faster. “It’s a shame. Because I was kind of thinking maybe...you’d give me another chance.”

  She stared at him. “You what?”

  “Yes.” He ran his hand through his tousled dark blond hair. “I think I made a mistake. About you.”

  She stared at Carter, wondering how she could have ever thought she loved him. The truth was, she’d never even known him. He’d been just a symbol to her. A way of getting out of an unhappy life.

  “Oh, Carter. I’m afraid...I must decline your kind offer.”

  He blinked. “I thought you had a thing for me.”

  She gave a low laugh. “I thought so once, too.” She looked away. “I thought if I could get a man like you to love me, it would mean I was worth something. But that’s not love.”

  “Then what is?”

  “It’s not about trying to feel better about yourself,” she said slowly. “Love is about protecting the other person.” Her throat went dry. “It’s about doing everything you can to give the person you love the life they deserve...” Irene’s voice trailed off as she remembered how Sharif had done exactly that.

  And she’d left him. In that woman’s clutches.

  But there was nothing I could have done! She told herself desperately. It wasn’t as if she had any kind of control over Kalila—or way to stop her from—

  The emir is getting what he deserves. Basimah’s voice came back to her. If I could do something to prevent his wedding, if I knew something that would prevent it, I still wouldn’t lift a finger.

  Irene stared off in the distance, her lips parted. Basimah had said that long ago, but she’d been too distracted with her own jealousy and misery to pay attention to the words. How had she missed it? How had she not heard?

  Even Basimah is surprised, Aziza had said. She told me, since you didn’t call after my wedding was canceled, you must not love Sharif at all.

  “Irene?”

  She focused abruptly on Carter’s handsome, pouting face.