by Holly Rayner
The drive from the mercantile section of the city out to the sprawling—palatial, even—home that Zayed owned was shorter than Zelda would have thought; within twenty minutes she caught sight of the grounds, tucked away behind impressive stucco walls, with lush plantings further obscuring the house itself.
The driver stopped at the gate, speaking a few words to a guard there, and Zelda thought to herself that she could never imagine living in such a way as to need a personal guard. A moment later they were inside the walls, following a winding driveway up to an immense house.
An older woman, dressed in a uniform of black, white and gray, her hair concealed under a scarf, greeted them at the top of the driveway, and Zayed stepped out of the car, speaking a few words to her in his native language.
“Hadya will get the staff started on putting away your things in the rooms I’m having set aside for you,” the Sheikh told Zelda, leaning into the backseat of the car. “While they’re working, if you’re not too tired, I’d like to show you around your new home.”
Zelda, still somewhat stunned at the contrast between the lush, verdant grounds around the house and the more arid climate outside of the property, took a deep breath and nodded, sliding across the seat to get out of the limo.
The Sheikh gave her his hand and helped her to her feet, carefully not letting go right away. He ducked his head in closer to hers, and Zelda thought for a panicked moment that he meant to kiss her. Instead, he whispered, “Hadya does speak some English, but she has worked for me for years now, and for my family for even longer; she will not give us away.”
As the Sheikh led Zelda up a walkway and to the front door, she tried not to look as if everything she saw was completely amazing to her; she tried to take it all in her stride, but everywhere she looked, the details added up to a staggering impression of wealth beyond anything that Zelda had ever imagined.
The entryway into the house bore two fountains, one on either side of the doorway, with crystalline water lapping at the marble in a soothing murmur and green plants tucked away around them. The floor was marble tile, laid out in an intricate pattern, cool despite the heat of the afternoon.
As the Sheikh led her through the house, Zelda tried to imagine what it would be like to have grown up in a home like the one she would be spending the next few weeks in; what it would mean to have the earliest memories of her life take place in marble-floored hallways, surrounded by priceless art, with a background of fountains and quiet. It was impossible to wrap her mind around.
“These will be your quarters,” Zayed said finally, leading her through a door off of one of the main hallways. “They are the second best in the house after my own, which seemed appropriate.” A brief look of something like upset flitted across Zayed’s features, but it was gone before Zelda could wonder what had made him sad. He gestured around the room they’d stepped into. “This is your sitting room, for when you need to meet with seamstresses, wedding planners, or friends and so on.”
Zelda neglected to point out that other than him—somewhat—she didn’t actually have any friends in the country.
The Sheikh stepped off to the right of the sitting room and opened another door, and Zelda obediently looked into what she saw was the bedroom, taking in the huge chest of drawers, the opened closet door—displaying many of her purchases already hanging inside it—and a bed that Zelda thought might be as large as her entire freshman year dorm room, flanked by low tables with lamps, perfect for reading into the night. It was a beautiful room, painted a soft, champagne gold that Zelda was sure would catch the light stunningly in the mornings.
“You have a balcony over here,” Zayed told her, walking over to a set of French doors off to the side of the room, the sheer valances pulled back to let light in. “And over there is your bathroom.” The Sheikh hesitated, then, and instead of letting him walk over to open the door for her, Zelda stepped in that direction, opening the brass doorknob and looking inside.
It was hard not to feel daunted by the sight of a bathtub carved out of marble and large enough to comfortably hold two people, as well as a separate shower cubicle with a stone bench built in, and a wood-paneled closet that Zelda recognized as a sauna. This is a desert country, right? Where is all the water coming from?
“My room is just down the hall,” Zayed said, interrupting her train of thought. “As you leave your quarters, all you need do is turn left, and walk for a bit, and you’ll be at my door.” He checked his watch and made a face. “Unfortunately I have to step away now, to start getting things in order, but this will give you a chance to relax a bit before we get started on the process of making this wedding happen.” Zayed smiled at Zelda slightly and moved towards the door. “If you need anything, there’s an intercom into the kitchen where Hadya should be; I’ll come and get you for dinner in about an hour.”
Zelda nodded her acceptance of the schedule and waited until Zayed had left the room before walking back to her sitting area. She sank down onto a low, damask couch and tried to wrap her mind around the fact that she had “quarters” that were, on their own, as large as any of the apartments she’d ever lived in. She turned on the TV and discovered that the Sheikh had probably the most enormous satellite package that a person possibly could—it even had American channels.
“All this wealth, all this space,” Zelda murmured to herself, pretending to watch a crime procedural show she had found. “But who lives here?”
She’d seen a handful of servants, including the maids who were preparing her room, loading her new wardrobe into the closet and drawers, but other than maybe ten employees, there was only Zayed.
Maybe it wouldn’t have been a bad idea for him to go with an arranged marriage, Zelda thought absently. At least the house would have been less empty that way.
SEVEN
Later that evening, Zelda steeled herself to sit down with the Sheikh and begin the process of getting to know each other. As a concession to Zayed’s insistence that she play her part, she changed into one of her new outfits before following a maid down to the dining room.
“You look beautiful,” Zayed said, greeting her with a quick kiss on either cheek. He’d changed into more casual clothes, but they were of the same high quality as Zelda had seen on the yacht, the same quality that he’d bought for her in the boutiques near the harbor.
“Thank you,” Zelda said, feeling slightly uncomfortable in clothes that she was sure were worth more than her entire paycheck from working on the yacht.
“Let’s get started,” Zayed suggested, pulling out a chair at a low table which was already loaded with food of different kinds.
Zelda thought to herself that the kitchen staff at the Sheikh’s home must rival the numbers on his yacht. She immediately wondered if there was any overlap between the two teams. Please no, she prayed, sitting down on a comfortable, cushioned chair. That would make everything so much more complicated.
“How are we going to start?” she asked, trying to focus on the moment.
The Sheikh seated himself and tucked his napkin onto his lap, reaching over the table to serve her from different platters.
The food looked and smelled amazing; it was spiced and colorful, like the feasts Zelda had helped to create on the yacht. It was nice to be one of the recipients of such a meal instead of eating a “staff meal” while the guests feasted, and Zelda watched contentedly as Zayed deftly placed spoonfuls of this and that on her plate in a practiced order.
“Well, we need to know each other extremely well,” Zayed said, finally answering her question. “As well as any two people who want to get married do. And we don’t have long to do it.”
Zelda raised an eyebrow. “We’re supposed to have only known each other a short time though, right?”
The Sheikh smiled. “A short time, yes, but long enough to know each other well enough to get married,” he specified. “You start.”
“Well,” Zelda began, helping herself to a few bites of food as Zayed began filling his ow
n plate. “My parents are both professors; my mom has a doctorate in literature, my dad in history and political science. I grew up in Miami, went to one of the private schools there—a perk of my parents being professors.” Zelda saw a look of concern flit over Zayed’s face, but continued. “I lasted two years in college—not quite enough to get my associate’s—and then a few weeks in culinary school.”
“That explains how you were able to fool Babette,” Zayed said. He ate a bite of one of the stews, wrapped in a pinch of flatbread.
“I was definitely glad that it was the chef who assumed I was her new employee, and not the head of housekeeping,” Zelda admitted.
The Sheikh paused, then, his smile faltering. “Unfortunately, that is not…” he looked at her, hesitating. “That is not exactly a promising life story for the future wife of a sheikh.”
Zelda set her fork down and crossed her arms over her chest, feeling her cheeks heat up with embarrassment. “There’s some prince in…Sweden or somewhere who married a bartender,” she pointed out. “How is it that a bartender is an acceptable bride for a prince, but a college dropout is inappropriate for a sheikh?”
“I don’t make the rules,” the Sheikh said then. “I just know that it’s not going to work. No one is going to believe that I met a college dropout and culinary student a few weeks ago, fell in love with her, and asked her to marry me.”
“So what are you suggesting?”
Zayed gestured for Zelda to keep eating, and poured her some wine. “We make you an heiress,” he said after a pause. “Little-known but wealthy family, in the same business as I am.”
“I don’t even know what business you’re in,” Zelda protested.
The Sheikh chuckled. “The luxury hotel business,” he said. “I own five of the most exclusive hotels in the world.”
“And the company you want to buy?” Zelda began eating again, intrigued.
“Another syndicate like mine. They own four hotels—not quite as exclusive, but beautiful properties in exotic locations that with the right management can turn a very tidy profit.” He paused and considered for a moment, nibbling on a grape. “We’ll say that your parents are the owners of an exclusive hotel in South Beach, and that I met you while scouting for potential properties; we’ll say your parents couldn’t be persuaded into selling, but that we had an instant rapport.”
“I don’t think I like this,” Zelda said, picking at one of the vegetable salads on her plate. “How is that any more respectable than them being professors?”
“In my country, it just is,” Zayed insisted. “Money talks, and besides, it makes it easier for people to believe that we met and fell in love.”
“Don’t let the truth get in the way of a good story,” Zelda said wryly.
“So I met your parents first, discussed the possibility of going into business together, it fell through, and in the process I met you and we fell in love.”
Zelda took a deep breath. It’s not like you have a whole lot of choices here, she reminded herself. If she didn’t go along with the Sheikh’s plan, it was easy to believe that she would at least be deported, and possibly spend years in prison to boot.
“Okay,” she said finally. “But we are not changing my name.”
The Sheikh shook his head. “Of course not; it would only make it harder to have documents that would work for you if we gave you a fake name. Besides, the press will love the alliteration of Zayed and Zelda,” he added.
Zelda grinned, smiling drolly. “So we met through my parents, had a whirlwind secret romance, and now I’m getting ready to marry you,” she said. “I should probably know about you, too.”
“We’ll be working on that for the next few days, as well as rehearsing your story,” Zayed told her. “For tonight, let’s focus on hammering out the details of your past.”
Zelda took a deep breath and ate a forkful of some grain which was both spicy and sweet. “My fake details,” she said with a wink.
The Sheikh gave her a quick, not quite sympathetic look. “Our engagement party is scheduled for a week from today,” he told her. “You are going to need to be able to stick with your story, to know it so well that questions can’t shake you.”
“I get that,” Zelda said. “I understand.”
“We’ll also need to get you a special gown for the night,” Zayed told her. “It will be your debut into high society here, so you’ll have to look absolutely spectacular.” He gave her a quick, appraising glance. “Not that the basic ingredient isn’t already more than acceptable.”
“That’s…thanks, I guess?” Zelda wasn’t sure if it was necessarily a compliment.
“You’ll be meeting some of the wealthiest people in this country,” Zayed told her, “as well as some minor royalty from my family.”
Zelda set her fork down again, staring at the Sheikh. “Minor royalty? In your family?”
He dismissed the shock in her voice. “I’m distantly related to them,” he told her. “But I’m nowhere near close enough to the throne to ever consider inheriting it. Over a dozen people would have to die for me to even have a chance.”
“So I’ll be meeting with…the equivalent of dukes, or something?”
Zayed considered the question, tilting his head from side to side. “Basically,” he agreed finally. “Everyone invited to the party will either be press or upper class, so we will need to be absolutely flawless.”
“Are you getting a special suit for the occasion?”
Zayed smiled. “A tuxedo, yes,” he told her. “Events here tend to be extremely formal. You’ll have an evening gown specially made, too.”
Zelda thought about the amount of money that he was investing in the enterprise of them getting married and it staggered her; it was almost absurd, and she was tempted to ask again why it was possible for him to game the system but not change the law.
The Sheikh served her a little more of the meal from the platters in front of them, and Zelda noticed that he had somehow discerned which items she liked the best from her first serving.
“Shouldn’t I be at least a little involved in the process of planning my own engagement party?” she asked. “My own wedding?”
“You will be,” the Sheikh said. “I’m a busy man, after all. You’ll be meeting with my personal assistant, Tarek, who’s in charge of the arrangements. He can handle it, but of course he’ll consult with you about your preferences.”
They continued to talk and eat, and Zelda found herself feeling somehow both more comfortable with the prospect of what they were going to do and more anxious at the stakes they were playing with.
Of course, she thought to herself when she and Zayed finished their meal, it wasn’t as though the Sheikh having a marriage of convenience would really impact his life in any way. She somehow imagined that in the eyes of Murindhi law, a fake marriage—as long as it was legal—would be as good as a marriage for love. It would probably have more of an impact on her if the scheme was found out. Living in Miami, Zelda was familiar with the concept of “green card weddings,” where people from different countries made deals with Americans so as to find an easier route to citizenship.
When Zayed left, their conversation cut short by an “urgent” business call, Zelda walked back to her quarters, thinking about the strange twists and turns her life had taken in less than a month. She never would have expected to find herself stowing away on a yacht, or being rescued by a billionaire—still less the proposal that said billionaire sheikh had made.
Zelda stripped off her fine new clothes and decided that the saying was right: truth was even stranger than fiction. She went into her bathroom and decided to put some of the bath products Zayed had had delivered to her room to good use; she would need to get into character as quickly as possible if she wanted to see their scheme through and not get caught.
After fiddling with the taps for a few moments, Zelda got the water running and selected a bath package that smelled of lilies and jasmine. Sinking down into the wa
rm water, she sighed at the strangeness of life, her thoughts turning towards assembling a character that would match up to the Sheikh’s expectations of his imaginary bride-to-be.
EIGHT
“Where is Zayed? We were supposed to meet after breakfast,” Zelda said to Hadya.
The older woman shrugged. “He leave for business. Back maybe three hours.”
Zelda smiled politely at the older woman, inclining her head in a respectful nod that concealed her annoyance; it was the day before her and the Sheikh’s supposed engagement party, and she had wanted plenty of time to go over their cover stories in detail once more.