She’d promised him days ago that she’d stay, that she’d try and be the queen he wanted, and he’d be damned if she went back on that because of some ridiculous ideas about love.
But afterwards as he’d lain by himself in his bed, he’d ached. Burned. Wanted her so badly it hurt. And that had only made him angrier. He’d offered her everything that was in his power to give and still it wasn’t enough for her.
She wanted to be wanted for herself. She wanted love.
But how could he give her those things? Yes, he wanted her as a woman, but nothing could change her Kashgari blood and that’s what he needed from her. Love would not change that, nothing would.
The past was immovable, it couldn’t be altered. All he could do was try and strike a balance. Do good to make up for the bad. And yes, that included marrying her for her blood. But he’d tried to offer her other things, tried to give her something back for what he’d taken. Wasn’t that enough? Why did she need to make it about love?
He’d meant what he said. Love did mean nothing. Because the heart lied. His heart had wanted only a father to understand him and so he’d betrayed himself, brought his country to ruin.
He’d never trust it again.
The thought hurt and he didn’t know why. Didn’t understand why that should make him so angry he wanted to break something.
He stared sightlessly down at the paperwork on his desk, his chest empty and hollow. This political situation needed to be sorted out and yet he couldn’t bring himself to do it.
Where was his purpose? The throne. Peace. Marriage. Those were things he should be thinking about, not the glitter of tears in Safira’s eyes as she’d told him no.
She couldn’t leave, he wouldn’t let her. Without her, the throne would fall and his country would implode, all that he’d worked for would become nothing.
It should be an easy choice, because surely his country was more important than the needs of one small, passionate princess? But it didn’t feel easy. It felt impossible.
This is not about me. It is about you and your guilt.
He hadn’t answered that when she’d thrown the accusation at him the night before. Mainly because a part of him knew she was right. He was fixing his country, fixing her, to ease his own guilt. And that was wrong. Being a king was about sacrifice and duty, not about healing his own broken soul. At least that was what Tariq had always taught.
So where did that leave him? He couldn’t release her from this engagement and he couldn’t simply walk away from his throne. Yet insisting on this marriage felt as if he was forcing her into a life she didn’t want.
Her entire life has been one she didn’t ask for and didn’t want.
Something twisted inside him. He couldn’t do it again. He couldn’t force that on her a second time.
His gaze caught on the gold signet ring of his office and something inside him slowed and came to a stop.
There was one way out of this. One way to make things right.
No, he couldn’t give Safira what she wanted, but he could give her the purpose she craved, the chance to change things. A choice about the life she wanted for herself.
And maybe it would be better for his country too.
Altair pushed his chair back and got to his feet, going to the door and pulling it open. “Go to Princess Safira and tell her she is needed in my office,” he said curtly. “Now.”
Ten minutes later, Safira swept in. She wasn’t in any of her gowns nor was she wearing traditional robes. Her clothes were, instead, much more familiar than either of those. Mainly because for two days he’d been the one taking them off her, before being the one to help her put them back on again; her desert robes with her keffiyeh around her head. All she needed was her rifle.
The reminder hurt, but in a way it only made him even surer of his decision.
She was a warrior. She always had been.
Her chin lifted, her eyes blue-green fire, her expression resolute.
She’d never looked more beautiful. Not in her princess gowns, not in her traditional robes and not in her white western dress either.
Naked. She looked as beautiful naked.
He allowed the thought to sit there for a second, along with the image that made his breath catch and everything in him go tight with need.
Then he forced it from his head.
Rising from behind his desk, he said coolly, “Thank you for coming, princess.”
Safira’s bright turquoise gaze pinned him to the spot. “If you’re here to lay down edicts on my movements until our wedding day, you can think again. I have not changed my mind, Altair. I am not marrying you. In fact, I’ve packed my bag and I’m—”
“I do not need you to marry me.”
She blinked. “Excuse me? But I thought …”
“Yes. I know what you thought.” He gestured to the chair near the desk. “Please, sit down.”
She didn’t. “What is this, Altair? Why am I here?”
He took a breath. “You are here because I have decided to abdicate.”
Shock blazed over her face. “What?”
“I think you heard me.”
The color had drained from her face, as had the resolution. “Why?” she demanded starkly. “You’ve spent five years of your life fighting to keep this throne and now you’d just give it up?”
Slowly, he sat down again, leaning back in the chair. “You were right when you told me this was all about my guilt,” he said flatly. “I am trying to fix my country and, yes, I am trying to fix you to make up for what I did years ago.” He paused. “It cannot go on. A selfish king can destroy an entire country.”
“But … who will rule in your place? You have no heirs.”
“That is not quite true. There is one heir.” He lifted his hand, pulled the signet ring off his finger, and laid it in the middle of his desk. “This is your ring, Safira.”
Her brow furrowed as she glanced down at the ring. “I don’t understand.”
“This country needs a Kashgari on the throne and I will not force you into a marriage you do not want. Which leaves only one choice. I must abdicate in your favor.”
She looked sharply up at him. “What?”
He met her gaze unflinchingly. “This will be your choice, Safira, make no mistake. I will not force this on you. But understand, this is what you were born for. Not to be a pawn, or a figurehead. Or even someone’s sheikha. You were born to rule.”
Her throat moved, shock still blazing in her eyes. “B-but … I have no experience at all at ruling a country. I could make things worse. I’m too young, I’m too—”
“You’re strong, you’re loyal. You’re intelligent and passionate,” he interrupted. “You wanted a purpose, to make a difference, so here is your chance. You are exactly what this country and its people need.”
What you need.
No, he did not need her. He would find something else, a new purpose.
“Hamiz will guide you,” he went on. “He has been my advisor for many years and he was with your father too. I trust him.”
“But the palace, the army …”
“You have the blood. You are a Kashgari and they will follow you if I ask them to.”
She said nothing, staring at him. Looking at him the way she had the night before, as if she could see inside him. Making his lying heart want so badly, making it ache.
“Safira—”
“Is this really what you want, Altair?”
He stared into her eyes, watching the quicksilver shift of her emotions. “It is the right thing to do. Both for you and Al-Harah.”
“What about you?”
The statement caught him off guard “What do you mean? What is best for me?”
There was a spark in her eyes, like … grief. “You cannot allow yourself even the smallest chance of happiness, can you?”
Something squeezed hard in his chest.
“Why is that? You don’t think fifteen years is atonement enough?” she went on s
oftly. “Whose forgiveness do you want, Altair? Because I do not think it’s mine or that of the Al-Harah’s people.”
No. It is not. It is Tariq’s.
The hand around his heart squeezed tighter. Because of course all of this was for Tariq. For the father who wasn’t his father. Forgiveness for all the times Altair had disappointed him. For his final betrayal, the desperation to seek out his biological father in the hope that perhaps that man would accept him in the way he felt Tariq never had.
Because he’d never been able to forget the disappointed look in Tariq’s eyes in the ambulance. Or the way he’d turned his face away as he’d died, not even looking at his own son.
As if he’d known all along the truth of Altair’s betrayal.
Abruptly, Altair looked down at his hands spread out on the surface of his desk. At the gold signet ring glinting in the sun through the windows.
He would never have Tariq’s forgiveness.
Grief struck him hard in the chest, the pain of it drowning out even his own thundering heartbeat.
“Altair?” Safira said.
He rose all of a sudden, pushing the signet ring towards her. His hand felt strange without it, as if it would float away.
You do not need your throne. But you do need her. Kashgari blood or not.
No. His heart lied. It always had.
“Here,” he said brusquely, pushing the ring further across the desk. “Take it. It’s yours.”
Something glittered in her eyes and there was no mistaking the grief in them now. “You stupid, stubborn sheikh,” she whispered. “You promised me we would do this together.”
The words were like a knife between his ribs, grating and sharp, and there were tears in her eyes, one sliding down her cheek.
And suddenly he had to get out of there, away from the palace, away from her. Away from his guilt and his grief and everything his heart was telling him he wanted.
Everything he could not have.
Altair came around the side of the desk and started heading towards the door.
“Don’t kid yourself this is some kind of noble gesture, sheikh,” she said hoarsely after him. “You are doing what you always do. Distancing yourself.”
He stopped but didn’t turn, his heart twisting inside his chest. “I am doing what is right, Safira. For you and this country, like I told you.”
“No, you are not.” Her voice shook. “What is right for me and this country is you and I, together. Like you told me.”
He paused by the door, turning to look at her, trying to ignore the pain and the anger blooming in his heart. “And we would have had that, Safira. If only you hadn’t wanted more.” A mean, petty thing to say and yet he couldn’t help it.
A tear had rolled down her cheek, yet her eyes blazed with a fierce determination, a fierce strength. Her spine was straight and her shoulders were back, as if she were wearing a crown already. “And if I didn’t demand anything of you? If I told you I loved you, offered you my heart, would that change your mind?”
A wave of electricity went through him, bright and hot, but he forced it away. “No,” he said, making his voice cold. “I told you. The heart lies. You should not believe what it tells you.”
Another tear rolled down her cheek. “It’s not the heart that lies, Altair. It’s you. And you deserve happiness, no matter what you tell yourself.”
He ignored the way the words struck something inside him. Something pure that rang like a tuning fork.
“Good luck, your highness,” he said flatly instead. “You will be the ruler Al-Harah always should have had. Your parents would have been so proud of you.”
Forcing himself to turn away, he opened the door.
“Altair. I command you to stay. As your sheikha.”
But he stepped through the doorway and pulled the door closed behind him.
She did not call out again.
* * *
Altair stopped only to visit Hamiz to finalize a few details. His advisor was shocked when Altair gave him the news that he would be abdicating in favor of Safira, but when Hamiz didn’t protest Altair knew he’d done the right thing.
Briefly he debated instructing his helicopter pilot to take him into neighboring Dahar, because staying in Al-Harah would be problematic, especially if there were any still loyal to him who would cause trouble for Safira’s new reign. He didn’t think there would be many of those, but one never knew.
Sheikh Isma’il and his sheikha Lily would be welcoming, of that he had no doubt. He’d put quite a bit of effort into cultivating a good relationship with them and it would probably be polite of him to let them know personally of his abdication.
But he found he could not stand the thought of standing in someone else’s palace speaking of the end of his reign.
Especially not with a couple who had been ruling together very successfully for over a year now. The reminder would be …
No. He could not do that.
He found himself instructing the pilot to take him into the desert, to the outpost he’d gone to with Safira. When he got there he took the horse that had been saddled up for him, and rode out deeper into the desert, for the first time in five years his mind empty of any goal. Empty of anything but the rolling sands and the sound of the horse’s hooves.
So it was somewhat to his own surprise when he realized he was riding in the direction of the oasis where he’d spent those blissful few days with Safira.
Part of him wanted to change direction, go somewhere else, and yet he had nowhere better to go. Nothing he had to see.
No one to go to …
He tried to ignore that and yet he didn’t pull on the reins to turn the horse on a different path, letting the animal take him into the cool of the oasis instead.
It had only been a couple of days since they’d left, the signs of their camp still there. The fire where they had sat, the pool they had swum in, the flat place where their tent had been. The tent they’d made love in …
His heart cracked in his chest.
He’d never been happier than he had been here, with her. Where for a time he’d allowed himself to not think of his guilt. Not think of the betrayal he’d committed.
Not think of Tariq’s disappointment.
Not feel like the dog you are.
Altair swung down off the horse, leaving it to crop at the grass near the pool while he walked over to the pool itself, crouching down beside it. His reflection looked back, the keffiyeh shielding his face from the sun to leave only his eyes glinting at him from the surface of the water.
A dog’s eyes. Because yes, that’s what he was. A dog to have refused the heart she’d offered him.
But what else could he have done? The forgiveness he sought, the forgiveness he was desperate for, he would not find in the palace. Or on the throne. Or in battles with the rebels. Or in marriage.
Or in her arms.
You will only find it in yourself.
His breath caught, his reflection rippling as a breeze stirred over the surface of the pool.
Forgive himself? But how was that possible? The things he’d done …
You did not fire the rifle that shot them. The bullets were not yours. All you did was try to understand who you were …
Her words the night he’d told her the truth came back to him. She hadn’t blamed him or judged him. She’d understood the need that had driven him when he’d been that wild boy, desperate for something he didn’t even have a name for.
If she can forgive you, then anything is possible.
His heartbeat slowed, the reflection in the pool suddenly still.
Because he could see it now. If he did not forgive himself, he would never move on from this. There would be nothing for him. Only suffering, an endless penance for an all-devouring guilt.
You cannot allow yourself even the smallest chance of happiness, can you?
She saw too clearly, too well.
It all came down to choice. He would have to choose to forgi
ve himself. Choose to be happy.
Choose to trust his heart. His lying, lying heart.
He did not know if he could do that.
Except … Safira had never doubted her heart. She lived with it on her sleeve, her passion strong and vital and free. She hadn’t been afraid to tell him what she wanted. Hadn’t been afraid to say she loved him.
And he’d thrown them back in her face.
Perhaps you cannot trust your heart. But you can trust hers.
Safira’s heart. Her brave, wild, loving heart.
Altair rose to his feet in a sudden, jerky movement, something exploding through his veins in a wild, rushing storm. The wind blew around the top of the cliff above the pool, making a sighing sound. The heat of the desert beat down on his head.
But he just stood there, staring at the reflection of the coward in the pool.
She was right. He was a coward. Because it was easier to hold her at a distance, to hold onto his guilt, than to believe he was worthy of anything more. Worthy of love, worthy of happiness. He had been a disappointment to one father, been betrayed by another, and he had ruined an entire country. What did a man like that deserve?
If I told you I loved you, offered you my heart, would that change your mind?
Safira wanted him. Safira loved him. Was that not forgiveness enough?
The wild rush of emotion burned right through ten years of iron control and icy repression, a terrible agony. And he just stood there and let it come, let it rip him apart, grief and pain and guilt. But right at the end of all that anguish, there was something else, something that had always been there and always would.
Love.
He’d loved his father.
He loved Safira.
And the best memorial for Tariq was not a strong country and a secure throne. It was not isolation and loneliness.
It was love.
Altair whirled around and strode back to where his horse was still lazily cropping at the meager grass. Grabbing the reins, he vaulted back up onto the horse’s back and rode straight out of the oasis at a gallop.
Chapter Eleven
Safira sat in Altair’s office for a long time after he’d shut the door, her eyes gritty, her chest aching. She did not want to go out, as if by opening the door the fact that he’d abdicated would somehow become real. The fact that he’d gone would be real.
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