by Lynne Graham
Of course, she wanted a divorce as well, Tati assured herself. Naturally, she wanted to reclaim her own life again. Yet it was a challenge for Tati to consider a future that she had never been free to consider before. And would she be free?
After all, for how long would her marriage to Saif ensure that her uncle would continue paying her mother’s expenses? Now that he had got the money he wanted, it was difficult to have faith in the older man’s word. Perhaps her mother would eventually have to be moved to a cheaper care facility, Tati reasoned unhappily. Beggars couldn’t be choosers. There were worse options, she reminded herself impatiently. Whatever happened, she would handle it and she would help her mother to handle it too. Although, had Saif meant it when he had said that from now on he would handle her mother’s care bills? But, for how long would he be prepared to do that? Would there be a divorce settlement that covered that need?
Tomorrow, she decided, she would phone the nursing home to check on the older woman. She would also ring her mother’s cousin, Pauline, who lived only yards from the care facility and who, as Mariana’s only other visitor, always had a more personal take on Mariana’s condition. She would discuss the possibility of a move with Pauline.
How could she possibly accept more money from Saif? Neither she nor her mother were his responsibilities. They could not acknowledge on the one hand that theirs was not a real marriage and then behave as though it were when it came to money. She had to grow up and stop looking to other people to support her, Tati told herself in exasperation. Saif didn’t owe her anything!
CHAPTER SEVEN
ALMOST THREE WEEKS into their stay, the bridal couple were viewing the catacombs beneath Paris.
Saif was uncomfortable with his surroundings. He had done all the tourist stuff without complaint for his wife’s benefit. He had taken her for a cruise on the Seine and they had climbed the Eiffel Tower at night when it was an illuminated beacon of golden light across the city. He had even dutifully snacked on macarons at the famous Ladurée, while treacherously thinking that they could not match similar Alharian delicacies. But the catacombs were proving a step too far for him because he felt claustrophobic below the low ceilings, and the skulls and remains of six million souls stacked up to make artistic patterns in the walls did not improve his mood. Tatiana might enjoy the morbid atmosphere, but it spooked him.
Tati sidled up behind Saif, forcing his bodyguards to back away, and stretched up to cover his eyes with her hands. ‘I’m a zombie... Run!’ she whispered in the creepiest voice she could contrive.
Saif whirled round and gazed down into her lovely smiling face as she giggled, eyes dancing with mischief. It was one of those occasions when she made him feel twice her age, yet it was also one of those times he cherished because she brightened his days like sunshine while simultaneously turning the darker hours into sensual experiences of indescribable pleasure. He valued a bride, blessed with such advantages, obviously he valued her greatly.
That wasn’t something he thought about much, though, because she had been with him round the clock since their marriage. He did know, however, that he wasn’t looking forward to her departure the following day for a trip back to England to see her mother. She had refused the offer of his company, saying it was unnecessary. He should have been relieved by that breezy dismissal because he had a duty to return to Alharia and see his own parent, not to mention needing to deal with at least a dozen tasks he had been unable to tackle from a distance. For the first time he was acknowledging how much he missed his father and how lucky he had been in the older man’s reliable care. Yet Tati’s regular references to her mother and her deep attachment to her often made him wonder what he had missed out on.
As a further complication for Saif, there were the worrying irregularities uncovered by the investigation agency he had initially hired to provide him with a background check on his bride. As yet he had no idea what those anomalies meant, and he didn’t want to upset Tatiana with concerns that might yet prove to be groundless. He wished to handle that matter in person, rather than allow a member of his staff to deal with such a confidential matter, but if the agency’s suspicions were true, there would be criminal charges brought, he thought with angry disgust.
‘Sometimes...you are way too serious,’ Tati scolded softly, a fingertip gently tracing the firm sculpted line of his full lower lip.
‘But I have you to remind me of the lighter side of life,’ Saif countered, closing an arm round her to move her on. ‘Let’s get out of here...we’re eating out tonight.’
‘It’s sort of our last night,’ Tati muttered abstractedly, small fingers toying with the magnificent emerald that hung on a chain round her slender neck as they emerged back into the sunshine, the light momentarily blinding her.
Saif had somehow contrived to talk her out of returning to England the week before and she wasn’t quite sure how he had done it, because she did miss that regular connection with her mother, slender though it was. It was true that her mother didn’t look for her if she was absent. Indeed, Mariana had to be introduced to her daughter at every visit because she no longer recognised her. The time for producing the family photo albums and reminding Mariana was long past because it only confused and upset the older woman now to be confronted with faces and events she had forgotten. So, Tati was accustomed to a mother who greeted her each time as a stranger. And every time, it broke her heart a little more.
For dinner, she picked a dress from her array of choices that she had been saving for a special occasion. It was a cerise-pink print with slender straps and that whole summery vibe somehow encapsulated the holiday spirit of freedom that she had revelled in since her arrival in Paris. Saif, she thought ruefully, really knew how to show a woman a good time. Although he spent several hours a day working, he had devoted more time to ensuring that she enjoyed herself. And whether they had been admiring the gorgeous cathedral of Sainte-Chapelle or wandering hand in hand around Saint-Germain-des-Prés, where she had explored intriguing little shops full of wonders or sat outside cafés watching the world go by, Saif had made a praiseworthy and highly successful effort to entertain her. She had gathered a handful of little gifts that would make her mother’s eyes sparkle but she felt guilty as hell for not returning sooner to England.
She had worried too when she hadn’t heard anything more from Ana and her texts had failed to receive a response. She was beginning to suspect that the beach wedding that her cousin had been so excited about hadn’t happened because Ana documented the big moments in her life with photos and she would definitely have sent at least one photo. Sadly, Tati was reluctant to contact her uncle and aunt to check on Ana’s well-being because of the way they had behaved at the wedding in Alharia. She would be staying in a hotel near the care home because she wasn’t sure that her relatives would even be willing to offer her hospitality.
‘I’ll have to pack up and collect my stuff from my uncle’s house while I’m in England,’ she sighed over dinner in a sophisticated bistro in possession of several Michelin stars that evening.
‘No, that would be unwise. You should avoid visiting Fosters Manor,’ Saif startled her by intoning with a harsh edge of warning to his dark drawl.
‘Why on earth would you say that?’
Saif studied her. She was pretty as a picture in her dress, blond hair gleaming below the low lights, soft blue eyes politely enquiring, so naturally lively that she exuded a positive glow of vibrance, but she was also so trusting that she would be innately vulnerable to anyone wishing her ill.
As Saif looked, a stab of lust pulsed in his groin and he almost winced at his own predictability. That was beginning to bother him and make him think that the absence of his bride for a week would do him good. He couldn’t afford to want Tatiana too much or too often, nor could he allow himself to depend on her for anything when she was only passing through his life. It was the first time he had ever had a longer, more intimate r
elationship with a woman and he told himself that it was excellent practice for the future when he would surely find a more lasting partner. Unhappily, however, Tatiana, with all her little individual quirks and inherent sensuality, didn’t feel like a practice run for any other woman. Even so, he knew that he didn’t have Tatiana to keep and he acted accordingly.
‘Why did you say that?’ Tati pressed again, her smooth brow furrowing.
‘Your uncle and aunt are hostile towards you, and I don’t trust them,’ Saif told her truthfully.
‘You think they might murder me and bury me below the floorboards?’ Tati teased.
‘Safety concerns are not a joke, Tatiana,’ Saif sliced back, pushing away his serving of Baba au Rhum with a frown as his appetite died. ‘If you do choose to visit your relatives, keep your bodyguards with you at all times. But there is no need for you to visit their home merely to collect your possessions. That can be arranged for you.’
‘I don’t want my aunt Elizabeth going through my belongings,’ Tati said with distaste. ‘And that’s what would happen if I don’t go myself. Are you serious about bodyguards accompanying me to England?’
‘Of course. You are my wife, the Crown Princess of Alharia, and as such require security measures,’ Saif parried without hesitation. ‘It’s not as though you wear a label saying that you are not my “real” wife, as you are so fond of telling me...or as though anyone wishing me harm would even believe that.’
Tati reddened and shifted uncomfortably in her chair. That was a comment she had regularly made as much for her own benefit as his, because there had been several occasions of late when she had felt that they had crossed boundaries that she had not foreseen at the outset of their agreement. For a start, Saif could not be dissuaded from buying her gifts, not least the huge emerald currently nestling above her breasts.
He seemed to be the sort of guy who liked to buy things for women, and time and time again he had surprised her. She had a gorgeous silk scarf that had cost the earth, designer shoes that looked as though they had been sprinkled with stardust and a diamond bracelet that was blinding in daylight. On her twenty-second birthday, he had engulfed her in gifts and treats and that lavish desire to spoil her rotten had touched her to the heart. There had been a whole host of presents from flowers to little trinkets she had admired. He was ridiculously generous and totally out of touch with what being friends with benefits should encompass—that being, in her view, a much looser and more casual connection.
Only she could hardly criticise Saif when she had been shamelessly, wantonly hogging his attention whenever she got the opportunity. There was nothing casual about her behaviour, she allowed guiltily. They had had sex on his office desk the day before because she was turning into a stage five clinger who found it hard to keep her distance when he was working for several hours.
‘Will you promise me that you will be careful of your security while you are away from me?’ Saif pressed gravely. ‘Even though you think that my concern is unnecessary.’
Tati nodded hurriedly, disconcerted by his reading her so accurately, something he often did and which she found unnerving. The sea-glass brilliance of his eyes made warmth pool in her pelvis, sent her pulse racing, made it difficult for her to catch her breath.
‘You haven’t eaten much this evening,’ Saif commented.
‘I probably ate too much all day,’ Tati quipped, reluctant to explain the very slight sense of nausea that had afflicted her when the scent of meat assailed her nostrils. She wasn’t actually sick and didn’t think that she was falling ill, but her usual enthusiasm for food had recently dwindled. Possibly it was the result of eating too many rich, elaborate meals, she reflected ruefully, thinking how easily she had become accustomed to being thoroughly spoiled on the gastronomic front. Now she was clearly getting fussy, craving salad when there were barely any cold options on offer.
An hour later, she walked into the dressing room off their bedroom to check the case she had already partially packed.
‘The staff could have taken care of this,’ Saif told her from the doorway, moving forward to glance down into the case with a frown. ‘You don’t seem to be taking very much.’
‘At most I’ll be away a week and I won’t be going any place where I need to dress up,’ Tati proffered.
A week. A kind of relief engulfed Saif. A week was no time for a man accustomed to living without a woman although it was astonishing, he acknowledged, how quickly he had become used to her presence and how rarely she irritated him. He was reserved, a loner, and had always suspected that marriage would be a challenge for him, but Tatiana was accepting rather than demanding and took him as he was. He ran an appreciative fingertip over the porcelain pale expanse of her back, caressing the soft silky skin.
‘Need some help getting out of this?’ Saif husked, tugging on the strap of the dress.
Tati stifled a grin. ‘Go ahead...’
The zip went down, and the dress floated to her feet. She stepped unhurriedly out of her heels, superaware of the fine turquoise silk bra and panties she wore and the intensity of Saif’s appraisal. When she glanced up, his stunning green eyes glittered like emeralds and butterflies took flight in her tummy, her body’s programmed response to that appreciation as natural as her need to breathe.
Lifting her out of the folds of cloth on the floor, he pinned her slight body to his, a large masculine hand splayed across her bottom to hold her close. His tailored trousers could not hide the hard heat of his erection, and as she felt the raw promise of him against her stomach, fierce desire flashed through her like a storm warning. Her arms snapped round his neck as his mouth came crashing down on hers with a ravaging, smouldering hunger that matched her own.
Somewhere in the background a vaguely familiar snatch of music was playing, and her brain strove to rise to alert status again. There was a reason why she should know that sound, only it didn’t seem important with her fingers raking through Saif’s silky black hair while her heart was racing and her body was pulsing with insane arousal. He was tumbling her down on the bed with scant ceremony when she realised that that sound was her mobile phone ringing and that there were very good reasons why she always leapt to answer it on the rare occasion that it rang. Consternation gripping her, Tati broke free of that kiss and rolled over, almost falling off the bed in her haste to reach her clutch bag and the phone within it.
Half-naked, she sat on the floor clutching the silent phone and checked the call that she had missed. It was from her mother’s nursing home as she had feared. Within the space of a minute she was ringing back, identifying herself, listening with an anxious expression to what the manager was telling her and asking apprehensive questions, all beneath Saif’s frowning gaze. Assuring the older woman that she would be returning to England as soon as she could arrange it, she sat silent, tears prickling her eyes and stinging them before slowly overflowing to drip down her cheeks.
‘I should have gone back last week. I should have known better. If anything happens to Mum, I’ll never forgive myself for neglecting her,’ she whispered brokenly.
‘You haven’t neglected her. Even the most dutiful daughter is entitled to a holiday.’ Saif crouched down in front of her. ‘What’s happened?’
‘Mum has a chest infection...she’s had a few of them but they think she’ll have to go into hospital this time,’ Tati muttered wretchedly. ‘I should’ve visited her last week, Saif.’
‘That wouldn’t have prevented her illness,’ Saif pointed out shrewdly. ‘You will want to return to England as soon as possible. I will make the arrangements.’
While he engaged in phone calls, Tati stayed on the floor, rocking slightly in self-comforting mode as she thought with a shudder about how horribly selfish she had been. She had always placed her mother’s needs first...until Saif came into her life. And then everything in her world had changed. Saif had turned her world inside out and
upside down. Emotions had come surging in a colourful explosion: anger, excitement, attraction, a shocking awakening to all the feelings she had no reason to feel before. And, unforgivably, she had stopped putting her mother first because Saif had turned her head and made her as irresponsible as a teenager.
‘I will come with you,’ Saif informed her gravely.
‘No...no, that’s not necessary,’ Tati said sharply, reluctant to expose her fragile mother to a stranger, even though she knew that Saif would be kind and respectful. But that protective instinct was hard to combat and, what was more, she didn’t want the temptation of Saif being with her in England when she needed to focus solely on her mother.
‘I think it is necessary when you will need my support,’ Saif overruled.
‘If I hadn’t been forced to stay abroad, I would never have been away from her for so long,’ Tati argued, knowing she was making a veiled and unjust accusation but wanting to punish him as much as she wanted to punish herself. ‘Mum’s had these infections before. I don’t want anyone with me. She gets upset if she sees a strange face, particularly male ones. I don’t need you.’
Tati watched his lean, darkly handsome face freeze in receipt of that ungenerous response and her conscience smote her. She didn’t need him, couldn’t afford to need him, had to persuade herself that she didn’t need Saif in any corner of her world. Why was it that only at the moment she realised that she did crave his support she grasped why it would be even more foolish to rely on him?
Because they weren’t a real couple or a real husband and wife where such troubles as family illness were shared. They were friends with benefits at most, casual lovers at the least and in that type of relationship people didn’t get involved in the commitment of deeper problems. And she couldn’t afford to forget that because very soon, perhaps sooner than she even believed, she and Saif would be separating, their intimacy at an end. That was what her future held and wanting anything more was nonsensical and unrealistic...