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The Arabian Mistress
LYNNE GRAHAM


Begging for Prince Tariq Shazad ibn Zachir's mercy was the last thing Faye wanted to do. She hadn't seen Tariq for a year…since their wedding. But Faye's brother was imprisoned in Tariq's homeland, and only Tariq could grant his freedom. Faye expected her meeting with the man she'd married to be tough, but Tariq's ultimatum took her breath away: become his mistress and her brother would be released!












is one of Mills & Boon’s most popular and

bestselling novelists. Her writing was an instant

success with readers worldwide. Since her first

book, Bittersweet Passion, was published in 1987, she has gone from strength to strength and now has over ninety titles, which have sold more than thirty-five million copies, to her name.

In this special collection, we offer readers a

chance to revisit favourite books or enjoy that rare

treasure—a book by a favourite writer—they may

have missed. In every case, seduction and passion

with a gorgeous, irresistible man are guaranteed!







LYNNE GRAHAM was born in Northern Ireland and has been a keen Mills & Boon


reader since her teens. She is very happily married, with an understanding husband who has learned to cook since she started to write! Her five children keep her on her toes. She has a very large dog, which knocks everything over, a very small terrier, which barks a lot, and two cats. When time allows, Lynne is a keen gardener.




The Arabian Mistress

Lynne Graham







www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




CONTENTS


CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN




CHAPTER ONE


IN HIS villa in the South of France, Prince Tariq Shazad ibn Zachir, paramount sheikh and ruler of the oil-rich Gulf state of Jumar, tossed aside the cellular phone and turned his attention to his most trusted aide, Latif.

Shrewd at reading others, Tariq noted the strain etched on the older man’s face. ‘Something wrong?’

‘I regret that I should have to disturb you with this matter…’ Latif settled a folder down on the desk with an air of profound apology ‘…but I felt it should be drawn to your attention.’

Surprised by the other man’s discomfiture, Tariq swept up the folder. The opening document was a detailed report from Jumar’s chief of police. Tariq scanned the name of the foreign national, who had been imprisoned for bad debts. He froze, his superb bone structure clenching, narrowed dark eyes hardening with angry incredulity. It was Adrian Lawson, Faye’s elder brother!

Yet another Lawson guilty of dishonesty and deception! As he read the explanation of the events which had led to Adrian’s arrest his lean, strong face hardened in disgust. How could Faye’s brother have dared to set up a construction firm in Jumar and rob the very citizens that he, Tariq ibn Zachir was sworn to protect?

Powerful memories were stirring, disturbing memories which Tariq had spent twelve months endeavouring to forget. What male wished to recall his own worst mistake? Faye with her fake innocence, who had laid a snare to entrap him as surely as any seasoned gold-digger. The bait? Her beautiful self. The threat after the trap had snapped shut? Scandal! The paramount sheikh of Jumar might exercise feudal power over his subjects. But, even in the twenty-first century, Tariq ibn Zachir accepted that it was his duty to maintain a conservative lifestyle. And a year ago his choices had been few for his father, Hamza, had been dying…

Snapping back to the present, pale with bitter anger beneath his tawny skin, Tariq slowly breathed in deep. Unlike many other scions of Middle Eastern royal families, he had not been educated in the West. Tariq had been raised much like his ancestral forefathers. Military school, tutors, desert survival exercises with the British special forces. At the age of twenty-two, a pilot and an expert in every possible form of combat, Tariq had finally convinced his father that, while the ability to lead his future people into battle was naturally important, one hundred years of peace within their borders and with their neighbours might suggest that a business degree could be of rather more imminent use to his son.

Tariq had duly discovered a natural talent for the business world and had enriched the swollen coffers of a state already so fabulously wealthy that he and his people made the highest per capita charitable contributions of any country in the world. And with his entrance into the more liberal culture of Europe, Tariq had also received an unparalleled education on the ways of Western women. Yet even in the grip of his subsequent cynicism, he had still been slaughtered like a sitting duck when he’d met Faye Lawson…

‘How do you wish me to act in this matter?’ Latif enquired.

Tariq flashed him a questioning glance. ‘There is no action to be taken. Let the process of law take its course.’

Latif studied his feet. ‘It seems unlikely that Adrian Lawson will be able to produce the money necessary to obtain his own release.’

‘He may rot.’

After a very long and tense silence, Latif cleared his throat with deprecatory hesitance.

Tariq sent him a look of grim amusement. ‘Yes, I know what I do…’

Uneasy though he was with that response, the older man bowed and departed again. Well aware of the source of Latif’s anxiety, Tariq considered his own position with grim disfavour. Realities he had sidestepped now confronted him. His fierce pride, his fury at being set up and trapped, had come between him and common sense. But it was time to sever his connection with Faye Lawson and move on.

It should have been done a year ago. It was not a situation which could be left unresolved. Particularly not when he now had the responsibility of bringing up three young children, orphaned by the plane crash which had decimated his own family circle. He needed a wife, a warm, maternal woman. It was his duty to marry such a woman, he reminded himself. However, it could not be said that he was eager to embrace that duty.

Thrusting aside the folder on Adrian Lawson, unread beyond that first enlightening page, Tariq lounged back in his chair like a restive tiger, brooding dark golden eyes hard as iron. The Lawson siblings and their boorish stepfather, Percy, were a sly and greedy trio, who allowed no moral scruple to come between themselves and financial profit. How many other men had Faye played for a sucker? How many lives had Percy ruined with blackmail and dishonest business practices? And now it was evident that even Adrian, the only one of the trio whom Tariq had believed to be decent, was equally corrupt. Such people should be punished.

Tariq pictured the hawk that was the emblem of his family soaring high above the desert in search of tender prey. A chilling smile formed on his well-shaped mouth. There was no reason why he should not strike a blow for natural justice. Indeed there was no reason why he should not take advantage of the situation and have a little fun at the same time…



Faye sat beside her stepfather in the back of the taxi in total silence. Small and slight of build, she was dwarfed by the bulk of the man beside her.

It was only mid-morning but it was hot and, after the long night flight from London, she was exhausted. The cab speeding them through the wide pristine streets of Jumar city was taking them to the prison where her brother, Adrian, was being held. Had she not been so worried about Adrian and had money not been so tight, she would have refused to share even a cab with Percy Smythe.

It still shook Faye that she could feel such intense dislike for any living person. Family loyalty had always been very important to her but she knew she would never forgive Percy for dragging her down into the dirt with him and utterly destroying any faith that Prince Tariq ibn Zachir had ever had in her. Nor could she forgive herself for being so infatuated that she had refused to allow herself to question Tariq’s sudden unexpected proposal of marriage twelve months earlier.

‘This is a waste of time.’ Percy’s plump, perspiring face was full of exasperated impatience. ‘You’ve got to go and see Prince Tariq and ask him to have Adrian released!’

Beneath the pale blonde hair which merely served to accentuate her present lack of colour, Faye’s delicate profile froze. ‘I couldn’t—’

‘Well, how are you going to feel if Adrian picks up some ghastly Middle Eastern infection and pops his clogs?’ Percy demanded with brutal bluntness. ‘You know he’s never been strong!’

Her sensitive stomach churned for there was more truth in that melodramatic warning than she liked to credit. As a child, Adrian had had leukaemia and, although he had recovered, he still tended to catch every passing bug. His uncertain health had finally destroyed the army career he’d loved, forcing him to rethink his future and plunge into the business venture which had led to his current plight.

‘The Foreign Office assured us that he was being well treated,’ Faye reminded the older man tautly.

‘Insofar as he’s been locked up indefinitely! If I was a superstitious man, I would believe that your desert warrior put a hex on us all last year,’ Percy complained bitterly. ‘I was riding high then, making money hand over fist and look at me now—I’m practically broke!’

Just as he deserved to be, Faye reflected heavily. Her stepfather would walk over anyone and do anything to feather his own nest. But there was one surprising exception to that rule: Adrian had somehow become as dear to Percy as any flesh-and-blood son. It was ironic that Percy should have sacrificed his own security in trying and failing to keep her brother’s business afloat.

The prison lay well outside the city limits, housed in a grim fortress surrounded by high walls and lookout towers. They had to wait for some time before they were shown into a room where a line of seats sat in front of a sturdy glass partition. Faye only then appreciated that neither privacy nor physical contact were allowed between inmates and visitors.

But a bigger shock was in store for her when Adrian appeared. He had lost a lot of weight and his prison clothes hung loose on his thin frame. The drawn pallor of his features alarmed her: her brother looked far from well. His bloodshot eyes were strained and reluctant to meet hers.

‘You shouldn’t have come, sis,’ Adrian groaned on the phone provided for communication. ‘This is my mess. I got too cocky and over-extended myself. I let Lizzie spend like there was no tomorrow. It’s the way people live here…you go a bit mad trying to keep up—’

Percy snatched the receiver from Faye and growled, ‘I’ll go to the press back home and kick up such a stink they’ll let you out of this hell hole!’

Adrian studied his stepfather in open horror. ‘Are you crazy?’ he mouthed silently through the glass barrier.

Faye retrieved the phone, her violet-blue eyes full of anxiety. ‘We can’t raise the kind of money you need to get out of here. Your lawyer met us off our flight but he said that he could no longer act for you and that the case was closed. You have to tell us what else we can do to fight this.’

Adrian gave her a bleak defeated look. ‘There is nothing. Didn’t my lawyer tell you that there is no right of appeal in a case like mine? How are Lizzie and the kids holding up?’

At that reference to his wife, Faye tensed for she had no good news to offer. After the experience of having her luxurious home in Jumar repossessed and being deported with her twin toddlers because she no longer had any means of support, her sister-in-law, Lizzie, was feeling very sorry for herself.

‘Like that, is it?’ Adrian read his sister’s evasive gaze. ‘Lizzie didn’t even send me a letter?’

‘She’s pretty down…’ Faye hated adding to his misery with that admission. ‘She asked me to tell you that she loves you but that right now she’s having a problem just coping with being back home without you.’

Adrian’s eyes filled with moisture and he twisted his head away, swallowing hard to get himself back under control.

Faye blinked back tears at her brother’s distress and hurried to change the subject. ‘How are you managing?’

‘Fine…’ her brother mumbled curtly.

‘Are you being treated all right?’ Faye was intimidated by the suspicious appraisal of the two armed officers watching their every move.

‘I have no cause for complaint…just that it’s hell because I hate the food, speak rotten Arabic and keep on getting sick.’ Her brother’s jerky voice faltered. ‘But whatever you do, don’t let Percy go screaming to the media because that will make me a marked man in here. The locals see any criticism of Jumar as criticism of their lousy womanising ruler, Prince Tariq—’

In an abrupt movement, one of the armed officers strode forward looking outraged and wrenched the phone from Adrian’s grasp.

‘What’s wrong…what’s happening?’ Faye surged upright in a panic.

But on their side of the restrictive glass, she and her stepfather might as well have been invisible. Adrian was escorted back to the doorway through which he had earlier entered and vanished from view.

‘I bet those thugs are taking him away to beat him up!’ Percy was as aghast as Faye at what had happened.

‘But neither of those men put a hand on Adrian—’

‘Not in front of us…but how do you know what they’re doing to him now?’

They waited ten minutes to see if Adrian would reappear but he did not. Instead a severe-looking older man in uniform came in to speak to them.

‘I want to know what’s going on here,’ Percy demanded aggressively.

‘Visits are a privilege we extend to relatives, not a right in law. Your visit was terminated because we will not allow our most honoured ruler to be referred to in offensive terms.’ As Percy swelled like a ripe red fruit ready to burst in messy rage, the senior prison officer added loftily, ‘Let me also assure you that we do not abuse our prisoners. Jumar is a civilised and humane country. You may request another visit later this week.’

Registering then that every word spoken during such visits appeared to be monitored and that Adrian must have been equally unaware of that reality, Faye hurried her stepfather out of the room before he could add to her brother’s offence.

Percy raved in frustrated fury all the way back to their small hotel in the suburbs. Faye was grateful that the taxi driver did not seem to understand a word of Percy’s vitriolic diatribe against Jumar and all things Jumarian. Taking Tariq’s name in vain in a public place might well be tantamount to inviting a physical assault. As her stepfather headed straight for the residents’ bar on the ground floor, Faye got into the lift and went back up to her hotel room.

In her mind’s eye, all she could see was the look of naked despair on her brother’s haggard face. Just six short months ago, Adrian had believed he would make his fortune in a city reputed to be a building boomtown. Faye sat at the foot of the bed staring at the challenging reflection of the telephone in the dressing mirror facing her.

‘The number is easy to remember,’ Tariq had told her once. ‘We owned the first telephone in Jumar. You just dial one for the palace switchboard!’

Momentarily Faye shut her swimming eyes, pain and regret and bitterness tearing at her. However, like it or not, Prince Tariq ibn Zachir seemed to be the only option they had left. In most other countries, Adrian would have been declared bankrupt, not imprisoned for debt as if he were a criminal. She had no choice but to approach Tariq and plead her brother’s case. Tariq was all powerful here within his own country. Tariq could surely do anything he wanted to do…

So what if the prospect of crawling to Tariq made her cringe? How could she value her pride more than her brother’s welfare? Tense as a cat on hot bricks, Faye paced the room. Would Tariq even agree to see her? How did she beg such a massive favour from a male who despised both her and her stepfather? She was out of her depth here in Jumar where the very air seemed to smell of high-powered money and privilege, she thought bitterly. A year ago, she had been even more out of her depth with a male as exotic and sophisticated as Tariq ibn Zachir. And bone-deep foolish to imagine that anything lasting might come of such an inequal relationship. But, no matter what Tariq had chosen to believe, she had played no part in Percy’s sordid attempt to blackmail him!

Reminding herself of that essential truth, Faye reached for the phone. Dialling that single digit to be connected to the palace was easy. However, in the minutes that followed, she discovered that the palace switchboard was tended by personnel who spoke only Arabic. Breaking off the call in frustration, Faye reached for the purse in her bag. From the central compartment, she withdrew a slender gold ring etched with worn hieroglyphic symbols.

Her hand shook. For a split second, memory took her back to the instant when Tariq had slid that ring onto her finger in the Embassy of Jumar in London. She shivered, assailed by a tide of choking humiliation. How stupid she had been to believe that that was a real wedding ceremony! It had been a farce staged solely to combat Percy’s threat to plunge Tariq into a sleazy media scandal. But only when that cruel farce was over had Faye realised what a complete clown Tariq had made of her.

Making use of the hotel stationery, Faye dropped the ring into an envelope and dashed off a note requesting a meeting with Tariq. She went down to Reception and asked how to have an urgent letter delivered. The receptionist studied the name on the envelope with widened eyes and extended her interest to the additional words, ‘PERSONAL, PRIVATE, CONFIDENTIAL’ taking up half of the space. ‘This…it is for Prince Tariq?’

Faye reddened and nodded.

“One of our drivers will deliver it, Miss Lawson.’

Back in her room, Faye went for a shower and changed. Then she lay down on the bed. A loud knock, recognisable as Percy’s calling card, sounded on the door. She ignored it. He thumped again so loudly she was afraid that the hotel staff would come to investigate. She opened the door.

‘Right…’ Her stepfather pushed his way in, his heavy face aggressive and flushed by alcohol. ‘You get on that phone now and contact Tariq. Hopefully he’ll get a kick out of you grovelling at his feet. And if that’s not enough to please His Royal Highness, warn him that you can still go to the newspapers and give them a story about what it’s like getting married and divorced all in the space of the same day!’

Faye was horrified. ‘Do you really think that wild nasty threats are likely to persuade Tariq to help Adrian?’

‘Look, I may have miscalculated with Tariq last year but I know how that bloke ticks now. He’s a real tough nut to crack—all that SAS training—but he’s also an officer and a gentleman and he prides himself on the fact. So first you try licking boots and looking pathetic…’ Percy subjected her navy blouse, cotton trousers and her clipped-back long hair to a withering appraisal. ‘Look pathetic and beautiful!’

The light rap that sounded on her door at that point provided a merciful interruption. It was the hotel manager, who had greeted them on their arrival. He bowed as if she had suddenly become a most important guest.

‘A limousine has arrived to take you to the Haja place, Miss Lawson.’

Faye swallowed hard. She had not expected so speedy a response to her request for a meeting.

‘Don’t you worry…she’ll be down in two minutes.’ Percy turned back to his stepdaughter to say appreciatively, ‘Why didn’t you just tell me you’d already started the ball rolling?’

Keen to escape her stepfather’s loathsome company, Faye went straight down in the lift. She settled into the luxurious limousine, feeling like a fish out of water in her plain, inexpensive clothes. And she was, wasn’t she?

She had lived in a quiet country house all her life, rarely meeting anyone outside her late mother’s restricted social circle. Percy had married Sarah Lawson when Faye was five. Disabled by the same car accident in which her first husband had died, Faye’s mother had been confined to a wheelchair and desperately lonely. She had also been a well-to-do widow. After their marriage, Percy had continued to use a city apartment as his base and, pleading pressure of work, had spent only occasional weekends with his new family.

Faye had never gone to school like other children. Both she and her brother had initially been taught at home by their mother, but once Adrian had overcome leukaemia Percy had persuaded his wife that her son should complete his education with other boys. At eleven years old, hungry for friends her own age, Faye had finally worked up the courage to tell her stepfather that she too wanted to attend school.

‘And what’s your mother going to do with herself all day?’ Percy’s accusing fury had shaken her rigid. ‘How can you be so selfish? Your mother needs you for company…she’s got nothing else in her life!’

Faye had been devastated at eighteen when her gentle mother had died. But only then had she appreciated that some people believed she had led an unnaturally sheltered life for a teenager. Indeed, at the interview for the nursing course she was hoping to begin in the autumn, several critical comments had been made about her lack of experience of the real world. Had she felt like baring her soul, she might have told them that, with Percy Smythe in the starring role of stepfather, she had had ample experience of life’s nastier realities…

Having traversed the wide, busy streets of the city to a gracious tree-lined square, the limo pulled up in front of a vast old sandstone building with an imposing entrance. Spick and span soldiers stood on guard outside. Faye clambered out, flustered and unsure of herself.

Climbing the steps, she entered a vast and imposing hall crowded with people coming and going. Frowning, she hesitated. A young man in a suit approached her and with a low bow said, ‘Miss Lawson? I will take you to Prince Tariq.’

‘Thank you. Is this the royal palace?’

‘No, indeed, Miss Lawson. Although the Haja fortress still belongs to the royal family, His Royal Highness allows it to be used as a public building,’ her companion informed her. ‘The Haja houses the law courts and the audience rooms, also conference and banqueting facilities for visiting dignitaries and businessmen. While retaining offices here, Prince Tariq lives in the Muraaba palace.’

So this was not Tariq’s home and he had chosen a more impersonal setting for their meeting. Her eyes skimmed over the fluted stone pillars that punctuated the echoing hall and the wonderful mosaic tiled floor which gleamed beneath the passage of so many feet. The Haja was a hive of activity. An elderly tribesman was sitting on a stone bench with, of all things, a goat on a string. She saw women veiled in black from head to toe, other women in elegant western clothing, their lovely faces serene, clusters of older men wearing the traditional male headdress, the kaffiyeh, sharply suited younger ones bare-headed and carrying files and attaché cases.

‘Miss Lawson…?’

Forced to quicken her steps, she followed her escort under an archway. Tribal guards armed with both guns and ornate swords stood outside the door which was being spread wide for her entrance. She forced her feet onward, heart thundering, throat tightening. Perhaps what she least expected was to find herself standing alone in a beautiful inner courtyard, lush with islands of exotic greenery and embellished with a tranquil central pool. She blinked. Hearing the sound of footsteps, she turned and saw Tariq coming down a flight of steps about twenty feet away.

To disconcert her yet further, Tariq was clad in riding gear, a white polo shirt open at his throat, skintight beige breeches outlining his narrow hips and long powerful length of leg, polished brown boots on his feet.

Her tummy muscles clenched. She had forgotten quite how tall Tariq ibn Zachir was and how dynamic his presence. He stilled like a lion on the prowl. Magnificent, hugely confident, his silent grace of movement one of his most noticeable physical attributes. In the sunlight he was a golden feast of vibrant masculinity. His luxuriant black hair shone. His tawny skin glowed with health and his stunning bronze eyes gleamed like precious metal, both brilliant and unreadable. Indeed, he was quite staggeringly beautiful and it was an appalling challenge for Faye not to stare at him. Her mouth ran dry, a slow, painful tide of pink creeping up to dispense her pallor. Her heart hammered against her breastbone so hard she could barely catch her breath.

‘I appreciate your agreeing to see me so quickly,’ Faye muttered dry-mouthed.

‘Unfortunately, I haven’t much time to spare. I have a charity polo match to play in an hour’s time.’

Tariq came to a halt at the stone table by the pool and leant back against it. He angled his arrogant head back and studied her with a bold, all-male intensity that made her feel horribly self-conscious. His expressive mouth quirked. ‘Surely Percy did not advise you to wear trousers to this meeting? Or is that sad outfit supposed to be a plea for the sympathy vote?’

At that all too accurate crack about her stepfather, Faye turned as red as a beetroot and stammered. ‘I c-can’t imagine why you should think that.’

‘Don’t play innocent.’ Tariq gave her that advice in a tone as smooth as glass. ‘I had a surfeit of the blushing virgin act last year. I should have smelt a rat the instant you ditched it and appeared in a plunging neckline but, like most men, I was too busy looking to be cautious.’

Writhing with chagrin under such fire, some of which she knew to be justified, Faye snatched in a stark breath of the hot, still air. ‘Tariq…I very much regret what happened between us.’

Tariq dealt her a slow smile which chilled her to the marrow for it was not at all the charismatic smile she recalled. ‘I’m sure you do. It could not have occurred to you then that your precious brother would soon be locked up in a prison cell in Jumar.’

‘Of course, it didn’t.’ Faye took that comment at face value, striving to be grateful that he had rushed them straight to the crux of the matter. She curled her hands together. ‘But you like Adrian. You know that he’s been gaoled through no fault of his own—’

‘Do I?’ Tariq broke in softly. ‘Is our legal system so unjust? I had not thought so.’

Recognising her error in appearing to criticise that system, Faye said hastily, ‘I didn’t mean that. I was only pointing out that Adrian hasn’t done anything criminal—’

‘Has he not? Here in Jumar it is a crime to leave employees and tradesmen unpaid and clients with buildings that have not been completed according to contract. However, we are wonderfully practical in such cases.’ His shimmering smile was no warmer than its predecessor. ‘To regain his freedom, Adrian has only to satisfy his creditors.’

‘But he’s not able to do that…’ As she was forced to make that admission, Faye’s discomfiture leapt higher still. ‘Adrian sold his home to start up the construction firm. He plunged everything he had into the venture—’

‘And then lived like a king while he was here in my country. Yes, I am familiar with the circumstances in which your brother’s business failed. Adrian himself was foolish and extravagant.’

As Tariq completed that brief but damning indictment, Faye lost colour. ‘He made mistakes…yes, but not with any bad or deliberate intent—’

‘Surely you have heard of the principle of criminal irresponsibility?’ Indolent as a sleek jungle cat sunning himself in the sweltering heat that she was finding unbearable, Tariq surveyed her. ‘Tell me, why did you send me this?’

That switch of subject disconcerted Faye almost as much as his complete lack of emotion. The last time she had seen Tariq he had been hot with dark fury and outrage. Now she focused on the ring in the extended palm of his lean brown hand and her tummy twisted. He tossed the ring into the air where it caught the sun and glittered, exercising the strangest fascination over her. Catching it again with deft fingers, he then tossed the ring with speaking carelessness down onto the stone table where it finally rattled into stillness.

‘Were you hoping that I might have some sentimental memory of the day I put that ring on your finger?’ Tariq asked with cold derision.

Faye studied his superb riding boots until they blurred beneath the fierceness of her gaze. A wave of deep shame enveloped her and roused a terrifying lump in her throat. How very hard it was to accept that he had caused her such immense pain yet deprived her of any real right of complaint. True, he had misjudged her, but he could hardly be blamed for that when her own stepfather had tried to blackmail him. Nonetheless, unjust as it might be, Faye hated Tariq for believing that she was as calculating and mercenary as Percy Smythe.

‘Tell me…’ Tariq continued with awesome casualness, ‘…do you think of yourself as my wife or as my ex-wife?’

Reacting to that light and, to her, inappropriate question as if it was the cruellest of taunts, Faye’s pale head flew up and mortified pink warmed her cheeks afresh. ‘Hardly. At the time you made it very clear that that wedding ceremony was a charade! I know all too well that I was never your wife.’

His dense black spiky lashes lowered over dark deep-set eyes for once unlit by any lighter hue. ‘I was curious to find out how you regarded yourself.’

‘I’m only here to discuss Adrian’s position—’

‘Adrian doesn’t have a position,’ Tariq interposed without hesitation. ‘The law has already dealt with him and only repayment of his debts can free him.’

He was like a stranger. Neither courteous nor sympathetic, neither interested nor perturbed. This was Tariq as she had never known him. Hard, distant, forbidding. Terrifyingly impersonal. A male whose cool authority of command was so engrained that it blazed from him even in casual clothing. Faye’s slim hands closed in tight on themselves. ‘But surely you could do something…if you wanted to…’

‘I am not above the law,’ Tariq stated, ice entering his rich dark drawl.

Her desperation grew. ‘But, even so, you can do exactly as you wish…isn’t that what being a feudal ruler is all about?’

‘I would not interfere with the laws of my country. It is a grave insult for you to even suggest that I would abuse the trust of my people in such a way!’ Hard golden eyes struck hers in a look of strong censure.

Faye tore her shaken gaze from his and tried not to cringe. She fully understood that message but did not want to accept it. Even though she was standing in partial shade, she was perspiring and wilting in the suffocating heat that he seemed to flourish in. But knowing that she undoubtedly only had this one chance to speak up on her brother’s behalf, she persisted. ‘Adrian can’t work to pay off his creditors from inside a prison cell—’

‘No, indeed, but how is it that you and your stepfather find yourself so poor that you cannot rescue him?’

‘Percy used up all his surplus cash trying to save Adrian’s business. And don’t tell me that you weren’t aware of that.’ Faye could not conceal her bitterness at the brick-wall reception she was receiving. It was now clear that, even before she’d approached him, Tariq had known all the facts of her brother’s case but had already decided not to interfere. ‘I’m only here begging you to find some way to help my brother because I have nowhere else to turn.’

‘You have yet to explain why I should wish to help Adrian.’

‘Common decency…humanity…’ Faye muttered shakily. ‘Officer and a gentleman?’

Tariq elevated an aristocratic dark brow. ‘Not where your self-seeking, dishonourable family is concerned.’

‘What can I say to convince you that—?’

‘Nothing. You can say nothing that will convince me. Tell me, were you always this obtuse? Or was I so busy looking at your angelic face and divine body that I failed to notice a pronounced absence of brain cells?’

His ruthless mockery lashed red into her tense, confused face. ‘I don’t know what you’re getting at—’

‘Why don’t you just ask me under what terms you might persuade me to settle Adrian’s debts?’

‘You settle them?’ Faye studied Tariq in bewilderment. ‘That idea never even occurred to me—’

That disclaimer fired an even more sardonic light in his level gaze. ‘We’re running out of time. So I shall use plain words. Give yourself to me and I will buy your brother out of trouble. There…it is very simple, is it not?’

Her lips parted. Give yourself to me. Her dark blue eyes huge, she stared back at him in disbelief.

Tariq absorbed her reaction with a cynical cool that sent her shock level into overdrive. ‘Sex in return for money. What you once used as a bait to set a trap for me but failed to deliver.’

Hot, sticky and stunned by that blunt condemnation, Faye raised her hand to tug at the constricting collar of her blouse. A trickle of perspiration ran down between her breasts. His keen gaze rested there and then whipped up to connect with her shaken eyes. The charged sexuality of that knowing look scorched her sensitive skin like a taunting flame. A helpless flare of response gripped her taut body without warning. Thought had nothing to do with the sudden ache in her breasts, the throbbing tautness of her nipples or the curl of dark secret heat darting up between her thighs.

Appalled self-loathing trammelling through her, Faye dropped her head, fighting and denying the physical sensations which threatened to tear her inside out. She needed to think, she had to concentrate for Tariq could not possibly mean what he was saying. This could only be a cruel power play at her expense. At the same time as he let her know that he would not lift a finger to help Adrian, he was trying to punish her for the past. Punish her with humiliation.

At that energising thought, Faye lifted her head high again. Her fine-boned features were pink but stiff with angry, injured pride. ‘Obviously it was a mistake to ask you for this meeting.’ Struggling to keep her voice level, she thrust up her chin. ‘Whatever you may think of me, I don’t deserve what you just said to me.’

A caustic smile slashed Tariq’s lean, powerful face. ‘What a loss you have been to the film world! That look of mortally offended reproach is quite superb.’

‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself!’ Undaunted by the incredulous blaze that flamed in his spectacular eyes, Faye gave him a scornful glance. Spinning on her heel, she stalked back out of the courtyard without lowering herself to say another word.




CHAPTER TWO


FAYE shot like a bullet back into the crowded concourse again, cannoned off someone with a startled apology and backed away into one of the pillars.

She was in shock. She knew she was. But she was furious to find that her eyes were awash with tears and she couldn’t see where she was going. Gulping back the thickness in her throat, she whirled round to the back of the pillar and struggled to get a grip on herself again. What was she? Some wishy-washy wimp all of a sudden?

‘Allow me to offer you refreshment…’ an anxious male voice proffered.

Frowning in surprise because she recognised that voice, Faye parted her clogged eyelashes and focused on the polished shoes of the little man standing in front of her. Latif, Tariq’s most senior aide, whom she had met in passing on several occasions the year before. Slowly she lifted her bent head. Latif bowed so low that she got a great view of his bald patch. Indeed she honestly thought he was trying to touch his toes and could not immediately grasp what on earth he was doing until it occurred to her that the older man might well be granting her a tactful moment in which to compose herself.

‘Latif…’

‘Please come this way…’

Latif led her through a door and across a hall into a charming reception room furnished in European style. Grateful for the blessed cool of the air-conditioning there, Faye collapsed down on a silk-upholstered sofa and dug into her bag in search of a tissue.

The reserved older man stayed by the door at a respectful distance and Faye averted her attention from him. Latif was kind. He had seen her distress and brought her here to recover in privacy and, unfortunately for him, good manners forbade leaving her alone.

Jingling with jewellery and barefoot, a procession of maids carrying trays entered the room. One by one they knelt at her feet to serve her with coffee and proffer cakes and sticky confectionery. Beneath her astonished scrutiny, they then backed away across the whole depth of the room with downbent heads before exiting again. Presumably all visitors, many of whom would naturally be VIPs, were treated with such exaggerated attention and servility but it made Faye feel extremely uncomfortable.

‘I believe the heat may have made you feel unwell.’ As Faye finished the bittersweet coffee in the tiny china cup, Latif broke the silence with exquisite tact. ‘I hope you are feeling better now.’

‘Yes, thank you…’ Faye bit at her lower lip and then took the plunge for she had not the slightest doubt that the discreet older man knew all about Adrian’s predicament. ‘Have you any idea how I can help my brother?’

‘I would suggest that a second approach might be made to Prince Tariq tomorrow.’

So much for inspired advice from an inside source! Faye tried not to release a humourless laugh. Surely Latif could not have the foggiest clue of what had passed between her and Tariq? Give yourself to me. Pretty basic, that. No room for misunderstanding there. She was still shattered that Tariq could have made such a suggestion to her. It was barbaric.

Yet no sooner had she made that judgement than an unwelcome little voice spoke up from her conscience. Hadn’t she once offered herself to Tariq in no uncertain terms? Hadn’t she once made it quite clear that she’d been willing to sleep with him? And hadn’t she then got cold feet when she’d seen how that unwise invitation had altered his attitude to her? Without a doubt, Tariq now saw her as the most shameless tease! Tears lashed the back of her eyes again. Wasn’t it awful how one mistake could just lead to another and another? From the instant she had departed from the values she had been raised to respect, she had learnt nothing but hard lessons.

Eager now to leave the Haja, Faye rose to her feet. ‘Thank you for the coffee, Latif.’

‘I will send a car again for you tomorrow, if I may.’

‘I’d be wasting my time coming again.’

‘The car will remain at your disposal for the whole day.’

Latif evidently wanted her brother released from prison, Faye decided. Why else was he getting involved behind the scenes? She returned to the hotel in the same style in which she had departed. As she crossed the foyer, slight shoulders bowed with exhaustion, Percy emerged from the bar to intercept her.

‘Well?’ he demanded abrasively.

‘All I got was…was an improper proposition.’ Faye could not bring herself to look at her stepfather as she admitted that but she hoped that that honesty would satisfy him and save her from an interrogation. Percy was a bully. He had always been a bully. Just then, she did not feel equal to the challenge of standing up to him.

‘So what?’ Percy snapped without hesitation. ‘You’ve got to do whatever it takes to get Adrian home!’

Once again, Faye was shocked. But as she hurried into the lift and left her stepfather fuming, she asked herself why. Percy had never had much time for her. It had been naïve of her to believe that he might be angry on her behalf. For Percy, the bottom line was Adrian. And shouldn’t that be her bottom line as well?

Knowing it was past time that she ate something, Faye rang room service and ordered the cheapest snack on the menu. Then she made herself face facts. But for her, Adrian would not have got to know Tariq and would never had thought of setting up business in Jumar. It was also her fault that Tariq now regarded her and her brother in the same light as their stepfather. Like it or not, she had put Tariq into a compromising position where Percy was able to threaten him. Her foolish infatuation, her lies and her immaturity had led to that development. Adrian was suffering now because Tariq despised and distrusted all of them. Who could ever have imagined that from one seemingly small lie, so much grief could have flowed?

Faye swallowed hard. When she had first met Tariq, she had pretended to be twenty-three years old, sooner than own up to being a month short of her nineteenth birthday. Tariq’s subsequent outrage at the lies she had told had been extreme and succinct. She might as well have set out to trap him for the end result had been the same. Retreating from recollections that still made her writhe with guilt, Faye returned to the present and the grim prospect of what she ought to try to do next to help her brother…

That evening, her stepfather came to her hotel room again but she opened the door on the chain and said she wasn’t well. It wasn’t a lie: she was so tired, she felt queasy. In her bed she lay listening to the evocative call of the muezzin calling the faithful to prayer at the mosque at the end of the street. With her conscience tormenting her, she got little sleep.

At half-past eight the following morning, wearing a loose dress in a pale lilac print, Faye climbed into the limousine which Latif had promised would be waiting. The day before she had made serious errors with Tariq, she now conceded, newly appraised humility weighing her down. She had tried to save face by talking only about Adrian. But, mortifying as it was to acknowledge, Tariq had good reason to think she was a brazen hussy, who had set him up for a sleazy blackmail attempt. Perhaps an open acknowledgement of that reality, a long overdue explanation and a sincere and heartfelt apology would take the edge off Tariq’s animosity. Maybe he would then consider loaning Adrian the money he needed to settle his debts and let bygones be bygones…

This time the limo whisked her round to a side entrance at the Haja fortress where Latif greeted her in person. Quiet approval emanated from the older man.

Ushered straight into a large contemporary office, Faye breathed in deep and straightened her shoulders. Sleek and sophisticated in a pale grey business suit of exquisite cut that moulded his broad shoulders, lean hips and long powerful legs, Tariq was standing by the window talking on a portable phone. He acknowledged her arrival with the merest dip of his handsome dark head.

Taking the seat indicated by Latif, who then withdrew, Faye focused on Tariq. His classic profile stood out in strong relief. She watched the long, elegant fingers of his free hand spread a little and then curl with silent eloquence as he spoke. Memories that hurt assailed her and she dragged her attention from him and folded her hands together on her lap to stop them trembling.

But she remained so aware of his disturbing presence that she was in an agony of discomfiture. She knew that lean bronzed face almost as well as her own. The slight imperious slant of his ebony brows, the spectacular tawny eyes that had such amazing clarity, the narrow bridge of his aristocratic nose dissecting hard high Berber cheekbones, the strong stubborn jawline, the passionate but stern mouth.

Only the day before, she had felt the humiliating pull of his magnetic physical attraction. Her soft full mouth compressed. That had unnerved and embarrassed her. But he had caught her at a weak moment. That was all. She was no longer an infatuated teenager, helpless in the grip of her own emotions and at the mercy of galloping hormones and foolish fantasies. She had got over him fast. She might not have dated anyone since but that was only because he had truly soured her outlook on men.

‘Why are you here?’

Shot from her teeming thoughts without due warning, Faye jerked. Then she lifted her head and tilted it back. ‘I believe I owe you an explanation for the way I behaved last year.’

‘I need no explanation.’ Derision glittered in Tariq’s steady appraisal. ‘Indeed I will listen to no explanation. If you think I’m fool enough to give you a platform for more lies and self-justification, you seriously underestimate me—’

In one sentence thus deprived of her entire script, Faye breathed, ‘But—’

‘It’s very rude to interrupt me when I’m speaking.’

Faye flushed but she was already so tense that her temper sparked. ‘Maybe you would just like me to lie down like a carpet for you to walk on!’

‘A carpet is inanimate. I prefer energy and movement in my women.’

Her humble and penitent frame of mind was already taking a hard beating. Cheeks scarlet at that comeback, Faye nonetheless tried afresh. ‘Tariq…I need to explain and apologise. You wouldn’t give me the chance to explain at the time.’

‘If that is your only reason for being here, I suggest you leave. Sly words and crocodile tears won’t move me. The very thought of your shameless deceit rouses my temper.’

Faye swallowed hard. ‘OK…you have the right to be angry—’

‘Grovelling insincerity makes me angry too,’ Tariq incised even more drily. ‘Cut the phony regrets. I made you an offer yesterday and that’s why you’re here now. Only a tramp would accept a proposition of that nature, so stop pretending to be a sweet, misunderstood innocent!’

Faye, who usually had the mildest temper in the world, was appalled to feel a river of wrath surge like hot lava inside her. She rose from her seat in an abrupt movement. ‘I won’t tolerate being called a tramp! What do you call a man who makes such an offer to a woman?’

‘A man with no illusions…a man who disdains hypocrisy.’

Faye trembled. ‘My goodness, you insult me with a proposition no decent woman would even consider and then you turn round and you flatter yourself from your pinnacle of perfection—’

‘You are not a decent woman. You lie and you cheat and there is nothing you would not do for money.’

‘That is not true…it all started because I told a few stupid white lies and I know it was wrong but I was crazy about you—’

‘Crazy about me?’ Tariq flung back his arrogant dark head and laughed out loud, the sound discordant in the thrumming atmosphere. ‘You let me go for a mere half million pounds. You were so blinded by greed, you were content to settle for whatever you could get!’

Almost light-headed with the force of rage powering her, Faye now fell back a step and gaped at him. ‘I let you go…for half a million pounds? What the heck are you trying to accuse me of doing now?’

Tariq centred his brilliant golden eyes on her, his beautiful mouth hard as granite. ‘You were a cheap bride, I’ll give you that. You may have come with no dowry but I was able to shed you again for a pittance.’

Faye was no longer sure her wobbling knees would hold her upright and she dropped down into the chair again, all temper quenched. Evidently, Tariq had handed over money to somebody, money she knew nothing about. She did not have to think very hard to come up with the name of the most likely culprit. ‘You gave money to Percy…?’ She swallowed back a wail of reproach at that appalling revelation.

‘I gave it to you.’

And like a flash in the darkness, Faye finally recalled the envelope which Tariq had flung at her feet after their fake wedding that dreadful day. Did he recall that he had been talking in Arabic at the time? Didn’t he realise that she had naively assumed that their marriage certificate had been in that envelope? And when she had finally stumbled out of the Embassy of Jumar, heartbroken and with her pride in tatters, she had thrust the envelope at Percy in revulsion and condemnation. ‘Are you satisfied now that you’ve wrecked my life? Burn it…I don’t want to ever be reminded of this day again!’

How many weeks had it been before she’d finally forced herself to see her stepfather again and ask for the certificate in the hope that he had not after all destroyed it? She had believed that she might need that certificate to apply for an annulment in case the extraordinary ease of Jumarian divorce was not actually recognised by English law. But Percy had laughed in her face when she’d mentioned that fear.

‘Don’t be more dumb than you can help, Faye,’ her stepfather had sneered. ‘That wasn’t a legal marriage! It wasn’t consummated and he repudiated you straight after the ceremony. Your desert warrior was just saving face and trying to protect himself with some mumbo-jumbo. Why else did he insist it took place in private in the embassy?’

Percy had followed that up with the explanation that embassies fell under the legal jurisdiction of the countries they belonged to, rather than that of the host country. Faye had felt too mortified by her own obvious ignorance to counter his charge of ‘mumbo-jumbo’. An Arab gentleman dressed just like a Christian vicar had presided over the first part of that ceremony but he had spoken only in Arabic and there was no denying that Tariq himself had called their wedding a complete charade.

Repressing that slew of memories, Faye focused her be-mused thoughts back on the cheque which Tariq had said was in that envelope she had blithely surrendered. She closed her eyes in stricken acknowledgement of yet another insane act of foolishness on her part. She had handed a cheque for half a million pounds to Percy Smythe! But if the cheque had been made out to her, how on earth had he cashed it? For she had not the slightest doubt that it must have been cashed!

‘Tariq…I didn’t know that envelope had a cheque in it.’ Her taut temples were pounding out her rising stress level. ‘I don’t know why you would have chosen to give me money either.’

The silence stretched and stretched.

Overwhelmed by guilty self-loathing and the most drowning sense of sheer inadequacy, Faye stared into space. No wonder Tariq ibn Zachir thought she was a trollop. No wonder he believed that she had conspired with her stepfather to set him up for blackmail. No wonder he was so certain that she was greedy for money. What had Percy done with that half million pounds? Percy, who had been outmanoeuvred in his blackmail attempt by Tariq’s announcement that he would marry Faye. Whatever, that huge sum of money was evidently long gone.

‘I can’t believe that you would want a woman with such low moral standards,’ Faye said finally.

‘You’ll be a novelty.’

‘A woman who doesn’t want you?’ Faye was past caring about how she sounded. Here she was guilty as charged it seemed on every count. Guilty of serial stupidity. Guilty of being a teenager madly in love and doing all the wrong things in her efforts to make him love her back. She had done a marvellous job on him, hadn’t she? Thanks to her own lies, he thought she was the most dishonest brazen hussy he had ever met!

‘Is that a challenge?’

Faye gave him a dulled look. Tariq gazed back at her with a sizzling force that penetrated her veil of numb defeat. ‘No!’

‘You will be my mistress for as long as I want you.’ Tariq surveyed her as if he had just stamped a brand of ownership on her, his male satisfaction unconcealed.

Seriously unnerved by that statement of intent, Faye leapt back out of her seat again, her hands clenched into fists. ‘You can’t still want me…you never wanted me that much to begin with! This is just a giant ego-trip. It’s mindless revenge—’

‘Not mindless. I never act without forethought.’ Tariq stretched out an imperious hand. ‘Come here…’

Faye went into retreat rather than advance. Shark-infested water might as well have separated them. ‘I didn’t say I agreed.’

‘Then make your mind up.’

Faye folded her arms in a defensive movement. ‘Adrian?’

‘He goes home to England on the first available flight.’

Faye shook her head, tried to still the nervous tremor in her lower limbs. ‘I’m not what you think I am. I can’t imagine being any man’s mistress. I won’t fit the bill—’

‘You underestimate yourself.’

Tariq extended his hand again, glittering golden eyes fixed to her with intimidating cool and expectancy.

‘If you think I’m going to come running every time you snap your imperious fingers—’

‘Sooner or later, you will. I have immense patience.’

That quiet confidence took Faye wholly aback and froze her to the spot. ‘You’re crazy…’

A slight smile curved his lips. ‘You’re scared.’

‘Like heck I am…I’m just fed up with all this nonsense!’

The smile acquired amusement, veiled eyes resting on her slight, taut frame with an intimate intensity she could feel as surely as if he had touched her. ‘I didn’t sleep last night. I couldn’t sleep, not even after a couple of cold showers. I knew you were mine then.’

‘But you…you hate me!’ Faye slung back at him in vehement protest.

‘Hate? Too strong a word.’ Tariq strolled closer like a hunter set on closing in for the kill but doing so at his own leisure. ‘Is that why you look sick with fright? Is that fertile imagination of yours throwing up images of gothic whips and chains? Do you really think I would inflict a single bruise on that perfect skin of yours? You’ll cry out with pleasure, not pain, in my bed.’

Faye was so mortified by that assurance, she whirled away from him. It was a mistake. He closed his arms round her and turned her back to him. With one hand, he loosened the clasp at the nape of her neck and cast it aside. Gazing down at her with scorching golden eyes, he threaded long fingers through her long pale blonde hair and tugged her head back in a gentle motion.

‘Tariq—’

‘You want me.’ A lean hand pressed to the shallow indentation of her rigid spine and curved her into intimate contact with his long muscular thighs.

Suddenly it was a challenge to talk and breathe at the same time. She stared up at him, trying to hold herself rigid but awesomely conscious of the all-pervasive strength of his powerful physique. ‘No—’

‘You’re trembling—’

‘I’m cold!’ Faye scarcely knew what she was saying any more. That close to Tariq, her mind was a sea of confusion and her own physical reactions took over.

‘Cold?’ Tariq lowered his proud dark head, his breath fanning her cheek, the evocative timbre of his low-pitched drawl sentencing her to stillness. ‘Who are you trying to fool?’

Feeling weak as water, Faye mumbled, ‘Please…’

‘Please what?’ Tariq brought his wide sensual mouth within inches of hers and somehow made her lips part in invitation, her very breath catching in her throat, her slender length instinctively stretching up to his to get still closer. ‘Tell me, please, what?’

The scent of him enveloped her like a sneak invasion by an aphrodisiac. So familiar, so special, so…him. Her nostrils flared, head spinning on a released flood of sensuous recall from the past, heat forming in her pelvis, breasts lifting and swelling within the constriction of her cotton bra. It was as if her whole body were burning and melting from inside out, a blind sense of fevered anticipation enthralling her, pitching her high.

‘What?’ Tariq prompted soft and low, even his dark sexy voice sending a darting quiver of hot response through her.

‘Kiss me…’ The instant she actually yielded and formed the words, Tariq released his hold on her.

She staggered back on cotton-wool legs, ill-prepared for staying upright without his support. She blinked like a woman wakening from a disorientating dream.

‘As a people we prefer to keep intimacy behind closed doors,’ Tariq murmured smooth as silk. ‘This office is too public but there is no greater privacy available than that within the harem quarters at Muraaba.’

Faye pressed an unsteady hand against her tingling lips as if she might quiet the sheer craving which still held her taut. ‘Harem quarters—?’

‘To be a mistress in Jumar is no sinecure and no ticket to freedom or excess. To be my mistress is, above all, to be an invisible woman,’ Tariq said with a regretful sigh. ‘To live behind high walls and locked doors and centre your whole being and your every thought on the man in your life because he truly will be all that is in your life. Say goodbye to the world that you know for the foreseeable future.’

Faye was slower to recover from that near embrace than he had been. She had only just reached the point of dying a thousand deaths over the recollection of how she had swayed against him, reached up to him on tiptoes of yearning, begged for his kiss like a brainless programmed doll. He had made her want him. With effortless ease and within seconds. She was devastated by that discovery.

‘On the other hand, since an aversion to me would not appear to be a sticking point…’ Tariq surveyed her with the predatory gaze of a hawk ‘…you may well be inconsolable when I get tired of you.’

‘Harem…you think you’re going to put me in a harem?’ Faye parroted in a wobbly voice. ‘Are you out of your mind to suggest such a thing?’

Tariq lounged back against his polished desk. ‘Very much in it. Furthermore, since I cannot trust you, your brother will not walk free from his prison cell until you have moved in—’

‘Tariq—’

He made an unapologetic play of studying the slim gold watch on his wrist. ‘I’m afraid your time is up. Unfortunately, I have other people waiting to see me. A car will now convey you to my home—’

‘Now?’ Frowning in absolute disbelief, Faye just gaped at him.

‘Your hotel room was cleared within minutes of your departure from it. Having been informed that your brother may soon be released, your stepfather is already waiting at the prison. You will see neither of your relatives again until our arrangement comes to an end.’

Faye attempted to swallow but the lead weight of incredulity sat like a giant rock at the foot of her throat. ‘You’re not serious…you can’t be serious about any of this stuff—’

Tariq strode past her and opened the door for her departure. He gave her a lethal smile that tied a cold hard knot inside her. ‘How much of a gambler are you?’

Faye turned pale.

‘And how well do you think you ever knew me?’




CHAPTER THREE


FAYE saw a stone bench sited near the side entrance. From there, she could see the now familiar limousine waiting outside. To take her to the Muraaba palace? Or to the airport? Her choice, wasn’t it? Essentially, she was free as a bird. Sitting down, she tried to calm her seething thoughts.

How well do you think you ever knew me? A body-blow of a put-down from the male who had almost destroyed her. In spite of her attempts to suppress it, angry bitterness welled up inside Faye and she laced her trembling hands together. Was it her fault that her stepfather was a con artist? Her own mother had died penniless but for the roof over her head. Within weeks of Tariq’s defection, Adrian had decided their childhood home should also be sold.

‘OK, sis?’ It had been a rhetorical question.

Adrian had had no desire to hear that his sister’s heart had been breaking at the prospect of losing her home. Nor had he wanted to be reminded that she had hoped to set up a riding school there or that, deprived of both stables and paddock, she would have to sell her beloved horse as well.

But then Faye was not used to putting herself first. Growing up, she had not been encouraged to think her needs or wishes should carry the same weight as other people’s. But that didn’t necessarily mean she was a doormat, did it? How could she have argued about the sale of their family home? Her clerical job had not paid enough to cover her share of the maintenance costs. So Adrian had sold house, contents and land to raise capital for his construction firm. He had promised that she would share in the fruits of his success, would undeniably have shared those profits generously had there been any…

And what had Percy done with that half million pounds from Tariq? Pocketed it by forging her signature? Or had Tariq made it even more simple for Percy by making out that cheque in her stepfather’s name? Tariq, who thought all women leant on the nearest man for financial support. A ‘goodbye and get lost and keep quiet’ payment.

Was that what that cheque had been, on his terms? Faye shuddered. Compensation for the wedding that had filled her with pathetic joy and then concluded in the cruellest farce? She folded her arms tightly round herself. She could not bear to think of that day at the embassy. She had truly believed it was her wedding day. But after the ceremony Tariq had turned on her as though she were the lowest form of human life, stamping on her pride, her hopes, her love, devastating her.

‘Divorce is easy in my culture,’ Tariq had delivered. ‘I say in Arabic, “I divorce thee” three times and circle as I say it. Do you want to watch me reclaim my freedom again? Do you want me to demonstrate what a sham this ceremony was?’

The savage hurt and humiliation of that day would never leave Faye. The unwilling bridegroom, the arrogant and autocratic prince, outraged even by a wedding that was a charade. He had just stomped all over her feelings as if she were nothing, nobody worthy of any consideration. Was it any wonder she hated him?

Yes, she hated Prince Tariq Shazad ibn Zachir. Yet the same frightening physical longing which had deprived her of her wits before still lingered like a bad hangover. Why? She refused to think about that. However, she had not the slightest intention of taking up residence in any harem! Thought that was a good joke, did he? Well, she wasn’t quite as wet as she had once been.

Adrian had to be freed from prison before he fell seriously ill. No choice on that count, she told herself. No matter what the cost? And then her strained eyes widened on a sudden realisation: the instant Adrian was on his flight back to London, he would be safe! Tariq had called her a liar and a cheat. So why should she act any differently? Tariq deserved to be double-crossed. Tariq deserved to be cheated. For the sin of having the stepfather from hell, she had already paid a high enough price.

‘May I be of assistance?’

Faye glanced up to see Latif and she stood up. ‘I’d like to make a phone call.’

The little man looked uneasy.

‘Even a criminal usually gets one phone call…but maybe not in the civilised and humane country of Jumar,’ Faye conceded in a bitter undertone.

Latif flushed and bowed his head. ‘Come this way, please.’

He left her alone in an office a few doors down the corridor. She called her stepfather on his portable phone.

‘Faye?’ Percy demanded loudly. ‘Whatever stunt you’ve pulled, it’s working! I haven’t had the final word yet but it looks like our Adrian may be walking free this afternoon—’

‘Just answer one question for me,’ Faye interrupted in a flat little voice. ‘The day of the wedding, I gave you an envelope. What did you do with the cheque inside?’

Total silence buzzed on the line.

Percy cleared his throat.

‘You took the money, didn’t you?’ Faye pressed in disgust. ‘You let Tariq think he could buy me off as if I was a blackmailer too!’

‘Adrian’s had most of the money without knowing where it came from and stop talking about blackmail, Faye. All I did was try to protect your interests and, if Tariq wanted to pay us off to keep us quiet, why shouldn’t I have accepted the money?’ her stepfather protested. ‘It’s all in the family—’

‘You’re a con man and a thief. You robbed my mother and you ripped off me. Don’t insult my intelligence by talking about family!’ Faye sent the receiver crashing down again.

Slowly she retraced her steps and walked head held high out into the hot sunshine to climb into the limousine. ‘How well do you think you ever knew me?’ Tariq had asked. Well, some day soon he might be asking himself just how well he had ever known her!

The drive out to the Muraaba place took much longer than Faye had expected. Once the city limits were behind them, the desert took over for miles. It was the emptiness that fascinated Faye, then the rise of the rolling shadowed dunes baking below the remorseless heat of mid-morning. Sand and more sand…what a thrill! Had she really been so crazy about Tariq once that she had fondly imagined she could live with all that sand?

In the distance she saw a massive sprawling building surrounded by fortified walls that got higher the closer they got. As the limo approached, a cluster of tribesmen squatting in the shade jumped up to open the gates. Two sets of solid iron gates, Faye noted, one shorter inner pair, the outer so tall they could have kept the sun trapped, she thought fancifully.

Within the walls, terraced gardens of breathtaking beauty stretched up the hillside in every direction. She was blind to them. She was noting the number of guards on duty and reckoning that Tariq’s desert palace appeared braced to withstand both imminent seige and invasion. Her heart sank. Her nebulous plan to stage an escape within the next twenty-four hours would be more of a challenge than she had naively hoped.

Shoulders straight, chin tilted, ignoring the curious eyes and the whispers that accompanied her passage, Faye entered the palace. On her way past, soldiers snapped to attention, presented arms and saluted. She drifted on. It would be so easy to develop delusions of grandeur in Jumar, she decided. The Muraaba was a really ancient building, she registered with a grudging stirring of interest. Fantastic mosaic panels in glorious turquoise, green and gold covered every inch of the walls in the great hall that echoed from her footsteps.

A startling cry of pain followed by the shout of a child smashed the tranquillity and made Faye first freeze and then hurry on in search of the source. If a child had been hurt…

Faye came to a halt on the threshold of a room. So appalled was she by the scene which met her gaze, she could not initially accept what she was seeing. Three servants were huddled by the wall wailing and a fourth, a woman, was down on her knees while a small boy struck at her back with a switch. For an instant, Faye waited for one of the staff to intervene and then she realised that nobody was going to intervene and that the victim seemed too scared to protest such treatment.

Faye stalked forward. ‘Stop that!’

The little boy in his miniature robes stopped for an instant in surprise and then started again.

‘Stop it right this minute!’ Faye ordered icily.

The next thing the little horror rushed at her with the switch! She bent down and gathered him to her. The switch fell from his hand. Then she held him at a distance from her to let him kick out his tantrum without hurting her or anyone else. He was very young but his little face was screwed up in a mask of uncontrollable rage. ‘Let go of me!’ he bawled at her. ‘Let go, or I will whip you too!’

‘I’ll put you down when you stop shouting.’

‘I am a prince…I am a prince of the blood royal of Jumar!’

‘You’re a little boy.’ But Faye stiffened, now picking up on the stricken silence surrounding her. She studied the exquisite silk embroidery on the clothing the child wore. He spat at her and she grimaced. ‘No prince of the blood royal would behave like that,’ she told him without hesitation.

His bottom lip came out. His big brown eyes suddenly filled with tears. ‘I am an ibn Zachir. I am a prince. You do what I tell you…why you not do what I tell you?’

And in that instant he went from being a little monster to being a child, and a distressed and frightened child at that. As he went limp, Faye slowly released her breath in relief that she had won the battle and drew him close. He could not have been more than five years old, maybe not even that. ‘Does the prince have a name?’

‘Rafi…’

Belatedly conscious that an outraged parent might descend on her at any minute, that she was in a foreign country with a very different culture and that for all she knew even the tiniest royal children were encouraged to beat servants all the time, Faye attempted to set the boy down again. Disconcertingly, he clung like a limpet.

Faye felt something touch her toes. She peered down over Prince Rafi’s back. His female victim was sobbing at Faye’s feet. The other servants were now lying face down on the floor as if they were waiting on a bomb dropping or someone shouting, ‘Off with their heads!’ She felt like an alien set down without warning in very dangerous territory.

‘Sleepy…’ Rafi told her round his thumb.

‘Will someone put Rafi…I mean, His Royal Highness down for a nap?’ Faye asked with the weak hope that someone spoke some English.

‘Nurse…I am nurse.’ It was the lady cowering at her ankles.

‘It is wrong and unkind to hurt people, Rafi.’ Faye sighed.

‘He no mean hurt,’ his nursemaid muttered fearfully.

‘Rafi sleepy…’ He snuggled his silky dark head under her chin. ‘Lady take Rafi to bed?’

Well, hopefully that would get everybody up and moving again, Faye decided.

‘My horse flies faster than the wind,’ Rafi told her sleepily as she carried him from the room.

She resisted the urge to ask if he beat the horse too. ‘I love horses.’

‘I show you my horse.’

It was a long trek through passageways, a positive procession for they seemed to gather servants and grow into a crowd on the way. And with every covert marvelling look that came her way, every awestruck appraisal that suggested she was doing something extraordinary, Faye’s frown grew. It was one weird household. She might possess the stepfather from hell but Tariq had got nothing to boast about on his own home front. Did he beat his servants too? Her tummy turned over at that image.

Finally they arrived in Rafi’s bedroom which was just stuffed with every imaginable toy and indulgence. Spoilt little brat, Faye thought, refusing to be softened by the child’s sweet innocence asleep. But some adult must surely first have taught such brutality by example, she conceded heavily. A parent? Evidently, Tariq shared his huge palace with his extended family. No wonder he was talking about stashing her like a guilty secret in a harem! No way was she staying in the Muraaba palace!

With that conviction in mind and ignoring the servants following never more than a dozen feet from her, Faye explored until she found a room literally walled with packed bookshelves. Her search took some time but eventually she found a map of Jumar which had the airport clearly marked. Noticing that the airport appeared to be a much greater distance from the city than it actually was, she assumed that it was an older map for the city had grown much larger in more recent times.

Concealing the map in her bag, she settled down in a magnificent reception room on a low traditional divan. Refreshments were brought to her there. More grovelling, all the staff seeming so scared and desperate to please. At the same time, her dazed eyes roamed over the spectacular exoticism of her surroundings. Rich geometrical patterns of faience tiles adorned the walls, some of which were even studded with what appeared to be precious stones, and the elaborate domed ceiling far above appeared to be composed of tiny coloured glittering mirror-glass mosaics. Superb Persian rugs lay on the pale marble floor. The divan on which she sat was covered with hand-painted precious silk. This was where Tariq had grown up, she found herself thinking, against a fantastic and opulent backdrop so dissimilar to hers, it took her breath away.

A wave of what appeared to be collective anxiety sent the maids into retreat a mere minute before Faye heard a man’s footsteps echoing in the main hall. Seconds later, Tariq strode in and stilled to view her.

His lean, strong face was taut. ‘Latif has informed me that there had been some incident between you and Rafi—’

Eyes flaring with anger as she recalled the shocking episode she had witnessed earlier, Faye shot to her feet in full defensive mode. ‘So someone has complained about my behaviour, have they? Well, let me tell you, you had better get me on a plane home because I have no plans to stand by and watch any child or indeed any adult beating servants!’

His superb bone structure clenched hard. ‘Say that again—’

‘You mean once wasn’t enough? What sort of primitive country is this? What kind of a society allows a small child to behave like that?’

Pale with anger beneath his bronze skin, Tariq breathed. ‘Are you telling me that Rafi struck one of the household staff?’

Breathing in deep, Faye described the scene she had interrupted in a few pithy words.

‘Rafi is mine to deal with,’ Tariq growled, the darkening of outrage accentuating his bold cheekbones. ‘We are not a primitive country. I will have you know that assault is assault in Jumar, no matter who the victim or who the perpetrator. I am very grateful that you intervened but do not judge a whole people by the behaviour of my obnoxious little brother!’

‘L-little brother?’ Her cheeks were now glowing red as fire. ‘Rafi is your little brother? But if what you are saying is true, why didn’t someone step in to assert control over him?’

‘Who? My father died when he was three. His mother died six months ago. She was an evil-tempered woman from another Gulf state.’ His stunning dark eyes had a grim light. ‘She taught Rafi to behave as he does. The servants who look after him were hers and the spirit was knocked out of them long before they accompanied their mistress to Jumar. They would never dare to try and restrain Rafi. It is an offence to lay hands on anyone of royal blood—’

‘Is it?’

‘That law was not made to allow a child to rampage out of control! I was reluctant to deprive Rafi of the nursemaids who have looked after him since he was a baby but I see now, it must be done. He has to be taught how to behave.’

‘What age is he?’

‘Four…old enough and bright enough to know better. I shall deal with him.’ Tariq headed for the door like a male with a target and a definite purpose in mind.

Faye rushed after him. ‘What are you going to do?’

‘I can see what you think I’m going to do but you’re wrong,’ Tariq spelt out in impatient reproof as he read her anxious expression. ‘I may know little about children but I hope I know enough not to repay violence with violence. I will talk to him and remove certain privileges as a punishment.’




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