The Sheik's Unsuitable Bride

‘It’s from Diana,’ he said, finding some consolation in being able to say her name. ‘To go with the snow globe.’

‘The Princess and the Frog?’ James said, looking at the book, then at him. ‘What on earth has that got to do with the Snow Queen?’

‘The Snow Queen?’

Glacial, icily beautiful. He could see how the subject might appeal to a glass-blower but he was, he decided, glad that it had been broken. Its replacement might not have had any intrinsic value but it had warmth…

Or was that an illusion? Was it Diana, weaving her tale for him, who’d given the toy a touch of magic?

James was still awaiting an explanation and, with a shrug, he said, ‘I’m afraid there was a slight accident at the airport. A small boy in a hurry. A concrete pavement. I had to find an instant replacement.’ Then, ‘Nothing nearly so precious.’

‘You should have mentioned it. I’ll get someone to sort out an insurance claim.’

‘Let it go, James. Let it go. In fact, forget this too,’ he said, dropping the book in the waste basket. ‘We’ve more important things to do.’

It was late when he arrived in Ramal Hamrah, but Zahir had warned his mother to expect him. He wanted this over with and he’d changed on the plane, abandoning his suit and tie for traditional robes.

For a formal visit to his mother, this formal visit, only traditional robes would do. The gossamer-fine black and gold camel hair cloak. A keffiyeh held in place by a simple camel halter.

His mother was alone, standing in the centre of her drawing room-a princess granting an audience. He touched his forehead, his heart, bowed low.

‘Sitti,’ he said. My lady. Only then did he approach to kiss her.

She was slight and, as he straightened, he stood nearly a foot taller, but her slap as she struck his cheek with the flat of her hand had force enough to drive him back a step, ring his ears.

Futile, then, to hope that she hadn’t seen the newspaper.

He bowed a second time, an acknowledgement that her anger was justified, her rebuke accepted without argument.

‘I am here to inform you, sitti, that I am at your command, ready to meet with, take a bride from the young women you have chosen,’ he said.

‘You think it is that simple?’ she enquired, her voice dripping ice. ‘Yesterday I met with the Attiyah family. They have no male heir and mothers are lining up to make an alliance for their sons with Shula, their oldest daughter. You, my son, for reasons that I cannot begin to fathom, seem to be favoured above all, but this morning I received a note from the girl’s mother, asking me to deny a rumour that you have installed your mistress at your house at Nadira.’

Well, that explained the slap. Embarrassing his mother was the sin.

‘I will assure Kasim al-Attiyah, as I assure you,’ he replied, ‘that Miss Metcalfe is not my mistress. I have simply given her and her family temporary refuge…’

‘Her father is not the one you have to convince. He is a man and he knows that all men carry their brains between their legs.’

Having got that off her chest, her face softened and she laid the hand she’d struck him with against his cheek. ‘Shula al-Attiyah is a modern woman, Zahir. She is well-educated, travelled, as are all the young women I’ve chosen for you to meet. I sought a true match for you, my son. Someone who understands your world. Who will be the kind of life partner you would choose for yourself.’ She let her hand fall, turned away. ‘But this is the twenty-first century and no Ramal Hamrah girl worth her salt is going to ally herself with a man who’s photographed dancing in a London street with his-’

‘Mother,’ he warned.

‘With a woman who, even now, is living in your house with her child. A boy the gossips in the souk are saying is your son!’

‘What did you say?’

Zahir heard his mother’s words clearly enough but they made no sense. He reran them over and over…

Boy…

Son…

‘Is it true?’ she demanded, while he was still trying to come to terms with what she’d said.

He shook his head. It couldn’t be true…

And yet, almost like a movie running in his brain, he saw again the carrier with the books she’d bought. Saw himself opening it. Children’s books, she’d said. Children’s books. Plural. The fairy tale book had been for Ameerah. But the other one, the book of knots, that was the kind of gift you’d buy for a small boy…

She’d lied to him. No…

His gesture, pushing the thought away, was emphatic.

She had not lied.

He, in an offhand remark, had provided her with the excuse and she’d grabbed at it, using it to keep him at a distance. And it would have worked but for the photograph in The Courier-

‘You do not seem certain, my son.’

He was dragged back to the present, to the reality of what was rather than the might-have-been, by a suggestion of anxiety in his mother’s voice, sensing that beneath her aristocratic posture was a genuine fear that, even in this most basic duty-to make a marriage that would bring honour to his family-he was about to fail her.

‘You may rest assured that I met Miss Metcalfe for the first time this week,’ he said, and his heart tore at the unmistakable sag in her aristocratic posture as the tension left her.

It was recovered in a moment and, with a gracious nod, she dismissed him. ‘Very well. Call on me tomorrow at five and I will introduce you to Shula al-Attiyah.’

CHAPTER TEN

ZAHIR’S first impulse on leaving his mother’s house was to drive straight to Nadira to demand answers. But not dressed like this. Not wearing the robes in which he’d just made a commitment to marriage, an alliance that would bring honour to his family.

This was not the man who’d kissed, danced in the streets as if his life were his own.

By the time he’d showered, changed and was racing out across the desert, however, common sense began to assert itself.

It would be the early hours of the morning before he reached Nadira and he’d already caused Diana enough grief with his foolishness.

He slowed, pulled off the road and, wrapping himself in a heavy camel-hair cloak, began to walk.

He’d sworn he’d stay away from Diana, for once do his duty. It was his cousin, Hanif-a man for whom duty was as life itself-who had warned him that marriage was a lifelong commitment. Not something to be entered into lightly, but wholeheartedly.

And he was right. There must be no looking back over his shoulder. No lingering sense of unfinished business.

With the memory of Diana doubled up in silent agony on the quay seared into his mind, he had no doubt that there was unfinished business here.

Why had she lied to him?

He stopped. No. That was wrong. She had not lied. But neither had she contradicted him when he’d offered his own insulting interpretation. But what was he to think when one moment she was lost to the world in his arms, the next minute on edge, untouchable, desperate to get back to London?

He’d seen her pain, but had written it off as her own guilty conscience troubling her. Had turned away, so blinded by hurt, by a sense of betrayal, that he’d been unable to accept what, deep down, he’d known. That the betrayal was his.

His future was written. He could offer her nothing, whereas Diana…