question him or mention the suspicion to me and both those omissions have been on his conscience ever since. He called in Jasim, who is now his closest aide. Jasim worked for my father’s advisor five years ago. He was aware of the file and very troubled by what was done,’ Rashad related heavily.
‘At least someone knows right from wrong,’ Tilda muttered.
‘Jasim was silent for fear of losing his position. His former employer is now dead. Jasim saw you when you visited the embassy in London last month and when you came to my house. He believed that I had discovered the truth about the file and he informed my father that you and I appeared to be seeing each other again.’
‘But nobody came clean and owned up about the file until it was too late to matter.’ Tilda had gone from shock that Rashad had been hoping to marry her five years earlier to overwhelming bitterness that the happiness that they had had then had been cruelly stolen from them. ‘And nobody’s going to pay for what was done to me or my reputation, either.’
Rashad was watching her every move. ‘Haven’t we all paid many times over?’
A sharp little laugh was dragged from Tilda. She turned from him to stare sightlessly out of the window overlooking the handsome early Victorian city square. ‘I don’t think five years of consorting with gorgeous supermodels and actresses and socialites was that much of a penance for you, Rashad.’
Rashad turned an ashen shade below his bronzed skin. He was willing her to look at him and she would not. There was a distance in her that he had never seen before. He did not know what to say to her. He could not deny the supermodels, or the actresses or the socialites, but not one of them had been blonde because it would have reminded him too much of her. Not one of them had brought him happiness. Not one of them had been her.
‘I did not forget you. I was never able to forget,’ he breathed flatly.
Tilda was unimpressed. ‘Only because of the insult to your pride. That rankled with you. You wanted revenge.’
‘I wanted you back-’
‘You wanted revenge. As if it wasn’t enough that you just dumped me without a word. As if it wasn’t enough that I had to see you kissing another woman. As if it wasn’t enough that you left my mother loaded with debt!’ Tilda flung at him chokily, striving not to parade her emotions in the manner he had described.
In response to that hail of accusations, his tawny gaze remained bleak. ‘What you say is true. I have no defence to offer.’
‘But do you know what your biggest sin is? That you didn’t care enough about me or what we had to confront me or even doubt that file!’ Tilda condemned fiercely, raging resentment finally breaking through her hollow sense of bitterness. ‘You put your pride first.’
‘I wouldn’t now,’ Rashad murmured in a roughened undertone.
‘Oh, yes, you would. Last night, instead of concentrating on me, you went for a blasted shower and then you went off to see your father! You wanted someone to blame. You couldn’t put me or my feelings first even then,’ she accused shakily.
‘That is not how it was.’ Rashad drew in a deep shuddering breath. ‘I was so angry at what we had lost-’
‘You didn’t lose me; you dumped me!’
Lean, vibrantly handsome features taut over his superb bone structure, Rashad dealt her a resolute dark golden appraisal. ‘I know how many mistakes I have made with you, but I won’t give up trying. I refuse to accept that the past should be allowed to wreck our marriage.’
‘But that marriage is less than I deserve and I’m not settling for it,’ Tilda protested vehemently. ‘Your father is also obviously dead set against even having me in the family, although he was too well mannered to reveal those reservations to me.’
‘My father is not against you,’ Rashad asserted with assurance. ‘Did I not tell you how much he regretted his doubts when I first knew you? It seems that ever since he has been haunted by the fear that he was responsible for the end of our relationship. He is very pleased that we are married and most impressed by the way you have taken on a public role.’
Tilda shook her silvery fair head. ‘But I’m only your wife now because your revenge rebounded on you. When I saw that file, I just felt sick with anger that you had believed that rubbish…I couldn’t ever forgive you for that.’
‘But you are still my wife and it would go against my very nature to let you leave me,’ Rashad responded quietly. ‘I will do everything within my power to keep you. My bad judgement caused this. I believe that I can make our marriage what you deserve.’
The tears that she refused to shed were strangling her. Her throat ached and she could barely swallow. He was blaming himself for everything and, contrary as she was, she didn’t like that. She was conscious of how hard he worked in every corner of his life. He carried a huge load of responsibility. It seemed wrong that he should feel forced to work at his marriage, as well. It had been his father’s weakness and reluctance to be honest with his son that had created the situation. Rashad had been set up for a fall just like her and he was a warrior, born and bred, and he had responded with natural aggression.
She hated the fact that she was already making excuses for him. She felt like someone hovering indecisively while the last lifeboat was lowered from a sinking ship. That sinking ship was her image of what it would be like for her to live in a loveless marriage. In such a union, she would never feel truly necessary or special to him and she would always be forced to keep the emotional stuff low-key for fear of making him feel uncomfortable. The very knowledge that she wasn’t loved would only make her continually try harder to be the best possible wife, and the most she could ever hope for in return would be appreciation and acceptance.
Involuntarily, driven by forces stronger than her willpower, Tilda stole a glance at Rashad and it was as if her very body was screaming at the threat of having to survive without him. For once, that response had nothing to do with his dazzling sexual magnetism. He might as well have chained her to him, she acknowledged bitterly, for there was a deep abiding need within her to be with him and to grasp at whatever closeness he could offer. Even though deep down inside she was still seething with indignant pain and anger over that hateful file, she knew that she still loved him enough for both of them. Walking off into the sunset with her pride intact was only going to make her wretchedly unhappy.
In an effort to bolster her mood, Tilda reminded herself that she had seriously undervalued her importance to Rashad when he was a student. She had assumed that all he had ever been after was a good time-primarily a good time in bed-while instead he had been making plans to marry her. Energised by that tantalising information, she fixed glimmering turquoise eyes on him. ‘Were you in love with me five years ago?’
Rashad froze. He looked like a guy confronted by a firing squad without warning. ‘I…’A tiny muscle pulled taut at the edge of his wide, sensual, unsmiling mouth. ‘I liked you very much.’
It was a response that would have delighted her had they both been aged around ten years old.
Recognising that he had said the wrong thing, Rashad said abruptly, ‘If I say I loved you, will you stay with me?’
And that telling response from Rashad, who barely uttered a word without triple-checking it in moments of stress, shed blinding light on his motives for Tilda. Never had she felt more ashamed of herself. She had him over a barrel. Within twenty-four hours of the televised state wedding she had scarpered. Angry, hurt and humiliated and needing to hit back the only way she knew how, she had run away. Doubtless Rashad thought her behaviour had been very immature. He had had to follow her and try to persuade her to return to Bakhar with him. What choice did he have? If his wife abandoned him he, along with every Bakhari, would feel they had lost face because he had picked the wrong wife. It wasn’t fair to ask him if he had loved her.
‘I think we should have some breakfast. Have you eaten?’ Tilda enquired woodenly in a change of subject aimed at politely and quickly burying her stupid question and his revealing response.
His winged ebony brows drew together. She could see him struggling to master his bewilderment. ‘No. I could not eat.’
Tilda drew in an irregular breath. She trod over to the bell in the wall and pressed it. The silence swirled like a stormy sea full of dangerous depths. A manservant appeared and she ordered breakfast in slow, careful Arabic.
Shaken up by the question she had asked, Rashad had felt able to tell her anything she wanted to hear, even if it meant lying for the first time in his life. But he had only felt that way for about ten seconds, for free speech or lies struck him as extremely dangerous in the current climate. He knew exactly how he felt about her. She was his wife with all that encompassed and he wanted, quite naturally, to take her home again.
‘You are learning quickly,’ Rashad murmured a shade unevenly, stunning golden eyes screened by the thick
