Raffa nodded at something the German ambassador had said, and the intrusion of Fahir was unwelcome.
“I said I am not to be disturbed,” he said, without looking up.
But when his eyes met Fahir’s something like apprehension began to unfurl inside of him. For his servant’s face was very pale, his expression taut.
“Excuse me,” he said to the ambassador, standing and crossing the room. In hushed tones, he implored Fahir: “Is it my father?”
“No, sir. His excellency’s condition is unchanged. But…”
“What?” Raffa had a sixth sense that something was badly, badly wrong, and he needed it to be assuaged.
“It’s Her Highness, sir.”
Raffa’s chest caved inwards. He felt as though he’d been winded. “What is it? Is she hurt?”
Fahir’s expression was stricken.
“Damn it,” Raffa demanded. “Tell me at once.”
“She is not hurt. At least, not that I know of. Sir, she’s…”
“Yes? For God’s sake, Fahir, tell me.”
The servant nodded. “She’s missing.”
Raffa began to relax, to calm, just a little. “Missing? Unlikely. She is more well-guarded than a palace…”
“No, sir. Her security detail lost sight of her, and she cannot be found.”
Raffa’s whole world tilted. Nothing made sense. Chloe? Missing? He thought back to the note he’d received that morning, that she was going to America. There had been nothing in that to alarm him – she’d taken to disappearing each month, and he understood her reasons for needing to be alone. He accepted that she took this time to accept that they hadn’t achieved their goal. Though he’d wished, for many months now, that she would turn to him instead, that she would lean on him when she needed support, when she needed to be told that everything would be okay.
Not for the first time, a thunderbolt of guilt slashed him.
He’d demanded an heir from his bride, and he’d set all this in motion. He could have had no way of knowing that they wouldn’t conceive quickly. Did it upset her more than he’d realized?
He pushed those grim thoughts from his mind. That didn’t matter now. Where was his wife?
“Get me a phone,” he said through clenched teeth, before turning to the ambassador and excusing himself from the room. “My aid will conclude this discussion,” he said, nodding across the room and forcing himself into the corridor.
He could hardly breathe. His body felt slack, as though the bones inside of him were insufficient against the tsunami of his raging blood.
Where was she? America, certainly, but then what? Had she been kidnapped? Or hurt?
Fahir returned with a cell phone and Raffa snatched at it, dialing Chloe’s number. Odd that he remembered it by heart when he’d only called it a handful of times.
It rung out.
Gritting his teeth, he dialed once more, and this time, she answered.
“Chloe?” He spun around, turning his back on Fahir and prowling down the corridor to a space where he could speak privately. “Where are you?”
Silence. Anxiety overtook the surge of relief.
“I’ve thought a lot about this.” She sounded strange. Wooden. Yet somehow manic too. “Our marriage was a ridiculous idea.” Raffa felt as though he’d been punched, hard, in the gut, but he didn’t react. He stood like a statue, letting her words rain down on him, hard and abhorrent. “I thought there was some sense here, but there’s not. Everything’s too complicated.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
She sighed heavily and it was such a familiar sound he could instantly picture her.
“We’re surrounded by love’s graveyard. Everywhere we look are the relics of other people’s broken hopes. Your parents, my parents, Elena, Goran. I can’t bring a child into the world knowing what kind of marriage we have, what kind of family it would be coming into. I’m sorry to disappoint you, but it’s better to reach this conclusion now rather than after,” her voice cracked, “conceiving a child.”
Raffa’s eyes filled with white, as though the sun had flared and filled him with the heat of its solar body. “You’re being absurd. We need to speak about this. Wherever you are, come back here. Come and tell me this face to face.”
“You need a fresh start, with someone new. Someone unconnected with your family, someone … else.”
“Chloe, I meant what I said. This is not a conversation to be had over the phone. I demand you return to the palace.” He swept his eyes shut, knowing he was saying all the wrong things. “Come back to me.” The last was a plea. A need from deep within his being.
“No.”
And then, fear was like ice in his veins, for he heard the strength in the word and knew she was slipping far away from him.
“You’re my wife.”
“No. I’m just the woman you married.”
Raffa hated her in that moment. No, he didn’t hate Chloe, he hated the words she was saying, he hated the way she was describing their marriage.
“Semantics,” he said darkly. “You are my wife, and for all I know, you have my child inside of you right now. Your place is here, in Ras el Kida…”
“I’m not pregnant.” The words were hollow, and he understood her grief then.
“Chloe, that’s fine,” he said, gruffly, wishing he’d had the foresight to discuss this with her before that moment. “So it’s taking a while to conceive. This doesn’t matter, habibte. You do not need to run away month after month. It will happen for us – and that baby will be the heir I need.”
Silence met his pronouncement, so he continued. “You’re upset, and I understand that. You expected we would conceive before now.” He swept his eyes shut, hating himself for being relieved when they hadn’t. Hating himself for being so selfish that he’d actually relished the prospect of another month of trying. “But it’s only been six months. Soon, Chloe, we will have success.”
Her sob was so faint he thought he’d imagined it, but no! He knew all her sounds, all her soft, gentle noises. “What is it?” He softened his
