“Your highness!” Ayshas’ exasperation was evident. “It’s not appropriate --,”
Chloe laughed. “I want to go for a walk, Aysha. I was just going to finish my chapter and then go out, anyway.”
“As you wish.”
Chloe knew Aysha well enough to know that her servant was showing utter frustration, and even though she didn’t agree with her, she appreciated her servant’s concern.
Spontaneously, Chloe leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Aysha’s cheek. “You take good care of me.”
Aysha’s eyes sparkled. “Will you return for dinner?”
Chloe’s heart turned over. Raffa. He rarely joined her for dinner, but each night she wondered if he would appear earlier, to sit opposite her and talk with her, to smile at her, to eat with her before they went to bed.
“Yes.” Heat simmered in her blood. “I won’t be long.”
When she stepped into the wide hallway, with its golden wallpaper and huge arrangements of native flowers, she found Amit leaning against a wall. Twelve was a funny age. Not yet an adult, but no longer a child, there was an awkward in-between-ness about the boy that pulled at the fibers of her heart.
“Good afternoon,” she said, smiling encouragingly.
Amit’s lips flicked with a smile of his own. “I have something for you.”
“You do?”
“It’s in the library.”
“Well, then, let’s go to the library.”
“You grew up in America,” Amit asked after they’d turned the corner.
Chloe nodded. “In Seattle.”
“With the space needle?”
She caught Raffa’s eye and smiled. “Yes.”
“Do you miss it.”
She thought about that for a moment. Her childhood had been miserable. Lonely. Bleak. The weather always rained. And yet, there was a tenderness in her heart, but she didn’t think it had anything to do with Seattle. She had told herself she would stay cold, remain unaffected by her husband, and yet she felt the pull of his appeal more strongly than ever before, and not just the way his body made hers sing. The pain in her heart had nothing to do with Seattle, she knew, and everything to do with the loveless marriage she found herself in.
“Not really. I miss certain things,” she said after a moment. “But that’s what happens when you move, especially overseas.”
“I’ve always lived here, in the palace.”
“I would imagine so,” she said with a nod.
They came to a set of marble stairs, bound on one side by a wide balustrade, white and gold, and on the other by huge portraits of the royal family. Chloe had seen many portraits, in the gallery every family member from the middle ages was featured. But these were different, because they were photographs. Still formal in nature, but somehow more illicit, as though she’d peeled back the corner of a private moment and seen something special and intimate.
As they passed a full-size picture of Raffa with his father, Chloe was struck anew by the likeness Amit bore to his predecessors. She doubted Raffa had ever been awkward, not for a day in his life, but their eyes, their physiques – there was a clear family resemblance that had her pressing a hand to her flat stomach.
Would their baby take after Raffa so strongly? Would their baby be a boy? Another son, this one acknowledged? And how would that make Amit feel?
Pain that her most deeply-cherished hopes had the potential to inflict anything like hurt on this boy almost made her miss her footing, so that Amit place a hand under her elbow, his instincts razor sharp.
“I’m okay,” she said with a reassuring smile. “I was just distracted.”
Would Amit hate their child? Resent him? Resent the place the infant, the heir, had in Raffa’s life and heart? And could she blame him?
They turned down another corridor, this one lined with the most glorious navy-blue wallpaper and works of ancient art. The library was at the end, two enormous stained-glass windows stood sentry to the collection of books that was as old as time. Before books, there were scrolls, and these were housed at the royal palace.
Academics often came to study them.
“What is it?” Chloe asked as they entered, taking in the beautiful visage of this space, the reassuring tenor it had, the sense of harmony generated by so many books.
“This way.” He guided her deeper into the room, to a space near one of the many windows. They were tinted dark, so as to help preserve the books, but this one had been thrown open, so that a slice of afternoon sunshine perforated the room. And set to gain full advantage of it was an easel.
“Have a look.” The heat that had started in Amit’s cheeks spread through his whole face now, and Chloe frowned, wondering what she’d see on his art stand.
When she rounded the easel, she understood the reason for his embarrassment. He’d drawn Chloe. It was a very good likeness of her face, her eyes staring straight ahead, her lips slightly parted, as if she’d been caught in a moment of surprise. Her hair was down, falling loose over her shoulders, so she knew Amit had used his imagination to supply the detail, as she was sure she’d never had her hair loose around him.
“It’s excellent,” she said truthfully. “It looks just like me.”
Amit’s smile was rich with the pleasure that such unqualified praise could give. “I intend to frame it and give it the Sheikh. I know it’s nothing compared to the formal portrait you’ll have done, but I thought…”
“He’ll love it,” Chloe said, wishing with all her heart that was true. Though the artwork was excellent, the picture striking for its perfect likeness to her, she doubted Raffa would ever spare it more than a passing glance. And she wished, with all that she was, for that not to be the case.
“I did others,” Amit said, and now, he was an artist, not an awkward twelve-year-old boy. He lifted the page and gently laid it on a side table, revealing another picture of Chloe. In this one, she was smiling, and her hair was up, though tendrils fell around her face.
“These really are
