The Sheikh's Bride Page 6

  ‘Look at that moon,’ Amer said, unheeding. He sounded as self-congratulatory as if he had arranged it personally, Leo thought.

  She looked up. The moon was not quite full, a champagne sorbet among all the diamond chips. She thought she had never seen it so clear or the sky so close. It made her feel slightly dazed. She closed her eyes against the whirling sensation.

  Amer said softly, ‘Puts human nonsense in perspective, doesn’t it?’

  Leo opened her mouth to demand whether her views fell into the category of human nonsense. Only then she opened her eyes. And found herself looking straight into his. The whirling sensation increased.

  Hardly knowing what she did, she subsided among the cushions. She could not take her eyes off him.

  Amer did not touch her. He did not even lean over her, though his eyes scanned her face intently.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, as if he was answering something she said.

  Leo thought: I want him. He knows I want him. I’ve never felt like this before in my life. I didn’t know I could feel like this.

  He lowered himself until he was leaning on his elbow among the cushions, looking down at her. Leo felt as if he could see straight through her. He saw the defences; went through them to her galloping confusion; smiled, and went through that, too, right into her soul.

  She went very still. They were as close as lovers. But still he did not touch.

  She had thought she was immune. It was other girls who waited sleepless by the phone. Other girls who held their breath when their man looked at them.

  Leo thought: their man? Their man? I am laying claim to this man, now? When he hasn’t even kissed me? I don’t even want him to kiss me. Do I?

  The boatman was coming back. She heard his friendly greeting. Felt the small movement in the boat as he came aboard.

  Amer did not move. Nor did Leo. She could feel her eyes widening, widening…

  The boatman was busying himself with the sail.

  Amer said softly, ‘Shall I tell him to go away again and leave us alone for a couple of hours?’

  The studded sky wheeled behind his head.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’ Leo spoke with difficulty.

  He was so close she could feel his little puffed breath of frustration. She thought: Why doesn’t he touch me? But still he did not.

  Instead he murmured, ‘That’s the first lie you’ve ever told me.’

  She felt a sort of agony at his words.

  She thought: No matter what happens now, I’m never going to be the same after this.

  She held her breath. But Amer rolled aside and sat up. He gave the boatman a few orders and did not sound annoyed. He did not sound as if he cared very much at all.

  Leo let out her breath very carefully. The men talked rapidly. Then the boatman packed the debris of their meal back into the picnic basket. Leo swung her legs aside and sat up, setting the boat rocking wildly. Probably for the first time in her life, she did not apologise. She was too wound up.

  She smoothed her hair with a shaking hand. Every tiny area of exposed skin at neck and wrists quivered where the soft breeze brushed against it. She had never been so intensely aware of sensation before; nor of her own sensuality. Never realised so totally that she was a physical creature. Never wanted…

  Leo halted her thoughts abruptly at that point. Never wanted what? she asked herself fiercely. Amer? Nonsense. Crazy nonsense.

  She straightened, folding her hands in her lap. She did not care if she looked prim. She did not care what Amer thought of her at all. She suddenly, desperately, wanted to get back to her room and take stock of what had happened to her.

  At least she had not reached for him, Leo thought. She thanked Heaven for that.

  Leo was monosyllabic on the return journey. Amer did not push her. He was very much at his ease, courteous but slightly distant. When they entered the hotel he thanked her formally for her company and wished her good-night.

  Leo shook hands. ‘Thank you,’ she said as politely as if he were one of Adventures in Time’s regular bus drivers.

  Her tone clearly amused him.

  ‘We will meet soon,’ he assured her.

  Leo had not told him that she was expecting to fly out imminently. She did not tell him now. She just gave him a meaningless smile and headed for the lifts.

  Hari knew that the evening had not been a success the moment that Amer walked into the suite. One look at the Sheikh’s face and Hari decided to keep the conversation strictly professional.

  ‘Report of various conversations I had before the dinner,’ he said, handing over a slim folder. ‘Extract of speeches.’ That was a substantial ring binder. ‘Oh and a message from His Majesty.’ An envelope from the hotel’s fax bureau.

  ‘My father can wait,’ said Amer, showing his teeth.

  Hari did not comment, though he knew what the old Sheikh’s views would be if anyone reported that back to him.

  ‘The South of France,’ Hari said, consulting his notes. ‘I’ve booked flights for Paris on Thursday. I thought you’d want to stop over.’

  Amer was frowning. ‘Hold on that for the moment,’ he said curtly.

  ‘You want to stay for the reception at the end of the conference?’ asked Hari, surprised.

  Amer shrugged. ‘Maybe.’ He paused, his frown dissolving into a speculative look. ‘I’ve got unfinished business in Cairo.’

  Hari hid a smile. ‘Didn’t she like the picnic?’ he asked innocently.

  ‘She—’ Amer bit it off. ‘She is not entirely what I expected. Nor was the evening, for that matter.’

  Hari chuckled. ‘That’s what comes of not telling her who you are.’

  Amer shook his head slowly. ‘I don’t think so. She is unusual. I don’t think that would have made any difference at all.’

  ‘In that case, she’s not unusual, she’s unique,’ said the cynical Hari.

  Amer was surprised into a sudden laugh. ‘You could be right,’ he said. He clapped Hari on the shoulder. ‘Intriguing, isn’t it?’

  Leo was not sure whether it was too late to check on Mrs Silverstein. She compromised by knocking very softly on the lady’s door. There was no answer.

  Oh well, thought Leo, she was probably asleep. She was turning away when one of the hotel staff came running out of the service door. The lady had called room service asking for ice, he said. Then when they tried to deliver it, she had not opened the door.

  ‘When was this?’ said Leo with foreboding.

  Just ten minutes ago. They had knocked several times.

  ‘Have you got a pass key?’

  He nodded.

  ‘Then let’s go and see what’s happened.’

  He was clearly relieved at this decision. He opened the door for Leo.

  Mrs Silverstein was lying on the carpet in the main body of the room. Her fall had overturned the coffee table and sent Arabic sweetmeats flying. Her forehead was clammy and she had the beginnings of an almighty bruise on her cheek. But, Leo established, she was breathing.

  She summoned a doctor, warning him that the patient would need to be admitted to a clinic fast. He arrived with an ambulance and paramedics and put Mrs Silverstein on oxygen immediately. Leo went with the stretcher.

  In the lobby light, Mrs Silverstein opened her eyes. She looked anxious. Leo took her hand.

  ‘It’s all right,’ she said reassuringly. ‘I’m here.’

  The weak eyes blinked and focused.

  ‘Looking good,’ said Mrs Silverstein, rallying a bit. ‘Hot date?’

  Leo smiled down at her. ‘I’ve been out to dinner,’ she tempered.

  ‘Anyone I know?’

  ‘A guest in the hotel.’ Well, it sounded better than pick up, Leo thought ruefully. ‘A Mr Amer.’

  A beatific smile curved Mrs Silverstein’s cherubic lips.

  ‘Sheikh.’

  Leo stumbled. ‘What?’

  ‘Sheikh Amer el Barbary,’ said Mrs Silverstein with satisfaction. ‘I look
ed him up.’

  Leo stopped dead and stared. Slow realisation dawned. It was followed by horror.

  He had lied to her. Deliberately misled her. Invited her to ask him questions, knowing she wouldn’t, when he had already withheld the most important piece of information. Oh what an idiot, he must think her. What an idiot she was.

  Mrs Silverstein’s stretcher was disappearing through the door. Leo broke into a run.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  SIX months later, Leo could still feel the shock of that realisation. It could bring her awake in the middle of the night, cold with embarrassment. And, at the same time, hot with longing. Which, of course, made the embarrassment worse and did nothing at all for her self-respect.

  God knows what she would have said to him, if she had come face-to-face with Amer again. But she did not. Mrs Silverstein needed to be accompanied back to the States. As Leo was leaving Egypt anyway, she jumped at the chance to leave at once.

  So now she was in London, trying to restart her life. Without much success.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ said her friend Claire Hartley, as Leo drove her down to spend the weekend with the Hartley family. ‘Missing the pyramids?’

  ‘Not missing one damn thing,’ said Leo with rather more emphasis than the casual remark required.

  Claire digested this in silence as Leo concentrated on getting through the one way system. Eventually they got onto the motorway and Claire said, ‘You’ve been seeing a lot of brother Simon, haven’t you?’

  Leo cast her a quick look of surprise. ‘Only at work.’

  ‘You went to the Nightingale Ball with him,’ Claire reminded her.

  Leo grimaced. ‘That’s work.’

  ‘Then he’s got nothing to do with your being glad to be home?’

  ‘I didn’t say I was glad to be home,’ Leo said patiently. ‘I said I didn’t miss Cairo. There’s a difference.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Claire enlightened. ‘What happened in Cairo?’ She thought about it. ‘Or should I say who happened in Cairo?’

  Leo winced. An Arab prince had amused himself for an evening by offering a humble courier a night of high romance and princely luxury. Because that was all it had been for him, an amusement. Leo saw it clearly. That refusal to touch her which had set all her senses aflame and still shot through her dreams, only showed how little he cared whether she responded to him or not.

  ‘That just about covers it,’ she said with harsh self-mockery.

  Claire had not heard that note in her voice before. ‘What happened?’

  ‘One minute I was an independent woman with a small local career problem and no roof over my head. The next—the aliens invaded.’

  Claire slewed round on the leather seat and stared at her friend.

  ‘What sort of aliens?’

  ‘Rich, royal and thoroughly irresponsible aliens,’ Leo said bitterly. ‘Well, one alien.’ She ground her teeth, remembering.

  Claire was amazed. ‘He really hit the spot, didn’t he? New experience for you, Mrs Cool.’

  Leo’s smile was wry. Her reputation for indifference to the opposite sex had started long ago. At her boarding school dances to be precise. Gawky as she was, taller than most of boys and painfully shy, Leo found the best way to deal with being teased was to pretend that she did not care. Neither Claire nor anyone else ever detected the truth. They just thought Leo was too level-headed to suffer the traumas of adolescence. If only they knew!

  ‘Amer el-Barbary would be a new experience for anyone.’

  ‘Sounds like fun,’ Claire said enviously. ‘Tell.’

  Leo looked at the long road ahead of them. In the sun it looked like a stream of melting black toffee. She sighed. It was going to be a long journey.

  She told.

  Claire was astounded. When Leo finished she sat in stunned silence for a moment. She shook her head in disbelief.

  ‘And you didn’t even write to him?’

  ‘What would I have said?’ Leo snapped. ‘Thank you for an illuminating evening? By the way, I hope this finds you as you didn’t bother to give me your real name?’

  ‘There could have been all sorts of reasons for that,’ protested Claire.

  Leo was more suspicious than her friend. ‘Like what?’

  ‘Well, maybe he thought you wouldn’t go out with him if you knew he was terribly grand.’

  Leo said something very rude. Claire grinned. ‘No. All right. Well how about this one—he wanted you to go out with him as a man and not his position in the world.’

  Leo snorted. ‘I don’t believe in fairy stories. He just thought it was amusing to hand me a smooth line. In fact—’ for a moment her expression lightened ‘—he got very annoyed when I didn’t respond as predicted.’

  ‘Did he say so?’

  ‘He said we would meet soon,’ Leo admitted reluctantly.

  Claire made an exasperated noise. ‘So you ran away to America with an eighty-year-old widow. Honestly, Leo, I despair of you.’ She added curiously, ‘Hasn’t he tried to get in touch with you?’

  ‘It wouldn’t do him any good if he did. All my records have gone from the Cairo office. Nobody there knew who I was. I used my grandmother’s name.’

  ‘The office could still forward mail, presumably.’

  ‘I told you,’ Leo said patiently, ‘they don’t know there’s anyone to forward it to. None of the staff there know that Miss Roberts is the boss’s daughter, Miss Groom.’

  Claire shook her head, dissatisfied with this ending to the romance. ‘If you saw him again—’

  ‘I’d spit in his eye,’ Leo said militantly.

  Claire was a good friend but she was not noted for her tact. ‘But it sounds as if you were half-way to falling in love with the guy.’

  ‘Love,’ said Leo ferociously, ‘is the biggest fairy story of the lot.’

  ‘Most people expect to fall in love at some time or other.’ Claire’s tone was dry.

  Unbidden, Amer’s triumphant voice said in her ear, ‘You mean you do want to but you don’t think it’s going to happen.’ Admittedly he had been talking about marriage not love. But Leo flushed as violently as if he had been there in the car with them and reading her thoughts.

  ‘Not me,’ she said very loudly.

  The Trustee of the el-Barbary charitable foundation was having a bad time. Normally Sheikh Amer was more approachable than the old Sheikh. But on this visit he was proving even more difficult than his autocratic father: elusive, preoccupied and now downright irritable. He was tapping his gold fountain pen on his papers as if he could hardly bear to sit through the meeting a minute more.

  ‘Several matters for Sheikh Amer’s personal attention.’

  Amer did not bother to disguise his impatience. ‘Give the list to my assistant.’

  The Trustee did not hear. ‘Dinner at your college. Oh, I see you’ve already accepted that. Reception at the Science Museum to launch the second phase of the Antika Research Project. They have asked—’

  Amer’s face was thunderous. Hari intervened swiftly.

  ‘Shall I deal with those?’ he suggested in a soothing voice.

  The Trustee handed them over, relieved. But he was a conscientious man.

  ‘Antika have asked if His Excellency will contribute something to their book.’

  Amer looked as if he were going to explode.

  The Trustee began to gabble. ‘Fund-raising. They’re bringing out a collection of essays by celebrity sponsors. As His Excellency is Chairman…They say all the other board members have written something…’

  There was a dangerous pause.

  Then, ‘Get the details,’ Amer told Hari curtly. He stood up. ‘That concludes the meeting, gentlemen. I have an appointment now, but I hope to join you for lunch later. Hari will show you where to go.’

  Hari marshalled them out.

  Amer got up and moved restlessly round the room. When a tall, quiet man was shown in, he looked round. His visitor was shocked. There were deep new lines at
the corner of the Sheikh’s eyes and when he smiled you could see that it was an effort.

  ‘Major McDonald.’ He held out his hand. ‘Good of you to come. I need your help.’

  He explained succinctly.

  ‘I’ve had the sharpest private detectives that money can buy digging into it for six months. The woman has disappeared,’ he concluded.

  ‘No,’ said the Major with quiet confidence, ‘they have just not looked for her in the right way. You’re sure she’s English?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then let me use my contacts. I’ll find her for you.’

  Amer went to the window and looked out. The city street looked like a mineral maze in the spring sunshine. He said to the pavement below, ‘If you find her, you bring the information straight to me. You don’t tell her. Or anyone else.’

  The Major was surprised into indiscretion. ‘Are things so explosive in Dalmun, then?’

  Amer turned back and smiled. It was not a pleasant smile. ‘It is not Dalmun which is explosive,’ he said in a matter-of-fact voice. ‘It’s me. This one is mine.’

  The weekend with the Hartleys did not turn out as Leo expected. She thought it was going to be a relaxed, family affair, mowing lawns and cleaning swimming pools. She could not have been more wrong.

  There was a dinner party on Friday night, when she and Claire got down there; a lunch party— ‘Just close friends, darling’—on Saturday; a sailing club dance on Saturday evening to which the entire household and their guest were expected to turn up; and a drinks party for over a hundred before lunch on Sunday. In between whiles Simon’s mother, a cut-glass blonde, took her on a guided tour of the family pile. It was crumbling and, in Leo’s view, badly in need of being turned into a conference centre. Simon’s baronet father walked her through several acres of formal garden, equally neglected.

  And Simon. Well, she did not know what Simon was doing at all. Except that he kept getting her on her own and telling her how well he got on with her father.

  By Sunday afternoon, Leo was feeling breathless, uneasy and her wardrobe had given out.