Читать книгу Midnight in the Desert - Линн Грэхем, Jane Porter - Страница 13

RUBY suffered a rude awakening the next morning. Raja was shaking her shoulder, the tent walls were flapping loudly and her ears were ringing with noise.

‘Get dressed,’ he framed urgently as she blinked in bewilderment. ‘We’ve been found and we’re leaving!’

As he strode from the tent she peered out after him and saw a pair of what looked like heavy-duty military helicopters coming in to land. Galvanised into action as she registered that their desert sojourn appeared to be at an end, she yanked open her case in search of something decent to wear. She dressed in haste, choosing cropped trousers and a vest top teamed with a light shirt. As she hastily brushed her hair every movement she made ensured that she remained mortifyingly conscious of the intimate ache between her legs.

The events of the past twelve hours raced through her memory and her slender hands fisted in defensive rejection of her reckless behaviour. As a rule, Ruby didn’t do reckless. Ruby was usually thoughtful and cautious, never impulsive, yet she had, with very little thought, utterly destroyed the platonic marital agreement she had insisted on. All for what? Great sex, she acknowledged shamefacedly, but in the aftermath even greater regrets.

They had agreed to a fake marriage and now how was their relationship to be defined? The agreement had been broken, the boundaries blurred and their respective roles were no longer clear-cut. Raja’s unqualified passion had enthralled her. She had to be honest with herself about that. She found the Najari prince regent incredibly attractive. He fascinated her and he had tempted her from that first kiss back in England. No other man had ever had that effect on her. She had been eager to know what sex was all about, had wanted to feel what other women felt and had sensed from the outset that he might well be the guy who could show her. And he had, unquestionably, shown her. Over and over and over again, she recalled, her face burning. In bed her desert prince ditched all reserve and cool in favour of a scorching-hot sexual intensity that had lit a fire inside her that she could neither resist nor quench.

As Ruby emerged from the tent she saw Raja standing in conversation with several men, all of whom wore military uniform. Every male eye turned towards her and then heads inclined and lowered and a respectful murmur of greeting acknowledged her presence. Raja drew her forward with an assured hand to introduce her to the various air-force personnel before assisting her into the nearest helicopter.

‘We will breakfast in Najar—’

‘I think I should stay in Ashur for the moment,’ Ruby told him quietly. ‘I ought to continue on to where I was heading when we were kidnapped.’

The tall black-haired male by her side frowned down at her.

‘Naturally you want to let your father see that you’re OK as soon as possible. I’ll be fine,’ she asserted lightly.

Raja captured her hand in his. ‘Where’s your wedding ring?’

Ruby glanced down at her bare fingers. ‘Oh, dear, I didn’t notice. It was very loose and it must’ve fallen off. I don’t think it was still on my finger when we arrived here.’

His wide sensual mouth compressed. ‘I will find a replacement.’

A slight hint of amusement on her gaze, Ruby sent him an airy glance as though the matter was too trivial to discuss. ‘No hurry …’

His face hardened, inky lashes dropping low over his intent scrutiny. ‘We must agree to disagree,’ he traded huskily. ‘I will see you tonight—’

‘Tonight?’ Ruby was surprised, having assumed that their separation would last somewhat longer. She was also rather keen to have a decent breathing space in which to regroup.

‘Tonight,’ Raja confirmed, striding off to speak to the pilot before climbing aboard the second helicopter.

During the flight, when Ruby felt nervous tension beginning to rise at the prospect of what expectations might await her in Simis, the capital of Ashur, she breathed in deep. She reminded herself that she was reasonably intelligent, even-tempered and willing to learn, not to mention being filled with good intentions. She didn’t need Raja by her side telling her what to do every minute of the day.

The airport building outside Simis was a large temporary shed. Surrounded by soldiers and police who made her nervous, Ruby was greeted by Wajid Sulieman’s familiar and surprisingly welcome face and tucked straight into a waiting car. His concerned questions about her health and how she had managed in the desert brought a smile to her expressive mouth.

‘I was lucky to have the prince with me,’ she admitted, willing to award honour where it was due. ‘How did you find us?’

‘Someone contacted the media with your location,’ Wajid told her. ‘From the moment that we announced that you were missing, people began gathering outside the palace gates to wait for news. There was great anger and concern on your behalf. Some were quick to suspect the Najaris of duplicity and there were protests. It was a very tense situation.’

‘I’m sure feelings ran equally high in Najar,’ Ruby remarked as the car cut around a horse and cart.

‘Even higher. Your husband is a war hero and tremendously popular,’ Wajid said. ‘It is unfortunate that he was unable to accompany you here but I understand that he will be arriving later.’

‘Yes.’ Crowds lined the old-fashioned city streets and necks were craned to get a better view of her car. ‘Are those people actually waiting to see me?’ Ruby whispered incredulously.

‘There is great excitement and curiosity about your arrival. It is a positive event after so many years of bad news,’ the older man volunteered wryly. ‘For the next few days you will be out and about a good deal to allow people to become familiar with you. The photograph taken after your wedding was very well received. I cannot praise Prince Raja highly enough for having had the foresight to organise it.’

‘Raja thinks of everything,’ Ruby agreed, thinking sunburn, scorpions … sex. A little tremor of heated recollection rippled low in her body and she stiffened, annoyed that even memory could make her so sensually susceptible.

On her short visit to Ashur as a teenager she had seen the imposing grey building that comprised the palace only from the vantage point of the tall wrought-iron gates. A step in the imperious wake of Wajid, she entered the palace from a side entrance where a group of staff bowed low and several introductions were offered. From the hall she was escorted up a staircase.

‘Your uncle, the late King Tamim and his family used the east wing. I thought you might be more comfortable in this more modern corner of the palace.’

Ruby reckoned that only in Wajid’s parlance could a décor at least sixty years out of date be deemed modern. ‘What was my uncle like?’

‘He was rather set in his ways, as was his daughter, Princess Bariah—’

‘My cousin.’

‘A fine young woman, who was of course destined to marry Prince Raja before the accident that took her life and that of her parents,’ the older man remarked in his pedantic manner, quite unaware of Ruby coming to a sudden halt and shooting him a look of dismay.

Her cousin had originally been contracted to marry Raja? Of course that made sense but it was still the first time that that fact had been mentioned to Ruby. And like a bolt from the blue that little fact cut Ruby to the bone. Just at that moment it was a deeply unwelcome reminder that there was nothing personal, private or indeed special about her relationship with the future king of Najar and Ashur, for Raja had been equally willing, it seemed, to marry her cousin. Fate had simply served Ruby up in her cousin’s stead. But how had Raja really felt about that sudden exchange of brides? Had he been attached to her royal cousin, Princess Bariah? A sliver like a shard of ice sliced through Ruby, who was affronted and hurt by the idea that she might well have been a second-best choice on her husband’s terms. No doubt he would have been equally willing to share a bed with her cousin. How could she have been foolish enough to allow such intimacy without good reason? And how could desire alone ever be sufficient justification?

As she stepped through a door a little dog barked wildly and hurled itself at her legs. Smiling happily, Ruby got down on her knees to pet Hermione, who gave her a frantic squirming welcome before finally snuggling into her owner’s arms and tucking her little head blissfully below Ruby’s chin. Wajid mentioned the reconciliation service to be held at the cathedral that afternoon, which Ruby had to attend, as well as an evening reception at which she was to meet many important people. She stifled a groan at the thought of her inadequate wardrobe and wondered if the red suit could be freshened up for the occasion.

A knock sounded on the door and a young woman joined them. ‘This is Zuhrah, Your Royal Highness, who with the assistance of your personal staff will take care of all your needs,’ Wajid explained. ‘She speaks excellent English.’

Zuhrah explained that she would look after Ruby’s diary and take care of all the invitations she received. Wajid departed while the pretty brunette showed Ruby through the spacious suite of rooms that had been set aside for her use. Over the light lunch that was served in the dining area Ruby mentioned the red suit and Zuhrah wasted no time in going off to track it down. As soon as she had eaten Ruby took advantage of the bathroom—she would never take one for granted again—and enjoyed a long, invigorating shower. Having dried her hair, she returned to the drawing room, clad in a wrap, and asked Zuhrah, who was tapping out notes on a netbook, if her missing handbag had turned up. Apparently it had not and Ruby knew she would have to see a doctor if she wanted another contraceptive pill. But did she need to take that precaution now? Was she planning to continue sleeping with Raja?

She thought not. Her brain said no, a very firm no. A mistake was a mistake and better acknowledged as such. There was another consequence to be feared as well, she reminded herself ruefully. She had missed taking her contraceptive pills while she was in the desert and there had to be a risk that she might already have conceived a child by Raja. What was she going to do if that happened? A chill ran down Ruby’s spine at the prospect of such a dilemma. She loved babies but a baby that would be deemed royal would severely complicate her practical marriage and ultimately wreck any hope of them establishing a civilised relationship. She was convinced that if she had a child there was no way that Raja would agree to her taking that child back home to the UK with her again.

The service at the cathedral late that afternoon required nothing more from Ruby than her presence. Police stood outside the historic building with linked arms to hold back the crowds struggling to catch a glimpse of the new princess. The evening reception was a great deal more taxing, however, for while she was perfectly able to make small talk she was embarrassed several times by more probing questions concerning her background than she wished to answer. People were extremely curious about her and as yet she did not have the skill to deflect unwelcome queries. Later she would register that she had known the exact moment when Raja entered the big reception room for a flutter of excitement seemed to run through the gathered cliques. With a muttered apology, Wajid left her side and heads turned away from her, eyes swerving towards the door while a low buzz of comment sounded.

‘Real royalty,’ someone whispered appreciatively within Ruby’s hearing. ‘And you can definitely tell the difference.’

Mortified heat burnished Ruby’s fair complexion. Real royalty? Had she performed her role so badly? But then she knew that she could only be a pretend princess by virtue of her birth. How could she be anything else when she had spent all her life to date living as an ordinary person? But she was trying, she was trying very hard to be polite, reserved and dignified as Wajid had advised her she must be at all times while carefully avoiding controversial subjects. It was tough advice for a bubbly and naturally outspoken young woman to follow. To Ruby it also felt like trying to be something she was not while putting on airs and graces that went against the grain.

His tall powerful physique sheathed in a dove-grey suit, her husband looked devastatingly handsome. Her husband? Why was she thinking of Raja in such terms? He wasn’t her husband, not really, she told herself angrily, irritated by the mental mistake. A woman chose her husband with her heart but she had not. Guilty colour mantling her face, Ruby studied that lean, strong, wondrously handsome face and she steeled herself to feel nothing, absolutely nothing. She watched Raja work the room like a professional, smooth and practised and yet charming as well with a word here, a greeting there, for some a smile, for others a more serious aspect. He was a class act socially, everything she was not. Hovering at his elbow, Wajid Sulieman looked as though all his Christmases had come at once.

When refreshments were served, Raja was finally free to join Ruby. Lustrous dark eyes gleaming like polished amber flared down into hers while he rested a light hand at her spine. She went rigid, rejecting the temptation of even that much familiarity while recalling Bariah, who would never have been ill-at-ease in such a social gathering.

‘My family were very disappointed not to meet you today,’ the prince told her quietly.

‘Whereas here everyone is disappointed that I’m not you—you carry the accolade of being real royalty, unlike me,’ Ruby retorted, only to bite her lip a few seconds after that hot rejoinder had escaped her for she would have preferred to keep that particular thought to herself.

‘You are imagining that. A beautiful woman in fashionable apparel is almost always more welcome than a man,’ Raja fielded without skipping a beat.

Wajid introduced them to an older couple, who represented a charity that ran an orphanage just outside Simis, which Ruby, apparently, would be visiting the next day. In the wake of that casual announcement, which was news to Ruby, she appreciated how little freedom she now had when it came to how she might choose to spend her time. Her time evidently now belonged to an ever-growing list of duties, engagements and activities, not least of which was her need to learn the language so that a translator did not have to dog her every footstep.

‘You’re very quiet. What’s wrong?’ Raja enquired as Ruby mounted the stairs that led back to her suite.

‘It’s not important.’ Ruby pushed open the door and sped through to the bedroom to change into something more comfortable. A maid was engaged in hanging clothes in a closet there, male clothes. Her soft full mouth compressing as she recognised that fact, Ruby walked back into the main reception room where Raja was poised by the window.

‘You’re staying in this suite with me?’

‘Married couples usually share the same accommodation,’ Raja pointed out evenly.

Temper roused by that tranquil response skittered up through Ruby in an uneasy rush. He made it sound so simple but their relationship was anything but simple. ‘I didn’t realise that but for that plane crash you would have married my cousin Bariah,’ she admitted. ‘I hadn’t worked that out yet.’

‘A marriage would hardly have been included in the peace accord if the royal families did not have a bride and a groom in mind.’

As usual what Raja said made perfect sense and her teeth gritted in frustration. ‘I’m sure you would have preferred a proper Ashuri princess!’

Face deadpan, Raja gazed steadily back at her, patently refusing to be drawn on that touchy topic.

Tension roared through Ruby’s rigid stance like a hurricane seeking an outlet. ‘I said—’

‘I am not deaf,’ Raja cut in very drily. ‘But I do wonder what you expect me to say in reply to such an assumption.’

Flushed and furious, Ruby surveyed him. ‘Is an honest answer too much for me to ask for?’

‘Not at all, but I will not insult either you or your late cousin with the suggestion that I might compare two completely different women and voice a preference for either,’ Raja advanced, eyes cool while his strong jaw-line set hard as iron. ‘That is not a reasonable request.’

‘Well, as far as I’m concerned, it’s perfectly reasonable!’ Ruby slung back heatedly.

‘But to answer you would be disrespectful.’

‘Unlike you I’m only human. Naturally I want to know although I don’t know why I’m bothering to ask. Bariah was a real princess and would’ve had much more in common with you than I have.’

‘No comment,’ the prince pronounced stonily and with much bowing and scraping the little maid emerged from the bedroom and left the suite.

‘Bariah spoke the language, knew this country.’ Ruby’s statement was pained for after spending only hours in the Ashuri palace she was all too conscious of her deficiencies.

‘Given time and patience you will learn,’ Raja murmured quietly, his lack of tension merely increasing the adrenalin surge ready to charge through Ruby’s veins.

Ruby was in no mood to be comforted. ‘My cousin would have known automatically how to behave in every situation—’

‘Wajid already thinks you’re doing a marvellous job,’ Raja imparted gently.

As she stiffened defensively her eyes flared bright as topaz gemstones. ‘Don’t patronise me!’

‘I’m going for a shower,’ Raja breathed, casting his jacket down on a chair and striding into the bedroom.

Ruby stilled in her restive stalk round the spacious room and shot a startled glance in his direction as she followed him into the bedroom. ‘You’re actually planning to sleep in here with me?’

In the act of unbuttoning his shirt, Raja dealt her an impatient glance and said nothing.

For a timeless moment Ruby watched a wedge of masculine torso appear between the parted edges of the shirt. ‘There are two big sofas in the room next door,’ she pointed out, in case he had not yet noticed the possibility of that option.

Raja treated that reminder to the contempt he evidently felt it deserved. His eyes burned hot gold below his black, spiky lashes, his jaw squared, giving his face a dangerous edge.

‘All right … I’ll take a sofa,’ Ruby pronounced, determined to stick to her guns. It was her belief that if she reinforced their separation they would both soon forget those boundaries they had unwisely crossed and return to their original agreement.

Raja elevated a deeply unimpressed and sardonic black brow and stripped off his boxers to walk fluidly into the bathroom. As nude exits went it scored an impressive ten in the cooler-than-cool stakes. While the shower was running, Ruby made up a bed on a sofa for herself, donned her pyjamas, doused the lights and climbed in. Hermione snuggled in next to her feet.

A little while later, a wild burst of barking drove her from the brink of slumber.

‘Call off the dog or I will put her out to the kennels,’ Raja growled, his face grim in the light spilling from the bedroom.

Ruby leapt off the sofa, snatched the snarling Hermione up into her arms and attempted to soothe her overexcited pet. ‘What are you doing in here?’

‘Retrieving my wife,’ Raja traded in a wrathful tone of warning.

‘I’m not your wife, not your proper wife!’ Ruby launched furiously back at him, inflamed by that insistence and the label.

‘So you’re not a real princess or a proper wife. Then what are you?’ Raja challenged impatiently, bending down from his considerable height to haul her up into his arms while she clutched Hermione frantically to her chest. ‘My sex buddy? A friend with benefits?’

He then went on to employ a third term of description, which was crude enough to make Ruby’s soft, full lips fall open in shock and her big, brown eyes flame. ‘How dare you?’

Raja settled her down on the bed with a good deal more care than she had grounds to expect from an angry man. Hermione tried to bite him. Composed in the face of that attempted attack, he scooped up the animal and put Ruby’s pet out of the room. From the other side of the door Hermione whined and scraped the wood.

‘Are you planning to do the same to me if I stand up to you?’ Ruby enquired furiously. ‘I am not sleeping with you again—’

‘I’m not very interested in sleeping right now either.’ At least six feet three inches tall and magnificently male, Raja threw back the sheet and slid into bed beside her.

‘I am not your sex buddy or that other thing you mentioned!’ Ruby proclaimed in a rage.

‘No, you’re my wife,’ Raja repeated again, immovably stubborn on that point.

Ruby was taken aback when he got out of bed again and crossed the room to reach for his jacket and retrieve something from a pocket. He returned to bed and reached for her hand.

‘What are you doing?’ she demanded apprehensively.

‘I’m replacing your wedding ring.’ And this time the ring on her finger was a perfect fit as well as being very different from its predecessor. The first ring had been a plain gold band but the second struck her as a good deal more personalised for it was a slender platinum ring chased with ornate decoration.

‘Don’t call me your wife again,’ Ruby muttered helplessly, twirling the ring round her finger with a restless hand. ‘It makes me feel trapped.’

This time Raja did not hide his anger. His nostrils flared and his dark golden eyes scorched hers like burning arrows, leaving her feeling alarmingly short of breath. ‘You should be proud to be my wife,’ he told her without hesitation.

Her breath rattled in her tight throat. She had not meant to insult or offend. Without warning things had become terrifyingly personal. ‘I’m sure I would be proud if I loved you,’ she whispered in a response intended to soothe.

‘Love!’ Raja loosed a derisive laugh of disagreement. ‘What need have we of that with the fire that burns between us?’

Well, so much for the emotional angle, she was thinking irately, for clearly she had not married a romantic guy, when sure fingers trailed across her cheekbone and captured her chin. His other hand curving to her waist, Raja lowered his proud, dark head and claimed her full, pink mouth hungrily with his. There was a split second when she might have pushed him away and her slim body braced and her hands rose in protest against his broad shoulders to do exactly that. But the moist slide of his tongue between her lips and the hand rising below her pyjama top to curve to the plump swell of her breast sent a flood of damp heat to the tender flesh between her thighs and a surge of such hunger that she shivered in shock. The dark force of desire took her by storm, every fibre of her being sitting up, begging and clawing for more.