Читать книгу Hidden In The Sheikh's Harem - Michelle Conder, Amanda Cinelli - Страница 8

CHAPTER TWO

FEELING HORRIBLY GUILTY that she had been enjoying her own time while her father was away, Farah raced to the ancient stables and saddled her beloved white stallion. If what Lila said was true then her father could face the death penalty and her heart seized.

As if he could sense her turmoil, Moonbeam whinnied and butted his head against her thigh as she saddled him. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, knowing she was reassuring herself more than the horse. ‘Just go like the wind. I don’t have a good feeling about this.’

Riding into the secret camp a short time later, she reined in Moonbeam and handed him off to one of the guards to rub down. As it was dusk the camp was getting ready to bed down for the night, the tarpaulin tents shifting and sighing with the light breeze that lifted her keffiyeh. The camp was set up with mountains on one side and an ocean of desert on the other and she usually took a moment to appreciate the ochre tones in the dying embers of the evening sun.

Not tonight, though. Tonight she was too tense to think about anything other than hoping Lila was wrong.

‘What are you doing here?’ Amir asked curtly as she approached her father’s tent, his arms folded across his chest, his face tense.

‘What are you?’ She folded her arms across her own chest to show him she wasn’t intimidated by his tough guy antics. He’d been her friend once, for Allah’s sake.

‘That’s not your concern.’

‘It is if what I just heard is true.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Please tell me it isn’t.’

‘War is men’s business, Farah.’

‘War?’ The word squeaked out of her on a rush of air and she let out a string of choice words under her breath. Amir looked at her with the disapproving frown he wore ever since he had asked her father for her hand in marriage; the boy she had once played with, and who had taught her to use a sword when she’d been twelve and full of anger and despair over the death of her pregnant mother, seemingly long gone. ‘So it’s true.’ Her voice dropped to barely a whisper. ‘The Prince of Bakaan is here?’

Amir’s lips tightened. ‘Your father is busy.’

‘Is he in there?’

She’d meant the prince but he’d misunderstood. ‘He won’t want to see you right now. Things are...tense.’

No kidding. You could have cut the air in the camp with a knife. ‘How did this happen?’ she demanded. ‘You know my father is old and bitter. You’re supposed to look out for him.’

‘He is still leader of Al-Hajjar.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Farah? Is that you?’ Her father’s voice boomed from inside the tent.

Farah’s insides clenched. As much as her father’s controlling and chauvinistic ways chafed—a lot—he was all she had in the world and she loved him. ‘Yes, Father.’ She swept past a disgruntled Amir and entered the plush interior of her father’s retreat, lit from within by variously placed oil lamps.

The roomy tent was divided into sleeping and eating areas with a large bed at one end and a circle of cushions at the other. Worn rugs lined the floor to keep out the night-time chill and silk scarves were draped from the walls.

Her father looked tired as he sat amongst the cushions, the remnants of his evening meal set on a low table before him.

‘What are you doing here, girl?’

Looking out for you, she wanted to say but didn’t. Theirs had never been an overly demonstrative relationship even when her mother had been alive. Then, though, at least things had been happier and she’d tried so hard to get that feeling back in the years since.

Frown lines marred his forehead and his hands were clasped behind his broad back, his body taut. If she’d been a boy she would have been welcomed into this inner sanctum but she wasn’t and maybe it was time she just accepted that. ‘I heard that you have the Prince of Bakaan here,’ she said in a ‘please tell me it isn’t true’ voice.

He stroked his white beard, which she knew meant he was thinking about whether to answer her or not. ‘Who told you?’

Farah felt as if a dead weight had just landed on her shoulders. ‘It’s true, then?’

‘The information needs to be contained. Amir, see to it.’

‘Of course.’

Not realising that Amir had followed her in, she turned to him, her eyes narrowing as she noticed that one of his eyes was blackened. ‘Where did that come from?’

‘Never mind!’

Farah wondered if it was from the prince and turned back to her father. ‘But why? How?’

Amir stepped forward, his jaw set hard. ‘Prince Zachim arrogantly assumed he could go dune driving in the middle of the night without his security detail.’

Ignoring him, Farah addressed her father. ‘And?’

‘And we took him.’

Just like that?

Farah cleared her throat, trying not to imagine the worst. ‘Why would you do that?’

‘Because I will not see another Darkhan take power and he is the heir.’

‘I thought his older brother was the heir.’

‘That dog Nadir lives in Europe and wants nothing to do with Bakaan,’ Amir answered.

‘That is beside the point.’ She shook her head, still not comprehending what her father had done. ‘You can’t just...kidnap a prince!’

‘When news gets out that Prince Zachim is out of the picture, the country will become more and more destabilised and we will be there to seize the power that has always been rightfully ours.’

‘Father, the tribal wars you speak of were hundreds of years ago. And they won. Don’t you think it’s time to put the past to rest?’

‘No, I do not. The Al-Hajjar tribe will never recognise Darkhan rule while I am leader and I can’t believe my own daughter is talking like this. You know what he stole from me.’

Farah released a slow breath. Yes, the king’s refusal to supply the outer regions of Bakaan with basic medical provisions, amongst other things, had inadvertently led to the death of her mother and her unborn brother—everything her father had held dear. Farah tried not to let her own misery at never quite being enough for her father rise up and consume her. She knew better than anyone that wanting love—relying on love—ultimately led to pain.

Her father continued on about everything else the Darkhans had stolen from them: land, privileges, freedom. Stories she’d heard at her bedtime for so long she sometimes heard them in her sleep. Truth be told, she actually agreed with a lot of what her father said. The dead King of Bakaan had been a selfish, controlling tyrant who hadn’t cared a jot for his people. But kidnapping Prince Zachim was not, in her view, the way to correct past wrongs. Especially when it was an offence punishable by imprisonment or death.

‘How will this bring about peace and improve things, Father?’ She tried to appeal to his rational side but she could see that he had a wild look in his eyes.

Her father shrugged. ‘The country won’t have a chance of overthrowing the throne with him on it. He’s too powerful.’

Yes, Farah had heard that Prince Zachim was successful and powerful beyond measure. She had also heard he was extremely good-looking, which had been confirmed by the many photos she’d seen of him squiring some woman or another to glamorous events. Not that his looks were important on any level!

She rubbed her brow. ‘So what happens now? What was the Bakaan council’s response?’

For the first time since she’d walked in, her father looked uncertain. He rose and paced away from her, his hands gripped behind his back. ‘They don’t know yet.’

‘They don’t know?’ Farah’s eyebrows knit together. ‘How can they not know?’

‘When I am ready to reveal my plans, I will do so.’ Which told Farah that he didn’t actually have a plan yet. ‘But this is not something I am prepared to discuss with you. And why are you dressed like that? Those boots are made for men.’

Farah scuffed her steel-capped boots against the rug. She’d forgotten that she still wore old clothes from working with the camels, but seriously, they were going to discuss her clothing while he held the most important man in the country hostage? ‘That’s not important. I—’

‘It is important if I say it is. You know how I feel.’

‘Yes, but I think there are more...pressing things to discuss, don’t you?’

‘Those things are in play now. There is nothing that can be done.’

A sudden weariness overcame him and he flopped back onto the cushions, his expression looking suspiciously like regret. Farah’s heart clenched. ‘Is he...is he at least okay?’ She cringed as visions of the prince beaten up came into her head. She knew that would only make things worse—if that was even possible.

‘Apart from the son of a dog refusing to eat, yes.’

‘No doubt he thinks the food is poisoned,’ she offered.

‘If I wanted him dead, I’d use my sword,’ her father asserted.

‘How very remiss of him.’ Fortunately her sarcasm went over his head, but it didn’t escape Amir, who frowned at her. She rolled her eyes. She knew he thought she overstepped the boundaries with her father but she didn’t care. She couldn’t let her father spend his last years in prison—or, worse, die.

‘Perhaps that is the answer,’ Amir mused. ‘We kill him and get rid of the body. No one could pin his death on us.’

Farah gave him a fulminating glare. ‘I can’t believe you said that, Amir. Apart from the fact that it’s completely barbaric, if the palace found out, they would decimate our village.’

‘No one would find out.’

‘And no one is going to die, either.’ She shoved her hands on her hips and thought about how to contain the testosterone in the room before it reached drastic levels. ‘I will go and see him.’

‘You will not go near him, Farah,’ her father ordered. ‘Dealing with the prisoner is a man’s job.’

Wanting to point out that her father was doing a hatchet job of it if the prince was refusing to eat, Farah wisely kept her mouth shut. Instead she decided to take matters into her own hands.

‘Where are you going?’

She stiffened as Amir called out to her in a commanding tone. Slowly she pivoted back around to face him. ‘To get something to eat,’ she said tightly. ‘Is that okay?’

He had the grace to look slightly uncomfortable. ‘I would like to speak with you.’

She knew he was waiting on her answer as to whether she would accept his courtship but she wasn’t in the mood to face his displeasure when she told him no. ‘I don’t have anything to say to you right now,’ she informed him.

His jaw tensed. ‘Wait for me outside.’

Farah smiled sweetly. Like that was going to happen!

Quickly stepping out of the tent, she took a moment to pull her headdress lower and bent her head to shield her eyes against the setting sun. The air temperature had already dropped and the nearby tents flapped in the increasing wind. She looked for signs of a storm but found nothing but a pale blue sky. That didn’t mean one wasn’t coming. In the desert they came out of nowhere.

Deciding not to waste time on food, she stomped off to the only tent that had a guard posted outside, anger rolling through her. Anger at her father for his outrageous actions and anger at the prince himself—the lowly offspring of the man who had inadvertently caused her mother’s death and changed her once-happy life forever.

She tried to get her emotions under control but it felt like she was fighting a losing battle. Still, she needed to remain calm if she was going to work out a way to get her father out of this mess before he did something even more insane—like listen to Amir!