Читать книгу Modern Romance September 2016 Books 5-8 - Natalie Anderson, Carol Marinelli - Страница 22
ОглавлениеFELICIA WOKE LONG before her alarm, and after showering she dressed for battle.
And it would be a battle to keep her true feelings from him.
But there was work to be done and finally, after a long night spent tossing and turning, she had a plan.
She went to her wardrobe and chose the white dress she had worn on the first day they had met.
It was her favourite lie.
It made her look sweet when she wasn’t.
It made her appear a touch fragile when in fact she was very strong.
And she was strong enough to get through this.
She rubbed a little red lipstick into her nose and saw the redness of her eyes had gone down, so hopefully it looked as if she were at the end of a cold rather than in the throes of a broken heart.
Instead of arriving at work early she lingered over her breakfast, and then headed to a very exclusive department store and waited until its doors opened.
There she made a purchase, before going to his office where the doorman greeted her as she walked in.
‘Can I help with your bags?’ he offered.
‘I’m fine, thank you,’ she responded.
She would not let the bag and its contents out of her sight for even a moment.
It was far harder than facing the press—far harder than anything she had ever done—to walk out of the elevators with a smile and greet Anu, who looked as tearful and as anxious as Felicia felt on the inside.
‘Is he in?’ Felicia asked.
‘He flies in a couple of hours.’ Anu nodded. ‘I just took a call from a reporter. He was asking for confirmation that he is flying today to Zazinia. I don’t want to trouble Kedah with it, but I don’t know what to say...’
‘Just tell him that for security reasons you are not at liberty to discuss his movements,’ Felicia answered, and then she looked at Anu’s crestfallen face. ‘Have some faith—Kedah will be fine.’
‘You don’t know that.’
‘Of course I do.’
‘You didn’t grow up in Zazinia,’ Anu said. ‘The people there have always feared this. You don’t know what is about to come...’
So Anu knew of the rumours, Felicia realised. Possibly the whole country did, and had been waiting for the black day when their Golden Prince was removed.
‘When does he leave?’
‘At midday.’
As Felicia headed towards Kedah’s office Anu, the gatekeeper, stopped her. ‘He said that he doesn’t want to be disturbed.’
Felicia nodded, but would not be halted. ‘I need to speak with him.’
She knocked on the door and when there was no response opened it. Kedah was on the phone, and he gestured for her to take a seat and then carried on speaking in Arabic for the best part of ten minutes before ending the call.
‘Are you feeling better?’ he checked.
‘Much.’ She nodded.
‘Good—because the press have got hold of it already and my staff are starting to become concerned. Let them know that nothing has changed and—regarding the press—clarify, please, that it was I who called for a meeting of the Accession Council...’ He stopped talking then and came around the desk. ‘I didn’t think you were coming in.’ He went to take her in his arms. ‘It’s good to see you.’
Felicia pulled back. She could not take affection and also do what was required.
‘Kedah, I’ve been thinking. Take me with you to Zazinia.’
‘Felicia, I am going to be busy, and you know as well as I do that when I am there we can’t do anything. Anyway, you said you’d never go back.’
‘I know I did, but I’m not asking you to take me there for a romantic holiday. Kedah, if you knew for certain that you were your father’s son, would it change things?’
‘Of course.’ He nodded. ‘I am fighting blind at the moment, but...’ he shook his head ‘...there is no way to find out unless I speak with my mother.’
‘And we both know that no good can come from that.’
He didn’t look convinced.
‘Kedah, I’ve worked with people who’ve been caught red-handed and they’ll all admit to once, but...’ She shook her head. ‘You need irrefutable proof—DNA testing.’
‘I’ve told you—I couldn’t get a sample without his knowing.’ Kedah pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose. ‘Soon the elders will call for one.’
‘Then find out now.’
‘Ask him?’
‘No.’ Felicia shook her head. ‘I doubt your father would want to know, unless forced. What if you asked him to come to your office?’
Felicia took a large box from the bag she had carried in and opened it. Along with a stunning crystal decanter and glasses there was a pair of white cotton gloves.
‘I’ve got the buffering solution. I can prep the glass, and if he takes a drink from it I can fly straight back and have the test done. You said they already have your profile?’
Kedah nodded to that question, but then he shook his head. It could never work ‘Felicia, you’ve seen how it is there. There is no way he would come into my office for a discussion, let alone stay long enough to have a drink. No, he would ask me to meet with him in his.’
‘What if you had your office set up for a presentation?’
Kedah looked at her. ‘What sort of presentation?’
‘The one you’ve spent years working on—your hopes for Zazinia. Your vision for your country. All the plans you have made.’
All the plans that had been knocked back. ‘I told you to delete that file.’
‘Since when did I do as I was told?’ Felicia shrugged. ‘And I’m glad I watched it...’
‘You watched it?’
‘Of course I did.’
Of course she had, Kedah thought. This was the woman who had taken a screenshot of that article that had only briefly appeared online. He was a work project, a problem to solve, and for a while he had forgotten that.
‘Aside from obtaining a DNA sample, I think it’s something that your father ought to see. He needs to know what he’s taking on—or turning his back on.’
Kedah had grown too used to the other side of Felicia—the softer side he sometimes glimpsed—not the very tough businesswoman she was.
And this, although private, was business.
The business of being royal.
‘Show it to him,’ Felicia said. ‘We can set up for a presentation in your office and ask him to come and view it. It goes on for an hour...’
It could work, Kedah realised. By the time the Accession Council met he could know the truth.
‘Whatever the result, I shall fight for my people.’
‘Ah, but it will make it so much easier, Kedah, if you’re able to laugh in Mohammed’s face...’
‘Assuming the result is the one I want.’
‘And if it’s not?’
‘I can handle the truth, Felicia.’
Could he?
She thought of the baby within her and wondered for a brief moment if it might be better to tell him—but then, in the same instant, she changed her mind.
Kedah needed to find out who his father was before she told him that he would soon become one.
* * *
There was no question of them whiling away the flight in the bedroom.
Kedah had not only his presentation to his father to edit, but also his speech for the Accession Council to prepare.
Aside from that, Felicia didn’t know if she could risk being close to him right now without confessing her own truths.
Not just the baby, but the fact that she loved him.
So she put herself firmly into Felicia mode.
Or rather the Felicia he had first met.
She only had one robe that complied with the dress code in Zazinia, so an hour from landing she went and changed into the dusky pink one.
Her hands were shaking as she did up the row of buttons and her breath was tight in her lungs. She feared that he might come in, for she was not sure she possessed the strength not to fold to his touch.
He did not come in.
Oh, he thought about it, but he didn’t dare seek oblivion now. He knew he had to keep his mind on the game.
God, but he wanted her.
‘Still working that worry bead?’ she teased when she came out from getting changed and saw him tapping away.
‘I told you—I never worry.’
‘Liar.’
‘I don’t worry, Felicia. I come up with solutions. I’ve known for a long time that one day this would happen. While the outcome might not be favourable, I’ve prepared for every eventuality. I’m a self-made billionaire. I’ll always get by.’
He flicked the diamond across the table to her and Felicia picked it up.
‘It’s exquisite.’
‘When my designs for Zazinia were first knocked back I spoke with Hussain. He had studied architecture with my father, and when I told him the trouble I was having he said his struggles for change had been thwarted too, and he would not let history be repeated. He invited me to come in on a design with him in Dubai. It was my first hotel, and a stunning success. Back then I sold it. I had never had my own money. I cannot explain that... I was royal and rich, but to receive my first commission brought a freedom I had never imagined, and with the money I bought this. I know each time I look at it that, if need be, I can more than make my own way.’
‘People will be hurt, Kedah, even if the result is what you want. If Mohammed discredits your mother...’ Felicia had thought about that too. ‘She will be okay. It would be awful for a while, but—’
‘No,’ Kedah interrupted. ‘She would not be okay. She isn’t strong in the way your mother is.’
Felicia looked up from the diamond she was examining. She had never heard her mother described as strong; in fact she had heard people suggest she was weak and a fool for standing by her father all those years.
‘It must have taken strength of character to go through all she did,’ Kedah said, and after a moment’s thought Felicia nodded. ‘My mother doesn’t have that strength.’
It wasn’t something that had ever been said outright, yet he had grown up knowing it to be true.
‘I remember when my father went on that trip. His last words were, “Look after your mother.”’ Kedah hadn’t even been three. ‘My father always said it, and I always took it seriously. She is a wonderful woman, but she is emotionally fragile. All the arguments, all the politics—we do our best to keep them from her. She does so many good things for our country. She worries for the homeless and cries for them, pleads with my father to make better provision for them. She takes their hurts so personally...’
There was no easy answer.
‘She’ll be okay,’ Felicia said again, and watched as Kedah gave a tense shrug.
Had she even listened to what he had just said? he wondered.
She had.
‘Your mother shall be okay, Kedah, whatever happens. It sounds to me as if she has the King’s love.’
Kedah nodded. ‘She does.’
Rina, Felicia thought, was a lucky woman indeed.
* * *
Kedah went back and forth to his country often. Usually they were short visits, so that he didn’t get embroiled in a row, but he was a regular visitor and so as he stepped out of the plane he knew what to expect.
Or he thought he did.
But this time, as Kedah stepped from the plane it was to the sound of cheering. From beyond the palace walls the people of Zazinia had gathered to cheer their Prince home.
They wanted Kedah to rule one day, and it was their way of letting the Accession Council know that he was the people’s choice.
Kedah would make the better King.
‘Kedah!’ Rina embraced him, but she had a question to ask. ‘Why now?’
‘Because the elders have long wanted Mohammed and it is time to put this to rest once and for all.’ He stepped back. ‘I have some work to do. I shall be in my wing.’
‘Kedah...’ Omar came out to greet his son.
‘I would like to speak with you,’ Kedah told him.
‘Of course,’ the King agreed. ‘I have much to discuss with you also. Come through to my office.’
‘I would prefer that we speak in mine,’ Kedah responded but Omar shook his head.
‘We shall meet in mine.’
‘I have something I want you to see.’ Kedah refused to be dissuaded. ‘I will go and prepare for you now.’
He didn’t even turn his head to address Felicia.
He just summoned her in a brusque tone and gave that annoying flick of his wrist.
He offered a small bow to his parents and walked off, with Felicia a suitable distance behind him.
Up the palace steps they went, past the statue where as a child Kedah had hidden, and then past the guards and down a long corridor. Felicia understood now why he wanted these offices destroyed, for events there had caused so much pain, and possibly were about to cause more—not just for Kedah, but for his family and the people.
He closed the heavy door behind them and dealt with the projector and computer as Felicia pulled on gloves and pulled out a decanter and glasses and filled them.
‘If he asks for another drink don’t top it up—let him do it. You don’t want anything from you on this glass.’
‘He’ll call for a maid to do it,’ Kedah said. ‘He is King.’
Felicia was confident that Omar would not be calling for a maid. After all, she had seen the presentation and had no doubt Omar would sit transfixed as he watched it, just as she had.
‘Are you nervous?’ she asked, and then went to correct herself. Of course he wasn’t nervous—Kedah never was. Yet he surprised her.
‘Yes.’
It was possibly the most honest he had ever been. In some ways more open than he had ever been, even in bed. She went straight over to him and as easily as that he accepted her in his arms.
Kedah took a long, steadying breath as she leant on his chest. Here, once the scene of such devastation, he found a moment of peace.
‘I’m sure the result will be as you wish it to be.’
‘No one has seen my work before...’
‘Kedah?’ She looked up to him. ‘It might not count for much, but I’ve seen it and, for what it’s worth, I thought it was amazing.’
He was about to say that he hadn’t meant it like that—more that no one important had seen it—but then, as he stood there, holding her, it dawned on him that the presentation had been watched by someone very important to him.
‘Did you watch it all the way through?’
‘Yes.’
‘And...?’
‘The truth?’ Felicia checked, and he nodded.
‘I saw it first by mistake and I have watched it many times since. The designs are stunning, Kedah.’
‘I thought you said my work was impersonal?’ he teased, and Felicia looked up.
‘Your vision for Zazinia isn’t work.’
It was everything.
There was the sound of the guards standing to attention and, when he would have preferred to hold her for a moment longer, Kedah had no choice but to let her go.
Felicia’s eyes were glassy and, rather than let him see, she busied herself, walking over to check the projector was set up correctly and that everything was in place.
And then the door opened and in came Omar the King.
‘Thank you for coming,’ Kedah said, and he stood proudly. He had possibly been preparing for this moment for most of his adult life. Not just the confrontation, but sharing his vision for Zazinia with his father. ‘I have something I would like you to see.’
‘Not without first hearing your choice.’ Omar thrust a bundle of files onto Kedah’s desk. ‘This is a shortlist of suitable brides.’
Even though Omar spoke in Arabic, this was not something Kedah wanted to discuss with a certain person present. ‘Felicia, could you excuse us, please?’
‘Of course.’
Omar hadn’t even noticed that a lowly assistant was present, but he simply stood until she had left and the door closed quietly behind her.
Kedah broke the silence.
‘If I choose a bride, then I shall have your full support at the Accession Council tomorrow?’ he checked, and then let out a mirthless laugh at his father’s lack of response.
He knew for certain that his father was bluffing, for he saw a rare nervous swallow from him as he reached for the files as if to peruse them.
‘I need to know that, once I’m married, I shall have your approval to make the necessary changes...’
‘First things first,’ Omar said.
‘Isn’t that what your father said to you?’ Kedah asked. ‘Choose a bride, produce an heir, and then we can talk?’
Omar did not respond.
‘Yet nothing got done, and all these years later still there is little progress in Zazinia...’
‘I ensured an improved education system,’ Omar interjected. ‘I pushed for that.’ Yet both men knew that he had pushed for little more. ‘The King did not want change,’ Omar said.
‘What about this King?’ Kedah asked, but again there was no response. ‘Please,’ Kedah said, ‘have a seat.’
He dimmed the lights in the office and took a seat himself as the presentation commenced.
Kedah looked over to his father, but the King gave no comment—though he did, Kedah noted, take a sip of his drink. And, while that was supposed to be the reason they were there, suddenly his father’s reaction to the presentation was more important to Kedah.
Felicia had been right. His father needed to see this.
And there it all played out.
Like golden snakes, roads wove across the screen and bridges did what they were designed to—bridged. Access was given to the remote west, where the poorest people fought to survive, and somehow it all connected.
Schools and hospitals appeared, and within the animation teachers, doctors and nurses walked. There were animated children too, playing in parks. Now, hotels rose, and there were pools. Restaurants and cafés appeared on bustling evening streets.
And the King sat in silence.
Kedah watched as his father took a drink, and another, yet made no comment. An hour later, when an animated sun had set on a very different Zazinia from the one they knew and the presentation had ended, it was Omar who stood and opened up the drapes.
Still he offered no comment. Omar just stared out to the golden desert beyond and it was Kedah who spoke.
‘That is what you deny your people. All this is achievable and yet you do nothing...’
‘No—’
‘Yes,’ Kedah refuted. ‘Turn around and tell me that Mohammed would make the better Crown Prince.’
Omar did not.
‘Turn around and tell me that you don’t want a glittering future for our people.’
‘That is enough, Kedah,’ Omar said, but Kedah had not finished yet.
He picked up the files and held them out for his father. ‘As I said to you when I was eighteen, you shall not force me to take a bride. I will never be pushed into something that is not of my choice. If you want me gone then say so, but let us stop pretending that it has anything to do with my choosing a wife.’
Kedah tossed the files down on the desk in frustration as again his father said nothing. He simply walked out.
He had shown his father his best—the very best of his vision, all that he hoped to achieve—and his father had offered no comment.
* * *
Felicia was startled when the office door opened unexpectedly. She did not receive any greeting from the very angry King who stalked past.
She had been seated at the very desk where years ago Kedah had once hidden, and now she took the same steps that he had at three years old—though she opened the door with greater ease.
‘How was it?’
Kedah shrugged. ‘Hopeless.’
‘He didn’t have a drink?’ Felicia checked, and then Kedah remembered the real reason for the meeting.
He looked over to his father’s glass, which was empty.
‘I meant that the presentation was hopeless. He’s never going to change his mind.’
Felicia pulled on her gloves and popped the glass into a clear bag, and then another, then placed it in her purse. On the desk she saw that there were some photos of dark-haired and dark-eyed beauties. One of them, no doubt, would be his bride.
Kedah was too incensed by his father’s lack of response to notice where her gaze fell. His mind was on other things. ‘What am I fighting for?’ Kedah asked, and for the briefest moment he wavered where he had always been resolute. ‘Am I the only one who wants change?’
‘Your people want it also,’ Felicia said. ‘I heard them cheering you, Kedah.’
She was right—it wasn’t just his ego that insisted he could do things better than his brother. And after his father’s pale reaction to the presentation it was as if she blew the wind back into his sails.
‘I am going to speak again with Mohammed,’ Kedah said.
‘Do so,’ Felicia agreed. ‘I’m going to head back to London.’
She was meeting a courier at Heathrow, who would take the glass to a laboratory where the samples would be analysed.
‘I’ll call you as soon as I get the results.’
And this was it, she realised. It was the very last time she would be in Zazinia—for certainly she would not travel here as his PA once Kedah had chosen his bride.
‘Don’t leave now.’
Kedah stood and came around the desk. He felt her resistance when he took her in his arms.
His fingers went to her chin and he lifted her face to meet his gaze. He was going to kiss her, she realised. Right now, when she was doing all she could not to break down.
‘I have to go.’
‘Not yet.’
His mouth was fierce and claiming, and she tasted salt at the back of her throat as she squeezed her eyes closed and held on to the tears he must never see her shed.
‘Not here,’ she said.
‘Yes, here.’
He did not want her gone.
He could not picture the future. He just wanted a moment of the oblivion that they created together. So he did what Abdal should have done all those years ago.
Felicia stood as he walked over and turned the lock on the door.
Kedah turned her on in a way no one else ever had or ever would. He tossed his sword to the floor and was opening his robe as he walked back towards her.
His passion was so fierce and overpowering. His hands were at the buttons of her robe and he was holding back from tearing it open.
And she loathed herself for wanting him so badly.
Even with his future wife’s photo on the desk she would do this. She would, Felicia decided as he lifted her onto the desk. Now, while she didn’t know his wife’s name, she would be taken for the last time.
His hands ruched up the skirt of her robe and lifted it over her thighs, and perhaps Kedah was aware that this was the last time because impatient fingers were tearing at the buttons.
She had to walk out of this office soon, so she tried to assist him. But the buttons gave way so that her legs and chest were exposed and he pulled down the cups of her bra. There was no time to take off her knickers. His erection moved the slip of fabric aside and he stabbed into her.
Felicia sobbed as he filled her.
Their mouths were frantic and bruising in their fast, urgent coupling.
He thrust hard, then pressed her so the desk was hard against her back and her hair splayed out. Now he tore at her knickers, and the sight of them, of himself deep inside her, almost made him come. It was intense, it was fast, and as he scooped her up her legs wrapped around him and she bit his shoulder to fight the scream as her body beat with his.
And it could never be over—and yet it was.
He was lowering her down, and she rested her burning face against his chest and listened for the last time to his heart. She told herself that she would never succumb to this bliss again.
‘Felicia...’
She peeled herself from him and started to do up her robe. She wanted to be away from Zazinia, in the safety of the plane and then back in London. There she could sort out her head.
‘I’d better get going.’
‘In a moment. But first...’
‘Kedah, the plane is waiting—there’s a courier at the other end. If there’s to be any hope of getting the results back in time...’
‘Can’t you stop thinking about work?’
‘You are work, Kedah.’
Felicia took a mirror from her bag and ran a comb through her hair, and she saw her own lips start to tremble as he spoke on.
‘In that case, if all goes well, then I am going to be spending a lot more time here in Zazinia. I will need someone to help with my overseas investments, and there will be an opening for an executive assistant...’
And briefly she allowed herself to glimpse it—an amazing career, a stunning flat and a night with Kedah whenever time allowed. A part-time father...yet she would be his full-time mistress...
She snapped the compact mirror closed and managed to sneer as she faced him ‘You mean an executive whore?’
‘Felicia...’
‘I have to go.’
She really did—because otherwise she would say yes to him. If she stayed for just a few moments longer she would accept his crumbs.
‘I’m going to go.’
‘Of course.’ He nodded.
‘I hope you get the result that you’re hoping for.’
And they were through.
She had but one more smile left in her, and she gave it to him now as she held up her bag.
‘My work here is done,’ she said.
‘No,’ Kedah said. ‘You will be back in the office tomorrow. I employed you to look out for my people. This was...’ He hesitated. ‘A personal favour. Thank you.’
He could not quite believe that she knew. That he had asked for and received her help.
‘I trust you, Felicia.’
And she waited for him to warn her, to remind her that if she let him down then she would be dealt with ‘outside the law’, but there was no postscript.
‘I hope it all goes well,’ she said.
And maybe he shouldn’t trust her, because right then she had lied—for there was a part of her that didn’t want him to be Crown Prince.
No.
She wanted what was best for him.
‘Hey, Kedah?’ Felicia said. ‘For what it’s worth...’ This was the hardest thing she had ever said, the least selfish words she had ever spoken, because she was very good at her job, and she could see another route even if the news for Kedah was not good. ‘It’s very hard to dissuade a loyal public.’
Kedah frowned.
‘Your people know the rumours and yet they still cheered you home. Whatever the result, you can still fight.’
She walked out and she saw that Mohammed was deep in conversation with Kumu at the end of the long corridor. When he saw Felicia approaching Mohammed stalked off, leaving Kumu by the large statue at the top of the stairs.
‘Are you leaving?’ Kumu asked, for she had heard that Kedah’s jet had been prepared to fly out and Mohammed had asked her to glean more information.
‘Yes...’ Felicia smiled politely, about to carry on down the stairs. But even if Kedah wouldn’t let her help, it didn’t mean she couldn’t try. And so she paused and turned around. ‘It’s a relief, actually,’ she said in a low voice, as if confiding a secret.
‘A relief?’ Kumu frowned, a little taken aback but curious.
‘I always worry that I’ll say the wrong thing,’ Felicia admitted.
‘The wrong thing?’
‘You’re very used to royalty...’ Felicia sighed. ‘It’s just all so new to me. I keep worrying that I’m going to mess things up. I mean, King Omar has been perfectly kind, and he seems lovely—you just have to see how devoted he is to his wife to know that. Even so, I would hate to be the one to offend him.’ She gave Kumu an eye roll. ‘I mean, after all, he is the King.’
* * *
Kedah walked out of his office just in time to see the very end of a conversation between Kumu and Felicia, and almost instantly he doubted his thought process. Now Felicia was smiling and walking down the stairs, as confident as ever. Kumu, on the other hand, stood looking worried and clearly more than a little perplexed.
She hurried off, but Kedah’s attention was no longer on Kumu. Instead he was looking again at Felicia.
Her slender frame packed a punch even from this distance. Confident, collected, she walked towards the grand entrance and nodded for the guards to open the doors. In her bag was the glass, the answer, but that wasn’t all that was on Kedah’s mind.
Yes, he would have to select a bride—and, given her response, that meant this was the end.
They were over—just as he had told her from the start that they would be.
* * *
‘Felicia...’
The Queen called out to her as Felicia walked to the car.
‘Your Majesty?’
‘You’re leaving already?’
‘Yes, Kedah needs me to go back to London.’
The Queen frowned, for she had rather thought Kedah might need someone on his side here, for when the Accession Council met.
* * *
Felicia was driven the short distance to the private jet, which she boarded. It felt so odd to be there without him. Over the last few months they had flown together on many occasions.
The plane felt lonely without him.
Her life would from this point on.
‘There’s a slight delay getting clearance,’ the steward informed her. ‘It shouldn’t be too long.’
But Felicia could no longer hold it in.
‘I’ll be in the bedroom. Call me when we’re ready to take off.’
Felicia headed to the bedroom suite and lay on the bed and allowed the tears to come.
Oh, and they did come.
Except the slight delay wasn’t in order to get clearance from Air Traffic Control—it was caused by a certain Crown Prince who did not like it that she had gone.
He was thinking of her on the long flight to London when, in truth, he would far rather she was here. For a moment he even considered the possibility of someone else taking the glass to have it tested.
But, no, that couldn’t work. It would mean involving another person, and Kedah wanted it kept just between them.
She was crying too hard to hear her phone, but then there was a knock at the door.
‘Kedah wishes to speak with you,’ the steward informed her, and gestured to a phone by the bed.
Felicia furiously wiped away her tears and blew her nose before picking up.
‘Hello?’
‘Hey,’ Kedah said.
‘What do you want?’
Kedah had been about to talk dirty, to tell her to get back this minute, or maybe to be honest and tell her he wasn’t ready to let her go. Then he heard her slightly thick voice and knew that unless Felicia had the most rapid-onset cold in medical history she was crying.
Which meant she’d been crying that other time. He knew that now.
It would seem that she did have a heart after all.
‘How long will the results take?’ he asked, and Felicia frowned.
Why would he ask when they’d already been through this numerous times?
‘Overnight,’ she answered. ‘The results will be couriered to your office, hopefully by lunchtime in the UK.’ Which would be late afternoon in Zazinia—just a few hours before the Accession Council met.
A few hours before he was expected to choose his bride.
‘Felicia?’
‘I think we’re about to take off,’ she lied. ‘Speak soon, Kedah.’
