Читать книгу The Desert Lord's Love-Child - Кейт Хьюит, Оливия Гейтс - Страница 14

Something frantic flapped inside Carmen’s chest.

It felt too much like hope.

She pressed her palm over it, trying to stem its painful surge. Not that she knew from experience, but she’d heard that where it blossomed, hope defied logic, sprouted with a life of its own, blasted through barriers of caution and self-preservation.

It seemed to be doing so now. It kept saying, if he believed her experience and skills would be of use to him, maybe her life in Judar wouldn’t be a prison of duty outside her role as Mennah’s mother, and she’d find purpose and function there, in his life. And maybe—just maybe—one day they’d forge some sort of relationship, and their marriage wouldn’t remain the lie he intended to propagate for Mennah’s legitimacy and birthright …

“Now you heard what you’re fishing for, what more reasons will you give for being ‘staggered’ that I’m now the crown prince?”

His disparagement hit her with the force of a landslide, smothering the chain reaction of optimism.

So he didn’t believe she could be valuable to him in his new position? He’d been leading her on only to slap her down?

Shoved back into the pit of resignation, her hand shook as she raised it from her chest to her eyes, pressing the stinging away. “I already told you why I think this a huge mistake. But you’ve made up your mind about me and whatever I say, no matter if it’s the truth, won’t change it for you.” She shot him what she hoped was a look of unconcern. “Why bother wasting more breath?”

His cynical pout was proof of her deductions. He still prodded, “Waste some more, just for me. Tell me your version of the ‘truth.'”

“What do you care about my ‘version’ when you already know everything about me since the day I was born, Farooq? You’re probably in possession of details I don’t even remember or know.”

“And how am I supposed to possess that omniscient knowledge of your life?”

“C’mon, Farooq. Your intelligence machine must provide you with a phonebook-thick dossier on everyone who comes within a hundred feet of you.”

“That’s true. But I don’t have one on you.”

He didn’t? But he must have … oh. Oh. A sarcastic huff escaped her. “That’s right. My life would fill two pages. Double spaced.”

He clicked his tongue. “That’s not a version of the truth, that’s an outright lie, Carmen. The things I found out about you from talking to you, from taking you, would fill a book. I was wrong about the content of the book, but whatever the truth is, it’d still fill a book. But neither book would contain the most basic data about you, what you never divulged. And for some reason, it didn’t matter and I didn’t have you investigated.” She knew the reason, all right. Because she hadn’t mattered. “Then I did, but you’d erased your existence so well, I came up with only your professional portfolio, address—and a photo.” His palm pressed over his heart, like hers had done minutes ago. Was that where the photo was? “Of you and Mennah.”

Her eyes remained prisoner to the telling gesture, her own heart battering itself against her ribs, even when she wasn’t sure what it told her.

It was his claim that he knew nothing about her that slowed her heartbeats. Could it be?

She had used methods learned in the circles where people erased their pasts or reinvented themselves for safety and second chances, first to cover up parts of her past to escape the heartache, then to remain hidden with Mennah forever. But she hadn’t thought her cover-up tactics would be so effective that he wouldn’t find out everything about her if he put his mind to it.

But then he probably hadn’t; had only tried to find her, not find out about her. Trailing someone wasn’t the same as researching them. Yes. That had to be it.

She sighed. “Well, what you came up with was enough. You found me, found out what I ran to hide. Anyway, I never tried to hide who I am from you, so you do know everything that counts.”

“Really?” He mimicked her recent irony. “Beyond knowing what you can do, in your job, in bed …” The way he said that, in such menace-coated sensuality, made her snicker. He raised one eyebrow. “So glad you find me funny. Even when I’m not trying to be.”

Her earlier outburst rippled to the surface, her facial muscles hurting under its renewed onslaught. “It is hilarious, hearing you refer to me as some sort of femme fatale.”

“They don’t come any more fatal, Carmen.”

She looked around, looked back at him, pointed to herself in open mockery. “You’re talking about me? Boy, now that’s a parallel universe version of the truth. A Bizzaro world one. Whom have you been talking to? Someone I turned down and he decided to paint me as a black widow? To justify his failure as he propagates tales of his lucky escape? One thing’s for sure. You didn’t get this from my ex. Apart from him, you’re the only man who was in a position to comment on my so-called sexual powers, and you both certainly …”

Her voice trailed off. What was it with those attacks of truthfulness? Had she misplaced her discretion during the months she’d barely talked to another adult?

It was futile to kick herself over it now, anyway. She’d already said too much. The whole truth and nothing but.

Now his eyes were glinting with things that sent goose bumps cascading through her like a storm through a wheat field.

Before she could theorize what those things were, impassiveness blanked his gaze, neutralized his voice. “You’re telling me I’m one of only two men in your life?”

His ego relished that, did it? So what? She was only expanding it from planetary to stellar proportions. Nothing mere mortals could tell the difference between.

“I am telling you that,” she ground out. “And you know what, you’re not only the second, you’re the last.”

He sat forward, coming closer like a tide that would overwhelm her if she didn’t back away. “Of course I’m the last.”

She didn’t. “You are, because even if I wasn’t off men after you and my ex, I’d never expose Mennah to a strange man.”

He stilled, intensifying the menace in the calmness of his next words. “You’re likening me to your ex-husband?”

She didn’t care. “And it’s blasphemy to liken your highness to anyone? Well, considering he’s a mommy’s—and daddy’s—boy with loads of unearned wealth and power, the similarities are plenty. If this arouses your royal fury, it sure isn’t worse than practically calling me a liar, a fraud and an all-round whore.”

Farooq was lost for words for the first time. Ever.

Not because he found none to answer her insults with. What struck him mute was Carmen’s allegation that he was the only man, besides the husband she’d married too early, she’d been intimate with. In effect, her only lover. The claim had flowed from her with the impetus of a statement of fact, had lodged into him with the force of an ax in the gut. Of the truth.

Could he believe it? She’d been Tareq’s mole, but not his plaything? She hadn’t been anybody else’s? Her abandon in his arms had been just for him, as his had been just for her? Discounting the ex-husband she spoke of now without continuing emotional attachment, with disdain even, he’d been, no matter the reason, her first, and as she vowed, her last passionate involvement?

Everything in him insisted that was the truth. That she’d told him many truths today.

But she’d done so only up to a point. He could feel her hiding things. Major things. Her deal with Tareq, no doubt. And fool that he was, he didn’t want to corner her into a confession.

He didn’t want to hear it. Not anymore.

With each moment near her, he believed more and more that it hadn’t been as sinister as he’d believed on her side, that she hadn’t realized the scope of the damage she’d been sent to do. That maybe Tareq had even convinced her she’d be serving a greater good by toppling him from the succession.

If this was true, maybe Tareq had caught her at her lowest ebb, and she’d made an out-of-character decision. But once she’d succumbed to their affinity, to the pleasure they’d shared, seen him for what he was and Tareq’s lies for what they were, she’d forgotten her mission. But she’d gotten pregnant and Tareq had changed the rules, and she’d panicked, feared retribution from all sides, feared for Mennah for real, had fled, hidden …

Or maybe he was looking for ways out for her because he was falling under her spell again.

And he was. Instead of the cold loathing he’d believed would be his only reaction to her, he was mesmerized by everything about her, reveling in her company, unable to get enough of her wit, her outspokenness and contentiousness and defiance, all so in contrast with the vulnerability she strove to hide. Then came her physical effect. She’d had him hard and aching within minutes of seeing her again. It was all he could do now not to drag her to the floor and just have her. Just take her again. And again.

He would have her. Would take her. Just not now.

He’d wait. For their wedding night.

As for the truth, whatever it was, there was nothing to be gained by ripping open festering wounds. It wasn’t as if he needed to have this resolved. It was all pointless now that he’d won. Now that the throne of Judar was safe from falling into Tareq’s hands. Now that she’d fallen into his. For as long as he deemed to hold her there.

And now he could turn to her taunt.

She dared imply he and her ex had unearned wealth and power in common? Was that how she viewed him? When she must know of the global enterprises he’d built from the ground up, multiplying his kingdom’s wealth? After she’d seen for herself a six-week sample of his life as peacemaker and relief-bringer?

No. She’d meant it as the worst insult she could think of.

But even if she’d qualified it as retaliation, he’d make her pay for it. Make her beg. For the chance to atone. For the end of torment. For the pleasure he knew, just knew, beyond doubt, only he had ever brought her, could ever bring her.

His equilibrium regained, his mind ordered and made up once more, he challenged her, “So you take exception to my … assumptions. What others could I have when I know nothing about you beyond what your actions led me to believe?”

She seemed to shrink in her seat. “There isn’t much to know. I was born to Ella and Aaron McArthur, a megawealthy businessman and his ex-P.A. second wife. Their marriage fell apart and I lived with my mother and her assortment of … strange men, until she died, then moved in with my father and his fourth wife till the day I turned eighteen. On acquiring my first boyfriend, whom I eventually married, a year later, my father, who hadn’t checked to see if I was still alive since I moved out, popped back in my life all eagerness and blessings. Turned out the marriage was part of a coveted merger. When it turned out I wasn’t the asset they all thought I would be, both the marriage and the merger were dissolved and my father moved to Japan with his fifth wife. When I was twenty-five, my mother’s estate became mine—her accumulated alimony and divorce settlement from my father, plus what she got from her ‘sponsors.’ It was a bundle, the fortune you intimated I got from a ‘sponsor’ of my own. I bought the apartment, put the rest for Mennah in a trust fund, since I earn enough to support us both in comfort. See, I overestimated the complexity of my life. That’s one page, triple-spaced.”

Farooq stared at her, thoughts rearranging, long-entrenched ones being forced out, new questions rushing at him.

She’d been born then had been married into money. But she’d implied her father hadn’t supported her after she’d moved out, that her ex-husband had divorced her without compensation. Was that why she’d accepted Tareq’s mission? Had she gotten so used to the good life her mother and her “sponsors” followed by her father and her ex’s wealthy family had provided that she couldn’t bear to wait months till she claimed her inheritance?

That no longer felt like enough of a motive. Or a motive at all. Not with her disinterest in anything material while she’d been with him replaying in his mind, another manifestation that had the conviction, the texture of truth.

So it hadn’t been about money after all? Had it been maybe a reckless lashing out after all the major relationships in her life had failed or ended, throwing herself into something dangerous, maybe even self-destructive? She could have easily been throwing herself into an abyss when she’d thrown herself in his arms. She’d had no way of knowing he’d turn out to be a civilized or even sane human being, let alone the lavish lover he’d been with her. He could have been a monster who lived to collect slaves, or to abuse beauties and maim them before snuffing out their lives.

Suddenly he was incensed. Far more so than he’d ever been. At her for endangering herself that way. Whether her goal had been financial gain or temporary rebellion or oblivion.

His rage deflated as fast as it had mushroomed.

No. She might have been groping for the catharsis of a wild fling with a sheikh prince, or the fantasy of playing Mata Hari or securing a quick fortune or all combined. But she hadn’t risked herself. She had known she’d be safe with him, would be cared for and catered to, pleasured and pampered. She’d known it, felt his nature and intentions with the first look into his eyes.

As he’d thought he’d felt her nature and intentions with the first look into hers?

But if what he’d seen was all she owned, and he could now find out the truth about her inheritance, if she still had to work, where had the money Tareq had said she’d cheated him for gone? Or had Tareq cheated her out of their agreed upon price?

Ya Ullah, was this how men went insane, revolving in unending loops of suspicion?

Kaffa. Enough. It didn’t matter anymore, how it had been.

Suheeh? Really? If he told himself that enough times, would it register so he could finally let it go?

Another question blasted through, proving that letting go didn’t seem possible. But then, it was a paramount question.

How had his people not found out all she’d just told him?

Before the question fully formed, the answer detonated in his mind. Tareq. His counterintelligence must have foiled Farooq’s investigations, in fear he’d find her, find Mennah, the final card pulverizing Tareq’s conspiracies to hang on to the succession.

B’Ellahi, how had he not seen this before?

Loathing for his cousin shot to a new zenith.

But anger and hatred aside, now that he knew what he had to counteract—what he might not need to counteract now that Tareq had no more reason to block his research into her past—it would be easy to check out her story. As she must know he would.

This meant one thing. She’d told him the truth.

His gaze clung to her averted profile. He no longer saw the seductress who’d breached his barriers, entrenched herself in his responses, his fantasies, his cravings, or the traitor who’d deprived him of his child, who’d almost let Judar’s throne fall into the hands of a man guaranteed to topple it. He saw only the little girl who’d been exposed to her parents’ damaging behavior, who grew up let down, neglected, used, maybe even abused, by everyone who should have cherished and protected her. He saw only a woman who’d suffered. A lot.

He gritted his teeth against a resurgence of fury, against all the people who’d blighted her life. Against the softening that assailed him toward her as he realized she’d been doing everything to protect her—their daughter, from all she’d suffered, living for Mennah, thinking only of her safety and happiness.

He might be starting to understand her motives, her psyche, but it made no difference. He couldn’t forget, nor would he ever forgive what she’d done.

He exhaled, casting away the weakening, pushed a button.

It was time to get back on track.

“Are we crashing?”

Farooq turned inquiring eyes on Carmen at her croak.

She gestured toward Hashem, who’d entered their compartment carrying what looked like a treasure chest right out of the times of genies and flying carpets. “You said that’s the only time we’d be disturbed.”

“This is a planned intrusion.” He beckoned to Hashem who strode forward, his eyes scanning her, ascertaining her condition before casting a look of disapproval on the untouched food.

Farooq rose, extended a hand to her. She must have taken it, risen, walked. Either that or he had hypnotic and/or teleportation powers, too. Without knowing how, she found herself sitting on a plush couch in yet another compartment drenched in sourceless lights and deep earth tones, in the serenity of sumptuousness and seclusion.

Hashem placed everything on a two foot-high, six-foot-wide, square polished mahogany table in front of her and Farooq. He opened the chest, produced two boxes, one the size of a shoebox, the other half its size, both like the larger chest, handmade, ornamented in complex mosaic patterns of gold, silver and mother-of-pearl. Next he produced a variegated brown leather folder and small drawstring pouch. Everything was in perfect condition, but looked ancient, heavy with history and significance.

An urge rose, to run her hands over the textures and shapes, feel their mystique and power flowing through her fingertips. She settled for soaking in each detail. The folder and pouch embossed with intricate gold-leaf borders, Judar’s royal crest at their center: an eagle depicted in painstaking detail, its wings arched up to enclose the kingdom’s name written in the ornamental muthanna or “doubled” calligraphy with each half of the design a mirror image of the other in a tear-drop oval. The boxes’ blend of repoussé, inlaid and engraved zakhrafa embellishments that married Arabian to Ottoman, Persian and Indian designs.

Hashem’s deep murmur tore her gaze back to him. She couldn’t believe how welcome his presence was. How she didn’t want him to leave. She couldn’t take more of Farooq undiluted.

Not that an army would make effective reinforcements. Not against Farooq. Or what she felt.

Sighing, she eyed Hashem in resignation as he bowed to them and retraced his steps out of the compartment.

Farooq opened the pouch, producing two brass keys that looked designed and forged in the Saladin era. He opened the small box, produced three stamps and an inkpad of the same design, before opening the folder and extracting two papyruslike papers and two crimson satin ribbons. Then he reached into his suit pocket—opposite the one she assumed held the photo—and extracted a gold pen.

He extended it to her. “Let’s see how well you write Arabic.”

She gaped from the pen to the papers to his eyes. “You’re giving me a written Arabic proficiency test?”

“I am interested to see your level, yes. But I’d hardly give you royal papers reserved for documenting state matters of the highest order to test your spelling and handwriting.”

So all this stuff was as momentous as she’d sensed. Her heart wrenched to a higher gear. “So what do you want me to write?”

He pushed the pen into her flaccid hand. “I’ll dictate to you.”

“Yeah, you live to do that, dictate,” she grumbled.

One side of his lips twitched. His eyes remained solemn. “Write, Carmen.”

The depth of the command, the gravity, squeezed her dry of breath. She sat forward, tremors buzzing through her like a current, took in the papers in front of her, handmade, each one a unique blend of beige-tan with multicolored fibers offsetting its pearly, heavy silk finish.

She put down the pen, wiped her hand on her pants. His clamped onto it. She bit her lip on the jolt as his other hand delved inside his jacket again, produced a monogrammed handkerchief, placed it on the paper, put the pen back in her hand.

As soon as the tremors allowed her to firm her grip on it, he started dictating. She geared her brain to the right-to-left writing of the exotic letters that always felt more like drawing.

She’d written a whole sentence before it registered.

This was a verse from a sacred scripture invocation.

She raised her hand off the paper, her eyes to his. “What is this? An incantation to sign over my soul?”

His eyes smiled now, a smile drenched in that overriding sensuality that was as integral to him as his DNA. And in seriousness. “Essentially, yes. This is az-zawaj al orfi language. You are free to add to the basic pledges, if you’re feeling creative, to express how eager you are—were—for our union.”

“This is the paper the cleric will read?”

“Yes. And along with my copy, it will reside in the royal files, proof of Mennah’s legitimacy.”

“So it’s an official document. And you want me to get creative.” The teeth sprouting in her stomach sank into its walls. “Just give me the exact language. Better yet, paraphrase.”

He pouted in mockery, continued dictating. She kept writing until he told her to sign her name. She did, raised her eyes. She’d only written two paragraphs. “That’s it?”

He shrugged one massive shoulder. “It takes only so many words to pledge oneself unto eternity.” He reached for the paper, ran his eyes over her efforts. “I’m impressed.”

Without waiting for her reaction to his praise—an upsurge of irritation for wanting it, for being so pleased at having it—he turned to his own paper, started writing the words he’d dictated her. And she forgot everything as she watched those fingers that had once owned her flesh, moving in the certainty of expertise and grace, producing a req’uh script of such beauty and elegance, such effect, it did feel like a spell.

After he signed both documents, had her sign his, she rasped, “So not only a prince, a tycoon, a philanthropist, a diplomat and a handyman but a calligrapher, too.”

“Yet another side-product of my unearned privileged existence.” His eyes mocked her, documented her chagrin at being caught out at a pettiness, at the need to apologize for it, at her anger at that need and at him.

Not that he waited for her to come to a decision about which urge to obey. He let go of her eyes, pressed three stamps to the inkpad, marked the documents with each. Judar’s royal insignia, the Aal Masood family crest and the date. The one he’d fixed to the day they’d first made lo—had sex.

She stared at the seals. The dark red ink became viscous as it dried, like congealing blood. She did feel she’d just signed a blood pact. A binding, unbreakable one.

He rolled up both documents, tied each with a ribbon, placed them in the larger box. “Those papers aren’t considered legitimate without two witnesses. As soon as we land in Judar, Shehab and Kamal, my brothers, will add their seals and signatures to ours.” He rose, extended a hand to her. “Now we’ll check on Mennah.”

Everything in Carmen squeezed. Fists, guts, lungs, heart.

Mennah. The reason he’d just taken her on.

The reason she’d just signed her life away.