Читать книгу Desert Nights: Falcon's Prey / The Sheikh's Virgin Bride / One Night With the Sheikh - Пенни Джордан, PENNY JORDAN - Страница 10

THERE was no opportunity for conversation on the return journey to the villa, although once or twice Felicia caught Zahra’s sympathetic eyes on her in a way that made a mockery of her own hopes that the latter had not noticed her uncle’s anger.

When the car stopped in the outer courtyard, she whispered gently to Felicia,

‘Don’t be too upset, I always hate it when Raschid is annoyed with me. That dreadful cold anger of his is far worse than if he actually lost his temper.’

Felicia was feeling far too ruffled to be soothed by the placatory words and only exclaimed shortly,

‘Your uncle may take it upon himself to order your life, Zahra, but he will never order mine. If I want to walk the streets of Kuwait alone, then I shall do so!’

With that she stalked into the house, head held high, Zahra following hurriedly behind.

‘He has made you very angry, hasn’t he?’ she sympathised.

‘Angry?’ Felicia almost choked in her indignation. ‘He practically humiliated me! Treating me like…’ She broke off. There was no point in trying to make Zahra understand her feelings. ‘Oh, what’s the use?’ she said wearily. ‘I’m only glad that once we’re married, Faisal and I can go our own way. I would hate to live here under your uncle’s roof!’

She sounded so bitter that Zahra frowned unhappily, touching her arm.

‘Perhaps it is that Raschid does not understand, Felicia. If I were to tell him that you were upset…. Faisal would not have approved either, you know,’ she added gently. ‘I shall speak with Raschid…!’

‘No! No, Zahra, don’t do that.’ In her mind Felicia was thinking how badly she was failing in the mission Faisal had set her, but Zahra misinterpreted her words, and her face broke into a relieved smile.

‘You are beginning to forgive Raschid already,’ she breathed. ‘I know he didn’t mean to upset you, Felicia. He forgets sometimes how formidable he is!’

Like a falcon forgets its prey, Felicia thought bitterly. Zahra saw her relative through rose-tinted glasses. Forgive him indeed! That was something she would never do! When she remembered what he had said about her, and the look in his eyes….

HER MOTHER normally rested during the afternoon, Zahra explained to Felicia as they went inside. It was a practice she herself would probably want to adopt as the days grew hotter, she added, and because of this it was the custom that the family did not gather for their meal until early evening.

After she had showered and slipped into a refreshingly cool dress, Felicia inspected her reflection in the mirror. Was her appearance ‘chaste’ enough to pass Raschid’s rigid specifications? she asked herself wryly. Her dress had a gently rounded neckline and small puffed sleeves, the neck and hem piped in crisp white scalloping in contrast to the lemon-gold cotton. She had washed her hair and it curled attractively on to her shoulders, more red than gold in the fading light. A thin gold necklace drew attention to the slender column of her throat, a matching bracelet round one delicate wrist, high-heeled, strappy sandals completing her outfit.

For dinner they were served with roast lamb, deliciously flavoured with herbs, pastries stuffed with exotic vegetables, and spicy rice dishes, and Felicia groaned a little to think of the effect of all this rich food on her figure.

When the first course had been cleared away, the maids reappeared with an immense tray of fresh fruit, and more of the frighteningly fattening almond and marzipan tartlets they had had the night before.

Felicia accepted a slice of melon and some fresh, sweet dates, noting that Raschid had the same, although his sister and Zahra tucked into the almond tarts with a cheerful disregard for the consequences.

After the meal a manservant came in with coffee cups and an elegant silver coffee pot, pouring the thick, steaming liquid into the fragile cups and handing them round.

Felicia had brought her gifts downstairs and hidden them under her chair. She had intended to distribute them after the meal when, she hoped, Raschid would retire to his own quarters, but to her annoyance he seemed determined to linger, leaning back in his chair, with a tigerish grace she had never seen in a European, his hair blue-black under the light of the chandelier. She wondered if he had ever sat cross-legged in the tents of his tribe, eating from the communal dish and drinking from the communal cup as Arabian hospitality demanded. In his expensive hand-made silk suit he looked every inch the sophisticated businessman, but she sensed that under the suave façade lurked a man as elemental as the desert which was his natural home.

While Umm Faisal and Zahra chatted, Felicia’s eyes strayed again and again to the shuttered face of the man seated opposite her. The betrayingly passionate curve of his lower lip caught her attention, as it had done before, and she shivered involuntarily, imagining what it would be like to feel that hard mouth against her own; that warm golden skin next to the creamy paleness of her own.

A shudder racked her. What on earth was she thinking? In vain she tried to conjure up the protective image of Faisal’s softer features, as though they were a talisman to ward off the potent effect of Raschid’s masculinity. What was wrong with her? she wondered despairingly; Raschid stood for everything she most despised, and yet here she was comparing him to Faisal, and finding the harsh features had somehow insinuated themselves into her memory, superimposed over Faisal’s more gentle image. It was not to be tolerated. In vain she tried to recall Faisal’s warm smile and liquid eyes, but as though he had worked a spell upon her, all she got back was a mirror image of Raschid’s cold grey eyes and derisory smile. Like one in a trance she tried to shake off her tormenting thoughts, dismayed by her momentary awareness of the man seated across from her. Hurriedly she bent down to retrieve her gaily wrapped packages, her colour high.

‘I’ve brought you both a little something from England—a small token of my gratitude for your hospitality.’

Umm Faisal inclined her head graciously, but Zahra was far less inhibited.

‘A present?’ she exclaimed with shining eyes. ‘Oh, Felicia, how lovely—but you shouldn’t have.’

‘Nothing very exciting, I’m afraid,’ Felicia warned her, remembering the deprecatory words Faisal always used before giving her some shockingly extravagant treat. It was an Arab trait to deprecate their possessions, stemming from the days when to boast of one’s achievements could call down the ‘evil eye’ upon the bragger, and she knew it was still the custom for an Arab to welcome a visitor to his ‘humble’ home, even if that home were a palace.

A little apprehensively she watched Zahra open her present, but the younger girl’s gasp of pleasure obliterated her fears that it would not be well received. Even Raschid was commanded to admire the contents of the make-up box, although he did so with typical male indulgence for so purely a female delight.

Umm Faisal’s pleasure was a little more restrained, but genuine none the less, and Felicia was pleased that she had taken the trouble to ask Faisal what sort of perfume his mother preferred.

‘It’s gorgeous!’ Zahra exclaimed, sniffing the bottle. ‘It reminds me of the one al-Azir mixed for you the last time we were in Jeddah, Mother—do you remember?’

‘I certainly do,’ Raschid interrupted drily. ‘It was extremely expensive.’

Felicia smiled politely at his little joke, and looked up to find Zahra watching her expectantly.

‘Where is Raschid’s present, Felicia? Or are you keeping it from him until he apologises for this afternoon?’ she teased with a smile.

Felicia felt her colour come and go. How could she say that she had not brought a present for Raschid? She bit her lip and then remembered the paperweight she had bought for Nadia, Faisal’s elder sister.

‘It’s upstairs,’ she improvised hurriedly, hating the guilty blush that mantled her cheeks. ‘I wasn’t sure that Raschid would be eating with us.’

‘You have forgiven him, then. I knew you would. Do go and get it,’ Zahra urged Felicia, before turning to her mother, her eyes twinkling. ‘Uncle Raschid was unkind to Felicia this afternoon, Mother. She didn’t realise she could have asked him to cash her travellers’ cheques and she had gone into the bank alone!’

The shocked expression on Umm Faisal’s face told Felicia that Raschid had spoken no less than the truth when he warned her about her behaviour, and she used the diversion created by Zahra’s announcement to excuse herself and slip upstairs to collect the paperweight.

Fortunately it had been wrapped in a silvery striped paper suitable for either sex, and hating herself for the deceit, she hurried downstairs with the small package. When she had decided against bringing a gift for Faisal’s uncle, she had not bargained for being faced with a situation such as this evening’s!

As she handed Raschid the small square box her fingers trembled, accidentally brushing his, the brief contact sending alarm bells jangling along her nervous system, her eyes wide and dismayed in her small heart-shaped face. She knew that it was too much to hope that the man thanking her so urbanely for her thoughtfulness had not noticed the small, betraying gesture.

Nothing escaped those smoky-grey eyes, now sardonic with comprehensive amusement, and Felicia slipped hurriedly back into her chair, wishing that she had waited for a more propitious moment for her present giving.

‘Go on, then, open it!’ Zahra commanded her uncle, her eyes on the package. ‘I’m dying to see what it is!’

‘Then I had better unwrap it quickly, before Miss Gordon accuses me of further cruelty to my family,’ was Raschid’s cool comment as lean fingers made nonsense of the sealing.

When the paper fell away to reveal the dark blue leather box, Zahra expelled an impatient sigh.

‘Raschid, do hurry—it looks very exciting!’

In the growing darkness of the Oriental room with its plain white walls and luxurious, richly coloured Persian carpets; its priceless antique furniture with its glowing patina, the pure beauty of the blue-green glass was a poignant reminder for Felicia of the country she had left behind. The glass was Caithness, from Scotland, where craftsmen took a pride in fashioning the heavy paperweights, imprisoning within the depths of the molten glass, small flowers; petals; sea anemones so that their beauty would live for ever. The one Felicia had chosen held a blue-green sea anemone, and it had been one of a limited range and consequently frighteningly expensive, but she had fallen in love with its cool, remote beauty.

As she watched, her breath caught in her throat, Raschid lifted it out of its white satin bed, balancing it on his open palm. The silence that followed was a tribute to the craftsmen who had conceived and made it.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Zahra whispered, touching it with a delicate forefinger. ‘So cool and fresh—like you, Felicia.’

‘It is a gift any Arab would treasure, Miss Gordon,’ Raschid’s deep voice agreed. ‘The glassblower has captured the quality and colour of the sea in our gulf, and nothing is more precious to our race than water.’

‘It can be used as an ink-holder, or just a paperweight,’ Felicia told them, dismayed by the faint huskiness in her voice. For some subtle reason which she could not define, the gift had taken on an intensely personal aura she had never intended it to have. When she bought it, the salesgirl told her that it was designed to be used as an ink-holder or perfume bottle, and it was for the latter reason that she had deemed it suitable for Nadia, apart from its obvious beauty. Thank goodness she had not bought her perfume, she decided, quelling a nervous giggle; then she would have been placed in an embarrassing position. If she had not been so stubbornly against buying anything for Raschid in the first place, she would not now be in this unpleasant situation, she reminded herself, trying not to notice Raschid’s cool scrutiny both of her and the gift.

‘You are very generous,’ he said at last, silvery-grey eyes holding anxious green ones. ‘More generous than I deserve.’ He placed the paperweight back in its box, snapped the lid down and got up. ‘If you will excuse me, there are certain business matters I have to attend to.’

Felicia had wanted to enquire whether there were any letters for her. She had learned from Zahra that all the mail, irrespective of its eventual recipient, was passed to Raschid, and she was hoping that there might be a letter for her from Faisal. Although she had only been in Kuwait a very short time, Faisal had not written to her since his departure for New York, and she had half expected to find a letter awaiting her arrival. A letter from him would help banish the memory of those tension-fraught seconds when awareness of Raschid had threatened to swamp her, and she badly needed the reassurance that hearing from him would bring.

‘How clever of you to choose such marvellous presents,’ Zahra murmured admiringly later. ‘Especially Raschid’s. Did Faisal tell you that he collected rare glass?’

Felicia shook her head. There seemed to be rather a lot of things Faisal had neglected to tell her about his uncle, and she guessed intuitively that these omissions had been deliberate.

‘You are showing siyasa after all, Felicia,’ Zahra dimpled up at her. ‘Your generosity will surely melt Raschid’s heart.’

That was the last thing it was likely to do, Felicia thought despairingly. If Raschid thought that she was deliberately trying to soften his hostility he would be less likely than ever to view her in a favourable light.

‘It is my name day soon,’ Zahra confided. ‘Raschid has promised that we may go to the oasis for a few days. You will like it. I don’t expect I will be able to spend much time there once I am married, as it is really Raschid’s house, so this is by way of being a special treat.’

It was the first time Zahra had mentioned her marriage and Felicia did not like to pry. However, they were alone, Umm Faisal having excused herself, and Zahra seemed to be in the mood for confidences. ‘They brought the material for my wedding gown this afternoon,’ she told Felicia, wrinkling her nose slightly. ‘Of course, I am not supposed to know anything about it.’

‘Don’t you mind marrying a stranger?’ Felicia asked curiously, hoping that she wasn’t treading on dangerous ground, for she had no wish to upset the younger girl.

Zahra looked shocked and indignant.

‘Saud is not a stranger! Whatever gave you that idea?’ She shook her head.

Feeling rather perplexed, Felicia ventured hesitantly, ‘But when your uncle mentioned to me the negotiations I thought your marriage must be an arranged one.’

Zahra laughed. ‘Well, yes, in a way I suppose it is. Saud and I met at the university, but his family is a very important one and very old-fashioned. Saud was to have married his first cousin, as is customary, but fortunately Raschid was able to discover that the girl wanted to marry elsewhere, and so he was able to persuade Saud’s family to accept me as Saud’s wife. It could have been very difficult, for it would have been an unforgivable insult were Saud to refuse to marry his cousin, and conversely, had the girl objected to him, it would have caused her father to lose face. Our wedding is to take place quite soon, but first must come the formal visits.’ She pulled a face. ‘It is all so silly really, both of us having to pretend that we don’t know one another. I would be quite happy to get married in your English fashion, but Raschid says that sometimes the more roundabout route is actually the shorter.’

Felicia did not know what to say. She had imagined that Zahra was being forced into the marriage for reasons of policy and had even suspected that somehow or other Raschid would benefit financially from the marriage. Now she was being compelled to review her suspicions.

‘Of course Saud’s family demanded a very large dowry,’ Zahra continued matter-of-factly, startling her still further. ‘But Raschid has been very generous. You must ask Mother to show you my bridal chest. It will hold Saud’s gifts to me on our marriage, and it has been passed down through our family for ten generations.’

Felicia was still digesting this unwelcome insight into Raschid’s actions when Zahra excused herself, saying that she had some studying to do. When she had gone Felicia stared out into the darkness of the gardens. It seemed that she had completely misunderstood Raschid’s motives—at least as far as Zahra was concerned, for there could be no mistaking his attitude towards her. Was inviting her here a roundabout way to destroying Faisal’s love for her? With considerable misgivings, she wandered restlessly from the window to the door leading out into the courtyard, tempted by its inviting solitude and fresh air. It was cooler outside than she had expected and she shivered in her thin dress, but the music of the fountains was particularly haunting by night, suiting her mood, and she found herself drawn to where the clean, cool water splashed down into its marble pool. She passed the birds in their aviary and sighed faintly. She was as much a prisoner as they, although there were no walls to her cage other than custom and hostility.

‘Miss Gordon!’

She froze as the dark shadow loomed over her, the sound of her name on those cruel lips sending shivers of apprehension running over her skin. All at once the velvet darkness seemed to press down on her, every instinct warning her to flee as Raschid emerged from the shadows, crossing the courtyard with silent stealth.

She had thought that she had the courtyard to herself, Raschid the last person she had expected to materialise at her side, and she choked back her dismay, forcing herself to say coolly, ‘Sheikh—I didn’t see you. Zahra told me you’d gone out.’

‘So I had,’ he agreed. ‘But now I have returned, and like you I was tempted into the garden to enjoy its solitude.’

Felicia turned, intending to return to the protection of the house, but his fingers grasped her shoulder, forcing her to stand mute under his considering scrutiny. His eyes seemed to strip away her fragile defences, leaving her exposed and vulnerable, her eyes wide and uncertain as she tried to hold his gaze.

‘This meeting is most opportune,’ he drawled at length. ‘I am glad of the chance to speak privately with you.’

‘I thought my presence was yours to command,’ Felicia retorted bitterly. ‘Or are you no longer master in this house?’

He ignored her taunt, his eyes mocking as they pierced the darkness. ‘I was thinking of your embarrassment and my sister’s curiosity were I to send for you privately; not my own ability to command you if I so wished. Fatima tells me that Zahra was to have shown you the town this afternoon, and apparently my appearance on the scene deprived you of this treat.’

When Felicia refused to reply he continued coolly,

‘That being the case, I shall put myself at your disposal later in the week. You know, of course, that Friday is our holy day, but if you will name another, I shall make sure that it is free.’

Munificence indeed, Felicia thought wryly, but being escorted around Kuwait by a disapproving Raschid was the last thing she wanted.

‘There’s no need for you to go to such trouble,’ she assured him quickly—too quickly, she realised, when she saw him curse under his breath, his fingers tightening painfully.

‘It seems that you are determined to quarrel with me,’ he accused. ‘You British have a saying that is particularly relevant, and I suggest that you accept the olive branch I extend. We are extremely dependent upon the olive in our harsh climate, and we never take its name in vain. It is plain that Zahra has taken you to her heart—perhaps the fault for this is mine in not warning her more thoroughly about the type of woman you are— However, the damage is now done, and it will hurt her if she sees that we are enemies. She is to leave us soon, and I will not have her last days with her family spoiled and marred by ill-feeling between us.’

‘A pity you didn’t think of that before you insulted me so grossly this afternoon,’ Felicia reminded him bleakly, dismayed by the bitterness that swept over her.

‘So!’ He seemed to consider her for a moment, his eyes probing the darkness until she shrank under their assessing gleam. ‘Very well. If I cannot gain your co-operation through goodwill, I shall have to gain it in some other fashion.’

A frisson of fear ran over her skin. In the dark the fountain played, but the sound suddenly seemed heightened to her overstrung nerves, emphasising the solitude of the garden.

‘If you’re thinking of bribery,’ she said distastefully, ‘I suggest you think again. There’s nothing you could offer me that would change my love for Faisal.’

‘Nothing?’ Raschid taunted softly, coming towards her like a jungle cat, all feline grace and terrifying danger. Although it was dark she could see the faint sheen of his skin, marred by the dark shadow of his beard along his jawline. It was unfair that any man should possess such arrogant certainty of his own power to compel others to do his bidding, she thought nervously, her tongue wetting her dry lips, as long lashes flicked down over his eyes, hiding his thoughts from her. His touch had become less brutal, his fingers gently massaging the fragile bones of her shoulders, sending a warning screaming through her veins. This man is dangerous, it seemed to say, and with trembling certainty she knew that she had pulled the tiger’s tail and must surely suffer the consequences.

Without her being able to do a thing about it, Raschid slid his hands from her shoulders to her waist, propelling her towards him, his voice a mocking imitation of tenderness, as he murmured softly against her hair, ‘You leave me with very little choice, Miss Gordon. You have continually defied me, and must pay the price. You cannot expect me to believe you are naïve enough not to know how a man will retaliate when you challenge his most basic instincts?

‘Very well then,’ he said harshly, when she refused to answer, ‘let this be your punishment.’

Cruel hands imprisoned her against the hard warmth of his body, his voice cold as he commanded her to abandon her vain struggles to be free, as his mouth descended on hers with a punishing ferocity.

If she had once read passion into that full underlip, there was none now. It was a kiss of bitter anger; a contemptuous punishment of her defiance, breaking through the fragile cobweb dreams she had spun of a moment like this; alone in an Eastern dusk, in the arms of a man who could trace his origins back to the fierce tribesmen who called the whole desert home. But then, of course, she had been thinking of Faisal—not this man who crushed her against the steel wall of his chest, without a thought for the fragility of her own soft curves; who destroyed her dreams as easily as he might tear the wings from a foolish moth.

Furiously resentful, she withstood the harsh pressure of his mouth; rigidly refusing to admit defeat, her lips clamped shut against the demand of his. He might be able to physically restrain her, but nothing could make her respond to him in the way he had obviously intended.

This kiss could only have lasted seconds, but it seemed an eternity before she was released, feeling mangled like some poor creature set free from the talons of the falcons that sheikhs flew from their wrists.

She beat at his chest with ineffectual hands, but he grasped her wrists, smiling down tauntingly.

‘Well, do you still say that you can defy me?’

‘I’ll tell Faisal what you’ve done!’ Felicia all but wept, trembling with humiliation, but Raschid only laughed.

‘You would never dare,’ he told her softly. ‘We have a saying in our country, that it takes two to commit adultery. Mud sticks, Miss Gordon. By all means tell Faisal. I wish you would…!’

Leaving her to digest that remark, he released her so suddenly that she almost fell. Her fingers went instinctively to her throbbing lips, tears blurring her vision.

‘Oh, by the way,’ Raschid added casually, slipping a hand into his jacket and withdrawing the blue leather box that held the paperweight, ‘I suggest you give this to the person for whom it was originally intended.’ And he threw the box towards her. ‘I think we both of us know that you would never have bought such a gift for me, and you insult my intelligence by expecting me to believe that you did. Keep it for Faisal. I am sure he will be far more appreciative—and show it in a more acceptable way!’

He had gone before Felicia could admit that the paperweight had been purchased for Nadia, his anger leaving an almost tangible atmosphere in the cool garden.

He had shamed and humiliated her; mocked her love for Faisal and his for her, and treated her in a way that no man should ever treat a female member of his family, and yet try as she might she could not conjure up the comforting memory of how it felt to be in Faisal’s arms, and it came to her, with shock, that although he had driven her to fury and bitter despair she had not shrunk under Raschid’s embrace as she did when with Faisal. Because she had been too angry, she assured herself, staring down at the box in her hand.

Suddenly she hated the paperweight more than she had ever hated anything in her life. Before she could change her mind she hurled the box as far as she could, barely aware of the small, distant thud as it fell amongst some roses, then she turned her back on the courtyard and sought the sanctuary of her bedroom.

Under the electric light she saw the faint beginnings of what would eventually be bruises from Raschid’s tight grip.

Removing her clothes, she showered, soaping her flesh until it glowed, as though by doing so she could remove for all time the memory of Raschid’s kiss. She hated him! Hated him, she told her flushed reflection defiantly. So why was she crying, silly, weak tears, that would only afford her self-confessed enemy the greatest satisfaction?

She touched a tear-damp cheek with shaking fingers. In the space of a few earth-shaking minutes Raschid had destroyed her illusions and ripped away the veils of innocence which had hitherto protected her, and all because she had dared to flout his authority and walk unattended in the streets of Kuwait.

But as she waited for sleep to claim her, Felicia admitted that it went deeper than that. For the first time in her life she had experienced true fear, and as her eyes closed she fought desperately to remember what it had felt like to be held in Faisal’s arms, investing her memories with a passion they had never possessed in an endeavour to obliterate every last trace of Raschid’s touch.