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‘The one which seems to be glued to your left thigh.’
Was it rude to stand in front of a sheikh with your hand rammed deeply into your pocket? She supposed that it was. And she couldn’t exactly potter one-handedly around this vast kitchen making tea, with his clever black eyes watching her, could she? Reluctantly, she withdrew her fingers, aware of the scratch of the stone against the denim and the dazzle of the gem as it emerged into the light.
The feeling of wonderment she’d been experiencing just minutes before his arrival now evaporated into one of acute embarrassment. Stupidly, she found her cheeks colouring as she lifted her eyes to meet his—but finding nothing other than cold curiosity in his gaze.
‘Why, Francesca,’ he said, with a note in his voice she’d never heard before. ‘I don’t believe it. You’re engaged to be married.’
CHAPTER TWO (#u0d7633fa-594f-5b1f-ab6d-e525e3790232)
BLACK eyes burned into her with a question blazing at their depths and for a moment Frankie felt oddly weak beneath their fierce scrutiny.
‘You’re getting married?’ Zahid queried silkily.
Frankie nodded, her throat parchment-dry, wondering why she was feeling so damned nervous when she should have been feeling proud. ‘Yes. Yes, I am.’
‘When did this happen?’
‘Just—yesterday.’
‘Let me see. Oh, please don’t be coy about it.’ His black eyes gleamed with some dark emotion she didn’t recognise. ‘Come on, Francesca—I thought that all women loved showing off their engagement rings?’
Reluctantly, Frankie extended her hand and as he took it in his she felt the prickle of awareness as the sheikh’s warm flesh touched hers. Hadn’t there been years and years when she’d dreamt of Zahid holding her hand like this? And yet the exquisite irony was that at last it was happening and it meant precisely nothing. All he was doing was holding her hand so that he could examine an engagement ring bought for her by another man!
Zahid frowned as he studied the gem closely, feeling her unmistakable shiver as she pulled her fingers away. And hadn’t he felt the faintest whisper of something himself? Something which, if he didn’t know better, might almost have been the first potent shimmering of desire. Lifting his head, he met her eyes, raising his brows in mocking query. ‘But surely this should be a cause for celebration, rather than secrecy?’
The colour in her cheeks intensified. ‘Oh, but it is.’ So why had she been hiding the ring from him? The unspoken question hovered on the air, but even if he’d asked her Frankie doubted whether she would have been able to come up with a satisfactory explanation. Not to him—not even to herself. And as it happened, he didn’t ask her.
‘So who’s the lucky man?’
‘His name’s Simon Forrester.’
‘Simon Forrester.’ Zahid pulled out a chair from beneath the large, scrubbed oak table and sat down, spreading his legs out in front of him. Idly, he noticed the unusual and fancy display of hothouse roses which were sitting there replacing the hand-picked sprigs from the garden which she normally favoured. Had ‘Simon’ bought her those? Was he the reason for the long hair and the junking of her glasses? The incentive to start wearing sexy jeans and a clinging sweater? Had Simon woken her up to all kinds of new experiences, as well as a new way of dressing?
Inexplicably, he felt the souring flavour of distaste in his mouth. ‘And what does he do, this Simon Forrester?’
Frankie’s smile became fixed. Wasn’t this what she had instinctively been fearing—having to give a detailed account? She felt like telling him that it wasn’t his place to just breeze in after however long it had been and start interrogating her. But she knew that there was no point. Zahid was used to getting exactly what he wanted—and why on earth wouldn’t she tell him?
‘He owns the estate agency I work in. Remember I mentioned I’d started there, in one of my Christmas cards?’
Had she? Zahid frowned. He was certain she knew that Christmas wasn’t celebrated in Khayarzah, but she still insisted on sending him a card every year. And for some reason, he insisted on opening them himself—instead of letting one of his aides deal with it. They were always variations on a theme: images of robins and berry-laden sprigs of holly. Or carol singers singing in snowy villages. And even though he didn’t celebrate Christmas, he did find those cards made him nostalgic for the years he spent in England while he was at boarding school.
‘Maybe you did mention it,’ he said slowly. But it was a surprise. Hadn’t he thought she might follow a scientific route, like her father? ‘Tell me more.’
Frankie bit her lip. He didn’t have a clue what she was talking about! Obviously, he never even bothered to read the chatty accompanying letter she always took the time to tuck inside the annual card. ‘Well, Simon runs a very successful company—’
‘Not about the company, Francesca—about him,’ he butted in. ‘This man you are proposing to marry. This Simon Forrester.’
It wasn’t easy when she felt as if he were spearing her with hostile black light from his eyes and spitting out Simon’s name as if it were some particularly nasty kind of medicine, but Frankie tried to remember all the things she liked best about her fiancé. Those blue eyes and the way he’d dazzled her with his attention. The roses which he’d had sent to her house, week after week—she, who had never received a bunch of flowers in her life!
She licked her lips. ‘He’s not the kind of man I would have normally expected to go out with—’
‘Really? You go out with many men, do you?’ he fired back. ‘And then compare them?’
‘N-no.’ Why on earth was he looking at her so darkly? ‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘So what do you mean?’
Frankie swallowed as she filled the kettle from the big, old-fashioned sink and put it on to boil. Why was he tying her up in knots with his clever line in questioning and, furthermore, why was he being so … aggressive? As if he had some sort of right to question her. Resisting the impulse to tell him it was none of his business, she forced her mind back to Simon and an image of his face popped into her mind. She thought of the thick lock of hair which flopped onto his forehead unless he brushed it back, which he did—rather a lot, as it happened. ‘Well, he’s blond and very good-looking.’
Zahid scowled. ‘I’m disappointed in you, Francesca,’ he said. ‘Are you really so superficial that physical attributes matter most?’
‘That’s rich, coming from you!’ said Frankie quietly, before she could stop herself.
There was a short and disbelieving silence. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Oh, but it does.’ His voice dipped to a tone of menacing silk. ‘Tell me.’
Frankie met the flash of annoyance which sparked from his eyes. Why shouldn’t she tell him? He didn’t think twice about foisting his opinion on her. ‘You’re not such an angel yourself, are you, Zahid? Don’t you use your so-called “business” trips to Europe and the United States as a cover-up for your affairs with women?’
It would have been laughable if it were not so insulting and Zahid felt a mounting fury that Francesca—whom he had known all her life—could think so poorly of him. As if he were nothing more than some brainless stud. ‘And just where did you acquire this fascinating piece of information?’
‘The gossip columns are always full of your exploits—though I notice that they’ve tailed off since you became King. But prior to that, you were always being seen with some woman or other!’
‘How very naïve you are, Francesca.’ With a faint sigh of impatience, he shook his dark head and subjected her to a look of chilly censure. ‘Do you really believe everything you read in the papers?’
‘I believe the evidence of my own eyes! I’ve seen enough photos of you wit … with …’ To her fury and consternation, Frankie found that her breath was catching in her throat and that her mind was now being plagued with images far more vivid than that of Simon’s face.
Zahid with a Hollywood hottie gazing up at him, with naked adoration on her face. Zahid being papped with a sexy international lawyer who had been representing one of his rivals in some complicated court case. Except that she was pretty sure it wasn’t written into a legal code of conduct that a legal representative should look at her own client’s adversary as if she’d like to eat him up for breakfast. ‘With all kinds of women!’ she finished hotly. ‘Making you look like some sort of international playboy!’
Zahid winced and, to be fair, he conceded that she did have a point. He had always enjoyed a colourful and varied sex-life until the constraints of his unexpected new role as King had forced him to employ a little more prudence. But even so …
‘And you think that’s the only reason I travel?’ he demanded. ‘To have affairs with women?’
As his tone of indignation washed over her Frankie forced herself to remember all his humanitarian work. She thought about the money he’d poured into a world peace project and the well-received speeches he had made on the subject. Just because she had experienced the green-eyed monster when she’d seen the photos didn’t mean that she should make him out to be some kind of uncaring brute who was only interested in bedding members of the opposite sex.
She shook her head. ‘No, of course I don’t and I shouldn’t have implied that I did,’ she said stiffly, tipping boiling water into a pot containing two mint tea bags and glancing up to find his eyes on her. ‘But even you wouldn’t deny that it’s probably one of the perks of being away from all the restrictions in Khayarzah.’
He gave a brief nod. How well she knew him. Or maybe it was just that she was permitted the rare freedom to be able to voice such thoughts because of her long association with his family. And because of the great debt he owed to her father …
‘I’m sorry about your father,’ he said suddenly. ‘And I’m sorry I couldn’t get to the funeral.’
Frankie puckered her lips tightly as she picked up the teapot. Don’t show emotion, she told herself fiercely. It’s counterproductive because it will only get you upset—and it really isn’t done to break down in front of the sheikh, no matter how well you think you know him.
‘I understand,’ she answered, her voice sounding like a child’s squeaky toy. ‘You explained in your letter that you had only just acceded to the throne, and that you c-couldn’t get away.’
Zahid nodded, remembering back to those troubled days—when the crown he had never imagined he would wear had been placed on his head. ‘I couldn’t,’ he said simply.
‘It was good of your brother to come in your place. And that wreath you sent,’ Frankie added, with a gulp. ‘It was absolutely b-beautiful.’
He heard her voice wobble and he glared, getting up from the table to take the teapot from her trembling hands. ‘Here. Let me take that.’
‘You can’t pour your own tea.’
‘Don’t be so ridiculous,’ he returned. ‘I can just about upend a pot of boiling water. Or do you think I have people waiting on me every second of the day?’
‘Pretty much.’
A faint smile edged the corners of his mouth. ‘Impertinent woman,’ he murmured, and as he said it found himself looking into her startled blue eyes as one word leapt out and hung in the air surrounding them. He felt a pulse of heat deep in his groin. Woman. He swallowed. He would never have said that to her before. Nor found himself looking at her lips and wondering what it would be like to kiss them—even though they weren’t wearing a scrap of make-up. Did Simon not like her wearing make-up? he wondered heatedly.
Frankie took one of the mugs of tea and quickly moved away—the fact that it was burning her hand hardly noticeable when measured against the hot burning in her cheeks which had followed that curiously intense moment back then. ‘I’ll … I’ll get some honey,’ she said.
Glad to have the distraction of moving away, she walked over to one of the cupboards. Her fingers were trembling as she brought out a half-filled jar and handed it to him, and she watched as he spooned a teaspoonful of honey in each cup, seeing it melt in a golden puddle into the pale green liquid.
He looked up then, a careless question in his eyes. ‘So when do I get to meet him?’
‘Meet him?’ Francesca’s heart thudded. Surely he didn’t mean what she thought he meant? ‘Wh-who?’
‘Simon.’
She stared at him, trying to disguise her horror—some instinct telling her that Zahid and Simon should be kept apart at all costs. ‘Wh-why on earth would you want to meet him?’
He shrugged and her obvious reluctance to have him do so only fired up his sense of determination that he should. ‘Why wouldn’t I? My country owes a great debt to your father and I am an old family friend. Since you don’t have any senior male relative to look out for you, I consider it my duty to meet the man you are intending to marry.’
Frankie hoped that her face didn’t betray her appalled reaction to his suggestion—and not just because he had painted a rather grim image of himself as a “senior male relative”. The last thing she wanted was for him to meet Simon—because surely Zahid would make any man look hapless in his presence.
‘Well, perhaps we can arrange something for the next time you’re in town,’ she said, with the confident air of someone who knew that tight royal schedules made such casual meetings almost impossible.
‘But aren’t you seeing him tonight? Aren’t you planning to cook him dinner?’
She wondered how on earth he could have known that until she saw him looking at the covered dish of chicken and the little heap of potatoes waiting to be peeled; the box of unopened candles which lay next to them. Perhaps he had been a detective in another life, she thought crossly. ‘Yes, I’m cooking him dinner. I’d ask you to join us except that you’re probably busy.’ She gave a weak smile. ‘And I’ve only got two chicken breasts.’
Zahid almost laughed at the sheer banality of her statement, but the truth of it was that her attitude was firing him up even more. He wasn’t used to people saying no to him. And his curiosity had been aroused. What was she trying to hide? ‘No woman should have to cook a meal when she’s just got engaged—she should be freed from the drudgery of domesticity and left to enjoy the romance,’ he said silkily. ‘So I’ll take you and Simon out to dinner instead.’
‘No, honestly—’
‘Yes, honestly,’ he mocked. ‘I insist. What’s the name of a good local restaurant?’
‘Le Poule au Pot is pretty good—but you’ll never get a table this late.’
‘Please don’t be naïve, Francesca—I can always get a table. I’ll meet you in there at eight-thirty,’ he said implacably, as—pushing away his untouched tea—he got up from the table.
Frankie scrambled to her feet, aware of the sheer power of his body as she stared up into his hawklike features. ‘I suppose there’s no point in me trying to change your mind?’
‘No point at all.’ Black eyes bored into her. ‘And why would you want to?’
This silky challenge she couldn’t—or wouldn’t—answer. All she knew was that the thought of subjecting Simon—and herself—to the distracting company of the powerful man she’d known since childhood was filling her with trepidation.
Zahid looked down into her upturned face and those strangely kissable lips, which her tiny white teeth were currently digging into as she turned anxious blue eyes up at him. And in that moment she looked so vulnerable yet so damned sexy that he began to wonder whether fate might not have had a hand in bringing him here today.
‘Just don’t be late,’ he added softly.
CHAPTER THREE (#u0d7633fa-594f-5b1f-ab6d-e525e3790232)
‘SMILE, baby, and just relax—we’re going to have a ball.’ Relax? Frankie swallowed down the acid taste of nerves as Simon eased his car into the last available spot in the Le Poule au Pot’s car park. How could she possibly relax, knowing that an evening with Zahid lay ahead of them? Questions had been spinning round in her head all the time she was getting ready. Wondering why the autocratic sheikh was insisting on taking them out to dinner—and what on earth his agenda was. Was it really because he wanted to vet Simon, to see if he measured up and was suitable? And if so, wasn’t that an awfully old-fashioned point of view?
‘I just wish we weren’t going out,’ she said, her fingers playing nervously with her necklace. ‘And having a quiet dinner at home instead—the way we’d planned.’ Simon put the brakes on and shot a quick look at himself in the driving mirror. ‘Are you crazy? You’re best buddies with some sheikh—’
‘I wouldn’t describe us as “best buddies”—’ ‘
Well, friendly enough for him to invite us out. And you’d rather be sitting in your old kitchen with a home-cooked meal? I mean, what planet are you on, Frankie? Wait till I tell everyone that I had dinner with a royal!’
‘But you mustn’t,’ put in Frankie anxiously. ‘That’s the whole point. You’re not supposed to mention it to anyone—it’s an infringement on their privacy and they get little enough of that as it is.’
Simon’s smile was tight. ‘Let’s not drift too far from reality, shall we? I don’t need lessons in protocol from my secretary.’ He gave her knee a quick squeeze. ‘Even if she does also happen to be my fiancée!’
She gave him a weak, answering smile but Frankie’s heart was pounding as they entered the restaurant and she felt an overpowering feeling of relief when she realised that Zahid wasn’t there. Maybe he’d changed his mind about coming, she thought hopefully as they were led to their table. Decided that something more important—or someone very beautiful—had come up. Any minute now and the maître d’ would discreetly slide up to their table and tell them that he had been unavoidably detained, and …
‘Hello, Francesca.’
She’d been so deep in thought that she hadn’t noticed the sheikh enter the room until his silken and faintly accented voice broke into her thoughts. She looked up and there he was, standing in front of their table like some dark god—with Simon springing to his feet as if his long-lost brother had just appeared and for one awful moment Frankie thought that he was actually going to try to embrace the sheikh.
But Zahid pre-empted any inappropriate familiarity by extending a cool hand in greeting and an even cooler smile. ‘You must be Simon.’
‘And you must be Zahid. Frankie’s told me all about you.’
‘Has she really?’ Dark eyes were briefly glittered in her direction as Frankie attempted to clamber to her feet, but a careless wave of his hand indicated that she should remain seated.
‘Of course I haven’t,’ said Frankie. ‘And please won’t you sit down, Zahid?’ she added on a whisper. ‘Everyone’s staring at us.’
It was true. Even the eyes of the more studiedly cool diners seemed to be drawn irresistibly to the tall man in the impeccably cut suit, whose two burly-looking companions had been seated rather ostentatiously at a table right by the door. Frankie sighed. Even if it hadn’t been for his bodyguards, he just oozed power, wealth and a potent sexual charisma which had all the women in the restaurant responding to him. She could see a blonde who’d been shoehorned into a silver dress and who seemed to be wearing most of Fort Knox around her neck was now flashing him a sticky, vermilion-lip-sticked smile.
But Zahid seemed oblivious to the restrained excitement his presence was causing. Instead, he sat down with his back to the room, and as two waiters fussed round them with the kind of speed she wasn’t used to Frankie realised that this was the first time she’d actually been out in public with him—and that this must be what it was like all the time. The flattery and deference. His every wish anticipated and granted. No wonder his manner could be so assured and so … so … arrogant.
Having refused wine himself, Zahid ordered champagne for a clearly eager Simon and then leaned back in his chair—looking, thought Frankie indignantly, as if he were interviewing them for some sort of job!
‘I gather congratulations are in order, Simon,’ he murmured. ‘You are indeed a lucky man.’
Simon took a mouthful of champagne, followed by an appreciative glance at the label on the bottle. ‘Aren’t I just? Although naturally, there were lots of raised eyebrows when we first announced it!’
Zahid slowly curled his fingers over the starched linen surface of the tablecloth. ‘Really?’ he questioned coolly.
Simon leaned across the table towards him, in a man-to-man kind of way. ‘Well, lots of my friends were surprised to begin with,’ he confided.
Frankie squirmed. She could guess what was coming and although she didn’t usually mind Simon’s justifiable boasts about the dramatic effect he’d had on her appearance, something in her rebelled at having Zahid hear them. ‘Zahid isn’t interested,’ she said quickly.
‘Oh, but Zahid is,’ corrected the sheikh archly. ‘In fact, he’s absolutely fascinated. Do continue, Simon.’
