скачать книгу бесплатно
His gaze settled on his guest. So far, Heidi wasn’t an unappealing choice.
She caught him looking at her and gave him a tight, worried smile. Malik was wrong, he thought. She wasn’t a prune. She was actually somewhat cute.
There were footsteps in the hallway. Heidi pushed up her glasses then leaned toward him. “Remember,” she said. “Be rude. Ignore me. It’s what I really want.”
He nodded his agreement, all the while wondering what it was he really wanted.
Jamal was not taking her concerns seriously, Heidi thought later as one of the servants cleared the dinner plates. Worse, the evening was not going as she’d hoped. For one thing, Jamal was now sitting across from her.
Fatima, Jamal’s grandmother, and the king had been the first to arrive. They’d taken seats at opposite ends of the table. Then when Khalil and his wife, Dora, had walked into the dining room, Fatima had insisted that Jamal move so that husband and wife could sit across from each other. Which meant Jamal had shifted to the seat opposite hers. Where she’d been forced to stare at him for the entire meal. It was horrible.
She took a sip of her wine and tried not to let her frustration—not to mention her apprehension—show.
Fatima leaned close and patted the back of Heidi’s hand. “Now that you’re going to be living here, we can plan a trip to London and attend the theater together,” she said.
Heidi pressed her lips together. That sounded like a normal enough statement—one she could respond to without fear of Jamal being dragged into the conversation again. “I’d like that,” she said cautiously. Fatima was safe, she reminded herself. The king’s mother had always been a friend.
Heidi risked a smile at the older woman. Tonight Fatima wore an elegant evening suit in dark gold. The tailored jacket emphasized her slender but regal figure, while her upswept hairstyle gave her added inches of height. Her makeup was perfect and discreet; the pearls at her ears matched the triple strand around her neck. Fatima was all Heidi aspired to be—beautiful, confident and in control.
“Jamal is very fond of the arts,” Givon said, his voice carrying the length of the table and then some. “Theater, dance, music. He enjoys it all.”
The king’s comment was only one of a dozen extremely unsubtle attempts to show how much Jamal and Heidi had in common.
Khalil, Jamal’s younger brother, looked up and grinned. “It’s true. Jamal lives for the arts. He’s so fond of them, sometimes we even call him Art. As a nickname.”
Dora, sitting across from her husband, touched her napkin to her mouth. “Ignore them both,” she said. “Khalil has a wicked sense of humor, which is currently operating at your expense. I will discuss it with him later and make sure the torment of this evening is not repeated.”
Khalil, sitting on Heidi’s left, didn’t look the least bit concerned. “Are you threatening me, wife?”
Dora, a pretty brunette with warm, friendly eyes, smiled. “Absolutely. Heidi is a guest here. Be kind to her.”
“You’re not lecturing the king,” her husband said.
“I’m not married to the king.” Dora turned her attention to Heidi. “I suggest you don’t pay any attention to them. The men in this family mean well, but they can be a trial.”
Heidi smiled weakly at the gesture of friendship. She hadn’t met Dora before, but she thought she might like Khalil’s wife. At least Dora seemed to be the sensible type.
“I’m not a trial,” the king insisted.
“Yes, you are,” Fatima and Dora said at once.
There was a moment of silence, then everyone laughed. Heidi tried to join in, but her heart had nestled firmly in her throat. It made it difficult to breathe, let alone laugh. She found it easier to simply be quiet and hope the conversation returned to a more normal topic.
To distract herself, she studied the room in which they were dining. The family dining room was an open area tucked into an alcove by the main garden. One wall was glass, opening out onto a fountain and the blooming flowers beyond. Extra chairs lined the back wall. Flowers decorated the white tablecloth. Silver gleamed, and crystal reflected the light of the brilliant chandelier overhead.
She wanted to say this was one of her favorite places in the palace, but the truth was, she enjoyed the entire structure. There was so much beauty here…so much history. Parts of the palace predated the Crusades. There were entire rooms filled with antique weapons, and the library contained dozens of books written and illustrated by hand.
“What are you thinking?” Jamal asked.
She looked up and found the prince’s dark eyes focused on her face. His attention made her nervous. She pushed her glasses into place and cleared her throat.
“Just that the palace is a very beautiful place. I’m pleased to be back. Did I mention that I was interested in restoring the ancient texts?”
“Jamal is interested in history,” the king said, interrupting. “He reads about it all the time.”
Jamal’s well-shaped mouth tightened in annoyance. “I live for history,” he said. “They call me History. It’s a nickname.” He tossed his napkin onto the table. “Come on, Heidi. I think you and I should leave these good people to finish their dinner.”
She rose gratefully to her feet. While she wasn’t all that excited about being alone with Jamal, she didn’t want to stay here and be tortured, either.
“Where are you going?” the king asked. “Into town? You could take her to a club. Or dancing. Dancing is nice.” He smiled at Heidi. “Don’t you like to dance?”
“Or a walk in the garden,” Fatima added quickly. “It’s very beautiful out tonight.”
“Hey, we could clear the table, and you two could get to it right—” Khalil stopped abruptly.
“You kicked me,” he accused, glaring at Dora. “What did I say?”
Dora ignored him. “Go,” she told Heidi. “I’ll hold them back while you two make your escape.”
Jamal held out his hand. Heidi took it and allowed him to lead her from the room. They raced to the end of the hallway, then made a series of quick turns, finally ending up in an alcove that led to one of the small gardens on the side of the palace.
Jamal leaned against the wall and dropped his chin to his chest. “That was horrible.”
“I tried to warn you,” Heidi told him. “But you wouldn’t listen.” She shuddered. “Dancing is nice. I can’t believe the king said that.”
Jamal looked at her. “You missed your line on that one.”
She thought for a minute, then laughed. “You’re right.” She pressed her free hand to her chest. “I live to dance. They call me Dan.”
Jamal chuckled, then jerked his head toward the glass doors. “If I promise not to discuss anything of significance, do you want to take a walk for a couple of minutes? Just until it’s safe to go our separate ways.”
“Sure.”
He pulled open one of the glass doors, and they stepped out into the night.
Heidi inhaled the scent of oranges and plants and turned earth and even the sweetness left by the lingering heat. She closed her eyes and sighed. “This is El Bahar,” she breathed. “I always try to remember how it smells in the gardens, but no matter how I promise myself I’ll remember, I always seem to forget. After a couple of months I can’t recall the exact sweetness, or the way the earth adds a darker tone to the fragrance. I lose the sounds of the night here. The chirpings and stirrings. The gentle splash of the fountains.”
“You love it here, don’t you?”
Heidi opened her eyes and found Jamal staring at her. She started to take a step back from him, only to discover that they still held hands. She looked at their entwined fingers in amazement. How had that happened?
“I, um…” She gave him a quick smile, then freed herself. “I’ve waited my whole life to live here. This is the only place I’ve felt at home.” She motioned to the garden. “I love the combination of old and new. We’re in the middle of the desert, and it’s June. The daytime temperature is among the hottest in the world. Yet this is lovely.”
Jamal shrugged out of his suit jacket and placed it on a bench next to them. “That’s because there are discreet air-conditioning vents and fans around here. It keeps the temperature down.”
“I don’t care. It’s magic, and that’s all that matters to me.”
He stared at her for a long time, then shoved his hands into his slacks pockets and asked, “Is that why you came back?”
They stood on a stone-paved path. There was a fountain to her left and a lattice covered in vines to her right. She traced one of the leaves.
“I didn’t come for the magic, if that’s what you’re asking. I told you, I want to work. Time and the elements are destroying hundreds of ancient texts each year. I want to preserve history so it isn’t lost.”
“What about your boyfriend? Wasn’t there someone special you left behind?”
He was kidding, right? Boyfriend? Her? She’d been groped a couple of times, but that hardly counted as a meaningful relationship. “Not exactly.”
“Then what…exactly?”
Was it her imagination, or had Jamal moved closer to her? She looked at him. “Let me be completely clear on the subject. I don’t want to get married.”
He was looming, she thought in some distress. Somehow he’d gotten taller, and he now loomed. A dark warrior prince in the night.
“To respond with like clearness,” he said seriously, although she would have sworn she saw a smile lurking at the corners of his mouth, “I don’t recall proposing.”
What was it with the heat on her face? “Yes, well, you might. And I don’t want you to.”
“Because you can’t say no?”
She pressed her fingers to her cheeks. “Exactly. I promise you that King Givon and Fatima are experts at pushing my buttons. They’ve done it before. When I graduated from college, all I wanted was to come here and work.”
“Isn’t that what happened?”
“No. Somehow they talked me into attending finishing school.” She sighed in disgust. “Do you know what year it is? Young women should not be attending finishing school in this day and age. It’s horrible.”
“But you went.”
“Exactly.” She looked at him. “Don’t ask me how it happened. One minute I was telling them I wasn’t interested in the idea and the next I was boarding a plane.” She paused, remembering those conversations two years ago. “I think of myself as a strong person, but maybe I don’t have any backbone. Maybe…”
She pressed her lips together as a sudden and unpleasant thought occurred to her. Fatima and the king had been very insistent about her going to finishing school. Before that, they’d both encouraged her to study Middle Eastern politics and history with an emphasis on El Bahar. Her education didn’t exactly prepare her to make her way in the world…unless they’d had a very specific job in mind.
She sucked in a breath. “Oh, no! They’ve been planning this for years .”
“Who’s been planning what?”
She clasped her hands together in front of her chest. “Jamal, you have to believe me. The king and your grandmother want us to marry. I just realized they’ve been preparing me for the role of your wife.” She thought about the exclusive all-girls boarding school she’d attended before her women’s college. Had they influenced her grandfather to arrange that? “Maybe for longer than I thought.”
She was so damn earnest, Jamal thought with amusement. Heidi looked up at him with her big eyes and her trembling mouth, acting as if her revelation was going to change the course of history.
“You’re saying they sent you to the closest equivalent of Princess School?”
Her nose got scrunchy. “You’re mocking me, but this is serious. I do not want to marry you.”
“You’ve got to stop flattering me, Heidi. It goes to my head.”
“Oh, don’t be such a man. I’m not being insulting. I can’t imagine you want to marry me, either. In fact this isn’t about you.”
“If we’re discussing marriage between the two of us, then it is about me.”
She dropped her hands to her sides and turned away. “You’re being deliberately obtuse.”
She was so frustrated by the situation. Her feelings about avoiding any kind of permanent entanglement were genuine enough to charm him. After spending his entire adult life avoiding women who wanted something from him, how was he supposed to resist a woman who couldn’t care less about his title, his money or his heritage?
He had a feeling that Heidi was right—that Fatima and his father had been preparing her to be his bride for some time. He’d made it clear he was in no hurry to marry again, so they wouldn’t have been concerned he would run off and fall in love. Been there, done that, he thought grimly. With disastrous results. He wasn’t anxious to repeat the experience.
But he would have to marry. For the sake of the kingdom and because he wanted children. So far Heidi was the front-runner. He held back a grin. He could only imagine how thrilled she would be to hear the news.
“What if I said I wouldn’t mind marrying you,” he said as much to tease her as to test the waters.
She spun back to face him. “Are you insane? ” she demanded. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. We have nothing in common.”
“On the contrary. We have several things in common. We care about El Bahar, both past and present. I’m very interested in preserving our heritage. You know the customs, you enjoy living in the palace. You’re intelligent enough to be able to handle the complexities of living a royal life. I suspect you think I’m handsome, and I find you quite attractive.”
The last bit was a stretch, but he’d told worse lies in his time. After all, it was for a good cause. In truth, she wasn’t unattractive , she just needed a little help.
She opened her mouth and closed it several times. No sound emerged. He watched the color climb her cheeks.
“You’re blushing,” he observed.
“No, I’m not. I don’t blush. Never. I don’t live an embarrassing life, so why would I blush?” Even so, she ducked her head and pressed the back of her hand against her cheek.
“Would it be so very terrible?” he asked.
“Yes!” She glared at him. “Why are you doing this? Why aren’t you running screaming in the opposite direction? I’ve just told you that your father wants you to marry a stranger, and you don’t seem to care.”
“I care. I just don’t think it’s the end of the world. There are worse fates.”
“Like what? Being buried alive? Being eaten by bloodsucking bats?”
He winced. “You’re right, Heidi. You don’t cater to the male ego. As my wife, you’d have to work on that.”
She stomped her foot. “Read my lips, Prince Jamal Khan of El Bahar. I am never, ever going to marry you. Not in this life, not in the next life, not even for a day. No. Not me. And that’s final.”
“Want to bet?”
Jamal grinned, then stepped close to her. He slipped one arm around her waist and slid the other around her shoulders. Instantly her body went stiff, and her mouth dropped open with shock.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked as she pressed her hands flat against his chest.
“Finding out if that mouth of yours is good for anything but tossing around insults.”
Her hazel eyes flashed with fire. He was afraid the heat just might melt the frames of her glasses.
“Don’t even think about it,” she told him. “I’m not interested in you in that way. I don’t enjoy physical contact. I will only ask this once, sir. Unhand me.”
“If you’re only going to ask once, then I’ll only have to answer once. No.”
Chapter Three
