The Sheikh's Prize Read online

  Saffy dropped down onto the nearest sofa, lowered her head and breathed in slow and deep while she fought to reclaim her composure. Her head was swimming, her skin damp with perspiration and she felt slightly sick.

  ‘When would you like to move out?’ Zahir enquired smoothly. ‘Give me a date and I will have all the arrangements made for you. There will be no hassle, no inconvenience—’

  ‘Move out?’ Saffy questioned blankly. ‘I’m not moving anywhere!’

  ‘You can’t continue to live here with McDonald.’

  With unsteady hands Saffy caught up her trailing hair and shoved it back from her clammy face as she clumsily sat up. ‘What just happened was a bad idea. A really bad idea and letting you keep me in an apartment somewhere as a mistress is never going to happen, Zahir. Just accept that.’

  ‘I will not accept it.’

  Saffy sprang up on a surge of temper and just as suddenly the room seemed to spin violently around her. Disorientated, she swayed sickly, so dizzy she couldn’t focus and she couldn’t combat the rising tide of darkness that engulfed her as she fainted.

  With a sharp imprecation, Zahir snatched her limp body up from the wooden floor and he settled her down on the sofa. Saffy recovered consciousness quickly and blinked in confusion to find him on his knees beside her. ‘What happened?’

  ‘You just dropped where you stood,’ Zahir breathed tautly. ‘Did I hurt you? Are you ill?’

  Her lashes fluttered in bemusement as she dimly registered the sound of the front door slamming. ‘No,’ she whispered weakly. ‘But I think the real problem may be that I’m pregnant…’

  ‘Pregnant?’ Zahir exclaimed, his strong bone structure pulling taut below his olive skin. ‘When did you get pregnant?’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ a familiar voice interposed from the door, which Zahir had left ajar. ‘Is this one of those moments when I walk out and come back in making more noise so that you know that I’m here?’

  ‘Cameron?’ Saffy craned her neck and began to sit up as her flatmate stared at her anxiously from across the room. Her brain felt as lively as sludge. She had not meant to blurt out her suspicion that she might be pregnant; she had simply spoken her thoughts out loud and now felt exceedingly foolish. ‘I fainted. I’ve never done that in my life before.’

  ‘There’s a first time for everything,’ Cameron said soothingly.

  ‘Pregnant,’ Zahir said again as though he could not get past that single word, and he studied Cameron grimly. ‘Your child?’

  ‘No, you can leave me out of this little chat. I bat for the other team,’ Cameron confided with a wry smile. ‘You need to make an urgent appointment with the doctor, Saffy.’

  Zahir’s brow indented. ‘What do you mean?’ he queried.

  ‘I’m her gay best friend and you can only be Zahir,’ Cameron responded ruefully. ‘The guards at the front door and the limo flying the little flag parked outside are a dead giveaway.’

  ‘You’re gay?’ Zahir murmured wrathfully, and he fixed brilliant dark golden eyes accusingly on Saffy. ‘Why didn’t you tell me that?’

  ‘It was none of your business.’

  ‘And the baby?’ Zahir prompted tautly.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Cameron said quietly, and he walked back out of the room, carefully closing the door in his wake.

  Sitting up then because she no longer felt light-headed, Saffy swung her feet down onto the floor and swivelled round to face Zahir. ‘Look, I don’t even know yet if I am pregnant,’ she admitted heavily. ‘I have a test but I haven’t used it yet. My suspicions may just be my imagination.’

  His face granite hard, Zahir studied her intently like a male struggling to concentrate on only one thing at a time. ‘If he’s gay, why do you live with him?’

  ‘Because he’s my friend and we both were keen to buy an apartment at the same time. We get on very well,’ Saffy told him wryly, wishing she had bitten her tongue out of her head before letting drop the fact that she suspected that she might be pregnant, for such a threat—and she had no doubt that he would see it as a threat—would only create more stormy waves in her dealings with Zahir.

  ‘If McDonald’s gay, why do people believe you and he are a couple?’ Zahir persisted.

  Saffy sighed. ‘Cameron was raised by elderly grandparents and he’s very attached to them. He doesn’t think they could accept his sexuality and he says he won’t come out of the closet until they’re gone.’

  ‘So, in the meantime he uses you for cover.’

  ‘We use each other,’ Saffy parried without hesitation. ‘I get bothered less by aggressive men as long as Cameron appears to be part of my life. Now can we please leave my friend out of this discussion?’

  Zahir gritted his even white teeth together. ‘Pregnant,’ he repeated afresh.

  ‘Maybe, maybe not,’ Saffy muttered wearily. ‘Look, I’ll go and do the wretched test now and we’ll see if there’s anything to worry about.’

  ‘If it is true, how will we know whether or not it is mine?’ Zahir demanded icily.

  ‘Don’t make me slap you, Zahir. I haven’t the energy right now,’ Saffy sighed unhappily, moving past him.

  Long brown fingers snapped round her wrist to hold her still. ‘Do you have any idea how major an event this could be for a man in my position?’ he raked down at her.

  ‘No and, right now, I don’t want to think about it. I only want to find out if there is anything for us to worry about. You shouldn’t have come here, Zahir. You should have kept your distance. What happened between us in Maraban ended there. You’re screwing up my life,’ Saffy condemned, dragging her arm angrily free.

  ‘It won’t be at an end if you’re carrying my child.’

  Without another word, Saffy trudged through the hall to the bathroom, retrieved the test kit from the cupboard and pulled out the instructions. Minutes later she stood at the window holding the wand, waiting to see the result. She still felt shell-shocked by the explosive passion that had erupted between them, had never dreamt that she could lose control of her own body to such an extent, had not even suspected that the desire for sex might so badly betray her principles. Of course it had not occurred to her either that she would see him again, that he would deliberately seek her out in London or tell her that he couldn’t sleep for wanting her. At least she wasn’t the only one of them tossing and turning sleepless in the dark of the night, she thought wretchedly. But without the smallest warning, everything had changed. She had believed she could shrug off their encounter in Maraban; she had tried to tell herself that she had used him. In short, she reflected painfully, she had told herself a whole lot of face-saving rubbish in an effort to persuade herself that she was fully in control of events and now reality was banging very loudly at her door.

  Almost absent-mindedly she looked down at the wand in her hand and her entire body froze. She gulped in a breath, checked her watch, gazed down transfixed at the line that had formed just as the instructions had explained. Her legs suddenly felt so woolly she had to perch on the side of the bath. Be careful of what you wish for…for according to the test result, she was pregnant. For a split second a rush of joy consumed her and then she recalled Zahir’s hard, forbidding expression and she groaned out loud, for nothing but complications lay ahead. Zahir and an accidental pregnancy would be a very dangerous combination: Zahir liked to plan everything; Zahir had to be in control; Zahir had been raised in a culture in which such a development was totally unacceptable, socially, morally and every other way there was.

  Why, oh, why had she opened her silly mouth and told him? Regret touched her deep. Now whether she liked it or not he was involved and it would have been much better for both of them if he was not. She didn’t want him involved. Even less did she want him to be hostile to her condition. She might never before have allowed herself to dream of having a baby, but she would never, ever have chosen to have a child by a man who couldn’t possibly want either of them.

  Saffy walked back into the living room
where Zahir was drinking coffee—Cameron evidently having played host in her absence—and staring moodily out of the window. He didn’t like cities: he felt claustrophobic in them. Why did she still remember that? Hearing her entrance, he swung round, stunning dark golden eyes shooting straight to her pale, tight features.

  And he knew, that fast he knew, read the defensiveness there and the reluctance to get any closer to him. Why? Was she afraid of him now? Did she think that in some way he meant her harm? Her golden hair had dried into loose, undisciplined waves round her lovely oval face and her eyes were incredibly blue against her pallor. Even with strain etched in every line of her visage she was hauntingly beautiful.

  ‘We do have something to worry about,’ she confirmed.

  Zahir released his breath in a slow hiss, not a muscle moving on his lean bronzed face. ‘I thought you were taking the contraceptive pill.’

  ‘You assumed I was. I saw no reason to tell you otherwise because I didn’t think this situation would arise,’ Saffy admitted doggedly, determined to be honest now because matters had become too serious for her to risk even half-truths.

  ‘Why were you not taking precautions to protect yourself against this development?’ he demanded.

  ‘I had no reason to. I wasn’t having sex with anyone, so you don’t need to wonder whose child it is,’ she told him tightly, colour mantling her cheekbones.

  ‘Naturally I will wonder. I have no wish to offend you but I was certainly under the impression that you had other lovers,’ Zahir countered flatly.

  ‘Don’t believe all that you read in the papers,’ Saffy advised, lifting her head high, her blue eyes guarded.

  ‘I don’t but, even allowing for a fair amount of exaggeration and invented stories, there is room for me to doubt the likelihood that in one brief encounter I have fathered your child,’ Zahir fielded very quietly.

  ‘I didn’t think it was very likely either, but we’re both young and healthy, it was the wrong time of the month for me to have an accident and clearly you have killer sperm,’ Saffy told him drily.

  ‘Don’t make a joke of it,’ Zahir growled.

  ‘I can’t prove it’s your baby until after it’s born,’ Saffy murmured ruefully. ‘DNA testing is too risky during pregnancy. On the other hand you could think back sensibly to that day in the tent and appreciate that ironically you are the only lover I’ve ever had.’

  Zahir frowned, winged ebony brows pleating above questioning dark as night eyes flaring with disbelief. ‘That is not possible.’

  ‘Forget the newspaper stories and your prejudices and think about it rationally,’ Saffy urged with quiet dignity, determined not to allow him to continue to cherish doubts about who had fathered her child. ‘You’re not stupid—I know you’re not. I was a virgin.’

  All colour bled from below his olive-toned complexion as he stared back at her with smouldering golden force and she recognised the exact moment when he recalled the blood stains on the bed because he suddenly swore in Arabic, tore his stunned gaze from hers and half swung away from her, his lean brown hands clenching into fists. ‘If that is true, I have greatly wronged you,’ he bit out rawly.

  ‘We wronged each other a long time ago,’ Saffy cut in. ‘I chose to share that bed with you. It was my decision and this is my…er, problem.’

  ‘If it’s my child, it’s mine too and I don’t see our child as a problem,’ Zahir retorted with a harsh edge to his dark deep voice. ‘We’ll remarry just as soon as I can arrange it.’

  ‘Remarry?’ Saffy gasped in wonderment. ‘You have to be joking!’

  ‘Our child’s future is too serious to joke about and it can only be secured through marriage.’

  ‘And we all know how that turned out the last time,’ Saffy returned doggedly, fighting to think logically because his proposal had shaken her to her very depths. Was he serious? Was he really serious?

  ‘When my father died and I took the throne, everything changed in Maraban,’ Zahir declared levelly. ‘We would be able to lead normal lives now. You’re pregnant. Of course, I want to marry you.’

  Saffy was reeling from a dozen different reactions: disbelief, scorn, anger, frustration among them. Zahir was set on taking charge as usual. He wasn’t reacting on a personal level, he was reacting as a public figure, keen to hide an embarrassing mistake within the respectability of marriage.

  ‘I don’t want to marry you just because I’m pregnant.’

  ‘And what do you think your child would want?’ Zahir shot that icily controlled demand back at her. ‘If you don’t marry me, you will deprive that child of a father and of the status in life he or she has a right to enjoy. Without marriage, the child will have to remain secret and it will be almost impossible for me to establish a normal relationship with him or her.’

  In one cool statement, Zahir had given Saffy a lot to think about, but then faster than the speed of light her child had gone from being a line on a test wand to a living, breathing being, who might well question her decisions at a later date. For the first time she appreciated that she could not continue to put her own wants and needs first because, whatever she chose to do, she would, one day, have to take responsibility for the choices she had made on her child’s behalf.

  ‘We could get married just to ensure that the baby was legitimate…and then get another divorce,’ she suggested tautly.

  Brilliant dark eyes flamed golden as flames. ‘Is that really the very best you can offer? Is the prospect of being my wife again such a sacrifice?’

  Saffy studied the floor. She thought of the wicked forbidden delight of his passion, recognising that on that level everything between them had radically changed. She looked up, feeling the instant mesmeric pull of him the moment she saw his lean dark face. Her heart hammered inside her, her mouth running dry.

  ‘Couldn’t you give our marriage a second chance?’ Zahir asked huskily.

  ‘It’s too soon to consider that,’ Saffy argued. ‘The first thing I need to do now is see my doctor and confirm that I am pregnant. Then we’ll decide what to do. Look at this from my point of view. When you arrived here, you asked me to be your mistress…now suddenly you’re talking marriage, but I don’t want to get married purely because you accidentally got me pregnant.’

  Zahir surveyed her with stormy intensity and the atmosphere thickened as though laced with cracked ice. ‘I believe in fate, not accidents. What is meant to be will be.’

  Saffy rolled her eyes, compressed her lips and stood up. ‘You shipped me out to the desert for seduction, not fatherhood. You brought this roof down over our ears—you sort it out!’

  ‘Marriage will sort it out,’ he contended stubbornly.

  ‘Oh, if only it were that simple.’

  ‘But it is.’ Before she could even guess his intention, he had closed a hand over hers. His brilliant gaze sought and held hers by sheer force of will. ‘Right now, it’s the best choice you can make. Let go of the past. Trust me to look after you and my child. I will not let you down.’

  ‘And would you agree to a divorce at a later date?’ Saffy prompted shakily, more impressed than she wanted to be by his promise of good intentions.

  ‘If that’s what you wanted, if you were unhappy as you were before, yes,’ Zahir agreed grittily, not choosing to add the unpleasant realities that would accompany any such decision on her part. Complete honesty was not possible. What really mattered was getting that ring back on her finger and securing their child’s future. ‘This is not about us, this is about our child, what he or she needs most.’

  ‘If you really mean that…’ Saffy drew in a ragged breath, terrified of the confusing thoughts teeming through her head. She was trying very hard to put the welfare of her child first and not muddy the waters with the bitterness of the past and the insecurity of the present. He would keep his promise: she knew that. On that level she trusted him and she quite understood that he wanted their child to have the very best start in life possible. They owed their child tha
t chance.

  ‘I do,’ Zahir confirmed levelly.

  ‘Then on that basis, I agree.’ So great was the stress of making that announcement that Saffy felt light-headed again as all the little devils in her memory banks began queuing up to remind her of how vulnerable she would be if she put herself in Zahir’s power again.

  Zahir released her hand. ‘I’ll organise it.’

  He got as far as the door before Saffy called him back to say tautly, ‘I want a proper wedding.’

  ‘Meaning?’ Zahir sought to clarify.

  ‘No hole-in-the-corner do in the embassy for me this time,’ Saffy spelled out with scorn. ‘I want a bridal gown and a family occasion with my sisters as bridesmaids and all the rest of the wedding hoopla.’

  Taken aback by the admission, Zahir literally paled.

  ‘Those are my terms and I won’t budge on them,’ Saffy completed doggedly.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘ARE YOU REALLY sure about doing this?’ Kat looked tense and anxious and Saffy immediately felt guilty.

  What had she been thinking of when she dragged her family into all of this? A shotgun wedding, no less. Her sister, Kat, didn’t need the stress but she had insisted on organising the wedding within the space of one incredibly short week and had proven that if sufficient money was thrown at a challenge, it could be done. Saffy studied her reflection in the mirror. Her gorgeous designer wedding dress was a classic, nipped in at the waist for shape and falling in fluid folds to her satin-clad feet. She wasn’t wearing a veil: the hairdresser had piled her hair up and topped it with the magnificent sapphire and diamond tiara Zahir had sent to her. Matching drop earrings sparkled with every movement she made.

  ‘Saffy?’ the attractive redhead pressed. ‘You know, it may be your wedding day but it’s still not too late to change your mind. You don’t have to marry Zahir. You don’t have to do this to please anybody.’

  Looking reflective, Saffy breathed in deep. ‘I really do want to give our baby the chance to have two parents. None of us ever had that. My sisters and I had you and you were a brilliant stand-in Mum,’ she told Kat warmly. ‘But I’d like to try it the old-fashioned way before I try to go it alone.’