Bartered to the Sheikh: Honour, duty, marriage ... and passionate desert nights Read online

  She did love him.

  But that love scared her.

  “It will not take long,” he murmured, running a single finger down her arm. Goosebumps danced behind it.

  “Do I have any choice?”

  He felt that now familiar mix of guilt and frustration. He lowered his finger to her hand. “We all have choices. Always.”

  And she had made hers.

  She’d married him.

  She was his wife. For better or for worse, that commitment had been her choice.

  She nodded with a weary acceptance. “Fine.”

  He stepped out of bed and moved towards the palatial bathroom. “Excellent. Be ready as quickly as possible.”

  She lifted her fingers to her forehead in an imitation of a salute, but he didn’t see. He was already, mentally at least, miles away.

  Sally readied herself with trepidation. Her sense that she was completely out of her league with Khalid only seemed to magnify with every moment that passed. She stepped out of her own dressing room a little over an hour later, fully aware she’d been dragging her heels out of an increasing sense of anxiety.

  Khalid’s eyes were unreadable when they sought hers. A knot had formed in Sally’s throat. She swallowed past it and walked towards him.

  He smiled with a gentleness that surprised her. “Are you ready?”

  What for? She nodded anyway, dropping her gaze.

  He put a hand in the small of her back, and led her out of their rooms, and to the stable entrance of the palace. With a sense of history repeating itself, Sally considered the two white stallions lined up near the door.

  “I don’t feel like swimming,” she murmured with a frosty smile.

  His laugh was warm treacle on her spine. “No swimming today, then.”

  His touch was light on her body as he helped her take her seat aback the horse. He pulled himself easily onto his own beast.

  Despite the wariness in her mood, pleasure crept in around the edges as they rode further from the palace. They were going in a separate direction; taking a route Sally hadn’t yet explored. She couldn’t help but feel a sense of contentment as the horses strode confidently away from the manicured gardens of the palace, towards a wilder, less tamed landscape. Long grass crept so high it brushed against her shoes at times. The sky was a creamy blue, and the sun was not yet too warm. She stared ahead, thinking that Tari’ell was the most beautiful place on earth.

  “We are almost there,” he said, taking her reigns and shifting their direction slightly. She could hear water, though it was far away.

  “Yes,” he said, responding to her unspoken question. “It’s the waterfall. From up here, you can hear it quite clearly.”

  “It’s stunning,” she said with sincerity. And it was. That waterfall and lagoon would always be one of her favourite places. Their scenic beauty was indelibly imprinted on her mind and memory.

  On the horses trekked, rising all the time, up the gentle undulation of a grassy mountain. There was a splendid vista of the palace and grounds, and on the other, the border of trees she’d admired so often from her suite of rooms.

  “Here.” He pulled on the reigns of his horse as well as hers, simultaneously slowing them to a gentle stop.

  Sally angled her face towards the palace, sighing as its impressive size and appearance hit her anew. Khalid held a hand out, to ease her off the horse, and when she was halfway down, he scooped an arm around her waist, bringing her into intimate contact with his broad, muscled chest.

  She felt the immediate kick of recognition and struggled to contain it.

  “Why are we here?” She was lost in the intensity of his gaze, her whole body shifting with the strength of how he made her feel.

  His black eyes moved from her eyes to her mouth, then back to her eyes. He let go of her quickly, as if only just realising he was holding her to his body. He sent her a smile that almost seemed apologetic, and then gestured with his hand that she should precede him.

  A small frown tugged at her lips as the mystery deepened. After taking only a dozen or so steps, he stopped walking. “Here.”

  “Where?” She asked, exasperation beginning to creep into her now. She had no sense of why he’d brought her with him, and only a feeling that he was being intentionally vague.

  “This is the spot,” he moved towards one of the enormous trunks, and gestured to the empty space. Well, not quite empty. There was a sapling between the two trees. Eventually, it would grow to thicken out the hedge.

  She knew what he meant. He was referring to the tree he’d lopped for no reason except a desire to test his strength against such a formidable opponent.

  “Why have you brought me here?”

  He linked his hand with hers and lifted it to his lips. His eyes were a magnetic force, drawing her focus. “Because, habibi, I needed to show you something.”

  At her arched brow, he continued.

  “I destroyed this tree. I cut it to the ground. Only the other day, I came back here for the first time in many long years. And look what has happened! From a seed of these trees, another has taken its place. Where once there was nothing, there is now hope. Where I had destroyed something, it is not completely ruined forever.”

  She frowned, trying to grasp the point he was making.

  His laugh was almost embarrassed. Except if there was one emotion Sally couldn’t imagine the powerful Sheikh feeling it was embarrassment.

  “Sally,” he spoke quietly, his expression almost fierce for its powerful seriousness. “I love you.”

  She froze. Her whole body, including her heart, and her blood, and her brain, seemed to stop conducting any activity. She was a lifeless object, incapable of anything.

  “I think I loved you the first moment I saw you. You were so very scared, and yet so brave for it. I admired that strength of character, and then I admired your beauty. And I never stopped.”

  Nothing. She couldn’t speak. She was absolutely mute.

  “I told myself that I couldn’t love you. It would only complicate what was a straight-up political marriage. I felt, at the time, that we would both fare better if we kept our distance.”

  Sally shook her head. “You’re wrong. You don’t love me.”

  His smile was confident again. “I was wrong not to admit it to myself. Where you have been fearless, I have been a coward.”

  “You? A coward?” She was trembling from the shock of the situation.

  “I fell in love with you the first moment I saw you. When you stood before Kaman and me, so obviously terrified but with your chin pointed and your shoulders squared. You were the picture of defiance, and I loved that about you. When you stared at the Allani mountains and your face lit up, I loved you for how you loved our people. You have been gracious, proud, and incredibly resilient. You fascinate me and you empower me. When I am around you, I want to be the kind of man you are proud of. Just you.”

  “Khalid,” she whispered, still not sure if she was understanding. Had she fallen asleep? Was it a dream?

  He lifted her hand back to his mouth and kissed it again. “But the night we made love for the first time, I loved you with an intensity that could have cut me in half. I ran from that love. I forced myself to keep it deep within me. When you told me you were falling in love with me, it felt like we were travelling a disastrous path. One of us had to be strong enough for both of us. I chose to be that person. I thought that our marriage would succeed if we kept it … business-like.”

  “Business-like?” Despite his words, she felt her indignant hackles rising. “We had just made love! There was nothing business-like about what we were.”

  “No.” He nodded, his smile distracting her. “But after Kaman kidnapped you, I realised that I didn’t want to love you. Not if it meant I might lose you, and feel that again.” He shook his head slowly. “And so I kept you at a distance, until I couldn’t. Until I couldn’t not be with you. Until I couldn’t not touch you and see you and laugh with you. I love you, Saa
liyah, and finally I have realised that the only thing I have left to fear is not being able to say that to you whenever I want. I love you. I love being with you, I love you.”

  Sally dipped her head forward, resting her forehead against his chest. “I don’t … I don’t know what to say. Last night you were …”

  “I was a bastard,” he groaned. “I worried I’d ruined everything. That you no longer loved me, and I thought that I could get you to admit it, and everything would be okay. But I ruined it even more. Then somewhere in the night, I thought of this tree. I thought of the way nature has a way of putting hope where there is none. Of filling in the gaps with barely a seed. And I realised that I might have come close to ruining our marriage with my stupid arrogance and misguided intentions, but still I hope. I stand here filled with all of the hope in my heart, Saaliyah, that you will hear my words and know their truth. You are my princess, in every way. A woman I love, and a woman I am not certain I will ever deserve.”

  Her sob was a muffled sound against his chest. She shook her head from side to side as blissful happiness and relief began to penetrate the protective shielding she’d been erecting around her heart.

  “I’m sure this isn’t real.”

  “It is real,” his voice was throaty. “It is the most real I have ever felt. With you, I am no longer a Sheikh. I am a man. And I hope it will be this way between us forever. To me, you are my wife, and if you let me, I plan to love you for the rest of my days.”

  “If we weren’t already married, that would have been the most romantic proposal,” she said on a shaky laugh.

  “We are already married, but from today, we become husband and wife – true partners in every way.”

  Her smile, when she lifted her face to his, was dazzling, and her eyes shone with the happiness of unshed tears. “Then my answer is a resounding yes.”

  EPILOGUE

  The sun cresting over the mountains was spectacular. Perhaps even more so from this, the other side of the range.

  “This is it.” She lifted her gaze to Khalid’s face. Even now, almost a year to the day after their wedding, he still had the ability to take her breath away. Particularly like this. Wild, rugged and a man of the elements. Dressed in his usual regal attire – a cream robe with golden detail – he was still somehow feral and untamed. His long hair loose and lifting in the gentle breeze, his stubble rough and untamed.

  “I know it doesn’t look like much,” she continued, somewhat self-conscious suddenly. “But it’s where I grew up.”

  He angled his face to hers, his eyes unreadable. Even to Sally, who knew and understood everything there was about this powerful man.

  “And for this reason alone, it has value to me. I want to see it.”

  She squeezed his hand, her happiness a force that was impossible to contain. She smiled up at him and began to walk to the modest house. “My memories are fragmented. Like strange shards of a broken mirror. I can see little details. My mother used to love geraniums. She kept window boxes full of them, and pots, too. They were always overflowing with red flowers.”

  She stopped walking so that she could collect a piece of blue pottery. “Except this one.” Her smile was distracted. “This was part of a pot. And the flowers in this one were pink. I used to pick them and arrange them in a small vase.”

  She shook her head, and took another step towards her past. “My bedroom was down there.” She pointed to the far end of the house. “And Tasha’s was beside it.”

  They toured the house extensively, and though she suspected he was humouring her, Khalid made every effort to show genuine interest. He enquired after details, and nodded sagely when she recounted stories from her youth.

  “Leaving must have been hard for you,” he surmised, as they walked out of the house, and through the back garden.

  “Yes. Though at eight years old, I don’t know if I grasped the permanence of our departure.”

  “And when you did?” He prompted softly.

  She had been miserable. “I had Abigail by then,” she answered. “She helped me understand. She helped me see the bright side in my new life.”

  “Ah, yes. Abigail.” He was teasing. There was nothing he liked so much as teasing his wife, particularly on the subject of her curmudgeon of a governess. “That was … fortunate.”

  She playfully slapped him in the chest. “You know you love her.”

  “Almost, but not quite, as much as I love you.” He kissed the tip of her nose, unleashing a kaleidoscope of butterflies inside of her.

  “You’re just saying that because I saved this country of yours from another generation of civil war.”

  “This country of ours,” he corrected with an indulgent tone. “And you’re right.”

  “That you only love me because I’m valuable politically?”

  “Yes,” he winked at her.

  “You are impossibly arrogant at times, you know.”

  “Am I?” His smile was laced with smugness. “I think my arrogance is appropriate. I have managed to find myself, for a wife, the most kind, gentle, loving woman in the world. And she just happens to be very beautiful and sexy as well.”

  Sally rolled her eyes, but her heart was melting. “Flattery will get you nowhere.”

  “We’ll see.” He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, bringing her close to his side. “Did you see that Kaman and Tashana have asked to return to see you?”

  Sally nodded slowly. “Yes, I got the email too.”

  “What did you think?”

  Sally blinked, and shook her head. Though a year had passed, she still found she couldn’t quite forgive her cousin’s actions. “I don’t know,” she said frankly. “Is there a statute of limitations on how long you can be pissed off at the people who drugged you then kidnapped you in the boot of the car?”

  He groaned, his temper spiking in pained memory of what had transpired. “Don’t remind me. I have literally just accepted his millionth apology. I can’t quite bring myself to remember how you were treated.”

  She shrugged. “Let me think about it. I know there’s a part of me that would like to see Tasha, but it’s still a small part. It’s enough for me to know she’s happy in her own life.”

  “And so much the better that her life is far, far away from you,” he agreed.

  They walked a little further, to the edge of the garden. It had been abandoned long before, and it was overgrown now. Weeds weaved their way through the beds, and long-forgotten borders crumbled underfoot.

  “It’s a little like my own personal Pompeii,” she murmured, shaking her head at the decline of the home.

  “Yes. How would you like to give it a renaissance, then?”

  “What do you mean?”

  He stopped walking and looked at her intently. “We need a sanctuary. I am sick of having to share you with the adoring public, and palace servants. We need somewhere we can go and be truly alone. With your permission, I would like to have this restored.”

  Her mouth dropped open, and not being certain of her feelings, he continued quickly. “You can oversee the renovations. It will be sympathetic to the original home. The home you remember. I do not intend significant changes. Simply to make it liveable and comfortable once more.”

  “Oh, Khal. There must be better places …”

  “The best places in the world are the ones that make your eyes light up like this.” His gaze was so intense on her face she felt as though he were touching her. “I can’t think of anywhere else I would rather escape to with you than here.”

  “But it’s on the other side of the mountains,” she teased. “You’d be on my turf.”

  “And very happily so. It is you who made this ceasefire possible, habibi. Without your braveness of spirit, our two people would still be at war. Instead, you have brought peace.”

  “Let’s hope it proves to be lasting,” she said under her breath.

  “Nine months without a single incident bodes well. But there are never guarantees. We
will face what the future holds together.”

  “Yes. And when it all gets too much we’ll come here to chill.”

  “To chill?” He queried, his brows knitted. “There are times, every now and again, when you remind me forcefully of how British you are.”

  “I like to keep you on your toes.”

  He nodded. “In that case, I shall continue to be surprised by you.”

  “Oh?” She laced her fingers through his and slowly pulled them forwards. “I think the best surprise is yet to come.” She placed his hand on her stomach, and watched as the moment of realisation began to roll across his features. Surprise. Confusion. Doubt. Delight and finally joy.

  He lifted his other hand to her still flat stomach and let out a rumble of pleasure. “You are pregnant!”

  “Yes,” she nodded quickly, biting down on her bottom lip. “Pregnant and rather thrilled about it.”

  “Oh, Saaliyah, I cannot believe it.”

  “Really?” She enquired a little shakily. “We’ve certainly been giving this baby every chance to come into our family.”

  “Our family.” His eyes widened at the most perfect description he’d ever heard. They were a family. Somehow, through a twist of fate and a design of the stars, he had married a woman who had brought peace to his kingdom, passion to his heart, and contentment to his soul.

  THE END

  Following is an excerpt from At The Sheikh’s Command by Clare Connelly.

  AT THE SHEIKH’S COMMAND

  Clare Connelly

  All the characters in this book are fictitious and have no existence outside the author’s imagination. They have no relation to anyone bearing the same name or names and are pure invention.

  All rights reserved. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reprinted by any means without permission of the Author.

  The illustration on the cover of this book features model/s and bears no relation to the characters described within.

  First published 2015

  (c) Clare Connelly