Forbidden: The Sheikh's Virgin (16 page)

How could he have been so stupid? How could he have been so blind?

But even as he climbed the stone steps back to the palace, even as the setting sun reflected bright off the shell-rich stone, something sat uneasily with him. For ten years ago she
had
loved him—hadn’t he learned as much? And she had said what she had because she’d been forced to marry Hussein and forced to make it look like she actually wanted to.

So why was she saying she couldn’t marry him now?

His right foot wavered over a step, the gears crunching in his mind. They were good together—they both knew it—and this time they had more than proved it. And he’d been her first lover, as he’d always intended. Didn’t that prove something? That they were meant for each other?

That it was fate that had brought them together again, not fate that was forcing them apart?

Damn it all! Whatever she said, whatever she claimed, this time he wasn’t just walking away bitter and twisted and waiting another decade before he found out why. There were enough wasted years between them. There would be no more.

Maybe he had learned from his mistake after all
.

He spun around and launched himself down the stairs,
sprinting across the sand to where she sat slumped with her head in her hands.

‘Sera!’ he cried, and before she could respond he had pulled her to her feet and into his arms. Her eyes were swollen, her cheeks awash with tears and encrusted with grains of sand, but without a doubt she was still the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. But just one look was enough to make him sure. Enough to let him know he was right.

‘Tell me,’ he said. ‘There is no father this time to intimidate you, no other man you need be afraid of. This time there is only me. So tell me, truthfully this time, why you say you cannot marry me.’

S
ERA
collapsed into his arms, her sobs tearing his heart apart, her tears seeping into the cloth of his robe, wetting his skin.

‘Oh, Rafiq, I’m so sorry. I…I love you so much!’

They were the words he most needed to hear—so much so that he wanted to roar with victory as he spun her around, his lips on hers a celebration of love shared and hard earned. But he knew there were other words that needed to be said, that he needed to hear, before the way would be clear between them. But it
would
be clear, of that he was sure. He would make damn well sure of it.

‘Sera, you must tell me what has been troubling you. I will not leave you another time without knowing. I could not bear it.’ His hands stroked her back, soothing, gentling. ‘Tell me what’s troubling you, and then I can make it right.’

She shook her head. ‘There is no righting this. You will want to have nothing to do with me when you know. You will not be able to afford to.’

And he felt a frisson of fear in his gut.
How bad was it?
‘You have to tell me. Everything. Come, sit with me. Explain.’ He drew her gently down to the sand, settling her across his lap so he could hold her like a child and kiss her tears away while she spoke.

‘Hussein found a use for me,’ she began, and Rafiq’s blood
ran cold. ‘He thought if I was good for nothing else I could help “persuade” visiting delegates to see his point of view. He made me dress like some kind of courtesan, and all the time he was negotiating he would make lewd innuendoes about sex, and how he liked to share what was his.’ She stopped, and Rafiq hugged her tight to his chest, wanting to murder the man who had done this to her, who had treated her with such little respect.

‘Most of the men were as embarrassed as me. They were family men, they said. They loved their wives. They would leave, barely able to look at me, and Hussein would later say it was because I was not good enough, not pretty enough, that nobody found me attractive enough to sleep with. That I deserved to remain untouched, barren, when I could not even arouse my own husband. And then he would make me try…’

She shuddered, and he sensed her revulsion. ‘You don’t have to talk about it.’

‘You need to know. You need to know it all to understand.’ Her voice sounded hollow and empty, as if it was coming from a long, long way away. ‘He made me dance, if you could call it that. He watched me from the bed, where he lay naked, and while he— Oh, God, while he tried and tried, and it was my fault that he couldn’t—my fault that every time he failed.’

‘It’s okay,’ he soothed, stroking her jet-black hair. ‘It’s not your fault.’

She blinked up at him, her watery eyes desolate. ‘It’s not okay. Because by the end I wanted so much for him to succeed I tried to make him come. I thought that maybe then he would be happier. Maybe then he would not be so angry all the other times.’

His hand stilled in her hair, and despite the warmth from the sun a chill descended his spine. ‘What other times?’

She buried her head in his chest again, as if too ashamed to look at him. ‘There were men who were not such family men, vile men, who believed Hussein was simply being generous,
who were only too happy to agree to whatever Hussein wanted for a piece of his wife. But once he had that agreement he would get angry and pretend to take offence, and have them thrown out.’

She jerked in his arms as she gulped in air.

‘The ambassador from Karakhistar was one of them. He tried to touch me, brushing his fat fingers through my hair, breathing his ugly hot breath on me, before Hussein had him ejected. He was there today, at the coronation.’ She shuddered in his arms. ‘I saw him watching me, hating me…’

Rafiq felt sick to the stomach. The enormity of the wrongs against her was inconceivable, and he hugged her closer, trying to replace the hurt, the humiliation. No wonder she’d looked so stricken when he had arrived to take his seat. And no wonder she’d been a shadow of herself when he’d first seen her outside his mother’s apartments, unsmiling, her whole body leaden with the abuse Hussein had subjected her to.

Anger simmered in his veins. Because, for all the indignity inflicted upon her, she had remained in the marriage until Hussein had died. ‘Why did you do the things you did? Why did you stay with him?’

Again came the quiet, chillingly flat voice. ‘I had a kitten he had given me as a wedding present—a perfect Persian kitten, as white as snow. The first time I tried to say no he took it from my hands. He was so angry. I thought he just wanted to get it out of my hands so he could hit me. But he didn’t hit me. He didn’t need to. One minute he was gently stroking the kitten’s fur. The next he had snapped its neck.’ She squeezed her eyes shut, her teeth savaging her lip. ‘He told me it could just as easily be someone I loved, a friend or one of my family, and I believed him. And then he gave me another kitten the next day.’ She looked up at him. ‘I tried to save it, Rafiq, I tried to protect it. Believe me, I tried.’

He curled his arms more tightly around her, feeling sick to his stomach. ‘What happened?’

‘I found it on my pillow, the day Hussein discovered one of the security guards had secretly given me driving lessons. The guard was taken to hospital, bashed senseless. Two lessons! Only two, and that innocent man suffered so much. But Hussein never gave me another kitten after that. He didn’t need to.’

Tears flooded her beautiful eyes and he held her close and rocked her, not knowing what else to do, what else to say, until she pushed herself up, swiping tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand. She took a deep breath and then sighed it out.

‘And even though Hussein’s gone, that’s why you can never marry me now. Because as King you will be expected to entertain some of the same people Hussein met, whether it’s the ambassador of Karakhistar or any one of a hundred other dignitaries who saw me being offered in exchange for deals and favours. How can they be expected to meet me? For even if they refused, why would they not believe that someone, some time,
would
have taken advantage of Hussein’s generous offer? How could such a woman ever be Queen? People will talk. And sooner or later the story will get out. The tabloids would love it. Qusay’s Queen, no more than a harlot. The monarchy would become a joke.’

And he pulled her to him, crushing her head to his chest, pressing his lips to her hair, wanting to tell her that she was wrong, wanting to tell her that there was a way out, but finding nothing he could say, nothing he could do.

Because she was right.

The gossip rags would have a field-day.

Damn his brother! For, as much as he had a grudging respect for the strength of character that had seen him choose the woman he loved over a responsibility borne of blood, in doing so his brother had ruined Rafiq’s own chance of love.

If Kareef hadn’t abdicated they could even now have slipped away to Sydney to live in relative anonymity. But as the Queen Sera would be forced to move in the same social circles as she had with Hussein. It was inevitable that she would run across some of the same men Hussein had offered her to. And, as much as he wanted her as his wife, he had seen her reaction today at the ceremony, and he could not do that to her. And, similarly, he could not expose the monarchy to such scandal.

It would be unworkable. Their marriage would be unworkable. Sera was right. There was no way he could become King, as was his duty,
and
take Sera for his wife.

It didn’t stop him trying to work out a way. Lap after lap that evening his swinging arms and kicking legs ate up the pool. Ten laps, then twenty, then thirty, until he had lost count, wanting the pain in his muscles and lungs to overtake the pain in his heart, finally emerging from the pool weak-limbed, with lungs bursting and his mind going over and over the possibilities.

Qusay needed a king to rule over it.

Sera needed a man to love her.

Qusay deserved a king after the hell of the last few weeks.

Sera deserved a lover who could make her forget the hell of her previous marriage.

He fell onto a lounger and dropped his face into a towel. How could he be both lover to Sera and King to Qusay?

And the answer came back in his own fractured heartbeat.

He could not
.

But neither was he afforded the ultimate choice Kareef had decided upon: to give up the throne for the woman he loved. With no sign of Tahir, no sightings of his helicopter after days of fruitless searching in the seas around Qusay, he had no option to walk away. He was duty-bound to assume the mantle Kareef had flung in his direction.

This was no mere game of last man standing or pass the parcel. This was about duty and responsibility. The future of a kingdom was at stake and he had no choice.

But why did it have to come at such a cost? Why should he have to give up Sera?

Akmal called for him after a restless night during which he had tossed and turned alone until the early hours, before finally sinking into a fitful sleep. He was being asked for at the hospital, came the message, and, knowing who would be making such an enquiry, Rafiq reluctantly dragged himself from bed and towards the shower.

Sera had refused to sleep with him now that there was no chance they could be together. The sooner they parted, she’d said, the better chance he had to find someone new, someone befitting the title of Sheikha. She would not even accompany him to the hospital. He appreciated her logic even while he doubted it, resenting the thought of having to find another woman when he had her. When he’d
thought
he had her. How exactly was he supposed to sleep with another woman? How could he give that woman children when it was Sera he wanted in his bed, Sera he hungered to see ripe with his child?

‘Any news of Tahir?’ he asked Akmal as they climbed into the waiting limousine, but Akmal merely shook his head. There was no need for words. Each passing day made the likelihood of his younger brother showing up even slimmer. Rafiq felt the noose tighten ever so slightly around his neck.

Her eyes were closed as he entered her hospital room, but he had the uncanny feeling that even so she missed nothing.

‘Prince Rafiq.’ It was a surprisingly clear gaze that met his, the curtains gone from her eyes—eyes that shone a startling green, the colour of the very emeralds the women of Marrash
worked wonders with. Set amidst her deeply creviced face, they made her look years younger.

‘Abizah. It’s good to see you again.’ He took her gnarled hand. ‘Did the operation go well?’

‘Thank you so much,’ she said, with grateful tears in her eyes, clutching his hand between her own papery-skinned fingers. ‘I was hoping you would come, so I could thank you for your generosity. I cannot tell you how wonderful it is for an old woman to see colours and shapes and the beauty of her surroundings.’ She looked around, saw only Akmal standing by the door. ‘But where is your lovely wife?’

Rafiq drew a sharp breath. Tossed a look at the poker-faced Akmal and wished he’d been in the mountains with them, to hear what Suleman had said about some people thinking she spoke rubbish so that he might understand and not think them both crazy.

‘Sera… Sera will visit you later.’

Abizah looked at him with her unclouded eyes, and Rafiq got the impression she could see all the way into his very soul. ‘I am sorry. I have caused you sadness by asking when I merely wanted to let you know how much I appreciate your kind gesture.’

‘My mother loved your gift,’ he said, deflecting the conversation, and at this she smiled.

‘Your mother is a fine Sheikha,’ she said with a decisive nod, ‘as will be our next Queen.’

He turned away. Coming here was pointless. He didn’t want to hear about the next queen, no matter how fine she might be, not when it could not be the woman he loved.

‘Prince Rafiq, before you go…’ He stopped and looked back to the woman on the bed. ‘Do not give up hope. Believe. Have faith. There is always an answer.’

Breath whooshed into his lungs as he took a step forward,
his insides flushed with sensation. ‘How…? How is it that you see the things you see?’

And she smiled at him, a lifetime of wisdom shining forth from her green eyes. ‘Sometimes we look with our eyes and we see only that which is in front of us. Some people have perfect vision but will never see.’ She folded her arms and patted her chest. ‘For sometimes we must look beyond the pictures our mind presents as fact. Sometimes we need to see what is in our hearts. Only then do we see what is really true.’

He wasn’t sure it answered his question. He wasn’t sure he understood—but he held onto her words as they made their way back to the palace.

‘Sometimes we have to see what is in our hearts.’

Was that what Kareef had done? Listened to his heart and not to his brain? Believed what he felt, rather than what he saw as his duty?

He knew what his brain told him he must do. It was his duty, his responsibility. A king for Qusay.

And yet he knew too what his heart wanted. A black-haired woman with dark eyes and golden skin. The woman who possessed his heart.

Sera.

He had loved and lost her once before. Why should he lose her again?

But who would be king? Who would rule Qusay?

‘Believe,’
Abizah had said.
‘Have faith.’

He pushed back into the buttery leather upholstery and took a deep breath. The old woman was right. By the time the car pulled up outside the glistening palace he knew what he had to do.

‘Akmal,’ he said, stopping the vizier from alighting with a hand to his arm. ‘There’s been a change of plans.’