The Sheikh Who Claimed Her: Master of the Desert / The Sheikh's Reluctant Bride / Accidentally the Sheikh's Wife

Pulling away from the door, he opened it and stepped inside the room again. Whatever he had expected it was not this—Antonia seated at the dressing table, calmly reading letters.

‘Why didn’t you tell me about these letters, Ra’id?’ she asked him in a voice that was calmer than he might have expected.

Had he anticipated hysteria—a broken woman, crushed beneath the weight of grief? Had he forgotten the virago who had confronted him on the yacht with a knife? This was no girl to be easily dismissed, but a strong and determined woman, even if that woman resided in a young girl’s body.

‘I had no idea my mother even had a maidservant in whom she confided,’ she said, flourishing the bundle of letters she’d found. ‘No letters were ever forwarded to Rome.’

‘That might be because your mother wrote to her maidservant in English.’

‘And the maidservant could only read Sinnebalese,’ Antonia murmured, understanding. Then her face hardened. ‘The maidservant might not have been able to read English, but she would have understood these.’

She was looking at photographs of herself as a baby in her mother’s arms.

‘I imagine so,’ he agreed.

‘You imagine?’ Antonia bit out, springing to her feet. ‘So why didn’t I receive them?’

‘They were overlooked, perhaps.’ He made a dismissive gesture, but felt a surge of arousal as they confronted each other, both with passions raised. ‘Are you finished here?’ He held the door for her.

She shook her head slowly and her expression suggested she detested him. ‘You have absolutely no heart, do you, Ra’id?’

He neither agreed nor disagreed with that assessment.

‘I give up!’ she flared. ‘And don’t think we’re finished here.’

‘You are finished here,’ he told her coldly, pointing to the door.

She saw his shadow cross the courtyard from the window in her room and felt a pang of regret. Standing in her chaste, cotton pyjamas watching Ra’id stride purposefully towards some unknown destination, she realised he still had the power to take her breath away. If anything, the deep blue robes of office and the Arabian headdress, with its gleaming gold agal holding it in place, only added to Ra’id’s menacing appeal. Though she had tried to hate him, that emotion was far too close to love. But how cold Ra’id had been when he’d looked at her, Antonia remembered; how dismissive.

And he was the father of her child …

As dusk thickened into glutinous night, she agonised over how to tell him. Was he visiting a lover now—perhaps some glamorous and frivolously dressed ladies in his harem? The father of her baby. The thought made her sick—sick and angry. Swallowing deep, she turned away.

Shutting the window to give the air-conditioning a chance to work, Antonia realised sleep was out of the question. How could she sleep with Ra’id in her head? But she had no rights over him; they were practically strangers, strangers who owed each other nothing, and who knew less about each other now than they ever had.

But she missed him, she realised, angrily biting back tears. And what would it bring her, this love of hers, other than distractions and more unhappiness? Antonia Ruggiero in love with the Sword of Vengeance? It sounded ridiculous even to her.

She padded barefoot across the room to her lonely bed. Some might think it generous of Ra’id to allow her to stay in such splendid accommodation, but she suspected it was his way of keeping her close so he would know what she was doing. He was orchestrating her every step, and what hurt the most was the knowledge that she was carrying his baby and couldn’t tell him.

How much closer could they be than parents of a baby? Yet how much further apart? Antonia wondered, trailing her fingertips across crisp, white linen sheets on a bed she doubted she would spend even a moment on.

During the lonely vigil of the long night, Antonia considered what she had learned from looking through what remained of her mother’s possessions. Helena had been very young, both in age and attitude, although she’d already had a son by the ruling sheikh when she’d moved to Rome to marry Antonia’s father. Helena had never been allowed to see her son again. Poor Helena; a girl who had liked pop music and fashion, and who had traded on her looks, believing they were the key to happiness. She had discovered that in the end those looks were her downfall—for no one, especially not the ruling Sheikh of Sinnebar, had wanted beauty without substance when the novelty had worn off.

And, though Ra’id could never be called weak, he was his father’s son, Antonia acknowledged, and that was the type of heartless individual she was dealing with. He couldn’t even look at her without self-loathing, because she represented his one and only failing. Antonia was Ra’id’s one breach of duty, and now she must be punished and driven away. Whatever was waiting for her at the fort, she suspected it was something Ra’id believed would end her quest once and for all and send her flying back to Rome in a panic. In one last act of cruelty, he was determined to be there to see her reaction for himself.

He drove his stallion hard. The horse was well-named Tonnerre, which meant thunder in French. When they galloped from yielding sand to a firmer path leading directly to the mountains, Tonnerre’s hooves struck sparks off the moonlit track.

Then the horse smelled water and it took all Ra’id’s riding skills to persuade the stallion to slow. When Ra’id mastered him, the stallion consented to walk, whinnying and snorting his disapproval. Ra’id loosened the reins, allowing Tonnerre to amble the last half-mile or so to cool him down.

When finally they reached the icy spring that emerged at the foot of the cliff, he sprang down, and, murmuring praise into one alert velvet ear, he removed Tonnerre’s tack and allowed the horse to go free.

Free …

Something he would never be, Ra’id reflected as he leaned against cold, black granite watching his mount suck in water. He had chosen this path, though he would never be free from the ache in his heart. He thought of Antonia, asleep in bed, and had to wonder how one young girl could affect him so deeply. There was no future for them, and she was nothing but trouble. He had decided that the best course of action was to show her what awaited her in the desert, and then she would be pleased to go home, where he hoped she would fight some other cause.

Unwinding the black howlis from his face, he shrugged off his robe and dived into a pool turned frigid by snow-melt from the mountains. His last image before he sank deep was not that of a young girl sighing with passion in his arms but of an aircraft soaring into the flawless Arabian sky, as it carried Antonia and her foolish fantasies back to Rome.

By the time dawn peeped through the shutters, Antonia had drawn up a plan. She would use her own money to convert the citadel she had inherited without having to take anything from the charity’s resources. She could only hope Ra’id might want to contribute his expertise and that of others around him to the project. Without their help, it could just be her best stab at an Arabian retreat, and she wanted it to be authentic down to the last detail. But before she could do any of that she must persuade Ra’id to give her the precious water supply.

She would have to appeal to his better nature and hope he had one, Antonia concluded, drying her hair after her shower. Startled by the sound of approaching hooves, she put down her brush and crossed to the window. Her apartment was on one of the highest floors of the palace, and she could see Ra’id returning to the stables. She knew it was him before she even focused on the man springing down from the ferocious-looking stallion. Even severe black robes only added to Ra’id’s glittering majesty, but it was his barbaric vigour that had called to her before she saw him.

She shrank back. He stared directly at her. Could he feel her too? It was as if he knew she was looking at him as surely as if she had called to him.

Pulling further back inside the room, she grabbed a steadying breath. She was right to think there was some invisible link between them, and wrong to believe it was fading when it had grown.

CHAPTER TWELVE

SO NEITHER of them had slept, Ra’id noted, carrying the image of Antonia’s unusually pale face with him into his private quarters. There had been dark circles under her eyes and her face had been tense. Had she finally accepted there was no point in her staying on in Sinnebar? Would she return home without a fuss? And, if she did, how would that make him feel?

He showered fast before dressing in workmanlike robes, prior to striding at a brisk pace to the breakfast room where he had arranged to meet her. She was standing by the buffet table dressed in a safari suit, seeming uncertain while a manservant was doing his job well, trying to tempt her with morsels of food from the wide selection.

Everyone stood and bowed to him. Antonia looked troubled when she turned. ‘Ra’id,’ she said, causing a murmur of surprise by using his first name.

No one addressed him that way. In time he might have forgotten what his first name was, if it weren’t for Antonia and his brother, he reflected wryly.

Desire for her swept over him as their gazes met and held. But he had closed his heart to her, he reminded himself sternly, to protect her from a ruthless king.

‘You had a good night, I trust?’ he said, taking the plate out of her hands and choosing some delicacies for her himself.

‘No. Did you?’

Would he ever get used to her bluntness? He saw hurt and disappointment mixed with the defiance in her eyes. She had expected him to come to her, he realised. However deep the rift between them, she thought they could get over it and pick up where they had left off. ‘I rode out,’ he said briskly. ‘Is there anything else you want from here?’ He scanned the buffet.

‘No, thank you. Did you ride all night?’ she asked innocently. ‘Did you have things on your mind, Ra’id?’ The look she gave him was fast and accusatory.

‘No. Should I?’

She raised a faint smile. ‘I guess not.’

Now her cheeks were flushed and her breath was coming faster, as if her heart couldn’t keep pace with her emotions. He turned away, effectively dismissing her, but he carried with him her fresh, clean scent and innocent appearance. That and the appeal in her eyes had almost melted him, he realised, but thankfully he was ruled by his head and not his heart, so it was easy for him to walk away.

He had almost reached the door when he realised she was at his elbow. He glanced down. ‘Yes?’

‘I can’t wait to see the citadel,’ she said, as if this was a holiday for her and he was her tour guide.

He made a brief hum of acknowledgement, before sweeping on his way.

‘What about your breakfast?’ she demanded catching hold of his sleeve.

He looked down at her incredulously, ignoring the collective gasp.

She seemed unaware of it. ‘Aren’t you going to eat anything, Ra’id?’

His look hardened. ‘I have more important things on my mind.’

‘So you don’t feel like eating either?’ she said, actually tightening her fingers on his sleeve so the fabric was crushed.

‘On the contrary—but I will eat in private.’ He shook her off.

‘Of course. I forgot,’ she snapped. ‘In your ivory tower.’

‘Will you excuse me?’ he murmured, ignoring the barb. Whether she would or not, he was going to the stables to make sure their horses were ready for them to leave at once.

She shouldn’t have annoyed him. She ate breakfast, if only for the baby’s sake, and returned to her room to get ready to leave. If Ra’id took her to see the citadel, which was by no means certain now, it would be no magnanimous concession on his part, but another opportunity to rub her nose in the fact that her dream of a fun-filled castle to be used to such good effect by the charity was a naive and frivolous plan. One which without Ra’id’s water supply would fail utterly.

But she was going to call Ra’id’s bluff. She refused to be put off by his threatening manner. She would go into the desert. Whatever it took she would find the water she needed somewhere, and then she would renovate the ancient building and make it live again.

The opportunity to tell Ra’id about their baby seemed further away than ever, Antonia reflected anxiously, but she wouldn’t get a chance to tell him unless she stayed close to him. She had to keep with her original plan to visit the citadel with Ra’id. How could she not when there was still this huge and pressing secret between them?

He watched Antonia stride across the stable yard in a blaze of purpose. She had put on a little weight, he noticed, and it suited her. She was glowing with health, in fact. Her hair in particular seemed to gleam more than it ever had, though she had made an attempt to tame the abundant locks in a severe chignon which did her no favours. The hairstyle was the one jarring note in her appearance—that and the look in her eyes.

So this was war, he thought with a mixture of anticipation and amusement. Excellent. Let battle commence.

‘Are you ready to go?’ she said, eyeing the quiet gelding he had chosen for her before raising an eyebrow when she viewed his stamping monster of a stallion.

He almost had to curb a smile at the sight of the girl he recognised even without a knife in her hand. This was Antonia white-lipped with determination, and even the kind gelding he had selected for her was hanging its head uncertainly, as if it sensed trouble approaching its back.

He soothed it with a gentle touch as she mounted up, and then said, ‘Ready?’

Her gaze was like a lick of flame that wavered when he held it. Travelling into the desert with him wasn’t so appealing, suddenly, he guessed. On my own? he imagined her thinking. With you? Without anyone to take my part?

‘You have a hat, I hope?’ he said. ‘The sun is hot. You may have noticed?’

She crammed on the totally unsuitable headgear she had been holding crushed in her hand.

‘That hat isn’t suitable for the desert,’ he pointed out.

‘Well, it’s what I’m wearing.’ She gave the brim a defiant tug.

‘You’ll need this.’

She huffed contemptuously at the scarf he was holding out for her to wind about her face and head. ‘Keep it!’ she exclaimed, as if accepting anything from him was the first step on the road to damnation. ‘I’m just fine as I am,’ she assured him, wheeling her horse around.

One hour and a sandstorm later, she was begging him for the Arabian headgear.

‘I suppose you think this is funny?’ she demanded as he sipped cold, clean water from a ladle offered to him by the Bedouin who had set up temporary camp around a well of clean drinking-water.

‘Not at all.’ Having unwound the yards of fabric he wore to protect his head, neck and face, he was largely untroubled by grit and sand, while Antonia looked more like a sand sculpture, with her red-rimmed eyes the only sign that she was human. ‘I have a solution for you.’ He smiled.

‘You do?’ She glanced towards the stallion, where his saddlebags full of the supplies he considered necessary were hanging.

‘Certainly,’ he said, tipping the bucket of water over her head. ‘That should clean you up a bit—and cool you down.’

Spluttering, she swore at him. ‘Why, you—’

‘Brute?’ he supplied mildly, already on his way to retrieve the spare howlis he’d brought for her to wear.

By the time he had returned, the laughing women of the camp had helped Antonia to wash her hair, and were hustling her away between them, no doubt to find her something more suitable for the desert than her Hollywood gear. Bedouin were kind that way, he reflected; infinitely generous.

He waited with mounting impatience as the minutes ticked by, chatting with the men whilst keeping an eye on the women’s tent where they had taken her. He wouldn’t put it past Antonia to steal a camel and make a break for it—and this time when she left the country he wanted to be sure it was for good.

But as he held that thought Antonia just ducked her head to leave the tent, and now was coming towards him with her head held high and that seemingly irrepressible look of determination and challenge locked in her eyes. She was wearing a serviceable but undeniably sexy outfit. The Bedouin women knew a thing or two about such things. It comprised a robe and a headdress that both protected her and—regrettably, as far as he was concerned—made her seem only too well suited to the hostile environment. She didn’t belong here, and in his opinion the sooner Antonia realised that, the better.

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