Carrying The Sheikh's Baby

‘I’ll escort her to the women’s quarters myself,’ Zane cut in.

Both Catherine and Ravi looked at him, obviously startled by the offer. He was a little startled himself—etiquette for someone of her station certainly did not require him to give her a personal escort.

But he found he couldn’t regret the impulsive decision as he led her through the palace towards the separate walled estate in the grounds where the female staff and his unattached female relatives lived and he watched her reaction.

Ever since he had arrived in Narabia, the palace had felt like a prison to him. The ornate splendour both oppressive and confining, the grandeur only emphasising the unhappy history contained within these walls.

But as the scent of lemons and limes refreshed the air around them, and he watched the vivid colour on Catherine’s cheeks intensify and her caramel gaze sparkle with fascination, her head swivelling back and forth as she took in the sights before her, for the first time in his life, he could see past the darkness too.

He pushed the romantic thought aside, determined not to read too much into the buoyant feeling at Catherine’s exhilarated response.

She was the first foreign visitor to see this place since his mother. Of course she would be awestruck. The Sheikh’s palace was a beautiful and elaborate prison, but a prison nonetheless, something his mother had found out to her cost.

Just because Catherine in her naivety couldn’t see that, it didn’t mean it wasn’t true.

After all, it was his job to keep her from discovering that truth.

Walking through the Sheikh’s palace was like stepping into an alternative world—as exotic and mesmerising and exciting as Narnia behind the wardrobe. As Cat absorbed the myriad sights and sounds and scents, she struggled to ignore the man beside her, whose stern demeanour was at odds with the cascade of emotions making her heart hammer like a timpani drum.

Unlike the rest of the palace, which had been calm and quiet and steeped in an austere reverential solemnity, the women’s quarters were a hive of chatter and activity—until the women spotted the Sheikh in their midst.

A few of them tugged veils over their faces as Zane passed, but many of the younger ones did not, some even chatting behind their hands before they bowed or curtsied. Zane seemed impervious to the attention, but it was clear to Cat she wasn’t the only woman aware of the magnificent figure he cut.

The sunlight dazzled her, leaving her dazed when they stepped out of the searing heat of the forecourt into a walled garden. Shaded by trees laden with all manner of exotic fruit and an array of lush plants, the garden was laid out along a series of mosaic pathways punctuated by fountains and other decorative follies. More women, many of them wearing brightly coloured silk robes, sat on intricately carved marble benches, but sprang to their feet to curtsy as she and Zane passed.

They turned a corner and Cat’s mouth fell open. A stunning pool, its blue-green water fed by a man-made waterfall, stretched out before them, creating a cooling centrepiece to the lavish garden. On the outside, the quarters had seemed austere, but this garden was like a secret paradise.

Zane proceeded to lead her through a citrus grove that skirted the pool. The refreshing scent of oranges and lemons filled the hot, dry air. They walked down another path shaded by towering palm trees, the raised flower beds on either side filled with a profusion of showy blooms and manicured shrubs.

Finally they left the garden and entered a cool domed courtyard, this one covered with a painted ceiling. Like the rest of the palace, the chamber was intricately and elaborately decorated, with stunning marble and mosaic tiling. Lounging areas filled with cushions and draped with exquisitely embroidered silk hangings made the space feel welcoming rather than forbidding. The warm air was cooled by huge ceiling fans, which covered the sound of laughter and talking coming from the interior of the building with the swish of the blades.

Large arched doorways led off the central chamber. Each smaller chamber contained a disparate group of women indulging in different pursuits. One group was seated in a circle on the floor sewing a tapestry, another group was cooking in a kitchen equipped with state-of-the-art stainless-steel surfaces—the aromatic scents of frying spices making Cat’s tummy grumble—and yet another chamber appeared to be a classroom, where one woman was scribbling maths problems on a whiteboard for the others. It occurred to Cat that the juxtaposition of female learning, new appliances and traditional crafts was like a microcosm of how the new Sheikh’s modernising influence was affecting Narabia’s ancient society. But as before, all conversation ceased as they walked past, only making Cat more aware of how revered Zane was by his people. And the centuries-old power that emanated from him.

She wondered why he had offered to take her to her quarters. Because she felt both hideously exposed while also being invisible.

Stop hiding, darling. And say hello to Mummy’s friend.

The jolt of memory made her steps falter. Zane’s arm tensed as she stopped.

‘Are you okay?’ he said. His voice sounded rough, and she realised it was the first time he’d spoken to her since they had left the palace forecourt.

‘Yes, yes, I’m fine. I’m just a little tired. And overawed.’

Or rather a lot tired and overawed. Why else would she start thinking about her mother?

And reading far too much into a simple courtesy. Obviously, Zane Khan had only offered to escort her to her quarters to be polite. And now she was making a massive meal of it.

He searched her face in a way that only made her feel more uncomfortable, then clicked his fingers above his head. ‘Who here speaks English?’ he asked, addressing a group of young women who had gathered to watch them from a respectable distance.

A teenage girl stepped forward, covering the bottom of her face with her veil, her dark eyes alive with curiosity.

‘What is your name?’ he asked the girl.

‘Kasia, Your Divine Majesty,’ she answered in faltering English.

‘This is Dr Catherine Smith. You will serve her for the duration of her stay here at double your normal salary. Make sure she has everything she desires and she does not go anywhere unescorted. Do you understand?’

The girl nodded furiously, her cheeks flushed as she dropped to one knee. She didn’t reply, clearly speechless at being addressed directly by the Sheikh. But Cat felt the prickle of dismay at his instructions. Why did she have to be escorted everywhere?

‘Kasia will show you to your quarters,’ he said, addressing Cat, that searing, all-seeing gaze silencing the unruly thought. ‘She will accompany you wherever you go. It is very easy to get lost in this place.’

The prickle of dismay was crushed by panic.

Exactly how powerful was this man? Could he read her thoughts?

As Kasia, her new minder, led Cat up a flight of stairs to a mezzanine level, she stole one last glance over her shoulder.

Zane Khan strode back through the gardens towards the entrance to the women’s quarters. His powerful figure cut a dark swathe through the colourful clothing of the women and the garden’s exotic flora.

The soft edges she had glimpsed in the car had been sheared off, as if they had never existed. As soon as they had arrived at the palace, he had become every inch His Divine Majesty again, entitled to rule over everyone he surveyed... Including her.

Her rapid heartbeat sank into her abdomen. But it couldn’t disguise the pang of regret at the thought that the man she’d glimpsed in the car had never been more than a figment of her overactive—and far too romantic—imagination.

CHAPTER THREE

OVER THE FOLLOWING fortnight Cat buried herself in the project, which helped ground her and dispel any more of the foolish feelings about Zane that had assailed her on her arrival.

The first job she set herself was to become more fluent in the spoken language, so she didn’t feel like such an interloper. Although Kasia had overstated her command of English, she was smart and eager to help Cat integrate into the society of women in the palace. As they tested out their faltering language skills on each other, Kasia soon became a friend, and also an invaluable research assistant, proving a font of knowledge when it came to documenting Narabia’s customs.

Kasia and the other women who Cat had interviewed though, were less informed on the subject of the Nawari royal family. And Zane in particular. No one seemed to know anything about when he had first come to the palace, or more specifically his relationship with the former Sheikh. Either that or they had been told not to say anything.

Cat convinced herself she was being paranoid. Why would Zane have hired her to do a job like this if he had something to hide? Especially as he had arranged for her to go on a series of ‘fact-finding missions’.

But even though Cat had found the day trips—to a host of local businesses, architectural wonders and even to one of his council meetings—informative and interesting at first, after two weeks of these carefully orchestrated excursions, her initial suspicions had begun to return.

She was learning how to converse in Narabi with Kasia’s help, but she was never allowed to speak to anyone not specifically sanctioned to speak to her by the Sheikh. The bodyguards and advisors who accompanied her wherever she went seemed to be under strict instructions about whom to allow her to speak to. And nothing she said or did could influence them to loosen their hold on her schedule.

Zane meanwhile had been unavailable since that first night. And the interview he’d promised her had yet to materialise.

At first Cat had been grateful for his absence, aware of how overwhelming she found his presence. But as the days passed, and her conversations with Kasia and the other people in the palace brought up questions she wanted to ask that only Zane could answer, her gratitude began to turn to frustration—with herself as much as him.

She wanted this project to be a seminal study of a country and a people whose lives and culture had been almost entirely cut off from the outside world for generations. But for that she needed proper access to all walks of Narabian society, and more access to their Sheikh, especially as he appeared to be the driving force behind all the changes taking place.

Her academic integrity was at stake. Not only that, but Zane had promised her the interview when she’d agreed to take the job.

She could keep her strange reaction to him in check. She wasn’t used to male attention, and certainly not the attention of a man who exuded enough testosterone to arouse a stone. But she couldn’t let her social ineptitude screw up this project. And she only had three months to write this study, so she couldn’t waste any more time pandering to her own insecurities.

But two weeks after arriving in Narabia, she didn’t seem to be any closer to getting the promised interview with its Sheikh. Ravi had been unfailingly polite and helpful, but whenever she’d asked about Zane, she’d been fobbed off with a series of vague excuses.

His Excellency was too busy. His Excellency was out of the country. His Excellency didn’t have the time to deal with the project today.

So yesterday, she’d decided to write the Sheikh a note—reminding Zane of his promise to grant her an interview.

One curt line scrawled in black ink on a piece of cream notepaper was the result.

Ravi will arrange an interview at my convenience, when I have the time.

ZK

‘The Sheikh, he writes to you like a lover.’

Cat glanced up to find Kasia grinning at her.

Cat blushed as she scrunched the note up in her fist and tossed it in the waste bin by the writing desk she had been given. ‘He writes to me like a tyrant, more like.’

‘What is this tyrant?’ Kasia asked, testing her increasingly fluent English.

Cat searched for the word in Narabi. But of course there wasn’t one, because tyrant was an insult, and apparently being an obstructive jerk was perfectly okay if you were the Sheikh in this country. ‘Someone who never lets you do what you want to do,’ she said.

The girl grinned. ‘What is it you wish to do?’

‘I need to speak to people outside these walls,’ she said in her own faltering Narabi. ‘I want to interview a much bigger cross section of Narabian society.’

She’d like to interview Zane Khan too, but she figured that was way outside Kasia’s remit.

‘Why do you not go to the marketplace? There are many people of Narabia there.’

‘I would, but I can’t go anywhere unaccompanied,’ she huffed, the frustration starting to choke her. ‘And all the visits we’ve been on so far, I haven’t been allowed to talk to anyone properly.’

‘You could come with me to buy the herbs and spices for eating tomorrow.’

Cat’s heart hammered against her ribs. Why had she assumed that Kasia never left the palace? ‘That’s... Thank you. That’s a brilliant idea.’

The thought of finally taking her research to the next level had her pulse pounding in her ears. She should have had the guts to do this a lot sooner. After all, Zane hadn’t specifically said she couldn’t leave the palace. It wasn’t Zane holding her back, it was her own conformity. And cowardice.

‘Your Excellency, there is news from the women’s quarters.’

Zane glanced up from the letter he was writing to find his major-domo standing at the arched entrance to his private office. Ravi’s face was drawn, and his hands clutched together.

Terrific, what the heck has Catherine Smith done now?

The woman was proving much more troublesome that he had anticipated.

No way was he arranging an interview with her before he was sure he could control the emotions that had fazed him when she had first arrived. But she’d proved surprisingly persistent and demanding, making repeated requests to see him even though he’d made it quite clear he was not available.

‘What is it, Ravi?’ he snapped, putting his pen down. ‘Please tell me this isn’t another request for an interview from Dr Smith,’ he said. ‘Because the answer is still no.’ And he’d already told his major-domo he did not want to be bothered with her requests from now on—because all that did was trigger more of the desires he was currently trying very hard to suppress.

‘No, Your Excellency.’ Ravi’s usually implacable expression became tight with concern. ‘I have just been informed Dr Smith is no longer in the palace.’

‘What?’ The punch of anxiety hit Zane square in the solar plexus. ‘Then where the hell is she?’

‘We do not know, but we believe she may have left to go to the spice market with her servant, Kasia.’

Zane jerked out of his chair, his heart starting to kick his ribs like his thoroughbred Arabian stallion, Pegasus.

‘How long have they been gone?’ he demanded as he charged across the room.

‘No one has seen them for several hours.’

Several hours.

His thundering heart crashed into his throat.

Anything could have happened in that time. Catherine was a stranger here—how well did she even speak the language? He should never have left her to her own devices. The panic tightened around his heart, reminding him of being a boy in LA and waking up in the middle of the night to find himself alone in his mother’s apartment. A gaping hole opened in the pit of his stomach, the very same one that had appeared every time he’d had to scramble out of bed and track down his mother in one of the neighbourhood bars.

Not the same thing, damn it.

Zelda had been fragile, mentally and physically, and a chronic alcoholic. Catherine Smith was none of those things.

But still the gaping hole refused to disappear as he marched down the walkway towards the palace’s stables.

He had to get her back before she got hurt, or worse.

‘Why wasn’t I told about this sooner?’ Zane demanded, channelling the old fear into anger at his major-domo.

‘I am sorry, Your Divine Majesty,’ Ravi panted, breathing heavily as he raced to keep up with Zane.

‘Get me a robe and have Pegasus saddled,’ he shouted at one of the stable boys as he arrived in the equine palace, the comforting scent of hay and manure doing nothing to stem the fear gripping his insides.

‘Your Excellency? There is no need for you to venture o-out...’ Ravi stammered. ‘I have the palace guard ready to search the marketplace on your orders.’

‘I’ll lead the search party,’ he said.

Ravi returned with his robe. Zane shrugged it on, then took the keffiyeh. Securing the traditional headscarf with an agal rope, he covered his mouth and nose. It was almost noon, so it would be a hot dusty ride in searing heat. But he’d be damned if he’d let the palace guard conduct the search without him.

Pegasus arrived, stamping his hooves, his nostrils flaring as he shook his head against the bridle. Taking the reins from the stable boy, Zane grabbed the pommel on the horse’s saddle, stuck his boot into the stirrup and leapt onto the highly strung stallion as the horse charged out of the yard.

The hooves of the guards’ horses clattered behind him as the palace gates were rolled open.

The sun blinded him as Pegasus flew out of the grounds, and past the palace’s walls. The horse took the unpaved road down towards Zahari. People scattered, many dropping to their knees as they recognised him and his guards.

As they approached the labyrinth of streets leading to the old town and the women’s spice market, the colourful silks on the clothing stalls waving like flags, anger rose up to cover the gaping hole.

When he found Catherine, she was going to feel the full force of his fury, for defying his orders. And putting herself in unnecessary danger.

If he found her.

‘She says Tariq was a cruel Sheikh.’ Kasia relayed the information in English as Cat nodded, scribbling on the notepad she’d brought with her.

They had been at the market for over two hours, she’d taken photos of the amazing sights and sounds, had absorbed the workings of the place and revelled in the chance to finally see a side of Narabian society without close supervision. But speaking to Nazarin, an elderly stallholder, was the first opportunity she’d had to talk to anyone specifically about Tariq Ali Nawari Khan’s forty-year reign.

Nazarin’s hands were gnarled and stained from years spent dying cloth to sell at the market. Her accent had been far too thick for Cat to decipher, but with Kasia’s translation help she had been a font of knowledge about the Nawari family thanks to her experiences going to the palace to deliver cloth.

‘She says he was very cruel to his son,’ Kasia added.

Cat’s head jerked up from her notes. ‘Are you talking about Zane?’ she said in Narabi to Nazarin.

The woman stared for a moment, obviously taken aback by the informal address. Then she nodded and rushed off a torrent of words, but the guttural inflections were impossible for Cat to understand.

She had to wait patiently for Kasia to finish listening to the woman’s words. Eventually her friend turned to Cat, her eyes round with shock. ‘She says, yes, the new Sheikh. The one from America. When the boy came to the palace, she says he tried many times to escape and he was punished harshly for this disobedience.’

‘Punished? How?’ Cat whispered, shocked. Why had Zane tried to escape? Had he been brought to Narabia against his will?

Cat had wondered about the circumstances of his mother’s decision to give up custody of her son. Zelda Mayhew Khan had fled Narabia not long after Zane’s birth and taken him with her—the fairy-tale romance with the Sheikh obviously not living up to the media hype. The actress had never spoken publicly about her marriage and it seemed once she had faded from the public eye, she’d struggled to find work and had a string of arrests for DUIs and disorderly conduct when Zane was in his teens. So it had made sense Zane’s father had assumed custody, but Cat had never been able to find a formal custody agreement—or a court order declaring Zelda an unfit mother—during her initial research. And she had wondered what it must have been like for a teenage boy, who had probably had minimal supervision while living with his mother, to suddenly find himself in a place like Narabia, where the customs and culture were a lot more constrained... But she hadn’t suspected anything like this.

She was trying to formulate a question, keen to discover more about Zane’s relationship with his father, when one of Nazarin’s teenage granddaughters rushed into the tiny room at the back of her shop where they were talking.

‘You must leave—the Sheikh, he comes on horseback with his men,’ she beseeched Kasia and Cat in the native language.

‘We should go,’ Kasia said. ‘He has come to find you.’

Cat’s heart pummelled her chest.

Why had he come looking for her? And why did she have the feeling the answer to that question could not be good?

She didn’t want to leave. There were so many questions she still had for Nazarin. But she could feel her granddaughter’s fear and see Kasia’s concerned expression. The last thing she wanted to do was cause any trouble for Nazarin, her family or Kasia. This could only be a misunderstanding. Yes, Zane had told her not to go anywhere unaccompanied, but she had Kasia with her. And anyway, she would have told him of this trip if he hadn’t been so reluctant to talk to her.

Thanking Nazarin, she and Kasia left the room and hurried through the stall to the courtyard.

She pulled on her headscarf and shielded her eyes against the midday sun, which was blisteringly hot now. The spice market had closed an hour ago, the heat becoming unbearable, and the stalls had been packed away. Only a few people still milled around. But some of the citizens came out of their dwellings at the thunderous sound of hooves approaching.

Cat’s breath clogged her lungs as six horsemen appeared on the ridge above the marketplace. Their shapes became distinct through the heat haze as they galloped into the courtyard. Out in front was a monstrous black stallion, the rider handling the powerful horse with consummate ease, his robes flying out behind him. He led the riders to a skidding stop in front of Cat and Kasia.

The stallion reared before his hooves crashed down only a few yards from Cat’s toes. She scrambled back. Even with the traditional face and head covering she would have recognised Zane Khan anywhere.

It seemed the locals did too, because they were already falling to their knees in his presence, Kasia included. Cat stayed upright, her whole body rigid with stunned disbelief, and something that felt suspiciously like awe.

Ripping off his face covering, Zane Khan leaned down towards her. His blue eyes glittered with temper, shocking Cat to her core.

Why did he look so furious?

The stallion pawed the ground as if mimicking its master’s agitation as he held out a gloved hand. ‘Up. Now.’

She probably should have taken his hand and done as he asked. She hadn’t come to the market intending to anger him. She certainly hadn’t thought he would come to fetch her back—after all, he had been too busy to even speak to her for over a fortnight.

But something inside her snapped at the autocratic command. She was here to do a job; what exactly was his problem with that?

‘I’m not finished. I still have work to do here,’ she said, clasping her hands behind her back.

Zane’s curse was like a missile shot in the afternoon quiet and Cat cringed.

What was she doing? Perhaps she should do as she was told, and discuss this later, in a less public place? But before she’d had a chance to reconsider her position, he swung his leg over the saddle’s pommel and jumped down.