Special Deliveries: Heir To His Legacy: Heir to a Desert Legacy

“I don’t. But if this continues, if we start to look too frayed to the outside world… we will become vulnerable to it. We must present a front of absolute unification for our enemies. If there is dissent from within, we will rot from within, and rest assured, the countries we share borders with will happily take advantage of our weakness and watch us crumble.”

He spoke with ferocity, intensity, his dark eyes boring into hers.

“And how do you propose to do that?” she asked, knowing as soon as she asked the question that she wasn’t going to like the answer.

“I intend to propose,” he said, cold humor twisting his lips into a smile that held no warmth or hint of happiness.

“What exactly do you mean by that?”

“It’s very simple, Chloe James. I intend to take you as my wife.”

Chloe felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach, all the air leaching from her body, making her gasp. “What?”

“Not a real wife, you understand. This is about presenting the image of a family to the people. If I am meant to raise Aden as my own, my wife will be expected to treat him as her own. You want to stay, you want that role, so I am giving it to you.”

“But… you want me to marry you?”

“I don’t want you to marry me, I want to protect Aden and give the people what they expect, give them an image that will bring comfort.”

Chloe felt as though her heart was trying to claw its way up her throat. Failing that, she was certain it would beat through her chest. She knew all about marriage. About the dynamic between a husband and wife. About what a man did when he saw a woman as his property.

She knew that not every man was abusive. That not every marriage was marked by violence. She knew it, but in her head, it was all she could see.

The word husband brought forward visions of her father venting his rage on her mother, the woman laying on the floor as he continued to hit her. Kick her. And on the wall behind them was their wedding portrait, the bride in white, smiling lovingly at the man who was now trying to wring the life out of her with his hands.

It was a vision that was with her always, this scene of extreme violence and suffering. It was, now and forever her strongest association with the words husband and wife.

“We won’t have to stay married forever.”

“Just until Aden assumes the throne?” she asked, her tone incredulous.

“Yes. Just until then.”

“So only sixteen years of my life spent married to a man that I don’t even like?”

“I’m spending sixteen years in a position that I don’t want, until Aden is ready to rule. I understand that this isn’t your country, that your loyalty isn’t the same as mine. But your loyalty is to Aden, isn’t it? To giving him what your sister wanted him to have?”

Her heart felt as if it was being torn in two. Visions of her future burning before her, turning to ash and floating away on the wind. And she had to let them burn, along with her fear, because the only other option was leaving Aden behind. Visiting when she could, and otherwise going on with her life as though it hadn’t changed forever.

She couldn’t do that. Had come to that conclusion already.

“Does it have to be marriage? I am Tamara’s half sister. I’m Aden’s aunt. It’s entirely possible that I would move into the palace for those reasons alone.”

“For a while, yes. But until he’s a grown man?”

“Well, I don’t consider sixteen a grown man…”

“In Attar it is different,” he said, his tone hard and cold as ice.

If she left, this was Aden’s family. His closest family. There would be no warmth from his uncle.

“It would just be a legal marriage, right?”

He nodded once. “I have no desire for a wife. And it is traditional for the royal couple to have separate quarters.”

“Rashid and Tamara didn’t.”

“They were unusual. Theirs was a love match, and Tamara’s American sensibilities colored the way they did things.”

“Rashid never struck me as being very traditional.”

“He wasn’t. It was one reason he gravitated to Tamara.”

“But we…”

“We will be a traditional Attari couple. It will be no hardship. In fact, it will come as little surprise that you’re the woman I select as my queen. You demonstrated bravery, the desire to protect Aden at all costs. Love is not always a factor in marriages here, particularly not royal marriages. No one will expect it.”

Chloe swallowed hard, the earlier image of her parents branded in her mind. “Can I think about it?”

“Of course.” He looked at her as though he expected thinking about it would only take a few moments of her time.

“Not with you watching me.”

“It is quite clear-cut. The only thing you’re finding difficult is your emotional connection to the idea of marriage. And I have no such emotional idea. About marriage or anything else.”

“I’m sure you don’t. But it’s not just that…” She looked up at him, his eyes boring into hers, gripping her, holding her. Stealing her words.

“You’ll be able to finish your schooling. I spoke to the president of the university about you continuing on in your studies from Attar, and I provided you with this space so that you could work easily.”

Anger came to her rescue, demolishing the fear, demolishing the strange attraction that seemed to pull her to him. “You… you what?”

“There is no need to thank me.”

“I’m not going to thank you! You called the president of the university? And you told him I would be completing my studies from here without even speaking to me?”

“You told me you wanted to stay already.”

“And you told me no.”

“And I changed my mind when I found the solution to the problem.”

Chloe felt as if her head might explode. “But I didn’t agree to anything.”

“Naturally, Chloe, we both know you will say yes. You want to be with Aden and this is the most practical way to go about it. This is the best thing. The best way for me to keep the nation whole, intact until Aden takes the throne.”

“You don’t know that I’ll say yes,” she said.

“Yes, I do. And when I told Dr. Schultz that you were staying here to marry me and become the sheikha of Attar he was naturally very supportive.”

“You told him I was going to marry you?” She put her hands on her face and started pacing. “Oh… I’m going to have a stroke.”

“No, you aren’t.”

Her head snapped back up. “Oh? I’m not? Well, I guess you would know since you seem to know exactly what I’m going to do at all times. Do you have any more brilliant insights into me for me? Oh, all powerful Sheikh, please reveal to me, the poor, little, feebleminded woman, my desires.”

“You are being overdramatic now, Chloe.”

“I am not. I am being exactly as dramatic as the situation demands.”

“What is the difference between you living here in a room in the palace, and you living here in a room in the palace with a title and a marriage certificate? Practically, for you, there will be very little difference.”

“Marriage honestly means nothing to you?”

“It is nothing more than a social construct. Without emotion or obligation to remain faithful, why should it mean anything? I do not want a wife, and you certainly won’t be filling the position. You will be here for Aden, which will be to your benefit. And you will be here for public events, which, I will not lie, will be for mine. But I will require nothing from you in terms of what a man wants from a wife. I don’t need a place in your bed, neither do I wish for you to give me children.”

“Good, because I don’t want that stuff, either.” She ignored the little kick that went through her body at the mention of being in bed together. Ignored it so well it was almost as if it hadn’t happened. Because it didn’t mean anything. Nothing at all. “I can’t believe you. You arrogant, controlling…”

“Decisive,” he finished. “I am decisive. You said what you wanted and I set out to find a solution that would work. More than work, I have found one that will benefit us both. I suggest you thank me, rather than verbally abusing me.”

“I think your ego can stand it.”

“I don’t have an ego, Chloe. I see things as they are, as they need to be in order to work. It’s not about ego, it’s about knowing my place in life and ensuring that I meet every obligation. I will do it for Aden and when you are my wife, I will do it for you.”

When, not if.

Chloe felt as though she was breaking apart inside. Like the world, the world she knew anyway, had cracked and was shattering around her, taking away any sense of certainty, any idea of where the right path was.

She was standing in the dark, wishing she had a lantern so she could find her way.

But she had a feeling there was no right way. Not now. There was only the way that would hurt the least, the way she could best manage.

If only she knew for certain which direction that was. Because one choice would lead her back to Oregon, back to her life as she’d planned it since she was a teenager. But it would lead her away from Aden.

And the other way would lead her straight into the lion’s den. Straight into the thing she feared the most.

But she would be here. Would be with her child.

And he really could be hers. No more holding herself slightly at a distance to keep herself from breaking.

She swallowed, fear, grief, making her throat tight, making it hard to breathe.

And in the darkness, she saw the light. It came with an image of Aden. Because in that instance she realized that out of every desire she had, that one would never lessen. The connection with him would never fade.

Jobs would change, what she wanted in terms of work would change. The people in her life would come and go. She would move out of her apartment, and lose her attachment to the old one. She would complete her doctorate and find new, more challenging goals.

But no matter what changed in that part of her life, no matter where her priorities shifted to, her love for Aden would remain. It would be the constant, no matter what she was surrounded by. And if she chose to leave, the grief, the pain at being separated, would be the companion to that love.

She couldn’t bear it. Couldn’t bear the idea of embracing ephemeral, temporary things for the one connection she had that had ever felt real. Permanent. For the only family she had.

It was more than even that now, more than just a desire for her family. Aden was her son. No matter what the truth might be genetically, the truth of her emotions was that he was nothing other than her own child.

“All right, Sayid, I will marry you,” she said, the words getting stuck in her throat.

There was no look of victory on his face, no sense of triumph, just a single nod, his expression remaining as cold and unreadable as ever. “And I will have it arranged. The sooner the better.”

He turned and strode from the room, leaving her standing there, surrounded by books and whiteboards. That at least was a familiar comfort.

A part of her had always feared marriage, but in that vision, she’d been weak. Clinging to the man she called husband, as her mother had done.

No, that wouldn’t be her life. Because in order for a man to have that kind of power over her, she would have to love him. And she didn’t love Sayid. She never would.

More than that, he would never feel any passion toward her.

There was no emotion in him, and in that there was safety.

Sayid was as cold as ice. And she welcomed that. Clung to the safety in his lack of emotion.

As long as there was no passion, there would be no danger.

CHAPTER SEVEN

SAYID RAN, THE SAND HOT even through his shoes. The sun was a punishment, sending heat through his skin and into his body, burning him from the inside out, cleansing him.

He stopped and looked around him. There was nothing visible in any direction, the slight hill behind him concealing the palace from view. And everywhere else… there was simply nothing. Nothing but open space. Red sand. Bleached sky. No walls. No bars.

Even so, it felt as if chains were tightening on his wrists, binding him, squeezing his throat, threatening to crush his windpipe. He had nightmares at night, every night, of the blackness. Of being bound, unable to move. Of waiting. Waiting for the crack of the whip, the blade of a knife, over flesh.

Waiting for pain he couldn’t show he felt. Crushing the agony down, turning it inward so that no one would ever know how close he was to being broken.

He bent at the waist, his hands braced on his knees as he tried to block out that feeling of being trapped, the sense of walls closing in on him. Usually, being out in the Attari desert helped. The vast openness, the sense of unending space relieving the dark claustrophobia that lived inside of him.

This time it didn’t stop. He felt trapped, felt as though he couldn’t breathe.

He sat down, uncaring that the sand burned his legs where his shorts exposed them to the elements, not caring that the sun beat down on him with all the cruelty of a whip.

He felt as if he would burst, his breath coming slow and hard, pressure building inside of him, rage, so strong, so uncontrollable that he had to let it out. Only here. Only with the desert as witness.

Only here could he allow himself to feel the crushing weight of all that had been placed on him at birth. There had been chains on him long before he’d been taken prisoner. Chains put on him, first by his family, by the expectation that came with being the son meant to oversee the military, meant to oversee the protection of a nation. By all he’d been forced to give up, held captive to the life he’d been born into.

But in the end, he kept the chains of his own free will. He had tightened them. In that prison cell, the one that had stolen a year of his life, he had suffered indignity. Had lived in filth, had been stripped naked, every sign of rank and stature stolen. And then the skin had been stripped from his body.

But the harder they had pressed, the stronger he’d made his walls. The greater the weight, the deeper he buried his pain. He was the symbol of the strength of his nation and no matter how hard he was pushed, he knew he could never break.

Knew he could never allow weakness, emotion, to come in and crack the walls. That torture, the captivity, was the time in his life he’d been created for. Was the reason he had been broken, then remade, in his youth.

He had taken beatings already, had already lost all he’d cared about. At the hands of his uncle. The only family involved in his daily life. But it had been necessary.

And then Rashid had died. And another weight had been added to him. More defenses had needed to be built. And the man had been buried deeper still. But it was no longer a refuge, not like it had been during his time with his uncle, or in the enemy prison. Now it threatened to choke him.

In that moment, the need to break free of it, the need to scream into the silence of the desert, to release the tension that was threatening to crush him in its grip, was overwhelming. But he could not. He was too tightly bound.

Now he would have a wife. A child.

A chance he’d thought lost to him. A chance he no longer wanted. Not anymore.

Another woman. Another time. Another baby. One that had never been allowed to take its first breath.

And Sura…

Sayid’s love for her had been unacceptable, his loss of control with her a weakness. And that was why, at sixteen, his uncle had ensured that the woman who held Sayid’s heart had been given to another.

Sayid could remember still, watching the armored car that carried her driving away. Taking her to the home of her future husband.

But she’s pregnant. The baby…

There is no pregnancy now, Sayid. Her father ensured that it was dealt with. And Sura is to be married to another.

Who? Where?

It is not your concern. She is not for you. She never could be. It is not what you were meant for.

He had longed to cut his own heart out in that moment, would have done it, gladly, because the pain would have been preferable to the loss, unending, searing, that he had felt then. He had been on his knees, broken.

Do you see, Sayid? Do you see the power she had? The power it would have given to your enemies? They would have used her against you. You cannot love like that. To feel like that, is to give your power to others.

Kalid had been right. Then, as ever. Had shown him the power such a weakness might give his enemies. And Sayid had taken the final step that day, purging himself of every emotion, leaving nothing more than the ideal he had been born to be. A symbol of the nation. Untouchable. Immovable.

He had given up on the thought of having a wife. Of having a child.

But Chloe would not be his wife. Not truly. And Aden would never be his child. Nothing had changed. Nothing would change.

He stood, carefully closing himself down again, shutting the doors against all the feeling he had just released, against the pain, against the feeling of being in bondage.

And the chains on his soul loosened, a numbness taking their place.

By the time he returned to the palace, he felt nothing again.

“Thankfully, we will be spared the circus that often comes with a royal wedding,” Sayid said, his eyes connecting with hers across the table.

He had requested, with some advance notice even, that she join him for dinner that evening. Everything in her had rebelled against the idea but she really couldn’t afford to follow the feeling. They didn’t have to play like a love-struck couple, but she could hardly seem afraid of him.

More than that, she couldn’t be afraid of him, she wasn’t going to spend her days hiding in the palace, trying to avoid him. She was stronger than that.

She would be stronger than that.

“Why is that?”

“I aim to have the wedding take place quickly, and a celebration so soon after the sheikh’s death would be distasteful.”

“Well, I can’t say I’m too sad to avoid the big wedding.”

“Neither can I.” Though she would be happier to avoid a wedding altogether.

“You have not touched your dinner.”

“I don’t think I’ll be hungry for a week at least.”

“You have to eat. You’ll get too thin.”

She looked down at her increased figure and back up at him. “Losing baby weight wouldn’t hurt my feelings.”

“You don’t need to lose any weight.”

She looked up at him and realized that his eyes were focused on her breasts. She fought a surge of heat that bloomed at her midsection and spread outward. She should be offended. Instead, she was intrigued.

She couldn’t remember having a man look at her breasts before. The men she interacted with were like her. Focused and driven, with tunnel vision when they were working on solving equations. Yes, there were obviously students and professors at the university who had relationships. Plenty of them. But while they were at school, they were at school.

And she chose to extend that kind of drive, focus and exclusion to the rest of her life. She’d never wanted a relationship and so had never really cared whether or not men looked at her breasts.

It was… interesting. And she really, really should be angry.

She cleared her throat but he didn’t adjust the trajectory of his gaze. “Well, that’s beside the point. The point is that in the space of a few days my life has changed completely.”

Now he looked at her face. “Your life started changing nearly a year ago. And again when Aden was born. This is just an extension of that.”

She bit the inside of her cheek. “I know.”

It was true. Her life had been taken over when she’d gotten pregnant with Aden. The pregnancy had changed how she felt, how she looked, what she liked. Her body had been foreign to her, a stranger. Naively, she’d held on to the belief that after giving birth everything would be the same again.

She’d been so stupid.

“I’ll never know how it would have been if they were still here,” she said, her tone soft. “Would it have been easier to give him up?”

He shrugged. “Likely. You were confident that they would do a good job raising him.”

She nodded. “I was.”

“And are you confident that I would?”

“Not in the least,” she said, not seeing the point in lying.

He didn’t miss a beat. “Then I’m certain had Rashid and Tamara lived, you would have been fine.”

She wasn’t sure, though. Wasn’t sure if she ever really could have dealt with this the way she imagined she could.

“Probably.”

“It does no good to castigate yourself for things that will never happen.”

“I suppose you’re right.”

“Naturally,” he said.

“You’re so arrogant.”

He shrugged. “As are you in the right setting. You have complete confidence in your abilities as a scientist, in your thought process and problem solving skills, I imagine.”

“Of course I do.”

“Then I fail to see why I should have anything less than complete confidence in my own domain.”

“It’s because it seems nothing falls outside of your domain,” she said drily.

“I already told you I’m sure you could outtalk me on string theory.”

“Then I’ll stay in my science corner where I reign supreme.” The words gave her some comfort. It really might not be so bad being married to him. She could spend time with Aden and spend time in that gorgeous study he’d had put together for her.

“You are welcome to your corner.”

“Ah, generous,” she said, looking down at her food and thinking that now she might chance a bite. And then she remembered how he’d looked at her breasts. Why had he been looking at her breasts?

She took a bite of rice and chewed while she pondered this new mystery of the universe. She could feel his eyes on her again and heat crept over her skin.

“I am not master of every domain, habibti,” he said, his voice quiet. “You need only to look at the headlines to realize that.”

“That’s just public perception. It’s not necessarily reality.”

“There was an event, shortly after Rashid died, and a diplomat from a neighboring country wanted to speak to me about an upcoming rugby match between our two countries.”

“And?”

“And I told him, quite succinctly, that I didn’t care about sport at the moment, all things considered. He was unhappy, said he would not be encouraging his people to patronize Attar when they were to go on holiday. My response was to tell him to go to hell.”

“Oh.”

“That made for very salacious news, I can tell you. The next time we had an event at the palace, my advisor told me to be nice. Like I was a child.” He laughed, the sound carrying no humor. “No, I am not the master of every domain.”

“Well,” she said, “I’m not either. And, strangely, I even work at proving myself wrong a lot of the time. It’s what a good scientist does. Searches objectively for truth, regardless of their own personal beliefs. I guess a good leader has to be nice to everyone regardless of their own personal mood.”

“I’m not sure I know how to be nice.”

She looked at him, at his coal-dark eyes. “You aren’t that bad, Sayid.”

“Tell me, Chloe, what were you going to do before all of this?”

She was surprised by the question, even more surprised by the genuine curiosity behind it. “I was also due to start student teaching in the fall. And I’m gearing up to write my doctoral dissertation on how matter and energy behave on the molecular scale.” Unlike having her figure stared at, in this, she had some confidence, total understanding. “After that, I had hoped to get a position at a research lab, and then a university as soon as I could manage it.”

“You seem to enjoy doing paperwork.” He said the word as though it was a scourge.