Sheikhs: Rich, powerful desert kings and the women who bring them to their knees...

by Clare Connelly

  She liked the noise.

  Sometimes, not often, but occasionally, it drowned out the thoughts that tormented her.

  She sat back in the sofa, staring at the screen without seeing, sipping her coffee from time to time. And then, she almost choked on the black liquid when the very man she’d been trying her hardest not to think about flashed up on screen.

  Sheikh Rafiq Al-Khalil is expected to announce at a press conference later today that his father, Sultan Malik Sharim Al-Khalil, has died after a long illness.

  Chloe’s heart stammered inside of her and she jerked to her feet, her pulse throbbing, her knees weak, adrenaline causing a bitter metallic taste to flood her mouth.

  “Oh, God.” She gripped the back of the sofa, weakened to the point where she truly thought she might pass out. She couldn’t though. This wasn’t a time for her to indulge emotional weakness – she had to be strong.

  Malik had died, and she hadn’t been there. She hadn’t even said goodbye to him.

  What a selfish, awful thing to have done! To have left without saying goodbye to him.

  “Oh, God.” She walked quickly towards the kitchen, dropping the mug and apple core into the sink and washing her hands before running to her bedroom. The voice from the television chased her, reciting Malik’s biography now. Every sentence only served to enhance her guilt, and her grief.

  She opened a browser on her phone and searched for flights. There was a seat on a commercial plane leaving in a few hours – but only one. She purchased it without a second thought, using the credit card she’d avoided touching for fear of being tracked by Raffa’s security detail.

  What did that matter now? Within a day she’d be back in Ras el Kida, there was no longer any sense in hiding.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “WHEN WILL SHE ARRIVE?” Raffa paced the floor of his office, his expression grim.

  “The car left the airport a short time ago. Her Majesty should be here within twenty minutes.”

  Raffa nodded, dismissing his servant. Emotions coursed through him: anger, fury, grief, sadness. Anticipation, relief, longing, need.

  He couldn’t feel those things though – he shouldn’t. He shouldn’t still want her, he shouldn’t be so weak that he could crave her even after she’d stepped out of his life without a backwards glance.

  She’d left him.

  She’d sent divorce papers through so many channels it had made it impossible for him to locate her. She’d wanted to dissolve their marriage without so much as a face to face meeting. Without the courtesy of even a conversation.

  He was tempted to have her sent away, and he knew it was the right thing to do. She could go to her apartment in the city until the funeral, and then make an appearance if she wished. A meeting with Raffa wasn’t necessary. She’d made it clear she didn’t want to see him again.

  Yet she was here, now, on her way to him, and she’d be before him within an hour.

  His blood pounded inside his body, and his emotions almost tore him apart. But he wouldn’t let her see that. He wouldn’t let her know that he’d spent these three months scouring the earth for her, worrying about her, needing her. He wouldn’t let her see that she’d left him and he’d crumbled apart inside.

  No one should have that kind of power over a king!

  He straightened his spine and poured all the strength he’d once laid claim to into his bones. His expression bore a mask of cool impatience.

  “Bring her to me as soon as the car pulls up.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  It was only fifteen minutes later when a knock sounded outside his office door. Raffa froze, sliding his hostility firmly into position as one might a shield, before turning around. “Come.”

  The door pushed inwards, and two servants strode in.

  He barely saw them. All of him, every cell of his body, every fibre of his being, was focused on the woman behind them.

  God, Chloe.

  His body, his traitorous body, wanted to push the servants aside and draw her into his arms. To kiss some sense into her, to remind her of what they’d shared.

  He didn’t. He glared at her, and in that glare he poured every single moment of worry, every single hour of regret, every single hurt and betrayal, so that Chloe blanched physically, her face pale, her eyes unable to meet his.

  During the first month of her absence, he’d missed her. He’d looked for her because he needed to see her, because he’d been worried. He’d been motivated by compassion, care, disbelief. The second month, it had morphed into impatience and disbelief. Where was she? How could she have disappeared into thin air? And why had she wanted to? The third month had been a reflection of his darkening soul. Her absence had soured him, and he no longer looked for her because he wanted to see her – he looked for her because he needed her to know what she’d done to him.

  But now, he saw what he’d done to her and the world shifted beneath his feet, leaving a flash of uncertainty where righteous indignation should have stood.

  Hell, she’d changed so much. She was physically altered in the way he felt internally different. Her skin was fair, after months without the kisses of the Ras el Kidan heat, and her hair hung loose about her face, unstyled, uncared for. But beyond that, she was…

  Hurting.

  He saw it because it was exactly as he felt! He recognized the pain in her features, the stretching of skin over worry and doubt. And for a second he felt hope, and gladness, but then he realized: she was grieving Malik. Of course she was. It was the only event that might have pulled her from the woodwork.

  And once the funeral was over, she would disappear once more.

  And he’d let her – because she wanted to go, and he wasn’t going to imprison her against her will. Hell, their whole marriage had obviously been so exactly the opposite of what she’d wanted. His gut rolled; anguished recriminations danced on the periphery of his mind but he wouldn’t speak them.

  The time of speaking was passed – this was closure. An end. That was all.

  “Leave us.”

  The servants straightened and walked in a line through the door, pulling it softly behind them, the click of the lock quiet but vital in a way that resonated around the room.

  “So,” he drawled, taking a step towards her, studying the way her expression shifted, the way she tried – and failed – to hide behind that icy mask she always had to hand. “You came back.”

  “Is it true?” She whispered, swallowing, so that the fragile column of her neck shifted visibly beneath his scrutiny. “Is he…”

  “Is my father dead?” Raffa asked, only the fact the death had, in fact, happened a week earlier, allowing him to speak the words without sounding at all effected. “Yes.”

  Chloe’s eyes swept shut and now, to his surprise, she began to sob. Big, racking sounds that filled his office. “I’m so, I’m so, sorry,” she stammered, spinning away from him, walking towards a chair and sinking down into it. “I knew he was sick but I thought… I still wasn’t ready …”

  “I told you almost a year ago that he was close to death,” Raffa denied, ignoring her cries, ignoring her pain. She deserved to feel it – she’d chosen to walk away from him, from his father, from all of them.

  “But he seemed well, and he…”

  Raffa didn’t finish the sentence for her.

  “I just didn’t think it would happen.” She dipped her head forward and it took every ounce of willpower not to go to her, to comfort her. She didn’t want his comfort – she never had. Or perhaps, early on in their marriage, she would have taken it, if he’d offered it. He hadn’t, and he couldn’t change the past.

  With a heavy sigh, he stalked to his desk and picked up the divorce papers. “You have no business here, Chloe. He’s not your father-in-law, he’s not your family. He is no one to you now.”

  “He’ll always be a man who showed me great kindness,” she countered softly, her voice cracking.

  “And you left him.” Raffa threw the wor
ds at her, like grenades. It was juvenile to make her feel guilty for running from Malik when what he really wanted to do was punish her for leaving him!

  Her nod was a sad, tentative admission.

  Raffa refused to soften. “I’m glad you came, though. It saves me the trouble of having these sent back.”

  He lifted a pen, his fingers shaking slightly as he hovered it over the space for his signature. He’d stared at the line for weeks now, knowing he needed to sign it, knowing he needed to give her what she wanted and end the marriage, but he hadn’t. And now, with her in his office, he finally scrawled his name – and for the worst possible reason.

  He did it so he could have the satisfaction of seeing her react.

  He wasn’t disappointed. When he straightened, the papers held in his hand, Chloe looked as though she was about to faint. But then, with what must have taken a monumental effort, she assumed some of her usual expression, a hint of ice around her eyes as she stood. Only the wobbling of her knees betrayed her. He watched as she crossed the room, and came to stand right in front of him, but he didn’t hand the papers over.

  “Tell me why you left,” he demanded, and despite his efforts at restraint, the words emerged as a hoarse, dark plea. Perhaps the depth of it surprised her, because her eyes jerked to his and she stepped back a little, shaking her head an infinitesimal amount.

  “It’s for the best,” was all she murmured.

  And the quiet, plaintive little sentence was like striking a match over gasoline. Raffa slammed his palm on the edge of his desk and spun away from her, stalking towards the window. Crowds had begun to form; hundreds of people dressed in black with highlights of gold, to honour the deceased King.

  “For whose best? Not my best!” He said quietly, but with enough anger to make the room shake. “Not my country’s best. For your best, then, I presume you mean. So tell me, Chloe, what was it about being my wife that you hated so much? What about me that made marriage so abhorrent? Tell me why you felt your only option was to run away as though you were some kind of unwilling prisoner in my bed?”

  He continued to look out of the window, so didn’t see the way she stumbled back slightly, didn’t see the way her fingertips grazed the edge of his desk, needing something solid to connect with.

  “Tell me that you hated me,” he said grimly. “Tell me that you hated being married to me. That you ran from me because I didn’t deserve you. Because I treated you like a possession instead of a woman. Tell me the words I have thought these last three months.”

  Behind him, Chloe shivered, but she didn’t say anything. She couldn’t. Her mind was fuzzy around the edges and black spots hovered on the edges of her mind.

  “Damn it, if you’re trying to protect me –,” he spun around in time to see her knees buckle and her body sag forward. He swore under his breath, striding across the room and catching her just an inch before her head connected with the hardness of the floor.

  Her face was pale against the black fabric of his robe, and now that he held her, he felt for himself how slim she was beneath the clothes she wore.

  A new emotion usurped all others. Fear.

  “Call a doctor,” he shouted in his native tongue, the words ringing out like a bell through this wing of the building. He heard the response – thudding of military boots as security officers ran, and the bursting open of his door as two more servants entered the room. Chloe was beginning to stir, but Raffa held her still, his eyes boring into hers when she blinked them open.

  “Stay where you are.”

  Chloe frowned, her mind blank. Which was where? She blinked again. No. She wasn’t dreaming. The last twenty four hours had really happened.

  Malik had died. She groaned, trying to sit up, but Raffa’s hands on her shoulders were like vices. Her head was in his lap, and his body was warm, all around hers. She needed to stand, but being close to him like this was the best thing she’d ever felt.

  But then she remembered. The divorce papers.

  Their marriage was officially over. Well? What else had she expected? She’d sent them to him. She’d walked out on him, and she’d hidden from him. Did she think he might still be foolish enough to want to convince her to stay?

  And even if he did, she couldn’t give into that. She couldn’t give him what he needed – and he needed that baby now more than ever.

  It jerked her into action. “Let me go.” She said with desperate urgency and determination, even when her heart was breaking, and now when she tried to move, he didn’t fight her. He helped her up though, and guided her to a seat. Once she was settled, he strode across the room and filled a crystal glass with iced tea, bringing it back to her and holding it out. She took the glass from the bottom, careful not to touch his fingers – there’d been enough touching already.

  “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I’ve been travelling all day. I hadn’t eaten. And the shock of Malik…” And seeing you again, she added mentally, closing her eyes as though that might blot her husband from her mind and her heart.

  It didn’t.

  “The doctor will be here soon,” Raffa said, his arms crossed over his broad chest.

  “I don’t need a doctor,” she said with a shake of her head. “I’m fine, truly.”

  But the door pushed inwards and a medical professional appeared, distinguishable by his white coat and black leather bag. He joined the servants who were hovering in the door, unsure of how to proceed.

  Chloe hadn’t seen this man before, but for once, the doctor was a servant who met her eyes. In fact, he smiled into them kindly, and when he spoke it was as though they were equals. How refreshing it was to be seen as a person rather than simply the Sheikha.

  “What happened, your highness?” He asked, placing a bag down beside Chloe and crouching at her feet. His voice was accented, but she understood him well enough. She could have slipped into Ras el Kidan but the language was part of her past – a past she needed to forget.

  She stuck to English.

  “Nothing, I…”

  “She fainted,” Raffa contradicted, coming to stand over them. “And she looks terrible.”

  Chloe swept her eyes shut, his assessment no less hurtful for being true.

  “Would you mind having the room cleared, sir?” The doctor asked, without looking at Raffa.

  Raffa barked a command in Ras el Kidan and the servants disappeared.

  Apparently the doctor knew better than to ask Raffa to join them. “Lie down please,” he said gently, arranging a pillow behind Chloe’s head.

  “This is silly.”

  “Chloe,” Raffa’s voice was thick with torment. “Just do as he says. Please.”

  She jerked her eyes to his and felt something pass between them, something she didn’t understand. She’d come to Ras el Kida to mourn the passing of her father-in-law, but also because she wanted to see and support this man, and instead, she’d arrived and brought pain to him, and now she was making trouble when he no doubt had other things to attend to.

  “You don’t have to stay,” she said softly, lying back against the pillows.

  A muscle jerked in his jaw but he remained resolutely where he was.

  “You fainted?” The doctor asked, taking a blood pressure cuff from his bag and wrapping it around her upper arm. It squeezed against her flesh and Chloe stared at the ceiling while it did its job.

  “Yeah. But it wasn’t a big deal. Like I said, I hadn’t eaten and…”

  “In how long?” The doctor prompted.

  “I had an apple this morning. American time.”

  The doctor frowned, but it was nothing to the glower or Raffa’s face. “And before that?”

  Chloe blinked. “I… can’t remember.”

  “Do you make a habit of skipping meals?” The doctor asked, removing the cuff and taking a thermometer from his bag. He placed it under Chloe’s tongue so she shot him a look of pique. He answered with a smile, before removing the thermometer.

  “No,” she answere
d. “I’ve just been…forgetful lately. Out of routine.”

  The doctor lifted his gaze to Raffa’s face then returned his attention to Chloe.

  “How have you been sleeping?”

  She swallowed. “Fine.”

  “Chloe?” It was Raffa now, and he crouched down beside her. “Tell the truth.”

  How did he know? How did he know that she tossed and turned all night every night, as though each shift might somehow fill the empty, gaping void inside of her?

  “Not well,” she answered, staring at the ceiling.

  “Is this the first time you’ve fainted?”

  “Yes. No. I nearly did when I heard the news about Malik,” she whispered. “I was so surprised. It just hit me that I hadn’t been here…” Her eyes flew to Raffa’s face and she felt a sob welling inside of her. She hadn’t been here for him – she loved him, she loved him with all that she was and she’d walked away from him. She’d done it to protect him, but how she wished she could have comforted him as well!

  His eyes met hers for a brief second before jerking away, a muscle throbbing at the base of his jaw.

  “Have you been sick at all? Any viruses? Flus? Nausea?”

  “No.” She shook her head. “I mean, I don’t feel great a lot of the time at the moment, but I think that’s just because I’m not sleeping well.”

  The doctor nodded, but his brows were drawn together.

  “Do you mind if I touch you, Chloe?”

  “Touch me?”

  “I just want to check your abdomen.”

  She frowned. “Why?”

  “Has it occurred to you that you might be pregnant?”

  Beside her, Raffa stilled. And she hated, more than anything, in that moment that she was going to disappoint him. That he had this glimmer of hope, that a baby had been conceived, and she was going to fail him – as always.

  “I’m not pregnant,” she said. For all the reasons she’d left him, she still couldn’t reveal the truth about her inability to conceive. He would still feel honour-bound to tear up those divorce papers, and they’d both be locked in a loveless, childless marriage. He deserved so much better than that.