“I thought I might go out,” she said with a confidence she was far from feeling.
His frown was brief. “Whatever for?”
“This city is to be my home now. I thought I should go and explore it.”
“While I appreciate your willingness to immerse yourself in your new life, it isn’t possible.”
She lifted a brow. “Are you actually telling me I’m not allowed to go out, Zayn?”
“Don’t be facile. It is not a question of permission. You cannot go alone, and I am too busy to take you this morning.”
She compressed her lips in annoyance. “Don’t I have security people who can escort me?”
He let out a sigh of annoyance. “They are too busy to indulge your every whim.” It was a lie. His security staff would do whatever he asked of them, and that courtesy and duty included his wife. But for some reason he couldn’t fathom, he didn’t want her exploring the city without him. He had fantasized about showing it to her himself, only he was in no mood to play tourist guide that morning.
“Fine.” She muttered. “Have it your way.” She went to storm out of his office in what she had hoped would be a truly dramatic departure, only she stubbed her toe on the edge of a chair and wailed in pain, as her whole body instantly felt the reverberation.
With an oath in his own language, Zayn came to her side and pulled her into his arms. He was surprised to see that she was crying again. He had not remembered her being so emotional before.
“Are you dying?” He drawled teasingly, but she surprised him again by punching him hard, on his left pectoral muscle.
“Shut up,” she said through her tears. “Just shut up.”
“Shhh,” he murmured, pulling her against his chest and running his hands through her hair. And despite the insults he’d thrown at her the night before, his whole body was begging to be pressed to hers.
He couldn’t help it. Slowly, gently, he lifted her face to his. The misery he saw there made him question everything he’d ever done to the woman. With a stifled groan, he kissed her, sensually moving his lips over hers and trying to take away some of the pain she felt. Even if it was a temporary solution.
“Don’t cry, Julia,” he said against her lips, as his hands moved down her body. He lifted her camisole from the waistband of her pants, so that his hands were on her bare back, feeling the warmth of her fair skin.
“Another order?” She intoned huskily, but her arms crept up and wound around his neck. It was an innocent gesture, but it brought her breasts hard against his chest and he ached to feel their softness in his mouth once more.
“I don’t like it when you cry,” he answered honestly, and to underscore his point, he thumbed away the tears that were falling from her eyes.
“I don’t usually cry this much,” she responded with artless truth. Her statement made his heart contract painfully.
“Is marriage to me so unbearable?” He shouldn’t have asked the question, as he definitely didn’t want to know the answer.
Julia lowered her gaze, so that her eyes were concealed by her thick fan of lashes. “We haven’t been married long enough to say, but last night wasn’t a great start.”
His laugh was genuine, low and warm, as he wrapped his arms tight around her waist. He had never felt such a conflicting range of emotions for a single person.
“I was wrong last night.”
She lifted her eyes to his face again, hope so obvious that it made him feel like the worst kind of bastard.
“You were?” Her breathing had quickened and her question came out as a husk.
“I said I didn’t want you. And I do.”
She closed her eyes, all hope dashed. “Even though I’m little better than a prostitute, according to you?”
She moved to disentangle herself from his arms, but was left disappointed when he let her.
“Let’s not get into another argument now,” he said warningly, stepping away from her and moving back towards his desk. “My house is big. Find something to do here.”
She sent a beam of hot disapproval at his retreating back. “I take it I’m dismissed?”
He felt a wave of impatience. “Stop acting like a child. I’m working. My business interests are responsible for employing around ninety thousand staff. That is a lot of people, and a lot of families, who depend on me to put food on their tables.”
“Oh, yes,” she said with a sarcastic nod. “I had forgotten that the world would stop turning if you stopped working for even five minutes. Silly me!”
“You’re being childish again, Julia.”
“You married me, Zayn. This is what you get.”
His expression was full of boredom, and it made her even angrier. Fortunately for Julia, she knew the one thing in the world that could anger Zayn in equal measure. Going against his wishes.
“Fine,” she held her hands up in what she hoped seemed a conciliatory gesture. “Have fun working.”
Only Zayn couldn’t work. After she’d meekly left his office, and quietly pulled the door shut, he was filled with swirling frustration. By the time he went to find Julia and apologize for his curtness, it was too late. She was gone, and her life was in danger, and he was powerless to do a thing about it.
It hadn’t been hard for Julia to leave Zayn’s home. She was, after all, married to the lord and master of the manor, and his staff were apparently willing to do her bidding. More than that, Julia had been raised in a style that gave her a natural authority. Though she was egalitarian to the core, she had no hesitation in assuming a haughty manner to achieve her ends.
She had just known that if she didn’t get out of Zayn’s vicinity, she might explode.
And so a small team of three security staff had assembled and driven her to one of the bazaars nearest the edge of the city. It was so beautiful, that she found herself wishing she had waited until Zayn had time to show it to her. She kept enthusing to her little band of staff, but she was met, in response, with resolutely blank faces. She gathered they’d been trained to interact as little as possible with the royalty they minded.
What a strange way to live.
Julia was a naturally skilled people person. Though crowds were not her predilection, one on one, she enjoyed meeting new people. She had always enjoyed chatting to strangers, and learning about their lives. The fact that she couldn’t do so now was a source of irritation to her. She turned her attention to the busy market and tried to simply enjoy the strange new sights she was encountering.
The thing that impressed her most of all were the spice stalls. They were all set up, side by side, and each of them had bowls of fine powder that were piled in perfect mountains of different colors. The artful presentation was something she’d never seen before. Then, there were the carpets. All beautifully woven, some out of bright colors, others from earth tones. There was a large, circular carpet at one stall that reminded her so much of the cover on Zayn’s matrah that she couldn’t resist buying it.
“Oh,” she said with consternation, when the stall keeper told her, in halting English, how much the floor covering would cost. Without knowing the exact currency conversion, she was certain it was an arm and a leg, but that wasn’t the problem. She had no physical money on her, and the stall keeper didn’t appear to take credit cards.
“I’m sorry,” she said earnestly. “I’ll have to come back another day.”
“No, no,” one of her aides – the pretty, dark haired woman – interrupted, and a rapid fire exchange took place in Arabic before the shopkeeper was all smiles and the aide turned to speak to her. “He is happy to bill the palace.”
Julia bit down on her lip. She had wanted to buy it as a surprise for Zayn, and now she saw what a stupid gesture it had been. The sun was beating down hard and hot, and she felt her spirits deflate. The brief glimpse of pleasure she’d received from rebelling against Zayn’s ridiculous decree that she couldn’t leave his home evaporated. But the shopkeeper was still beaming at her, having no idea that the
last thing she wanted was for her husband’s family to pay for her stupid and ill-thought out gift to him, and Julia didn’t want to retract her offer to buy the carpet, and so she nodded, and forced a smile to her face. “Thank you,” she said with a nod of her head.
“You have very good taste,” the aide who had negotiated the transaction said as they walked past the carpet stalls and down another alley of the markets.
Julia opened her mouth to say something but a sudden movement caught her attention out of the corner of her eye. She was aware then of a small child, perhaps only five or six, crouching down, and a heavy-set man with a long beard and mean looking eyes picking up a large flat paddle. “He’s going to hit her,” Julia said, frozen into inaction out of surprise. “He’s going to hit her. Why isn’t anyone doing anything?”
The aide looked confused and Julia felt her fear rise. The child was crying. Obviously, she was a little urchin, perhaps homeless, and Julia knew that no one was going to intercede on her behalf. Fear so strong she could taste it in her mouth flew through her system, but she didn’t hesitate. Julia quickly ran across the market, unaware of the commotion she’d caused by her actions. She threw herself between the man and the child at the exact moment the horrible beast brought the metallic paddle down with great force.
Julia had never been hit before. The sensation of a hard, cold metal reverberating against her skull was eclipsed only by the sight of blood dripping onto her expensive cream suit. She felt like she was going to faint but she couldn’t. Not until the child was safe. She glared at the man as she wrapped her arms around the little child, and she felt her heart go out to this frail little body.
The two men from her detail were only seconds behind her, and while they set about detaining the man who had hurt the new princess of Naman, the aide who had been speaking to Julia moments earlier tried to disentangle the urchin from her arms.
“No.” Julia hissed from beneath her teeth. “I want to make sure she’s okay.”
The aide, Marina, tried to reason with the Shiekh’s bride, but it was useless. “You are hurt, though, Your Highness. I need to get you to a doctor.”
“Look at this girl!” Julia said, though it was becoming increasingly difficult to stand and she had to press her hand against the wall behind her for support. “She is skin and bone. She is terrified. I am not leaving her. Bring her home with me, and have a doctor come to her.”
Marina pulled her satellite phone from her belt and began to dial. With a sinking heart, she could just imagine what the Sheikh would say when he saw the state of his wife.
“Please, ma’am, I promise, I’ll keep her safe. But you must sit down.”
The little girl lifted a finger and pressed it to Julia’s head. Julia smile at her reassuringly, but the action hurt her cheeks. She refused to give in to the wave of nausea that was clinging to her. But she knew that she wasn’t in a good way, and she silently uttered a prayer for help to come quickly.
And it did. The Al-melara name was all-powerful, and it was only a matter of minutes before an ambulance was screaming through the narrow markets. Julia was loaded into the back with great care, but she shot Marina one look that spoke volumes, and the aide hastily ushered the little girl into the van with her.
“Will you translate for me?” Julia asked Marina. And it was a matter of great importance now, for Julia suspected that if she didn’t keep speaking, she might fall into a faint. A medic was checking her vitals, and another inspecting her head, but Marina nodded, manoeuvring herself so that she could see the princess.
“What is her name?”
Marina said something to the young girl. Her voice, when it emerged, was dry and husky. “Maysan,” Marina relayed automatically to Julia, though Julia had heard it for herself.
“Why was that man about to beat her?”
Marina and the young girl had an exchange that ended with Marina looking disapprovingly at the girl. “She stole from him.”
Julia winced as the paramedic applied an ointment to her head. “Ask her what she stole.”
And after a few more minutes of the strange and beautiful language, Marina responded, “Fruit.”
Julia smiled reassuringly at the child, though the pain was now too much to bear.
The paramedic interrupted, speaking directly to Marina. The aide leaned forwards. “He says you must stop talking.”
“I’m almost done,” Julia responded, inserting as much authority into her voice as possible. “Ask her why she did it.”
The young girl listened to Marina’s question and then responded with a short admission. “She was hungry.”
Julia closed her eyes, the sadness of this child’s life making her ache. “Her parents?”
A few moments later, “They’re dead.”
As the ambulance squealed around a corner and then stopped, Julia knew she had to speak to Zayn. But everything was becoming jumbled, and her head was aching in a horrifying way. The doors were ripped open and four people in white hospital suits appeared to slide her bed out of the van and take her into the building.
“Maysan,” she said, reaching a hand out and taking the little girl’s in her own. “She stays with you, until I come for her,” she ordered Marina.
And there was no way Marina was going to say no.
Zayn waited in the foyer of the hospital, his heart hammering hard against his rib cage. Two ambulances had arrived since he’d got the call – one housed a pregnant woman clearly in the last stages of labor, and the second a man who looked to have broken his leg in several places.
The third contained his wife, and he went from feeling like he was about to shout at her for having gone out without him, to feeling like his whole world had tilted strangely on its edge, when he saw the way blood was splattered down her clothes, and the way her face was drained of any color.
He swore as he ran towards her, being wheeled through the hospital. “Julia,” he said, pushing aside a doctor, and taking her hand in his. “What happened?”
“I’m so sorry about my outfit. It was so beautiful and now it’s ruined,” she blurted out as soon as she saw him. And then frowned, because it wasn’t what she’d meant to say at all. But her head was thick with confusion. “Zayn,” she mumbled slowly, “Zayn, Maysan needs help. Please feed her. And call Adina. She will know what to do.”
He lifted his eyes to the tiny little figure huddling beside one of his longest-standing members of staff. “Of course, Julia.”
“Sir, we must work,” one of the doctors said to him in his own tongue, and reluctantly he released her hand.
“Why Adina?” He asked impatiently, following the bed as she was wheeled along the linoleum covered hallway.
“Just call her,” Julia said weakly, so he nodded, then turned back to the doctor.
In Arabic, he commanded, “If you do not save her, you will feel my wrath.”
The doctor would have smiled at this newlywed’s concern if it weren’t for the fact that he was one of the most powerful men in the country, if not the world, and he was obviously prepared to do whatever it took to ensure his wife’s comfort. And so the doctor simply nodded and said with a placating tone, “I don’t believe it is serious, but we must see to her immediately.”
“Of course.” Zayn watched her go, and then, with a strange emotion coursing through him, he approached Marina.
“What happened?” He asked in English, so that the small child would not understand their conversation.
Marina took his cue and told the whole story to him in English, and when she was finished, Zayn wasn’t sure if he was proud or furious. His wife should not have put her life in jeopardy like that. And yet, this tiny little creature was so pitiable; how could anyone have intended to hurt her? He crouched down on his haunches and switched to his native language.
“My wife tells me you are hungry. Would you let me organize some food for you?”
A solitary tear ran down the little girl’s face as she nodded at the prospect of a hot me
al. He turned his attention to Marina. “Have something brought, immediately.”
“Yes, sir.” She spun on her heel to leave and Zayn wondered what to say to this little person.
“Your wife is very brave, your highness,” Maysan said quietly. “I think he might have killed me if she hadn’t been there.”
“This man will be punished for his actions, Maysan, but you shouldn’t have stolen.”
The words rung accusingly in his ears. Because he had stolen too. He’d stolen his wife, right out of her life. And who would punish him?
Chapter Eight
“Explain that to me again,” Zayn commanded wearily, rubbing his hand across his forehead. Through the glass panel door, he could see Julia, lying prone in the hospital bed. She simply looked to be asleep. The head wound had been covered with a gauze tape. She looked so peaceful. And very young. Guilt was rapidly becoming his constant companion, and he felt its familiar grip now.
“Your wife’s memory has been affected by the attack. The mind is a little understood machine, and it’s simply not possible to predict how permanent the memory loss will be.”
“What sort of things will she forget?”
The doctor grimaced apologetically. “Again, I excuse my uncertainty, but it’s impossible to say. Generally, with injuries such as Her Highness’s, we tend to see the more recent past is most at risk. In most cases, the memories return, with the exception of a few fragments. Think of it as a bruise to the brain, if you’d like. Her brain, particularly her memories, are all scrambled. I am optimistic that, as her physical injury repairs itself, her memories will return.”
“But you cannot say that with any real certainty?” Zayn grilled him intently.
The doctor shook his head. “She is still your wife. All of what she was remains. There will just be some gaps in her knowledge.”
Zayn nodded mutely, but his whole body was charged with a fierce regret. Why hadn’t he simply agreed to take her into the city? He had been stupid and stubborn, for none of his work was so urgent that it couldn’t have waited a day.
Sheikhs: Rich, powerful desert kings and the women who bring them to their knees... Page 80
