The real world seemed such a long way away, and part of Sienna fervently wished it could stay that way. If it weren’t for his position they could live a life like this all the time. He was right—shehad always taken her freedom for granted—and never had she cherished it more than during this weekend.
She watched him relax. Saw the dark shadows melt away from beneath his eyes and the tiny, fan-like creases at the corners of his black eyes ironed out as if by magic.
And for Hashim it was a provocative glimpse of a life he could never really know. He had not felt as unencumbered as this since those long-ago days of falconing in the mountains of Qudamah.
‘Ah, Sienna,’ he said on their last morning, when they sat eating pancakes for breakfast. ‘Don’t you wish that life could always be this simple?’
She smiled, knowing full well that there was no point in coming out with a stock phrase like: Itcould be like this. Because it couldn’t.
She put the lid back on the golden syrup. ‘Do you want to listen to the radio?’
Hashim frowned. ‘What for?’
‘Well, Qudamah seems to have been in the news a lot lately.’
Funny how you could look for an opportunity to say something and then find, when it came, that you wished you didn’t have to. He gazed down at the clear amber of the delicate tea. ‘There is going to be an election very soon—and elections always demand a lot of my time.’ He looked at her. ‘I am going to have to fly back tomorrow.’
Sienna nodded. ‘I know you are.’
He drew in a deep breath. ‘And I’m not sure when I’ll be back.’
She felt the tendril of long-held fear finally wrapping itself around her heart. ‘I know that, too.’ Don’t make him have to say it. Accept what is inevitable. Make it easy on yourself. ‘Hashim, it’s okay. You don’t have to say it. I know it’s over.’
He didn’t deny it, but the dark eyes which he lifted to her face were troubled. ‘I do not wish this, Sienna—but increasingly I recognise that my place is in my homeland, not here.’ He gave a restless little movement of his shoulders. ‘There are obligations I now need to fulfil. And I don’t want to tie you down to a relationship which can never go anywhere. Or to make you a promise I am unable to keep. If this fades into failed intentions and meetings which never happen then all that we will have left to remember is bitterness.’ His voice grew hard. ‘And I cannot face that. Not for a second time. Not when…’
The words were there in his mouth, just begging to be said. But words could be dishonest—even if you meant them. They could open up all kinds of unrealistic expectations. If he tried to explain how much she had come to mean to him then would that not tie her to him anyway—no matter how much he tried not to let it? What if she started seeing them as star-crossed lovers instead of just getting on with her life?
She saw the discomfiture on his face and jumped in to rescue the situation—or rather to rescue herself. She had had more with him than any woman could have hoped to have, and she would ensure that he remembered her with dignity.
‘It’s been wonderful. Gorgeous. It was a fine affair,’ she said softly. ‘But now it’s over.’
His eyes narrowed. He had expected…what? That she might at least shed a tear for him! Or that her face might indicate some feelings of dejection! His pride was hurt, yet his pain came from deeper feelings than pride. He pushed them away with an instinct borne out of self-protection. ‘You seem almost pleased about it,’ he observed coolly.
‘Oh, Hashim,’ she said impatiently. ‘Of course I’m notpleased about it—but I recognise that it has to be, so what’s the alternative?’
Women had begged him before—many times. They had shed tears and clung to him. Hadn’t there been a selfish side which had thought that Sienna might do the same? For if she behaved like all the others, then wouldn’t that make it easier for him to walk away from her without another thought?
But there had never been another relationship like this one, he recognised. Nor ever would be again. His destiny would not allow it—for his flings and his freedom must now be curtailed. The luxurious but weighty doors of his royal prison were waiting to clang shut on him, and if he took himself down the path of useless and indulgent analysis then what good would it do him? Or her?
‘Come here,’ he said simply, and opened his arms.
Sienna didn’t need to be told that this was the last time. It was written in his eyes and spoken in every lingering kiss and caress. His hands and his fingers seemed as though they were discovering her for the first time, and yet bidding her farewell as they did so.
‘Oh, Hashim,’ she said, in a choked kind of voice.
‘Let us lie once more in that old bed,’ he whispered, and she nodded.
He carried her up the rickety staircase towards the room they had shared, bending his head so as not to knock it on one of the dark beams, and put her down as carefully as if she had been a cherished and delicate piece of filagree.
Their undressing was slow and silent, and as she sank back into feather pillows his dark body moved over hers. She thought about how many couples had lain in this bed, like this. How many children had been conceived—maybe even born here? Ghostly generations of long-ago lovers joined them—wordlessly entering the indefinable space between past and present. For at what point did the present become the past?
Their climax would bring an end to it all, and the sex would become just a memory. As would the rest. She trembled as Hashim thrust into her with a hunger and a poignancy which made hot salt tears slide from beneath her eyelids.
‘Ah, Sienna. Don’t cry,’ he said afterwards, wiping the tracks away with his finger.
They lay there for a while without sleeping, and then Sienna stirred. Be the first to make a move, she told herself. Don’t put yourself in the position of being the deserted one.
‘I’d better go and pack up the kitchen.’
He tightened his hold on her waist. ‘I can have one of the guards come over and do it.’
But she shook her head and prised his fingers away as if she was removing a clam from the side of a rock. ‘No, Hashim—that will defeat the object of our ordinary weekend. I’ll go and chuck all the leftover food away—you can wash the dishes.’
He was torn between outrage and humour. ‘Yes, Sienna,’ he murmured, but his heart was heavy.
They were quiet in the car on the drive back, even though the driver was firmly locked away behind soundproof glass. It had begun to rain, and through the tinted windows she could see droplets battering against the glass, as if the heavens themselves were sobbing.
It was only when they were approaching South Kensington that he laid one dark hand on hers.
‘You will come back to the hotel with me?’
‘No.’
He asked for no explanation; but then he had known what her answer would be. ‘Sienna?’
She turned her head back to face him and her green eyes were sombre, but there was a soft dignity about her which took his breath away. He thought about how often in the past he had been able to persuade her to do something against her will just by the sheer power of the sexual chemistry which existed between them, but he recognised now that nothing he could do would change her mind. Not this time.
Something had changed. In her. In him. In them both. For not only would she refuse to succumb to him, he would no longer make an attempt to have her bend to his will. Somewhere along the way they had become equals, and for Hashim it was a bittersweet awakening. An awareness that it had come at the wrong time—but could it have ever been the right time?
Not with Sienna, no.
He bent down to the Qudamah-crested dispatch box which accompanied him everywhere and pulled out a slim leather box. He held it out towards her but she shook her head, the thick dark hair flying like a storm.
‘No, Hashim!’ She would not be paid off—have him bid her farewell with the expensive baubles she had previously refused to accept. ‘Whatever it is, I don’t want it. I don’
t want your diamonds or your emeralds, thank you very much! I told you a long time ago that I could not and would not be bought, and I meant it!’
He laughed softly. ‘I know you did, my fiery Sienna,’ he murmured. ‘And I think that your expectations of costly gems are a little wide of the mark.’ He put the box in her hand and closed her fingers around it, his black eyes washing over her. ‘Please. Open it.’
Something in his manner made her obey him, her fingers trembling as she flicked open the catch to see a necklace lying against indigo velvet. But it was no ordinary necklace. The chain was as fine as a sliver of light and in the centre of it lay a tiny golden bird.
‘H-Hashim?’ she questioned shakily.
‘Here.’ He lifted it from the box and placed it into the centre of her palm, where the fine chain lay coiled like an elegant snake, the small charm gleaming like the sun.
‘What is it?’
‘It is an eagle—a golden eagle. She flies on the flag of Qudamah and is the symbol of my country—for she represents freedom and power. This is the only time you will ever see her chained.’
Like him. The thought flew unbidden into her mind. Freedom and power and never to be chained. She studied it intently, focusing fiercely on the workmanship because at least that kept the tears at bay. ‘It’s…beautiful.’
‘Shall I put it on for you?’
Sienna nodded, unable to speak for fear that she would blurt out words which could never be taken back. Words of love which would mortify him and make their parting even more painful.
He slid his hands around her neck, wanting so much to linger there—to raise the heavy weight of her hair so that he could kiss the soft nape and then turn her head to take her lips, coaxing their luscious warmth into eager response.
‘I thought you were going to put it on?’
Her faintly bemused voice disrupted his troubled thoughts. ‘So I was.’ He clipped it in place. ‘There.’
For a moment their eyes met, and the pain which smote at her heart made her feel dizzy and weak. Turning her head to look out of the window with the desperation of a drowning woman struggling towards the surface for light and air, Sienna saw with relief that they were at the end of her road.
‘Well, here we are! Thank you, Hashim.’ She leaned forward. The touch of her mouth against his was fleeting and the pain increased. ‘Take very good care.’
He touched her fingertips to his lips and as she pushed open the car door said something in his native tongue to the driver, who got out and removed her one small bag from the boot.
The tinted window slid silently down and all she could see were glittering black eyes—the only thing which seemed truly alive in the tight mask of his face. She flashed him a smile, and then she turned away.
Somehow she made it inside without crying, but once there the tears began to pour down her cheeks without stopping. Kat was away and she was glad, because it gave her time to get over the worst, to recover on her own like a wounded animal.
There was no one to tell her to eat. No one to question why she couldn’t sleep. No one to tell her that it was wrong to shed her tears and that there were plenty more fish in the sea. Maybe there were—but none like Hashim.
By the third day she had begun to feel a little better. Her heart was aching, but she knew that Hashim would hate it if she became one of those women who let their whole lives collapse around them because a love affair hadn’t worked out.
She bathed and washed her hair, and was just pulling on a big black sweater which virtually came down to her knees when the doorbell rang. She wondered if it was Kat back, having forgotten her keys.
She opened the door, completely unprepared to see the batallion of photographers who were jostling for position, jerking back in alarm as the multiple flash from their array of cameras temporarily blinded her. Someone thrust a phallic-looking microphone under her chin.
‘ Baker!’ called a TV-trained voice. ‘Sienna! Is the Sheikh of Qudamah aware that you used to be a topless model?’
CHAPTER TWELVE
THEstartled doorstep photo made the first edition and the second—only it ran alongside a much larger photo. There was her sand-sprinkled and sultry image plastered over all the tabloids.
Even the serious broadsheets gave it house-room—justifying their usual no-breasts policy with weighty pieces on the changing morals of the Middle East. And a censored version of it was beamed into homes the length and breadth of the country as an add-on to an otherwise boring television news show.
‘And finally, the Sheikh of the fiercely traditional State of Qudamah is rumoured to be dating a British glamour model. Stunning brunette Sienna Baker…’
Female leader-writers took up the case in their mid week columns, asking righteously:What would you do if yourson brought a topless model home?
Trapped inside the house, unable to go out without fear of being accosted, Sienna was sitting in the kitchen at the back of the house with the blinds drawn down when Kat came in and handed her the telephone with a look which said everything.
She pressed the phone to her ear. She wasn’t aware she’d actually said anything, but she must have made some sort of sound because she heard his deep and silky voice.
‘Sienna?’
She bit her lip. Closed her eyes. She wouldn’t cry. Shewouldn’t . But the sound of his dear voice was almost more than she could bear. ‘Yes, it’s me.’
‘Are you all right?’
‘Ask me another. How about you?’
He ignored that. ‘The press are still there?’
‘Well, not so many of them. I think they got fed up because I refused to say anything.’
‘Good. If you feed a story it only grows.’
‘Oh, Hashim—how the hell did they get hold of it? How did they even find out about it?’
Hashim’s mouth tightened into a grim and forbidding line. He suspected that someone in Qudamah must have informed the foreign press about a juicy piece of gossip in their Ruler’s life. In the power-play that was his life Sienna’s past had become a weapon. And he must protect her from the fall-out.
‘These things have a habit of getting out,’ he said slowly. ‘That’s the way the world works.’
He sounded almost weary, as if he had seen sides of the world she did not know—and of course he had. She couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be a sheikh, but she was fairly sure that it would be very hard to trust people’s motives towards you. ‘Yes,’ said quietly. ‘I imagine so.’
The silence between them seemed huge. ‘I am sending some people to look after you, Sienna. If I come myself it will only add fire to the story. Is there somewhere you can go?’
She was suddenly and acutely aware that this conversation was a purely practical one, and not personal at all. He didn’t want to talk—notreally talk—and besides, what was there left to say? This was damage limitation time.
She bit her lip. Where did she always turn when she wanted an escape route? Who would always accept her with open arms and no questions asked? Who wanted the best for her no matter what. ‘My mother wants me to go to her.’
‘Then go. Let me arrange it.’
‘Hashim—you don’t seem to understand!’ she said frustratedly. ‘I have existing contracts to fulfil. And the phone hasn’t stopped ringing with work requests—I’ve never been so popular. I think it’s the curiosity factor,’ she added acidly. ‘Having your party planned by a so-called “Glamour Model.” But some of the calls are from journalists pretending to be clients. I’m certain of it.’
He felt the dark dagger of self-contempt as he remembered that he too had done just that. Pretended. Masqueraded. Finally got his way by seducing her—and now what had happened? Had she ever deserved this because of some rash youthful decision made with all the best intentions? ‘I’m sorry,’ he said quietly.
She shook her head as if he was in the room, hating to hear his apology—so stilted and formal—like one stranger talking to another. ‘It isn’t your
fault, it’s mine. I should never have done it in the first place—I just didn’t realise it was going to come back and haunt me in such a big way.’
‘But that is down to me. To your relationship with me.’
The most precious thing in her life.Past tense , she reminded herself. She sighed, wanting to lean on him yet knowing she shouldn’t. And anyway, she couldn’t—not really. He was at his Palace, thousands of miles away, and she was holed up in her tiny terraced house in Kennington. There were no arms to hold her, no heart to beat next to hers, no hand to stroke her hair.
‘Can you get someone else to honour your existing contracts and ignore all the others?’ he demanded.
‘And who is going to pay my mortgage in the meantime?’
There was a moment’s silence, and Hashim chose his words with fastidious care, knowing that he trod on very sensitive ground here. ‘That is simple. You must let me help you, Sienna.’
Exposed The Sheikh’s Mistress Page 12
