The Sheikh's Guarded Heart

by Liz Fielding

  In this world, however, Lucy Forrester belonged to another man.

  He’d ridden out into the desert, certain that it was Noor’s memory he was running from. But alone, with only the stars for company, he’d discovered that it was Lucy who filled his thoughts.

  No matter how hard he’d ridden, she had been at his back and he’d found no peace in sleep, but woke from disturbed dreams, his body hard, throbbing with raw desire, completely focused on a living, breathing woman for the first time since his world had fallen apart.

  He’d come back determined to do what he should have done from the first—to move her to his mother’s house or maybe ask Jamilla to take care of her until Zahir could organise her departure.

  But he’d brought her here to appease some deep-seated need of his own. To help her and, in doing so, assuage his own desperate yearning for atonement.

  How could he send her away now, because her presence disturbed his peace of mind? His mind deserved no peace…

  ‘I’m sure Zahir is doing everything required,’ he said. Although he was sure of nothing of the sort. He had not spoken to Zahir since he’d left for Rumaillah.

  ‘If you could pass me my crutches?’ Lucy prompted, sitting up, trying hard not to wince as her foot dragged on her ankle. ‘Your lily pool is a joy to look at, but the mud is something else. I really need to go and wash it off.’

  ‘Your sandals are ruined. I will fetch the wheelchair.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll reach them myself,’ she said, pushing her good foot into a wet and muddy sandal and lifting herself using the arm of the sofa, swaying unsteadily as she kept one foot clear of the ground.

  He reached out to steady her. Then, with his arm around her waist, he looked down at her and said, ‘I should not have kissed you.’

  ‘No,’ she agreed, but her voice, as she continued, did not match her apparent carelessness. ‘But then I really shouldn’t have kissed you back. Why don’t we forget it ever happened?’

  As she turned to move away from the support of his arm, Han tried to imagine a world in which he could forget a kiss which, for one perfect moment, like the garden itself, had seemed to promise heaven on earth.

  Lucy might, in law, belong to someone else, but she had kissed him as if he were the man she had been waiting for all her life and, in doing so, had delivered him from the past.

  This was her place, her citadel, and he made a silent vow to himself that if Steve Mason had plans to reclaim his wife, he would have to wait on her convenience, her pleasure, make reparation for all the harm he’d done her, get on his knees and grovel for forgiveness before he would be allowed to cross the threshold. And then only to offer her the freedom to choose whether she left with him or stayed here, where she belonged.

  Lucy had to force herself to move away from Han, from the support of his arm, even though all she wanted to do was lean against him, feel his arm at her back as she faced the future, but as she tried to ease clear, he tightened his grip.

  ‘Han—’

  Her voice rose in a cry of alarm as he bent and caught her behind the knees, lifting her into his arms and, dropping her crutches, she made a wild grab for his shoulders.

  ‘I will do my best to forget that I kissed you, Lucy Forrester,’ he said. ‘That you kissed me.’

  She was clutching at the cloth of his robe, bunching it beneath her hands, struggling for breath.

  ‘Good,’ she managed. ‘Now, if you’ll just put me down—’

  ‘But as you told me so forcefully just a few days ago, memories become a part of us, make us what we are. Good and bad, we have to live with them.’ He looked down at her, she thought, as if he was seeing her for the first time. ‘We have to live.’

  ‘I said that?’ He did not reply. ‘I said that,’ she confirmed.

  ‘Did you mean it?’

  ‘Of course I meant it.’ As if to demonstrate her sincerity, she stopped fighting the longing to let her arms wind themselves around his neck and let them have their way. ‘I didn’t think you were listening.’

  ‘I did my best not to hear you,’ he said, setting off with her, carrying her towards the pavilion. ‘I rode like the wind, but your words kept pace with me. I tried to lose them, but there was nowhere to hide. Your words, your face when you want to be angry but you can’t stop yourself from smiling, the scent of your skin as I washed you in the hospital—’

  ‘Antiseptic,’ she said, reliving a memory of her own. His irritation, his gentleness, his care…

  ‘Antiseptic,’ he agreed. ‘Petrol fumes. Dust. The shampoo you’d used to wash your hair. Something else. Not scent…’

  ‘Soap,’ she said. ‘I have this thing about really good soap. Gran used carbolic and it stung my face. I could never get away from the smell of it.’ Even now, just to think of it brought back the smell, the roughness of the washcloth, and she buried her face in his shoulder. ‘The first time I earned some money of my own, babysitting for a neighbour, I used it to buy good soap.’

  ‘Your grandmother was harsh.’

  ‘She did what she thought was right. She thought she’d failed with her daughter, wanted to save me from following in her footsteps. From the temptations of the flesh. The fact that I wanted expensive soap only proved to her how weak I was, strengthened her determination.’

  He stopped. ‘What did she do?’

  ‘Nothing terrible. She just made me put it in a bowl of water, watch until it had completely dissolved and there was nothing left.’

  ‘And yet you stayed, took care of her for all those years.’

  ‘My teachers thought I was a fool. They wanted me to put her in a home, take my place at university. But she didn’t do that to me, Han, even though it must have been hard for her to be left all on her own to bring up a baby. How could I leave when she needed me?’

  ‘When you love someone you let them go, even when you need them more than life itself.’

  That sounded, she thought, as if he was finally coming to terms with his loss. But despite the warmth of his body, of his arms, she shivered a little as he carried her out of the sunlight and into the blue shade of the arched walk.

  Han picked up the phone, hit the fast dial for Zahir’s cellphone. He should have returned days ago. He’d expected messages to be waiting for him. But there had been nothing.

  The voice mail prompt cut in, asking him to leave a message. On the point of leaving one that was brief and to the point, he found himself distracted by the sight of a kitten scampering past the French window.

  There were feral cats that lived wild around the stables, feeding off mice, but this was a pretty pedigree kitten, cream with a smudge on its nose and ears that would darken to chocolate and, if memory served him right, it would have blue eyes.

  Abandoning the telephone, he followed the creature—creatures, there were two of them, he discovered—along the balcony, scooping up the pair of them in one hand before they could enter Lucy’s sitting room.

  She was lying back, her feet up, headphones in place, oblivious to everything but the Arabic lessons she was repeating. He stood there, listening for a while, enjoying the sound of her cool English voice grappling with the unfamiliar sounds.

  There was nothing half-hearted about her efforts. She was trying really hard and was clearly well along with her lessons. Determined, it seemed, to play a full part in the business she apparently half-owned.

  He set one of the kittens down on the floor and watched as it ran to her, using its tiny claws to pull itself up on to her lap. She paused the CD player and, even though he couldn’t see her face, he knew that she was smiling as she said, ‘Hello, sweetie, where’s your brother?’ She turned to look for the kitten and saw Hanif.

  She pulled off the headphones and said, ‘Ah.’

  The second kitten was wriggling desperately and he set it free to join its brother.

  ‘I was going to tell you about the kittens.’

  He didn’t care about the kittens, but he envied them their freedom to rub
against her, to demand her attention.

  ‘Where did they come from?’

  ‘Your sister. She phoned me and I asked if she could send some things to amuse Ameerah.’

  ‘Did they?’

  ‘Amuse her?’ Her smile was rueful. ‘For about five minutes. Then they wanted to sleep and when she wouldn’t let them they scratched her.’

  ‘Predictable, I would have thought. What else did she send?’

  ‘A tricycle. Books. Games. Puzzles.’

  ‘You seem to have kept yourself busy.’ Then, because he knew his sister and because he had come to know Lucy too, he said, ‘What else?’

  ‘What makes you think there’s something else?’

  ‘Because, Lucy Forrester, your face gives away your every thought.’

  ‘No…’

  ‘It is true. You look at me and I know what you are thinking.’ Even when her face was still, all expression blanked out, her eyes spoke volumes for those with the heart to read them. He should not be telling her that, but he could not help himself. He wanted her to know. To understand. ‘Today,’ he said, ‘even when you were in pain, your only thought was for Ameerah. In your heart you were begging me to hold her close.’

  She swallowed, gave a little shake of her head as if she found it disturbing to be so open to him, said, ‘It was your own heart you were listening to, Han.’ She quickly changed the subject. ‘A Shetland pony arrived in a horsebox this morning, along with all the tack, riding clothes and a hard hat.’ When he didn’t say anything, she said, ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be. You could have had no idea what forces you were unleashing.’ Then, ‘So, tell me, why is Ameerah chasing dragonflies instead of trotting around the garden on this fat little pony, giving Fathia palpitations and keeping a groom from his work?’

  ‘I told Ameerah that the pony was tired from his journey.’ Then, ‘As you know, the Shetland Islands are a very, very long way from here.’

  ‘And here I was thinking that Milly had offloaded one of the ponies her own children had grown out of.’

  ‘She might have done that,’ Lucy said. ‘I wasn’t prepared to take the risk.’

  He laughed. Laughed out loud. The sound was rich and full and warmed Lucy’s heart in a rush of joy. She had made him laugh and it was the most precious sound.

  Then he reached for her hand and said, ‘Don’t go, Lucy.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  ‘DON’T go, Lucy. Stay here.’

  Han was on his knees beside her, clasping her hands, and she could have no doubt what he was asking. He was offering her the citadel and she yearned to say yes, to take it, take him and all that he was offering.

  When he’d kissed her, her response had been instinctive, without thought, without consideration of right or wrong, of what would follow. In his arms there had been no need to think.

  Even the touch of his hands as they held hers was enough to drive all rational thought from her mind, tempt her in ways she could never have begun to imagine.

  But she must think.

  Not just for her own sake, but for his.

  She had already made one terrible mistake, reaching back for the life she should have had when she was eighteen, desperately grabbing at a schoolgirl fantasy when she was a grown woman who should have long ago learned that life was not a fairy tale. But she’d learned nothing. She’d had no life. No chance to measure herself, make judgements, make mistakes, grow up.

  How could she know whether this was real or just another fantasy, another crutch, so that she wouldn’t have to face the reality of the life she’d been handed on the day her mother had abandoned her?

  And maybe that was all she was for Hanif too. A crutch. Forced into such heightened intimacy, it was not surprising that he’d found himself responding to needs that he’d denied since Noor’s death.

  They’d both been living half lives for so long that they couldn’t begin to know if what they felt was true emotion or simply the tingling of pins and needles as the blood began to flow back into unused muscles.

  The heart, after all, was nothing more than a muscle. Wasn’t it?

  Unable to look at him, knowing that to look up into his face was to signal surrender, she stared at their hands, linked together. His so strong, so beautiful. The hands of a horseman, a poet, a prince. Hers were the practical hands of a woman who had spent her life doing the kind of chores for which nails had to be kept short, that no amount of hand cream could ever keep soft.

  Maybe Han had been right when he’d suggested she’d kept her hair long for herself. The one symbol of her femininity that no one could take from her.

  He seemed to understand her instinctively, to know her every thought. Was that love?

  Unable to help herself, she looked up, meeting eyes that seemed to assure her that it was. Found herself floundering, falling into their depths.

  The kittens saved her, their needle-like claws jabbing her back to reality as they kneaded themselves a comfortable bed on her stomach.

  ‘Ouch! Stop that!’ she said, flustered, hot, confused.

  Han, with his ability to read her thoughts, plainly understood that she had seized this excuse to avoid answering him.

  Before she could say another word, he raised her hands to his lips, stepped back, bowed—not with the barest inclination of his head this time, but with his shoulders, his body, his hand to his heart—then, without uttering another word, he was gone.

  She was right. Despite everything, Han thought—she was tied to another man and until she was free she could not pledge herself to him.

  He might regret that, but he must honour her for doing what was right. Maybe it was time he did that too. Found Lucy’s husband.

  He called Zahir again and this time responded to the voice mail prompt. ‘Find Mason. Bring him to me.’

  Then, because he could not stay in the pavilion, because he did not want to go to the lodge, because he was restless and needed some distraction for a burning need that was in danger of consuming him, he went to the stables to see for himself what horror his sister had visited upon him.

  And that was a mistake too.

  Ameerah was there, grooming the already glossy little pony under the eye of one of the grooms. With a silent gesture he sent the man away, took his place. She was so engrossed, chatting away happily to the pony as she brushed his thick cream mane, that she did not know he was there.

  She was so like her mother that it hurt to look at her. Her gestures, the way she held her head to one side, the way her hair grew in soft curls.

  She moved to the pony’s forelock but, unable to reach, she turned to the groom for help. Froze as she saw him.

  He could not speak, did not know what to say, but the pony snorted, nudged her in the back, and as she stumbled forward he caught her, picked her up. Knelt with her so that she was at the right height to finish grooming him.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ he said, before he set her down so that she could run to find Fathia, ‘tomorrow I will teach you to ride.’

  ‘Lucy! Lucy!’

  It was early, the sun had barely risen above the mountains, but she was dressed as plainly as possible in a linen skirt that skimmed her ankles, a long-sleeved silk blouse.

  Today she was leaving Rawdah al’-Arusah. It would, she thought, break her heart to leave, but it was impossible for her to stay.

  After Han had left her she’d chosen to eat alone in her room shutting all the doors to keep out temptation. Closing herself away so he could not tempt her with a look that burned into her soul, or read her thoughts and know that she was lying when she said she wanted to leave.

  Ameerah took no notice of closed doors. She burst in, a tiny dynamo in jodhpurs, ankle boots, a crisp white shirt and with her hair fastened up in a net under her velvet-covered hard hat.

  ‘Come and watch me,’ she begged, her eyes alight with happiness. ‘I’m going to ride Moonlight!’ The words came out in a jumble of Arabic and English but Lucy understood her perfectly. Then, as
if sensing her hesitation, ‘Pleeeease!’

  How could she refuse? Besides, it was the one place she could guarantee not to meet Hanif. When she spoke to him she would have to be in total command of every one of her senses.

  She followed Ameerah, moving swiftly now on her crutches. The extent of the stables should not have surprised her, but it did. There were boxes for dozens of horses around a paved yard as well as garaging for horseboxes and the powerful four-wheel drive vehicles required for desert travel.

  ‘This way!’

  Smiling, despite a sleepless night, a heavy heart, she allowed Ameerah to tug her in the direction of Moonlight’s loose box. He was being saddled before being led out into the yard, a groom crouched low on his haunches so that he could tighten the girth.

  Except that it wasn’t a groom. As he straightened, towering over the tiny pony, she saw that it was Hanif and when he saw her he smiled.

  ‘If I said that I can read your thoughts right now, Lucy Forrester, would you believe me?’

  Shaking, weak with a confused mixture of feelings, she said, ‘Believe me, at this moment even I do not know what I’m thinking.’

  ‘Then I will tell you—’

  ‘No!’ The sting of tears that were both of joy and sadness cleared her mind as nothing else could have. ‘I will not be responsible for any delay.’ She tore herself away from the power of his gaze and turned to Ameerah. ‘Your daughter will explode with excitement if she has to wait another moment.’

  ‘She and I have that in common.’

  Before she could respond, he turned to Ameerah, lifting his little girl into the saddle, adjusting the stirrups for her, showing her how to hold the reins. Then, because the attention span of a three-year-old was limited, he led her slowly around the yard so that everyone could see how wonderful she looked, before taking the pony for a walk down a shady path.

  Lucy did not follow—this was a time for father and daughter. Turning to go, she found herself confronted by Fathia.