“You have some calls, Highness.”
“Thanks, Salmah—give me the mobile.”
The diplomat shook her head, emphatically. “No, ma’am. We must get you to a secure place.”
“There’s trouble?” Haya demanded, instantly alert. She beckoned the new nanny to come over with Noor and cuddled the toddler, who was already half-asleep. Emily Wilkins had long since tired of the heat and gone home to Ireland; Haya still missed her.
“Yes—no—please get into the car, Siti Haya.”
She obeyed. A face like that was not to be argued with. But as soon as the driver had pulled on to the streets—miraculously cleared by her omnipresent outriders—and they were safely headed to the airport, Haya demanded to know what the problem was.
“His Majesty is gravely ill.”
“The king?” Haya shook her head. “Poor man, God spare him! Where is my husband?”
“That is just it, Highness.The prince asks you come home at once. He says things are happening and you must be there.Your appointments for this afternoon have been canceled.”
Haya did not like that. “At whose orders? I never canceled them.”
“Prince Jaber’s,” Salmah said firmly.
Haya bit her lip. Her husband outranked her, of course, and could do what he liked. She found it slightly sexy that he was ordering her schedule around. On the other hand, Jaber would never do that unless something was up.
“Is there any danger?”
“No, Highness.”
“Then let’s get going,” Haya said.
“And one more thing—your friend rang from the United States. Miss Morgan. She said it was important.”
What now? Haya could tell that this was exactly the wrong time for Jane to be calling her. “That can wait.”
Salmah nodded. “She said if you said that, to tell you they are selling the company.”
A rush of adrenaline poured through Haya; her palms started to sweat; she felt the soft hairs on the back of her neck start to prickle and rise.
“Get me on that airplane!” she said to her driver.
“Yes, Highness,” he replied, and stepped on the gas.
While Noor was settled, eating her lunch of pureed fruit and soft cheese, Haya retreated into her private cabin to call from the Skyphone. They had in-flight TV, and although the national station was censored, she could pick up what was going on; the king, suddenly ill with a stroke, and now recovered, was tinkering with the succession. His eldest son, who had tried to kill him, had long been exiled; the younger brother was a playboy, and was apparently being removed.That meant it was wide open. He had five other boys, a half brother, and a vast array of cousins.
Would the new crown prince favor Jaber?
She wanted to get back there, to be with her husband.
When she got through to him, he was calm.Talked about the king’s health and said it was all in God’s hands; Haya thought the palace lines might be bugged; if he was anxious, he wouldn’t discuss things over the phone.
That left Jane.What the hell? Haya wanted this nonsense out the way, and fast.
She dialed the number Jane had left.
“Morgana, Inc. How may I direct your call?”
“I’m sorry, I was looking for GLAMOUR,” Haya said, confused.
“Were you looking for Ms. Morgan, ma’am? This is her new company. Any queries about the stores can go directly to her office. Whom shall I say is calling?”
Haya felt an icy chill.What the hell?
“This is Haya al-Yanna,” she said, angrily.“Put me through to her at once.”
“Yes, certainly, Your Royal Highness.” Haya was impressed; typical of Jane to hire the best staff around, right from the get-go, she thought; even the operators were capable of putting two and two together. “One moment, ma’am.”
There was a pause, and Jane came on directly. Haya supposed she should be grateful for not being put on hold.
“Haya?”
“I got some crazy message, and believe me, Jane, this isn’t the time,” Haya said, crisply. “We’re not doing anything dramatic with GLAMOUR right now. My husband—”
“Yes, it’s on the news. I know you’ll want to focus on him, Haya.”
“If that’s another pitch for my shares …”
“Not directly. Look, I’ve known you too long to soft-soap it, and I can see you have your hands full, so here goes: Sally and I are determined to take GLAMOUR public.We’re holding a board meeting on Monday, and this is your notification. You don’t need to be there, because we form a quorum without you, and we are going to instruct banks to put the company on the market.”
Haya gasped. “You wouldn’t.”
“It has to be, Haya. It’s gotten too big. And we all have different visions.” Jane sounded slightly wistful, but she was plowing on. “The fact is both Sally and I want to own the company, and the only way out of the stalemate is to float the shares and compete with the stockholders. We’ll be holding back enough of a personal stake to make sure the three of us still sit on the board—that is, if you still want to.”
“Damn right I do!” Haya was shouting, and she didn’t care who heard her.“Are you two using this crisis to shove me out of the picture? I’m the soul of our store, it’s mine. I provide half the stock and ninety percent of the vision.Without me you wouldn’t bother with one ethical sale… .”
“When you’re a public company, ethical is making money for the pension funds who own your shares. Families have their savings in you.”
“But we’re not public!”
“We’re going to be.” Jane was clearly amused by Haya’s claim, and that drove her to a white-hot fury. “It seems all three of us think we made the biggest contribution here.”
“So much for friendship.”
“We could argue that since you are now a bona fide royal with no intention of working again, you would have been a friend to sell your shares to Sally and me. It’s a bit Marie Antoinette, Haya.”
“I could never trust anybody else with my regional operation. You know how much heart I put into that.”
“Haya, face it.” Jane was blunt. “You’re done.You’re finished. Princesses and boardrooms don’t mix, at least you got that right. You could at least let your cofounders run with the ball.”
“We’ll see if I’m finished,” Haya shouted. “I don’t want to be just somebody’s wife. Ahmed had his business and Jaber has his politics, but GLAMOUR was my own. My store, my stock, my damn business model! I’ll be there on Monday, Jane Morgan. If you start that meeting without me I’ll sue your asses off!”
She slammed down the phone and jumped to her feet, pacing around the cabin, seething with rage.
There was an urgent knock on the door, and Salmah, her face shiny with excitement, poked her head inside.
“Highness!”
“Did I say come in?” Haya was simmering with rage, and her unfortunate lady-in-waiting was in the line of fire.
“Excuse me, Highness!” Salmah said. She bowed her head low, and sunk into a very deep curtsy, which brought Haya up short. Salmah and she had been working together for a while now. Except in public, Salmah never curtsied. “But you must come in here, you must come and see the television!”
Haya hurried out into the main cabin. Everybody was staring at the wall-mounted TV, which was tuned in to CNN via satellite; as she entered, they all turned to look at her.
“Mama!” Noor said, obliviously.
The screen showed her husband, dressed in a dark Western suit, sunglasses on, surrounded by soldiers, exiting from the Queen Fizouleh Hospital in Ghada City; Haya’s mouth dropped open as she saw the anchor began to speak.
“And regional sources confirm, I repeat, we have confirmation,” the redheaded anchor was saying, “that King Nazir has appointed his prime minister, Prince Jaber ibn Mohammed, as the new Crown Prince of Ghada. Prince Jaber’s wife is Princess Haya”—her own face, smiling with Sally and Jane, an old PR shot, flashed up—“an
American citizen and a founder of the wildly successful GLAMOUR chain of luxury stores. So we could wind up with two American queens in the Middle East, Jack!”
“Prince Jaber is known for his moderate attitude toward the West and a strong commitment to social justice and democracy,” the coanchor said. “But Ghadan officials were keen to stress that the king’s health remains good …”
Haya paled, and steadied herself against a seat.
“Turn it off,” she said quietly.
A soldier leaped to obey her.
“We will all pray for the health of the king,” she added. And as they were staring at her, she covered her face and turned toward Mecca.
Oh, God … please spare him!
She didn’t want to be queen. She hadn’t signed up to be a queen!
Haya thought of her daughter, her husband, her new country, her parents. And she thought of the news item she had just seen. If her life was to shift again, in this cataclysmic way, the one thing she was damn sure of was that she was going to save her company.
She hoped Jaber would understand why it mattered. But come hell or high water, Sunday night, she was getting on a plane to L.A.
CHAPTER 15
“Great doing business with you.” The broker shook hands briskly with Jane. “It’s a great space, I think you’ll be very happy. If we can assist you with anything more, do get in touch.”
“I will. Thanks.” Jane had just got a steal of five thousand square feet on the Lower East Side. And even better, it came fully carpeted and equipped; she wouldn’t have to waste time.
She walked around her new offices. Great views of lower Broadway, looking toward the World Trade Center; perfect for a Wall Street newcomer.
Jane would employ fifteen brokers, two analysts, and fifteen assistants. As she expanded she hoped it’d be more.
Maybe she could never be another Craig Levin, but she was sure as hell going to try. Until GLAMOUR was hers, that meant trading in currencies and stocks; Jane intended to take buy-and-hold positions, maybe start a retail hedge fund. Her track record there was golden. Plus, she thought she might dabble in real estate.
She didn’t want to be just another woman executive.To persuade stockholders to sell their GLAMOUR shares to her, she needed to be playing in the mixed divisions.
The thought of Haya, shouting and raging, crossed her mind; of Sally, telling her any broker could handle the finances.
And then of Craig … her love … lying there, not stopping her, not holding her.
Her father; the last time she had seen him, clutching ineffectually at him as he got into his diplomatic car.
Friends. Lovers. Family. In the end, you could trust only yourself.
Let Monday come. When she sat down in that boardroom, her offices would be fully staffed, fully funded, and trading.
She walked out.Time to get her hair and nails done.The press would be there, Monday. Haya was an almost-queen, and Sally was a star. She, the single girl, didn’t want to look bad.
Jane thought of Craig, and winced from the sheer physical ache of it. She wanted him so badly. Wanted his body driving into hers, his strong, bearish frame on her slight one, her fingers clutching at his back.
But she wanted so much more than that, too. And he wasn’t going to give it to her.
Love—whatever kind of love—was always dangerous, a bad risk. She’d never gotten away with her heart intact. Now she was just playing to win.
But as she locked the office door behind her, there were tears in her eyes.
Jane despised her own weakness.
Sally glanced down at the little stick. She’d had the pregnancy test included in her grocery deliveries; that way it could be anonymous—she got them with a credit card in her assistant’s name, to stop the tabloids raking through her trash. Didn’t want to read about it in the Enquirer.
The little blue flush crept up to the window. Sally held her breath …
But no; there was only the one line. She waited. Nothing. Not pregnant.
Sally sighed. Of course, it wasn’t gonna happen right away. She was just gonna have to be patient. Oh, yeah—and practice a lot. She smiled.
She was fitter than she’d ever been. Chris loved to play around while working her out. Talk about an incentive! He made her watch while he lifted weights with his shirt off. Got her so worked up, watching his strong muscles slide around under that tanned skin, his biceps straining, that Sally could scarcely keep from jumping on him as soon as he was done.
Before, it had been good. Now they were married, it was perfect. Every time she looked down at the thick round band of white diamonds—there was enough ice on her left hand to satisfy a polar bear—Sally felt a rush of deep, profound pleasure. He was hers—signed, sealed, delivered. She relaxed in bed in a way she hadn’t thought possible. All she wanted now was to have his babies….
And to run her company.
Looking down at the single, lonely little line, she consoled herself. Hey, this wasn’t a once-for-all thing.They got an infinite number of attempts.
With GLAMOUR, not so much. Sally threw out the stick, washed her hands, and went downstairs to call her lawyers again. She might not be the world’s biggest brain, but she was savvy. And there were brains around for hire.
And she was her father’s daughter. Let Haya and Jane pit their bookish minds against her street smarts. She was damn sure who was going to win.
“But aren’t you under contract? To GLAMOUR?”
The gray men in suits were sitting behind the table in the Chicago office, trying not to ogle Sally. She knew how she appeared to them—a butterfly among moths; her tight, short dress displaying her perfectly toned figure—Chris was, like, the world’s best personal trainer, and she did mean personal—her long, blonde hair shimmering with fresh white platinum highlights shot through a buttercup base, like liquid strands of sunshine; her teeth, whitened with porcelain veneers to Hollywood-like perfection; a ruby and diamond necklace, another gift from Chris, lying against the creamy hollows of her throat.
“Yes.The Lassiter brand is theirs.Which is why I’m proposing to start a new one.” She dazzled them with a smile.
“But what could be more recognizable than Lassiter?”
“Sally,” she said, and winked.
The chemists and marketing executives sighed. Sally. Of course. It was perfect. One word. One name. America’s sweetheart.
“I’ll want the highest quality and on-time delivery; we’d be talking to America’s premier outlets, not just GLAMOUR. This would be on sale at Harrods, at Saks Fifth Avenue, at Scruples in L.A. And that means zero mistakes. I’m thinking Crème de la Mer—but bigger. A little less expensive, too. Affordable luxury, like a Chanel lipstick.”
They nodded frantically, as similar execs had done in every cosmetic house she’d visited.
“And the marketing?”
“I have it out to five top Madison Avenue firms.”
“It’s been a very impressive presentation, Mrs. Nelson,” said their chairman, standing up and all but rubbing his hands together in glee. “And we’d love to be in business with you. We’ll messenger our costings to your people later today.”
“Total creative control,” Sally repeated firmly. “It’s my brand; you’ll be supplying the raw materials—that’s going to be in the contract.”
“Mrs. Nelson, you are the brand,” he replied, looking surprised. “Why would we go anywhere else?”
Sally shook hands, delighted.Yeah, they got it. If only her two former best friends could see things the way the marketing men of America did!
On the limo ride back to O’Hare Airport she mulled things over. She could get this going by the end of next week. Samples on her desk, packaging included …
She’d intended to use it purely as blackmail. But now another idea was forming. Two companies—one public, one her own. Why not? If Jane could branch out, why not Sally? Showing she was competent, showing she could run things—that would sweet-talk the share
holders into selling GLAMOUR back to her.
Yeah. It was a great idea. She took out her mobile and dialed the direct line to her chief lawyer. He was head of a big firm in L.A., and available to her whenever needed.
“Tony? Sal. Listen, I’m going ahead. Can you draw everything up, get it registered in my name? Sally Lassiter Cosmetics.Thanks, doll. Have the papers waiting when I get home.”
She listened as he gave her a report. Perfect. Everything was going fine.
Jaber sighed with pleasure and rolled off Haya, panting; drained, he lay on the bed and stared at the mosaics in the ceiling.
She was exhausted, herself. But man, was he good. Patient, exacting, knowledgeable. He knew just how to handle her body. She responded, intensely, unable to help herself.
“I couldn’t handle this without you. None of it.”
“You couldn’t have refused?” Haya asked, timidly.
“Refused?” Jaber propped himself up on his elbows and stared down at her, her glorious dark hair pooled out over the white Egyptian cotton sheets. “You can’t refuse your destiny when it calls.That way lies eternal regret.”
She turned onto her belly to meet him, and nuzzled kisses into his ear and throat.
“Which is exactly why I have to go.”
“Haya.” He sighed. “The king could die any minute. While you’re out there.You would be the Queen of Ghada, and sitting in some boardroom in Los Angeles! How would it look?”
“Like you aren’t a man who compromises his principles,” she said. “You took a risk when you married me, Jaber.You know what a woman I am—a businesswoman, a professional.Yes, I set it aside. But not so that they can destroy everything I’ve built up. Let me save the company. One day. It’s all I ask.”
He shook his head.“Haya—I cannot deny you. But make it as quick as you can, and be back on the jet the second you get out of there.” Jaber sighed. “Women. You’d think as a king I might have it easier.”
She hit him on the chest, grinning. “No chance.”
“I should have married that distant cousin,” Jaber said, darkly. He reached for his wife, yanking her to him; Haya was amazed at his inexhaustible energy.
“Never mind.” He kissed her lightly, deliberately. “I’m going to give you a chance to make it up to me.”
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