The Sheikh's Bride

by Sophie Weston

  Leo cast him an harassed look. Nothing was going to serve her but the truth, she realised.

  ‘I am not the best co-ordinated person in the world,’ she announced defiantly. ‘I was just trying to work out how to get into this thing.’

  The jeep roared off. It left behind the starlit dark and the soft slap of the river against the jetty. And the man, now no more than a dark shadow against shadows. It was a warm night. But in the sudden quiet, Leo shivered.

  ‘That’s easy,’ Amer said softly.

  He picked her up.

  ‘Careful,’ gasped Leo, clutching him round the neck.

  She could feel the ripple of private laughter under her hands. Amer held her high against his chest and stepped down into the boat.

  She was right. There were cushions everywhere. Amer sank gracefully into them. He seemed, thought Leo, to hold on to her for far longer that was necessary. She inhaled the new aroma of expensive laundry and man’s skin, all mixed with some elusive cologne that was hardly there and yet which she knew she would never forget.

  None of the semidetached men in her life had made her feel like this. Was it because he was, as her mother had called him, a seriously sexy article? Would any woman have felt her pulses race in this situation? Or was it only Leo? Had her cool temperament and shaky experience led her to over-react to an embrace that was not an embrace at all? Somewhere deep inside there was still a clumsy sixteen-year-old who had hung around at the edge of the room at parties, marooned in her own self-consciousness. Had someone found the route to reach her at last?

  If so, Leo was far from grateful. She disentangled herself, not without difficulty, and sat up. She pulled her jacket straight and smoothed her hair.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said primly.

  ‘My pleasure.’

  She believed him. There was a note in his voice that said he was enjoying himself hugely. Leo was suddenly grateful to the darkness. It meant he could not see the colour in her hot cheeks.

  She moved along the cushioned seat to leave a small but definite space between them. Amer glanced down, noting it. But he did not object. Instead he called out to the boatman and they pushed off from the side.

  The light breeze took them quickly out to midstream. Amer leaned back among his cushions and looked at the stars.

  ‘How is your astronomy?’

  ‘Not very good.’

  ‘Mine is excellent. Let me be your guide.’

  Leo looked up reluctantly. It hurt her neck but she was determined not to lounge at her ease as he was doing. She was not going to pretend she felt comfortable when she did not.

  Amer began to point out the stars by name. He knew a lot of them. The strain on her neck became intolerable. Almost without realising she was doing it, she eased the pain by sliding down until she, too, was reclining among the cushions. Out of the darkness she thought she caught a gleam of white teeth as he smiled. But he was too clever to offer any comment. Far less to touch her.

  Oh boy, am I out of my depth here, thought Leo.

  The lamp at the prow swung with the motion of the boat, sending waves of shadow over them as if they were under the river instead of on it. She could hear the soft lapping of the water and the unhurried rhythm of his breathing. Nothing else.

  Leo did not take her eyes off the stars. But she knew that Amer was less than a hand’s length away from her. She had only to turn her body a fraction and they would be touching. She thought: I have never felt so totally alone with anyone in my whole life.

  She became aware of the sound of her own breathing. She shivered a little.

  ‘You are cold,’ said Amer, coming to halt in mid-discourse on the starscape.

  He sat up and shrugged out of his jacket. Leo turned her head. At that angle she had to look up at him. She caught her breath. For a moment it was as if they lay in a bed, drowsing among habitually shared pillows.

  At the thought, her whole body convulsed. She jackknifed upright so violently that the frail craft dipped.

  The boatman turned his head with a surprised question. Amer answered him, laughing.

  He slid the jacket round her shoulders.

  ‘How jumpy you are.’ It sounded like a caress.

  To Leo, shaking badly now with reaction, it felt as if he had reached out and run his hand over her flesh, though not an inch of skin was exposed. She huddled his jacket round her. Then realised that it still held the warmth of his body and wished she hadn’t.

  She swallowed. Loudly.

  He did not move any closer. But he reached out a lazy hand and brushed her hair outside his jacket’s collar. Leo went very still. It felt as if he owned her.

  ‘Your hair is like silk,’ Amer murmured. ‘But too short.’

  Leo had an involuntary picture of the two of them lying in bed, Amer propped on one elbow, running his free hand through her yards of soft and shining hair. It was so vivid that she almost believed he could see it as well. Her whole body buzzed with shock and embarrassment.

  ‘It used to be long,’ she said, her voice too high and fast. ‘All through school. I used to be able to sit on it. But when I got older and tried to pin it up, it was too fine. So it was always collapsing. And then my boy friend in college said he couldn’t sleep with it, because it was always getting wound round him or getting in his mouth…’ She wished she hadn’t said that. She was gabbling and she knew it.

  Amer held up a hand to stop the flow.

  ‘Don’t tell me about other men,’ he said in a pained voice.

  Leo gasped. The light on the prow swung as the boat tacked. It showed him lounging among the cushions, regarding her quizzically.

  ‘You really don’t know how to play this game, do you?’

  ‘What game?’ said Leo.

  Though she knew. Her racing pulse had been telling her ever since he picked her up and put her in the boat. Now she was almost sure he was smiling in the darkness.

  ‘That’s an interesting question,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Maybe somewhere between a contest and a carnival. What do you think?’

  Leo swallowed. He was right. This was a completely new game for her. She had no idea how to riposte.

  ‘I think I’m in over my head,’ she said honestly.

  There was a pause as if she had surprised him. Not entirely pleasantly.

  Then, ‘Hey. You’re supposed to be enjoying yourself, you know.’

  Amer moved. At once her muscles clenched. She was burningly conscious of his body. He was so close, she could sense the latent power of him. And it was not fear that kept her alert and trembling, she realised.

  But he was only stretching, making himself more comfortable. He put his arms behind his head and looked up at her thoughtfully. As the light swung again, she saw that he had pushed up the sleeves of his shirt. The brief glimpse of muscular forearms did unwelcome things to her stomach.

  The boat tacked again and the light swung in the other direction. Leo tried to gasp for air quietly. She had not realised she was holding her breath.

  She cleared her throat. ‘Where are we going? I mean, is this it?’

  Amer gave a soft laugh.

  ‘Hungry are you?’

  Leo decided to assume he was talking about food.

  ‘Well breakfast was at five o clock this morning and I haven’t eaten since,’ she told him.

  ‘Good grief.’ He sounded genuinely horrified. ‘We must do something about that at once.’

  He said something in quick Arabic to the boatman. The boat turned.

  ‘What happened?’ Amer demanded. ‘The revenge of the unreasonable boss?’

  Leo shook her head, laughing. ‘Nope. That’s normal at this time of year.’

  ‘It sounds like slavery. Why do you do it?’

  Leo felt better now they were discussing an ordinary subject at last. She could do polite conversation, she thought ruefully. It was subtle sexual repartee that defeated her.

  ‘It’s my job,’ she said.

  ‘Why did you choose
a job like that?’

  Leo thought about her father’s announcement of her two-year assignment.

  ‘Well, the job sort of found me,’ she said ruefully. ‘My chief told me where I was going. I didn’t get a vote.’

  ‘Then you should have looked for a new job with a more modern chief.’ He sounded impatient.

  Leo bridled at his tone.

  ‘It’s easy to say that if you have an infinite range of choices open to you. Most of us don’t.’

  Amer gave a bark of laughter. ‘No one has infinite choice. Most people have fewer than you think.’

  ‘Are you telling me that you’re a slave of circumstance, too?’ Leo challenged him mockingly.

  He did not like that. He said curtly, ‘We are not talking about me.’

  And that, she thought, sounded like an order.

  The boat was skirting a small island. It came to rest against the bank. The boatman moored it fore and aft and lowered the sail. He unhooked the lamp from the prow and brought it down to them.

  Amer motioned to him to set out the picnic basket. Then waved him away. The man leaped over the side of the boat and disappeared into the darkness. All Leo’s returning confidence went with him.

  She thought Amer would expect her to unpack the basket and serve the food. But he did not. Instead he filled warm ovals of pitta bread with a deliciously aromatic salad and gave one to her. Watching his deft movements, Leo thought: He thinks if he left it to me, I’d drop the food all over the cushions. The truth was she thought so, too. It added to her constraint.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said in a subdued voice.

  She sat up, curling her legs under her, away from him.

  ‘Drink?’

  There was tea, sherbet, juices. Leo chose water and drank a whole glassful.

  Amer raised an amused eyebrow. ‘You’ve got a real desert thirst there.’

  ‘Anxiety always makes me thirsty,’ Leo said unwarily.

  He grimaced. ‘Ouch.’

  ‘What? Oh.’ She bit her lip. ‘That sounded rude. I didn’t mean—’

  ‘I think we both know what you meant,’ he said drily.

  Now the soft light was at their end of the boat and hardly swaying at all, he would see her blush. Leo cursed her porcelain-pale skin. It was always giving her away.

  She said stiffly, ‘I’m sorry.’

  Amer did not answer for a moment. Leo hesitated; then dared a look at him under her eyelashes. His expression was unreadable.

  ‘You’re an education,’ he said at last. ‘I’m very much afraid that Hari was right.’

  Leo was confused. ‘Who’s Hari?’

  He gave an unexpected laugh. ‘But then, I was right, too,’ he went on unheeding. ‘You’re nobody’s toy, are you? You’re your own person. Right through to the beautiful frankness.’

  Leo knew she was being mocked and did not like it. ‘I’ve said I’m sorry,’ she muttered.

  ‘Don’t be sorry.’ He was amused again. ‘You should be proud to be a truth teller. There aren’t so many of them around.’

  Leo wished she had her glasses to hide behind. In their absence, she munched on the pitta.

  It was odd. She should have been starving after the turbulent day. But the last thing she wanted was food. If Amer would only stop looking at her like that, as if he had never seen anything like her, she would have turned away from the food with relief.

  But Amer continued to play the attentive host, offering her delicacies from the basket and keeping up a steady flow of informative conversation. The Nile, the desert sky, ancient temples, modern dams—he covered them all while Leo worked her way stolidly through more calories than she cared to count. Eventually he gave her a thimbleful of thin, sharp coffee and said, ‘Your turn.’

  It was the moment Leo had been dreading. ‘My, er, turn?’

  ‘Talk to me,’ he commanded.

  ‘What—’ Her voice wavered. She took command of it and started again. ‘What shall I talk about?’

  He gave a soft laugh. ‘It is usual to start with whatever you want the other party to know about you.’

  ‘But I don’t want you to know anything about me,’ Leo said unguardedly. There was more truth in that than she would have been willing to admit, if she had thought about it.

  Amer took it calmly. ‘Then tell me what I want to know.’

  ‘Like what?’ said Leo warily.

  ‘Like where you come from. How you ended up in Cairo. How the men in your life like it.’

  Leo considered. Nothing too private there, she thought.

  So she said readily enough, ‘I come from London—well a suburb of London. My company is basically an international hotel chain. They diversified into other leisure areas, including this local travel agency, and sent me out here for two years. To get experience of work at the coal face, so to speak. I’ve been here just over a year. Eventually I’ll go back to Head Office.’ She sighed. ‘After the row with Roy sooner rather than later.’

  ‘And the men in your life?’ he prompted.

  ‘Ah.’

  Well, it was not private, exactly but Leo was not sure she wanted to discuss her romantic failures with this unreadable man. On the other hand, her father had taught her that the truth was never damaging. And after tonight she would never see Mr Amer again.

  She squared her shoulders and said cheerfully, ‘No men.’

  His eyes narrowed. She caught the flicker of long lashes against the dark.

  ‘Not even—what did you call him?—Roy?’ he asked. He did not sound very interested. His tone was almost idle.

  She gave a snort of laughter at the thought.

  Amer did not share her amusement. ‘So how did he manage to throw you out of your flat?’ he demanded, swift as a striking snake.

  It shocked her into silence.

  ‘I asked you if you lived with him, if you remember. You did not answer then, either.’

  Leo had the sudden impression of fierce anger. She searched the shadowed face. He did not say any more but his silence was somehow relentless.

  She said hurriedly, ‘It was a company flat.’

  Still he did not say anything.

  Leo found her tone was placating, as if he had accused her of something. ‘We go out of Cairo so much with the tourist parties that it’s not worth having a flat each. We all share. Roy, Vanessa, Kevin, anyone else that comes out. Truly. Roy wasn’t there most of the time.’

  Amer digested this for a moment. ‘Not much privacy then,’ he said at last.

  To Leo’s relief it seemed as if he was no longer angry. Instead he sounded thoughtful. ‘Is that the reason?’

  ‘Reason?’ Leo echoed, puzzled.

  She caught the flash of white as he smiled. ‘You said there were no men in your life,’ he reminded her.

  ‘Oh that!’

  She was oddly relieved that he had decided to believe her. What could it matter whether a stranger trusted her word, after all? She would never see him again after tonight. But she was glad and she knew it.

  ‘Yes that,’ he mimicked her, teasing. ‘If there are no men in your life there has to be a reason.’

  And he was going to persist until she told him. Leo sighed and gave him the truth.

  ‘I don’t really work with men, if you know what I mean. Never have. Not really. Drives my mother mad.’

  She felt him considering it. She gave him a quick, bright smile. But she could not sustain it. Her eyes slid away from him before she could read his expression.

  He said thoughtfully, ‘Does that mean you are not attracted to men?’

  Leo was startled. ‘Oh no. Well, at least, I haven’t thought about it much. I’ve had a couple of sort of relationships. Pretty low-grade stuff. The guys walked away after a bit and to be honest it was a relief. I don’t think I’m designed to stroke the male ego. Well not for long.’

  Amer stiffened. ‘There is more to a relationship between a man and a woman than ego stroking.’

  ‘Is there?’ L
eo said drily. ‘Didn’t seem that way to me.’

  This time she managed to look at him for longer. There was no doubt she had annoyed him. He was still smiling but his displeasure was tangible.

  Leo was surprised; and then amused. Amer must have thought she would turn to toffee under his stylish not-quite-seduction. It was pleasant to have knocked his assumptions off course, however slightly.

  He said shortly, ‘It sounds as if you have been unfortunate in your encounters.’

  Leo shrugged. ‘No, I’d say it was pretty standard.’

  ‘On the basis of—what did you call them?—a couple of low-grade relationships?’

  She looked at him ironically. ‘I don’t just know about my own mistakes. Girls talk you know.’

  ‘In that case,’ Amer said triumphantly, ‘you must know that most girls these days would have more than a couple of unsatisfactory experiments to base their theories on.’

  ‘Ah but most girls keep on trying. They’ve got to. They want to marry.’

  Amer was taken aback.

  ‘And you don’t?’

  Leo shifted her shoulders. In her head she could hear Deborah saying anxiously, ‘Darling, how on earth do you think you’re going to get married if you go on like this?’ She managed not to wince.

  ‘I’d say the odds are against it,’ she said evenly.

  Amer noticed the evasion. ‘You mean you do want to but you don’t think it’s going to happen.’ He sounded a lot more content with that.

  It made Leo furious. She sat bolt upright, rocking the small craft again with the violence of the movement.

  ‘Look,’ she said, ‘I said I’d have dinner with you. I didn’t agree to be dissected because you happen to have a nasty taste in dinner party conversation.’

  ‘Is that what I’ve been doing?’ He sounded startled and not very pleased.

  There was a pause while he considered it. Then he said in amusement, ‘All right. Take your revenge. I’ll tell you anything you want to know.’

  ‘No, thank you,’ said Leo distantly. ‘I don’t want to dissect you, either.’

  He shook his head, still deeply amused. ‘Still telling the truth? Not great tactics—but very impressive.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Leo, not meaning it.

  He stretched. The fine cotton stretched, too, across taut muscles. Leo remembered how those muscles had felt under her fingers when he put her into the boat and her mouth was suddenly dry.