Innocent in the Sheikh's Harem

by Marguerite Kaye

  Ramiz froze. The expression on his face was ludicrous in its intensity. Sheer disbelief, swiftly followed by horror. As the sharpness of the pain receded, and she realised he was going to pull away, Celia clutched at him. ‘No.’

  But she could not hold him. He cursed long and viciously in his own language, pushing her hands away and pulling himself from her in one move. He grabbed his robe from the floor and pulled it over his head. There was no mistaking the anger which froze his face into rigid lines. His eyes were cold too, glinting chips of amber. Celia sat up, clutching the sheet around her. Bright beads of blood showed crimson on its pristine white, like berries in snow. Hastily she twisted the sheet, but Ramiz had already seen them. He wrenched it from her grasp, forcing her to scrabble for her caftan to cover her nakedness.

  ‘A sheet any bride would be proud of,’ Ramiz said through gritted teeth, holding it up so that the traitorous blood spots could not be avoided. ‘But you are not a bride. Why in the name of all the gods did you not tell me? Do you think I would have? Do you think I would have let you—allowed myself—? You don’t know what you have done.’

  ‘What I have done?’ Celia stood up, glaring at him.

  ‘What I have done, then. Something your husband evidently did not!’ Ramiz ran his hand through his hair. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘You didn’t ask!’ But even as she threw the words at him she knew how unfair they were. The reality of the situation came crashing down like a sudden cloudburst. What had she done? ‘George didn’t want—we didn’t—he said it would be easier if we waited until we knew each other better,’ she said quietly. ‘But we never did.’

  ‘Evidently,’ Ramiz said bitterly.

  ‘No.’ Celia blinked, determined not to allow the tears which burned her eyes to fall. ‘I doubt we ever would have, to be honest. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t mean this to happen. I should have stopped you. I’m sorry.’

  She brushed the back of her hand across her eyes. The defiant little gesture touched him as tears would not have. ‘Celia, did I hurt you?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She managed a weak smile. ‘Just a little.’

  ‘Next time it won’t be so—’ Ramiz stopped. There would never be a next time for them. There should not have been a first. He should be thanking the fates that he had managed to stop—that shock had allowed him to stop. Only he didn’t feel like thanking the fates. Horrified by his own base desires, by the persistence of his erection, which nudged insistently against his belly, he realized that what he wanted to do was to finish what they had started. To sheath himself in the luscious delight of her, to thrust deeper and deeper, until he spent himself inside her, to claim her as his. As his own. As her first.

  No! He could not. He would not. Not even if it meant another would take what rightfully should be his.

  No! No! No! He would not think of Celia with another. Looking at her trying so hard not to cry, the flush of passion fading from her cheeks, her mouth bruised with his kisses, the delicate creamy white of her breast showing the imprint of his touch, Ramiz fought the urge to take her in his arms and soothe away the hurt he had caused. The stain on his honour, the tangible evidence of that stain on the sheet he gripped, held him back. ‘What have I done?’

  ‘It wasn’t just you. It was my fault as much as yours,’ Celia said resolutely.

  ‘I have deflowered you. The dishonour!’

  ‘Ramiz, as you have already pointed out, I was married. In the eyes of the world I was already deflowered. There is no dishonour because no one will know.’

  ‘I will know!’

  ‘Well, I’m sure you’ll learn to live with it.’

  ‘Is that all you can say?’

  She bit her lip. What she wanted was to know how it felt to really make love. How it felt to have him move inside her. What she wanted was to complete and to be completed—because that, she realised, was what it was really about. Two people as one. That was what she wanted to say, but she couldn’t, because for Ramiz it had clearly been nothing more than the easing of tension. The natural conclusion to her massage.

  ‘I think you should go now,’ she said instead, wresting the horrible evidence of her virginity from his hands. ‘I think we should agree to forget all about this.’

  ‘Forget?’

  ‘Yes. It’s for the best.’

  ‘Is this your famous British stiff upper lip? It doesn’t suit you.’

  ‘It’s what we British call being practical. You’re tired. Exhausted, in fact. Go to bed.’

  ‘But you…’

  ‘I will be fine.’

  She was right, but it felt wrong. He didn’t want to leave her—which was exactly the reason why he should. Nothing about this was right. Staying would only heap more wrong on wrong.

  He didn’t like the way she was so determined to take her share of the blame. And he definitely didn’t like it that it was she and not he who insisted he go. It was all the wrong way round. Where was the clinging vine? Why must she be so stoically independent? He didn’t like it, but there wasn’t a thing he could do about it either.

  Ramiz shrugged. ‘Goodnight,’ he said coldly. Then he left without another word.

  Alone, Celia picked up his headdress from where he had dropped it carelessly on the floor. The square of white silk smelled of him. She clutched it to her chest. Then she curled up on the divan and gave way to racking sobs and blinding tears.

  Peregrine Finchley-Burke’s confidence in the efficiency of the Royal Navy was not displaced. Lord Wincester’s despatch reached England less than three weeks after it had been written. The special courier arrived mud-spattered, his horse’s flanks speckled with foam, at the country estate of Lord Henry Armstrong just as its owner was preparing for a long overdue meeting with his bailiff. The contents of the missive, perused in the seclusion of his study, were shocking enough to require sustenance in the form of brandy, despite the early hour. Throwing back the large snifter, Lord Henry read the letter for a third time. A frown marred his normally serene countenance, for the consequences of the matter were potentially far-reaching. A delicate situation. Very delicate indeed, he thought, scratching his bald pate. It was a good thing his sister Sophia was here. He could trust her to manage the girls. But what to do about it all was another matter.

  ‘Damn the man,’ Lord Henry muttered, staring at Lord Wincester’s signature. ‘Bloody fool. Only reason he’s out there is because of that fracas in Lisbon. He thought it was all hushed up, but I know the real story.’ He poured himself a second snifter. ‘Damn the man,’ he said again, more loudly this time. ‘And damn George Cleveden too! You’d have thought he’d have more wit than to get himself killed in such a manner.’ Lord Henry leaned over to ruffle the fur of his favourite pointer bitch, sitting obediently at his feet. ‘Bloody stupid thing to do, if you ask me.’ The dog whined. ‘You’re quite right. Time they were all told,’ Lord Henry said, bestowing another affectionate pat upon the animal before he got to his feet and left the library in search of his family.

  He entered the blue drawing room to find the collective eyes of his four daughters and sister Sophia upon him. Not for the first time he wondered at his own inability to father a son. Girls were all very well, but he couldn’t help thinking five girls excessive. And expensive. ‘Well, well, here you all are,’ he said, with an air of false bonhomie which he mistakenly imagined would reassure them.

  Cassandra, the beauty of the family, had been rather too aptly named, for she had a propensity for prophesying tragedy. She clutched dramatically at her father’s coat sleeve, her lovely eyes, the colour of cornflowers, already drowning in tears. ‘Papa! It is Celia, isn’t it? She is—oh, Papa—tell me she is not—’

  ‘Celia is absolutely fine,’ Lord Henry said, detaching her fingers from his coat sleeve. ‘It is George, I’m afraid. Dead.’

  Cassandra collapsed back into a convenient chair, clutching her breast, her
countenance touchingly pale. Caroline gave a little gasp of horror. Cordelia and Cressida simply stared with mouths wide open at their father. It was left to Lady Sophia to seek clarification. ‘May one ask what happened to result in such an unfortunate outcome?’ she asked, rummaging in her reticule for the vial of sal volatile she kept there for such occasions.

  ‘He was murdered,’ Lord Henry replied flatly.

  This shocking news gave even the normally redoubtable Lady Sophia pause. Casting a baleful look at the two youngest of her nieces, who had squealed in a most unrefined manner, she thrust the sal volatile under Cassie’s nose.

  ‘May I?’ asked Sophia, holding her hand out imperiously for the despatch which Lord Henry was only too happy to hand over. She read it with close attention, her eyebrows rising fractionally as she digested the content. ‘You may leave this to me, Henry,’ she said to her brother.

  Only too happy to obey, Lord Henry left the room.

  ‘I am sorry to inform you that George has indeed been murdered,’ Lady Sophia informed her nieces. ‘Brigands. It seems he and Celia were on their way to a place called A’Qadiz, which is somewhere in Arabia, on a special assignment which entailed a journey across the desert. That is where poor George met his fate. He died bravely, serving his country,’ she said with an air of assurance and a complete disregard for the truth. ‘That fact will, I do most sincerely trust, mitigate the rather vulgar manner in which he was slain.’

  ‘And Celia?’ Faced with a genuine crisis, Cassie had abandoned her vapours and, though prettily pale, was composed enough to join her sisters on the sofa, putting a comforting arm around the two youngest. ‘What does the despatch say of Celia? I take it she is now under the care of the Consul General? Or perhaps she is already on her way home?’ she said hopefully.

  ‘Hmm.’ Lady Sophia inspected the lace of her sleeve.

  ‘Aunt?’

  ‘Hmm,’ Lady Sophia said again. ‘Celia is still in A’Qadiz, I am afraid.’

  ‘What? In the desert?’

  ‘She is apparently resident in the royal palace there. As a guest of a Sheikh al-Muhana. Prince al-Muhana, I should say.’

  This information was met with stunned silence. Lady Sophia twitched at her lace.

  ‘Cassie, is Celia being held prisoner?’ Cressida’s chin wobbled.

  ‘Cassie, will she be locked away and have to tell the Sheikh a story every night to stop her getting her head cut off?’ Cordelia, aged twelve, asked. Too late she remembered that Aunt Sophia had forbidden them to read that book. Cordelia blushed. Cressida pinched her. Caroline drew her a look.

  The ensuing reprimand distracted Cassie temporarily from the question nagging away at her. ‘Why has Celia been left alone with Sheikh al-Muhana?’ she asked, when order had finally been restored.

  ‘A very pertinent question,’ Lady Sophia answered dryly.

  ‘A very pertinent question indeed,’ Lord Henry said as he re-entered the room. ‘Wincester is a buffoon and a liability, which is why I’m going out there personally to sort this mess out. Don’t worry about your sister’s safety in the meantime. No foreign power would dare harm the daughter of a senior British diplomat.’

  ‘Papa, Celia has witnessed the murder of her husband. She has been kidnapped by a man who for all we know could have her under lock and key in his harem,’ Cassie said, her voice rising as the full horror of her sister’s plight began to sink in.

  ‘Now, now,’ Lord Henry said, eyeing his daughter warily, ‘no point in letting our imagination run away with us. Celia is a sensible gal, and I’m sure the Prince is an honourable man. I’m sure there’s no need to worry on that score.’

  ‘No need to…’ Cassie stared at her father in disbelief. ‘I take it you are going to Egypt at once?’

  ‘Well, of course I am.’

  ‘Then I am coming with you,’ Cassie said resolutely.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, girl.’

  ‘I am coming with you, Father, and nothing you can say will dissuade me. Celia is my beloved sister. Heaven knows what she has gone through—is going through even now,’ Cassie said with a shudder. ‘She will need me to support her. I am coming with you and that’s that.’

  ‘Sophia, can’t you talk some sense into the girl? The desert is no place for a young lady of breeding.’

  ‘You might have thought of that before you despatched your other daughter, then,’ Lady Sophia said witheringly. ‘Cassandra is quite right. Celia will need her sister. And what’s more she will need her aunt too. I am also coming with you.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘You heard, Henry,’ Lady Sophia said, fixing her younger brother with one of her glacial glares. ‘Now, since time is of the essence, I will go immediately to attend to my packing. You will summon Bella Frobisher to look after the girls. Since it is your intention that the woman is to be their new stepmother, she might as well make a start in getting to know them. Come, Cassandra. We will leave in an hour, Henry.’

  Lord Henry Armstrong was renowned as a tough and unyielding negotiator, who had faced down the most cunning and powerful courtiers in all of Europe, but he was no match for his sister and he knew it. ‘As you wish, Sophia,’ he said resignedly, before leaving to go in search of the brandy bottle for the second time that morning.

  Chapter Ten

  Ramiz wandered alone in the gardens of the royal palace. The relatively compact area was divided by a series of covered walkways and winding paths, linked with fountains and small pavilions to give it a sense of space. Watered by an ingenious system of sprinklers fed by underground pipes, it combined the traditional plants of the East, such as fig, oleander and jasmine, with a number of species brought back by Ramiz from his travels. Amongst these were several roses. One of his favourites, the lightly scented pink rose which climbed round the gilded trellis by the fountain where he sat now, had been given to him by the Empress Josephine herself, from her treasured garden at Malmaison. The petals appeared almost white when furled, the pink revealing itself like a blush only when the flowers opened fully.

  They made him think of Celia. Three nights had passed since his last visit to the harem, and the only conclusion he had reached was that it was best to keep away from her. He had taken something precious, and there was nothing he could do to recompense her for the loss. What he had done was wrong, without a doubt, and Ramiz was unused to being in the wrong. He had never before been in a position where he could not put a wrong right, and he was wholly unused to the position in which he now found himself—torn between the desire to make amends and the equally strong desire to make proper love to Celia.

  That was the most shocking thing of all. He had done wrong, commited a sin of honour, but he was struggling to regret it.

  The fact that Celia herself refused to accept his crime didn’t help. Why had she not stopped him? Why had she not confessed? Why was she determined to brush it off as something trivial? Didn’t it matter to her? What did she want of him? Could it be that she was a pawn in some diplomatic game, ready to cry ravishment in order to gain advantage for her country? But she had already insisted she would not cry ravishment, and one of the few things he was certain of was that she did not lie.

  So why? The last time he’d asked her, after the visit to Katra, she had blamed it on the harem. Unreal, she’d said. As in a fantasy? From the start she’d shown a fascination with the harem, or with her perception of the harem drawn from that set of fairytales One Thousand and One Nights. Like her compatriots on the Grand Tour, perhaps she was indulging in a fantasy safe from the prying eyes of her peers. It made sense. It made a lot of sense.

  The only way to eliminate temptation is to yield to it. An old saying of his brother’s. As the eldest son and his father’s heir, Asad had been much indulged. Asad had preferred action to words. ‘Women talk, men act,’ he’d used to say. ‘The sword is the instrument of the Prince. To his subjects falls the task of writing down his words.’ Too quick to the flame, their father had always said of Asad, but he’d
said it in such a way as to make his pride in his eldest son clear.

  If truth be told Ramiz and Asad had rarely seen eye to eye. If truth be told, Ramiz thought wryly, nor had he and his father, but that didn’t stop him missing them both. Nearly two years now since Asad was killed, and in that time Ramiz’s life had been turned upside down. While he had always felt strongly about what he would do differently were he to become ruler of A’Qadiz, he had never seriously considered it happening. Putting his long-considered policies into action had gone some way to help him through the loss of his last remaining close relative, for his mother had died when Ramiz was a teenager, but it had also prevented him from thinking too much about the loss itself. He missed Asad. Why not admit it? He was lonely. He was a rich prince, with thousands of loyal subjects, and he had everything except someone to confide in.

  He hadn’t noticed until Celia came along. He’d been too immersed in state policy and state negotiations and state legislation. No time to think about anything other than A’Qadiz. No time to think that maybe he needed something for himself. Someone for himself. Perhaps Akil was right. What he needed was a wife.

  But the idea of marrying one of the princesses from Akil’s list was even less appealing than ever. Such a wife would be taken for the sake of A’Qadiz. Such a wife would not give him anything other than more responsibility, one more thing to worry about. Such a wife would not be like Celia—would not be Celia.

  Ramiz growled with exasperation. A whole hour wasted thinking, and he was right back where he started. The only way to eliminate temptation is to yield to it. One thing Asad had always been good at was getting to the nub of a problem. Lady Celia, with her copper hair and her creamy skin and her forthright opinions, was in danger of becoming an obsession. If she did not think herself dishonoured, why should he worry about it? Why not indulge her in her Arabian fantasy and at the same time rid himself of his unwelcome obsession?