"Let's get this show on the road, then," Dickie Jones said with a wink.
"No broken legs though, thanks," Grace replied with her standard rejoinder.
Maureen threw her hands in the air with mock exasperation. "You ‘show people’. You really are two peas in a pod." Grace looked at her father with a twinkle in her eye, and then leaned in and spontaneously kissed his cheek.
"Thanks, mum." And for the first time in a long time, she didn't feel like it was an insult to be compared to this man who had deserted them both so many years ago.
"I'll be in the front row, crying happy tears into my handkerchief." Maureen said with a watery smile at them both. "I love you, Gracie, and I'm thrilled for you."
Grace nodded and waited for her mother to slip out of the private room. As soon as she opened the door, noise filtered inside. Grace pulled herself up straighter. "There's no time like the present."
Dickie nodded in agreement, then signaled towards one of the wedding coordinators, standing by the enormous wooden doors that led into the formal state rooms of the palace.
The strains of a traditional Elaminarn marriage song began to play. Grace had heard it before, many times, in the lead up to the wedding, but now, it was especially poignant. With her arm hooked through her father's, wearing an enormous and beautiful gown, knowing her future was just at the end of a long tiled aisle, Grace eye’s glowed with unshed tears.
The moment they stepped into the room, Grace felt her step falter. There must have been two or three thousand people, not just in the state room but on the balcony above.
"Holy crap," she whispered to Dickie, looking nervously at the throng of people.
"Remember, you're a princess. Knock 'em dead."
She threw him a wry grimace. Trust her father to see everything, even her wedding day, as a performance. Grace focused her attention on the elaborate alter at the front of the room. And right in the center of it, stood Samir. Looking as heart breaking and gorgeous as ever, in a traditional black suit with gold detail on the cuffs and collar.
And just like that, her nerves disappeared. As though a cloud had gathered beneath her Jimmy Choo clad feet, she virtually floated down the aisle, beaming with happiness the whole way.
Once they'd reached the top of the room, Dickie gave her a swift kiss on the cheek and then moved to join the other family members. Grace watched him take up a seat next to Fatima and, impulsively, she followed behind him, so that she could embrace her future mother in law. Nadia's words had been entirely accurate. Fatima had been an incredibly warm and welcoming presence in Grace's life, and she'd come to feel a genuine affection for her.
Then, finally, she moved to stand opposite Samir.
His face was set in an expression she had come to recognize. Once, she had thought it was emotionless, but now, she knew the opposite. When he was most overflowing with emotion, he aimed to convey none.
Grace smiled at him, suddenly, inexplicably shy, and Samir relaxed.
"I was afraid you would not come," he whispered into her ear.
"You never have to worry about that," she responded, but the tiny wink she gave him afterwards was a not-so-subtle reminder that her thoughts were entirely focused on the moment they could finally be alone, after wedding.
The ceremony was lengthy, compared to western weddings, and by the end of it, even Grace, a consummate fashionista, was wishing she'd worn more sensible shoes. And the reception seemed to go on forever. The sheer quantity of dignitaries Grace was expected to make small talk with was exhausting.
"My love," Samir said when she was finally able to disentangle herself from a team of United Nations spokespeople. "Come with me."
Grace slid him a sidelong glance. "I thought you'd left me."
"Never." He looped his arms around her waist. "I am never leaving you again, my beautiful wife."
She smiled up at him. "I'm glad to hear it. Can we escape now?"
His laugh was rich. "Impatient?"
"Are you kidding me?" Her blue eyes devoured him.
"Your mother is with Jacob. He's fast asleep, by the way."
Grace nodded. "Yes, I checked on him before."
"I didn't even know you'd slipped out."
"That's because I have hardly seen you all night," she said with a hint of complaint in her tone.
He shook his head slowly. "This is not a good start. Come, let's go. I have shared you long enough."
He linked his hands in hers and tugged her through the crowd. People might have tried to stop them. Grace couldn't remember. She only had eyes for her husband.
A Range Rover with heavily tinted windows was waiting for them at the back entrance of the palace.
Samir dismissed his security agent and opened the door for Grace himself.
"You're driving?" She asked incredulously, when he slipped in behind the wheel.
"Yes." He turned to her slowly. "For the first time in my life, I feel like I'm driving where I'm meant to be going. You have brought purpose to my life, Grace."
Pleasure spread through her like a warm wave.
"Where are we going?" She asked; her voice thick with emotion.
"It is a surprise."
Grace took in a deep breath. "I have a surprise for you, too."
"Do you now?"
She nodded uncertainly. "Do you remember the first night we met?"
He looked at her with a quirk of his lips. "Every exquisite detail."
She flushed to the roots of her hair. "When I was in the kitchen that night, humming. And you said I had a nice voice. Do you know what I was humming?"
He frowned. "No. I'd never heard it before."
"It's a song from Cinderella, called "Ten minutes ago". I want to sing it to you now."
"Please," he invited, steering the car off the highway and onto one of the country tracks. His security detailed followed only a hundred or so meters behind.
Grace’s voice filled the car with its sweet, sultry sound. "Ten minutes ago, I saw you. You looked up when I came through the door. My head started reeling, you gave me the feeling the room had no ceiling or floor. Ten minutes ago I met you and we murmured our 'how do you dos'. I wanted to ring out the bells and fling out my arms and to sing out the news. I have found him, he's the light of the stars in my eyes. We are flying. I have found him, he's the light of the stars in my eyes. I may never come down to earth again."
It was the most beautiful song he'd ever heard, and it rendered him speechless.
"That's how I felt about you." She whispered into the silence. "From the moment I looked out of my smashed up car and saw you, I knew that I would never meet anyone else who made me feel like you did."
He swallowed past his emotion. "I felt the same."
He took his hand from the gear stick and placed it over hers. "I can't believe how close I came to losing this."
"Don't." She said warningly. "You would never have lost me. You're the best man I've ever known. You only forgot it for a few days."
The look he gave her set her pulses skittering madly. "I will endeavor to deserve you for all eternity."
She bit down on her lip, suddenly just wanting the car to stop, so that she could be in his arms.
"We are almost there," he said, as though he'd read her mind.
Then, to lighten the tone, he said with a grin, "Guess who I saw in a very intimate looking conversation as we were leaving?"
She stared across at him.
"Ashley and Irena."
"No!" She hit him on the arm. "That's wonderful. I can't believe I never thought about it. She's a doctor, he's a doctor. I can see that."
"And another thing. I've been thinking about Rupert."
Grace rolled her eyes. "I can't believe that you two have become bosom buddies. You used to hate him!"
"I was jealous as all hell of him. But it didn’t take me long to appreciate the man who would go to such efforts defending you.”
She nodded slowly. Rupert was nothing if not loyal.
“Anyway, seeing as I won the prize (you're the prize, my love), I figure I can afford to be magnanimous. I was thinking of offering him a visiting artist position. He would be based at the palace for a year or two, and salaried to create art. What do you think?"
Grace's face softened as she stared at this complex giant of a man. "You don't have to do that for me."
Samir shrugged. "He's a talented artist. That's the main reason I intend to extend the offer. But I think it would make you happy to have friends nearby, no?"
"Of course. In that case, I think it is a great idea."
"Consider it done, my love."
Grace squinted through the windscreen, but it was pitch black except for the small patch of light thrown out by their headlights. Samir pulled the car sharply to the left, then cut the engine. Grace couldn't see much except perhaps a fence in the moonlight. "Come." He opened her car door, but as soon as her feet had touched the ground, he scooped her up and held her against his chest.
"What are you doing?" She said with a chuckle.
"I believe this is tradition."
"That's thresholds silly, not honeymoons."
"Same thing," he said quietly, and he shouldered his way through a large glass door. Loosening his grip a little, he flicked a switch by the door and the entire home glowed to life.
Grace looked around in curiosity.
"This is my mountain home. My real home," he said quietly. "I think it is where we should live, rather than the palace."
He eased Grace to the ground and linked his hand to hers.
"Samir, it's beautiful," she said a minute later, after he'd given her a tour of the enormous downstairs area. "I just have one question."
"What is it, Mrs. Almassi?"
"Where is the bedroom and how quickly can we get there."
His eyes flared with sensual promise. "Not fast enough," he growled, pulling her against his chest and kissing her roughly on the lips. "I have waited too damned long for this, Grace, I don't want to wait another minute."
"Me neither." She stood on tiptoes and lifted her arms, so that her hands latched behind his neck. "Make love to me now, Samir, and promise to love me for the rest of my life."
"Without hesitation."
And just like in the Cinderella song, as she watched him reverently unbuttoning her wedding gown, all Grace could think was:
"I have found him, he's the light of the stars in my eyes. We are flying. I have found him, he's the light of the stars in my eyes. I may never come down to earth again."
THE END.
If you liked One Night with The Sheikh, you’ll love The Sheikh’s Christmas Mistress, available in the Amazon Kindle e-Reader store, released 21st November 2014.
THE SHEIKH’S CHRISTMAS MISTRESS
Clare Connelly
All the characters in this book are fictitious and have no existence outside the author’s imagination. They have no relation to anyone bearing the same name or names and are pure invention.
All rights reserved. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reprinted by any means without permission of the Author.
The illustration on the cover of this book features model/s and bears no relation to the characters described within.
First published 2014
(c) Clare Connelly
Photo Credit: dollarphotoclub.com / GooDAura
Contact Clare:
Website: http://clarewriteslove.wordpress.com/
Email: [email protected]
Follow Clare Connelly on facebook for all the latest; or on
twitter, if you’re more of the tweet-tweet persuasion.
CHAPTER ONE
If anyone had asked, Charlotte would have said that Jeff Buckley’s version of Hallelujah was the most beautiful she’d ever heard.
But then, the minute she walked into the exclusive bar nestled deep into the foothills of the most expensive ski resort in Switzerland, she changed her mind. This was a voice so smooth, so deep, so soulful, that she thought an angel must surely be responsible.
She froze, just inside the door, and peered through the dimly lit room, at the man on stage.
If his voice was beautiful, then he, the man who was singing, was even more so.
She took in a deep breath of awe as she surveyed him. His eyes were closed, but she could see the rest of his face was strong and symmetrical; his eyebrows were thick, his skin tanned, his hair close cropped but with a slight wave to it. His frame was broad without being bulky. In fact, he was anything but. Pure muscle and strength.
She gulped, and blinked, to clear the illusion. For surely he must be an illusion?
Just then, his eyes opened, and completely by coincidence, latched with hers. She knew he probably couldn’t even see her through the smoky haze, and the spotlights that were trained on the stage, but still, as though an invisible cord connected them, she slowly paced across the bar. Physically, she was unable to look away. Her whole body seemed to resonate with a force of realisation that was new and foreign and exciting. Her mouth was dry and her pulse simmered.
The bar was not busy. It was, after all, late on a Wednesday night, in the weeks before Christmas. Most of the resort’s holidaymakers were families, and had no interest in the famous bluesy hot-spot. But Charlotte had heard about this place all her life, and she had known she couldn’t visit Mount Arrianna without at least one drink. Even if the cost of that drink promised to cost her a week’s salary, she had made the pilgrimage for her father, who had not lived long enough to make it there himself.
The few guests in attendance clapped when the man finished singing and he smiled, somewhat bemusedly, as he hooked the microphone back in the stand. His eyes scanned the crowd, and then, with the athleticism she had just known he would possess, he crouched down and swung off the stage.
Charlotte couldn’t help but watch as he cut through the room with a long, powerful stride, and purposeful intent. He neared a group of men. Three, all similarly dressed – like businessmen or executives, she imagined. One of them, a blonde tilted his head in her direction, said something, and they all laughed.
Except him.
His face assumed a quiet watchfulness as his eyes, now they were open she could see they were so dark they were almost black, began a slow perusal of her. It was so slow, so intent, that she would have called it insolent were it not for the way her body seemed to thrum beneath his inspection.
He dragged his eyes from her feet, up the length of her slender legs encased in a pair of old Levi's. They were low slung after years of wear, and the coat she’d discarded at the entrance meant that she was wearing a simple white tee shirt that showed a glimpse of her toned midriff. His eyes seemed to pause on the generous swell of her breasts (a swell so generous she’d often lamented it, through high school, when boys had shown little interest in anything she had to say for their preoccupation with her rapidly developing chest). Then, his eyes reached her curved smile, and she dipped her tongue out and licked her lips, which felt dry and tight suddenly. When his eyes reached hers, they seemed to pierce her soul, and again, she gasped; he was already moving towards her.
He took her hand in his automatically.
Up close, he had a woody fragrance. It was almost alpine in nature, like Christmas and spice; sandalwood and cinnamon.
“Do I know you?”
His voice in song had been heavenly. In speech, it was even more so. Thick, accented and gravelly, it sent darts of feeling zinging through her body.
Charlotte wasn’t sure she would be able to speak, so she simply shook her head.
His smile transformed his features from austere and intimidating to almost painfully beautiful.
“You look at me like you know me,” he insisted, still holding her hand.
Again, Charlotte shook her head, dislodging a tendril of blonde hair. She puffed at it with a breath from between her red-painted lips. “I don’t. Believe me, I’d remember if we’d ever met.”
His grin wa
s disarming. “As would I.”
She shook her head, attempting to focus. Her fingers were tingling in his grip and she went to remove her hand. To her disappointment, he let go immediately.
“It is a shame.”
“What’s a shame?” She asked with a blank expression.
“That we are not acquainted. Allow me to rectify that. Will you permit me to buy you a drink?”
Thinking with relief of her rapidly dwindling savings, she aimed for nonchalance. “Sure. That’d be great.”
Inside, her heart was palpitating. A woman had taken to the stage, and as she crooned an old Nina Simone song, the man put his hand in the small of her back and nudged her towards a table at the back of the room.
“I’m Charlotte,” she said, as they sat down. “Charlotte Faber.”
“Charlotte Faber.” He repeated, and the way he said it was as though he was committing it to memory. Though with hindsight, she would come to realise he just had that intensity about him, in everything he did, and everything he said.
“And you are?” She prompted with an arched brow. “Apart from a singer, I mean.”
His frown was minuscule, and disappeared so quickly she thought she’d imagined it. “My friends call me Mal.”
“Mal.” She nodded. “And what brings you to Mount Arrianna?”
“The season.”
“You’re not a Victorian Debutante in disguise, are you?” She said with a conspiratorial wink, pausing while a waiter appeared, as if from nowhere, and took their drinks order.
His smile, when he diverted his attention back to her, was burning with sensual interest. “The ski season,” he corrected easily. “My friends and I go skiing each year. This time, it’s Mount Arrianna.” He tilted his head towards the group of men she’d noticed earlier. One of them, good looking and swarthy in complexion, waved his hand in a half salute. “That’s Marcos. He’s the one who dared me to take the stage and inflict my lack of vocal talent on the room.”
One Night with The Sheikh: An accident of fate brought them together, and it would bind them for the rest of their lives. Page 13
