by Carol Grace
“Thank you,” Anne said. Now she was getting worried. This sounded like the top of the sandwich from one of those books on how to succeed, how to manage a staff and get along with your colleagues and underlings. The strategy was to use first the praise on top, then the criticism in the middle and then finish off the bottom layer with some more praise. How she wished the woman would get on with it.
“I had a call from one of the parents the other day. Actually from more than one.”
“Oh?”
“It seems they saw you in a compromising position in a hotel downtown. I hardly knew what to say.”
Anne’s heart sank. How long would the memory of that infamous night continue to haunt her? “I think I know what you’re referring to,” she said quickly. But she didn’t. Were they referring to the morning when she tiptoed through the lobby or the evening, which was a blank in her memory. Her mind was spinning. What to say. How to explain.
“I never pry into any of my teachers’ private lives,” Leona continued. “And yet when it affects their reputations and that of the school, I feel I should give them a chance to respond.”
“Yes, of course.” Anne was stalling for time.
“It involved a man. Of course I know you aren’t married and you have a perfect right to have dates, er…relationships, whatever. It’s just that the parents who saw you reported that this was in a very public place and that you were in a very compromising position.”
Anne knew only one thing. If it involved a man, they must be referring to the evening. She wondered just what they’d seen. Since she’d been unconscious at the time, she wasn’t sure. What did a compromising position mean exactly? She realized she couldn’t ask that. Leona was waiting. She had to say something.
“I think I can explain,” she said, pressing her palms together.
“Good. I assume the man was someone you are well acquainted with,” Leona said. “Since he carried you across the lobby and up to his room.”
“Oh, yes,” she said. “Of course.” Across the lobby and up to his room? How many people saw her? “You see, I’d been to a wedding reception where I was the bridesmaid. I was feeling ill so my…my fiancé brought me back to the hotel where the wedding party was staying.”
“You included.”
“That’s right,” Anne said gratefully. “We were all staying there.”
Then why were you still wearing your pink bridesmaid dress the next morning? she imagined Leona asking. But thankfully, she didn’t. Maybe no one she knew saw her in the morning. She could only hope.
Leona appeared to relax. She even smiled. “I didn’t know you were engaged, Anne. Congratulations.”
“Thank you.” She didn’t know it herself, she thought. It had just popped into her mind. She knew why. It was all that talk about a faux fiancée. If he could get one, so could she. She’d had no idea if a fiancé would make a difference until she saw the relief on Leona’s face. Then she knew she’d said the right thing and her impulse had been correct. “I know it must have looked scandalous,” Anne continued. “But it was all quite innocent.” But was it? Would she ever find out the truth? Only one person knew what had happened that night, and he was not to be believed. For her own peace of mind she decided to accept his version of what happened. And that was that nothing happened.
“And quite romantic,” Leona said.
In lieu of a response, Anne forced a smile. She’d run out of lies and excuses. She just wanted to get out of the office and back to her real life. A life out of the spotlight. A life without sheiks and their problems. Without fancy clothes and chauffeur-driven cars. A life without tension. Without lies. Assuming the interview was over, Anne stood up.
“I’d like to meet him,” Leona said. “And so would the rest of the staff. After all, it isn’t every day one of our teachers gets engaged to a sheik.”
Anne’s heart skipped a beat. She licked her lips. She tried to say something but no words came out. If she could have spoken she would have said, Who said he was a sheik? What makes you think I am engaged to a sheik?
As if she’d heard Anne’s silent questions, Leona casually mentioned that the parents who’d seen her in the hotel were aware of the buzz in the lobby. The questions, the gossip, the interest in finding out who was the woman the sheik was with.
“It would be my pleasure to have a little get-together as we did for Marcia last spring when she got engaged,” Leona said as she reached for her calendar. “After all, we like to think we’re one big happy family here at Pinehurst.”
Anne stood still as a statue. Inside a voice was shouting no no no. No get-together. No engagement. No sheik. But there was silence in the room as Leona perused her calendar. “What about a week from Saturday in the Hall?” she asked.
“I…I…I’ll have to…” Anne stammered.
“Of course you’ll have to check with your fiancé, the sheik.” She smiled. “My sources reported that he’s quite handsome.”
And rich, Anne wanted to add. And arrogant. Haven’t your sources reported that yet?
Somehow she managed to leave the office and walk through the campus to the parking lot without running into any students or other teachers. She tried to replay the conversation to figure out how on earth she’d gotten herself into this fix. She tried to think of how she could have avoided it, and lastly she tried to think of a way to get out of it. But her brain refused to cooperate. Once in her car, she rested her head against the steering wheel. She tried to blink back the tears of frustration, but they fell against the leather.
All afternoon she told herself to get it over with. She had to call him. Tell him she’d go to the gala. That’s all. Take the first step. See how it went. If she couldn’t abide his manners, his authoritarian way, his so-called charm, she’d go back to the school, tell Leona it was all a misunderstanding. She wasn’t engaged. That wasn’t even her in that compromising position. It must have been someone else. The way she had it worked out in her mind, it all made sense. Then why did she dread making that call? She wasn’t afraid of him. Especially when he wasn’t occupying the same space as she was.
In the back of her mind it occurred to her that maybe he wasn’t so bad. Maybe she’d gone overboard in thinking badly of him. Maybe she could tolerate him for an evening at his gala in return for his pretending to be her fiancé for a short reception. Then when school began in the fall her colleagues might have forgotten about her so-called engagement.
Forget about an engagement to a sheik? Probably not. But she’d worry about that later. There were months left to summer vacation, months left to come up with an explanation. All she needed to do was to call him. That shouldn’t be so hard.
She could deal with a disembodied voice on the phone. She had a harder time when he was right there in her garden or in his office. Where she was only too aware of the way he looked at her, as if he was going to eat her up. Aware too of the tension in the air, the force of his personality that caused her to come up with answers, to match him word for word. She could feel herself changing when she was around him. Becoming more sure of herself, more confident and yes…more feminine, more desirable. That part wasn’t bad. The part that scared her was that she didn’t know what he’d do next. He didn’t seem to get the message that she was not interested in having anything more to do with him. Now that she knew nothing had happened that night, he could forget about her and she could forget about him. Then why did she keep thinking about him? Why did she wonder what he was going to do next?
Rafik was about to go into a meeting with his father and his brother. Before he went into Massoud’s office, he paused at the secretary’s desk. “If I get a call from an Anne Sheridan, please let me know. It’s important.”
When he looked up he saw his brother leaning against the door and listening to every word he’d said. Rahman raised an eyebrow. Together they walked into their father’s office to wait for the old sheik.
“What happened?” Rahman asked.
“Nothing,” Rafik said. He hated
to admit defeat.
“Did you ask her?”
“I asked her. She said no,” Rafik said.
“But you expect her to call you and change her mind, according to what I just heard you say to Ruth. After all, how many women have turned you down? I’d say zero, just offhand.”
“This is different. I’ve never asked anybody to pretend to be my fiancée before,” he said with a quick glance around as if his father might be hiding somewhere behind a bookcase.
“But why? Why wouldn’t she go for it?” Rahman asked.
“I guess I didn’t make a very good case for it. Don’t worry. I haven’t given up.”
“That’s my brother. Never give up. Never surrender.”
“I won’t. Especially when I think of the alternative to choosing my own fiancée. My own temporary fiancée,” he added quickly. “There’s no way I’d want a real one. Father’s idea of someone suitable is miles away from my idea. She has to agree, she has to.” But what he’d do if she didn’t, he didn’t know. There was a stubborn look about Anne Sheridan, as sweet and innocent as she was, that worried him. Something about the set of her slender shoulders, the tilt of her chin that concerned him. If she’d really made up her mind, he didn’t know how he’d change it. She seemed impervious to whatever charm he had.
During the meeting Rafik couldn’t keep his eyes off the door to the outer office. But no one came in. No one knocked and said, “You have a call, Rafik, it’s from a Ms. Sheridan.” No matter how much he willed it to happen, it didn’t. Instead his father gave him a steely look from time to time, no doubt to see if he was paying attention. When the meeting finally broke up and Rafik walked out, Massoud’s secretary stopped him and handed him a slip of paper.
“I got a call?” he said to Ruth. “I thought I said…”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “I told her to hold on and I’d get you, but she insisted on leaving a message.”
“Yes, what was the message?” he asked, staring at the paper which only said “Anne called” and the time of her call.
“She said to tell you she can come to the gala after all.”
“That’s it? That’s all she said?” Had she changed her mind about posing as his fiancée also?
“That’s it. I’m sorry,” Ruth said.
“You’re sorry,” he muttered as he walked down the hall to his office. If only he’d been able to speak to Anne, he could have judged her mood, found out why she’d changed her mind, and if she’d changed her mind about the fiancée part, too. Once in his office with the door closed, he dialed her number, but there was no answer. He left a message on her machine.
“Anne, I got your message and I’m very happy you can make it to the gala. I’ll pick you up that night at your house. I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to talk to you. Give me a call at the office so we can firm up our plans. Did I say that I am very glad you can come?” Yes, of course he’d said that. He was repeating himself, and making a fool of himself, no doubt. He had so much to say to her, and it was frustrating not to be able to say it in person. He hung up and stared out the window for a long time before he could get back to work.
Chapter Four
It was a cool, damp morning on the marshes some thirty miles south of San Francisco along the San Mateo County coast. At least twenty bird-watchers were out holding binoculars to their eyes watching herons swoop into the reeds looking for food.
“Some people would think we were crazy to get up at six to watch birds,” Anne remarked to her friend Sally. “But I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Who knows, I might even add a new bird to my list today.”
“That’s the fun of it,” Sally agreed. “You never know what you’re going to see.”
“And it’s so peaceful, so quiet. The world is new and fresh.” Anne sighed. “It makes me feel a lot better when I’m out here.”
Sally put her binoculars down and gave Anne a sideways glance. “School’s out. You’re on vacation. Anything wrong?” she asked
“No, of course not,” Anne said. “It’s just…well I am a little worried. I’m going to a gala ball on Saturday night.”
“How exciting. What’s to be worried about?”
“Oh…uh…” How to explain that the problem was one overbearing sheik who’d caused her no end of troubles since she’d first met him at the wedding. Him and his search for a fiancée. Him and his teasing about what happened that night in the hotel. Then there was her headmistress’s assumptions and Anne’s need to protect her own reputation. She couldn’t bring herself to mention any one of these things, so she brought up the one problem she could mention.
“I don’t know what to wear to a gala.”
“You don’t have anything?”
“Nothing but a pink bridesmaid dress I wore to my friend’s wedding. I’m sure that won’t do, and besides, I really don’t want to wear it again.” She said this with a little more vehemence than absolutely necessary. The dress brought back memories of traipsing through the lobby of the hotel, standing in the middle of Montgomery Street looking up at the sheik’s office building and entering his office without her shoes on. She had stuffed the dress to the back of her closet and didn’t ever want to see it again.
“I’d be happy to go shopping with you,” Sally offered. “If you’re thinking of buying something new.”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking. Would you really?”
“Really. I’m even free this afternoon.”
“I would love that. I can’t tell you how much that means to me. First, I have no idea what’s appropriate and second, I…I need support. I don’t go to galas very often. In fact, I’ve never been to one.”
“Neither have I,” Sally said. “But I’ve seen the pictures in the society section of the newspaper of the charity balls, so I kind of know what the women wear. And I know the tickets cost upwards of a thousand dollars.”
“A piece?” Anne was shocked. Though she shouldn’t have been.
“I assume your date can afford it,” Sally said.
“Yes, I…I assume he can.”
“This is so exciting to have an excuse to buy a special dress. Lucky you.”
“Lucky?” Anne murmured. “I’m not sure about that.”
After a stop at home to change out of her knee-high boots and fleece jacket, Anne met her friend for lunch in the food court of the mall before they went to the fancy dress section of one of the large department stores. Sally wasn’t the only one who thought it was exciting to be invited to a gala ball and have the chance to buy a new dress for it. The sales clerk also got into the spirit and threw herself into the task, bringing in dress after dress. Some were long and sequined. Some were short and strapless. Another was bright red and form-fitting.
“Stunning with her hair,” the clerk declared, standing back for a long look.
“I feel too conspicuous,” Anne said. “I never wear red.”
“Hmm,” Sally said. “With your skin I think something in black might work better.”
The clerk nodded and went back out on the floor to look for more dresses.
“I assume your date will be in black tie,” Sally said.
“My date? Oh, yes, my date,” Anne said, taking a seat on the dressing room bench while she waited for the sales-woman. “Actually he’s just a friend, no, more of an acquaintance. He only asked me because he’s new in town and doesn’t know many women. I really don’t know what he’s wearing. I haven’t talked to him since he asked me. We’ve been playing phone tag.”
This was a lie. Anne was letting her answering machine take her messages so she wouldn’t have to talk to Rafik. She had nothing to say to him on the phone. She knew she’d have to broach the subject of the pretend engagement sooner or later, but she preferred that it be later. As late as possible.
“Whatever he wears,” Anne continued, “it will be appropriate, I know that for sure.”
The dress they all agreed on, Sally, Anne and the clerk, was a floor-length black chiffon dress t
hat was bare on one shoulder and had a wispy scarf that they showed her how to toss over the other shoulder. The fabric clung very snugly to her curves then flared out before it hit the floor. While Anne stood in front of the mirror, the other two women voiced their approval.
“Stunning.”
“Sensational.”
“Makes her skin look like porcelain.”
“Elegant.”
“Sexy in a subdued way.”
Anne blushed. But she did like the dress. She felt like everything they said she looked. Even sexy. She also felt a tingle of excitement at the thought of the ball, almost overriding her dread at seeing Rafik again.
Next was the shoe salon where Sally kept the salesman busy bringing out pair after pair of strappy sandals until they found some that were under four inches high so she wouldn’t throw her back out in the first half hour.
“As for a pedicure,” Sally said, “I’d go with some gorgeous shade of Jungle Red.”
A pedicure? She’d never had one in her life.
“I’ll give you the name of my nail salon,” Sally offered, as if she’d read Anne’s thoughts.
“Thank you.”
Before the two friends parted in the parking lot of the mall, Sally told Anne she’d help her get ready that night, if she wanted her to. “I’m no good at nails, but I could blow-dry your hair if you don’t want to sit in a beauty salon all day.”
“I’d love some help. I’m going to be a nervous wreck,” Anne confessed.
“I’ll bring my makeup kit, too,” Sally said. “Not that you need any. Just a hint of blush, maybe and some eye shadow.”
Anne thought she’d hate subjecting herself to a pedicure, but she loved it. Especially the foot massage that came with it. It put her into a state of relaxed nirvana that lasted for hours. But as time passed that day, she gradually lost her composure. She was glad to see Sally arrive to distract her from her thoughts and worries and also because applying mascara when one’s hand is shaking is a recipe for disaster. Sally, on the other hand, was cool and calm and collected and her hands were steady. Of course she wasn’t going to a ball with a sheik who some people thought she was already engaged to.
