As plates were cleared and people began to move around once more, she stood. Aki moved with her.
“I’m going for a walk,” she said through a saccharine smile.
“Not on your own,” he responded with a similarly false expression pinned to his face.
And though the temptation to yell at him seemed to be growing by the moment, his threats against her father kept her docile and silent. “Fine.”
Slowly, she moved through the crowd of people, Aki just behind her. As she reached the palace wall, she slowed her pace. The sun was high in the sky, despite the earliness of the hour, and the temperature was already unpleasantly hot. She paused to wipe at her forehead, which had sheened with perspiration, when a sound of raised voices caught her attention.
“We can’t just leave without saying good bye to Ellie.” Eleanor recognised her sister’s voice instantly.
“She is busy and I want to go immediately.” Jak. His tone sent a tingle of fear along Eleanor’s spine, and she felt goose bumps press at her skin.
“Why don’t you go and pack, and I’ll go say goodbye on our behalf?” Eleanor hated to hear her sister sounding so meek. So apologetic.
“Are you trying to infuriate me?” Jak asked, and because Eleanor knew his temper was escalating, she moved with a renewed sense of purpose, in the direction of their voices. Aki was at her feet, just behind her.
“There you are!” She said with a false cheeriness, when she emerged into the small courtyard. It was almost completely shielded by a thick hedge of gardenia.
“Ellie.” Michelle’s eyes were wary, and in her voice there was a note of warning. “You should be back at the party.”
“I noticed you were missing, and presumed you were going to be on your way.” How she hated Jak! And yet, for her sister’s sake, she slid her gaze to him, embracing him with the same smile.
“Yes.” Michelle’s breath escaped in a rush of relief. “Jak has surgery tomorrow afternoon, so we have to catch the earlier flight.” Michelle turned to her new brother-in-law, the Emir of Talina. “It’s so good of you to have made your jets available for the guests.”
“Of course,” he said, all civility. “It is my pleasure.”
Michelle’s expression was uneasy. “We really had better go.”
Eleanor bit down on her lip, the sense of worry she always felt for her sister fast growing. “Call me when you land,” she said solicitously, putting her arms around her sister’s shoulders. “Or any time.”
“Good bye, Mrs Katabi,” she said with an attempt at their usual humour.
Eleanor was barely able to get through a polite farewell to her brother-in-law, but somehow she did. As they disappeared from the courtyard, Aki fixed Eleanor with a thoughtful gaze. “You do not like him,” he said perceptively.
She rolled her eyes. “What gave it away?”
“You look at him as you do me. And I know you do not like me.”
She bit down on her lower lip, her emotions in a state of flux. “Well? Would you? If our positions were reversed?”
He shrugged. “I would never have married you, if our positions had been reversed.”
Something like ice lodged in her chest. “Why not?”
“Because you would then have had all the power, and I would have been vulnerable, as you are now. That is not a situation I would ever be able to accept.
* * *
Aki watched his wife from across the crowded theatre. One week. One week since the wedding, and he’d been forced to endure night after night such as this. An evening of polite smiles and glimpses, perhaps a few stilted lines of conversation. Nothing to address or relieve the simmering tension that was zipping just beneath the surface. She felt it too, didn’t she?
He hadn’t expected to desire his wife. He’d had no indication that he would feel this way on any of the occasions he’d visited her in America. In fact, he’d approached their wedding with misgivings as to how their private relationship would develop.
Of all the scenarios he’d envisaged, this had not been one of them.
He moved towards her, as if pulled by an invisible rope. She was making every effort to meet the harsh requirements he’d laid out to her the morning after their wedding. Her behaviour to him, when they were in public, was beyond reproach. No one would ever have guessed that, behind closed doors, she addressed him with a silent antipathy that took even his breath away, for the sheer strength of it. And because the only time he could provoke a response from her was in public, he took full advantage of that fact.
“How are you coping with the heat?” He asked, leaning forward so that he could whisper in her ear. Conscious of the hundreds of people covertly studying the royal pair, Eleanor didn’t react.
“I can manage,” she said quietly, her eyes not quite meeting his.
They were in the midst of a late summer heatwave. The days were scorching hot, and even the evenings like this were without their usual desert night relief.
Her neck was angled to him, and he caught a hint of her perfume. Enough to make his gut kick in recognition.
And he enjoyed that, too. The dark desire she prompted in him was an odd experience. Almost as strange as the knowledge that he wanted something or someone he could not have. At least when they were in public he could force her to remember that he had the power to make her weak at the knees, too. His lips twisted into what could have been a grimace or a smile. He leaned forward again, so that when he whispered his breath would fan the sensitive skin of her neck. “You are beautiful in that dress.”
Her eyes were wide. “Thank you,” she murmured sotto voce.
“Better without it, though.” And he lifted a hand to lightly brush it against the small of her back. She startled, surprised by the contact, disappointed in the way her body instantly trilled with longing.
“Do you come to the theatre often, Minister Atti?” She addressed the elder statesman who had invited them out that night, earning a look of wry cynicism from Aki.
“Coward,” he mouthed, allowing his eyes to drift lower and linger insolently on the curves concealed by the couture gown.
Eleanor didn’t know what her next move could possibly be. Day by day, night by night, the strength of her resolve was being tested. He was her husband. She had no intention of divorcing him, for it would bring about an even greater embarrassment to her father. So why was she holding him at arms’ length when she so badly wanted to be with him?
She forced herself to concentrate on what the kindly gentleman was saying. “Yes, Aida was always one of my favourites too,” she responded, catching the drift of his last sentence. “I saw it in Vienna a few years ago. It was beautiful.”
“I did not know you enjoy musical theatre,” Aki said, drawing her attention back to him.
“Opera,” she responded. “Though no doubt you think musical theatre is more at my intellectual level,” she responded waspishly.
He laughed, a sound of actual amusement that sent waves of pleasure spiralling down her body. “On the contrary, I think anyone can enjoy the opera. It is something to be experienced rather than intellectualised.”
Eleanor compressed her lips. He had an answer for everything! And he hadn’t even attempted to deny her assertion regarding her intellect.
He saw the way her expression changed and misinterpreted its meaning. “You do not agree?”
“Actually, I do,” she said, looking up into his eyes. It was a mistake. The minute her hazel eyes fixed on his, she felt a powerful ache low in her abdomen. She sucked in a deep breath, but was powerless to look away. “I think that opera has suffered from being seen as the province of intellectuals and musicians. Something like The Magic Flute has moments of humour that even novices can appreciate.”
He scanned her face thoughtfully. “Go on.”
“Oh… why?”
Because he liked hearing her speak. He narrowed his eyes. “You seem to feel passionately about it. I thought you would like to tell me more.”
&
nbsp; “No.” She shook her head self-consciously.
She was silent again, and it angered him. Every time she seemed to show a hint of personality, she crawled back into her shell and hid away from him.
“Walk with me,” he ordered, his tone of voice not open to argument.
She lifted a hand to the necklace she always wore and ran it back and forth along the chain. His eyes followed the motion.
“I… wanted to finish my conversation with Minister Atti,” she responded lamely, for the old man was nowhere to be seen.
Aki leaned forward, a hand lightly on her elbow, his mouth against her ear. “It is not wise for anyone, even you, to disobey me. Walk with me.”
A frisson of awareness ran down her spine. She set her face into a mask of withering annoyance, but she allowed him to lead her away from the guests. As always, a flurry of servants seemed to mark their progress, the whole way down the steps of the theatre, and out onto the busy street. Unlike in Western society, there was no flashing of cameras, no paparazzi. Aki was able to come and go without worrying about photographers and the tabloid press.
“Where are we going?” She asked, looking around at the Talinese people who had stopped what they were doing so that they could stare at their ruler.
“Well,” he drawled, putting an arm around her waist so that she was held close to his side, “What I really want to do is take you to the palace and renegotiate the terms of our marriage. But I suspect you are not yet amenable to altering your restrictions. And so I am showing you something that I think you will like in the mean time.”
Her heart lurched. Renegotiating the terms of their marriage actually held a lot of appeal to Eleanor. And that was terrifying. “Fine,” she muttered. Up close, he felt hard and warm, and his body emanated a strength that she knew was not simply an illusion.
“It is not far. You are comfortable walking?”
Her feet pinched a little. Unfortunately, the royal protocol officer who had arranged Eleanor’s wardrobe did not approve of her penchant for comfortable, flat shoes, and had insisted on kitting her out with a selection of leather heels. They were not stiletto, and the leather was soft, and moulded especially for her feet, but the sensation of walking on tip-toes was still foreign to Eleanor. “I’ll be fine.”
“Kalinad is beautiful,” she said a short while later, referring to the capital city, as she peered up at the cityscape. It reminded her a little of Morocco. Low set buildings huddled together with holes cut in the clay walls for windows. They were painted in different shades of red and brown, giving the city a very earthy feel. The streets were paved with stone, and contrary to the expectations she’d had of a desert city being barren of greenery, there were spiky green trees along the side of the road.
“In here,” he said with a nod toward a narrow opening between two buildings.
“In there?” She peered after him, scrunching her nose a little at the smell of dank earth.
“Follow me.” He reached down and latched his fingers through hers, then took a step between the buildings.
It was only narrow for a couple of feet. As they progressed, it widened out again, until they emerged from the buildings into a beautiful green park. “Oh!” She gasped, stopping on the spot and twirling around. “What is this place?”
Dusk was quickly giving way to night, and the sky above them was filled with purples and blacks, and some orange and red, giving it a stunning effect. Stars twinkled high overhead. “It is a royal park. This part of the city was traditionally reserved for palace officials, and therefore the layout was carefully managed to ensure the best lifestyle. Hundreds of years ago, my ancestors worked out how to feed water into the city from the ocean – so many hundreds of miles away. These parks are kept green using the same historic viaducts.”
“Incredible,” she remarked, crouching down and gliding her hands over the cool green grass. It ran as a carpet across the gentle undulations of the land. “That must have been an enormous undertaking.”
He nodded sagely. “Amazing what can be achieved with an army of slaves at your disposal.”
She frowned. “When you put it like that… it seems wrong to compliment you for it.”
“And yet I bet you still admire the pyramids for their beauty. And the colosseum in Rome for its grandeur. Why not this for its ingenuity? Much of our country was built on the backs of slaves. It is regrettable but unchangeable.”
“Regrettable?” She spat, with a roll of her eyes. “It’s barbaric.”
“Yes,” he agreed, not caring what they were discussing, so long as it brought that fire back into her eyes.
“Doesn’t it make you ashamed?”
“Five generations ago, slavery was abolished in my country. Talina was one of the first countries in the world to recognise the rights of all people equally – to discard the notion that one person can own another.”
“What about arranged marriages?” She prompted recklessly. “Are you telling me that doesn’t go on in your Utopian society?”
His heart felt odd inside his chest. Weightier than normal. “There are many things that go on in Talina of which I do not approve.” When she opened her mouth to interrupt, he continued over the top of her. “And you would be the first to accuse me of behaving like a dictator if I took greater control of my people’s behaviour.”
She shook her head. “Control, yes. But ensuring proper laws maintain the standards you expect… that is not dictatorial.”
“Isn’t it?” He wondered aloud. “How do I find out what people are doing? Spy on them? Have government agencies read their emails? When we are aware of a crime, my police forces prosecute.”
She ran her eyes over his handsome face thoughtfully. “You don’t strike me as a man who accepts failure.”
He nodded, and pulled her to him. It was unexpected, and caught her completely off guard. They were in the middle of a group of bushes, and yet still Eleanor’s first thought was as to who might be able to see them. She looked around nervously.
“I am King, and you are my wife. And if you think I’m going to accept failure in our marriage, then you do not know me at all.”
“I don’t know you at all,” she retorted quickly, but her body was beginning to shiver in response to the contact with his rock hard frame. His woody, masculine fragrance made her pulse race.
“You know that I desire you. You know that I am respecting your wish to decide when we consummate our union.” He lowered his mouth, so close that he was almost able to kiss her. “You know that when we do, it will be very, very satisfying. You have never known the sensations I can give you. The pleasure of two bodies moving as one, perfectly in time, anticipating one another’s needs to deliver pleasure.”
Her breath hitched in her throat. But his words from the night of their marriage had lodged in her brain, and nothing could free them. She shook her head. She had to give him credit for trying to make the best of a bad situation. But how he must resent her! He had married her simply to remove the threat of civic disharmony. He had sacrificed his right to choose his own bride because of what was best for his country.
She focussed on a point over his shoulder. “I should get back to the palace. I have an early start tomorrow.”
Mentally, he groaned, but outwardly, he seemed nonplussed. He put a deferential hand in the small of her back, to guide her back to the opening in the houses. “What is your early start?”
She flicked a nervous glance up at him. Her whole body felt alight with raging fire. Had he really been able to switch off his desire so easily? “A breakfast with your mother and cousins. I am officially to be welcomed by the women of the family.” It was a farce. They expected to welcome a happy bride, and instead, they were getting Eleanor. A woman stoically resisting her husband’s charms because she’d heard him admit that he pretty much hated her.
Aki looked at her with an apologetic expression. “My mother is rather… intense at times.”
Eleanor angled him a curious look. “She
seems fine to me.”
“Oh, she’s harmless. She will, however, take every opportunity to remind you of your responsibility to secure our royal future.”
“Ah. I see.” Her cheeks flushed, and she worried at her lower lip. “The baby issue.”
“It is not for my mother to impose her thoughts. You are my Emira, Eleanor. You do not have to answer anything that makes you uncomfortable.”
She stopped walking in the middle of the narrow path between the buildings. It was dark, and it was quiet. “I can’t just ignore your mother though! She’s your mother!”
“She deserves to be ignored, if she is pressuring you,” he murmured darkly.
He had told himself he’d be patient. But he was desperate to pull Eleanor back into his arms and kiss her senseless. He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “No one deserves to be treated with contempt,” she responded crossly, a little line creased between her brows. “At least, not for asking what is a perfectly normal question. After all, you and I are strangers who married. Who wouldn’t presume that a baby was part of the equation? That an heir was your primary concern in marrying me.” Her breath was shallow in her chest. Anxiety was making her skin tingle.
“Why I married you is no one’s business,” he responded, and he allowed himself to put his hands on her hips and feel the warmth of her skin.
“I’ll be able to handle her,” she said quietly, distracted from their conversation by the knowledge that they were completely alone, and that he was touching her.
“I have no doubt.” She’d torn shreds off him on the night of their wedding and he hadn’t forgotten. She looked up at him, and silently, she was imploring him to kiss her. It was wrong. It was confusing. He’d said such horrible things about her to his friend Ryan, but her body didn’t seem to be getting the message.
He lifted a hand to her hair and ran a finger over the crown of braids. “You know, when I first met you, I thought you were so American.”
“I am American,” she said, ignoring the way her heart was thudding in her chest.
“You are also Talinese. And tonight you look very… regal.”
The Sultan's Virgin Bride: A story of lust, loyalty and passionate resentment. Page 4
