Chosen as the Sheikh's Wife

CHAPTER FIVE

Violet felt numb. As they sped towards the airport, enfolded in the luxurious leather of his car, the only warmth came from Sheikh Fayad's hand, holding hers as if he would never let it go.

Her hand. And her mouth.

She knew why he'd kissed her. He'd seen how hard it was to walk away from her home when they both knew that she'd never be going back. It had been no more than a distraction. He'd wanted to divert her, get her over the step, down the path, through the gate and into his car. To keep her from looking back.

And it had worked.

While her lips had clung to his, she'd had the feeling that there was nothing in the world that could hurt her. That there was no past, only a future. That with him she was safe.

She hoped it was true, because she'd put herself entirely in his hands. Good hands. Strong, gentle, she thought, looking at her own wrapped in his long fingers as he continued to hold on, never once letting go, despite the constant stream of calls he took on his cellphone.

Even when they arrived at the airport and a member of the VIP ground staff would have whisked her away, as if that were the norm, he just tightened his grip and said, 'Leave her. She stays with me.'

Only when they were in the air and he'd escorted her to an unbelievably luxurious sitting room did he finally release her hand, delivering her into the care of the young woman waiting there.

'Rest now. Leila will be your companion. She will take care of you,' he said. 'No one will disturb you.'

Too late. She was disturbed beyond repair. But she managed a hoarse, 'Thank you.'

He responded with a frown. 'Why do you thank me? You have given me all you have while I have brought nothing but trouble to you and your friends.'

'I returned what is rightfully yours. As for the rest-you told Sarah that it was not her fault. Well, it's not yours, either.' Then, because he seemed lost for an answer, 'They will be safe?'

This morning she'd been so arrogant in her dismissal of danger. How could she have been so stupid? If anything happened to them…

'They will come to no harm, insh 'Allah,' he said. 'By the will of God.' Then, with a smile, 'And the best security that money can buy.'

And then he was gone, leaving her to the pampering of Leila.

'Come. Bathe, sleep,' she said. 'You will feel better.'

She'd certainly look better. Forget her face. She'd thrown on the first things that had come to hand that morning when she'd dashed off to fetch Molly from playgroup. An old T-shirt on which she'd experimented with a design that not even her best friend would wear-let alone buy-and a pair of jeans that she'd bought in the market.

'So much for being a princess,' she said. 'I don't exactly look the part, do I?'

'I'm so sorry, sitti.' Leila was all flustered apology. 'I did not mean…'

Oh, good grief, the poor girl thought she was offended. 'I'm a mess, Leila. Honestly, you don't have to be polite.'

'Oh.' Then, indicating her suitcases, which had not been placed in the hold but in the bedroom-this was travelling, but not as she knew it-'I'll find something for you to wear.'

Violet's first response was to explain that she was perfectly capable of looking through a suitcase, but she choked back the words as she realised that Leila would be hurt, feel rejected.

'Thank you.' Then, 'Maybe you can help me choose something that would make me look a little more…?'

'The part?' she offered, repeating the word with a tentative smile.

Which was what?

Sheikh Fayad called her Princess.

Never in a million years, she thought.

Presentable was about as much as she could hope for. Less of a wimpy embarrassment.

'"The part" will do nicely,' she said, managing a smile of her own, and leaving Leila, considerably happier, to sort through her clothes, while she wallowed in the luxury of the bathroom. Soaking the hideous night, the unbelievably worse day, out of her bones.

What was it Sarah had said about needing a little excitement in her life?

How about flying in a wide-bodied jet that would make anything in the Queen's Flight look like economy. Flying at thirty thousand feet, up to her neck in scented bubbles. Being flown away on a metaphorical magic carpet to some strange and exotic country by a man who would light up any woman's dreams.

She lifted wet fingers to her lips and smiled. A man whose chosen method of distracting a woman in distress was to kiss her. How much better could it get?

No. She definitely wasn't going there…

It had been no more than his way of preventing her from descending into hysteria, she knew. But for a moment, as his lips had claimed hers, held them for what had seemed like endless moments, it had felt like… She grinned. It had felt like skiing down Everest.

When she emerged from the bathroom, this time in a soft snowy white bathrobe, her hair wrapped in one of those fancy towels that soaked up the water, Leila was waiting, and had her hair dry and glossily straight in no time flat. Clearly she wasn't the standard cabin crew member; her duties extended well beyond providing peanuts and mineral water.

'You will rest now,' she said, turning back the bed. 'I will iron your clothes and repack them properly.'

'No…'

Leila frowned.

'No, really-I can't expect you to do that.'

'It is my pleasure,' she said, gathering up her bags and, leaving her with nothing but a pair of clean but

crumpled cotton PJs, which she'd laid out as carefully as if they were made of silk, she headed for the door.

Fayad had to force himself to concentrate. Apart from the speculation that cutting short his visit to London was bound to provoke, stirring up more rumours about his grandfather's health, it meant a great deal of work for his staff as they cancelled meetings, lunches, receptions.

He made some calls himself, offering apologies for his abrupt change of plan, discussing alternative dates, leaving his diary secretary to confirm the details. But all the time, at the back of his mind, was Violet.

She had brushed aside the first attempt to steal the knife as if it had been nothing. But the wanton destruction of her home was an act of terrifying violence, rage, even, impossible to dismiss with the same casual courage. He understood why, instead of calling her closest friend, or even the police, she had called the only person she knew who would understand. Who wouldn't torment her with questions but would simply act.

It wasn't her safety that bothered him now. No one would harm her while she was in his care. But there was another problem.

In dropping everything and going to her aid he'd broken just about every protocol, crashed through every barrier that existed within his society between a man and a woman who was not his wife.

He could have done no less.

Seeing her, crumpled up like some broken, wounded creature, a man would have had to have had a heart of flint not to act as he had done, and everyone would understand that.

But there were consequences. It had not been a private matter. Too many of his staff had seen him holding her.

Everything else might have been accepted, even the kiss, but not that intimacy, and he had no doubt that his grandfather would hear of it long before he reached home. This would not be treated as some minor indiscretion to be overlooked; not when the consequences would suit the old man so well.

If she'd been anyone else it would not have mattered. As a foreign woman it would have been understood that she did not live by their rules. If she'd remained in London, even, it might have been possible to brush it aside.

But by taking her home, presenting her to his grandfather, he was giving her the status to which she was entitled, and as far as the court was concerned his marriage to Violet Hamilton would be a foregone conclusion.

To offer her anything less would be an insult to her and would certainly outrage the Sayyid family, happy to use whatever insult that came to hand in pursuit of discord. Even when it was an insult to the offspring of a daughter who had shamed them.

They'd gladly use it to manufacture a schism that they could use to drive the country apart and fuel their grab for control of the oil revenues that were-for the moment-pouring into the country.

The offer, with a dower fit for a princess, would have to be made, and in truth it was a marriage that would serve every imaginable purpose. From an aristocratic family, Violet was returning the symbol of their country's origins, redressing an old wrong with no thought of reward. Restoring her family's honour. Neutralising the Sayyid threat.

It was a marriage that would delight his grandfather and give Fayad a wife of great character, great beauty, while reuniting two great tribes who had for far too long been enemies beneath the diplomatic display of unity.

All attributes that made it a perfect match for him. Except one.

He dragged a hand over his face as if to wipe away the memories that haunted him. The loss of his wife, his son, had ripped the heart out of him and, despite all efforts to tempt him to offer for the treasure of one of the carefully nurtured daughters who would doubtless have made the perfect wife, he had been immune.

His family had been in danger and he had not been there to keep them safe. No man could live through that and be whole ever again…

Violet Hamilton was a chance to redeem himself, and in that first moment when he had set eyes on her, when she'd opened the door thinking it was just another day and looked up at him, any man would have responded to her as the desert to rain.

Even now he could feel the warmth of her body as he'd held her close, the softness of her breasts against his chest, the scent, the silk of her hair against his cheek.

Feel the soft tug of her lips against his…

'Sheikh?'

He looked up to see his aide regarding him anxiously and he shook his head, dismissing his concern with a gesture. Drank from the glass of water at his hand. It made no difference.

Violet woke to the steady thrumming of the aircraft's engines, for a minute completely disoriented. Then, as she rolled over, luxuriating in the feel of the finest linen sheets, it all came back with a rush.

The khanjar.

Her home.

Sheikh Fayad.

She was flying to Ras al Kawi in the kind of luxury that she could only ever have dreamed of. She concentrated on that rather than the horror she'd left behind.

'You are awake, sitti…' Leila placed a tray on the table beside the bed containing orange juice, fresh figs, small cakes. 'We will be landing in an hour,' she said, with a shy smile. 'Sheikh Fayad asked if he might be permitted to join you before we touch down?'

Be permitted? Then, as she sipped at the orange juice, her brain caught up. Obviously the meaning had become distorted in translation.

'I imagine he wants to drill me in the rules of court etiquette,' she said, putting two and two together and coming up with a little inventive translation of her own. 'Teach me when to curtsey and remind me that princesses only speak when they're spoken to.' And who could blame him?

Leila looked shocked. 'No! That would be most…'

'What?'

'Everything will be very different for you in Ras al Kawi, I think.'

'No doubt,' she said, swinging her legs to the floor. 'But even a girl from the wrong side of Camden Market knows that rule number one is never keep a sheikh waiting.'

Leila giggled. 'A woman must always keep a man waiting.'

'Really?'

'Until he has…' She sought for a word. 'Overwhelmed her and he is her lord.' And she blushed, leaving what she meant by "overwhelmed" crystal-clear.

'Okaaay,' Violet said, lost for any other response. 'I'll, um, just freshen up, and then you can help me pick out something suitable to wear.'

That brought a smile to the girl's face. 'I have already chosen,' she said.

'Oh, right.' Well, she'd had plenty to choose from. It was obvious that whoever had packed had emptied her wardrobes. Brought everything.

Left to her own devices, she'd have chosen her denim ankle-length skirt and a fine knitted top that covered her arms. Maximum skin coverage. She knew better than to offend Fayad's grandfather with some flighty western garment. A bare midriff. Too much leg.

But apparently that didn't come close to what Leila considered appropriate. Given the run of Violet's wardrobe, she'd picked out one of her student design pieces. A richly decorated evening outfit that she'd made for an end-of-term college fashion show.

'This is very beautiful,' Leila said. 'It will be perfect for your arrival in Ras al Kawi.'

"This" was a long skirt in a curious shot silk that in one light was blue-grey, in another a soft turquoise, that the stallholder-and he was a smooth-tongued man if ever there was one-had sworn matched her eyes exactly.

The fabric had been way beyond her budget, but, totally unable to resist something so gorgeous, she'd traded half a dozen of her precious one-off embroidered T-shirts, made for the co-operative stall she'd set up with some of her college mates.

She'd appliqued the skirt with a fan of velvet and silk peacock "eyes", free-hand embroidered the fine feathers using her sewing machine.

She hadn't had enough material to make a jacket, but had instead made a neat little waistcoat which, for the fashion show, she'd worn with one invisible hook at the breast and nothing else. It had been a huge success with the audience, if not with the avant garde college lecturers, who'd pronounced it too "conservative". Too "wearable". But then that was all she'd ever wanted to design and make-clothes that women longed to wear.

But a few days later she'd come home from a meeting of the co-op, full of their plans to expand, set up a proper business, to find her grandmother collapsed with the first of her strokes.

Three years on from college, her outfit, like her plans, her first step on the way to her own fashion label, seemed like a fantasy. Rich, gorgeous, but not the sort of thing you'd actually wear except to a pretty

fancy party. Even with the co-ordinating top that she'd made to wear beneath the waistcoat.

Struggling to bite back the I don't think so which flew to her lips, she said, 'It seems rather exotic, Leila. Do you really think it would do?'

'Oh, yes,' she said, with absolute confidence. 'It is quite perfect.'

In that case she was in trouble, she thought as Leila produced the hair straighteners to tidy up the curls that had made a bid for freedom while she slept. Then tutted as she insisted on applying the minimum of make-up herself.

'You need kohl to emphasise your eyes and your hands should be hennaed,' she insisted, and maybe she was right-about the kohl at least. She looked washed-out, and without a little colour the clothes would be wearing her rather than the other way around.

There was no time to draw elaborate patterns on her hands with henna, but she allowed Leila to add kohl and a touch of blusher, although Violet wiped off most of the kohl as soon as she'd turned away to pick up her skirt, hooking, buttoning and zipping her up, as if she hadn't been doing it herself for her entire life.

The waistcoat followed, and when Violet looked at the finished result in the mirror she swallowed. This was as good as her wardrobe got. Her Cinderella "you can go to the ball" outfit; if this was what constituted everyday wear in Ras al Kawi, what on earth did women wear when they wanted to make an impression?

What would make an impression on Sheikh Fayad?

She stopped the thought and turned to face Leila. 'What do you think?' she asked. 'Will I do?'

Leila's response was a sigh of envy. 'It is designer?' she asked, and Violet's smile was, finally, unforced.

'In a manner of speaking,' she said. Then, when the girl frowned, 'I designed it, Leila. And then I made it.' Since the girl was apparently lost for words, she said, 'Have we kept Sheikh Fayad waiting long enough, do you think?'