Cinderella and the Sheikh

chapter Eleven



Blood thrummed in Rasyn's ears. Pacing his apartment showed weakness, but agitation kept him active. He told himself that Prince Hani's opinion didn't change Parliament's law. His marriage still freed him from the threat of the succession. His gift to Imaran.

The door to his apartment creaked. He didn’t have to face the door to sense who was there. Imaran was off entertaining the Prince of Damali, so it could only be one person.

As if he would have mistaken her rose-tinted scent anyway.

A deep breath stilled him. He was married to her now. She'd just escaped an evil fate. He was supposed to be happy about this, he reminded himself.

"Love." The pet name reminded him of happier times. Yesterday, in fact, when everyone disliked his fiancée and regretted their engagement.

Libby didn't meet his gaze, but faced the marble fireplace instead. Her arms were tucked tightly against her chest, lifting up her generous breasts. "Should I even bother saying anything? Would my opinion make a difference?"

He frowned her direction. What was she talking about? She had Prince Hani in the palm of her hand. Why was she complaining?

"I told you everything would work out. That they would see you the way I do," he said. That was the hell of it. He'd never see her as just a servant again.

Hmmm. Maybe he could use that. Spread the word that she only wanted his money. But he drew back from the dark thought. She didn't deserve such a reputation.

"You don’t have anything to say? Not a word?"

He stared at her stiff back. "The prince has forgiven you. What more could you want?"

"Oh, I don't know." An uncharacteristic tone of sarcasm colored her voice. "Maybe a man who doesn't treat me like an animal to be bought and sold?"

What was she talking about?

"I say 'man,'" she continued, in the same tone, "because you, Rasyn al Jabar, are not my husband. This 'marriage' is a joke and isn't legal in the United States or any other country where the government has half a brain. I thought I was visiting North Africa, not the Dark Ages."

Ah. So that was it. The marriage. In truth, he agreed with her. However, the future of Abbas was more important than her freedom of choice. "Love—"

She whirled on him, cutting him off. "What can you possibly say to make this okay? Even you can't come up with an excuse for taking away my basic human rights."

He'd never seen her so angry. In her rage, she looked magnificent. The acid fire of her sea-green eyes seared the air. The hot flush of her cheeks—Rasyn felt his blood rush south.

Erotic memories came flooding back, reminding him of the very real advantages of being married to her. Prince Hani's opinions faded into the background as he searched for arguments justifying what he'd done. Anything to keep her from rushing back to the States, nullifying their union.

"I knew that you were in danger from the Prince—I only wanted to protect you." He stepped toward her.

"I would have been perfectly safe in New York." A vicious edge sharpened her voice. "But no, you fell in love, so I lose my job. You're a prince, so I get publicly humiliated. You want to marry me, so my choice doesn't matter. You say you love me, but I'm not even a real person to you. I want to go home."

He let silence fall between them. He waited until her breath no longer came in rapid gasps and the flash of acid in her eyes had receded.

When he thought she might absorb at least a little of what he had to say, he began. "Prince Hani spoke of the hand of heaven bringing us together." He kept an even, resigned tone. "But that is not true. Fate has been trying to tear us apart, in case you have not noticed. We were born in different worlds. It was pure accident that we met. I cost you your job. I could not stay in New York. Our backgrounds, my country, no one wants us to love each other."

Libby's gaze no longer scorched him. Her jaw lowered in a far less stubborn tilt. Taking his cue from her softening attitude, he sat on the sofa and held out his hand in invitation for her to join him. She hesitated.

She had to reconsider. He only needed to get through these next few days—through the celebration ball that Prince Hani planned for her in Damali to commemorate her service to Princess Sanurah. Once all that was out of the way, they could return to New York together and take up a lifestyle suitable for exiled royalty, leaving Abbas safe in Imaran's hands.

She seemed to make up her mind, and joined him on the couch. But she didn't take his hand. And she left a foot of distance between them. And she stared straight ahead, not at him.

"Even you are resisting," he told her, "looking for any excuse against this powerful love I feel for you. A love that I know you feel for me somewhere in your heart. I am trying to buy time for you, with all your caution, to fall in love with me."

She still said nothing, but she turned to face him at least.

"So, yes, I made the choice for both of us because you are listening to the outside forces pulling us apart. Perhaps now you will pay attention to our hearts pushing us together."

"Rasyn." Her voice croaked on his name.

He knew he'd reached her, but he had to erase all her doubts forever, or else she would bring up the subject every time they argued. He shoved his guilt aside and resorted to a degenerate tactic—emotional blackmail.

He ran his fingers through his hair, exactly as if he was a man pushed to his limits.

"But these are more of my persuasive words which you dislike so much," he said, taking her argument away from her. "The ones you think are weapons against you, forcing you out of your better judgment. Feel free to shut them out and do what you feel is best. If we are easily married, we are just as easily parted. All I have to do is say 'I divorce you' three times."

She parted lips that were still pink, despite all the lipstick being chewed off them, to speak.

He raised a hand and cut her off. "I divorce you," he said.

She gasped.

"I divorce you."

Her fingers twitched in her lap.

His throat went dry. Had he misjudged her? Would she let him do this? "I divor—"

She lunged for him, covering his mouth with a hand salty from nervousness. Relief flooded him. He fought the urge to wrap his arms around her soft body and pull her to him.

"Sometimes—" She left her hand on his mouth. "—I think you're a real jerk."

He inhaled through his nose, treating himself to her scent, and nodded. Slowly, she withdrew her hand.

Pushing his luck, Rasyn eased closer to her until he could feel the heat of her thigh through her now-crumpled silk dress.

"If I had asked you," he said, "you would have said no."

"This is crazy." She sounded slightly dazed.

He didn't deny himself anymore. She'd just discovered she was a bride. It was time to treat her like one.

He slipped one hand around her waist. To his surprise, she didn’t resist. Pulling her onto his lap, he laid his other hand along the sweet line of her jaw and turned her face to him.

The naked fear he saw in her eyes made his gut clench. He'd put that fear there by taking away her right to choose. No doubt she wondered what else he could take away from her if he wanted.

"We shall leave after the celebration and spend a few weeks in my mansion on the Mediterranean coast. You will have an army of servants."

"I don't need servants."

He quirked up the corner of his mouth. "Then I will fulfill all your desires myself."

Her cheeks colored an enticing pink. He cupped the nape of her neck, feeling the silk of her hair slide between his fingers. She bent to him, closing eyes dark with passion.

Their lips met in a kiss that sent explosive pleasure shooting through him. Soft breasts pressed to his chest, making his blood fire with lust.

From her moans, she felt the same. While she was willing and pliant, and before he was beyond forming coherent thought, there was one more thing he needed her to agree to.

He broke the kiss, but moved his fingers lower to caress her curvy backside. "Love, I want to introduce you to my uncle tomorrow."

Libby bit her lip. "The one who wants to make you his heir. But there's a law against that now. Because of me."

He had to give her credit. She wasn't stupid. Or maybe she was just getting used to the idea that everyone she met had some reason to hate her.

His uncle would hate her. Ever since Anwar's fiancée had left him for his own brother, Imaran's father, he'd found his solace in tradition. One look at her pale face and green eyes and he would banish Rasyn forever.

It was his last gift to Imaran. Instead of being Uncle Anwar's heir by default, it would be by choice.

"He will not hold that against you," he lied.

"It doesn't matter anyway." She sighed in resignation. "He's your uncle. Of course I want to meet him."



***



"He's been in the palace the whole time?" Libby planted her feet on the mosaic tile of the corridor, refusing to go any farther. She'd assumed he was in the hospital.

"Uncle Anwar lives in the south wing. He is more comfortable there than he would be in a hospital."

The breeze drifting through the archways of the open corridor blew a strand of hair into her face. Rasyn stepped to her and pulled it off her nose with gentle fingers.

She gazed into the shining warmth of his black eyes. This was Rasyn, the man who loved her enough to marry her even though there was no guarantee she would ever love him.

And she had Prince Hani's support. Though his expensive gifts made her uncomfortable, he was rapidly growing into more than a friend. Idd Hani would never fill the void her father's death had left in her life, but he made it clear that he was willing to take the role of a supportive older male figure for her. She was inclined to let him.

For a moment, she let herself relax and picture continuing this life with Rasyn. A tempting picture of sensuality and luxury.

In the end, it wasn't her. She longed for a life of working hard and helping people. One more reason why her relationship with Rasyn would end soon.

It wasn't long before they reached a hall set well away from the rest of the palace. A row of thick-shouldered guards in military-green tunics and traditional headscarves lined each wall. In addition to curved knives as long as her forearm, she couldn’t help but notice the semi-automatic weapons slung across their backs, in easy reach.

Rasyn didn't even glance at them, but walked down the hall like he owned it. He led her to another guarded door and nodded for one of them to open it.

She followed him inside to find a room that had obviously once been as ornate as Rasyn's own apartments. Where Rasyn had furniture, carpets and antique paintings, these floors and walls were bare and scrubbed clean. The smell of antiseptic and lemon hung in the air.

"What's wrong with him?" Libby whispered, while they waited for the arrival of the translator who would interpret her words. King Anwar spoke English when he was well, Rasyn had explained, but when he was sick, he found it too painful.

"The doctors cannot say," Rasyn said. "Age, maybe."

"Idd Hani is older."

Rasyn shrugged, but it was tighter and more controlled than the shrug that he gave when he really didn’t care about something.

The door opened, and a thin man dressed in an ash-gray robe that swept the floor entered and bowed to Rasyn.

She found herself gnawing her lip. While she was determined to be herself, she wondered why Rasyn had talked her out of a headscarf. She didn't really mind wearing one sometimes, as more of a fashion accessory than a religious observance, but he'd encouraged her not to. If King Anwar was a traditionalist, wouldn't he have appreciated the gesture?

The room that Rasyn led them into was even more clinical than the rest of the apartment. In the center of it, dwarfed by hospital equipment, an older man with ashen olive skin half-reclined on a hospital bed with pristine white sheets. A young man held King Anwar's left wrist in his hand, his fingers on the pulse point, looking at his watch. The doctor—a safe bet, Libby presumed—didn't acknowledge Rasyn immediately, but waited about thirty seconds before turning to them.

After the man bowed, Rasyn said something to him in Arabic.

She didn’t have to know the language to interpret the frown on the doctor's face. He bowed to Rasyn again before disappearing discretely.

Rasyn went to his uncle's side and spoke again, with a soft, inquiring tone.

The man in the bed lifted one eyelid, grimacing in pain as if it were a hundred pound weight. Rasyn motioned for her to approach, while the translator took up a position out of the way on the opposite side of the bed.

When she got into his line of sight, Rasyn's uncle looked her up and down, scowling the whole time.

Great. Libby mentally rolled her eyes. King Anwar might be sick—even dying—but she was so tired of people disapproving of her.

She tried to remember to smile pleasantly as he spoke. Even in Arabic, she didn't miss the knife-edge in his tone.

"You're my nephew's wife," the translator said.

"Yes, sir."

"Imaran's girl."

She managed to swallow a laugh at that idea. "No, Rasyn's."

When he narrowed his eyes, she noted they were the same black as Rasyn's, but lacking Rasyn's lively shine. "You're not from Abbas."

"No, sir. New York. America."

"You have red hair." The translator paused, unsure, before continuing. "She had red hair, too."

Rasyn's midnight eyebrows tightened in confusion. He'd told her about the tension between his uncle and Imaran's father over a woman, but one look at Imaran would tell anyone that his mother did not have red hair.

"Your fiancée?" she asked.

"Eh?"

She didn't need the translator to interpret that one. "Imaran's mother. She left you for your brother."

The translator looked behind her, at Rasyn. Some small part of her wondered why her husband raised a hand to indicate he should go on instead of cutting her off to protect the sick man.

King Anwar raised himself up in the bed. "Who told you that? Why are you speaking to me this way?"

"Rasyn, of course," she said, answering his first question. "I'm talking to you like I'd talk to anyone else, because my attempt to fit in here hasn't worked. It seems like some people decided in advance not to like me, so I might as well say what I'm thinking. What I'm thinking is 'Who's the woman with red hair?'"

For a second of silence, Libby wondered if she'd gone too far. But then King Anwar cleared his throat.

"Elizabeth Dixon." He spoke in perfect, unaccented English, slowly, as if savoring every syllable.

She had to wait for the translator for the rest. "She had blue eyes. And a smart mouth. The ambassador's daughter. From Canada."

"To-ron-to," King Anwar said.

Rasyn blinked at his uncle, obviously startled.

"You loved her?" It wasn't really a question. The only question was how long ago it had been.

King Anwar turned to her, and she noted that the dull haze had started to clear from his eyes, making him look more like an older version of Rasyn than a dying man.

"They would not allow it." His English had turned slow and thick, with R's that rolled on forever. "Told me I had to marry a woman from Abbas."

Rasyn began to speak, but she sensed that it was long past time that the king told this story. She grabbed her husband's arm and squeezed as tightly as she could. Rasyn took the hint and closed his mouth. He pointed at the translator, then the door. With a bow, the man exited.

"So they arranged a marriage for me. Then she ran off with my brother. It was humiliating."

"You didn’t love her anyway, so why was it humiliating?"

King Anwar gave a regal pout. "Because Elizabeth Dixon would not have married me after I sent her away."

"Wow, I'm really glad that Rasyn isn't like you."

King Anwar shot her a look that was probably meant to bully her into silence.

She shrugged. "If Rasyn had given up as easily as you, we wouldn't be married now."

"What did you say your name was?" King Anwar's brightening eyes narrowed.

"Libby Fay. I'm Rasyn's wife."

"Hmmph. Good for him." To her surprise, he laid one bony hand across hers. "Do not listen to what anyone else says. You shall make a fine queen."

With that, he lay back on his pillows and began to snore softly, as if the effort of such a long conversation had taken all his strength.

"Well," Libby said. "That went better than I expected. I think he only hates me a little."

She turned to Rasyn, expecting a look of pride at her accomplishment, or at least a laugh at her joke.

Instead, the shadows falling across his face painted a bleak expression, his mouth drawn into a thin line, his eyebrows turned down. Even stranger, Libby thought she saw a hard glimmer in his eye, directed at her.