Buch lesen: «One Night with the Sheikh»

“Mariella? What is it? What’s wrong?” she heard Xavier demanding angrily. “If you feel unwell…”

“No, I’m fine,” she began, and then stopped, unable to drag her gaze away from his mouth, where it had focused with hungry, yearning intensity.

She could feel the hot burn of his gaze as it dropped to her own mouth. She was trembling, her whole body galvanized by tiny sensual ripples of reaction and awareness that made her sway slightly towards him. She felt him shudder as he drew breath into his lungs, her body instinctively leaning into his as weakness washed over her.

His mouth touched her, but not in the way she had remembered it doing before.

Caught up in the shock of what she had experienced, Mariella lifted her hand to touch her own lips, as though unable to believe what had happened…what she had wanted to happen. She had wanted Xavier to kiss her; her body ached for him in a hundred intimate ways that held her in silent shock. She and Xavier were enemies, weren’t they?

Penny Jordan
ONE NIGHT WITH THE SHEIKH

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

‘YOU won’t forget your mummy whilst I’m away working, will you, my precious baby girl?’

Mariella watched sympathetically as her younger half-sister Tanya’s eyes filled with tears as she handed her precious four-month-old daughter over to her.

‘I know that Fleur couldn’t have anyone better to look after her than you, Ella,’ Tanya acknowledged emotionally. ‘After all, you became my mother as well as my sister when Mum and Dad died. I just wish I could have got a job that didn’t mean I have to be away, but this six-week contract on this cruise liner pays so well that I just can’t afford to give it up! Yes, I know you would support us both,’ she continued before Mariella could say anything, ‘but that isn’t what I want. I want to be as independent as I can be. Anyway,’ she told Mariella bitterly, ‘supporting Fleur financially should be her father’s job and not yours! What I ever saw in that weak, lying rat of a man, I’ll never know! My wonderful sexy dream fantasy of a sheikh! Some dream he turned out to be—more of a nightmare.’

Mariella let her vent her feelings, without comment, knowing just how devastated and hurt her half-sister had been when her lover had abandoned her.

‘You don’t have to do this, Tanya,’ she told her gently now. ‘I’m earning enough to support us all, and this house is big enough for the three of us.’

‘Oh, Mariella, I know that. I know you’d starve yourself to give to me and Fleur, but that isn’t what I want. You’ve done so much for me since Mum and Dad died. You were only eighteen, after all, three years younger than I am now, when we found out that there wasn’t going to be any money! I suppose Dad wanted to give us all so much that he simply didn’t think about what would happen if anything happened to him, and with him remortgaging the house because of the stock market crisis.’

Silently the sisters looked at one another.

Both of them had inherited their mother’s delicate bone structure and heart-shaped face, along with her strawberry-blonde hair and peach perfect complexion, but where Tanya had inherited her father’s height and hazel eyes, Mariella had inherited intensely turquoise eyes from her father, the man who had decided less than a year after her birth that the responsibilities of fatherhood and marriage simply weren’t for him and walked out on his wife and baby daughter.

‘It’s not fair,’ Tanya had mock complained to her when she had announced that she was not going to go to university as Mariella had hoped she would, but wanted to pursue a career singing and dancing. ‘If I had your eyes, I’d have a ready-made advantage over everyone else whenever I went for a part.’

Although she knew how headstrong and impulsive her half-sister could be, Mariella admired her for what she was doing, even whilst she worried about how she was going to cope with being away from her daughter for six long weeks.

Whatever small differences there might ever have been between them, in their passionate and protective love for baby Fleur they were totally united.

‘I’ll ring every day,’ Tanya promised chokily.

‘And I want to know everything she does, Ella…Every tiny little thing. Oh, Ella…I feel so guilty about all of this…I know how you suffered as a little girl because your father wasn’t there; because he’d abandoned you and Mum…and I know too how lucky I was to have both Mum and Dad and you there for me, and yet here is my poor little Fleur…’

Holding Fleur in one arm, Mariella hugged her sister tightly with the other.

‘The taxi’s here,’ she warned, before releasing Tanya and tenderly brushing the tears off her face.

‘Ella! I’ve got the most fab commission for you.’

Recognising the voice of her agent, Mariella shifted Fleur’s warm weight from one arm to the other, smiling lovingly at her as the baby guzzled happily on her bottle. ‘It’s racehorses, dozens of them. The client owns his own racing yard out in Zuran. He’s a member of the Zuran royal family, and apparently he heard about you via that chap in Kentucky, whose Kentucky Derby winner you painted the other year. Anyway—he wants to fly you out there, all expenses paid, so that you can discuss the project with him, see the beasts in situ so to speak!’

Mariella laughed. Kate, with her immaculate designer clothes and equally immaculate all-white apartment, was not an animal lover. ‘Ella, what is that noise?’ she demanded plaintively.

Mariella laughed. ‘It’s Fleur. I’m just giving her her bottle. It does sound promising, but right now I’m pretty booked with commissions, and, to be honest, I don’t really think that going to Zuran is on. For a start, I’m looking after Fleur for the next six weeks, and—’

‘That’s no problem—I am sure Prince Sayid wouldn’t mind you taking her with you and February is the perfect time of year to go there; the weather will be wonderful—warm and mild. Ella, you can’t turn this one down. Just what I’d earn in commission is making my mouth water,’ she admitted frankly.

Ella laughed. ‘Ah, I see…’

She had begun painting animal ‘portraits’ almost by accident. Her painting had been merely a small hobby and her ‘pet portraits’ done for friends, but her reputation had spread by word of mouth, and eventually she had decided to make it her full-time career.

Now she earned what to her was a very comfortable living from her work, and she knew she would normally have leapt at the chance she was being offered.

‘I’d love to go, Kate,’ she replied. ‘But Fleur is my priority right now…’

‘Well, don’t turn it down out of hand,’ Kate warned her. ‘Like I said, there’s no reason why Fleur shouldn’t go with you. You won’t be working on this trip, it’s only a mutual look-see. You’d be gone just over a week, and forget any idiotic ideas you might have about potential health hazards to any young baby out there—Zuran is second to none when it comes to being a world-class cosmopolitan city!’

One of the reasons Mariella had originally bought her small three-storey house had been because of the excellent north-facing window on the top floor, which she had turned into her studio. With Fleur contently fed she looked out at the grey early February day. The rain that had been sheeting down all week had turned to a mere drizzle. A walk in the park and some fresh air would do them both good, Mariella decided, putting Fleur down whilst she went to prepare her pram.

It had been her decision to buy the baby a huge old-fashioned ‘nanny’ style pram.

‘You can use the running stroller if you want,’ she had informed Tanya firmly. ‘But when I walk her it will be in a traditional vehicle and at a traditional pace!’

‘Ella, you talk as though you were sixty-eight, not twenty-eight,’ Tanya had protested. Perhaps she was a little bit old-fashioned, Mariella conceded as she started to remove the blankets from the running stroller to put in the pram. Her father’s desertion and her mother’s consequent vulnerability and helplessness had left her with a very strong determination to stand on her own two feet, and an extremely strong disinclination to allow herself to be emotionally vulnerable through loving a man too much as her mother had done.

After all, as Tanya had proved, it was possible to inherit a tendency!

She frowned as her fingers brushed against a balled-up piece of paper as she removed the bedding. It could easily have scratched Fleur’s delicate skin. She was on the point of throwing it away, when a line of her sister’s handwriting suddenly caught her eye.

The piece of paper was a letter, Mariella recognised, and she could see the name and address on it quite plainly.

‘Sheikh Xavier Al Agir, No. 24, Quaffire Beach Road, Zuran City.’

Her heart thudded guiltily as she smoothed out the note and read the first line.

‘You have destroyed my life and Fleur’s and I shall hate you for ever for that,’ she read.

The letter was obviously one Tanya had written but not sent to Fleur’s father.

Fleur had always refused to discuss her relationship with him other than to say that he was a very wealthy Middle Eastern man whom she had met whilst working in a nightclub as a singer and dancer.

Privately Mariella had always thought that he had escaped far too lightly from his responsibility to her sister and to his baby…

And now she had discovered he lived in Zuran! Frowning slightly, she carefully folded the note. She had no right to interfere, she knew that, but…Would she be interfering or merely acknowledging the validity of fate? How many, many times over the years had she longed for the opportunity to confront her own father and tell him just what she thought of him, how he had broken her mother’s heart and almost destroyed her life?

Her father, like her mother, was now dead, and could never make reparation for what he had done; but Tanya’s lover was very much alive, and it would give her a great deal of satisfaction to tell him just what she thought of him!

Blowing Fleur a kiss, she hurried over to the telephone and quickly dialled her agent’s number.

‘Kate,’ she began. ‘I’ve been thinking…about that trip to Zuran…’

‘You’ve changed your mind! Wonderful…You won’t regret it Ella, I promise you. I mean, this guy is mega, mega rich, and what he’s prepared to pay to have his four-legged friends immortalised in oils…’

Listening to her, Mariella reflected ruefully that on occasion Kate could show a depressing tendency to favour the material over the emotional, but she was an excellent agent!

CHAPTER ONE

ZURAN had to have the cleanest airport in the world, Mariella decided as she retrieved her luggage and headed for the exit area, and Kate had been right about Prince Sayid’s willingness to spare no expense to get her to Zuran. In the first-class cabin of their aircraft Fleur had been treated like a little princess!

Arrangements had been made for her to be chauffeur-driven to the Beach Club Resort where she would be staying along with Fleur in their own private bungalow, and, thanks to the prince’s influence with the right diplomatic departments, all the necessary arrangements to get Fleur a passport, with Tanya’s permission, had also been accomplished at top speed!

Craning her neck, Mariella looked round the busy arrivals area searching for someone carrying a placard bearing her name.

Behind her she was vaguely aware of something going on, not so much because of an increase in the noise level but rather because of the way it suddenly fell away. Alerted by some sixth sense, Mariella turned round, her eyes widening as she watched the way the crowds parted to make way for the small phalanx of white-robed men. Like traditional outriders, they carved a wide path through the crowd to allow the man striding behind them to cross the marble floor unhindered. Taller than the others, he looked neither to the right nor the left so that Mariella’s artist’s eye was able to observe the patrician arrogance of a profile that could only belong to a man used to being in command.

Instinctively, without being able to substantiate her reaction, Mariella didn’t like him. He was too arrogant, too aware of his own importance. So physically and powerfully male, perfect in a way that sent a hundred unwanted sexual messages skittering over her suddenly very sensitive nerve endings. He had drawn level with her, and, whether because she sensed her antagonism or because Mariella had gripped her just a little bit more tightly, Fleur suddenly broke the silence with a small cry.

Instantly the dark head turned in their direction whilst the equally dark eyes burned into Mariella’s. Mariella registered his gaze as her body gave a small, tight shudder.

The dark eyes stripped her, not of her clothes, but of her skin, her defences, Mariella recognised shakily, leaving them shredded down to her bones; her soul! But his gaze lingered longest of all on her face. Her eyes, she realised as she returned his remote and disdainful look of contempt with one of smouldering fury.

Fleur made another small sound and immediately his gaze switched from her to the baby and stayed there for a while, before it switched back to her own as though checking something.

Whatever it had been it brought a sneering look of contempt to his mouth that curved it into an even more dangerous line, Mariella noticed as her body responded to his reaction with a slow burn of colour along her cheekbones.

How dared he look at her with such contempt? She didn’t care who or what he was! Once she imagined her father must have looked so at her mother before walking out on her, before leaving her to sink into the needy despair and dependence that Mariella remembered so starkly from her childhood, until her stepfather with his love and kindness had come to lift them both out of the dark, mean place her father had left them in.

As swiftly and as silently as they had arrived the small group of men swept through the hall and left. As a production it had been ridiculously overdone and theatrical, Mariella decided as she found the chauffeur patiently waiting for her and allowed herself to be carefully driven along with Fleur in the air-conditioned luxury of the limousine.

The Beach Club Resort was everything a five-star resort should be and more, Mariella acknowledged a couple of hours later when she had finished her exploration of her new surroundings.

The bungalow she had been allocated had two large bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, a small kitchen area, a living room, a private patio complete with whirlpool, but it was the obvious forethought that had gone into equipping the place for a very young baby that most impressed Mariella. A good-sized cot had been provided and placed next to the bed, the bathroom was equipped with what was obviously a brand-new baby bath, baby toiletries had been added to the luxurious range provided for her own use, and in the fridge was a very full selection of top-of-the-range baby foods. However, it was the letter that had been left for her stating that the Beach Club’s chef would prepare fresh organic baby food for Fleur on request that really made Mariella feel she could relax.

Having settled Fleur, who fell asleep as easily and comfortably as though she was in her own home, Mariella checked her watch and then put a call through to her sister. Tanya’s cruise liner was on an extended tour of the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico.

‘Ella, how’s Fleur?’ Tanya demanded immediately.

‘Fast asleep,’ Mariella told her. ‘She was fine on the flight and got thoroughly spoiled. How are you?’

‘Oh…fine…Very busy…we’re doing two shows each evening, with no time off, but as I said the money is excellent. Ella, I must go…Give Fleur a big kiss for me.’

A little guiltily, Mariella looked at the now-silent mobile. She hadn’t said anything to Tanya about her determination to confront her sister’s faithless ex-lover and tell him just what she thought about him! Tanya might have gone willingly to his bed, but Mariella knew she hadn’t been lying to her when she had told her that she had believed that he loved her, and that they had a future together.

Mariella struggled to wake up from a confused and disjointed dream in which she was being dragged by her guards to lie trembling at the feet of the man who was now her master. How she hated him. Hated him for the way he stood there towering over her, looking down at her, looking over her so thoroughly that she felt as though his gaze burned her flesh.

He was looking deep into her eyes. His were the colour of the storm-tossed skies and seas of her homeland, a cold, pure grey that chilled her through and through.

‘You dare to challenge me?’ he was demanding softly as he moved closer to her. Behind her Mariella was conscious of the threatening presence of the guards.

She hated him with every sinew of her body, every pulse of blood from her heart. He left the divan where he had been sitting and came towards her, bending down, extending his hand to her face, but as his fingers gripped her chin Mariella turned her head and bit sharply into the soft pad of flesh below his thumb.

She felt the movement of the air as the guards leapt into action, heard them draw their swords, and her body waited for the welcome kiss of death, but instead the guards were dismissed whilst her tormentor stepped back from her. One bright spot of blood glistened on the intricately inlaid tiled floor.

‘You are like a wildcat and as such need to be tamed,’ she heard him telling her softly.

She could feel the cleanliness of her hair on her bare skin and froze as he slowly circled her, standing behind her and sliding his hand through her hair and then wrapping it tightly around his fingers, arching her back against his body so that her semi-naked breasts were thrown into taut profile. His free hand reached for the clasp securing her top and her whole body shook with outrage. And then abruptly he released her, turning to face her so that she could see the contempt in his eyes.

Swimming up through the layers of her dream Mariella recognised that his face was one she knew; that his cynical contempt was something she had experienced before…

In the half heartbeat of time between sleeping and waking she realised why. The man in her dream had been the arrogant, hawk-eyed man she had seen earlier at the airport!

Getting out of bed, she went into the bathroom, shaking her head to clear her thoughts, and then, when that tactic did nothing to subdue their dangerous, clinging tentacles of remembered sensuality, she turned on the shower, deliberately setting it at a punishing ‘cool,’ before stepping into it.

The minute the cool spray hit her overheated skin she shuddered, gritting her teeth as she washed the slick film from her body, and then stepping out of the shower, to wrap herself in a luxuriously thick, soft white towel. In the mirror in front of her she could see the pale, pearlescent gleam of her own skin, and dangerously she knew that if she were merely to close her eyes, behind her closed eyelids she would immediately see her tormentor, tall, cynically watchful, as he mocked her before reaching out to take the towel from her body and claim her.

Infuriated with herself, Mariella rubbed her damp skin roughly with the towel, and then re-set the air-conditioning. In her cot Fleur slept peacefully. Going to the fridge, Mariella removed a bottle of water and opened it. Her hand was shaking so much some of it slopped from the bottle onto the worktop.

Mariella and Fleur had just finished eating a leisurely breakfast on their private patio when a message came chattering through the fax machine. Frowning, Mariella read it. The prince had been called away on some unexpected business and would not now be able to see her for several days. He apologised to Mariella for having to change their arrangements, but asked her to enjoy the facilities of the Beach Club at his expense until his return.

Carefully smoothing sun-protection lotion onto Fleur’s happy, wriggling little body, Mariella bent her head to kiss her tummy, acknowledging that this would be an ideal time to seek out Fleur’s father. She had his address, after all! So all she needed to do was summon a taxi to take her there!

Kate had been quite correct when she had described Zuran’s February weather as perfect, Mariella admitted half an hour later as she carried Fleur out into the warm sunshine. Since she was here on business and not holiday she had packed accordingly, and was wearing a pair of soft white linen trousers and a protective long-sleeved top. When she showed the taxi driver the sheikh’s address he smiled and nodded. ‘It will take maybe three quarters of an hour,’ he told her. ‘You have business with the sheikh?’ he asked her conversationally.

Having learned already just how friendly people were, Mariella didn’t take offence, replying simply tongue in cheek, ‘You could say that.’

‘He is a famous man. Revered by his tribe. They admire him for the way he has supported their right to live their lives in the traditional way. Although he is an extremely successful businessman it is said that he still prefers to live simply in the desert the way his people always have. He is a very good man.’

Mariella reflected inwardly that the picture the driver had just drawn for her was considerably at odds with the one she had gained from her half-sister.

Tanya had met the man in a nightclub, after all. Mariella had never liked the fact that Tanya worked there—although she had been employed as a singer, it openly advertised the sexual charms of its dancers, and Tanya had freely admitted that the majority of the customers were male.

And, certainly, during the twelve months they had been together, Mariella had never heard Tanya mention any predilection on her sexy sheikh’s part to spend quality time in the middle of the desert! In fact, if she was honest, she had gained the impression that he was something of a ‘playboy,’ to use a perhaps now outdated word.

It took just under forty minutes for them to reach the impressive white mansion, which the taxi driver assured her was the correct address.

A huge pair of locked wrought-iron gates prevented them from going any farther, but as if by magic an official stepped out of one of the pair of gatehouses that flanked the gates, and approached the car.

As firmly as she could Mariella explained that she wished to see the sheikh.

‘I am sorry but he is not available,’ the official informed her. ‘He is away at the oasis at the moment and not expected back for some time.’

This was a complication Mariella had not been expecting. Fleur had woken up and was starting to grizzle a little.

‘If you would care to leave a message?’ the official was offering courteously.

Ruefully Mariella acknowledged inwardly that the nature of the message she wanted to give to the sheikh was better delivered in person!

Thanking him, she asked the taxi driver to take her back to the hotel.

‘If you want, I can find someone to drive you to this oasis?’ he suggested.

‘You know where it is?’ she questioned him.

He gave a small shrug. ‘Sure! But you will need a four-wheel drive vehicle, as the track can be covered with sand.’

‘Could I drive there myself?’ Mariella asked him.

‘It is possible, yes. It would take you two, maybe three hours. You wish me to give you the directions?’

It made more sense to drive to the oasis under her own steam than to go to the expense of paying a driver for the day as well as hiring a vehicle, Mariella decided.

‘Please,’ she agreed.

Methodically, Mariella checked through everything she had put on one side to pack into the four-wheel drive for her trip into the desert. The Beach Club’s information desk staff had assured her that it would be perfectly safe for her to drive into the desert, and had attended to all the necessary formalities for her, including ensuring that a proper baby seat was provided for Fleur.

The trip should take her around three hours—four if she stopped off at the popular oasis resort for lunch as recommended by the Beach Club. But just in case she decided not to, they had provided her with a packed lunch in the form of a picnic hamper.

If it hadn’t been for the serious purpose of her trip, she could quite easily have felt she were embarking on an exciting adventure, Mariella thought. Like everything else connected with the Beach Club, the four-wheel drive was immaculately clean and was even provided with its own mobile telephone!

The road into the desert was clearly marked, and turned out to be a well-built, smooth road that was so easy to navigate that Mariella quickly felt confident.

The secluded oasis where apparently the sheikh was staying was located in the Agir mountain range.

The light breeze, which had been just stirring the air when she had left the Beach Club, had increased enough to whip a fine dust of sand over her vehicle and the road itself within an hour of her setting out on her journey. The sand particles were so fine that somehow they actually managed to find their way into the four-wheel drive, despite the fact that Mariella had the doors and windows firmly closed. She had left the main road, now branched out onto a well-marked track across the desert itself.

It was a relief when she reached the Bedouin village marked on her map. It was market day and she had to drive patiently behind a camel train through the village, but fortunately it turned off towards the oasis itself, allowing her to accelerate.

In another half an hour she would stop for some lunch—if she hadn’t reached the second oasis, marked on her map, she and Fleur would have their picnic instead.

The height of the sand dunes had left her feeling surprised and awed; they were almost a mountain range in themselves. Fleur was awake and Mariella turned off the radio to play her one of her favourite nursery rhyme tapes, singing along to it.

It was taking her longer than she’d estimated to reach the tourist base at the oasis where she had planned to have lunch—it was almost two o’clock now and she had expected to be there at one. A film of sand dust had turned the sky a brassy red-gold colour, and as she crested a huge sand dune and looked down into the emptiness on the other side of it Mariella began to panic slightly. Surely she should be able to at least see the tourist base oasis from here?

Ruefully she reached for the vehicle’s mobile, realising that it might be sensible to ask for help, but to her dismay when she tried to make a call to the number programmed into the phone the only response was a fierce crackling sound. Stopping the vehicle she reached for her own mobile, but it was equally ineffective.

The sky was even more obscured by sand now, the wind hitting the vehicle with such force that it was physically rocking it. As though sensing her disquiet Fleur began to cry. She was hungry and needed changing, Mariella recognised, automatically attending to the baby’s needs whilst she tried to decide what she should do.

It was impossible that she could be lost, of course. The vehicle was fitted with a compass and she had been given very detailed and careful instructions, which she had followed to the letter.

So why hadn’t she reached the tourist oasis?

Fleur ate her own meal eagerly, but Mariella discovered that she herself had lost her appetite!

And then just as she was beginning to feel truly afraid she saw it! A line of camels swaying out of the dust towards her led by a robed camel driver.

Relieved, Mariella drove towards the camel train. Its leader was gravely polite. She had missed the turning to the oasis, he explained, something that was easily done with such a wind blowing sand across the track. To her alarm he further explained that, because of the sudden deterioration in the weather, all tourists had been urged to return to the city instead of remaining in the desert, but since Mariella had come so far her best course of action now was to press on to her ultimate destination, which he carefully showed her how to do using the vehicle’s compass.

Thanking him, she did as he had instructed her, grimly checking and re-checking the compass as she drove up and down what felt like an interminable series of the sand dunes until eventually, in the distance through the sand blowing against her windscreen, she could just about see the looming mass of the mountain range.

It was already four o’clock and the light seemed to be fading, a fact that panicked Mariella into driving a little faster. She had never dreamed that her journey would prove so hazardous and she was very much regretting having set out on it, but now at last its end was in sight.

It took her almost another hour of zigzagging across the sand dunes to reach the rocky thrust of the beginnings of the mountain range. The oasis was situated in a deep ravine, its escarpment so high that Mariella shuddered a little as she drove into its shadows. This was the last kind of place she had expected to appeal to the man who had been her sister’s faithless lover.

Would his villa here be as palatial as his home in Zuran? Mariella frowned and checked as the ravine opened out and she saw the oasis ahead of her. Remote and beautiful in its own way, it was very obviously a place of deep solitude, the oasis itself enclosed with a fringing of palms illuminated by the eerie glow of the final rays of the setting sun. Shielding her eyes, Mariella stopped the vehicle to look around. Where was the villa? All she could see was one solitary pavilion tent! A good-sized pavilion, to be sure, but most definitely not a villa! Had she somehow got lost—again?