She knew what he was doing. He was taking this away from acute emotions, even if the positive, wonderful variety. “Takes one mushy core to know another.” She jumped to her feet, dragged him up with both hands. “I didn’t have breakfast yet. Share it?”
His grin lit up the whole world. “Sure will. I haven’t eaten a thing since yesterday, dreading this confrontation.”
“Says the man who once went swimming with sharks.”
“Azeezati, first, that was for a zillion dollars in donations for your list of causes. Second, your possible rejection—and worse, my inability to heal your pain—were far scarier propositions than being gnawed on by sharks.”
She kissed him soundly on the cheek for that.
For the next hour, they talked and laughed and shared news and opinions as if they’d never stopped. It felt like being in the past, when she’d raced through her work so she could run to her squash date whenever he was in the kingdom.
They were sipping mint tea when he said, “Apart from being my friend and sister again, I need your professional services.”
One eyebrow rose. “Uh-oh. This was too good to be true.”
“You think all this—” he gestured to their cozy companionship “—was me leading up to this request?”
It took her a moment to make up her mind. “I might be a colossal fool with syrup for blood, but no. I trust you too much.”
“You didn’t trust me at all till a couple of hours ago.”
She shook her head. “That’s not true. Even if I didn’t hear you defending me to Haidar, I would have believed that however things started, the feelings you developed for me were genuine. It was because I thought you cut me from your life that I developed a grudge against you. I missed your friendship sometimes more than I missed the illusion of my love for Haidar.”
He dragged her into his arms for a convulsive hug. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am, how angry I am for the heartache my family caused you and forced me to be party to inflicting on you.” He set her away, held her by the shoulders. “But I will never let anyone hurt you again.” She nodded, a tear slipping down her face. He wiped it away gently. “This means you’ll consider my request?”
She mock shoved him. “Without knowing specifics, I have to remind you that friends and business are never a good mix.”
“Usually not, but not never. When it’s the right people, the right friendship, results can be spectacular. And lifelong.”
“There have been recorded incidents.” She faced him, folding her legs on the couch. “Okay. What do you propose?”
He mirrored her position. “With your connections, you must have heard I was approached by four of Azmahar’s major clans to be their candidate for the throne.”
“I was asked to weigh in on candidates. You, Rashid Aal Munsoori and…Haidar are the ones who made it to the final round.”
He couldn’t have missed her hesitation over Haidar’s name, but made no comment. “I want you to be my consultant, my all-round adviser. I am ambivalent about this whole thing, and I need the guidance of someone I trust implicitly, someone neutral, who knows all the goings-on of the political and economic scene. Is there anyone else on the planet you know who fits the bill?”
“With those criteria, no.” She chewed her lip. “Though I must qualify your ‘neutral’ assertion.”
His head shake was adamant. “What you lack in neutrality, you’ll make up for in professionalism.”
“Vote of confidence appreciated and all, but…” She took a deep breath, admitted, “This will put me in contact with…him.”
“If that’s your objection, then my quest is done. Haidar and I will probably not be in each other’s vicinity in this lifetime.”
Her heart missed a beat. “It’s that bad?”
“I haven’t talked to him in two years.”
That was bad. But… “You were always ‘not talking to each other.’ Then you’d end up drawn back together like magnets.”
“I thought so, too. I left him that day eight years ago with the agreement that we were getting the hell out of each other’s lives. But we were drawn back together, over and over. During the crisis in Zohayd, it seemed we were back to being as close as we were as children. Then—” a spasm contorted his noble features “—we clashed again. The last time we met, he renounced our very blood tie.”
Her heart quivered, her lungs burned. If their bond had been truly severed this time, Jalal must be bleeding internally.
As for Haidar, his reptilian genes no doubt protected him from injury. The man who’d goaded, manipulated and almost seduced her out of her mind hadn’t been suffering from anything.
She drew in a ragged inhalation. “Okay, I’ll do it. But I’ll make sure that there is no conflict of interest with my job, and I won’t divulge anything that would provide you with any unfair advantage, just sort your own findings and add my own insights. And of course I would be helping you on a strictly informal, personal basis, not officially.”
She didn’t know if he was more relieved that she’d accepted, or that she’d made that stipulation. Seemed he, too, was still considering Haidar and his reactions in everything he did.
That was a reason unto itself to see Jalal to the throne.
She’d be saving a whole kingdom from having Haidar as king.
Four
“How far are you willing to go for her?”
Haidar blinked, unable to turn his gaze from the second most magnificent sight he’d ever seen.
It was downright…magical. The undulating shore hugging pristine, placid aquamarine that in turn tugged at its unique red-gold edge in a tranquil, laced-in-delicate-froth dance. The bay that sent a tendril of land to almost touch the island teeming with palm trees just half a mile away. The canopy of crisp azure adorned in brushstrokes of incandescent white. Every wisp of breeze, every whiff of fragrance, every ray of light…breathtaking.
And he’d thought nothing could take his breath away anymore.
Seemed instead of becoming harder as he grew older, he was getting softer. A tiny, barefoot woman in a bathrobe had done just that last night. Taken it away, and held it at bay with her every move. And this place felt like an echo of…
“Her?”
He repeated the word as his eyes fell on his much smaller, middle-aged companion. He kept forgetting he was there.
The man, overdressed for the time and climate, beamed. “The estate. In the real estate business, everyone refers to it as ‘her.’ Comes from dozens of men going to lengths to acquire it that are normally reserved for bewitching and out-of-reach women.”
He could see how. He’d gone driving last night after he’d left Roxanne, and he’d registered nothing until he’d happened by this place.
He’d parked at the top of the dune that overlooked it, watched it transition through the grandeur of a starlit canvas to the glory of a majestic dawn to that of a sun-drenched morning. That he could appreciate any of it while he wrestled with his need to tear his way back to Roxanne proved this place was phenomenal indeed.
But as he’d sat there suffering, it had become clear to him.
He wanted her. And he would have her. Here.
He’d called Khaleel with his GPS coordinates, told him he would buy this place. In less than an hour the real estate agent had arrived, drooling at the prospect of a record-breaking deal.
They were standing at the ground-level terrace surveying the house that looked like a cross between a huge tent and a sail ship.
“…as you’ve seen, apart from the unique location and natural assets of this place, the house itself is a miracle of design. All bedrooms suites, sitting areas, upper and lower kitchens, formal and informal dining rooms have a sea view. Everything is arranged in an exquisite amalgam of Ottoman and Andalusian summer courtyard style, with waterways and gardens nestled within the interior—”
“As I have seen.” Haidar interrupted the slick Elwan Al-Shami’s sales pitch. He’d let him take him through the place, even though he’d already seen it as he’d waited for his arrival. The estate’s caretakers had fallen over themselves to show him around as soon as they’d recognized him. “Let’s close the deal.”
The man’s eyes brimmed with eagerness, yet Haidar could see he wasn’t ready to do so yet. He was programmed to keep driving a client’s acquisition need to fever pitch before he sprang the killing price. Even now that Haidar had made his efforts redundant, he couldn’t stop before his program had run through.
“When the owner heard it was you, he named a too-exorbitant figure. That’s why I asked how far you’re willing to go.”
Haidar swept his gaze around the place that answered any visions of heaven he’d ever had. “Shrewd man. He knows it would sell no matter how high he goes.”
“And he demands cash. That’s why those who bought it before fell behind in paying the installments of the huge loans they took, had to relinquish it to the indebting banks. The owner was always there to buy it back and make a profit.”
“He won’t be buying it back this time.”