The Royal House of Karedes: Two Crowns: The Sheikh's Forbidden Virgin / The Greek Billionaire's Innocent Princess / The Future King's Love-Child

‘He’s just there to scare what tourists come our way,’ Aarif murmured in her ear. ‘We have a national health service, and I can assure you he is not employed by it.’

Kalila smothered a laugh. ‘You mean you haven’t used his services yourself?’

Aarif’s smile gleamed, white and whole. ‘Most assuredly not.’

His hand came around her elbow, guiding her to the edge of the market square. ‘Your nurse is flagging,’ he remarked quietly. ‘I think it might be time to sit down. She looks as if her feet are killing her.’

Guiltily Kalila threw a look behind her, where Juhanah lagged back a few paces. Her nurse did look tired, and her pinched expression suggested that she would indeed prefer a rest.

‘Why don’t we take tea?’ Aarif suggested. ‘You might have preferred eating standing up in the street, but I don’t think your nurse did.’

‘I’m sorry, Juhanah,’ Kalila said, coming to take the older woman’s arm. ‘I’ve been so enjoying the sights, I haven’t thought enough of you.’

‘And enjoying more than the sights, it would seem,’ Juhanah huffed under her breath, and Kalila shot her a sharp look. Were her feelings for Aarif so obvious? She barely knew what they were herself.

Aarif guided them to a flat-roofed café on the north end of the square. Once inside they were greeted with a flurry of excited chatter interspersed with bows, and then they were taken up a narrow staircase to the roof, open to the sun and sky.

They sat down at a shaded table and a dark-coated waiter soon arrived with glasses of mint tea and a plate of salted pistachios.

They sipped and nibbled in silence for a moment, the sounds of the market below carried on the breeze.

‘Thank you,’ Kalila said at last, ‘for showing me Serapolis.’

‘There’s much more to see,’ Aarif replied with a tiny smile and a shrug. ‘Although nothing is quite as exciting as the central square on market day.’

‘I’m glad to have seen it.’

Aarif raised his eyebrows. ‘You must have seen similar sights back in Zaraq. Makaris’s market looked quite like ours.’

‘Yes,’ Kalila agreed slowly, ‘it is, and yet there is something different here.’ She looked around at the market below them, and then at the sea, a glinting jewel-green on three horizons. ‘There’s more of an international flavour here,’ she said at last, ‘an energy. In Zaraq, we are cut off from most of the world by mountains. It is what has kept us from being invaded, but it has also kept us isolated.’

‘Yet your country is very Western and progressive.’

‘On the surface,’ Kalila agreed after a moment, ‘if not in reality.’ She pressed her lips together and looked away, but she was still conscious of Aarif’s frown.

‘What are you speaking of?’ he asked after a moment. He rolled the tall glass of mint tea, beaded with moisture, between his palms as he looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Are you referring to your marriage?’ he continued quietly, although Kalila thought she heard an edge to his voice. ‘Arranged as it has been?’

She shrugged. ‘Not very Western, that.’

‘But necessary.’

‘Yes.’

‘You could have refused your father,’ Aarif said after a moment. ‘When you were in Cambridge.’ He leaned forward, his expression suddenly intent. ‘You could have said no.’

Kalila glanced up from her drink, her eyes widening as she realised what he’d said. What he’d guessed. For that was exactly the temptation that had assailed her in Cambridge, that forbidden, wonderful thought of what could be…but never would.

‘Yes,’ she said slowly, ‘I could have, I suppose. But I knew I never would.’

‘Why not?’ Aarif demanded, and Kalila shrugged.

‘Because. I couldn’t betray my family, my heritage,’ she stated simply. ‘It would be the same as betraying myself.’

Aarif looked away again, yet Kalila had the strange sensation that her answer had somehow satisfied him. She glanced at Juhanah and saw that the older woman had succumbed to the pleasures of a drowsy afternoon in the sun, and was now dozing, her chin nodding against her chest. She turned back to Aarif, a smile glimmering in her eyes, playing around her mouth.

‘We wore her out.’

Aarif smiled faintly. ‘So it would seem.’

She couldn’t resist taking advantage of the privacy afforded by Juhanah’s momentary nap. Kalila leaned forward. ‘What about you, Aarif? What brought you back to Calista? Were you ever tempted to stay in Oxford, make a life there?’

His fingers flexed around his glass. ‘No.’

‘Not at all?’ Kalila persisted, trying to tease, yet sensing a deeper darkness to Aarif’s words, seeing it in his frown.

‘No, my duty has always been here. There was never any question of anything else.’ He spoke flatly, his eyes on the horizon, or perhaps lost in a memory.

‘You always wanted to manage Calista’s diamonds?’

He shrugged. ‘Always, no. But for many years…’ he paused, and Kalila felt as if he was weighing his words, his thoughts. ‘Yes,’ he finally said, and left it at that.

‘What about one of your other brothers?’ Kalila asked. ‘Are they interested in the diamond industry?’ She snagged on a sudden memory. ‘Don’t you have a twin?’

‘Yes, and he has his own affairs to occupy him,’ Aarif replied. He drained his glass and set it on the table. ‘Now the day is late and it is not good for any of us to sit out too long in the sun. Why don’t you wake your nurse and we can go.’ He rose from the table to settle the bill, leaving Kalila feeling dismissed. She’d asked too many questions, she knew. She’d tried to get too close.

And yet she’d been closer than this—and closer still—the night in the desert. She couldn’t forget that wonderful moment of surprising intimacy, yet, watching the indifferent expanse of Aarif’s broad back as he moved through the tables, she felt with a pang of weary sorrow that he could.

Kalila roused Juhanah, who insisted she’d not been asleep at all, but merely resting her eyes, and they made their way back to the palace in rather sombre silence.

A liveried servant swept the front door open and as soon as they were in the foyer Aarif bowed and, with a polite, formal thanks for their company, he took his leave.

Kalila watched him go with a sense of disappointed loss. She had a feeling Aarif would make sure she didn’t see him again any time soon. He’d done his duty and taken her out, shown her the city. Now he would find excuses to stay away, and Kalila couldn’t think of any to see him again. She envisioned a week of meals in her room, followed by a sudden and inexplicable wedding, and felt the loss intensify inside her.

Back in her bedroom the late afternoon sunlight sent long, lazy shadows across the floor, and the ceiling fan whirred slowly above them, creating barely a stir of air.

There, on her bed, was a paper-wrapped package, and before she’d even touched it Kalila knew what it was.

Her silk. The silk Aarif had chosen for her, had said would look lovely on her—

Kalila choked back a sudden sob, pressing her fist to her mouth. She couldn’t cry now, not when it was too late, when nothing could be done—

‘Oh, Kalila.’ Juhanah stood in the doorway, her fists on her hips. ‘What foolish thing have you done, my child?’

Kalila blinked back tears. ‘N-n—nothing—’

‘You have fallen in love, haven’t you?’ Juhanah closed the door, shaking her head as she moved closer to Kalila and laid a heavy, consoling hand on her shoulder. ‘You miss the king, and so you have taken the prince instead.’ Kalila heard both sympathy and censure in Juhanah’s voice. ‘Haven’t you?’

Kalila closed her eyes. She was too tired and heart-sore to deny it, so she said nothing. Juhanah clucked her tongue and sighed.