Page 30 of Sheikh's Quarantine Triplet Baby Daughters

SHEIKH'S SECRET PLAYMATE: ANTOUN LIVES IN LUXURY WHILE IMPOSING SHUTDOWN

The words were like body blows and the pictures were worse. Someone had apparently been flying a drone low over the palace, and it had caught her in Samyar's lap on the veranda. Her face was obscured, but Samyar's was clear, as was the romantic dinner in front of him. It looked exactly like a playboy amusing himself while his country suffered, and Diane uttered a soft cry.

"Diane..."

"We wouldn't be in such bad shape without that damned security guard's testimony," Camille said, shaking her head.

"Security guard?"

"He had already agreed to be stationed at the palace for the duration of the pandemic, and he has signed an agreement that if he were to decide to return to his home, he would be placed on indefinite paid leave," spat Samyar. "Apparently that wasn't good enough for him. They caught him sneaking his girlfriend in, and of course that's a breach of security protocol. The head of security chewed him out and fired him, and apparently the first thing he did was go to the papers."

Numbly, Diane scrolled down to the article, where the guard in question had given everyone her name, told the world she was pregnant and then for good measure invented a few highly lurid stories about what he had seen them doing in the public halls of the palace while it was empty. Reading even a few paragraphs made her sick, and she had to push the tablet away.

"But ... we never did anything like that," she said faintly. "We've never..."

"Everyone knows that," Camille said reassuringly. "We at the palace know that you've behaved with impeccable grace during this difficult time. Though I do wish we'd had some warning on the pregnancy."

That last was directed at Samyar, who glared at her.

"It was private," he said. "It was a private matter between two adults—"

"You don't keep me here to respect your privacy," she said briskly. "The good news is that since you issued the stay at home order and the stipend to keep people financially afloat indefinitely, your approval rating is high. However, the bad news is that a lot of people were assuming you were living just like they were—"

"In a palace, as the most powerful man in the country," Samyar said flatly, and Camille shrugged.

"People see what they want to see, and your message was that we were all in this together. That's important because now—"

Diane followed Camille's words individually, but all strung together, they were almost incomprehensible. She sneaked another look down at the tablet, swallowing hard as she made herself read the words in front of her.

They were cruel, hitting her like stones. She was a secret woman, a gold digger who showed up and secreted herself in the palace until it was far too late to be removed. She was trying to trap the ruler of the land into a marriage, and he was too entranced to do what needed to be done. Diane's head spun as all of her worst dreams came true in front of her eyes.

It was simply too much. She stood up from the table, sending the chair clattering to the door behind her, and she ran.

Camille gave a startled yelp, but Diane was out the door before anyone could stop her, running through the empty halls of the palace. She had done track and field when she was a teenager, and she ran now like she had then, mindlessly and without thought for where she was going.

She ended up in the greenhouse, the warmth taking her breath away when she finally stopped, breathing hard and sobbing. The sobs were horrible, dry and wracking, and she couldn't stop herself from leaning over her knees, breathing and cradling her center as if she could protect it. As if she could protect anyone.

"Diane!"

Suddenly there were strong arms around her, pulling her back to sit on a stone bench, and even as she was settled on the seat, Samyar didn't leave her.

"Diane, you can't just go running off like that, what if you had tripped or hurt yourself?"

Diane tried to respond, but all that came out was a sob, and then she had to sit for a few minutes and get that crying out of her system. She was crying so easily these days, and she hated it. When she was done, she turned to Samyar, wiping furiously at her eyes.

"This is the worst thing that could have happened. This is what you have always been afraid of," she cried. "This is exactly why you left Paris in the first place, why we just stopped five years ago."

Samyar looked at her calmly, running a gentle thumb over the curve of her cheekbone.

"I have a much better imagination than I did five years ago. The worst thing I can imagine now has nothing to do with gossip columnists or pictures that I think are quite adorable."

"Adorable!"

"Yes. I love those pictures. And I find that this year, between a global pandemic and the worry of being a bad father, I am gaining some perspective on fear and what is worth it. Diane. This is nothing. We are going to get through it. It is not going to matter."

"Camille wouldn't be involved if it was nothing, would she?"

"Camille's job is to make sure that I look as good as I can, and that I can do what I need to do. It is her job to be overly worried about these things, and yes, she is good at it. She is on our side, and she is going to help us get the word out."

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