Page 28 of At the Sheikh's Command
“You mean you don’t love.” His tone was leaden.
She bit her lip. “It’s true.”
He considered her for a moment. “No, it’s not. I don’t want it to be true.”
“Wanting it not to be true isn’t the same thing as it being true.”
Someone called him. He ignored it.
“Darrius! I don’t love anyone, and I never have. I can’t.”
“But you’re here.”
“For the diamond only.” She didn’t remind him that she also wanted to make sure she was over him.
His name was called again.
“I must go.” He released her and stepped away. Briefly, he searched her face as if trying to puzzle her out, before turning and walking away. Then he stopped and turned to her. “But know this, Nora, your heart is more important than any diamond. Itisthe diamond. And I will claim it, whether you like it or not. And I know you don’t. I know you’re trying to resist me, to use me even, but I won’t have it. Youwillbe mine—all of you, body and soul.”
Leonora didn’t know how long she stood in the shadowy splendor of the formal gardens, aware only of the thudding of her heart, beating in time to his last words.You will be mine. It was like a threat, a warning… a promise. But it was a promise she refused to accept.
She looked around at the seductive night all around her, cloaking her in darkness, and at last she allowed the tears to flow. She stumbled once, twice, and then hurried back to her rooms.
He was wrong. He had to be wrong. Because she refused to allow herself to believe he was right. If she did that, where would she be? Right back to where she’d begun life. Dependent and at the mercy of someone else’s whims. She’d never be queen and so she’d have to be his mistress, tucked away out of sight. Just as her father had hidden her from the world. She refused to be that person ever again. Without her independence she had no defenses, no guard to her heart. And she was too scared to imagine what that would be like.
No, Darrius was wrong. She could keep her emotional distance from himandfind the diamond. All she had to do was stick to her original plan. Easy. Then why did her steps falter and the tears begin to flow once more? She swept them away with the back of her hand and looked out to the blurry vision of the city spread before her. Why? Because it wouldn’t be easy. But since when had her life ever been easy?
CHAPTER13
For a second night running, Leonora had a disturbed night because of Darrius. Except this time she’d been kept awake by her conflicting thoughts and desires. Part of her had wanted to go to him, just as she’d done the previous night, but another part resisted because she knew that opening the door to his room and to a night of bliss would challenge her defenses—and she really didn’t need her defenses challenged right now. They were already pretty shaky.
So by the time the sun had risen, Leonora had already been up for hours, working at her laptop, trying, but failing, to re-focus on her research. It had always been her savior, but now it seemed even this had left her. Instead, her gaze was drawn to the city below the palace and a slightly raised hill to the north. With its 360-degree views of the city, it was a popular beauty spot, despite its function.
She glanced at her watch. She’d been sent strict instructions as to the time she and Darrius would leave to travel into the desert. But she’d made sure she had a few hours when no one would know where she was, so she could go to the place she’d wanted to visit as soon as she’d entered the country. Darrius had stopped her then, and she was determined he wouldn’t stop her again.
It turned out to be easier than she imagined to slip past the guards. Dressed in her full hijab, she could have been anyone. She continued on through the streets toward the edge of town. She took a few wrong turnings before she found it. After all, she’d only been there once before. Two days after her premature baby had died. One day before she’d left this country for what she’d thought was forever. Darrius wanted to know why she didn’t have a heart? That was easy. She’d left it here.
It was for the views most people came to the grassy hill which rose above the city. The graves in the cemetery were clustered to one side, out of sight, and it was to one of these Leonora made her way. She found the small grave and pulled out the well-worn photograph she always kept with her and compared it. Yes, this was the one. And it was maintained well. The nurse she’d paid to look after it had obviously kept her word. She knelt down and touched the top of the gravestone gently, as if she were touching the soft hair on her baby’s head. Despite being premature, her baby had had a full head of dark hair. Her little girl. Azra. She would have been a beauty.
She touched the engraved words—the only ones she could think of at the time—and remembered how, eight years earlier, she’d been alone in this city, spurned by Darrius’s family, but determined to wait for his return from university. She’d told him she’d wait for him and she’d fully intended to. What she hadn’t told him was that she was pregnant. At first she’d tried to keep it a secret but, inevitably, his parents had found out. And they’d tried to pay her to leave. But she’d stood firm. Alone and firm until everything had gone wrong, and she’d lost Azra. And then she’d fled the country, unable to face Darrius in her grief, without a heart.
She swiped away the tears, and plucking out a cloth from her bag, wiped away the dust and grime which had accumulated on the plaque since the nurse’s last visit. When she’d finished, she traced her fingers along the words.
Azra. Gone too soon, and taken my heart with her.
She blinked, trying to hold back the tears, but they flowed determinedly out anyway. She looked up into the bright blue heavens and let out a wail which came from that empty place deep inside. The sound filled and hung in the air for a moment, and then there was nothing but silence once more. She clutched the headstone for support and sobbed like she hadn’t sobbed in eight years.
The car wasoutside when she returned and an assistant opened the front door for her with a polite greeting. She shrugged. She had no idea why she’d be sitting beside the driver, but decided it was preferable to being seated beside Darrius. The further she was away from him, the better.
Her bags had been collected, and they were waiting for Darrius. She took a mirror out from her bag and checked her make-up, which she’d had to re-apply in the cemetery. It was the best she could do. She slipped her sunglasses back in place to hide her reddened, swollen eyes, and looked out the window, waiting for Darrius.
She’d expected a formal escort, as usual, but when Darrius arrived, he was alone and slid into the driver’s seat beside her.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Good morning,” she responded, thinking it was faintly ridiculous to address each other with such formality when there was so much going on between them.
“I trust you slept well?” he asked as he drove away.
