The Mistress Bride

She found him in the living room, standing by the drinks cabinet pouring sparkling water on to freshly squeezed orange juice. Neither of them drank much alcohol, she because she didn't care for it and Raschid because his religion forbade it. He was dressed, which surprised her. Normally he was hard put to pull on a robe during evenings like this. But that soft checked cotton shirt, buff trousers and casual slip-ons he was wearing on his sockless feet were sending her messages.

Raschid was intending to take her home later rather than keeping her here for the night as he usually would. Well, maybe that wasn't such a bad idea, Evie told herself heavily when she felt her heart sink in disappointment. For what she had to tell him was going to necessitate some time apart while they both came to terms with what it was going to mean to them.

Hearing her come into the room, he sent her a brief smile over his shoulder. 'Your food has arrived, ma'am,' he drawled. 'Now you may feed that other ravenous appetite of yours.'

It was meant as a joke. But Evie couldn't laugh. Because the moment she glanced across the room to where an elegant soapstone coffee table stood spread out with a cold meal fit for a king her stomach objected.

Having gone from clutching at her with a demand to be fed, it was now clutching with sickening dread because she knew she couldn't put it off any longer.

'Raschid,' she said huskily. 'I need to talk to you.' Glass in hand, he turned, something in her tone perhaps alerting him to trouble, because his eyes had already sharpened. 'What?' he demanded.

Her throat dried up, her eyes shifting away from him because she knew she couldn't look at him and say what she had to say. So instead she walked over to the window where she reached out to send the curtain swishing open so she could fix her gaze on something outside while she decided how to begin. A tense silence followed. One where Evie could feel Raschid's quick mind grinding into action, picking up on the vibrations she was giving off, sorting through them and-belatedly perhaps-realising that all was not well with his lover.

After a minute, he put down his glass and walked slowly towards her. He didn't attempt to touch her-those shrewd instincts of his warning him that she needed her own space. 'What's wrong, Evie?' he prompted soberly.

Tears washed across her eyes and stayed there. 'We have a problem,' she began huskily-only to go silent again when she found she couldn't continue.

Raschid said nothing, waiting patiently for her to go on.

Evie could see his face reflected in the darkened window. He looked grave, the smoothly handsome lines of his features so very still that she knew he had already prepared himself for something dire to come. And, to her wretched despair, she found she couldn't do it. He was too important to her. She loved him so deeply that she discovered she couldn't risk the chance of losing him.

Not yet, she thought achingly. Please, not yet.

'My mother wants you to find an excuse not to attend my brother's wedding,' she said, dragging the half-truth out from the depths of a real desperation.

Another silence. Evie watched that face via its darkened reflection and saw a frown mar its smooth lines. Her heart began to beat with a sickly pump. He wasn't a fool, this man of hers. His highly tuned instincts where she was concerned had been warning him of something far more disastrous than a silly problem with her mother.

Oh, there was truth in the lie, she grimly acknowledged as she stood there waiting for his response. Her mother had spent the whole of their lunch together today telling Evie in no uncertain terms how much she would prefer it if Sheikh Raschid stayed away from Julian's high-profile wedding in two weeks' time.

'The notoriety that the two of you generate is bound to shift emphasis away from the bride and groom and on to yourselves,' Lucinda Delahaye had predicted. 'If he had the smallest amount of sensitivity he would have realised that himself and graciously declined the invitation. But since he has no sensitivity I feel it is your place to tell him.

But, as both Raschid and her mother knew, Evie was not open to that kind of petty manipulation. Under normal circumstances she wouldn't have even bothered mentioning such a conversation to Raschid.

So, what had been normal about today? she asked herself starkly as she watched that reflected face shift from puzzlement into annoyance. Within minutes of her getting up this morning the whole day had gone rocketing out of control. Since then she'd felt as if she'd been in a car accident, so shocked and dazed that she'd been barely able to function on a normal level.

In fact, the whole day had gone by in a fog. Until Raschid had taken her to bed of course, she mused ruefully. There the fog had cleared up remarkably-only to be replaced with a different kind of fog. The glorious fog of loving. Now even that fog had cleared, she noted heavily, and Raschid was standing behind her looking as if she had really let him down after such a tense build-up.

Which was, in effect, what she had just done. 'Is that it?' he said eventually.

'Yes,' she confirmed, pitifully aware of the depth of her own wretched cowardice.

'Then go to hell,' he murmured succinctly, refusing the request without any compunction. And turned his back on her to walk away.

Her heart took a lurching leap to her throat. The way he had said that told her he knew she had just chickened out over something. She turned too, staring anxiously after him as he crossed the room with that long, lithe, graceful stride of his that always set her pulses racing no matter what the mood was like between them.

'Raschid, you-'

'I refuse to discuss it,' he cut in, sounding annoyed, offended and just downright disgusted, which made Evie wonder how he would have reacted to what she had cravenly backed out from saying. 'Your mother is not your keeper and she certainly isn't mine!'

'It's a fair request,' she said, surprising herself by jumping to the defence of her mother. It seemed that anything was better than confessing the truth, she ruefully acknowledged. 'You know as well as I do the kind of interest we generate when we go anywhere together. In this case, it has to be Julian and Christina my mother must consider, not your feelings or mine.'

'And my father is a very close friend of Christina's father,' Raschid coldly countered. 'In fact, Lord Beverley is almost solely responsible for helping my father overcome some very awkward political and diplomatic obstacles in his quest to reform and modernise my country. I will not offend Christina's father simply because your mother wants me to.'

The chin was up, Evie noted. The passionate lover was now in full Noble Prince mode.

'In the face of my father's failing health,' Prince Raschid concluded

, 'it is my duty to be there as my father’s representative.'