The Sheikh's Convenient Bride

That such things had seemed to matter only made her angrier. She let Qasim’s head down none-too-gently and shot to her feet.

“Be careful,” Hakim snapped, rushing to ease a pillow under the sheikh’s head.

“If this is good,” Megan said grimly, “then you’re right. I guess I really don’t understand this country.”

“It is not complicated.”

“Oh, I think it is. Your sheikh goes off to be—to be drawn and quartered, and instead—”

“No one draws and quarters his enemies anymore,” Hakim said, so seriously that she blinked. “Not even sheikh Ahmet.” Hakim nodded toward the bed as he undid the top few buttons of Qasim’s shirt. “Get that blanket.”

She wanted to tell him to get it himself, but why play the role of sullen child? She was angry enough not to give a damn if Qasim froze to death, but she yanked the blanket from the bed and dropped it over him.

So much for thinking he’d been defending her or worried about her.

“There.” Hakim waved his hand to the other men as he rose to his feet. “We will leave you now, Miss O’Connell.”

“That’s fine. Just don’t think you can go without taking your sheikh with you.”

“His highness will probably sleep for several hours. You may send for me when he awakens.”

“Wait just a damned minute! You’ve got it wrong, pal. You may call me when he awakens, and only so I can tell your fearless leader what I think of him.”

“Sheikh Qasim drank with Sheikh Ahmet.”

Megan folded her arms and smiled with her teeth. “A brilliant deduction.”

“That means they held a successful negotiation.”

She looked down at Qasim. He’d rolled onto his side and was sleeping soundly as a baby.

“How? By drinking each other under the table?”

“They drank,” Hakim said coldly, “because they solved their differences. That is how it was done in the old days. And, in the old days, to drink less than the man who was your enemy was to insult him.”

“In other words, what we see here is an example of good manners.”

Hakim nodded. “It is so.”

“Good manners,” Megan said again, and rolled her eyes. Would she ever make sense of any of this? Still, the threat to their safety was over. She could, she supposed, let Qasim sleep it off on the floor. It was only that she felt a knot of anger each time she looked at him. No matter what Hakim said, the negotiations couldn’t have been very difficult, not if they ended in a party.

“Miss O’Connell? You will send for me when my lord awakens.”

“With pleasure.”

She took a chair to the window, carefully placed it so her back would face Qasim, and sat down. She heard the door shut; after a minute, despite what Hakim had said about successful negotiations, she went to it and slid the heavy bar into place.

Qasim was still sleeping. Caz. He’d told her to call him Caz.

She looked down at him again, at the thick, dark lashes lying against his tanned skin. He looked peaceful, content, not at all concerned at how she’d worried…

At the anguish she’d suffered, imagining him hurt or dead.

Megan rose to her feet. She knelt next to Qasim, stroked his hair back from his forehead, and touched her hand to his cheek.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” she whispered. “Very, very glad.”

Gently she brushed her lips over his.