A Bride for the Taking

‘Bien,’ said the Frenchwoman approvingly. ‘It was he who organised this international meeting, which has brought so many prestigious leaders to the hotel and has done much to elevate the profile of our new conference centre.’

‘Yes, Madame Martin,’ said Hannah, still not quite sure where this was heading.

‘And you are perhaps aware that many people have been trying to seek out the Sheikh’s company,’ said Madame Martin slowly. ‘Since he is a man of great influence.’

‘I’m sure they do.’ Hannah noted the pause which followed and which she somehow got the idea she was expected to fill. ‘It was exactly the same in the London branch of the Granchester—the more powerful the guest, the more people want to get to know them.’

‘Especially if the man happens to be newly single and extremely good-looking,’ said Madame Martin, with a busy wiggle of her manicured fingers. ‘But His Royal Highness has no wish to be the focus of the attentions which someone in his position always attracts. It is why he occasionally chooses to travel with only a very modest entourage, but unfortunately that only makes him more accessible to the general public. Why, only last night, a well-known heiress managed to bribe her way past security and make her way to his table.’

Hannah winced. ‘Was there a scene, madame?’

‘I’m afraid there was, and we do not tolerate “scenes” here at L’Idylle. Which is why, for the remainder of his stay, Sheikh Al Diya intends to finish the rest of his business in the sanctuary of his suite, which is certainly big enough to accommodate his needs.’ There was a pause. ‘And why you are being assigned to work exclusively for him.’

Hannah screwed up her face in confusion. ‘You mean, I’m to make his bed and change his towels?’

‘Of course. But you will also serve His Royal Highness any meals he orders and make sure there are drinks and snacks for his guests. Keep the water in the flowers topped up. Tidy up after him and make sure that nobody unauthorised tries to gain entry to his rooms. Security here is tight but there is no such thing as completely reliable security. Why, even in your famous Buckingham Palace, intruders have successfully gained access, is that not so?’ The Frenchwoman’s face grew stern. ‘Do you think you are capable of what I am asking of you, Hannah?’

Hannah’s first instinct was to say no. To protest that she was a chambermaid and nothing more. Someone who silently serviced the hotel bedrooms and learnt more about the guests than they would probably be comfortable with, if they only realised how many clues about themselves they left lying around the place. She wasn’t really confident enough to wait on a desert king, or to swish around topping up the water in expensive vases of flowers. She wasn’t really a maid.

‘Isn’t there someone else who would rather do it, Madame Martin?’ she questioned doubtfully. ‘Someone with a bit more experience of that kind of thing?’

‘Indeed there is.’ Madame Martin pursed her lips. ‘I am sure I could have the female staff queuing from here to our capital city of Cagliari, but none of them have your characteristics, Hannah. You are a young woman whose head is planted firmly on her shoulders, as you English say. You will not be seduced by a pair of flashing black eyes and a body which makes grown women shiver.’ Madame Martin seemed suddenly to realise what she was saying and as she pulled herself together she fixed Hannah with another stern look. ‘Can I rely on you to accept this task, so that I can report back favourably to your superiors in London?’

Hannah swallowed as she recognised it was going to be impossible to refuse—and why would anyone in their right mind want to? Surely a temporary promotion was a good thing. A chance to get the pay-rise she’d been hoping for. A pay-rise which might make it possible for her to one day buy a tiny place of her own.

A home of her own.

The chance to put down roots at last.

‘Will you do that, my dear?’ prompted the Frenchwoman kindly.

Hannah swallowed down the sudden lump which seemed to be clogging up her throat, wondering why she still reacted so stupidly to someone speaking to her with affection.

Because she wasn’t used to it?

Or because she mistrusted it?

Nodding her head, she produced a tentative smile. ‘I would be honoured, Madame Martin,’ she said.

‘Bien.’ Madame Martin gave a brisk nod. ‘Then come with me and I will show you around the suite of His Royal Highness.’

Hannah followed her superior along wide and airy corridors, which overlooked the small, natural harbour outside. Purple bougainvillea rippled softly in the breeze and the sky was the bluest she had ever seen. Every day was the same—picture-book perfect. Or at least, that was how it seemed. It hadn’t rained in paradise for as long as she’d been there and sometimes she could hardly believe she was.

Who would have thought it? Humble Hannah Wilson experiencing life in one of the fanciest resorts in Europe. The rootless orphan who’d never really known anything except making do was now working in a hotel which redefined the word luxury. A place which regularly entertained princes and tycoons, heiresses and film stars. And now a sheikh.

A sheikh for whom she was to work exclusively!

‘You must continue to be unobtrusive,’ Madame Martin was saying. ‘When the Sheikh arrives in his suite, you will quietly enquire what he requires and make sure he gets it. Immediately.’

‘And if he doesn’t actually want…anything?’ Hannah questioned cautiously.

‘Then you will vacate the premises as quickly as possible and await further instruction. You are being moved to a small staff room just along the corridor from his suite. Can I rely on you, Hannah?’

Hannah nodded in agreement because what else could she do? ‘Yes, Madame Martin.’

‘One last thing.’ The Frenchwoman’s voice lowered into a conspiratorial whisper. ‘The Sheikh is known as a man of great, shall we say—appetite.’

‘You mean he likes his food?’ questioned Hannah cautiously.

‘No, I do not mean that.’ An impatient shake of her head barely displaced an immaculate strand of Madame Martin’s hair. ‘I mean that he may have female guests visiting him and, should you find yourself dealing with them, you will treat them as if they were princesses. Which is probably their ambition,’ she finished, with a dry laugh. ‘Is that clear, Hannah?’

‘Yes, madame,’ answered Hannah as they entered the elevator, slotting in the special card which gave access to the exclusive penthouse suite, a journey which took mere seconds before the doors slid open. Hannah saw two bulky men in dark suits standing poker-faced on either side of a large door and she blinked. Could those bulges she could see in their pockets possibly be guns? She guessed they could. Of course the Sheikh would have bodyguards who looked as if they were made of steel and iron, rather than flesh and blood. Whose eyes didn’t even flicker as she stared up at them. A sudden realisation of what she had let herself in for made her spine tingle with apprehension.

‘Voilà! We are here,’ said Madame Martin. ‘Come.’

After a cursory knock, which went unanswered, the door was unlocked and Madame Martin walked straight in. Hannah thought she was prepared for any eventuality…for dancing girls, or some kind of harem. Or maybe a smoke-filled room where some kind of high-stakes card game was taking place.

What she had not been prepared for was the sight which greeted her—of the Sheikh himself. Her eyes nearly bulged out of their sockets and her throat dried to dust. After the kind of build-up she’d been given, Hannah wouldn’t have been surprised to see him lying half naked on one of the sumptuous velvet sofas, while some gorgeous nubile woman administered to him with warm oils. Or wearing something lavish and ceremonial—golden robes, perhaps—which swished as he walked.

In fact, he was seated at a desk which overlooked one of the resort’s many swimming pools and there wasn’t a golden robe in sight. He was wearing dark trousers and a blue shirt so pale that it was almost white. The shirt had two top buttons undone and the sleeves had been rolled up to

reveal his hair-darkened forearms. Hannah noted these things almost automatically—perhaps as a kind of defensive mechanism. As if labelling the most commonplace things about him could protect her from the impact his sudden searing black gaze was having on her.

Because there was nothing commonplace about his face. It was a face in a million, no question about that. An unforgettable face—with those imperiously high cheekbones and his hair which gleamed like sunlit tar. The olive skin of his hawk-like features glowed with health and vitality and there was an unmistakably arrogant tilt to his proud jaw. But it was the eyes which did it. She’d seen them from a distance but up close they were unsettling. More than unsettling. Hannah swallowed. Hard and unflickering and blacker than any eyes had the right to be. And they were staring at her. Staring as if she had some smut on her nose, or the dark stain of sweat at her armpits. Hannah shifted uncomfortably beneath the intensity of that gaze, her hands nervously fluttering to brush away imagined dust from her slightly too small dress until she remembered that she wasn’t supposed to be drawing attention to her hips like that.

‘I am extremely sorry to disturb you, Sheikh Al Diya,’ Madame Martin was saying smoothly. ‘But since no one answered my knock, I assumed nobody was here.’

‘I did not hear you knock otherwise I should have sent you away,’ said the Sheikh, an impatient wave of his hand indicating the mountain of paperwork piled in front of him. ‘As you see, I am busy.’

‘Of course, Your Royal Highness. Perhaps you would prefer us to come back at a more suitable time?’

Kulal put his pen down and studied the two women who were standing before him—the too thin French matron and the curvy chambermaid he’d seen hurrying across the patio a couple of days earlier, with an anxious look on her face. What he would prefer was not to have been interrupted in the first place because he was at a very delicate stage of negotiation. But suddenly the ever-engrossing topic of solar power melted away as he stared at the ponytailed brunette whose fingers were smoothing down her unsightly uniform dress.

Was that an unconscious gesture to draw his attention to the fecundity of her hips and breasts? he wondered. Or was it deliberate? Either way, she had hit the jackpot. No doubt she was aware that her ripe body was designed to send his hormones shooting into disarray and, inconveniently, they were doing just that. He felt his groin tightening as he imagined his tongue trailing a slow path over those magnificent breasts and for a moment he cursed the insidious power of Mother Nature-for were they not all puppets in her need to continue the human race? And that was the reason behind his instinct to get the chambermaid horizontal as quickly as possible, before impaling her with his hardness.