When he halted as if he had forgotten something ten yards on, Polly just wanted to kick him for striding back to haul her out of her death struggle with the aba twisted round her legs. ‘That is not a very graceful fashion in which to descend from a car,’ Raschid commented drily.
He guided her through the crush emerging from the great domed porch ahead. Glimpsing dark faces and avidly inquisitive female stares, she was ironically relieved to be covered from head to toe.
‘I understand that my father wishes to receive us immediately,’ he explained flatly. ‘You will not speak—I don’t trust you to speak lest you offend. On unfamiliar ground I do not believe you are at your most intelligent.’
Burning inside like a bushfire, Polly bit down hard on her tongue. He stopped before a set of carved double doors which were thrown wide by the fearsome armed guards on either side. He strode ahead of her. At a reluctant pace, she followed, to watch him fall down gracefully on his knees and touch his forehead to the carpet. For seventy, the grey-bearded old gentleman seated on a shallow dais at the foot of the room looked admirably hale and hearty. Polly got down on the carpet just as Raschid was signalled up. The King snapped his fingers and barked something in Arabic.
Raschid audibly released his breath. ‘Get up.’
Before she could guess his intention, he had deftly whipped the aba off again. Polly felt like a piece of plundered booty, tumbled out on the carpet for examination and curiously naked under the onslaught of shrewd dark eyes. Reija passed some remark, chuckled and went on to speak at considerable length. Turning pink, Polly slowly sank down again, but not before she noticed the rush of blood to Raschid’s cheekbones. Whatever his father was saying to him was having the most extraordinarily visible effect on him. His knuckles showed white as his hand clenched by his side. A pin-dropping silence stretched long after King Reija had finished speaking.
Suddenly Raschid spat a response. Polly was shocked. A split second later a wall-shaking argument was taking place over her averted head. Father and son set into each other with a ferocity which would have transcended any language barrier. The silences, spiced by what could only be described as Reija’s inflammatory and self-satisfied smiles, grew longer. Abruptly Raschid inclined his head and backed out. Polly nervously looked up again.
A gnarled hand beckoned her closer. ‘A most unfortunate introduction to our household,’ said Reija in heavily accented English. Noting her surprise, he smiled with distinct amusement. ‘I speak your language. However, it has often been of great benefit for me to listen rather than to converse.’
Somehow Polly managed a polite smile. Her gormless father had not had a chance against that level of subtle calculation!
‘You are welcome,’ he pronounced. ‘Such pale beauty as yours can only draw my son more frequently to his home.’
It wasn’t her place to tell him that he was in for a swift disillusionment. Raschid was about as adapted to having his wings clipped as a bird of prey deprived of a kill. But it was interesting to learn that his father wanted to see him here more often than he evidently did. Reassuring too, she conceded absently. Arguments between father and son were seemingly not evidence of some deep schism in their relationship. Yet she was frustrated by her inability to understand exactly what was going on around her. What had incited Raschid to barely leashed rage and roused his father to only sardonic amusement loudly voiced?
‘A man does not drink brackish water when he may sip sweetly within his own household.’
Bemusedly Polly blinked, having been briefly lost in her own thoughts. Fortunately a reply did not seem to be expected.
‘It is my hope that you will soon come to consider our country as your home.’
She gulped. ‘Yes.’
‘To facilitate this you will wish to learn Arabic.’ He nodded to himself. ‘A tutor will be found for you.’
At least he didn’t talk in riddles. She was King Reija’s gift to his son—unfortunately bestowed upon an ungrateful recipient. But that, she suspected, was most unlikely to keep the King awake at night. He looked mighty pleased with himself. The same steely obstinacy and ingrained ruthlessness that distinguished the son was reflected in the father.
‘Your father—he is well?’
‘Yes, Your Majesty.’
‘May he live long and prosper.’ He waved a hand. ‘You may withdraw—the women are impatient to prepare you for the wedding.’
When Polly emerged Raschid searched her eyes almost fiercely. What had caused that argument? she questioned frustratedly. It had driven Raschid into his current dark, smouldering mood. For all his outer detachment, he seethed with intense emotion just beneath the surface.
‘He suggested that I learn Arabic.’ In an effort to dispel the tension she smiled.
His jawline hardened. ‘Do not make that effort for my benefit. It is not important to me,’ he asserted harshly.
All over again Polly experienced that lowering sense of rejection. This time, however, she controlled her anger. Reality had finally sunk in. She could evade it no longer. This arrogant, unfathomable male was her husband. If they were at daggers drawn now, it was her own fault; her foolish references to annulment and divorce must have taxed his patience to the limits. She had spouted hot air. Her pride had smarted under a candour that had only equalled her own.
Breathlessly she hurried to keep up with his long stride. He led her down a bewildering succession of corridors. The palace complex was vast, composed of a hotch-potch of two- and three-storey buildings, many of them fashioned round traditional inner courtyards, the various wings linked by passageways and staircases. She would need a map and a compass to get round on her own. As the thick walls echoed with their footsteps, she thought anxiously about the womenfolk awaiting her, glad that her father had been able to fill her in on the distaff side of the family.
King Reija had married three times. His first wife had died in childbirth. His second, Nurbah, was Raschid and Asif’s mother. For years she had suffered from a heart condition that had sentenced her to an invalid’s existence. Perhaps that was why her husband had chosen to marry again. His third wife, Muscar, had had a daughter, Jezra, who was now sixteen. That alliance had ended in divorce, although Jezra remained within her father’s household.
Apart from Jezra, there was Asif’s wife, Chassa. She was the mother of two baby girls, and she was only twenty-two. Polly had tried not to look aghast when her father had added that Chassa was expecting yet again, no doubt in pursuit of the baby boy without which no Arab husband could be satisfied.
Shying away from the too intimate tenor of her reflections, she glanced at Raschid and reddened. ‘What did you and your father argue about?’
‘That is not open to discussion. Suffice it to say that my father and I do not always share the same sense of humour.’ His expressive mouth tightened.
Annoyed by the curt brush-off, she said, ‘I don’t think I want to marry you again. Once was enough!’
He cast her a predatory half-smile. ‘But I wouldn’t dream of depriving you of the excitements of an Islamic wedding. To deny that to one who, not two short weeks ago, expressed her willingness to live as I live would be inconceivably cruel,’ he murmured with silken satire.
Polly trembled with indignation. Raschid mounted a marble staircase slightly ahead of her and then hung back for her to catch up. He was thinking about ‘her’ again. It was a wonder he hadn’t thrown himself into the grave with her. Polly frowned, shaken by the meanness of the thought and the quite unjustifiable annoyance from which it had sprung. Berah had died suddenly, tragically. What kind of man would he be if he did not remember?
At the head of the staircase he stilled. ‘I must leave you here. You will find my sister through that door to your left.’ His gleaming scrutiny lingered impenetrably on her. Before she could turn away he reached out a hand. ‘But first,’ he said huskily, drawing her inexorably closer and lifting a hand to lace long fingers with unnerving slowness into the tumbled fall of her h
air, ‘this.’
In the shadows of the wall he captured her lips urgently. ‘Open your mouth,’ he demanded, his breath fanning her cheek, and then his tongue hungrily plundered the intimacy she had denied him.
It was as if the ground fell away from beneath her feet. Her hands clutched at his shoulders for support. She had no control over the surge of hunger that sent a scorching flame to the very centre of her body. It controlled her. Raschid controlled her. In instinctive repulsion, Polly jerked her head back, devastated by the immediacy of her response to him.
‘You are quite right.’ His eyes were veiled, his mouth taut. ‘I forgot myself. This is not the place.’
‘I don’t think anywhere’s the place. If this is a marriage of convenience, why do we…?’ She swallowed, apprehensively measuring the midnight blue flare of his gaze. ‘You know what I’m saying.’