Heart of a Desert Warrior

“Yes, I think you would have.” He brushed her cheek. “You will make a wonderful mother.”

She didn’t answer, just kept his gaze for several long seconds filled with profundity she only hoped he felt, as well. Then Russell broke the spell, telling her he needed help with a measurement.

Feeling guilty for neglecting her work, Iris sprang to her feet to do so, but Asad grabbed her wrist.

She looked at him with question.

“I am glad you are here.”

“I am, too.” And she meant it from the very depth of her soul.

She only hoped she’d feel that way in a few weeks when it came time to leave. If he did not ask her to stay, she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t beg him to let her anyway.

What was pride in the face of love and the hope of a family?

*

Asad’s phone rang and he picked it up from his desk. “Hello.”

He was enjoying a rare day working in his office; Iris and Russell were testing samples in their portable lab.

“Hey, cousin.”

“Hakim.”

“How is Project Iris going?”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh, come on. You insisted she be the geologist for this study. You don’t think I was blind to your ulterior motives.”

“I wanted to help her move forward in her career.” And maybe he’d wanted her back in his bed, but now…he wanted more.

The certainty had grown with each passing day. They fit in a way he had never done with Badra, and Iris was so good with Nawar. She would be a fantastic stepmother because she understood what it meant to be rejected. Iris would never visit such a thing on a child, but particularly not a child she had shown so much genuine fondness for already.

“And?”

“Maybe more.”

“From the way the air sizzled between you even after six years’ separation, I’d say a lot more.”

Asad had told Hakim about his former relationship with Iris and expressed his guilt for hurting her when he ended it. The king had been one hundred percent behind Asad’s plan for some small restitution. Now he had to wonder if Hakim had not seen something all along that Asad had been blind to.

All he said however was, “Perhaps.”

“Have you convinced her yet?”

Into his bed, assuredly, not that he would say so to his cousin. But for the more?

“I do not know.” He only wished he did, but his aziz seemed to make it her goal in life to confuse him.

Hakim laughed. “Good.”

Asad verbally encouraged his cousin to do something with a camel that was not anatomically possible.

The king’s laughter sounded over the phone again, this time louder. “You deserve a woman who will keep you on your toes. I am glad you found Iris. I cannot even wish you had not screwed up so badly with her in the past—if you hadn’t you would not have Nawar and she is a delight.”

Asad could not argue with any of that. At one time, all he’d felt toward the very existence of Nawar was anger and disgust, though he’d been loath to admit it, even to himself. But the first time he’d held her, he’d known. He would love that child forever.

He thought it was possible he was in the same boat with Iris, though he wasn’t quite ready to admit it…again, even to himself. “I would stand on my head for this woman, but she seems oblivious to my every effort.”

“That’s quite an admission. Changed your mind about the whole love thing since the last time we talked?” Hakim asked in a tone that said he knew the answer already.

“What are you? A gossiping old woman? Wanting to know my feelings.”

Instead of getting offended, Hakim’s chuckle said he was mightily amused. “What has you so confused, cousin?”

“She will not allow me to call her aziz.” He’d made the mistake of letting it slip out the night before and he’d woken up to an empty bed, Iris’s pillow cold from her departure.

“Catherine wasn’t thrilled with me using endearments she didn’t think I meant, either.”

“But you meant them?” He had to have. Hakim loved his wife fiercely.

“Yes, though it took me a while to realize it. Have you figured it out yet?”

“I have never heard my grandfather tell my grandmother he loves her, but their marriage is as enduring as the mountains.” Personally, Asad could happily live the rest of his life without making himself that vulnerable.

So long as it didn’t mean losing Iris.

“You don’t know what he says in their private moments,” Hakim observed. “But more importantly, he has not given Aunt Genevieve cause to doubt him. My esteemed great-uncle treats his wife like she is the queen of his existence and always has.”

“I have done my utmost to treat Iris with great affection and care since she arrived in Kadar. I’ve given up working in my office, put off meetings with important business associates and politicians.”

“Does she know that?”

“Naturally not.” He did not wish to make her feel bad for the time he made for her.

“How is she supposed to know she’s become the queen of your world if you don’t tell her?”

“I did not say she was my queen. She will be my lady.”

“She’s going to be the Sha’b Al’najid’s lady. You want her to be your wife.”

“It is the same.”

“Don’t believe it.”

Asad grumbled, “Catherine ran you a merry chase.”

“She did and I have never regretted one moment of it, or joining my life with hers.”

“You once told me that Catherine had regretted it,” Asad said, carefully.

What if Iris came to regret her time with him? She’d made it pretty clear in the beginning that she’d regretted their time together six years ago. Though he knew that was his fault and no one else’s.

“It’s true. Catherine almost left me once,” Hakim agreed, old horror at the thought tingeing his voice. “Do you want to lose Iris again?”

“No.” That was one thing he had no doubts about.

“Then you have to convince her to stay.”

“I am doing my best.” Asad made no effort to hide his exasperation. “She is more than receptive to my lovemaking. She adores my daughter and my grandparents.”

“But you are not sure if she still loves you?” Hakim asked perceptively.

Asad frowned, though his cousin could not see it and then sighed. “Does it matter?”

“You tell me

.”

“What do I do?”

“Tell her the truth, that you brought her to Kadar to woo her into staying.”

But even he hadn’t known that was what he was doing at the time. Just as he’d been unaware of naming his daughter after Iris. Self-aware he was not, he thought cynically. “She’s already figured out that I was instrumental in her arrival here.”

“Does she know that most of the land she’s surveying is owned by your family?”

“No.”

“Maybe you should tell her.”

“Badra’s only interest was in my possessions.” He never wanted to see the light of avarice in Iris’s eyes.

Not that he would. Intellectually, he knew that, but there it was.

“Iris isn’t like that. Catherine and I only saw her for two days, but we worked that out immediately. The geologist will make you a much better wife than your late princess ever did.”

“Badra was never mine, no matter that she spoke vows.”

“And you were never hers.”

The truth of that would have taken Asad’s legs out from under him if he had not been sitting at his desk. “I love her,” he said with wonder and no small amount of trepidation. His heart and soul belonged to the introverted scientist irrevocably. “I always did.”

“Did you really just figure that out?” Hakim asked with disbelief.

“It’s not something I thought about.” Not until he’d had no choice but to do so.

“Catherine would say that’s something you should be telling Iris, not your cousin.”

“That I didn’t want to label my feelings for her?”

“That you have those feelings for her. I love you like a brother, I really do, but for all your brains, you can be dense, Asad.”

“You’re right.” It wasn’t easy admitting, but he had been beyond blind when it came to his feelings for Iris. If he’d had an ounce more self-awareness, he would never have left her in the States the first time. And that was something Iris needed to know. She deserved the words. “Your wife, on the other hand, is a brilliant woman.”

“She is that. She picked me, didn’t she?”

“Iris calls me arrogant. I think it’s a family trait.”

“Catherine is certain of it and is convinced I’ve already passed it on to our son.”