Bella and the Merciless Sheikh

‘Before I was sent off to boarding school, I never thought about how I looked.’ It was something that hadn’t occurred to her before. ‘I just spent my whole life in the stables. With the horses.’ And being forced to exist without them had been torture.

‘You owned a horse as a child?’

Thinking of the stable full of horses at Balfour Manor, Bella flushed. ‘Well, I…rode quite often, yes. But not lately—’ Lately she’d been too busy messing up her life. ‘As a child it was my hobby.’ She hesitated, looking back on those days with a slightly sick feeling. ‘Three-day eventing—I don’t know if you have that here. Dressage, cross-country and show jumping.’

Should she have told him that much about herself? Bella stared at Amira’s mane, wishing she’d kept her mouth shut but then she reassured herself that Zafiq didn’t know anything about her past. He wasn’t going to know she’d been selected for the junior eventing squad when she was sixteen. He wasn’t going to have seen the newspaper coverage about her blowing her big chance.

‘Eventing takes considerable all-round skill.’ He looked at her with new respect. ‘Here, our passion is flat racing. It is a tradition that goes back centuries.’

‘On a race track?’

‘We have a famous race track in Al-Rafid, but the Al-Rafid Cup is raced in the desert.’

‘Isn’t that tough on the horses?’

‘It is a short race, run in the early morning when the air is cooler.’

‘But if someone really is trying to steal Amira, how are you going to keep her safe?’

‘She is safe here, with us.’

Us.

Bella wondered if he even realised what he’d said. Somehow over the past few days, they’d become a pair. A unit.

She concentrated again on the horse’s mane, terrified by what she was feeling. This man wasn’t right for her and this life wasn’t real, so why was she suddenly wishing she could stay in the desert forever?

Shaken by the thought, she glanced at the black stallion, who was prancing along the sand sideways, desperate to be allowed another burst of speed. ‘He’s so beautiful I’m surprised no one has tried to steal him too.’

‘Batal is infamous for his uncertain temper,’ Zafiq said drily. ‘No one who prefers their bones to be attached to one another, would steal this stallion.’

‘I think he’s a very genuine, gentle horse.’

‘With you he does seem to be astonishingly well behaved.’ Zafiq gave a faint smile. ‘It’s a compliment. Batal isn’t renowned for his people skills. If he were human he would have been sent to anger-management classes long ago.’

‘I think he’s sulking because Amira almost beat him in the race.’ Bella watched as the stallion’s ears twitched. ‘Are you afraid of being beaten by a woman, Batal? Just like your master. That’s why I had to let him win in the pool. To protect his male ego.’

‘My ego needs no protection,’ Zafiq drawled, and Bella narrowed her eyes and shifted in her saddle.

‘Race me again, then. No favours. The gloves are off.’

‘You are incapable of racing fairly. I can guarantee that the moment I’m about to start, you will remove your top or smile at me.’

Bella laughed. ‘Am I that bad?’

‘You are the most maddening, infuriating and seductive woman I’ve ever met.’

Her stomach flipped. They weren’t words of affection, but hearing that he found her seductive was better than nothing.

Flustered, she changed the subject again. ‘So shouldn’t we tell the stables that Amira is safe with you? They’ll think she’s been stolen.’