‘But he is there?’ She was clutching Mac’s card so tightly, she had crumpled it, Lucy realised as she waited for an answer. ‘And if he is, may I speak to him, please?’ she persisted, remembering who had made her brave. ‘It’s of the utmost importance.’
‘May I enquire what your business is?’
Mac was there. She knew it. She clutched the phone to her chest, her heart hammering so hard she was sure the man could hear it beating in Isla de Sinnebar. She put the phone to her ear again. ‘I’m afraid it’s personal. Perhaps I could meet with him?’ She had no intention of telling some stranger her business—but if she could just get into the building, maybe she could find Mac.
‘You cannot possibly make an appointment to see—’
Cannot possibly? She held the phone away from her ear. Was Mac contagious? Had he suddenly become so aloof, so untouchable, he wouldn’t speak to people he knew? ‘But I know him,’ she protested, ‘and I’m sure he’ll want to speak to me.’
There was silence and then a rather offensive laugh. ‘You cannot imagine how many people say the same thing,’ the man derided.
How many women? Lucy wondered.
Her heart shrank to the size of a bitter, joyless nut. Suddenly she saw how it must sound—a young girl that no one had heard of rang up to demand an appointment with the head of a large multinational corporation…
‘And in any case,’ the man rapped dismissively, ‘we have a public holiday coming up so there would be no one here to see you. Should you be so foolish enough to decide to come you’ll find no one here—everywhere will be shut from—’
‘From when?’ Lucy demanded eagerly.
‘From Thursday,’ he said, sounding surprised that she hadn’t folded yet.
In three days’ time. ‘Perfect. Can we arrange our meeting for Wednesday?’
‘Our meeting?’ There was silence as the man absorbed her sleight of hand. ‘I don’t think you heard me. There can be no meeting, Ms—’
‘Miss Tennant—’
‘Goodbye, Miss Tennant.’
Lucy stared at the silent receiver in disbelief. How rude. It was another dead end, but she couldn’t leave it here. She was shaking and not feeling brave at all after such a humiliating put-down, but with the baby to consider nothing would stop her seeing Mac. Dialling the operator, she got ready to book her flight.
Chapter Nine
THE purser on board had just announced they would soon be landing in Isla de Sinnebar. Consumed with curiosity, Lucy stared out of her tiny window as the commercial jet swooped in low over an azure sea. Tiny dots of white marked the passage of sailing boats while a patchwork quilt of ivory, green, gold and tan land stretched away towards distant purple mountains. As the plane banked a city came into view. White spires half hidden in a heat haze. No wonder Mac had an office here. If the rest of Isla de Sinnebar was half as magical as it appeared from the air, he was a lucky man.
A lucky man in so many ways. He was about to become a father. If Mac felt only a fraction of the love she already felt for their baby, he would be the luckiest man alive. She fretted as she thought about it, knowing she could only hope he would love their baby, and only hope that he would make time in his busy working life to see something of their child. He would miss so much if he didn’t—and she couldn’t wish that on him.
Resolutely, Lucy cleared her mind. It was early morning, and she planned to travel straight to Mac’s office from the airport and wait for as long as it took to see him. She had to be businesslike and determined. This wasn’t a social call. Her baby’s happiness, and, yes, Mac’s happiness depended on a successful outcome to this visit. And time was tight. Until she got a new job her savings from the ski season had to be eked out, and, much as she would have liked to, she had allowed no time for sightseeing on the Isla de Sinnebar, and just thirty-six hours for discussions with Mac on the way forward. Her homeward flight was booked in two days’ time, just before the public holiday closed everything down.
Dragging her gaze away from the window, Lucy tried to contain her emotions. Fear and apprehension at what lay ahead of her in a country she didn’t know competed with her blind faith in what she believed would be Mac’s instinctive love for their child. She had to believe he would be thrilled by her news, especially when she reassured him that she was going to take on full parenting responsibility, bringing up their baby as a single mother. But with so little settled it was hard to stop doubt setting in.
She had to concentrate on the positive, she told herself; even on such a short visit she could absorb so many things in a land of eternal sunshine where everything was new to her, but before she could do that she had to change her clothes before the seat belt sign lit up. She had worn a tracksuit for the twelve-hour flight, but had brought a lightweight business suit to wear when she met Mac. She was carrying such momentous news she had left nothing to chance. She must look professional and in control when she met him. She had even run a number of scenarios in her mind to work out how he might react when he heard the news. The only thing she was sure about was that it was important to keep her cool—and in every respect. Her time with Mac was done. She had to face that and get over it. She had a baby to think about now.
Everything ran like clockwork. The airport terminal was a haven of calm, clean efficiency, and the cabs were lined up outside the exit door. Lucy began to relax and to believe that in this sunlit, purposeful country things could only work out well for her.
Everything was so exotic she couldn’t stop staring around and had to be reminded with a gentle nudge from a kindly woman standing behind her to move along in the queue. How hard was it to believe that she was here—surrounded by the swish of robes, the click of prayer beads, the faint scent of spice in the air, and the pad of sandalled feet? How could she not feel excited—by the sight of everything around her and the thought of seeing Mac again?
Well…She’d warned herself that he might not exactly welcome her with open arms. And that was before she told him her news. But for now with her heart thundering in her chest she would feast her eyes on his country and, though she might not have long here, she would make the most of every minute so she could tell her baby about it one day.
He had stamped his authority on the kingdom in the first few hours of ascending the Phoenix throne. He had been conducting from the wings as CEO of Maktabi Communications with an office in the capital of Isla de Sinnebar, but now he was firmly established centre stage. The learning curve had been steep for those of his courtiers who were used to the old, lax ways—and for men like his cousin Leila’s father, who had imagined the playboy prince would be an easy target when he became King. They should have realised his success in business was founded on his overseeing everything, and that he might be expected to run a country to the benefit of its people in exactly the same way. There would be no sleaze, no corruption, no royal favourites; no exceptions. Even he would have to learn to live within the tight moral structure he had laid out in law. His personal life would be an arid desert until the day he took a wife—and even then he didn’t expect love to enter the equation; mutual respect was the most he could expect.
All this activity, along with the eighteen-hour days that accompanied it, should have come as a relief, because it left no time to dream about a young woman who would have been a breath of fresh air amongst all the girls they tried to foist on him now he was the ruling Sheikh. His new powers had encouraged a steady parade of dunderheads with porcelain teeth and falsely i
nflated bosoms to pay court to him, along with those who had to be dusted down as they were removed from the shelf. When he compared any of them to a girl too honest for her own good and as natural as sunlight, he was tempted to swear off women for life. She might not know it, but Lucy Tennant was as rare a find as a flower in the desert. And like that flower he had carelessly trampled her underfoot.
For Lucy the drive to Maktabi Communications was an education in itself. There was clearly order in Isla de Sinnebar, and a respect for the history and tradition of the ancient land that went as far as a camel lane on the six-lane highway. There was a respect for the environment too. Lucy had yet to see a single piece of litter, or graffiti, and the wide, perfectly constructed roads were lined with vivid banks of flowers.
Flowers in the desert, Lucy mused, settling back in her seat as the cab she’d taken from the airport turned onto a slip road, heading for the city, and one rampant lion waiting somewhere close by. The thought that she was getting closer to Mac with every yard the cab travelled had an inevitability about it that made her quiver with excitement and doubt her own sanity all in the same instant. Instinctively cradling her stomach, she wished she could reassure her baby that this was for the best, and that whatever happened her mother would protect her.