But he wasn’t going to do that. She would regret soon enough having turned him down and discover that he had no intention of chasing after her all the way to the altar. Did she really think a man in his position would ever have to grovel to a woman? His lips hardened into a smile.
Let her come to him.
‘So what exactly is it you want of me, Jazz?’ he enquired casually.
It was a question Jasmine had never thought he’d ask. She knew what she’d wanted when they’d been together before but had accepted she was never going to get it. Because you couldn’t demand love when instinct told you that love was an alien concept to a man like Zuhal. But she could discover more about the man who had always been a closed book to her when they had been casual lovers, couldn’t she?
‘Obviously, I’d like to learn about your country and your culture, Zuhal. But I’d also like to learn more about you.’
‘Even though you’ve just turned down a method guaranteed to do exactly that?’
‘I didn’t find out much about you in all the time we were together, did I? And we were having plenty of sex back then.’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘There are official biographies you can look at,’ he said coolly. ‘Which have always been in the public domain. We even have the authorised versions here in the palace library, which you are perfectly at liberty to read.’
She shook her head. ‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Oh?’
It was the most forbidding of looks and maybe if so much hadn’t been at stake, Jasmine might have heeded its silent warning. But there was a potential marriage to consider, and it had to have the makings of a good one for her to risk putting Darius at its centre. And how could she consider marrying a man who remained little more than a stranger?
‘I want to hear it from you, Zuhal,’ she said. ‘From your lips, not somebody else’s.’
She saw his face darken with frustration, irritation and then a grim kind of acceptance. ‘Very well,’ he said at last, bending to pick up the discarded headdress which she had pulled from his head. ‘You’d better speak to my diary secretary.’
‘Your diary secretary?’ she echoed in confusion.
‘Of course.’ He gave the flicker of a smile edged with undeniable triumph. ‘How else did you think I was going to find time to see you? I am King now, with many demands on my time. Speaking of which…’ he glanced at his watch ‘… I must leave you now, since I have work to do.’
She blinked. ‘What, now?’
His black eyes glittered. ‘There is always work to do, Jazz, no matter what the clock says. And since the evening has fallen far short of my expectations, I might as well put what remains of it to good use. I will show you back to your rooms and anything you require, just ring and one of the servants will attend to you.’
A peremptory wave of his hand indicated she should precede him. But it did more than that—it made it very clear who was in charge.
Jasmine opened her mouth to object before shutting it again, because what could she say? She had turned down his proposal and now he was suggesting she make an appointment to see him, in the same way he might schedule in an appointment with his dentist! And meanwhile that vast and rumpled bed was mocking her with all its unused promise.
The bubble of the evening seemed to have burst. She walked ahead of him, hearing the soft shimmer of his robes brushing over the marble floor as he followed her. And all she could think about was the powerful perfection of his brooding body and the way it had felt when he’d held her in his arms again, as she tried to quash a deep and overwhelming sense of regret.
CHAPTER NINE
IT SHOULD HAVE been a fairy tale. At least, that was how it might have looked to an outsider. A one-time single mother plucked from her humble abode and transplanted into a glittering, golden palace by a sheikh who was eager for her to be his bride.
A lump rose in Jasmine’s throat. Because this was no fairy tale. This was living in a gilded prison.
It was true she’d been meeting all kinds of new people—from royal monarchs who ruled neighbouring countries to the noblemen and women of Razrastan itself. She’d sat beneath sparkling chandeliers, wearing a fortune in diamond
s around her neck—while discussing with the American ambassador the proposed trip by the President of the United States of America!
Those were the facts.
The irrefutable facts.
But facts only told you so much. They only showed you the supposedly smooth surface—not the dark undercurrents which were swirling beneath. She might be the mother of the Sheikh’s baby, and they might be polite and perfectly civil with each other in public. But in reality they’d barely spent any time alone since she had rejected Zuhal’s sexual advances, and the subject of marriage was still unresolved.
She’d wanted to get to know him before making any firm commitment, but how was that possible when palace life seemed the enemy of intimacy? When meals were distinctly formal and featured guests Zuhal thought it prudent she meet. During course after endless course, streams of servants weaved their way in and out, bearing extravagant dishes heaped with Razrastanian specialities, whose very names dazzled her. None of the servants ever met her eyes. They seemed to look right through her. She suspected they disapproved of this Englishwoman who had entered their royal palace with an illegitimate baby in tow. Maybe they were glad there had been no official acknowledgement of her role in the Sheikh’s life.
And none of these functions offered any opportunity for private conversation with Zuhal because he was always sitting at the far end of the table, looking impossibly aloof and regal. Why, the physical distance between them was so great, that just getting him to hear her meant she almost had to shout. Just as there had been no shared moments of parenting with him. It seemed he made time to see his son only when he was certain Jasmine wasn’t around and she wondered if he was punishing her for refusing his proposal, by deliberately keeping his distance. On more than one occasion, she had emerged from her dressing room, her hair still damp from the shower, to see the silky shimmer of the Sheikh’s pale robes disappearing through the tall, arched doorway.