Back in her bedroom, she stuffed her ripped panties into the bin, dressed in jeans and a sweater and then found her old jodhpurs at the back of the wardrobe and began packing a suitcase. Layering in casual clothes and T-shirts plus a couple of smarter dresses, she went over to the bookcase and picked out a couple of long-neglected books. By the time she got downstairs, the helicopter had landed on the back field and Saladin was standing beside the Christmas tree, still talking into his cell phone.
He cut the connection immediately, but his eyes didn’t seem particularly warm as he turned to look at her, and he made no attempt to touch her as she walked over to him. There was no lingering kiss acknowledging their shared intimacy. No arm placed casually around her shoulder. Anyone observing them would have assumed that they were simply boss and employee, not two people who, a short time ago, had been writhing around in ecstasy together upstairs.
Boss and employee.
Which was exactly what they were.
‘Your hair is still wet,’ he observed. ‘You’ll get cold.’
Trying to ignore his critical stare, Livvy forced a smile. ‘I have a woolly hat I can wear.’
‘As you wish.’ He glanced around. ‘Do you need to lock up the house?’
‘No, I thought I’d leave the doors open to see if any seasonal burglar fancies taking their chances,’ she replied sarcastically. ‘Of course I need to lock the house up!’
She wanted him to stop talking to her as if he were a robot and to kiss her again. To convince her that what had happened last night hadn’t been some crazy kind of dream that was fading by the second.
But he didn’t. He seemed suddenly distant. As if he had retreated behind an invisible barrier she couldn’t access. Instead of being her cajoling and vital lover, he had effortlessly morphed into his real role of lofty and exalted sheikh.
Like a scene from an adventure movie, she found herself following him across the dark and snowy grass towards the helicopter, beside which stood a couple of burly men who bowed deeply before the sheikh before speaking in a fast and foreign tongue. Briefly, she wondered how Saladin was explaining the presence of a pale-faced woman in a woolly hat who was accompanying him.
With the helicopter lights flickering they flew over the night-time countryside to an airstrip, where a private jet was waiting. Aware of the veiled glances of his advisors, Livvy boarded the sleek plane, whose sides were adorned with the royal crest, startled to discover that she and the sheikh would be sitting separately during the flight.
She wondered if he saw her look of surprise just before one of the stewards ushered her through a door at the rear, to a much smaller section of the plane—though, admittedly, one that contained its own bed. Pulling out her books and music from her holdall, she looked around. Actually, there was a TV screen—and a neat little bathroom offering a tempting display of soaps and perfume. But even so...
Moments later, Saladin came to find her—all quietly brooding power as he stood in the doorway with his cool black eyes surveying her.
‘You are satisfied with your seat, I hope?’ he questioned.
She was trying hard not to show she was hurt—but suddenly it wasn’t easy to bite back the feelings that were bubbling up inside her. ‘I wasn’t expecting us to be sitting apart. Not after...’ She clamped her lips shut, aware of having said too much. Did expressing vulnerability count as tenderness? she wondered.
He glanced over his shoulder before lowering his voice. ‘Not after having had sex with you—is that what you mean?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she mumbled.
‘It does,’ he said, suddenly breaking into an angry torrent of Jazratian, which was directed at the hapless steward who had appeared at the doorway behind him, but who now beat a hasty retreat. ‘It matters because I’m afraid this is how things are going to be from now on.’
She stared at him, not quite understanding what he meant until his stony expression told her more clearly than any words could have done. ‘You mean—?’
‘What happened in England must stay in England, for we cannot be intimate in Jazratan,’ he said. ‘The laws of my country are very strict on such matters—and it would offend my people deeply if it was discovered that I was having sex with an unmarried woman. Particularly an unmarried foreigner.’ He shrugged, as if to take some of the heat from his words. ‘For I am the sheikh and you are my employee, Livvy, and from now on we will not be stepping outside the boundaries of those roles.’
It was several moments before Livvy could trust herself to speak, and if the giant plane hadn’t already been taxiing down the runway, she honestly thought she might have run up to the steward and demanded they let her out.
But she couldn’t. She had agreed to take the job and she was going to have to behave like a professional. And anyway—mightn’t this strategy be the best strategy for keeping her emotions protected? If she and Saladin were to be segregated, it would be very difficult to foster any kind of attachment to him. So even though his words hurt, somehow she found the strength to force a careless smile onto her lips.
‘Well, that’s a relief,’ she said.
His black eyes narrowed. ‘A relief?’
‘Sure. I’ve got a lot of reading I want to get through before we land. I told you it was a long time since I’d worked with horses.’ With a wave of her hand, she gestured towards the books she’d just unpacked. ‘So I’d better have a browse through these. Reacquaint myself with the species, even if it’s only theoretical—until I get to meet Burkaan. So please don’t let me keep you,’ she added. ‘I’ll be perfectly happy here on my own.’
His face was a picture—as if he’d just realised that in effect she was dismissing him—yet he could hardly object to her demand for privacy after what he’d just said.
But once he’d gone, and she was left with the opened but unread pages of Healing Horses Naturally, Livvy found herself staring out of the window at the black sky as England receded, unable to deny the sudden pain that clenched like a vice around her heart.
He’d made her sound...
Like a cliché.