‘That is a good start,’ he mused. ‘For a honeymoon.’
But what kind of honeymoon? she wondered as the car bumped along an unmade track to the hunting lodge she had not visited for years, and a small sigh escaped from her lips.
‘What is it?’ he questioned.
‘I—I’d forgotten how beautiful it was,’ she sighed, as the long, low building which stood in the shadow of snow-peaked mountains came into view.
And he had forgotten how beautiful she was—even with her magnificent hair all shorn off. He had allowed her perfect profile and those high, delicious cheekbones to fade from the forefront of his mind. He had allowed the two of them to become worlds apart. And now surely they were worlds apart?
‘It’s been a long time,’ he agreed. ‘Too long since I was here, also.’
‘Seriously?’ She squinted her eyes to look at him. ‘But you used to come up here whenever possible!’
His smile was rueful. ‘You think that extended breaks go hand-in-hand with ruling a country the size of Quador?’
‘You don’t delegate?’
‘Delegate?’ He gave a short laugh. ‘Delegation is a luxury I can seldom afford, Jenna. Being accepted by my people means that my profile always needs to be high.’
‘But you are accepted by your people!’ she said, with sudden passion. ‘You know you are, Rashid!’
He smiled. ‘Careful! That sounded very nearly like a compliment!’
She laughed back, caught in the dark cross-fire of his eyes. ‘Hold your horses—I wouldn’t go that far!’
For a moment they shared the compatibility of days gone by, and Rashid felt his heart thunder like the pound of equine hooves. ‘Speaking of horses—are you hungry?’
Hungry? How could she be hungry for anything other than the taste of his lips on hers once more? She shook her head. ‘No, not a bit. I had a big breakfast. Why?’
‘Then shall we ride together, Jenna? As we used to?’
There was a heartbeat of a pause, but she hid her disappointment. ‘Yes, Sheikh,’ she answered quietly. ‘I would like that.’
The driver had come round to open the door of the car. ‘Let us go inside and change,’ Rashid said, and his voice had deepened.
Shown inside by a delighted servant, Jenna felt a peculiar mixture of relief and disappointment to d
iscover that she had been allocated her own separate room, complete with a large divan and a luxurious en suite bathroom. She guessed that Rashid had a mirror image, only larger—and she also guessed that this meant that they could spend nights apart should they wish. She told herself that royal custom decreed it, that it had always been so and that she must just accept it.
And wasn’t it easier to slither into her jodhpurs and a long-sleeved white shirt without those mocking black eyes fixed on her—reminding her that in every way that mattered this was not a real marriage.
But all her anxieties and fears were washed away when Rashid led her into the stables and she was confronted by the sight of the Arab mare whose golden-brown and gleaming skin did, as Rashid had once commented, so cleverly mimic her own.
For a moment she was speechless, and then she turned to him, her eyes wide and brimming with tears which were not just about the horse. ‘Pasha!’ she whispered. ‘Can it really be so?’
‘Of course.’ His voice was very soft, but his heart beat strangely as he saw the luminous amber gaze she directed at him. ‘Did you think that once you had left for America I would let your father sell her to a stranger?’
Jenna put her arms around the horse and pressed her face close to its warm neck, breathing in the scent of a long-forgotten youth. ‘Why, Rashid?’
‘Because the horse belongs to you, Jenna, and always shall.’ His voice deepened into a sultry caress. ‘Just as you shall always belong to me.’
She thought that the words sounded more like a stamp of possession than any declaration of affection, but at least he wasn’t seducing her with false promises. Still with her arm draped around the horse’s neck, she stared into the irresistible dark glitter of his eyes. She didn’t want to be only half a wife, she realised.
His words to her came filtering painfully back. He would not beg her, and if she came to him it must be as one who was willing.
Should that moment be now?
But the eyes of the bodyguards who stood discreetly in the shadows of the stables were upon them, and Rashid would not approve of a display of feelings in front of his staff.