Jenna sent one of the bodyguards out with her lady-in-waiting to pick up a coat she had ordered from one of London’s most exclusive department stores and then she dressed in some of Nadia’s unashamedly American clothes.
And by nine o’clock that evening she found herself safely alone in Paris, speeding along in a taxi towards the Splendide, where Rashid always stayed when he was in the city.
Unless he was at Chantal’s, she thought, with a painful lurch of her heart.
She went straight up to his suite and the door was opened by Abdullah, his look of confusion quickly becoming one of wariness as he registered just who it was standing there, in blue jeans and a black leather jacket.
‘Mistress,’ he said slowly
, and bowed his head.
‘I have come to see the Sheikh.’
There was a pause. ‘The Sheikh is not expecting you.’
It was unmistakably a reprimand, but Jenna forced a smile onto lips which felt as though they had been carved from ice. ‘I want to surprise him.’
‘The Sheikh is not here, mistress.’
‘And I suppose you’re not going to tell me where he is, Abdullah?’
‘You know that I cannot do that, mistress.’
Her skin prickled and her smile faded as she marched past him. ‘Then I shall wait.’
She didn’t have to wait long. She had only been slumped in an armchair for less than ten minutes, watching a French soap opera in a vain attempt to try to keep her heart-rending thoughts at bay, when Rashid entered the luxury suite.
She heard him before she saw him. Heard the urgent words spoken to him in an undertone by Abdullah. And then suddenly he was there, filling the room with his magnificent and rather daunting presence. She searched his impassive face for any tell-tale signs of betrayal. Where had he been? Had his naked limbs been entwined with Chantal’s? Where had he been?
He stood looking at her, his face as dark and as unforgiving as thunder, but she was too angry to care.
‘Would you care to explain the meaning of this unwarranted intrusion?’ he hissed.
Intrusion! ‘And would you care to explain just where you have been until this hour?’ she retorted furiously.
‘I’ll tell you where I have been, you little fool—I have been at the British Embassy in an attempt to find out your whereabouts!’ he stormed. ‘I have had half the police force in London scouring the city. And your sister—who I gather you were supposed to be meeting—is nowhere to be found either! What the hell are you doing here, Jenna? And where the hell are your bodyguards?’
‘I gave them the slip!’ she boasted, blithely ignoring the look of dark menace on his face. ‘I dressed as Nadia and took the shuttle from London!’
‘You did what?’
‘You heard!’
He was almost beside himself with fury as he strode over to confront her, and he very nearly hauled her angrily into his arms—until he reminded himself what would happen if he did that. ‘You fool,’ he grated again. ‘Didn’t you stop to think about the danger you were placing yourself in?’
‘I can take care of myself, Rashid! I did without bodyguards for most of my life and I can function perfectly well without them!’
‘Not as my wife, you can’t!’
‘Oh, your wife!’ she scorned. ‘What’s in a name? What kind of a wife am I, Rashid? And, more importantly, what kind of a husband are you?’
He went very still. ‘And just what is that supposed to mean?’
‘Think about it!’ she stormed, but at least she felt alive again. At least the tiptoeing around his feelings and trying to guess at his needs had been replaced by a vivid but liberating honesty. ‘What have you been doing since you’ve been in Paris?’
The black eyes glittered dangerously. ‘What do you think I’ve been doing, Jenna?’
The bitter words came tumbling out before she could stop them. ‘Making love to your mistress, I expect! Chantal! I expect it’s nearly killed you to be faithful to me for six long months, hasn’t it, Rashid? Assuming, of course, that you have been faithful?’