Another time it would have made Sadie smile gently to see how carefully Hakeem pronounced the unfamiliar word. But how could she smile when she had just heard about such a tragedy?
‘It is unusual to hear of a Dhurahni prince marrying a European girl,’ she told Hakeem, guessing that she was expected to make some comment on her story.
‘Not so here. Here it is tradition,’ Hakeem corrected her firmly.
Before Sadie could question her any further, she indicated a pair of heavily carved dark, polished doors in front of them, and said, ‘Ahmed will be waiting for you outside the doors to the women’s quarters to escort you to His Highness, sheikha.’ She then salaamed gracefully and backed away from Sadie.
‘Hakeem—’ Sadie began, about to question the maid’s manner of addressing her. But it was too late. The double doors were opening and Ahmed was now salaaming to her.
He led her not back to the room, where she had seen Drax last night, but down a corridor and then through a large room ornately decorated, its furniture heavily gilded and its low sofas piled high with richly jewelled silk cushions.
At one end there was a raised dais with two throne-like chairs on it, and Sadie guessed that the room must be the audience chamber where the brothers held their formal divan—the event at which any subject could present his petition to his rulers and be heard.
However, they still had to negotiate another long corridor before finally Ahmed led her across a square hallway so plain in its architectural design and furnishings that the contrast between it and the rooms she had just seen was like receiving a glass of cold pure water after the stickiness of spiced wine.
The floor of the hallway was tiled with matt black tiles. A stairway led to an upper gallery, its banister carved out of some ebony-coloured wood, the symmetry of its curves so perfect and plain that it made Sadie catch her breath.
After knocking briefly on the closed double doors, and then opening them for her, indicating that she was to step through, Ahmed salaamed again and then backed away.
A little hesitantly, Sadie walked through the doors. The room beyond them was as modern and breathtaking as the hallway, and three times the size. It was a combination of a living area and an office, its furniture made from the same dark wood as the stairs, the seating streamlined and stylish.
A huge plate glass window looked out onto a courtyard, enclosed on three sides by the modern architecture of the building, with a large swimming pool at the far end.
Awed, she stared at the pool—and then realised it was occupied. Her heart thumped heavily into her ribs as she watched Drax place his hands on the walkway, his flesh hard and tanned, the water running off his shoulders and chest, and spring lithely out of the water, completely naked, before turning his back towards her as he reached for the robe on a recliner. Her heart was racing so frantically she had to breathe faster to keep up with it. Had he been naked? Or had she just thought that he was? Had that brief glimpse of male nudity before he turned his back on her been the product of her imagination? Surely he wouldn’t have swum naked knowing that he might be seen? Why not? an inner voice challenged her. He was one of the ruling Princes of a rich Arab kingdom, and so arrogant that he probably did exactly what he felt like when he felt like it. Who was there to stop or question him after all?
He had disappeared out of sight, but her heartbeat still hadn’t returned to normal.
‘You were admiring the view?’
The sound of his voice behind her had her swinging around, her face burning. While she had been staring out into the courtyard like an awestruck virgin, he had entered the room and was now walking towards her, still wearing his robe and making a very subtle and mocking reference to the fact that she had seen him getting out of the pool.
Well, two could play at that game, Sadie decided angrily.
‘It’s a very clever effect,’ she answered him coolly. ‘Very pared down and sparse. I like the clean lines and the sense of space—although of course we all know that it is merely a trick of the design that makes less look more.’
She was quick—and clever, Drax acknowledged. He had embarrassed her, he knew that, but she still had the wit to parry words with him. But how long would she be able to keep it up? Drax decided to put her to the test.
‘And, like most of your sex, you always opt for more—is that it?’
She was getting into deep water now, Sadie admitted uncomfortably, all too aware of the double meaning behind the mocking words.
‘It surprised me to see such modern architecture…’ She had meant to bring the subtle double entendre element to their conversation to an end with her reply, but when she saw the way he was looking at her, her expression gave her away. ‘I mean, all of this…’ she amended hastily, waving her hand in the direction of the entire room. ‘It is lovely but…not what I expected.’
‘So that is twice this morning you have witnessed something you weren’t expecting, then?’
Sadie opened her mouth and then closed it again. Her whole body was burning now.
‘Such embarrassment—and all over a glimpse of a naked male body,’ he taunted her softly. ‘You surprise me, Sadie. I had thought you would be rather more sophisticated.’ He gave a dismissive shrug. ‘I’m sorry if you were embarrassed, but I didn’t realise Ahmed had shown you in here until it was too late.’
Inwardly Drax was thinking that Vere would be pleased that she was so easily embarrassed. It pointed to a genuine lack of experience that would please his fastidious brother. As it pleased him? He frowned. Why should he have any personal opinions on the matter of her experience or lack of it?
‘He did knock on the door.’ Sadie didn’t want him thinking she had come in of her own accord, or that she had wanted to catch sight of him levering himself out of the pool.
Drax gave another small shrug. ‘It isn’t important. As I’ve already said, I’m sorry you were embarrassed. Now, I shall ring for Ahmed to bring you some coffee, and I’ll go and get dressed. I want to show you the building we intend to use as the headquarters for our new financial sector. We’ve put aside a hundred acres of land which will be used exclusively to house the financial business sector. The main building has already been constructed and is finished, ready for use.’ And, as Vere had already said, they would be left with it on their hands if their meetings failed and they did not get approval to go ahead.
Although Drax was covered from his throat to below his knees by his robe, Sadie was acutely aware that beneath it he was naked—and male. Very male indeed, if her brief glimpse of him had been accurate. Not that she had seen enough nude men in the flesh to compare. But it had been obvious to her that Drax was boldly ‘endowed’, as the saying went.
Drax knew that he was embarrassing her, Sadie recognised.