She knew where he had gone because it was the cafe that was transformed into the breakfast area in the morning.
There were several five-star restaurants in the complex and the cafe was the least formal of all.
At a little after eleven, it was still busy, with people coming and going. The crowd were all elegant, expensively dressed, and the mix of different languages as they chattered past her made Celia smile. This was a land of such contrasts, a place where people converged from all over the world, rich in diversity and ancient in its heritage.
Which made her think of the perfect evening they had shared at the desert. Leandro had put real thought into doing something special on their last evening in Dubai and he would have been utterly perplexed by the way she had thrown the gesture back in his face.
This wasn’t abouthim.This was aboutherand it suddenly felt imperative that she set things back on the right track.
Fired up with a new sense of purpose, Celia almost missed Leandro because she was so certain that she would find him at the long mirrored bar, which was still buzzing with people.
Standing in the doorway, she looked around, taking in the huge room as a whole. It was cleverly divided by tall, leafy trees in huge urns, and circular seating wrapped around marble-topped tables sectioned off private seating areas. Elsewhere, there were low, informal sofas with tables and more formal arrangements for dining.
Mostly people were standing with just a handful of diners sitting at some of the tables, having heaven only knew what manner of late-night snacks.
Eyes flitting then returning to the tall, languid figure leaning against the wall at the back, Celia felt her heart begin to beat fast.
Leandro was holding the glass of apricot juice and he was chatting to a young woman so stunningly beautiful that she took Celia’s breath away.
Her hair was short and sharp and raven-black and she was slender as a willow, wearing figure-hugging trousers and a bright red top that managed to be prim and ridiculously sexy at the same time.
She saw Leandro glance at his watch, smile, prepare to move off.
Nothing about his demeanour spoke of anything suspicious at all. He wasn’t standing too close to his companion and his expression was polite and friendly, but nothing more than that.
So why did she suddenly feel as though the world were tilting on its axis?
Old insecurities rose up with a vengeance and she was catapulted unfairly back to how she had felt when she had found out that Martin had found someone else, someone tall and beautiful and quite the opposite ofher.
She’d feltwanting. It was the same feeling that hit her now like a wave and she stood there, eyes wide, trembling and trying to kill the feeling because there was no place for it in this scenario.
But she was rooted to the spot.
Leandro, on the other side of the room, was startled because he’d been chatting to the Princess for longer than he’d thought but out of politeness it had been impossible for him to get away.
She’d spotted him and hived off from the group of friends she had come with so that she could tell him all about the latest family sagas, of which there were many.
Leandro had met Leila several times and had helped her with various university application forms, guiding her in her choice of subject and giving her the rundown on what Cambridge as a town was like because that had been her choice of university.
But even as he’d been chatting, his mind had been taken up with Celia.
He’d hated her withdrawal. It had made him realise how much he’d become accustomed to the easiness that existed between them. The silences between them were as comfortable as the chat and for Leandro that said a lot, although he was only now realising how much.
He glanced idly at the exit, ready to make his polite excuses because a tipsy Princess looked set to talk for England while her bodyguards, discreetly positioned by the bar, tried to stifle their yawns.
He saw Celia just as she spotted him and their eyes met, homing in on each other and eliminating everything else that was extraneous, from the milling late-night crowd to the sound of talk and laughter. The expression on her face was open and honest before she had time to think about adjusting it.
She was...hurt.
‘Excuse me, Leila, I really have to go—’
‘So soon, Leandro? Come join us for dinner!’
Leandro smiled but he was already straightening and his eyes were still on Celia. ‘I feel my age enough as it is chatting to you, Leila. Ten minutes surrounded by your peers and the hair on my head will start going grey!’
He detached himself, headed towards the exit to where Celia hadn’t moved although her expression had smoothed over, was now polite and distant.
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked. He ushered her away from the cafe, back into the lobby and towards the bank of lifts, still holding the juice in one hand.