CHAPTER EIGHT
‘THANKYOU.’SAFIYAHnodded to the maid who was turning down the bed. ‘That’s all for tonight.’
With a curtsey the woman left. Instantly Safiyah put down her hairbrush and shot to her feet. She was too restless to sit.
Each passing day had fed the awful mix of anticipation and dismay that had taken root inside her. The three days of public celebrations had passed in a whirl of colour, faces and good wishes. At the end of it, almost swaying with exhaustion and nerves, Safiyah had prepared herself for a showdown with Karim.
He’d said he’d come to her when the wedding was over. To claim his marital rights. As if she were his possession, to do with as he wished.
Inevitably the idea had stirred anger. Yet if she were totally honest it wasn’t just anger brewing in her belly.
But Karim hadn’t come to her room on the final night of the celebrations.
Nor had he in the ten days that had passed since the end of the festivities.
Ten days!
Each night she’d prepared to face him and each night he’d failed to show.
He’d clearly changed his mind about his demand that she sleep with him. Or maybe he hadn’t been serious at all—had just wanted to watch her squirm.
What had she done to make him despise her so much?
Safiyah felt her thoughts tracking down that well-worn trail, but she refused to head there again. Instead she crossed the room, hauling off her robe and nightgown as she went, tossing them onto the bed. Seconds later she’d pulled on trousers and a shirt. Socks and boots.
She’d had enough of being cooped up with her thoughts. Her sister had gone home after the wedding and Safiyah, always careful not to burden Rana, had smiled and sent her off rather than beg her to stay. How she wished she had someone to talk to now.
What she needed was to get out. At least here in the summer palace, just beyond the outskirts of the capital, she had the means to do just that. For her lovely chestnut mare, a wedding gift from Karim, was stabled downstairs.
To anyone who cared to enquire, the Sheikh and Sheikha had begun their delayed honeymoon today. The small, secluded summer palace was close enough to the city for Karim to be on hand should anything significant need his attention, but the location between two idyllic beaches was totally private—perfect for newlyweds.
If the newlyweds had been at all interested in each other!
She hadn’t seen Karim since they’d arrived. He’d headed straight to his office, trailed by a couple of secretaries, leaving Safiyah, Tarek and his nanny to settle into their rooms.
With a huff of annoyance Safiyah decided she’d rather be with her horse than stewing over whether Karim would deign to visit her. For ten days she’d been torn between anticipation—wanting to cut through this unbearable tension that ratcheted ever tighter—and dismay that finally she would give in to what she could only think of as her weakness for her necessary husband.
Twenty minutes later she was astride her mare as they picked their way down the path to a long, white sand beach that shimmered in the early-evening light. Once clear of the palace and the protests of the groom, who had been dismayed that she chose to ride alone and bareback, Safiyah drew in a deep breath. The scent of the sea mingled with the comforting aroma of horse, lightening her spirits.
After all, there were worse things than a husband who didn’t want sex and left her completely alone.
Safiyah shuddered, remembering the avid way Hassan Shakroun had eaten her up with his gaze in the days following Abbas’s death. The idea of his fleshy paws on her body was almost as horrible as the thought of Tarek’s safety being in his control.
Marriage to Karim had been the only sensible option. Tarek was protected and she… Well, she’d survived one loveless marriage and she could do it again. She’d happily live without sex. A marriage on paper only was what she’d stipulated. She should be glad Karim didn’t want more.
Safiyah squashed the inner voice that said perhaps there was more to sex than she’d experienced with Abbas. Perhaps with another, more considerate lover, there might even be pleasure.
‘Come on, Lamia,’ Safiyah whispered to her mount. ‘Let’s go for a run.’
They were halfway down the beach when the sound of thunder reached her. It rolled along the sand behind her. Safiyah looked up but the sky was filled with bright stars, no sign of clouds. Besides, this noise kept going—a rumbling that didn’t stop.
Pulling back on the reins, Safiyah looked over her shoulder. Instantly she tensed. Galloping towards her was a tall figure on a grey horse. An unmistakable horse and an unmistakable man.
Karim.
Together they looked like a centaur—as if Karim were part of the big animal. Their movements were controlled, perfectly synchronised and beautiful. Yet the urgency of their sprint down the beach snared Safiyah’s breath.
A frisson of excitement laced with anxiety raced up her spine to grab at her nape and throat.