In fact, Izzy’s pregnancy totally changed everything Rafiq had once taken for granted. A child,twochildren indeed, he recalled almost dizzily. The palace staff had automatically assumed that Izzy was his wife, married abroad, it being the default position of a conservative culture to believe that a man of his background could only have achieved parenthood within conventional boundaries.
But shewasn’this wife, this amazing woman who had contrived to conceive his children.Children, he savoured, child in the plural. Nobody else could possibly understand what that single word meant to Rafiq, long accustomed to viewing himself as the inadequate husband who had denied his wife her basic,desperateneed to have a child. It transformed his entire view of life in a way that onlyhecould understand. He had to marry Izzy, as soon as it could possibly be arranged. There was no other choice.
But even as he came to terms with the wonderful change Izzy had brought to his life, stark fear underlined that new knowledge. As a boy, Rafiq had seen his mother die in the aftermath of his brother’s birth. In the panic of rushing, fearful staff, struggling to deal with an emergency they were not medically equipped to handle, the presence of the quiet boy hovering at the back of the room had been overlooked. He remembered every moment of that experience and it had chilled him that the arrival of new life could bring death in its wake. Pregnancy and delivery could still be dangerous for a woman. Concern for Izzy gripped him, but it was not a concern he would share with her because the last thing a first-time expectant mother needed was a nervous partner even more fearful than she was.
‘What time is it?’ Izzy asked of the friendly female face that came into view as she lifted her head, registering that she felt truly rested for the first time in days. Of course, the stress she had been under meant that she hadn’t been sleeping and hadn’t been eating very sensibly either.
‘Early evening, Your Royal Highness. Would you like a shower or a bath?’ she was asked.
‘I would love one and a change of clothes,’ Izzy responded pleasantly, reluctant to enquire about that strange appellation. Why would anyone anywhere think that she was royal?
But even as she slid her legs slowly out of the bed, she remembered afresh that startling announcement of hers at the airport. It had erupted from her as panic took a hold. She had told them that Rafiq was the father of her child and she suspected that official label, that assumption that they could only be married if that were the case, was linked to that and she almost cringed in mortification, wondering what had come over her and why she had had to finally give way to her overload of stress in front of an audience. That was why she had been brought to the palace and a trio of doctors had arrived to attend to her. Airports and palaces, full of gossiping, chattering employees, were very public places. That was why Rafiq had felt constrained to act as though her arrival and everything that had happened since were normal. Move on by, nothing to stare at here, she paraphrased numbly.
The maid showed her into a reassuringly modern bathroom. Her suitcase already sat in readiness for her on a stand and she dug into it to extract a clean outfit and headed for the shower, stripping off her badly creased clothing and letting the garments fall to the floor. She freshened up in record time, keen to see Rafiq again and get things sorted out, say what she had to say while hopefully remaining civil if he planned to have a relationship withtheirchildren. That was the problem, she acknowledged ruefully—everything she said and did now would have repercussions that could impact on the happiness of the babies she carried. It would be unwise to be as unpleasant as she had originally intended. Yet, sadly, she was still so angry with him that just the thought of him enraged her.
Walking back into the bedroom to find a small table set with food by the window would have been most welcome, because she was really hungry, had Rafiq not been seated on the other side of the table awaiting her appearance. He flew upright, a very tall well-groomed and powerful figure in a designer suit that fitted his impressive physique to perfection. And then he made the very great mistake of smiling at her.
‘Don’t you dare smile at me, you...you creep!’ Izzy launched at him in disbelief at that smile. ‘Youliedto me. You told me you couldn’t father children! You are also engaged to another woman! I don’t want to even think about howshefeels about this mess!’
In the face of that attack, Rafiq breathed in deep and slow. She looked amazing, a glow in her pale cheeks, bright eyes like sapphire stars contrasting with those glossy copper curls that glinted in the sunlight. She wore a strappy vest top with trousers, a top that only hinted at the bounty of her lush breasts and the shadowy cleft between but that thought was all it took for his groin to tighten and the throb of arousal to set in.
‘It was my genuine belief that I was infertile,’ Rafiq murmured and he spread his lean brown hands in a graceful gesture that emphasised his acceptance of that conviction. ‘Although nothing was ever found wrong with me or my wife, we were together for ten years and we were unable to conceive a child.’
‘Ten years? You must’ve got married very young,’ Izzy heard herself comment without having meant to.
‘I was sixteen. Fadith was seventeen. We were far too young, but our guardians chose to believe otherwise,’ Rafiq countered levelly.
‘What happened to her? Are you divorced?’ Izzy pressed.
‘She caught a chest infection that turned into pneumonia and died. It happened very fast,’ he clarified.
‘I’m sorry...’ Izzy whispered awkwardly, disconcerted by his explanation.
‘Come and sit down now and have something to eat...’
‘I have a lot to shout at you about,’ Izzy argued, struggling to recapture her nerve.
‘You can shout after you have eaten,’ Rafiq pointed out smoothly. ‘I promise not to deprive you of the opportunity.’
A laugh almost bubbled out of Izzy’s throat but she swallowed it back, determined not to be manipulated or charmed or fooled or anything she didn’t choose to be. ‘I am very, very angry with you,’ she confided as she sank down in the chair he had yanked out for her. ‘But I’m also very hungry, so we’ll take a rain check on the shouting for now. Aren’t you joining me?’ Izzy prompted as he too sat down but there was no food at his place, only a cup of coffee.
‘I have already eaten.’ And it had not been an enjoyable meal with his uncle, the Regent, Rafiq reflected, his mind sliding back to that uncomfortable experience.
‘Twins!’ Jalil had pronounced, rubbing his hands together with incredulous glee. ‘This is a very special young woman you have brought to us.’
Rafiq had dug deep to extract his innate honesty and had said what he knew would cause distress. ‘This is a young decent woman, with whom I spent one night...’
His uncle surveyed him with tolerance. ‘But Allah saw more clearly and saved you,’ he breathed with genuine emotion, glossing over his nephew’s sinful encounter. ‘This woman ismeantto be your wife.’
A little less naïve, Rafiq nodded, accepting that necessity. He was a crown prince and he wasn’t stupid. He knew that the next generation was as important to the stability and popularity of the monarchy as he was. All those years wed to Fadith he had known he was a failure in providing that necessity, in fulfilling that occasionally despairing need a woman could have when it came to conceiving a child. He still could notquiteaccept that he could have unborn children on the way because, on his terms, itwasa miracle...with difficulty, he dragged himself back into the present.
Izzy spared Rafiq a single glance but his lean, darkly handsome features stayed stamped on her brain like the ultimate blueprint of perfection. Her hands a little unsteady, she picked up her knife and fork.
‘So tell me about the fiancée,’ she invited, sweetly sarcastic.
‘There isn’t one. I’mnotengaged. I did not contradict your misapprehension in Oxford because I was not in a position to explain that I had, however, recently agreed to remarry and why. As future King I am expected to take a wife. But no particular woman has yet been put forward for the role.’
While relieved that no other woman was involved in their plight to be hurt by her pregnancy, Izzy still made a stabbing motion with her knife in his direction. ‘You didn’t tell me who you were! You left me with no way of contacting you,’ she condemned thinly. ‘I had to go and talk to the receptionist at the rental agency to discover your identity. Why weren’t you honest?’