He wheeled away. ‘This is ridiculous. How do you think I feel about becoming King? Unprepared, raw, inexperienced. Don’t you think I could do with someone by my side who has some experience? You were an ambassador’s wife for a decade. Don’t you think that would help me? God knows I will need help if I am to perform anywhere near what this country needs.’
‘No.’ Her voice sounded little more than a squeak, with her head bowed low, her chin jammed against her chest. ‘I could not help you. Not if you married me.’
The day that had started so badly was getting progressively worse. What could she want? Once upon a time he’d thought her a gold-digger, thought she’d married Hussein for glamour and prestige. He’d accepted that she’d been forced to marry him, and that she’d found a cold marriage bed, but now any lingering thoughts that a rich and opulent lifestyle might somehow still appeal to her died a swift death. Nothing could be more glamorous than the life of a Qusani queen, and yet she was turning that down flat.
‘Can you tell me why?’
But she just shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’
He wheeled away, his hands tugging at his hair, relishing the sudden pain of it, wishing he could understand what was happening. What the hell did she want? Hadn’t he offered her everything last night?
But, no, he hadn’t. He hadn’t offered her everything because he hadn’t realised it then, not until today, when he’d tried to damn Kareef for his actions and found himself justifying them instead. When he’d realised… When he’d realised! And it was not too soon to tell her. She felt something for him, he knew. She melted into his touch, became liquid fire in his arms. She must feel something. He just hoped it was not too late to convince her.
He slowly turned back, found her clutching her arms across her belly, tendrils of black hair dancing loose across her wild-eyed face.
‘But you have to marry me, Sera, because nobody else will ever do. I love you.’
And her beautiful face crumpled, her keening cry of agony carried away by the wind as she buckled onto her knees in the sand.
‘Sera!’
She sobbed without tears into her hand. It was so unfair! He’d spoken of contracts and convenience and sense and sensibilities. He’d made no mention of love when he’d asked her to marry him last night. And she’d agreed, because she wanted him more than anything and it didn’t matter if he didn’t love her because she would be starting fresh, in a place nobody knew her, and she would have him by her side for ever.
But now to learn he loved her, when she knew she had no choice but to lose him again! There would be no escape, no fresh start, no having Rafiq by her side for ever.
Her lungs squeezed so tight it was near-impossible to breathe. Could this possibly be any harder to bear?
‘You can’t love me,’ she uttered, low and defiant, when the agony in her chest allowed her to continue. ‘You mustn’t. There’s no point.’
‘But why?’ he asked at her side. ‘I know you feel the same. I can feel it.’
And the seeds of escape planted themselves in her mind. Poisoned seeds, perhaps, but not out of character for a woman who was supposed to have poisoned her own husband. Useful in fact, given she had to poison this relationship too. ‘That’s where you’re wrong,’ she lied, straightening herself up to stand and dusting off the sand, knowing it would never be so easy to brush memories of this man away. Not after what they’d shared together. ‘It was nice to have sex with a real man, I admit—it was definitely a bonus to be relieved of my virginity at last—but I’m frankly surprised a man like you would confuse sex with romance. Because I don’t love you, Rafiq. Though I have no doubt there are plenty of women who are already lining up for the opportunity to say they do.’
‘You’re lying! Tell me you’re lying. I command it!’
And somehow, above the shame and hurt and despair, she found the strength to laugh. ‘You will make a good king. That much is certain.’
‘Tell me!’
‘I have told you all I need to hear. I don’t love you, Rafiq.’
‘Then why did you agree to marry me yesterday?’
She shrugged, her lies tearing her heart apart even as she forced hardness into her features. ‘Australia sounded fun. But you’ll be stuck here in Qusay now, won’t you? I’d be mad to tie myself to you, and you’d be mad to tie yourself to me—given I don’t love you, that is.’
Blood crashed in his ears, turned his vision red. It could not be happening again! But he was back there, transported by a thunderbolt through the years, there in that gilded, perfumed hall, a youth with a dream of love for a woman who was his every ideal of perfection.