At the Sheikh's Bidding(21)

‘Cover  yourself,' he growled, looking away from her while she dragged   her  blouse over her breasts with trembling fingers. ‘The answer to your    request to take Kazim to England is a resounding no,' he ground out    harshly. ‘His place is here. But yours is not. I suggest that for both    our sakes you go back to the house on the moors that you worked so  hard   to acquire.'

He swung away from her, his conscience prickling as  he thought of   Kazim. The little boy loved Erin and regarded her as his  mother. Would   it be fair to separate him from the woman who had cared  for him since   he was a couple of months old? Zahir thought back to when  his own   mother had left Qubbah, to how desperately he had missed her and  longed   for her to return, and his heartbreak when he learned that she  was   never coming back. How could he allow Kazim to suffer the same sense  of   abandonment that had haunted what had remained of his childhood  after   his mother had gone?

But Kazim was younger than he had  been, he reassured himself. He would   soon forget Erin. He would have to,  Zahir decided. Because the   alternative was for her to remain at the  palace indefinitely, and his   hormones would go into meltdown.

He  strode over to the door, but could not resist looking back at her.   His  desire for her had escalated to an agonising craving that was   beyond  anything he had ever felt for any other woman. She was forbidden   to him  while she remained Faisal's widow-but if she was his wife he   would have  exclusive rights to her exquisite body.

Marrying her would solve a  number of problems-not least his unbearable   sexual frustration, he  acknowledged grimly as he turned his back on  her  and slammed out of the  room. But was he really prepared to  sacrifice  his freedom and marry a  woman he had good evidence was a  gold-digger  simply because he was  desperate to take her to bed?



Erin scrambled to her feet  and stared after Zahir's retreating form.   Reaction was setting in: her  legs were shaking and she felt sick with   humiliation. She didn't know  what was worse-being caught making love   with Zahir by his personal  assistant, or the look of utter contempt in   Zahir's eyes when he had  stared down at her half-naked body, spread   before him like a concubine  awaiting her master.

She couldn't stay here for another day,  another hour, she thought   wildly, burying her face in her hands in an  effort to blot out the   images of Zahir's hands on her body. The memory  of his intimate   caresses made her cheeks flame. Her first ever orgasm  had been   mind-blowing, but she shuddered when she recalled how she had  sobbed   and writhed in his arms. She would rather die than have to face  him   again.

‘I have to get away from here,' she muttered to the  empty room, and   then gave a startled cry when a voice from behind her  replied.                       
       
           



       

‘I think that would be a most wise course of action,'  Omran murmured,   stepping into Zahir's office and closing the door behind  him. As usual   he was excruciatingly polite, but behind his deferential  smile Erin   caught an insolent gleam in his eyes, and she blushed when  his knowing   gaze slid over her dishevelled hair and swollen mouth. ‘His  Highness   Prince Zahir's interest in you is merely a temporary  aberration,' he   continued silkily. ‘You can never be more than his  mistress. One day he   will marry a highborn Arab bride, and then your  position here at the   palace will be untenable. It is perhaps better if  you leave now.'

Erin gave a tight smile. ‘You really know how to make a girl feel good about herself, Omran,' she muttered sarcastically.

Zahir's  personal assistant was almost as high and mighty as his   employer-and  that was saying something. She was tempted to tell him of   the King's  suggestion, that Zahir should marry her, just to wipe the   smug smile off  his face. But what was the point? she thought   dispiritedly. Omran  clearly believed she was less worthy of his royal   master's attention  than a pile of camel dung-a belief no doubt shared   by Zahir himself.


‘How  can I leave?' she queried miserably. ‘The palace guards tail my   every  move.' She broke off, thinking of the guard she had accidentally   punched  on the nose. It had not been the most edifying moment of her   life, and  it was small wonder that Zahir had accused her of being   unbalanced. He  was a royal prince, born into unimaginable wealth, and   he could have no  comprehension of her deprived childhood, during which   she'd learned  early on to fight to survive.

‘The guards are under orders to  protect young Prince Kazim. They have   no interest in you if he is not  with you,' Omran told her bluntly. ‘The   road from the palace leads  across the desert to the capital, Al  Razir.  There is a fleet of  four-by-fours parked in the courtyard in  front of  the staff quarters.'

Startled,  Erin stared at him, her heart thumping. Omran was offering   her a chance  to escape-but he did not realise that she would never   leave Kazim  behind. ‘Where would I find the keys to one of those cars?'   she  whispered.

In reply Omran walked over to Zahir's desk, pulled  open a drawer and   calmly took out a set of keys. ‘This conversation  never took place,' he   murmured as he dropped them into her hand, and  before Erin could  utter  another word he had turned-his long robes  billowing behind  him-and  swept from the room as silently as a snake in  the grass.



A few hours later Erin glanced in the rearview  mirror of the   four-by-four, hardly able to believe that she was not  being chased   across the desert by palace guards. She was amazed that her  plan to   smuggle Kazim out of the palace had worked so well, but guessed  that   Omran had had something to do with the absence of the guards who    usually patrolled the fortress gates.

She had done it-she was  free. All she had to do now was somehow locate   the British Embassy and  beg them to send her and Kazim home.

‘Where we going, Erin?' Kazim's voice piped up from the rear seat.

‘We're driving to the town, and maybe later we'll go on an aeroplane again. Would you like that?'

The  toddler nodded his head vigorously, and she was assailed by guilt.   He  was so trusting-an innocent pawn caught up in a battle between two    people who loved him-and, much as she despised Zahir, she had to admit    that he seemed to adore the little boy almost as much as she did. She    knew too that Kazim hero-worshiped his uncle. How was she going to    explain to him that Zahir was not coming back to England with them? Was    she really acting in his best interests-or her own?

Soon the  walls of the fortress were no longer visible, and the desert   seemed vast  and intimidating. The sun was sinking below the horizon,   and the  streaks of gold and red that stained the sky were fading to   purple as  night fell with surprising swiftness. Erin's palms were   clammy as she  gripped the steering wheel. She switched on the   headlights and stared  intently through the windscreen. Omran had said   that Al Razir was ahead,  but he hadn't mentioned that the road forked,   and she had no idea which  way to go. It had to be straight on, she   reasoned. She had no  recollection of turning from one dusty track to   another on the way to  the palace, but if she was honest the journey to   Zahir's home had been  an endless blur of sand.

After driving for another half an hour  it became obvious that she had   taken the wrong road. The lights of Al  Razir should surely be visible   by now, but instead the blackness was  thick and oppressive, and the   road had changed from a reasonably flat  surface to a narrowing track   which twisted tortuously between boulders  that loomed out of the dark.   She was lost, and the only thing to do was  turn around and go back to   the fork where the road had separated, Erin  decided, fighting her   feeling of panic.