“Then what were you doing?” He sounded angry now. Harsh. “Because you almost did just that, habibti! You and the babies were moments away from being mauled by jackals. If we had not come along when we did—”
The color drained from his face and he closed his eyes, his jaw tight.
At that look on his face, there was nothing she could do but tell him the truth. The reason she’d set out on a journey toward this oasis in the first place. Besides, she was too weary to dance around the subject any longer.
“I heard you were going to bring home another wife.”
His head snapped up then, his black gaze boring into her. “Where did you hear this?”
“In the palace. The rumor is that you will marry one of the chieftains’ daughters.” She lifted her chin. “I know that’s not unusual in Kyr, but it’s unusual for me.”
“And so you decided to risk your life, and the lives of our children, to make your opinion known? Did it not occur to you to ask me about this when I returned?”
She snorted. “With a new wife on your arm? No, it didn’t occur to me to wait.”
“Sheridan.” He shook his head. Said something in Arabic. And then he was looking at her again, his eyes filled with fury. “This stubbornness of yours could have cost you your life!”
“I realize that now!” she shouted back. “I behaved stupidly, I know it, and you’re embarrassed and furious and no doubt the new wife is signing documents as we speak. Well, I won’t live like that! I can’t.”
She put a fist to her heart, felt hot tears begin to roll down her cheeks and cursed herself for being so damned emotional. Hormones, she reminded herself.
“I won’t do it, Rashid.”
He looked stunned. “You do realize I am the king? That it’s not your place to advise me on this?”
The trembling in her limbs was no longer only due to the cold. “Just tell me if it’s true. Are you planning to take another wife?”
His jaw was marble. “Kyrian politics are complicated, Sheridan.”
“That’s not an answer.” Her voice was a painful whisper over the lump in her throat.
He closed his eyes and put his forehead in his palm. “The council wishes me to take a Kyrian wife. But I did not come out here to do that.”
“And yet it’s only a matter of time.”
“It would seem so.”
She sipped the tea as if they were having a polite conversation rather than one that broke her heart and ripped out her guts.
“Well, thank you for being honest. If you could perhaps wait until the babies are born, I’ll be busy enough then that I won’t mind so much.”
He growled. “You won’t mind so much?”
She looked at him evenly, though her face was still hot with tears. “As you’ve taken pains to inform me from the beginning, I have no choice. And no say in the matter, either. If you take another wife, I’ll endeavor not to disembowel you both with Daoud’s sword.”
If Rashid was amused or alarmed, he didn’t show it. “He followed you, you know.”