Exotic Affairs(52)

But did he feel lucky, when there was so much he was placing at risk by marrying her?

And, more to the point, did she feel lucky? Just because, three weeks ago in that hospital bed, she had finally come to terms with the knowledge that she couldn’t let Raschid go no matter what that decision was going to mean to both of them, it did not automatically follow that all the concerns she had been struggling with then had melted away.

And as she stood here now, in her old bedroom at Westhaven, alone with her brother because the rest of her family were already making their way to the registry office where she was to marry Raschid in less than an hour’s time, it was those concerns that came back to haunt her.

Like the worrying ring of tight security Raschid had thrown around Westhaven when it was decided that she would come here to convalesce until they married.

Funny really, she mused, but having been with Raschid for two years and having always been aware that he was an exceedingly wealthy man in his own right, she had never known him make such a dramatic show of that wealth—until they’d come to Westhaven.

But that wealth had certainly been put on show in the very high-profile cordon that secured both the grounds and the property. Even Julian had found it necessary to prove his identity before he could gain access to his own home!

The curious press loved it; her mother serenely ignored it. Evie, on the other hand, was horrified by it.

‘Is there something going on that you aren’t telling?’ she’d demanded of Raschid when he’d come down to Westhaven to join them for dinner one evening. ‘Am I still at risk—is that what all this security is for?’

‘No,’ he’d denied. ‘But I learn my lessons the first time they are taught to me, and by leaving only Asim to take care of you at my apartment I devalued your importance to me in the eyes of those who gauge worth by the strength of its protection.’

‘The Arab mentality, you mean.’

‘If you wish to call it that,’ he’d conceded, refusing to take up the provoking derision pitched into the remark. ‘But it is an impression that has now been rectified. No one will ever dare to approach you again in threat.’

‘Does that mean I have my eunuch at last, sneaking up to guard my bedroom door every night after I’ve retired?’ Again the remark had been sharp with acid.

‘Quite obsessed with this eunuch thing, aren’t you?’ he’d drawled, a sleek black eyebrow arching in amused mockery at that suggestion. ‘Could it be you have been weaving secret fantasies in your lonely bed at night? Maybe as a punishment to me because I refuse to share it?’

His determined abstinence in this area of their lives was just another form of protection he imposed on her that Evie found worrying. In all their two years he had never been able to resist her—she only had to remember that brief episode in her bedroom at Beverley Castle to prove that point!

But now, suddenly, Raschid rarely even laid a finger on her. Why? What could he possibly hope to gain by his abstinence now, when the damage of their loving had already been done with the conception of their baby?

He had, until now, avoided the question whenever she had challenged him with it. And it was just another worry she was having to contend with as she stood here staring at herself in the mirror.

‘If you were me, Julian,’ she burst out suddenly, spinning round to look anxiously at her beautifully tanned brother who had not long been back home from his month-long honeymoon sailing round the Caribbean, ‘would you be marrying yourself to an Arab who lives in a Muslim state?’

‘I thought true love could conquer all,’ he replied with a teasing grin.

But Evie was in no mood to be teased. ‘His family don’t want me to be his wife,’ she explained tautly. ‘His people don’t want me! For all I know, I may be walking myself straight into purdah!’

‘Or simply suffering from a bad case of wedding nerves,’ Julian suggested. ‘Oh, come on, Evie!’ he sighed. ‘Since everyone knows exactly what Raschid feels for you, I can’t see purdah being much of a problem when it would most definitely necessitate him having to share it with you!’

Then why does it feel as if I’m doing the wrong thing? she asked herself tautly as she turned back to the mirror.

What she saw standing there was a woman who was anxiously attempting to respect the traditions of two completely different cultures.

Her outfit had been made for her in-house by a top designer who had been drafted in at enormous expense by Raschid and instructed to create something incomparable, and what he had come up with was both startlingly simplistic and breathtakingly effective.