Protecting the Desert Princess(28)

                ‘I want champagne,’ Layla said. ‘The best one.’

                ‘Of course you do.’

                ‘Do you have any cigarettes?’

                ‘I don’t smoke,’ Mikael said, reading the menu, ‘and neither do you.’

                ‘I’d like to try a joint.’

                ‘Layla!’

                ‘Zahid nearly got expelled from school when one was found in his locker, and since then I have wanted to try. Just one time.’

                ‘It’s illegal.’

                ‘I know a very good defence lawyer!’ Layla said, and her knees nudged his.

                ‘You do!’

                ‘Do you have a girlfriend?’ Layla asked as the champagne was poured. Mikael declined; he only drank water when he was in the midst of a trial.

                ‘I have girlfriends.’

                ‘Anyone serious?’

                ‘If there was then she wouldn’t be very pleased right now.’

                ‘It’s just a romantic dinner,’ Layla said, and closed her eyes in bliss as she tasted her first champagne.

                ‘If you wanted romance then you chose the wrong man.’

                ‘Why?’

                ‘Because I’m not interested in romance,’ he said, and then changed the subject. ‘So, apart from drunken debauchery, what else is on your list?’

                ‘I just want to kiss, to flirt, to be sent flowers—and then I will return and marry and be content that I had one magical week.’

                He stared at her. It didn’t seem an awful lot to ask, and he loathed the lengths she had had to go to and the very real trouble she might find herself in.

                Serious trouble.

                ‘I would like to spend a day in bed.’

                ‘Layla,’ he said. ‘You can’t go around saying that.’

                ‘I’m only saying it to you…’ She frowned at his concern. ‘Always I have duties, and if I don’t have duties then I am to join my father for breakfast or have my hair braided. I just want one day where there is nothing planned.’

                He rolled his eyes as he realised her statement had been completely innocent. ‘I apologise,’ Mikael said. ‘I thought when you said a day in bed…’

                She thought that completely hilarious. ‘I wasn’t talking about sex! Don’t worry, Mikael, I’m not going to do anything reckless—I know I have to return to Ishla intact…’

                ‘Are we really having this conversation?’

                ‘We are.’ She smiled and looked at the purple marks that were still under his eyes. ‘You look as if you could use a day in bed,’ she said, ‘for sleeping.’

                ‘Well, that’s not going to happen any time soon.’ Mikael gave a thin smile. ‘But once the verdict is in I’m going to have some time away.’