Protecting the Desert Princess(47)

                Mikael had laughed then at Demyan’s passion.

                He was starting to glimpse it now.

                ‘Why does she have to go back to her family?’ Demyan asked.

                ‘Because they love her,’ Mikael answered, ‘and because she loves them too.’

                ‘Mikael—?’ Demyan started, but Mikael shook his head.

                ‘Don’t.’

                There was no point discussing it, for there was nothing he could do.

                As they headed out to the elevator Layla was all smiles, but when the doors closed she rolled her eyes.

                ‘What does that mean?’ Mikael asked.

                ‘You know.’ Layla smiled.

                ‘No.’

                ‘All my cousins have babies, and you hold them and you smile, and you say the right thing, but…’ Layla held out her palms in a helpless gesture. ‘Then you run out of things to say.’

                Very reluctantly Mikael smiled, but that was enough incentive for Layla to speak on.

                ‘Now Trinity and Zahid are having a baby it will be the same with them. That was how I escaped. Trinity was watching me like a hawk, but I suggested we go in a baby boutique and once we were in I might just as well have not been there.’

                ‘You don’t like babies?’

                ‘I don’t dislike them,’ she said, ‘though they do freak me out a bit, with their big heads and eyes. I know I shall love mine, but really I would love more of this.’

                ‘Of what?’

                ‘Kissing and dancing,’ she said as they stepped out of the elevator. ‘Anyway, pregnancy isn’t always a good thing…’

                ‘Are you worried that it might ruin your figure?’ He smiled.

                Just when he thought he knew a little of what went on in her mind, Mikael found out there was so much more he didn’t know.

                ‘No.’ Layla shook her head as they stepped out onto the street. ‘I worry about death, given that it was pregnancy that killed my mother—she died giving birth to me.’

                ‘Layla…’ He went to catch her wrist but she shook it off.

                ‘It is not something I wish to speak about,’ she said.

                ‘You can.’

                ‘What’s the point in that?’ she challenged.

                There was none.

                They walked to the car in silence.

                Layla was dreading a future with Hussain by her side.

                Mikael felt suddenly ill at the thought of the same.

                It was a bit strained on the drive to his property.

                Layla was lost in her thoughts and Mikael glanced over several times, trying to work out what she was thinking. Layla wished she hadn’t told him that, for she did not like to discuss her fears about getting pregnant, and there was nothing that could be done about them anyway.