Pursued by the Desert Prince(2)

He didn't seem to want to sit, so she pressed flat hands that tremored  on the back of the chair she usually used when visiting with clients.  "Was there something particular about the wedding arrangements you  wanted to discuss?"         

     



 

"Just that you should send your bill to me." He moved to set a card on the edge of Trella's desk.

She turned to follow his movement behind her. So economical and  fascinating. And who was his tailor? That suit was pure artistry, the  man so obviously yang to her yin.

He caught her staring.

She tucked her hair behind her ear to disguise her blush.

"Her Majesty made the same offer and you needn't have troubled yourself. It's a wedding gift for Sadiq and the princess."

He noted the familiarity of her using Sadiq's first name with a small shift of his head. "So Hasna said. I would prefer to pay."

His gaze was direct enough to feel confrontational, instantly amplifying  this conversation into one of conflict. Her pulse gave a reflexive  zing.

Why would he be so adamant-?

Oh, dear God! He didn't think she and Sadiq were involved, did he?

Why wouldn't he? According to the headlines, she'd slept with half of  Europe. When she wasn't doing drugs or having catfights with her models,  of course.

"Sadiq is a longtime friend of the family." She retreated behind the  cool mask she showed the world, ridiculously crushed that he would  believe those awful summations of her character. "This is something we  want to do for him."

"We." His gaze narrowed.

"Yes." She didn't bring up her sister or what her family owed Sadiq for  Trella's return to them. The fact that Sadiq had never once sought any  glory for his heroism was exactly why he was such a cherished friend.  "If that was all..." She deliberately presumed she'd had the last word  on the topic. "I should get back to the final arrangements for your  sister's things."



Kasim had to applaud his future brother-in-law's taste. Angelique  Sauveterre had grown from a very sweet-looking girl into a stunning  young woman. In person, she had an even more compelling glow of beauty.

Her long brunette hair glimmered and shifted in a rippling curtain and  what had seemed like unremarkable gray eyes online were actually a  mesmerizing greenish hazel. She was tall and slender, built like a model  despite being the one to dress them, and her skin held a golden tone  that must be her mother's Spanish ancestry.

Cameras rarely caught her with a smile on her face and when they did, it  was a faint Mona Lisa slant that allowed her to live up to the  reputation of her father's French blood: aloof and indifferent.

She wore that look now, but when she had first greeted him, she had  smiled openly. Her beauty was so appealing, Kasim had forgotten for a  moment why he was here and had been overcome with a desire to pursue  her.

Perhaps this captivating quality was the reason Sadiq was so smitten?

"About those arrangements... Today went well?" He had understood it to  be the final fitting of his sister's wedding gown and the bridesmaids'  dresses as well as a private showing of other clothes made for Hasna,  all taking place on the runway level of this building. Once the last  nips and tucks were completed, the entire works would be packaged up and  shipped to Zhamair for the wedding next month.

"You would have to check with the women who were here, but they all  seemed pleased by the time they left." So haughty and quick to keep the  focus on his sister.

From what he'd heard around his penthouse, the consensus had been a high  level of ecstasy with everything from the clothes to the imported  cordial to the finger sandwiches and pastries.

"Hasna doesn't seem to have any complaints," he downplayed. "Which is  why I'm willing to spare her the nuisance of replacing all that you've  promised her."

Angelique was tall in her heels. Not as tall as him, but taller than  most women he knew, and she grew taller at his words, spine stiffening  while her eyelashes batted once, twice, three times. Like she was  filtering through various responses.

"All that we've made for her," she corrected, using a light tone, but it  was the lightness of a rapier. Pointed and dangerous. "Why on earth  would you refuse to let her have it?"

"You can drop the indignation," he advised. "I'm not judging. I've had  mistresses. There is a time to let them go and yours has arrived."

"You think I'm Sadiq's mistress. And that as his mistress, I offered to  make his bride's gown and trousseau. That's a rather generous act for a  mistress, isn't it?"

She repeatedly spat the word as if she was deeply offended.

He pushed his hands into his pants pockets, rocking back on his heels.

"It's a generous act to arrange a private showing for such a large party  at a world-famous and highly exclusive Paris design house." It hadn't  been only his mother and sister, but Sadiq's mother and sisters, along  with cousins and friends from both sides.         

     



 

The cost of something like today wasn't so high as to imperil his  riches, of course. The groom's family could equally afford it and given  the extent of the Sauveterre wealth, and the rumors that the family  corporation had underwritten this folly of an art project in the first  place, he imagined Angelique wouldn't be too far out of pocket, either.

"Had this afternoon been the only line item offered at no charge, I  wouldn't have batted an eye," he said. "But the gown? I know my sister's  taste." He imagined it had easily run to six figures. "And to throw in  wedding costumes for the rest of the party? Including mothers of the  bride and groom?"

"Sadiq's parents and sisters are also friends of the family."

"Plus a full wardrobe for Hasna to begin her married life," he completed  with disbelief. "All at no cost? This is more than a gift' from a  family friend.' If I had learned of it sooner, I would have taken steps  long before today."

Hasna had been chattering nonstop about her big day, but what did he  care about the finer details? He was glad she was marrying for love, he  wanted everything to go well for her, but the minutia of decor and food  and colors to be worn had meant nothing to him. It wasn't until he had  noted she was grossly under budget-not like her at all-that he had  quizzed her on when to expect an invoice for the dress.

"If I'm Sadiq's mistress, then I should want the fat commission off  this! I would have told him to make his bride come to us as a payoff for  losing his support-which I don't need, by the way." The hiss in her  tone sliced the air like a blade. "That is not the way it went at all.  Hasna didn't even know Sadiq knew us. She said we were her dream  designer and he arranged it secretly, to surprise her. We're the ones  who decided not to charge him."

"Yes, funny that he would have kept this tremendously close  friendship'-" he let her hear his disdain "-such a secret from the  woman he had been courting for a year and professed to love. I might  have understood if he was paying you off." He wouldn't have condoned it,  not when Hasna had fought so hard for a love match and had managed to  convince him that Sadiq returned her feelings, but at least he would  have seen the why of this ridiculous arrangement.

"Have you discussed this with Sadiq?" she demanded frostily, arms  crossed. "Because I am as insulted on his behalf as I am on my own."

"Sadiq is plainly not capable of doing what is needed. I will advise him after the fact."

"I am not sleeping with Sadiq! I don't sleep with married men, or engaged ones, either."

"I'm fairly confident you stopped sleeping with him once the engagement  was announced. I can account for his whereabouts since then."

"He knows you're watching him like that? With these awful suspicions about him?"

"I don't judge him for having lovers prior to settling down. We all do it."

Although it annoyed him that his brother-in-law had slept with this  particular woman. Kasim didn't examine too closely why that grated. Or  wonder too much about how such a soft-spoken man had managed to seduce  her. Sadiq had always struck Kasim as being more book-smart than  street-smart, earnest and studious and almost as naive as Hasna.

This woman was surprisingly spirited. She would dominate someone like Sadiq.

Which more than explained why Sadiq hadn't been able to end things as definitively as he should.

"And I'm...what?" she prodded. "Trying to coax him back by outfitting his wife? Your logic is flawed, Your Highness."

Her impertinence took him aback, it was so uncommon in his life. The  most sass he heard from anyone was from his sister and she typically  confined it to light teasing, never anything with this much bite.

He found Angelique's impudence both stimulating and trying. She obviously didn't understand who she was dealing with.

"Why are you arguing? I'm offering to pay you for the work you've done.  The more you resist admitting the truth and promising not to see him  again, the more likely I am to lose patience and pull the plug on this  entire arrangement, Hasna's tears be damned."