The Sheikh's Forbidden Virgin(13)

‘I’m pleased you’re beginning to realise that.’

A long moment passed as the wind shrieked around them. Muttering something—Kalila couldn’t quite hear—Aarif rose fluidly from the ground and fetched his own saddlebags. ‘Come, then,’ he said, his voice taut. ‘I will not risk your own foolish life simply because you choose to be so stubborn.’

Kalila rose, and his arm went around her shoulders, a heavy, strangely comforting weight, as he guided her back to the tent. They crawled through the flap in an inelegant tangle of limbs, half-falling into the small space.

And it was small, Kalila realised with a thrill of alarm. It would be difficult to avoid touching each other.

Aarif turned back to the tent flap. ‘We must find a way to secure this, or you will have half the Sahara in here by morning.’

‘I have some duct tape,’ Kalila said, and dug through her saddlebags to find it.

He slotted her a thoughtful glance as she handed him the tape, although his eyes were still hard and unforgiving. ‘You came prepared.’

She shrugged. ‘I’ve camped in the desert many times. I simply knew what to bring.’

Aarif began to tape the flap shut, and it occurred to Kalila that they were locked inside. Trapped. Of course, she could remove the tape easily enough, but it still gave her the odd feeling of being in a prison cell, and Aarif was her jailor.

He turned to her, his eyes sweeping her with critical bluntness. ‘You are a mess.’

‘So are you,’ she snapped, but she was instantly aware of her tangled hair, the sand embedded into her scalp.

‘I imagine I am,’ Aarif returned dryly. ‘I was not prepared to go haring off into the desert in the middle of a sandstorm.’ He shook his head, and when he spoke his voice was resigned. ‘I don’t know whether to think you a fool or a madwoman.’

‘Desperate,’ Kalila told him flatly, and then looked away. The silence stretched between them, and she raked her fingers through the tangles in her hair, needing to be busy. She felt Aarif’s eyes on her as she began to unsnarl the tangles one by one.

‘Is marriage so abhorrent to you?’ he asked eventually.

‘Marriage to a stranger, yes,’ Kalila replied, still not looking at him.

Aarif shook his head; she saw the weary movement out of the corner of her eye. ‘Yet you knew you would marry my brother since you were twelve. Why choose your escape now, and such a foolhardy one?’

‘Because I didn’t realise how it would feel,’ Kalila said, her voice low. She pulled her fingers through her hair again, attacking the tangles with a viciousness that she felt in her soul, her heart. ‘When it came to the actual moment, when I thought Zakari would be there—’

Aarif exhaled, a sound of derisive impatience. ‘Is this all simply because he did not come to fetch you? Your feelings are hurt too easily, Princess.’

Kalila swung her head around to meet his gaze directly. ‘Perhaps, but yesterday—it clarified everything for me. I’d been going along waiting, hoping, believing I would do my duty, and then—all of a sudden—’ She shook her head slowly. ‘I thought, well, maybe I won’t.’

‘The thought of a child,’ Aarif replied. ‘What did you think? That you would flee into the desert for the rest of your life, live with the Bedouin? Did you think no one would ever find you?’

‘No,’ Kalila admitted slowly. ‘I knew someone would. And even if they didn’t, I would have to go back.’

‘Then what—?’

‘I just wanted to be free,’ she said simply, heard the stark honesty, the blatant need in her voice. ‘For a moment, a day. I knew it wouldn’t last.’

Aarif eyed her unsympathetically. Freedom, to him she supposed, was unimportant. Unnecessary. ‘And do you know how much you put at risk for an afternoon’s freedom?’ he asked. ‘If your father discovers it—if Zakari does—’

‘There’s been no harm done,’ Kalila objected. ‘We’re safe.’

‘For now,’ Aarif replied darkly. ‘All is uncertain.’

‘You have a grim view of things,’ she replied, lifting her chin, clinging to her defiance though he picked at it with every unfeeling word he spoke. ‘When you found me in the church, you were the same. Do you always think the worst is going to happen, Aarif?’

He reached for the canteen from his own bag. ‘It often does,’ he told her and unscrewed the top. Kalila watched him drink; for some reason she found she could not tear her gaze away from the long brown column of his throat, the way his muscles moved as he drank. He finally lifted the canteen from his mouth and she saw the droplets of water on his lips, his chin, and still she could not look away. She gazed, helpless, fascinated.

Slowly her eyes moved upwards to meet his own locked gaze, saw the intensity of feeling there—what was it? Anger? Derision?

Desire.

The moment stretched between them, silent, expectant, and Kalila again remembered his body against hers, its hard contours pressed against her, demanding, knowing. She swallowed, knowing she must look away, she must act, if not demure, then at least dignified.

‘We should eat,’ she said, and the words sounded stilted, forced. ‘You must be hungry.’

Aarif said nothing, and Kalila did not risk looking at him again, seeing that unfathomable darkness in his eyes. Her hands trembled as she reached for bread and cheese, breaking off a bit of each and handing it to Aarif.

He took it with murmured thanks, and they ate quietly, neither speaking, neither looking at the other.

Was she imagining the tension coiling in the room, a far more frightening force than the wind that howled and moaned outside, rattling the sides of the tent as if it would sweep the shelter, and them inside, all away?

No, she was not, at least not in herself. She had never been so aware of another human being, the sounds of him chewing, of the cloth stretching across his body, even his breathing. She’d never had such an insane, instinctive desire to touch someone, to know what his hair, his skin felt like. Would his stubble be rough under her fingers? Would his hair be soft?

Horrified yet fascinated by the train of her thoughts, Kalila forced down a dry lump of bread and finally spoke, breaking the taut silence. ‘Haven’t you ever felt like that?’

‘Like what?’ Aarif’s tone wasn’t unfriendly, but it was close to it.

She swallowed again. ‘Wanting to be free, if just for a moment. Haven’t you ever wanted to…escape?’

He was silent for so long Kalila wondered if he was going to answer. When he finally spoke, his voice was heavy with a dark finality that Kalila knew she couldn’t question. Wouldn’t.

‘Perhaps, when I was a child,’ he said. ‘But I outgrew such childish desires, and so must you.’

Kalila said nothing. Yes, she knew running away had been a childish, desperate desire, a moment’s insanity, perhaps, and yet it had felt so good to be out on the desert, alone, in charge of her destiny, if only for an hour…even with the churning fear and regret, it had been good.

For a moment, she had been free.

She wondered if Aarif could ever understand that.

‘Besides,’ he continued, still unsympathetic, ‘you had your years in Cambridge to be free, if this freedom is so important to you. Do you think my brother will veil you and lock you in the women’s quarters? He is a modern man, Princess.’

‘Yesterday you called me Kalila,’ she blurted, and his lips compressed into a hard line.

‘Yesterday was not today,’ he said flatly, and Kalila wondered what he meant. She almost asked him, but then she remembered again the feel of his body against hers, his eyes pleading urgently—angrily—with hers, and she thought perhaps it was better not to know. Safer, anyway.

‘What will happen?’ she asked instead, heard the unsteadiness in her voice. ‘Where is everyone?’

‘God willing, they are sheltered at the airport. The storm will not die down until morning, I should think. We will return then.’ His voice was grim, determined, and Kalila knew what he was thinking.

‘And how will you explain our absence?’

‘How will you?’ he challenged. ‘What will you say to your nurse, Kalila? She believed you were unwell. What will you say to all the civil servants of your country who have sworn to give their lives to protect you? Will you talk about freedom to them?’ His voice rang out, contemptuous, condemning, and Kalila closed her eyes.

‘Don’t. I know…’ She drew a shaky breath. ‘I know I acted foolishly. Selfishly. I know!’ swept the crumbs off her lap, suddenly restless, needing activity, needing the freedom she had so desperately craved. Tears stung her eyes as she realised the full depth of her situation, her mess. And she’d caused it. Everything, she thought miserably, was her fault.

‘How did you arrange it?’ Aarif asked after a moment. ‘Who brought the horse? The provisions?’

Her eyes flew to his even as her mind replayed the frantic, whispered conversation with a stableboy that morning. ‘I don’t want to tell you.’

He shrugged, no more than the arrogant lifting of one powerful shoulder. ‘I could find out easily enough.’