The Sheikh's Prize(31)

'For ever,' Zahir repeated, wrapping both arms round her and pulling her   close, knowing that, having lost her once, he would never take the   smallest risk of losing her again.

* * *

Two years on from that conversation, Saffy soothed her son, Karim, as he   fell off his toddler bike for at least the third time and roared with   temper and frustration. As soon as his mother set him down again on his   sturdy little legs, Karim streaked back to the bike, determined to   master the art of riding it so that he could race around the gardens in   the company of his female cousins. As she watched her little boy tell   the bike off for not doing his bidding, she laughed.

'He doesn't give up easily,' her sister, Kat, commented.

'No, he's like Zahir in that.' Saffy smiled at her sibling, loving the   fact that she and Mikhail had come to stay with them in Maraban but   aching for the couple at the same time. Kat had recently gone through   IVF in Russia in an attempt to conceive but, sadly, the procedure hadn't   worked. In another month the couple were set for a second try and  Saffy  was praying that the treatment would deliver a successful result,  for  if any woman deserved a child of her own it was Kat, who had  raised her  three sisters with so much love and support.

'The servants wait on him hand and foot,' Kat commented. 'You'll have to watch that.'

'I do. He tidies up his own toys. Zahir doesn't want him spoiled the same way he was.'

'The way your husband spoils you?' Kat laughed, secure in the knowledge that Saffy was deliriously happy in Maraban.

'Spoiling me gives Zahir a kick,' Saffy confided with a grin, thinking   of the vast selection of jewels and luxuries she was continually   showered in.

More importantly, Saffy had found a real role to keep her busy in her   husband's country. She had participated in making a promotional film of   Maraban and had impressed everybody with her skill as a presenter. But   then she had thoroughly enjoyed the personalised tour of the various   sites of interest with Zahir by her side and had become almost as   knowledgeable about his country of birth as he was in the process. The   warm welcome of the locals had increased her identification with Maraban   as her new home. She had got involved with local charities, now sat on   the board of the newest hospital in the city and regularly visited   educational institutions. But most precious of all on her terms had been   spending an entire week with Zahir and Karim at the orphanage school  in  South Africa, which she had long supported.

As a rule she usually went to London to see her sisters. Topsy was at   university, studying hard and rarely free for more than a weekend, but   Emmie often visited London to shop and the twins now got together as   often as they could contrive it. Rediscovering her relationship with her   sister meant a great deal to Saffy and the process was helped by the   reality that both women now had much more in common.

Zahir strode through the door with Mikhail a mere step in his wake.   Kat's husband, a Russian billionaire, was currently advising the   Marabani government on how best to invest the oil revenues that kept the   country afloat. Zahir swept his son off the bike a split second before   the child fell again.                       
       
           



       

'He won't stop trying,' Saffy told her handsome husband. 'He won't give up. He's so like you.'

'But he has your eyes and impatience,' Zahir remarked appreciatively as   he set his squirming son down again and watched him head straight back   to the demon bike that still wouldn't do what he wanted it to do.

Zahir linked his fingers with Saffy and walked her out onto the terrace.   Overhead the sun was sinking in a peach and orange blaze of colour and   soon they would sit down to dinner by candlelight and talk long into  the  night. Just for a moment, even though she was very much enjoying  having  her sister and her husband as guests, she wished she were alone  with  Zahir.

He looked down at her with smouldering dark golden eyes and butterflies   leapt in her tummy and her mouth ran dry. 'We should get dressed for   dinner,' he murmured lazily.

A smile tugging at her lush lips, Saffy leant back against his lean   powerful body in an attitude of complete trust, knowing they would end   up in bed, loving the fact that he found it as hard to keep his hands   off her as she did him. She was deliriously happy in her marriage and   Karim's arrival had enriched and deepened the ties between her and   Zahir. 'I love you,' she whispered.

'I love you too,' Zahir purred, pressing his mouth hungrily to the base of her throat and making her shiver against him.