The sheikh's chosen wife

CHAPTER ONE

Dressed to go riding, in
knee-length black leather boots, buff pants, a white shirt and a white gutrah held
to his dark head by a plain black agal, Sheikh Hassan ben Khalifa Al-Qadim
stepped into his private office and closed the door behind him. In his hand he
held a newly delivered letter from England. On his desk lay three more. Walking
across the room, he tossed the new letter onto the top of the other three then
went to stand by the griued window, fixing his eyes on a spot beyond the
Al-Qadim Oasis, where reclaimed dry scrubland had been turned into miles of
lush green fig groves.

Beyond the figs rose the
sand-dunes. Majestic and proud, they claimed the horizon with a warning
statement. Come any closer with your irrigation and expect retaliation, they
said. One serious sandstorm, and years of hard labour could be turned back into
arid wasteland.

A sigh eased itself from
his body. Hassan knew all about the laws of the desert. He respected its power
and its driving passion, its right to be master of its own destiny. And what he
would really have liked to do at this very moment was to saddle up his horse,
Zandor, then take off for those sand-dunes and allow them to dictate his future
for him.

But he knew the idea was
pure fantasy. For behind him lay four letters, all of which demanded he make
those decisions for himself. And beyond the relative sanctuary of the four
walls surrounding him lay a palace in waiting; his father, his half-brother,
plus a thousand and one other people, all of whom believed they owned a piece
of his so-called destiny.

So Zandor would have to
stay in his stable. His beloved sand-dunes would have to wait a while to swallow
him up. Making a half-turn, he stared grimly at the letters. Only one had been
opened: the first one, which he had tossed aside with the contempt it had
deserved. Since then he had left the others sealed on his desk and had tried
very hard to ignore.

But the time for burying
his head in the sand was over.

A knock on the door
diverted his attention. It would be his most trusted aide, Faysal. Hassan
recognised the lightness of the knock. Sure enough the door opened and a short,
fine-boned man wearing the traditional white and pale blue robes of their
Arabian birthright appeared in its arched aperture, where he paused and bowed
his head, waiting to be invited in or told to go.

'Come in, Faysal,' Hassan
instructed a trifle impatiently. Sometimes Faysal's rigid adherence to
so-called protocol set his teeth on edge.

With another deferential
bow, Faysal moved to his master's bidding. Stepping into the room, he closed
the door behind him then used some rarely utilised initiative by walking
across the room to come to a halt several feet from the desk on the priceless
carpet that covered, in part, the expanse of polished blue marble between the
desk and the door.

Hassan found himself
staring at the carpet. His wife had ordered it to be placed there, claiming the
room's spartan appearance invited no one to cross its austere threshold. The
fact that this was supposed to be the whole point had made absolutely no
difference to Leona. She had simply carried on regardless, bringing many items
into the room besides the carpet. Such as the pictures now adorning the walls
and the beautiful ceramics and sculptures scattered around, all of which had
been produced by gifted artists native to the small Gulf state of Rahman.
Hassan had soon found he could no longer lift his eyes without having them
settle on an example of local enterprise.

Yet it was towards the
only western pieces Leona had brought into the room that his eyes now drifted.
The low table and two overstuffed easy chairs had been placed by the other
window, where she would insist on making him sit with her several times a day
to enjoy the view while they drank tea and talked and touched occasionally as
lovers do.

Dragging the gutrah from
his head with almost angry fingers Hassan tossed it aside then went to sit down
in the chair behind his desk. 'Okay,' he said. 'What have you to tell me?"

'It is not good news,
sir.' Faysal began with a warning. 'Sheikh Abdul is entertaining
certain...factions at his summer palace. Our man on the inside confirms that
the tone of their conversation warrants your most urgent attention.'

Hassan made no comment,
but his expression hardened fractionally. 'And my wife?' he asked next.

'The Sheikha still
resides in Spain, sir,' Faysal informed him, 'working with her father at the
new resort of San Esteban, overseeing the furnishing of several villas about to
be released for sale.'

Doing what she did best,
Hassan thought grimly—and did not need to glance back at the two stuffed chairs
to conjure up a vision of long silken hair the colour of a desert sunset,
framing a porcelain smooth face with laughing green eyes and a smile that dared
him to complain about her invasion of his private space. 'Trust me,' he could
hear her say. 'It is my job to give great empty spaces a little soul and their
own heartbeat.'

Well, the heartbeat had
gone out of this room when she'd left it, and as for the soul...

Another sigh escaped him.
'How long do you think we have before they make their move?'

The slight tensing in
Faysal's stance warned Hassan that he was not going to like what was coming.
'If you will forgive me for saying so, sir,' his aide apologised, 'with Mr
Ethan Hayes also residing at her father's property, I would say that the matter
has become most seriously urgent indeed.'

Since this was complete
news to Hassan it took a moment for the full impact of this information to
really sink in. Then he was suddenly on his feet and was swinging tensely away
to glare at the sand-dunes again. Was she mad? he was thinking angrily. Did she
have a death wish? Was she so indifferent to his feelings that she could
behave like this?

Ethan Hayes. His teeth
gritted together as an old familiar jealousy began mixing with his anger to
form a much more volatile substance. He swung back to face Faysal. 'How long
has Mr Hayes been in residence in San Esteban?'

Faysal made a nervous
clearing of his throat. "These seven days past,' he replied.

'And who else knows about
this...? Sheikh Abdul?"

'It was discussed,'
Faysal confirmed.

With a tight shifting of
his long lean body, Hassan returned to his seat. 'Cancel all my appointments
for the rest of the month,' he instructed, drawing his appointments diary
towards him to begin scoring hard lines through the same busy pages. 'My yacht
is berthed at Cadiz. Have it moved to San Est6ban. Check that my plane is ready
for an immediate take-off and ask Rafiq to come to me."

The cold quality of the
commands did nothing to dilute their grim purpose. 'If asked,' Faysal prompted,
'what reason do I give for your sudden decision to cancel your appoint-

'I am about to indulge in
a much needed holiday cruising the Mediterranean with my nice new toy,' Sheikh
Hassan replied, and the bite in his tone made a complete mockery of the words
spoken, for they both knew that the next few weeks promised to be no holiday.
'And Faysal...' Hassan stalled his aide as he was about to take his leave '...
if anyone so much as whispers the word adultery in the same breath as my wife's
name, they will not breathe again—you understand me?'

The other man went
perfectly still, recognising the responsibility that was being laid squarely
upon him. 'Yes, sir.' He bowed.

Hassan's grim nod was a
dismissal. Left alone again, he leaned back in his chair and began frowning
while he tried to decide how best to tackle this. His gaze fell on the small
stack of letters. Reaching out with long fingers, he drew them towards him,
picked out the only envelope with a broken seal and removed the single sheet of
paper from inside. The content of the letter he ignored with the same
dismissive contempt he had always applied to it. His interest lay only in the
telephone number printed beneath the business logo. With an expression that
said he resented having his hand forced like this, he took a brief glance at
his watch, then was lifting up the telephone, fairly sure that his wife's
lawyer would be in his London office at this time of the day.

The ensuing conversation
was not a pleasant one, and the following conversation with his father-in-law
even less so. He had just replaced the receiver and was frowning darkly over
what Victor Frayne had said to him, when another knock sounded at the door.
Hard eyes lanced towards it as the door swung open and Rafiq stepped into the
room.

Though he was dressed in
much the same clothes as Faysal was wearing, there the similarity between the
two men ended. For where Faysal was short and thin and annoyingly effacing,
Rafiq was a giant of a man who rarely kowtowed to anyone. Hassan warranted only
a polite nod of the head, yet he knew Rafiq would willingly die for him if he
was called upon to do so.

'Come in, shut the door,
then tell me how you would feel smoothly intoned.

Below the white gutrah a
pair of dark eyes glinted. 'Sheikh Abdul?' Rafiq questioned hopefully.

'Unfortunately, no.'
Hassan gave a half smile, I was in fact referring to my lovely wife, Leona...'

Dressed for the evening
in a beaded slip-dress made of gold silk chiffon, Leona stepped into a pair of
matching beaded mules then turned to look at herself in the mirror.

Her smooth russet hair
had been caught up in a twist, and diamonds sparkled at her ears and throat.
Overall, she supposed she looked okay, she decided, giving the thin straps at
her shoulders a gentle tug so the dress settled comfortably
over her slender frame.
But the weight she had lost during the last year was most definitely showing,
and she could have chosen a better colour to offset the unnatural paleness of
her skin.

Too late to change,
though, she thought with a dismissive shrug as she turned away from her
reflection. Ethan was already waiting for her outside on the terrace. And,
anyway, she wasn't out to impress anyone. She was merely playing stand-in for
her father who had been delayed in London due to some urgent business with the
family lawyer, which had left her and her father's business partner, Ethan, the
only ones here to represent Hayes-Frayne at tonight's promotional dinner.

She grimaced as she
caught up a matching black silk shawl and made for her bedroom door. In truth,
she would rather not be going out at all tonight having only arrived back from
San Esteban an hour ago. It had been a long day, and she had spent most of it
melting in a Spanish heat wave because the air-conditioning system had not been
working in the villa she had been attempting to make ready for viewing. So a
long soak in a warm bath and an early night would have been her idea of heaven
tonight, she thought wryly, as she went down the stairs to join Ethan.

He was half sitting on
the terrace rail with a glass in his hand, watching the sun go down, but his head
turned at her first step, and his mouth broke into an appreciative smile.

'Ravishing,' he murmured,
sliding his lean frame upright.

'Thank you,' she replied.
'You don't look so bad yourself."

His wry nod accepted the
compliment and his grey eyes sparkled with lazy humour. Dressed in a black
dinner suit and bow tie, he was a tall, dark, very attractive man with an easy
smile and a famous eye for the ladies. Women adored him and he adored them but,
thankfully, that mutual adoration had never raised its ugly head between the
two of them.

Leona liked Ethan. She
felt comfortable being with him. He   was   the   Hayes   in   Hayes-Frayne,  
architects.   Give Ethan a blank piece of paper and he would create a
fifty-storey skyscraper or a whole resort complete with sports clubs, shopping
malls and, of course, holiday villas to die for, as with this new resort in San
Estaban.

'Drink?' he suggested,
already stepping towards the well stocked drinks trolley.

But Leona gave a shake of
her head. 'Better not, if you want me to stay awake beyond ten o'clock,' she
refused.

'That late? Next you'll
be begging me to take you on to an all-night disco after the party.' He was
mocking the fact that she was usually safely tucked up in bed by nine o'clock.

'Do you disco?' she asked
him curiously.

'Not if I can help it,'
he replied, discarding his own glass to come and take the shawl from her hand
so he could drape it across her shoulders. 'The best I can offer in the name of
dance is a soft shoe shuffle to something very slow, preferably in a darkened
room, so that I don't damage my ego by revealing just how bad a shuffler I am.'

'You're such a liar.'
Leona smiled. 'I've seen you dance a mean jive, once or twice.'

Ethan pulled a face at
the reminder. 'Now you've really made me feel my age,' he complained. 'Next
you'll be asking me what it was like to rock in the sixties."

'You're not that old.'
She was still smiling.

'Born in the
mid-sixties,' he announced. 'To a free-loving mother who bopped with the best
of them."