Rashid stood up and looked at her, a smug little curve to his mouth. As if victory was finally his.
“It is clear you were never right for him with all the nonsense you just spouted. His sheikha would understand his destiny and would not distract him.” With every wrong thing Rashid said, Lauren could see the right path.
Both she and this insufferable old man were wrong, too absolute, too rigid in their thinking. And Zafir...he’d been walking that tightrope all along. From the minute he had met her.
“I suggest you have your lawyers look at the papers I brought. My son needs to put this...episode behind him. As for my grandchild, I’ll—”
“No,” Lauren threw back, straightening from the couch. She’d face this bully and a thousand more like him for Zafir. She’d prove her love a thousand times over to Zafir if only he’d give her another chance. Mind made up, she said, “I’m not going to sign a thing and you can’t make me. And I’ll tell Zafir that you were trying to blackmail me into cutting all ties,” she added for good measure.
Rashid’s stare was flat, derisive. Could have scorched her into ashes, if she let it. “You think my son will believe your word over mine? If you still haven’t learned your lesson—”
“If you care anything for Zafir, if there’s even a little regret inside that political heart of yours about what you denied him for so many years, you’ll take me to Behraat,” she demanded.
Warning glittered in his eyes. “There’s nothing but misery for you in Behraat. Zafir does not forgive.” And in that last sentence, there was a crack, a deep regret.
“I’ll take my chances,” she threw back and slammed the door.
She quickly dialed her ob-gyn for an appointment.
She’d beg if that’s what it would take.
* * *
Lauren had to wait eleven hours and twenty minutes after setting foot in the dusty, blazing inferno that was Behraat before she saw Zafir.
Through the ride in the armored, dark-tinted limo, Lauren saw little villages en route to the city between long stretches of rough road in between. Her pulse thudded when the high walls of the palace came into sight.
This was home now, she reminded herself resolutely, even as she felt daunted by the task ahead.
Only to be told by Rashid’s nasally aide that she’d have to wait.
She’d eaten, walked a path on the rug, fallen asleep out of sheer exhaustion and jet lag, wanted to scream at the silence, had even wondered if Rashid hadn’t somehow imprisoned her with no intention of ever telling Zafir again. But she’d been shown into her old suite.
A day of administrative affairs cannot be disturbed for one emotionally weak woman, Rashid had said before leaving her to his staff, a grim smile to his mouth.
Not Farrah, not Huma, not even Arif, it seemed knew of her arrival. Only Ahmed waited outside in the lounge, as much a prisoner as she because he’d refused to leave her side. Even when Rashid had commanded it. Patted her shoulder in encouragement in that awkward way of his when he’d realized what she meant to do.
She’d showered and changed into a sleeveless tunic and loose, flowy cotton trousers and once again, fallen into a restless sleep. Inky black night cloaked the room in semidarkness and she wondered what had woken her.
When she checked the time, she was shocked to see she had slept for more than three hours.
She sat up and whimpered as a cramp twisted her calf.
“Should I call for Farrah?”
The room lit up in a blaze of lights and Zafir stood at the foot of the bed. Tall. Dark. Impossibly gorgeous. Heart-wrenchingly remote.
“How long have you been here?”
He shrugged, as if he didn’t care enough to answer. And in that casual tilt of his shoulders and the dull glow of his golden eyes, Lauren knew she was walking a very tight line.
Throat tight and limbs shaking, she looked at his face bathed in the light. A deep well of emotion clamped her chest.
His dark blue dress shirt and black trousers utterly failed at masking that barely civilized air around him. Thick stubble marked his jaw and her fingers itched to trace the proud angles of it. He’d let his hair grow longer and it made his face even more narrow and gaunt. Dark shadows hung under his eyes and she wondered how long he’d been up for if Rashid’s words were to be believed.
Undiluted power clung to him, like a second skin, and she knew now that it was both his weapon and armor, as much to rule and right Behraat as it was to keep everyone out.
And yet, he’d let her in and she had thrown it all away.
Dismay swirled through her, threatening to break her, and she wondered if she’d already lost him.
When she tugged her gaze to his, something in it made her mouth dry. “It’s just a cramp. I should have walked around more on the flight.”