One Desert Night. Kate Walker

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      Nabil bin Rashid Al Sharifa, Sheikh of Rhastaan, raised the glass in his hand high in a gesture of congratulation and angled it in the direction of the two honoured guests at the party. The couple who were celebrating today and who, in spite of everything in the past, were now his two greatest friends.

      ‘Congratulations on ten years together. Ten happy years.’

      It was the last three words that caught in his throat and almost closed it off, choking them back from his tongue. Ten happy years they had been for his friends, but if he was given the chance there was no way he would want to live through the past decade over again.

      ‘To Clemmie and Karim,’ he tried again.

      The elegant dark-haired woman, regal as the Queen she truly was in the scarlet robe, heavily embroidered in gold, turned a warm, generous smile in his direction while at her side, Sheikh Karim al Khalifa, like Nabil more sombrely but equally magnificently attired in the flowing robes and headdress of his country, lifted his own glass in acknowledgement of Nabil’s toast. It was a moment that no one could ever have anticipated happening ten years before, when Clemmie had been destined to be Nabil’s arranged wife, but his headstrong passion for the younger Sharmila had led him to reject her and marry his new, pregnant lover. No one then would have predicted that this huge party would be organised in the Rhastaanian palace to celebrate their ten years of love and marriage...

      Of children.

      Abruptly Nabil put his glass down on the nearest table, the fine crystal clattering harshly against the polished surface. Even if he hadn’t already been told the happy news, it was impossible not to notice the slight swell of Clemmie’s belly under the burnished red silk of the floor-length gown. Clementina had always been beautiful. Even when he had been in the throes of the foolishly righteous—or so he had believed—anger and mutiny that had driven him to reject her, he’d had to acknowledge that. But now, with her curvaceous form enriched by her early pregnancy, she had a glow about her that was positively incandescent.

      ‘Congratulations,’ Nabil repeated once more, forcing himself to smile at his friends.

      He wanted to smile to show that he was happy for them. He was happy for them, deep down in his heart. But at the same time he couldn’t help contrasting the richness of their life when compared with his own.

      What they had in abundance, and what he needed so badly now, but he didn’t see a way of discovering the same happiness for himself.

      Ten years ago, when they had been starting out on their journey into married happiness, he had thought he had it all. A beautiful wife at his side, a child growing inside her, the future of his country secured against the swirling darkness of uprising that had threatened. Young fool that he’d been—young, blind, heedless, headstrong fool!—he’d thought only of his longing to rebel against the hand that fate had dealt him.

      So he’d rebelled all right, and by doing so he’d tied himself into that fate even tighter. He’d locked himself in and thrown away the key.

      ‘Ten wonderful years!’

      Karim’s voice might have been lifted, projected to reach the whole room and the audience of his guests and peers who thronged the huge space, but his eyes were only on his wife. They were in their own private world and unconsciously Clemmie’s hand reached up to rest gently on the barely visible swell, the promise of their unborn child in her belly.

      The moment seemed to hang on the air, thick with emotion and a touch of secret sensuality, until it was broken by a flurry of sound and a whirl of movement as two small bodies careered across the room and flung themselves at their parents with shrieks of delight.

      ‘Adnan, Sahra...’ Clemmie’s voice was soft and warm even as she tried to make her words into the gentlest of reproofs. ‘Is that any way for a prince and princess to behave at such a public event?’

      ‘But it’s Mummy and Daddy’s party,’ Adnan declared with all the confidence of his just five years of age. ‘Not a pub-publicked ’vent!’

      Another smile passed between Clemmie and Karim at their son’s declaration, and the boy’s father let his hand drop to ruffle the mop of shining black hair with easy affection. It was the sort of warmth that Nabil had never known with his own father, a coldly distant man who barely knew his son’s name.

      ‘It’s both,’ Karim said quietly and something in that tone made Nabil move sharply and abruptly, half-turning towards the door and then forcing himself back again. As host for this event, it was his place to stay where he was, to ensure that the celebrations went perfectly, but right now...

       Go on...

      The words weren’t actually spoken but he could almost hear them on the air. It was just a flicker of a response that drew his attention to Clemmie’s fine-boned face, but as soon as she had caught his eye, she made the tiniest of gestures with her dark head, indicating the doors out on to the terrace. The complete understanding of what was in his thoughts was there in the warmth of her smile, the flicker of her eyes towards the open doors that spelled escape and freedom from the public ceremony. She had recognised his response, knew the thoughts that were in his head—and was happy to let him take the time to breathe that he needed.

      ‘Now—weren’t you going to sing that special song?’

      Her question drew everyone’s attention to the two children and Clemmie, focusing on her and away from Nabil.

      With a silent whisper of thanks to the woman who his father had once decreed should be his bride but instead, with her true husband, had become one of his dearest friends, Nabil took the opportunity that presented itself and moved, silent and soft-footed, across the marble floor and out on to the balcony.

      The coolness of a faint breeze stirred the robes he wore, making them swirl softly as he moved, and the blackness of the night was eased by the cold glow of the moon just coming up over the horizon. Roughly Nabil dragged in long, much-needed breaths of air as he paced down the long stone-flagged gallery before coming to a halt and, resting his hands on the high parapet, stared out at the lights that burned in the darkness beyond the walls of the palace. To where the people his country had completed their daily business, and now went about the procedure of settling for the night, getting their children ready for bed, kissing them goodnight.

      ‘Damnation!’

      His hand formed into a fist, pounding down against the roughness of the stone as he faced the images in his mind. It seemed that today everything around him conspired to drive home to him how much he should have. How much he had once thought he had only to have it all snatched away. In a gesture that was so much of a habit he barely noticed these days, he lifted a hand to rub at the side of his face where a scar marked his cheekbone, not really concealed by the thick black beard he had grown in an attempt to disguise it. Not that it had worked. The white line that scored through his skin was still there like the mark of Cain every time he looked in the mirror; reminding him.

      A sudden sound, soft and slow in the darkness, reminded him of just where he was, the open expanse of the palace grounds between him and the walls that surrounded them. Unwanted and unwelcome, the memories came creeping back, pushing him to take a single step backwards, away from the edge, into the shadows. Tonight it seemed that the darkness hid potential for danger, for destruction.

      Or was that just his own state of mind?

      At his left hand side, the sound came again, soft and light, bringing his head СКАЧАТЬ