The Desert King's Virgin Bride. Sharon Kendrick

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СКАЧАТЬ poppet, as her father had used to call her. And he had been right. Sunny little Sorrel had charmed everyone.

      Her parents had been diplomats—clever academics with a hunger for facts and experience which had ended over the treacherous peaks of the Maraban mountain range which bordered the Western side of the country. There, one hot and stormy evening, their plane and their dreams had crashed and lain in pieces on the ground, and the sixteen-year-old Sorrel had been left an orphan.

      Perhaps if she had been younger then she would have been unable to refuse to return to her homeland, to be cared for by a distant relative. And if she had been older then there would have been no need for a protector. But she had needed someone, and Malik—a great friend and confidant of her ambassador father—had been named as guardian in their will.

      He had been more than a decade older, and in a more liberal country than Kharastan questions might have been asked about whether such an arrangement was appropriate between a teenage girl and a red-blooded single man. But no questions had been asked. Malik’s reputation where honour and duty were concerned was unimpeachable. He had overseen her education and her upbringing with a stern eye, far stricter than that of any father—though Sorrel had never given him cause for concern, not even a hint of rebellion.

      Until now.

      He stared at her. She was almost completely covered in pale silk, as Kharastani custom dictated, so it was almost impossible to known what her figure was really like, though from the drape and fall of the cloth, and the perfect oval of her face, it was easy to recognise that beneath it she was a slim and healthy young woman.

      Only a strand of moon-pale hair peeped out from beneath the soft silver lace which covered it, and the only colour which was apparent was the bright blue of her eyes and the natural rose gleam of her lips. For the first time Malik began to realise that somewhere along the way she had become a woman—and he hadn’t even noticed.

      Should he let her go? ‘Can’t you just have a holiday in England?’ he enquired moodily. ‘And then come back again?’

      Sorrel sighed. He was missing the point—only she couldn’t really tell him what the point was, could she?

      ‘No, Malik,’ she said patiently, aware from the sudden narrowing of his eyes that few people said ‘no’ to him since his sudden elevation in status. ‘I’ve spent my whole life having holidays in England—I haven’t lived there properly for years. Why, I even went to university here, in Kumush Ay—’

      ‘Which has a fine reputation the world over!’ he interrupted, with fierce pride. ‘And which enabled you to become possibly the only Western woman to speak fluent Kharastani. Why, you speak it almost as fluently as I do!’

      ‘Thank you.’ Briefly, Sorrel bowed her head—aware that the Sheikh had just paid her a compliment and that to fail to acknowledge it would be seen as discourteous. But it was yet another example of how much had changed since his elevation into the royal ranks.

      There was a time when she would have playfully teased him—or perhaps challenged him about who was right and who was wrong—but not any more. And the longer you stay, the worse it’s going to get, she told herself.

      ‘I don’t want to become a stranger to the land of my birth, Malik,’ she said fervently. ‘And if I leave it much longer then I will be. I’ll become one of those people whose only knowledge of their country is through the rose-tinted glasses of memory.’

      His eyes glinted as he nodded his black head with slow consideration. ‘Yes,’ he conceded. ‘The ties to our homeland are one of the strongest of all instincts known to man—for they link us to our forebears and make up our very history.’

      Sorrel could have kicked the leg of his ornate writing desk in rage, wanting to tell him not to be so damned pompous, but she couldn’t do that either. He might be speaking to her as if he was aged about a hundred and three, but what he said made sense—and in this instance at least he spoke from the heart. His heritage was of huge importance to him, and so he would naturally understand her need to go and investigate her roots.

      After all, it wasn’t his fault that she had stupidly nurtured a rather different fantasy about their shared future over the years…

      ‘Sorrel?’

      His voice butted into her thoughts and Sorrel blinked, her heart leaping in spite of everything, the way it always did when he said her name in that uniquely honeyed way of his.

      ‘Yes, Malik?’

      ‘Just what are you proposing to do? In England?’

      Try to start a new life. Do the normal stuff that a twenty-five-year-old woman would have done by now if she hadn’t been all caught up with trying to fit in somewhere where she didn’t belong. Maybe even find herself a boyfriend along the way.

      ‘I’ll look for a job.’

      There was a pause. ‘A job? What kind of job?’ he demanded, as incredulously as if she had just started doing cartwheels around the state apartments.

      ‘I can do plenty of things.’

      ‘Oh, really?’ He sat back in his chair and, interlacing his long dark fingers in front of the silken shimmer of his robes, fixed her with a piercing black look. ‘Such as?’

      ‘I’m a good organiser.’

      ‘That much is true,’ he admitted, for she had been co-ordinating palace functions ever since she had graduated. No royal banquet was ever complete without Sorrel quietly manoeuvring behind the scenes to prevent delicate egos from clashing.

      ‘And I am also versed in the art of diplomacy.’

      He could see exactly where this was leading, and as he was reminded of just how protected and innocent she really was Malik shook his head. ‘If you think you’ll just be able to walk straight into a job without any formal training, then you are wrong, Sorrel.’ Thoughtfully, he drummed one long finger on the polished surface of the exquisite inlaid desk. ‘However, I may be able to speak to a few people on your behalf. Perhaps,’ he mused, ‘I could arrange for you to stay with a family. Yes, that might be the best solution all round.’

      ‘A family?’

      ‘Why not? Girls do it all the time.’

      Girls, he had said. Not women, but girls—and enough really was enough! For the first time in her adult life Sorrel looked around the high-ceilinged palace room and saw it not as a place furnished with priceless antiques and glittering chandeliers and wonderful artifacts but as a kind of elaborate cage. Except that even a bird trapped in a cage could be seen, while she was hidden away like a guilty kind of secret. Prevented from freely mixing with men, covered from head to toe in robes designed to conceal the female form from all eyes. Never before had she minded about the camouflage of the national dress—but lately she had been looking at fashion sites on the internet with a yearning which surprised her.

      ‘I am not a g-girl,’ she said, her voice shaking with an emotion she wasn’t sure she could identify—even if she had been in the mood for analysis. ‘I am a woman—not some teenage au pair who needs looking after.’

      Malik’s eyes were caught by the sudden trembling of her lips and his pupils dilated—for it was as if he had never seen them before. Like petals. Provocative and rosy. Did she have any idea what Western men might do when confronted СКАЧАТЬ