Liz Fielding - Her Desert Dream

He assumed that was because her grandfather’s garage offered so wide a choice. But then she said, ‘It’s…’ she used her hands to describe a shape ‘…red.’

‘Red?’ Why was he surprised? ‘Good choice.’

‘I’m glad you approve.’

The exchange was, on the surface, perfectly serious and yet the air was suddenly bubbling with laughter.

‘Do you really have homes in all those places?’ she asked.

‘Just a mews cottage in London. My mother, my father’s first wife, was a French actress. She has a house in Nice and an apartment in Paris. His second wife, an English aristocrat, lives in Belgravia and Gloucestershire. His third was an American heiress. She has an apartment in the Dakota Building in New York and a house in the Hamptons.’

‘An expensive hobby, getting married.’ Then, when he made no comment, ‘You stay with them? Even your ex-stepmothers?’

‘Naturally. They’re a big part of my life and I like to spend time with my brothers and sisters.’

‘Oh, yes. I didn’t think…’ She seemed slightly flustered by his father’s admittedly louche lifestyle. ‘So where does Italy come in? The Lancia?’ she prompted.

‘My father bought a palazzo in Portofino when he was wooing a contessa. It didn’t last-she quickly realised that he wasn’t a man for the long haul-but he decided to keep the house. As he said, when a man has as many ex-wives and mistresses and children as he has, he needs a bolt-hole. Not true, of course. It’s far too tempting a location. He’s never alone.’

He expected her to laugh. Most people took what he said at face value, seeing only the glamour.

‘From his history, I’d say he’s never wanted to be,’ Rose said, her smile touched with compassion. ‘It must have been difficult. Growing up.’

‘Life was never dull,’ he admitted with rather more flippancy than he felt. Without a country, a purpose, his grandfather had become rudderless, a glamorous playboy to whom women flocked, a lifestyle that his father had embraced without question. His family were his world but after one relationship that had kept the gossip magazines on their toes for eighteen months as they’d followed every date, every break up, every make up, he’d realised that he had no wish to live like that for the rest of his life.

‘You didn’t mention Ramal Hamrah,’ she said, ignoring the opportunity he’d given her to talk about her own grandfather. Her own life.

Rare in a woman.

Rare in anyone.

Most people would rather talk about themselves.

‘Do you have a home there?’

‘There is a place that was once home,’ he told her because the apartment overlooking the old harbour, bought off plan from a developer who had never heard of Kalil al-Zaki, could never be described as the home of his heart, his soul. ‘A faded photograph that hangs upon my grandfather’s wall. A place of stories of the raids, battles, celebrations that are the history of my family.’

Stories that had grown with the telling until they had become the stuff of legend.

It was an image that the old man looked at with longing. Where he wanted to breathe his last. Where he wanted to lie for eternity, at one with the land he’d fought for.

And Kalil would do anything to make that possible. Not that sitting here, sharing a meal with Lady Rose Napier was as tedious as he’d imagined it would be.

‘No one has lived there for a long time,’ he said.

For a moment he thought she was going to ask him to tell her more, but all she said was, ‘I’m sorry.’

She was quiet for a moment, as if she understood the emptiness, the sense of loss and he began to see why people, even those who had never met her, instinctively loved her.

She had an innate sensitivity. A face that invited confidences. Another second and he would have told her everything but, at exactly the right moment, she said, ‘Tell me about your brothers and sisters.’

‘How long have you got?’ he asked, not sure whether he was relieved or disappointed. ‘I have one sister, a year younger than me. I have five half-sisters, three half-brothers and six, no seven, steps of both sexes and half a dozen who aren’t actually related by blood but are still family.’

She counted them on her long, slender fingers.

‘Sixteen?’ she asked, looking at him in amazement. ‘You’ve got sixteen brothers and sisters? Plus six.’

‘At the last count. Sarah, she’s the English ex, and her husband are about to have another baby.’

Lydia sat back in her chair, stunned. As an only child she had dreamed of brothers and sisters, but this was beyond imagining.

‘Can you remember all their names?’ she asked.

‘Of course. They are my family.’ Then, seeing her doubt, he held up his hand and began to list them. ‘My sister is Adele. She’s married to a doctor, Michel, and they have two children, Albert and Nicole. My mother has two other daughters by her second husband…’

As they ate, Kal talked about his family in France, in England and America. Their partners and children. The three youngest girls whose mothers his father had never actually got around to marrying but were all part of a huge extended family. All undoubtedly adored.

His family, but nothing about himself, she realised. Nothing about his personal life and she didn’t press him. How a man talked about his family said a lot about him. She didn’t need anyone to tell her that he was a loyal and caring son. That he loved his family. It was there in his smile as he told stories about his mother in full drama queen mode, about his sister. His pride in all their achievements.

If he’d had a wife or partner, children of his own, he would certainly have talked about them, too. With love and pride.

‘You’re so lucky having a big family,’ she told him as they laughed at a story about one of the boys causing mayhem at a party.

‘That’s not the half of it,’ he assured her. ‘My grandfather set the standard. Five wives, ten children. Do you want their names, too? Or shall I save that for a rainy day?’

‘Please tell me that it doesn’t rain in Ramal Hamrah.’

‘Not often,’ he admitted.

Neither of them said anything while Atiya cleared the table, placed a tray of sweet things, tiny cakes, nuts, fruit, before them.

‘Can I bring you coffee or tea?’ Atiya asked.

‘Try some traditional mint tea,’ Kal suggested before she could reply. He spoke to Atiya in Arabic and, after a swift exchange, which apparently elicited the right answer, he said, ‘Not made with a bag, it will be the real thing.’

‘It sounds delicious.’

‘It is.’

He indicated the tray, but she shook her head.

‘It all looks wonderful but I can’t eat another thing,’ Lydia said. ‘I hope there’s a pool in Bab el Sama. If I keep eating like this I won’t fit into any of my clothes when I get home.’

‘I don’t understand why women obsess about being thin,’ he said.

‘No? Have you never noticed the way celebrities who put on a few pounds are ridiculed? That would be women celebrities,’ she added.

‘I know. Adele went through a bad patch when she was a teenager.’ He shook his head. Took a date, but made no attempt to push her to eat. Instead, he bestowed a lazy smile on her and said, ‘Now you know my entire family. Your turn to tell me about yours.’

Lydia waited while Atiya served the mint tea.

Completely absorbed by his complex relationships, the little vignettes of each of his brothers and sisters that had made them all seem so real, she had totally forgotten the pretence and needed a moment to gather herself.

‘Everyone knows my story, Kal.’

Kal wondered. While he’d been telling her about his family, she’d been by turns interested, astonished, amused. But the moment he’d mentioned hers, it was as if the lights had dimmed.