Kasey Michaels - The Sheikh's Secret Son

“A woman?” Clearly, Nadim was puzzled. “You postponed a meeting we have been planning for six months—for a woman? I know our beloved Leila is gone these past three years, Your Highness, but surely if you had need of a woman, there is no dearth of them at home in Kharmistan. If you had but asked, I—”

“There is a saying here in America, Nadim—‘Get your mind out of the gutter.’” There was an edge of steel in Ben’s voice as he interrupted the man. “You would do well to remember it.”

Nadim inclined his head. “My profound apologies, Your Highness.”

“Not that I am not honored by your offer to…um…pimp for your sheikh,” Ben said, unable to hide his smile. “I had no idea that procuring willing females was part of your duties as my advisor.”

Ben now saw the anger in Nadim’s eyes, the fullness of it, the depth of it, even as the man answered with a smile of his own. “Your Highness is being droll.”

“I try,” Ben said, his own humor evaporating. “Now, to get back to Miss Eden Fortune, if I might. Do you recall the name?”

“I do not, Highness. I am sorry. Have I met the woman?”

Ben stood, walked over to stand in front of his advisor, looked down at him as he sat at his ease. “No, Nadim, you have not. Perhaps you remember my father’s illness of some years ago, the time of his first cerebral accident?”

Nadim frowned as he stood, bowed to his sheikh. “Those were such trying times, Your Highness,” he said apologetically. “Your father had been meeting with the various desert chieftains on the delicate matter of water rights when he collapsed, sending everyone into a panic. Fools, all of them, believing that Kharmistan could not survive your father’s death. Our neighbors were looking for a reason to invade our territory, and without the loyalty of the chieftains we faced a turmoil that had to be avoided at all costs. We had to find you, which, I recall, was not an easy task, Your Highness, and then prominently produce you, prove that Kharmistan would go on, no matter what happened to your father.”

“Then you do recall, Nadim,” Ben said, beginning to pace once more. “And you found me. You found me in Paris. Now do you remember the name Eden Fortune?”

Nadim’s eyes were as dark as a starless midnight in the Kharmistan desert. “The woman. Of course. The father on his sick bed, possibly his death bed, and the lovesick son passing notes like a schoolboy, demanding delivery by hand in Paris. How could I forget?”

Ben turned on his heels, looked straight at his father-in-law. “But you did as I said, didn’t you, Nadim? You followed my direct order to have my letters hand-delivered to Miss Fortune in Paris?”

Nadim pulled his robe about him as he lifted his chin, struck a pose caught somewhere between arrogance and servility. “You question my loyalty, Your Highness? You question my vow to serve my prince in every way? I should leave your service at once, Your Highness, if you were to have lost confidence in me.”

“I will consider that an answer in the affirmative, Nadim. You did send a messenger with my letters. They were, as you had promised me, delivered directly into her hands. I must believe that she lied to me this afternoon, for I cannot believe that my most trusted advisor lied to me six years ago, and is lying now even as he looks into the eyes of his sheikh.”

Nadim continued to stare at Ben for long moments, then bowed, turned, and departed the room.

Ben’s suspicions went with him.

Ben paced the living area of the penthouse suite, pretending he did not see the hands on the mantel clock, pretending he had not heard the clock strike six a quarter hour earlier.

She was not coming. He could not believe she would not come. Not because he had demanded her presence, but because of her loyalty to her employer. Even as he had fallen in love with Eden, he had been able to see her finer qualities with a calm and detached eye. Loyalty, he had been sure then, had been sure until fifteen minutes ago, was very important to Eden.

As he, obviously, was not. Had never been.

How strange, how odd, how unprepared Ben was for rejection. From the time he had been a child, he had only to crook his finger, raise his eyebrow, give the faintest hint of what—or who—he wanted, and all that he desired had simply dropped into his lap.

His birth counted for some of this, his personality and will to succeed accounted for more. From his excellence in sports to his conquests with women, he had only ever brushed up against failure, had never embraced it. Failure had never embraced him.

Except for Eden Fortune, in Paris.

Except for Eden Fortune, here in Texas.

And now what was he to do? If he backed out of the negotiations with the American triad, Eden would surely lose her position. Obviously he had not thought through his plan completely. After six long months of planning, he had failed to factor in Eden’s temperament, her stubbornness in the face of his demands.

She was her own person. He had known that in Paris, he should have remembered it before he had presented her with an ultimatum that could only hurt any chance he had of speaking with her, perhaps holding her again. Perhaps loving her again.

“Stupid!” Ben told himself as he reached up a hand to his sheer kaffiyeh with its bold black agal. He had been as stupid, as cowhanded, with Eden as he had been to have dressed himself in the brilliantly striped aba denoting him as sheikh, a move meant to impress her, perhaps intimidate her.

Before he could yank the kaffiyeh from his head, strip off the aba to reveal the more pedestrian slacks and knit shirt beneath it, the doorbell of the suite buzzed once, twice.

“Eden,” Ben breathed, relaxing his shoulders, realizing that he, who routinely stared down princes, had been both anticipating and dreading this meeting. He was on edge, nervous. And that made him angry.

He walked over to stand in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over the city as one of the servants opened the door to the tiled foyer and he heard Eden give the man her name.

“Miss Eden Fortune, Highness,” the servant said a moment later, bowing Eden into the room, then retiring as he earlier had been bidden. Haskim would be back in a half hour, to serve the dinner of Middle Eastern specialities Ben had ordered prepared in the suite kitchen. Ben had, with an inner smile, ordered Dolma—stuffed grape leaves—among other Middle Eastern specialties, just to see how Eden reacted when she took her first bite of the delicacy that was a bit of an acquired taste.

Now he felt petty, and wished he had ordered from the hotel kitchens. Not that Nadim would allow such a thing without making a great fuss out of being his official taster, just in case the hotel chef had tried to poison the Sheikh of Kharmistan. The last person Ben wanted present in the room tonight was his outwardly conscientious, inwardly jealous father-in-law.

Ben watched as Eden walked into the room, her head held high, her posture that of a soldier about to undergo inspection. She was still clothed in the same trim, prim navy-blue suit he had seen her in this morning. Ben considered the outfit to be a deliberate choice, one meant to show her disdain for him, her determination to make this a business meeting and nothing more.

“Your Highness,” she said with a barely perceptible inclination of her head as she stopped, folded her hands in front of her. Glared at him.

Her dark brown hair was still drawn back severely. A French twist, Ben believed the style was called. He wondered if Eden could appreciate the irony in that description. The severe hairstyle helped to accentuate Eden’s high cheekbones, the clean sweep of her jaw, the fullness of her lips. Just as the severe blue suit skimmed over her body, setting off memories, hinting of a promise Ben was sure Eden had no intention of declaring.