Lynne Graham: Desert Prince, Bride of Innocence

Prince Murad was a benevolent man, Elinor acknowledged reflectively. She admired the older man’s strong sense of the family values of love, trust and loyalty. After her mother’s death when she was ten years old, Elinor’s upbringing had conspicuously lacked such sterling qualities and she was still feeling the pain of that loss. If only her own father had had an ounce of the prince’s warm and kindly nature!

While Louise squealed with delight at first sight of the luxurious limousine, Elinor was thinking instead about her father’s lifelong lack of interest in her. No matter how hard she had studied, her exam grades had never been good enough to please him. He had often told her that he was ashamed of her stupidity and that she was a severe disappointment to him. Her decision to become a nanny had outraged him and he had called her ‘A glorified nursemaid, nothing better than a servant!’ The dark shadows of those unhappy years had for ever marked her and she often felt as if she had no family at all. After all, her father had remarried without inviting her to his wedding and seemed to prefer to act as if he were childless.

‘I was reading an article about Prince Murad in a magazine,’ Louise remarked. ‘There were hints that he has quite an eye for the ladies and that he’s had affairs on the side. Watch your step with the old boy!’

Elinor frowned. ‘Oh, he’s definitely not like that with me—he’s more sort of fatherly—’

‘Don’t be so naïve. Ninety-nine per cent of middle-aged men are lechers with young attractive women,’ Louise derided with a scornful smile. ‘And if you remind him of your mother…’

‘I don’t think that’s very likely,’ Elinor interrupted in some amusement. ‘Mum was small, blonde and blue-eyed and I don’t look one bit like her.’

‘Whatever.’ Louise shrugged. ‘But if you didn’t remind him of your mother, why the heck did he offer you—a total stranger—the job of taking care of his precious daughter?’

‘It wasn’t quite as easy as you make it sound,’ Elinor fielded uncomfortably. ‘The prince put my name forward, but I went through the same recruitment process as everybody else that applied. He said he wanted to help me out because my mother once meant something to him. He also thought I’d be young enough to appeal to his daughter as a companion. And don’t forget that his wife only speaks Arabic and French, so my fluent French comes in very useful. I agree that getting the job was an extraordinary piece of good luck for me but there was nothing more sinister to it.’

Louise was still staring stonily at the younger woman. ‘But would you sleep with him—if he asked you?’

‘No, of course I wouldn’t! For goodness’ sake, he’s almost as old as my dad!’ Elinor objected with a shiver of distaste.

‘Now if it was his brother, Prince Jasim, you wouldn’t be shivering,’ Louise quipped. ‘There was a picture of him in the same article. He’s sex on legs: over six foot tall, single and movie-star handsome.’

‘Is he? I haven’t met him.’ Elinor turned her head away to look out of the limo at the well-lit city streets. Louise’s persistence and murky insinuations had annoyed her. Why were people always so willing to think the worst? Elinor would not have dreamt of working for Prince Murad and his wife if there had been anything questionable in the older man’s attitude towards her. Anyway, an unfortunate incident during her months of previous work experience had made Elinor very wary of flirtatious male employers.

‘A shame that the brother who’s going to be King one day should be short, balding and portly,’ Louise commented snidely. ‘Although plenty of women wouldn’t let that get in the way of their ambition.’

‘The fact that he’s married would be enough to deter me,’ Elinor replied very drily.

‘It’s got to be a shaky marriage though, with only a little girl to show for all those years he’s been with his wife,’ Louise insisted. ‘I’m surprised he hasn’t divorced her when there’s no male heir for the next generation—’

‘But there is an heir—the prince’s younger brother,’ Elinor pointed out.

‘He has to be the real catch in the family, then.’ A calculating glint shone in Louise’s gaze. ‘But after three months you still haven’t met him, even though you’re living in his house with his relatives, so that’s not too promising.’

Elinor didn’t waste her breath pointing out that falling in love with an Arab prince hadn’t done her late mother, Rose, any favours. Rose had met Murad at university and they had fallen head over heels in love. Elinor still had the engagement ring that Murad had given her mother. The young couple’s happiness had proved short-lived, however, because Murad had been threatened with disinheritance and exile if he married a foreigner. He had eventually returned to Quaram to act the dutiful son and do as he was told, while Rose had ended up marrying Ernest Tempest on the rebound. The marriage of two such ill-matched people had proved deeply unhappy.

‘You haven’t got any foreign travel out of the job either,’ Louise reminded her sourly. ‘At least I got ten days out in Cyprus with my family.’

‘I’m not that fussed about travelling,’ Elinor heard herself lie, her irritation at her companion’s snide remarks and put-downs strong enough to make her wonder why she had bothered to maintain such a one-sided friendship.

In the exclusive club they were treated to free drinks on the strength of Prince Murad’s vouchers, which was just as well as they could never have afforded to pay the high bar prices. Elinor reminded herself that it was her birthday and tried to shake off the sense of disappointment that had dogged her all week.

Her job was a lonely one and she often craved adult company; she knew that she needed to make the most out of a rare night out. Although she had the use of a car, Woodrow Court was deep in the Kentish countryside and within easy reach of few attractions beyond a small town. Zahrah’s parents travelled a great deal and preferred to leave their daughter at home rather than disrupt her schooling. As a result, Elinor had found her own freedom severely curtailed, as when her employers were absent they expected their nanny to be in constant attendance on their child. Elinor was travelling back to Woodrow Court in a limo later because leaving her charge in the care of the household staff overnight was not an option the prince was willing to allow. Even so, after being exposed to Louise’s bitter comments, Elinor was no longer feeling deprived by the fact that she had been denied the chance of a girlie sleepover.

‘You’re already getting the eye,’ Louise sighed enviously.

Elinor tensed and refused to look in the same direction. She found socialising with the opposite sex a challenging and often humiliating experience. She was unusually tall and made six feet even in modest heels. Guys happy to chat her up while she was sitting down wanted to run once she unfurled her giraffe-long legs and stood up to tower over them. Men, she had learnt from her awkward adolescent years when she was frequently a wallflower, preferred small dainty women at whom they could look down and feel tall beside. She knew she had an attractive face and a good figure, but neither counted for anything against her ungainly height. While men noticed her, they rarely approached her.

Some hours later she said goodbye to Louise, who had picked up an admirer. Elinor, on the other hand, had experienced a particularly painful evening when a young man had come up to her table to ask her to join him and then snarled, ‘Forget it!’ the instant she’d got up and he’d realised in horror that he barely reached her shoulder. He and his mates had heckled her and sniggered for what remained of the night as if she were a freak at a sideshow. As a result, she had had a little too much to drink to power the nonchalant expression she’d been forced to put on to conceal her misery.