Natasha Oakley - Cinderella and the Sheikh

At best she’d be a name on their application for permission to film in Amrah. Maybe he just wasn’t keen on a film crew coming to his country? But that hardly made sense because he could say ‘no’ and Minty would have to move on to another project. It was hardly something he needed to lose any sleep over.

But she might . Polly walked the length of the Long Gallery and through into the library with the wonderful smell of leather, polish and really old books. If Sheikh Rashid did veto the project, what would she do then? It was past time she left this place and it wasn’t as though she had alternatives leaping out at her.

‘Everything all right, Miss Polly?’

Polly spun round and smiled up at her stepbrother’s elderly butler who’d come through the Summer Sitting Room. ‘Fine. I’m just on my way to check everything’s ready for the fireworks.’

‘You’ll find the two gentlemen from “Creative Show” in the staff room,’ the butler said, the merest flicker in his eyes communicating how annoying he’d found them.

Polly smiled and gathered up the folds of her peacock-blue dress. ‘We’re nearly done. And the rain seems to be holding off all right so I think we’ll revert to midnight. Let’s get this over as soon as possible and send these people home.’

‘Very good, Miss Polly.’

Miss Polly. She liked that. Henry Phillips had managed to find the perfect solution as to what to call someone who was almost one of the family but not quite.

No, not quite . She would always be the housekeeper’s daughter even if her mother had married the fourteenth duke. And Henry Phillips would always remember he’d taken her into the kitchens and made her hot milk and sugar during her father’s wake. It was a bond between them that would never be broken even if she was almost ‘a member of the family’.

‘Henry…?’ She stopped him as a new thought occurred to her. ‘What do you know about Sheikh Rashid Al Baha? He’s not been to Shelton before tonight, has he?’

‘No,’ the butler answered with one of his rare smiles, ‘but I fancy he’s the money who bought Golden Mile all the same.’

‘By himself?’

‘Indeed.’

‘He must be worth billions!’

‘A little more than that,’ the butler said with another thin smile. ‘I doubt it was pocket change, but nothing that need worry him, I gather.’

‘So why didn’t he come here?’ she asked with a frown.

‘I imagine all the negotiations were carried out through his agent. His Grace and the anonymous buyer of Golden Mile both wished the transaction to be private.’

‘Oh.’

‘Why do you ask?’

‘No reason.’ Almost no reason . It had suddenly occurred to her that the look in Rashid Al Baha’s cold blue eyes might have had something to do with Anthony after all. Her stepbrother made enemies easier than anyone she knew.

‘And they met tonight?’

Henry nodded.

‘What happened? Did they argue?’

‘That would be very unusual for someone from his culture, I believe. They spoke and it was extremely cordial. But—’ the elderly man searched for the correct word ‘—it was…shall we say, cold.’

Why? An Amrahi prince with the reputation and disposable income of this one would normally have Anthony exerting himself to charm. And even she had to own he was good at that when he saw a reason to be.

But ‘cold’was exactly the word to describe the way Rashid Al Baha had looked at her earlier. Cold, angry and speculative.

CHAPTER TWO

RASHID watched the Hon Emily Coolidge finger the large diamond nestled against her rather bony chest and felt a familiar wave of boredom wash over him. This was his mother’s country, the country in which he’d received much of his education, but he felt very little affinity with it. Or with the people who lived in it.

It felt empty. Soulless. Emily had to know he’d never choose her, or anyone like her, as the mother of his children. It made her behaviour inexplicable.

The brunette’s finger moved again across the cool plains of the diamond droplet. There’d been a time, not so long ago, when that unspoken offer would have been appealing. In fact, he wouldn’t have stopped to think about it. He’d merely have lost himself in mindless pleasure, content that Western women seemed to view these things differently.

‘Will you be in London next week?’

Rashid twisted the champagne glass between thumb and forefinger, concentrating on the play of light on the liquid in his glass. He really hadn’t thought much about who the mother of his children would be. It was always something for the future. Something far distant.

But now things were changing. He felt a mortality that had never touched him before. There had to be something inbuilt that made a man long to pass on his genes. To feel that he would go on…

Was that it? Was that what this gnawing dissatisfaction with his life was about? A wanting to set his place in history? To find meaning?

‘I’m returning to town after this evening.’ Again the brunette moved her hand suggestively across her low décolletage. ‘Wouldn’t it be fabulous if we could spend some time together before you fly back to Amrah?’

‘No.’ And then he cursed himself for what had been a staggering lack of good manners. His shoulders moved in an apologetic shrug. ‘My father…’

Rashid let the sentence hang unfinished. The doctors, he knew, would do everything they could, but neither he, nor any man, could hope to foresee what the next few months would bring.

Emily leant forward and touched his hand, outwardly concerned.

Rashid studied her face. She didn’t care. There was no genuine emotion in her painted eyes.

And he couldn’t be bothered.

The truth of that slid into his brain like a dagger through silk. He wanted to shake these people off, move away, find space to breathe. And yet he had the responsibility of a guest towards his host’s friends. A responsibility he was shirking.

It was a relief when a loud crack ripped across the general murmur of conversation. He looked out towards the formal gardens stretching down to the ornamental lake and at the white firework cascading down like some overblown pompom.

‘Oh, my God, how lovely.’ Emily unwound her overly long body and stood, hand raised to shield her eyes as though that would somehow make it easier to see what was happening out in the landscaped gardens. ‘Fireworks! Oh, Rashid, how beautiful.’ She turned her long neck so she could look directly at him.

Another sharp crack, followed by a hiss and sizzle, and he caught sight of a particularly spectacular cascade of golden shards.

‘I love fireworks!’

Vaguely, very vaguely, he was aware of the movement around the table. Chairs scraped back and then Nick’s hand touching his arm. ‘Coming to see?’

Rashid shook his head. He looked up and met his friend’s understanding blue eyes. Nick knew why he was here and would be tolerant if his behaviour wasn’t quite as it should be.

Rashid’s head jerked upwards as he felt the spurt of anger flicker deep inside him. Under any other circumstances he wouldn’t be here. Given half a choice he’d be back in Amrah, ready to spend precious time with his father if he was sent for. And he’d have been watching his brother’s back, holding off the factions that were all too eager to turn recent events to their advantage.

His friend smiled and deftly manoeuvred the rest of the party outside. Rashid pulled a weary hand across his face and then let his eyes wander along the panelled walls. So different from home, but no less beautiful. Shelton Castle was a place of wealth. A little shabby, but in the English style of conserving all that was old regardless of fashion.