to pack the twins’ swimming costumes and her own bikini—because, unlike Fatima, she would swim with the girls.
Emir was at the helicopter, and she felt his air of impatience as she stepped in. He had already strapped in the girls and Fatima gave Amy a long, cool look as she left the aircraft, for it was an honour indeed to travel with the King.
It was not the easiest of journeys, though Emir did hold Nakia as they neared their destination. Again Amy watched his features harden and, looking out of the window, thought perhaps she understood why. Alzirz was celebrating as Alzan should have been on the day of the twins’ birthday. The streets around the palace were lined with excited people waving flags. They all watched in excitement as dignitaries arrived for the naming of their new Prince.
How it must kill him to be so polite, Amy mused as they arrived at the palace and the two men kissed on both cheeks. She could feel the simmering hatred between them that went back generations.
Queen Natasha didn’t seem to notice it. She was incredibly informal and greeted both Amy and the twins as if they were visiting relatives, rather than a nanny and two young princesses. ‘They’ve grown!’ she said.
She looked amazing, Amy noted, wearing a loose fitting white robe embroidered with flowers. She certainly didn’t look like a woman who had given birth just a few days ago, and Amy felt drab beside her.
‘Come through!’ Natasha offered, seeing the twins were more than a little overawed by the large formal gathering. ‘I’ll take you to the nursery. I have to get the baby ready.’ She chatted easily as they walked through the palace. ‘I’ll introduce you to my nanny, Kuma. She’s just delightful, but I really want him to learn English.’ She smiled over to Amy. ‘You’re not looking for a job, by any chance?’ she asked shamelessly.
‘I’m very happy where I am,’ came Amy’s appropriate response, though she was tempted to joke that Natasha might find her on the palace doorstep in a couple of days. But, no, Amy realised, even if Natasha was nice, even if she was easy to talk to, in Alzirz as in Alzan the Royal Nanny would have to be obedient to royal command. She could never put her heart through this again.
Kuma really was delightful. She was far more effusive and loving than Fatima. She smiled widely when she saw the twins, put a finger up to her lips to tell them to hush, and then beckoned them over to admire the new prince. Nakia wasn’t particularly interested, but Clemira clapped her hands in delight and nearly jumped out of Amy’s arms in an effort to get to the baby. She was clearly totally infatuated with the young Prince.
‘He’s beautiful,’ Amy said. His skin was as dark as Rakhal’s, but his hair was blonde like Natasha’s, and Amy was suddenly filled with hopeless wonder as to what her babies might have been like if Emir was their father. She was consumed again with all she had lost, but then she held Clemira tighter and qualified that—all that she was losing by walking away.
‘Would you like to hold him?’ Natasha offered.
‘He’s asleep,’ Amy said, because she was terrified if she did that she might break down.
‘He has to get up, I’m afraid,’ Natasha said. ‘I want to feed him before the naming ceremony.’ She scooped the sleeping infant out of his crib and, as Kuma took Clemira, handed him to Amy.
Sometimes it had hurt to hold Clemira and Nakia in those early days, to know that she would never hold her own newborn, and the pain was back now, as acute as it had been then, perhaps more so—especially when the two Kings came in. Rakhal was proud and smiling down at his son. Emir was polite as he admired the new Prince. But there was grief in his eyes and Amy could see it. She was angry on behalf of his girls, yet she understood it too—for the laws in this land, like in the desert, could be cruel.
‘Come,’ Emir told her, ‘we should take our places.’
Her place was beside him—for the last time.
She stood where in the future she would not: holding his daughters. She held Clemira and sometimes swapped. Sometimes he held both, when he did not have to salute, so he could give Amy a rest and once, when they girls got restless, she set them on the ground, for it was a long and complicated ceremony.
‘They did well,’ Emir said as they walked back to the nursery with the weary twins.
‘Of course they did!’ Amy smiled. ‘And if they’d cried would it really have mattered? Tariq screamed the whole ceremony.’
‘He did.’ Emir had been thinking the same, knew he must not be so rigid. Except his country expected so little from his daughters and somehow he wanted to show them all they could be. ‘Just so you know, the Alzirz nanny will be looking after the twins tonight. They are to make a brief appearance at the party, but she will dress them and take care of that.’
‘Why?’ Amy asked, and she watched his lips tighten as she questioned him.
‘Because.’ Emir answered, and he almost hissed in irritation as he felt her blue eyes still questioning him. He refused to admit that he did not know why.
‘Because what?’
He wanted to turn around and tell her that he was new to this, that the intricacies of parenthood and royal protocol confused him at times too. Hannah would have been the one handling such things. It was on days like today that the duty of being a single parent was the hardest. Yet he could not say all this, so his voice was brusque when he conceded to respond. ‘Sheikha Queen Natasha wants them to be close. It is how things are done. If Prince Tariq comes to stay in Alzan you will look after him for the night.’
‘I thought you were rivals?’
‘Of course,’ Emir said. ‘But Queen Natasha is new to this. She does not understand how deep the rivalry is, that though we speak and laugh and attend each other’s celebrations there is no affection there.’
‘None?’
‘None.’ His face was dark. ‘The twins will be looked after by their nanny tonight. They will be brought back to you in the morning and you will all join me at the formal breakfast tomorrow.’
‘But the girls will be unsettled in a new …’
He looked at her. He must have been mad to even have considered it—crazy even to think it. For she would not make a good sheikha queen. There was not one sentence he uttered that went unquestioned, not a thought in her head that she did not voice.
‘You keep requesting a night off. Why then, do you complain when you get one?’
Amy reminded herself of her place.
‘I’m not complaining.’ She gave him a wide smile. ‘I’m delighted to have a night off work. I just wasn’t expecting it.’
‘You can ring down for dinner to be sent to you.’
‘Room service?’ Amy kept that smile, remembered her place. ‘And I’ve got my own pool … Enjoy the party.’
Of course he did not.
He was less than happy as he took his place at the gathering. He could see the changes Natasha had brought to the rather staid palace, heard laughter in the air and the hum of pleasant, relaxed conversation, and it only served to make him more tense. He held his daughters along with Kuma, and Natasha held
