“I will ask the questions,” he told her. “You will answer.”
“But—”
He shook his head again. “Ms. James, I am Prince As’ad. Is that name familiar to you?”
The young woman glanced from him to his aunt and back. “Yes,” she said quietly. “You’re in charge of the country or something.”
“Exactly. You are here on a work visa?”
She nodded.
“That work visa comes from my office. I suggest you avoid doing anything to make me rethink your place in my country.”
She had dozens of freckles on her nose and cheeks. They became more visible as she paled. “You’re threatening me,” she breathed. “So what? You’ll deport me if I don’t let that horrible man have his way with these children? Do you know what he is going to do with them?”
Her eyes were large. More green than blue, he thought until fresh tears filled them. Then the blue seemed more predominant.
As’ad could list a thousand ways he would rather be spending his day. He turned to Tahir.
“My friend,” he began, “what brings you to this place?”
Tahir pointed at the girls. “They do. Their father was from my village. He left to go to school and never returned, but he was still one of us. Only recently have we learned of his death. With their mother gone, they have no one. I came to take them back to the village.”
Kayleen took a step toward the older man. “Where you plan to separate them and have them grow up to be servants.”
Tahir shrugged. “They are girls. Of little value. Yet several families in the village have agreed to take in one of them. We honor the memory of their father.” He looked at As’ad. “They will be treated well. They will carry my honor with them.”
Kayleen raised her chin. “Never!” she announced. “You will never take them. It’s not right. The girls only have each other. They deserve to be together. They deserve a chance to have a real life.”
As’ad thought longingly of his quiet, organized office and the simple problems of bridge design or economic development that awaited him.
“Lina, stay with the girls,” he told his aunt. He pointed at Kayleen. “You—come with me.”
Kayleen wasn’t sure she could go anywhere. Her whole body shook and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath. Not that it mattered. She would gladly give her life to protect her girls.
She opened her mouth to tell Prince As’ad that she wasn’t interested in a private conversation, when Princess Lina walked toward her and smiled reassuringly.
“Go with As’ad,” her friend told her. “I’ll stay with the girls. Nothing will happen to them while you’re gone.” Lina touched her arm. “As’ad is a fair man. He will listen.” She smiled faintly. “Speak freely, Kayleen. You are always at your best when you are most passionate.”
What?
Before Kayleen could figure out what Lina meant, As’ad was moving and she found herself hurrying after him. They went across the hall, into an empty classroom. He closed the door behind them, folded his arms across his chest and stared at her intently.
“Start at the beginning,” he told her. “What happened here today?”
She blinked. Until this moment, she hadn’t really seen As’ad. But standing in front of him meant she had to tip her head back to meet his gaze. He was tall and broad-shouldered, a big, dark-haired man who made her nervous. Kayleen had had little to do with men and she preferred it that way.
“I was teaching,” she said slowly, finding it oddly difficult to look into As’ad’s nearly black eyes and equally hard to look away. “Pepper—she’s the youngest—came running into my classroom to say there was a bad man who wanted to take her away. I found the chieftain holding Dana and Nadine in the hallway.” Indignation gave her strength. “He was really holding them. One by each arm. When he saw Pepper, he handed Dana off to one of his henchmen and grabbed her. She’s barely eight years old. The girls were crying and struggling. Then he started dragging them away. He said something about taking them to his village.”
The rest of it was a blur. Kayleen drew in a breath. “I started yelling, too. Then I sort of got between the chieftain and the stairway. I might have attacked him.” Shame filled her. To act in such a way went against everything she believed. How many times had she been told she must accept life as it was and attempt change through prayer and conversation and demonstrating a better way herself?
Kayleen desperately wanted to believe that, but sometimes a quick kick in the shin worked, too.
One corner of As’ad’s mouth twitched. “You hit Tahir?”
“I kicked him.”
“What happened then?”
“His men came after me and grabbed me. Which I didn’t like, but it was okay because the girls were released. They were screaming and I was screaming and the other teachers came into the hall. It was a mess.”
She squared her shoulders, knowing she had to make As’ad understand why that man couldn’t take the girls away.
“You can’t let him do this,” she said. “It’s wrong on every level. They’ve lost both their parents. They need each other. They need me.”
“You’re just their teacher.”
“In name, but we’re close. I live here, too. I read to them every night, I talk to them.” They were like her family, which made them matter more than anything. “They’re so young. Dana, the oldest, is only eleven. She’s bright and funny and she wants to be a doctor. Nadine is nine. She’s a gifted dancer. She’s athletic and caring. Little Pepper can barely remember her mother. She needs her sisters around her. They need to be together.”
“They would be in the same village,” As’ad said.
“But not the same house.” She had to make him understand. “Tahir talks about how people in the village are willing to take in the girls. As if they would be a hardship. Isn’t it better to leave them here where they have friends and are loved? Where they can grow up with a connection to each other and their past? Do you know what he would do to them?”
“Nothing,” As’ad said flatly, in a voice that warned her not to insult his people. “He has given them his honor. They would be protected. Anyone who attacked them would pay with his life.”
Okay, that made her feel better, but it wasn’t enough. “What about the fact that they won’t be educated? They won’t have a chance. Their mother was American.”
“Their father was born here, in El Deharia. He, too, was an orphan and Tahir’s village raised him. They honor his memory by taking in his three daughters.”
“To be servants.”
As’ad hesitated. “It is their likely fate.”
“Then
