In the event, it had not been Brad who showed her Paris, but Rachid. The party at the Embassy had not turned out at all as she had expected, and looking back on it now, she could still feel the thrill of excitement that had coursed through her veins when he had first laid eyes on her. It was the first time she had experienced such a tangible reaction to an intangible contact, and she remembered how put out Brad had been when Rachid relieved him of his companion.
Parties at Middle Eastern embassies were usually sumptuous, with plenty of food and drink provided for their European guests. Arabs, or at least Muslims, did not touch alcohol, but they had no inhibitions about providing it for their visitors. They were extravagant affairs, with a great deal of business mixed in with the socialising, and even Abby, who was not unaccustomed to the attentions of the opposite sex tended to cling to Brad like a lifeline in a stormy sea.
Meeting Rachid was different however. He had been there, with his father, Prince Khalid, welcoming their guests when Abby and Brad arrived. Tall and dark, with strong, tanned features, and eyes so deep as to be almost black, he nevertheless possessed a less hawklike profile than his father, whose looks were distinctly those of an Arab. Rachid displayed his English ancestry, in the thick length of his lashes, in the lighter cast of his skin, and the sensually attractive curve of his mouth. He had a sense of humour, too, which was something she learned his father lacked, and his lean muscular frame complemented the well-cut dinner suit, that contrasted sharply with his father’s robes and kaffiyeh.
Abby, at nineteen, had considered herself well capable of handling any situation. She had been Brad Daley’s secretary for over a year, and during that time she had countered the advances of men from various backgrounds, and while she was attracted to Prince Rachid, she was immediately suspicious of his motives. Men of his wealth and education did not get seriously involved with secretaries, and while she enjoyed his attention, she tried not to respond to his undoubted sexual magnetism.
It proved difficult—and ultimately, impossible. Despite the quite obvious disapproval of his father and the rest of his family, Rachid neglected his other guests to remain at her side during the course of the evening, and afterwards, with Brad’s grudging consent, he took her back to the hotel. He had been quite circumspect then, merely kissing her hand on departing, and wishing her a good night’s sleep, and even when the sheaves of white roses began to arrive in the morning, she had had no conception of how hopeless would be her attempts to resist him.
He arrived at ten o’clock to take her sightseeing, and sweeping Brad’s objections aside with the assurance that he would arrange for a temporary secretary to replace her, he took Abby on a tour of the city that left her speechless and breathless. He knew Paris intimately, having spent some time studying at the Sorbonne, and instead of whisking her from place to place in a limousine, he made her walk miles and miles through the fascinating heart of the city, until her feet ached, and she begged for relief.
Then he took her back to his hotel, instead of hers, much to her alarm, insisting that she must eat dinner with him, and that he did not intend to share her with Brad Daley. However, when she discovered that he intended ordering the meal served in his suite, she firmly declined, and only accompanied him upstairs to avoid standing alone in the lobby while he changed.
The hotel room had been magnificent, she remembered, with soft pile carpets and lots of concealed lighting. While Rachid disappeared into his bedroom, she kicked off her shoes and curled on a soft couch, and would have fallen asleep had not nervousness kept her awake.
He returned wearing not the casual pants and matching jerkin he had worn all day, but a robe, similar to the one his father had worn the night before, only striped in shades of blue and purple that accentuated the raven darkness of his hair.
Abby remembered she had been studying a painting on the wall above a polished escritoire, and her first intimation that she was no longer alone had come when firm, strong fingers had begun massaging her aching instep. She had been shocked to find Rachid squatting at her feet, performing the menial service, and had begun to protest when he had lowered his head and caressed her toes with his lips.
Her skin had burned through the fine mesh of her tights, and when he had lifted his eyes to look at her, her head had swum with the message she read in their depths. For the first time in her life she had encountered a man, and a situation, she could not control, and her preconceived ideas of the relationship between the sexes were violently revised.
Her startled use of his name was a further demonstration of how his actions disturbed her. All day she had maintained the formality between them, but suddenly they were no longer a Middle Eastern prince and a secretary, but a man and a woman caught in the oldest spell since creation.
Even so, she had clung to some semblance of dignity, scrambling off the couch and putting the width of the room between them. She couldn’t leave. Her shoes still lay near Rachid’s straightening figure, and she could imagine the scandal which would ensue if she ran from the room in her stockinged feet. But she needed a breathing space, and the palpitating beat of her heart was evidence of the powerful effect he had on her.
Contrarily, Rachid had not pursued the issue. With a gesture of indifference he had left her, returning minutes later wearing a fine mohair lounge suit and the tie that proclaimed the exclusiveness of his public school, and much to Abby’s bemusement, they had dined downstairs without another word being said about what had happened upstairs.
The following morning he arrived at her hotel before she was even dressed. Her room was still druggingly scented with the perfumes of the roses he had had delivered the previous day, and the chambermaid gushed admiringly as she brought an armful of pale pink orchids to join them.
‘Que Monsieur est romantique!’ she exclaimed, fingering the thick luscious petals, but Abby thought single-minded was probably a more apt description.
Nevertheless, she was aware her fingers had trembled so much she had dropped the soap in the shower, and she had deliberately dressed in her least feminine outfit to combat the emotions she was trying hard to suppress. She knew what he was doing. She had heard stories of other girls courted in this way. But somehow, imperatively, she must keep her head.
Unfortunately, despite what she later learned of Rachid’s dislike of women in trousers, the wine silk shirt and toning velvet pants she had chosen merely accentuated the delicate swell of her woman’s body, and with her hair straight to her waist and confined at her nape with a leather thong, she had looked both absurdly young and infinitely feminine. Rachid had not been able to take his eyes off her when she met him in the lobby of the hotel, and in spite of her earlier determination to refuse him, she found herself accepting his invitation to drive with him to Versailles.
He drove himself, an infrequent occurrence, she later learned, but in this instance essential to their privacy. They had wandered together through the magnificent park and gardens of the palace, gazing at the flowerbeds and ornamental lakes, the statuary and the fountains, and when Rachid captured her hand to draw her attention to the spectacular chariot rising from the waters of the Bassin d’Apollon, it seemed natural that her fingers should remain within the firm coolness of his.
It was another wonderful day, and by the time they drove back to Paris, Abby had almost forgotten the reasons which had brought her there in the first place. Unfortunately Brad had not, and the row that ensued on her return made her realise how selfishly she was behaving. His diatribe, too, on the recklessness of what she was doing did not improve the situation, particularly as he was only saying the things she herself had thought previously, and which even now were struggling for existence. He said she was a fool, and an innocent if she imagined the Prince Rachid Hasan al Juhami wanted anything more than to satisfy his lust for her body, and that if that didn’t trouble her the way Arabs treated their women would. They were just chattels, he
