Earl Grey tea with a dash of lemon and sandwiches would be perfect, thank you.’
Nura lifted a nearby phone and relayed the request, then turned just as Allegra was making her way to the bathroom.
‘You are travelling outside the city walls with His Highness this afternoon?’ she enquired. At Allegra’s nod, she continued. ‘You’re going to visit the Nur-Aram tribe. It is the place I was named after.’ She smiled, then worry creased her youthful face. ‘It is a difficult place to get to. The journey can be quite rough.’
‘It’s fine,’ Allegra reassured. ‘I’ve visited worse places, I’m sure.’
Nura continued to look worried, but then dashed forward when Allegra reached the wide marble bathtub. ‘I will draw your bath for you, Mistress.’
‘Please, call me Allegra.’
Nura looked horrified, her soft brown eyes widening in alarm. ‘No, I cannot.’
Surprised, Allegra asked, ‘Why not?’
‘Because it would be disrespectful to call a mistress of His Highness by her first name.’
Allegra wasn’t sure why her stomach dropped and rolled with such acrobatic skill it would’ve made an elite athlete proud. She was pretty sure something had been lost in translation. Or assumptions had been made because of where Rahim had placed her in his palace? ‘Are there a lot of mistresses in this wing?’ she blurted before she could stop herself.
Nura nodded. ‘At this time of the year, all of the fifteen residences are occupied.’
Nausea rose in Allegra’s belly. She tried to bite her tongue, but the next question spilled out anyway. ‘And all the fifteen occupants...they’re related to Sheikh Rahim?’
Nura looked puzzled as she straightened from checking the temperature of the four gold-plated taps that gushed water into the cavernous bath. ‘No, they are not His Highness’s relations. But they’re very important to him.’
Allegra tried to laugh but the sound came out skewed. ‘Wow, next you’ll be telling me there’s a secret passage between this wing and the sheikh’s bedchamber, like in the movies.’
Nura’s laugh was more natural, a shy twinkle in her eye as she plucked warming towels from a rail and laid them within arm’s reach of the bath. ‘There is a connecting passage, but it’s not secret. Everyone knows it is the last door along this hallway.’
Allegra’s nausea increased. She’d visited enough cultures around the world on behalf of her charity to know that harems and the taking of concubines were still a thing, even in the twenty-first century.
She didn’t know how else to ask the question burning on her tongue without coming straight out with it—does the sheikh keep concubines?—so she pulled hard on her diplomatic nerve and bit back the urge.
As detestable as the idea was, it was none of her business. Rahim Al-Hadi’s sexual conquests, singular or numerous, shouldn’t be something she wasted valuable time or brain matter over.
With a wrench at the master tap, she shut the water off. ‘Thanks for your help, Nura. I’ve got it from here.’
The young woman vacillated for a second, then nodded enthusiastically. ‘I’ll go and lay out your clothes and toiletries.’
Allegra smothered a groan, kept the smile pinned in place until the elaborately carved wooden doors shut behind her. Sliding into the richly scented bath, she reined in her rioting feelings.
Sure, the sizzling heat that passed between them when they touched and the shock waves of sensation that blanketed her each time their eyes met were undeniable.
But there was no way she was about to forget that the man whose palace she was currently a guest in was a notorious playboy, whose exploits were vividly documented.
Rahim Al-Hadi treated women like they were playthings to be used and discarded the moment the shine wore off.
He’d placed her in the women’s wing where he kept his harem, for heaven’s sake. And by doing so, he’d proven conclusively that he was—contrary to his statement in the car—completely irredeemable.
‘YOU READY TO hit the road?’ a deep voice said from behind where she stood examining a Gerhard Richter painting.
Allegra turned and swallowed a breath of surprise. Added to Rahim’s much more informal tone, he’d shed his ceremonial office clothes for a black cotton abaya, with similar coloured keffiyeh and white iqal. But the combination was somehow more potent. Perhaps it was because the lighter material emphasised the breadth of his shoulders and skimmed his lean hips and thighs.
Or she was going out of her mind ogling a man she had zero interest in. She drew her gaze from his well-formed chest and redirected her eyes to his face, taking care to pin a neutral smile to hers.
Sure, with his informal clothes and his easy smile, Allegra could’ve fooled herself into thinking she was about to step out for coffee with a regular Joe.
But he wasn’t. Rahim was a Dar-Amanian sheikh with a royal bloodline tracing back dozens of generations, and the wealth to match.
A wealth he hadn’t seen fit to share with his people.
‘Yes,’ she responded, a little terser than she’d intended.
He shot her an assessing look but said nothing as he gestured for her to precede him out of the reception room where she’d been ushered to await his arrival.
Staunchly vowing to keep her emotions and opinions in check, she cleared her throat as they once again travelled through endless magnificently decorated reception rooms and hallways. ‘How did your meetings go?’
‘Are you really interested?’
She saw the mocking light in his eyes and chose to ignore it. ‘Of course. I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t.’
‘The first one went as expected. The two that followed went badly,’ he replied.
‘You don’t seem too cut up about it.’
He shrugged. ‘Because I was prepared for it. I expected them to go badly. I would’ve been more surprised if they’d progressed smoothly.’
‘Why?’
‘Then I’d have known I was being lied to, and the meeting would’ve taken a turn for the very unfortunate.’ The smile hardened, a dangerous light entering his eyes.
‘Why?’ she parroted one more time.
‘Because I hate subterfuge in every form. I prefer my opponents to be straight up with me, even if the outcome of our confrontation is potentially disadvantageous to me.’
The thinly veiled warning lanced a spear of ice down her spine. She hadn’t done anything wrong. She just hadn’t had time to fully apprise Rahim Al-Hadi of her
