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‘I wasn’t assuming you were crying about me,’ he stated quietly. His voice was calm but he sounded as if he was trying not to grit his teeth.
‘Weren’t you?’ Elena retorted. ‘Ever since spending the night together you’ve been completely paranoid that I’m obsessing over you, and I can assure you, I’m not.’
‘What a relief.’
‘Isn’t it?’
They glared at each other. Elena folded her arms and tried to stare him down; Khalil’s eyes sparked annoyance and his mouth was compressed.
‘Why did you come into my tent, anyway?’ she finally asked, their gazes still clashing. ‘Have you learned something? Some news?’
‘Yes, I have.’
Her stomach rolled and she felt her nails bite into her palms. ‘What have you heard? Has Markos called for a meeting?’
‘I haven’t heard any news from Thallia, Elena. I think they still believe you are safely with Aziz.’ Khalil’s mouth was still a hard line but his expression seemed softer somehow, his eyes almost sad. ‘It’s Aziz,’ he said after a pause. ‘He’s married someone else, just like you said he would.’
‘He has?’ Her eyes widened as she considered what this meant for Khalil. ‘He did it within the six weeks?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then he fulfilled...?’
‘The terms of my father’s will.’ Khalil nodded. ‘Yes, he did. But you...? You’re not sad?’
She stared at him in disbelief. ‘About Aziz? I gave up on him a while ago, Khalil.’
‘Yes, but...still...he chose someone else. Rather quickly.’
‘So did I.’ She gave him a look filled with dark humour. ‘At least Aziz received a positive answer to his proposal.’
‘Yes...’ He shook his head, almost as if to clear it. ‘About that proposal...’
‘Trust me, you don’t need to remind me how much you don’t want to marry me, Khalil. I got that the first time.’
‘I’m sorry if I seemed...negative.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘That’s an understatement.’ Better to joke than to cry. In any case, she wasn’t sure she had any tears left, just a heavy sense of weariness, a resignation that nothing was going to be easy. That she’d probably lose her crown.
‘You surprised me,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t expecting... I’ve never expected...’
‘I know.’ She shook her head, exasperated, exhausted and definitely not needing to hash through all this again. ‘Why are we even talking about this, Khalil?’
‘Because,’ he answered evenly, ‘I’ve changed my mind.’
She blinked and then blinked again, the meaning of his words penetrating slowly. ‘You’ve what?’
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ he repeated clearly. ‘I want to marry you.’
Elena opened her mouth, then closed it again. ‘Well,’ she finally managed. ‘That was a charming proposal.’
‘Don’t be absurd, Elena. This is about convenience, for both of us.’
‘You didn’t seem to think so an hour ago.’
‘Aziz’s marriage has made me realise I need to strengthen my position.’
‘But if he’s married,’ Elena said slowly, ‘he’s fulfilled the terms of the will. How can you fight that?’
‘I can’t. I don’t want to start a war. The only thing I can do is confront him openly—demand he call the referendum. Perhaps I should have done that before, but it seemed too easy for Aziz to refuse. Perhaps it still is.’
‘And marrying me will strengthen your position when it comes to a vote.’
Khalil gazed at her evenly. ‘Yes.’
‘That’s quite a sacrifice for you to make,’ she said a bit sharply. ‘Just to look good for a vote.’
‘I am the rightful Sheikh, Elena,’ Khalil said, his voice rising with the force of his conviction. ‘That is who I am, who I always will be. I’ve lived my entire life waiting for the day I took the throne. Every choice I’ve made, every single thing I’ve done, has been to that end. Not for revenge, but for justice. Because it is right—’ He broke off, forced a smile. ‘In any case, marrying you is not a sacrifice.’
‘No?’
‘We are friends, are we not? And we have enjoyed each other’s bodies. Neither of us wants anything more.’ He smiled, reached out to touch her face. ‘It’s a match made in heaven.’
‘That’s an about-face if I’ve ever seen one,’ she huffed.
‘I admit, your proposal shocked me. I reacted emotionally rather than sensibly.’
‘I didn’t think you had emotions.’
‘You know I do, Elena.’ His gaze seemed to burn into hers. ‘I will be honest. This—’ he gestured between them ‘—scares me.’
Elena felt as if a giant fist had taken hold of her heart. ‘It scares me too, Khalil.’
‘So that is why we will agree to this convenient marriage,’ he answered with a small smile. ‘Because neither of us wants to be hurt again.’
‘Right,’ Elena agreed, but to her own ears her voice sounded hollow. They didn’t want to be hurt again—but she wondered if she or Khalil would be able to keep themselves from it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ELENA GAZED OUT of the window of the royal jet at the perfect azure sky and marvelled at how quickly things had changed. Just forty-eight hours earlier she’d been sobbing into her pillow, stuck in the middle of the desert with no possibilities and no hope.
Now she was flying back to Thallia with Khalil by her side, planning a wedding in just a few days’ time, and everything was possible.
Well, almost everything. She snuck a sideways glance at Khalil who sat opposite her, his face looking as if it had been chiselled from marble. A deep frown had settled between his brows and his mouth was its usual hard line. He’d barely spoken to her since he’d reconsidered her marriage proposal, a proposal which Elena had wondered more than once whether she should have accepted.
Yet in the moment before she’d agreed, when he’d been waiting for her answer, she’d seen a look of uncertainty on his face, almost as if he were bracing himself for a blow. As if he expected her to reject him.
That moment of vulnerability had been gone in an instant, but it still lingered in Elena’s mind. In her heart. Because it made Khalil a man with softness and secrets, a man she was starting to understand and know better and better.
Which, Elena acknowledged, violated the terms of this very convenient marriage. It was what she had first suggested, after all. If some contrary, feminine part of her wanted something different, something more...well, too bad.
She had other, more important things to think about. Like the fact that she was going to face her Council in just a few hours, and with a different fiancé in tow. She glanced again at Khalil, grateful that he’d agreed to accompany her to Thallia and marry in a private ceremony in the palace. It had made sense, rather than something furtive and hurried in the desert; both of them wanted this marriage to be accepted by the public as quickly as possible.
After she’d presented him to her Council, they’d return to Siyad and Khalil would demand Aziz call the referendum. Khalil had told her Aziz had retreated with his bride to a remote royal palace for his honeymoon. The announcement from the palace had simply said the Sheikh had wed, not the name of his bride. Siyad buzzed with speculation, but no one knew what was really going on. Khalil had said Aziz was just buying time. Things would come to a head when they returned from Thallia and Elena hoped that both of their countries—and thrones—would be secure.
Even then she didn’t know what life with Khalil would look like, or even where or how they would live. She and Aziz had discussed all these details, outlined everything in a twenty-page document that had been drawn up by lawyers from both of their countries.
But everything with Khalil was unknown. Looking at his grim expression, she wasn’t sure she wanted to discuss it now.
Instead she tried to plan what she would say to her Council. To Markos. No doubt he’d be contemptuous of her sudden change of groom. Perhaps he would claim she was being deceived by Khalil, as she had been by Paulo.
She thought of all the things Markos could say, all the contempt he could pour on her, and in Khalil’s presence, and inwardly she cringed.
‘What’s wrong?’ Khalil asked, turning to fix her with a narrowed gaze, and Elena realised her reaction had been visible too.
‘Nothing...’ she began, only to acknowledge she would have to tell Khalil about her mistakes. Better to hear it from her than Markos.
And actually, she realised, she wanted to tell him. She wanted to be honest, to share her burden with someone. To trust him with the truth.
‘Elena?’ Khalil prompted, and she took a deep breath.
‘Khalil...I need to tell you some things.’
His gaze swept over her. ‘All right.’
Elena took another deep breath. She wanted to tell Khalil, but it was still hard. ‘I was young when I became queen,’ she began. ‘As you know. My parents had just died and I suppose I was feeling...vulnerable. Lonely.’
‘Of course you were, Elena.’ His face softened in sympathy. ‘You’d had an isolated childhood and then you lost the two people who were closest to you.’
