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‘Magic. It keeps her happy and there is harm to none, so...’
‘Alternative, huh?’ he said, wiping his hands on the napkin she’d found tucked beneath the boxes, and she would have replied had she not been distracted by the way he smoothed the cloth across his skin.
‘You’re the youngest?’
She turned to him, curious as to how he knew that she had siblings.
‘You said “we’re all” and you don’t strike me as an only child,’ he explained.
‘I’m the middle. Skye is older, and Summer is younger.’
‘And do they all have...?’ He waved his hand towards a strand of her hair that had come loose from her headscarf.
Laughing, she tucked it back safely behind the stretchy jersey. ‘No, just me. Skye’s hair is a dark brown and Summer’s is cornfield blonde.’ She could see his mind working, trying to do the maths, and took pity on him. ‘Technically they’re my half-sisters. But I’d never call them that.’
‘Different fathers?’
She could tell that he was trying to keep his tone neutral and she appreciated it. Not everyone was that considerate. ‘It certainly drew a lot of unwanted attention and judgement when we were younger, and alotof stares.’ Her sisters thought she hadn’t noticed, but she had. Long before her grandparents had made their feelings known, Star had been aware of the way neighbours and some of the school parents and, in turn, their children had treated them, judged them, excluded them.
‘Ahh.’
She cocked her head to look at him, as if the different angle would reveal more than he’d done already. ‘You know how that feels?’
‘A little,’ he admitted. ‘Different reason though.’
Star looked him up and down, noticing the sharp cut to his clothes, the thick, heavy gold watch at his wrist, the expensive sunglasses sticking out of his pocket and smiled kindly. ‘Rich parents?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Richandpowerful. Iamimpressed,’ she assumed. He barked out a laugh and she felt as if she’d won something precious. ‘Children can be unintentionally cruel,’ she said, thinking of the young charges she loved working with.
She sighed heavily, feeling very far away from her teaching assistant’s job in the New Forest, and allowed herself a moment to bask in the sun. The warmth of it on her face, the feeling of contentment was tinged with a little something more. She hadn’t realised how much of a relief it was to talk to someone. Okay, so she might have been talkingathim, but still. Without opening her eyes, she drew his image to her mind, surprised how easily it came after the difficulties of yesterday. She mentally reached out to trace the strong jaw line shadowed with a close-cropped beard, imagining the feeling of him releasing the tension that she had seen when talking about loss. Unable to help the way her thumb stretched out to press against the plush lower lip, fire burning her thumb and core. The skin on her cheeks began to tingle, as if she had been stroked, and she leaned her head into the invisible touch, opening her eyes to find Kal staring at her, sending a jolt of pure lightning to her heart.
But, rather than turn away, embarrassed at being caught staring, he seemed to focus only more intently now that her eyes were open. A moment that she would hold to her as more precious than any romance book and she wondered for just a second if he might kiss her. Then he blinked and the haze of desire was banked.
‘Where have you reached in the exhibition?’
She took a breath and grounded herself, taking a second to focus enough to remember where she had been. ‘The attempted occupation by the Ottomans.’
‘Ah. A Particularly violent and difficult period.’
‘I should think so too. His Majesty Sheikh Omar could hardly allow the kidnap of his daughter to go unpunished.’
No, he could not, Khalif echoed silently, wondering what Star would think if she knew that, rather than being kidnapped, the family rumour was that Omar’s daughter had run off of her own volition to be with a Turkish prince and unwittingly nearly started a war.
‘And tomorrow?’ He cursed the question that had fallen from his lips before he’d had time to think it through. He really shouldn’t care what she had planned for tomorrow.
Star smiled excitedly and it rivalled the sun. ‘Tomorrow is the Fatimid period.’
‘History interests you?’ he asked, unable to curb his curiosity.
‘Yes, I like to see how everything comes together. How one generation impacts another,’ she said, the blue in her irises deepening.
‘What are you looking for?’
‘Who said I was looking for something?’ she asked a little too quickly and his eyes narrowed at the shift in her tone. He waited her out and, as expected, she clarified. The English were very predictable. ‘Research.’
‘For?’
