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‘Does she live with you at the palace?’
‘No.’
The finality of the answer made her wonder if she’d drawn a bad memory. ‘I’m sorry, she’s not...is she still...?’
‘Alive? Yes, very much so. She moved to Paris after my father died. We meet once or twice a year for the customary stilted lunch or dinner when she stages a maternal performance neither of us believe in.’
Lauren winced at the acerbity in his tone. ‘Why staged?’
His nostrils gave the briefest flare, then he was back in supreme control. ‘Because my mother exists solely to bargain her way into more of whatever she desires.’ He caught her puzzled frown and elaborated. ‘She isn’t the kind of mother who gives anything for free, be it her duties as Queen Mother or her affection for her children.’
‘You mean she had to bepaidto love you?’ she asked, disbelief bleeding through her voice.
Another stark look flashed across his face. ‘Is it love if she had to be paid to bear me or my brother?’
‘How do you know? Did she...did she tell you?’ The thought of that was abhorrent, even worse in her opinion than being abandoned at birth by a mother who wanted nothing to do with you. At least in her case, she’d been given up to the authorities in the hope that she might be given a better life.
‘There was documentation to that effect. She received a sum for delivering her firstborn and another for her second. From then on, each achievement, great or small, was transactional. I learned that to get her attention, I needed to give her something in return.’
‘Something like what?’
‘As a child it was mostly a sacrificial transaction. One appearance at a school recital meant she was free to skip the next two or three. As an adult, it was more...materialistic. Attending a handful of important state functions usually cost me a villa in Spain or an upgrade on her private jet.’
She sucked in a stunned breath. ‘That’s...deplorable.’
‘Is it?’ he parried with a curiously flat tone. ‘Or was it a valuable early lesson that everything comes at a price?’
‘Surely you don’t believe that?’
Leonine eyes cut to her, their depths holding no give. ‘Isn’t that why you’re here? You may delude yourself that it is out of duty for your brother, but haven’t others bargained with that duty to drive you to me when it was perhaps not your own choice?’
His intuitiveness floored her, as did the cutting comparison to his mother. But in truth, she could deny neither.
She was still floundering when he clicked his tongue and muttered to his mount. The camel kicked into a light trot, signalling their conversation was over. Hers followed, uneasy silence descending as they headed north.
Just as she feared her nerves would snap at the tension between them, a stunning, immense riad-style villa came into view. With soaring gold sun-shaped domes and ochre exterior walls, it blended seamlessly into the desert.
As they drew closer, she saw further graceful arches and wide terraces, the breathtaking Moorish villa a feast for the senses. Guards were posted at the entrance and at various discreet points along the storeyed terraces, but it didn’t take away from the beauty of Tahir’s desert residence.
It was only as Lauren’s gaze shifted back to Tahir’s broad shoulders that she realised they were bypassing the entrance and skirting the villa altogether.
Another handful of minutes later, they approached a wide cluster of palm trees and what looked astonishingly like...a large, sparkling body of water.
She reached him just as his camel was settling itself on the ground and Tahir was sliding out of his saddle.
‘Where are we?’
‘My private oasis. We’ll go inside once we’re done here.’
He murmured to her mount and the creature lowered itself. Her breath locked in her throat when he reached for her. As before, he wrapped his hands around her waist and lifted her off the beast, but this time they faced one another, and the strong compulsion that seemed to have become part of her commanded her gaze upward to clash with his.
For breathless moments, they simply stared at one another, his hands holding her captive while her heart banged hard against her ribs. Perhaps it was a trick of the light, but everything inside her froze in anticipation as his head descended a fraction, those far too sensual lips drawing tantalisingly closer.
But in the next instant he was setting her free, jerking away from her before striding towards his guards. One of them approached with a large basket and set it down on a flat rock a few feet from the edge of the water as she took a better look at her surroundings.
Several tall boulders formed a natural barrier against the elements on one side, while palm trees framed the remaining area, creating a circle of rock and trees with the sparkling spring a welcoming respite stop.
The spring itself was about the size of two Olympic-sized swimming pools and as she approached it she could see clear to the bottom of the turquoise-coloured water.
