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A telltale click followed, and Malik grinned at the way the other sheikh had cut the communication line between them like some hormonal teenager unable to handle the truth. Tarif had always been the one to conceal his thoughts and emotions behind an air of laissez faire complacence.
And yet – to paraphrase what Tarif had said – things were different now.
Malik’s gaze turned to where Anisah was, waiting by the finish line at the edge of the crowd. She looked her usual poised and composed self, not a single strand peeking out of her hijab, and the soft flow of her abaya uninterrupted by a single crease.
Prim. Neat. Proper.
These were the words that perfectly described the court tutor, but those were also the type of words that hadn’t attracted his cousin. So Anisah was different, but did Tarif understand why that was?
Tarif’s own thoughts were not far from his cousin’s as he scanned the crowd until he found what he was looking for. She stood next to another 4x4, black glasses perched on her nose, and her nearly colorless lips pursed in seeming annoyance.
He noticed the way the men in the crowd appeared to veer away from her like students not wanting to draw the attention of a terrifying professor, and a humorless smile touched the sheikh’s lips.
Even now, it was a galling thing to swallow that he had once been as oblivious as them. Once, all she had been was a nondescript figure in court, a name that occasionally cropped up in conversation because of her work, a face that never registered in his consciousness because she had known exactly how to jerk his strings –
But things were different now.
And you cannot keep pretending it is not so, my sweet.
****
Anisah couldn’t keep her lips from tightening at the way the crowd surged towards Tarif Al-Atassi like pagans starved for their god’s affection. Both men and women actually jostled against each other to have a chance of nabbing a selfie with the kingdom’s playboy sheikh, and his female fans practically swooned when he took his aviators off.
Oh heavens, save me from the incurably blind. The man had only taken his sunglasses off, for Allah’s sake, and they were acting like he had done something worthy of winning the Nobel—-
Anisah quickly put a brake on her thoughts the moment she realized how horribly unfair she was acting. Hate him as she did, she mustn’t let old (and not to mention bad) habits get the better of her. She mustn’t allow herself to forget that she knew the truth about him now.
Yes, he was a playboy, but he was also one of the kingdom’s most loyal and hardworking sheikhs. She had to at least give him that.
With this new commitment in mind, Anisah fought hard to keep her face expressionless as she watched the fans fawn over the sheikh for another five minutes. Sheikh Malik joined him a minute later, and the crowd’s excitement grew frenzied at the sight of the two men.
With them standing shoulder to shoulder, the similarities and differences between the two sheikhs were impossible not to notice. Although both were tall, dark, and handsome, their resemblance ended there. Malik, dressed in the kingdom’s white robes and his dark hair covered in a red headdress, was the picture of formality, the ideal figure of traditional authority. Tarif, on the other hand, had ‘bad boy’ written all over him, the classic rebel without a cause, with his lethal form encased in leather and denim.
The two sheikhs presented a united front as they delighted the crowd with a brief but entertaining banter and afterwards thanking the people for supporting the launch of the kingdom’s latest tourist offering. The ceremonies closed with a prayer, and as the crowd reluctantly dispersed, the sheikhs clasped each other’s arms in an ancient form of greeting founded in Ramilian history.
The two sheikhs parted ways after, and she closed her eyes as she sought to brace herself for the incoming storm. You can do this, Anisah. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes, but as soon as she lifted her head, the wind was immediately knocked out of her sails.
Tarif Al-Atassi already stood in front of her, tall, dark, and handsome, and his earthy masculinity so infernally potent it had Anisah digging her fingers into her palms.
Curses.
It had been so long since she had been this close to the sheikh. She had completely forgotten how the sheer presence of him was so intensely sexual, and it took everything in her to keep her body from trembling.
What a cursed life she led.
If only that stupid tabloid hadn’t printed the blind item about her, she would never have to seek the attention of the very man she had been determined to avoid for the rest of her life.
If only...
A thousand curses never tore a shirt, she reminded herself, and it was time to show the sheikh her mettle. “Yam jamil, alshaykh,” she said politely. The way the corner of his lips lifted told her he knew exactly what she was trying to do, but Anisah didn’t care. It was her right to be as close or as distant with whomever she wanted, and where this sheikh was concerned, she wanted to make it very clear that she saw him as her liege’s trusted vassal and nothing else.
“Marhava, Tory.”
Oh, curse him. There he went again using his own private nickname for her like she was his concubine to name as he pleased.
“Malik also says hello, by the way.”
Her brows furrowed. Why couldn’t have Sheikh Malik told her himself?
