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Tora looked up at him, her accentuated eyes hauntingly beautiful and her lips slightly parted. ‘After breakfast, then,’ she said as they walked towards the door.
But he turned back before leaving, wanting one more look at her, like this, like a woman dressed in silk and not a buttoned-up nursemaid with a bun. ‘I see you found something else to wear.’
‘Yes. You were right—Kareem had organised an entire wardrobe of clothes for me. Yousra’s been helping me go through them.’
‘I like what you’re wearing,’ he said, nodding at her choice. ‘You look beautiful.’
And her lips moved uncertainly, but he didn’t hear if she actually said anything, because he was gone.
CHAPTER TEN
THERE WERE SIX of them in all. A white palace, covered in mother of pearl shell that dazzled in the sun. A red palace with red turrets and domes that paid homage to the ruby. A palace with extensive scented gardens and called Yasmin—named after Malik’s favourite of the time, they were informed—the Grand Palace that was based on a Venetian row of palazzos complete with canals and gondoliers on demand if required together with vast rooms filled to the brim with Murano glass, and a palace that looked like a double for the palace of Versailles. There was even park-cum-palace called the Fun Palace with a fantasyland theme and an expansive garden full of perfectly maintained and oiled rides that sat eerily empty, just waiting for someone to push a button.
To Tora they seemed like the folly of a boy who’d never grown up, buildings that lacked the elegant good taste of the Old Palace despite the wealth of treasures they contained, buildings that ventured into the territory of ostentatious display of wealth for wealth’s sake.
‘Why so many?’ she asked Rashid as their convoy left the last on the list, the so-called Fun Palace, a rococo confection based on the retreats of the renaissance royals that wouldn’t be out of place in the French countryside. ‘Who even needs so many palaces?’
‘Malik did,’ he said, ‘because apparently the harem in the Old Palace was nowhere near big enough.’
‘So he built six additional palaces to accommodate his women?’
‘Apparently he was a man of insatiable tastes. I can’t think how else he could have so happily squandered so much money and so many hours when he should have been working for his people.’
‘But he had no children?’
‘It didn’t stop him from trying,’ he said drily, and Tora couldn’t help but laugh.
‘What?’
‘You. You sounded almost funny then.’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.’
‘I know,’ she said with a grin. ‘That’s what makes it so funny.’
He looked away, feigning umbrage at her laughter, when in fact he was enjoying himself immensely. It was good to get away from the endless papers and the spreadsheets filled with numbers that showed just how badly the economy had been neglected over the last three decades while its treasury had been plundered to pay for the Emir’s follies.
It was good to be with her.
Surprisingly good.
He’d imagined this outing would give her the chance to see him in a better light. He hadn’t expected to discover he liked her more in return.
She made a pleasant change from Kareem, who he liked and respected but whose conversation was limited to the necessary and delivered without humour.
Needless to say, she was more appealing on the eyes than Kareem, too. Much more. Today she was wearing another of those silky robes, this one coloured in ripples of yellow and orange so she looked like a shimmering sunset as she walked. He’d been right to ask her along. She made the tour a holiday excursion, expressing delight and sometimes horror at the old Emir’s excesses, rather than a dry exercise of checking out the inventory.
And suddenly he didn’t want it to end. They were on the outskirts of the city, only a sprinkling of buildings amidst the desert sands, and he had an idea. ‘Stop the car,’ he told the driver, and the vehicles rolled to a halt. Rashid climbed out to talk to Kareem and a few minutes later he was back and their car peeled away from the others and headed towards the desert proper.
‘What’s happening?’ Tora said. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Seeing we are so close, I thought we should see something of the desert. Apparently there is an oasis not far from here.’
