‘We’ve never had a visitor as pretty as you before,’ Layla offered conversationally. ‘Do all the women in your country look like you?’
‘Well, the women of Dorrada tend to be fair-skinned and blue-eyed. The men too, come to that. Your dark beauty would be much prized in my country. As I’m sure it is here.’
‘So, Prince Zahir...’ Layla continued. ‘You think him handsome?’
‘Layla!’
‘I am only asking.’ Layla stuck out her bottom lip.
‘Obviously she thinks him handsome. She wouldn’t be marrying him otherwise.’
Anna suppressed a smile as the two sisters set about one another in their own language, waiting for them to finish before speaking again.
‘The answer to your question is yes—I do think him handsome.’
The sisters exchanged an excited glance.
‘And it is true that you will be marrying and coming to live here in the palace?’ This time Lena asked the question, her curiosity overcoming her sense of decorum.
‘Yes, that is true.’ Saying it out loud didn’t make it seem any the less astonishing.
Lena’s and Layla’s pretty faces broke out into broad smiles and they even reached to clasp each other’s hands.
‘That is very good news, Your Royal Highness. Very good news indeed.’
* * *
Staring at the screen, Zahir cursed under his breath. He had braced himself for a small photograph of the two of them on the bridge, prepared to suffer the mild humiliation of being caught kissing in public, or rather being kissed, when it was put in the wider context of the engagement party. But this wasn’t a small photograph. This was a series of images, blown up to reveal every minor detail. With his finger jabbing on the mouse, Zahir scrolled down and down, his blood pressure rocketing as more and more pictures of him locked in a passionate embrace with Annalina flashed before his eyes. There were even several close-ups of the engagement ring, worn on the slender hand that was threaded through his hair, before finally the official photographs of the party appeared, the ones he wanted the world to see. The ones where he and Annalina were standing solemnly side by side, displaying their commitment to each other and to their countries.
And it wasn’t just one newspaper. The whole of Europe appeared to be obsessed with the beautiful Princess Annalina, the press in France, the UK, and of course Dorrada itself taking a particular interest, feasting on the titbits that the photographer had no doubt sold to them for a handsome fee.
A rustle behind him made him turn his head and there stood the object of the press’s attention, Annalina. At last—it was over an hour since he had sent servants to her room to find out what she was doing, giving orders that she should meet him here in the stateroom at her earliest convenience. Clearly he was going to have to be more specific. Dressed in a simple navy fitted dress, she looked both young, chic and incredibly sexy at the same time. Her ash-blonde hair was loose, tumbling over her shoulders in soft waves, falling well below the swell of her breasts.
Zahir felt his throat go dry. He hadn’t been prepared for such hair, only having seen it secured on top of her head in some way before. He had had no idea it would be so long, so fascinating. He had had no idea that he would be fighting the urge to imagine how it would feel against his bare skin.
‘Have you seen this?’ Angry with himself, with his reaction and this whole damned situation, his voice rasped harshly. He hadn’t been able to concentrate all morning, hadn’t got through half the work he’d intended to.
She glanced at the laptop, screwing up her eyes. ‘Is it bad?’
‘See for yourself.’
A soft cloud of floral scent washed over him as she sat down next to him, tucking her hair behind one small, perfect ear. He almost flinched as she reached across him to touch the mouse, quickly scrolling through the images and scanning the text as she moved from one website to the next.
‘Well.’ She turned in her seat to look at him, her eyes a startling blue. ‘I guess it’s no worse than we were expecting.’
‘You, maybe. I certainly wasn’t expecting such mass coverage.’
‘Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now.’ She exhaled, the light breath whispering across the bare skin of his forearm and raising the hairs, raising his blood pressure. ‘Are the photos in the Nabatean newspapers too?’
‘Fortunately not. The official photographs from the engagement party are all that they will see. My people would not be interested in such a sordid spectacle.’
He watched as she wrinkled her small nose. Her skin was so pale, so clear, like the finest porcelain.
‘What?’ He didn’t want to ask, he hadn’t even meant to ask. But her disrespectful gesture refused to be ignored.
‘I’m just wondering how you know that—if they aren’t given the chance, I mean. That sounds like censorship to me.’
Temper snaked through him, slowing his heart to a dull thud. He narrowed his eyes, the thick lashes blurring his image of this infuriating woman. ‘Let me make something clear right from the start, Princess Annalina. I may, or may not, seek your views on matters to do with European culture and traditions that I am not familiar with. That is your role. However, you do not attempt to interfere with the running of my country. Your opinions are neither needed nor wanted.’
‘If you say so.’
‘I do.’
‘All I’m saying is...’ she raised finely shaped eyebrows ‘...you can’t have it both ways.’ It seemed she was determined to stand up to him. To have the last word. ‘If you are marrying me solely because I am a Western princess, because you want entrée into Europe that my family, my country, can give you, then you are going to have to accept this sort of media attention. It comes with the job. It comes with me.’
Zahir scowled. Was this true? If so he was going to have to put a stop to it. He had no intention of becoming part of some celebrity circus. But then twenty-four hours ago he had had no intention of marrying at all.
‘I have to say, I am somewhat surprised that you would be happy for the first sighting the people of Nabatean have of their new princess to be a grubby little paparazzi shot of you wantonly pressing your body up against mine.’ He wished he hadn’t reminded himself of that now. Not when she was so close. Not when he knew he wanted her to do it again.
‘It doesn’t bother me.’ She tossed her head, her hair rippling over her shoulders, deliberately countering his pomposity with a throwaway remark. It felt to Zahir as if she was throwing his weakness for her back in his face too, even though he had gone to great pains to cover it up.
‘Well, it should bother you. It is hardly becoming.’ The pomposity solidified inside him, holding him ramrod-straight.
‘Look. The paparazzi have been following me all my life. I’m used to it—it’s part of the role I was unwittingly born into. There are probably hundreds of images of me being unbecoming, as you put it.’
Zahir felt himself pale beneath his olive skin. This was worse than he’d thought. In his haste to arrange a suitable match for his brother it appeared he hadn’t been thorough enough in his research. He knew there had been a broken engagement but what was she telling him now? That she had a history of debauched behaviour? This woman who he now had to take as his wife.
‘It’s okay!’ Suddenly she let out a laugh, a light-hearted chuckle that echoed between them, seeming to surprise the cavernous room as much as it did him. ‘There’s no need to look like that.’ Now she was reaching for his hand, laying her own over the top of it. ‘I haven’t done anything really terrible! And, who knows, maybe now that I’m officially engaged the paparazzi will lose interest