Giovanni sighed deeply. His head lolled against the snow-white pillow, but his gaze never wavered from hers. ‘I knew I could count on you. If my memory serves me right, my beloved box was sold to a sheikh decades ago. He wanted it for his bride and, at the time, he made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.’ He smiled, although it was tinged with an even deeper desolation. ‘Besides, who was I to stand in the way of true love?’
‘Do you remember his name? Where he was from?’ Allegra pressed, partly because she wanted the facts as quickly as possible so she could pull her grandfather from the memories that were clearly causing him such great sadness. The grandfather she remembered had always been focused very much in the here and now, the future of his family business and the welfare of his grandchildren, his paramount concern. To see him dwelling on the past he so rarely talked about heightened the fear of impending loss.
‘I don’t recall his first name, but he was the Sheikh of Dar-Aman. When we met, he was about to marry the woman of his dreams. He wanted the box as part of his wedding gift to her. It was one of many he’d accumulated over the years.’
‘Nonno,’ she murmured the Italian term she hadn’t used in a long time. ‘I’ll do all I can to get it back, but you have to bear in mind that this was a long time ago. The box may have been sold on.’ The last thing she wanted to do was disappoint her grandfather, but she had to prime him in case she hit a dead end.
Giovanni shook his head. ‘No. I tried to buy it back after the sheikh lost his wife. He refused to part with it. He swore that he would never give it up. I tried one more time a few years ago without success. But it’s still in the Dar-Aman palace.’
The conviction with which he said it made Allegra suspect her grandfather had been keeping a close eye on his precious box. Which made her wonder why he hadn’t made moves to reacquire it before now.
The Di Sione name alone could open the most hallowed doors, never mind the fortune that went with it.
‘Will you find it for me, my dear?’ The plea in his voice was hard to miss. And hard to take in that he’d yearned secretly for this box, which he’d let go in order to lay a foundation for his family.
‘Of course I will.’ Whether it was a long shot or not, Allegra intended to do her utmost to locate the box. ‘How did you come about it in the first place?’
Her grandfather coughed, the rough sound echoing around the sun-drenched terrace. Then he began to wheeze. Panicked, Allegra jumped to her feet. ‘Grandfather?’
Giovanni pointed feebly at the oxygen canister. She reached for it and settled the mask over his face just as an orderly rushed through the French doors.
Matteo had mentioned that the doctors had agreed for Giovanni to come home only if he arranged to have private medical care on-site. Nevertheless, the appearance of the nurse hammered home the severity of her grandfather’s condition. And the fact that things would only get worse.
‘I’m sorry, Miss Di Sione. He needs to rest now.’
Allegra watched the rapid rise and fall of her grandfather’s chest with stinging eyes. ‘Grandfather...’
He reached up and pulled down the mask, much to the disapproval of the nurse. ‘It’s okay. These bouts are short and much worse than they look. There’s life in this old dog yet.’ The brief twinkle in his eye triggered her smile, but the fear gripping her heart remained. When he reached for her hand again, she stepped closer.
‘Bring me back the box, Allegra mia. It needs to come home.’
Nodding, she leaned down and kissed his pale cheek. ‘I’ll find it. I promise. Rest now, please.’
His grip tightened on hers for a brief moment before he let go.
Allegra walked away with a head full of questions and a heart filled with tears. Plucking her phone from her dress pocket, she dialled Matteo’s number, then exhaled in frustration when it went straight to voicemail. She contemplated contacting the rest of her siblings, but discarded the thought. Besides Matteo and Bianca, she hadn’t spoken to the rest of her brothers or sisters for a couple of weeks. They all knew about their grandfather’s illness, and would make time to see Giovanni when they could, but they led busy lives. She couldn’t burden them with the sadness weighing her down.
Besides, she needed to get on with keeping her promise to her grandfather. A promise she intended to keep, come what may.
‘ALLEGRA, IT’S TEN O’CLOCK.’
Allegra highlighted another section of the document she was reading with her marker pen, then glanced up.
‘What?’ she enquired absently, her mind still tackling how best to encourage the powers that be in the tiny Asia Pacific country to ratify a few more women’s rights laws. As she’d found with countries great and small, diplomacy went a long way, but never far enough. She made a mental note to speak to her brother Alessandro about directing a few business deals to the country to grease her efforts. Allegra had learned the hard way that the lines of communication opened up wider with a promise of tangible reward. She’d fought too hard to win further rights for women in the country to let anything stand in the way at the last hurdle.
‘Sheikh Rahim Al-Hadi’s personal secretary agreed to grant you a fifteen-minute window, remember?’ Her assistant, Zara, glanced at her watch and smiled. ‘You now have fourteen minutes.’
Allegra dropped the marker pen with a grimace.
Wondering what sort of man she would be dealing with after her visit with her grandfather, Allegra had spent a quick half hour researching the Kingdom of Dar-Aman and its current ruling sheikh. Her initial discoveries had been appalling and an affront to everything she stood for as a champion of women’s rights.
But she had a task to perform. A promise to keep.
Her fingers flew over the numbers and she breathed out as the line connected. ‘Allegra Di Sione for Sheikh Al-Hadi, please,’ she said calmly, trying and failing to erase the images of the sheikh’s very vivid and very public playboy lifestyle, the pictures of gold-threaded sheets, diamond-studded mirrors and treasures in every room in the royal palace that were superimposed on her mind.
That those exploits and excesses were enjoyed at the cost of his kingdom’s subjects made her hand tighten on the phone as she was put on hold.
Sultry Arab music filled the brief silence, the sounds so surprisingly beautiful and poignant Allegra’s breath caught. She relaxed against her high-backed leather chair, a reluctant smile curving her lips as the hypnotic music washed over her, momentarily eclipsing every worry blotting her horizon.
Closing her eyes, she let her mind drift, back to a time when romance books had been her secret pleasure, her selfish escape. In a flash she was transported to hot Arabian desert nights and tall figures in flowing white robes. To whispered promises in the dark and soulful brown eyes that promised forever.
‘Hello?’
Allegra jerked upright, chagrined that she’d missed the first prompt.
‘Um... Sheikh Al-Hadi, thank you for taking my call.’
‘You can thank me by stating the purpose of this call, and giving it the proper attention it deserves,’ he replied, the pitch of the deep, masculine voice powering down her spine.
His intonation, the way his voice caressed the vowels of the words he spoke, threw Allegra for a moment. A moment too long, if the harsh exhalation at the end of the line was anything to go by.
She hurried to speak. ‘My name is Allegra Di Sione...’
‘I’m