His searching hand met empty sheets. He rolled over, reaching further, finding nothing but an empty bed and cold sheets and not the warm woman he was looking for. He cracked open an eyelid and found no one.
Now he was wide awake. ‘Tora?’ he called. But there was no answer, nothing but the soft hum of the air conditioner kicking in as the temperature rose with the sun outside.
‘Tora,’ he repeated, louder this time, on his feet now as he checked the bathroom and the living room. He pulled back the curtains in case she’d decided to take coffee out there so as not to waken him. Morning light poured into the room, and he squinted against the rising sun, but the terrace, like every other part of the suite, was empty.
She was gone, without so much as a word.
She was gone, before he was ready.
Before he was done with her.
He growled, a vein in his temple throbbing while his dark mood grew blacker by the minute.
Until he remembered with a jolt the revelations of yesterday and his black mood changed direction. He glanced at the clock. He had a meeting to get to.
He’d been angry when the lawyer had told him that he’d arranged it—too blindsided by the lawyer’s revelations to think straight, too incensed that someone other than himself was suddenly pulling the strings of his life—but now he welcomed this meeting with this so-called vizier of Qajaran. Maybe he would have the answers to his questions.
Only then, when he was convinced, would he agree to take on this baby sister—no, half-sister—the product of a father who’d abandoned Rashid as a toddler, and a woman he’d taken as his lover.
Only then would he agree to take on guardianship of her, to take responsibility for her now that both her parents were dead, and to fill the void in her life, and wasn’t that the richest thing of all?
Because how the hell was he supposed to fill a void in anyone’s life when there’d been nobody to fill the void in his?
Thanks for that.
He cast one last glance back towards the rumpled bed as he headed to the shower, the bed that bore the tangled evidence of their lovemaking. How many times they’d come together in the dark night, he couldn’t remember, only that every time he’d turned to her she’d been there, seemingly insatiable and growing bolder each time.
No wonder he’d been angry when he’d found her gone.
No wonder he’d felt short-changed.
But one night was what he’d wanted and it was better this way. She’d more than served her purpose. He’d lost himself in her and she’d blotted out the shock and pain for a while, but now he needed a clear head and no distractions. He thought back to the night that was. She’d been one hell of a distraction and he would have been hard pressed to send her on her way. It was better that she’d saved him the effort.
* * *
Kareem was not as Rashid had envisaged. He’d imagined someone called a vizier to be a small man, wiry and astute. But the man the lawyer introduced him to in his dark-timbered library was a tall, gentle-looking giant of indeterminate age who could have been anywhere from fifty to eighty. He looked the part of a wise man, perfectly at ease in his sandals and robes amongst a city full of men wearing suits and ties.
Kareem bowed when he was introduced to Rashid, his eyes wide. ‘You are indeed your father’s son.’
A tremor went down Rashid’s spine. ‘You knew my father?’
The older man nodded. ‘I did, although our dealings have been few and far between of late. I knew you, too, as an infant. It is good to meet you again after all these years.’
The lawyer excused himself then, leaving the two men to talk privately.
‘Why have you come?’ Rashid asked, taking no time to get to the point. ‘Why did you ask for this meeting?’
‘Your father’s death raises issues of which you should be aware, even if I fear you may find them unpalatable.’
Rashid sighed. He was sick of all the riddles, but he was no closer today to believing that this man they were talking about actually was his father than when the lawyer had dropped that particular bombshell yesterday. ‘You’re going to have to try harder than that if you want to convince me. My father died when I was just a child.’
‘That is what your father wanted you to believe,’ the older man said.
‘Wanted me to believe?’
‘I take your point,’ the vizier conceded, his big hands raised in surrender. ‘It would be more correct to say that he wanted the entire world to believe he was dead. I did not mean to give the impression that he was singling you out.’
Rashid snorted. And that was supposed to be some kind of compensation?
‘And my mother?’ he snapped before the other man could continue. ‘What of her? Is she similarly living out a life of gay abandon somewhere else in the world, having tossed her maternal responsibilities to the winds?’
The vizier shook his head. ‘I almost wish I could tell you she was, but sadly no, your mother died while you were in infancy, as you are no doubt aware. I am sorry,’ he said. ‘I know this must be difficult for you, but there is more. Much more.’
Rashid waved the threat in those words away. ‘I already know about this so-called sister, if that’s what you’re referring to.’
‘Atiyah? Yes, she is on her way here now, I believe. But I was not referring to her.’
He frowned. ‘Then what? In fact, why are you here? What do you have to do with my father’s affairs anyway?’
The older man regarded him levelly, his eyes solemn. ‘I know you were brought up,’ he said, slowly and purposefully, as if sensing Rashid’s discomfiture, ‘believing your father to have been a humble tailor, killed in an industrial accident...’ He paused, as if to check Rashid was still listening.
He was listening all right, although it was hard to hear with the thumping of his heart. Today he’d expected answers. Instead all he was getting was more of the madness.
‘In actual case, your father was neither. Your father was a member of the Royal House of Qajar.’ He paused again. ‘Do you know much of Qajaran?’
Rashid closed his eyes. He knew the small desert country well enough—his work as a petroleum engineer had taken him there several times. It had a problematic economy, he was aware, like so many countries that he visited, not that he had paid this one much more attention than he paid any of them. He had learned early on in his career that it was better not to get involved in the affairs of state when one was a visiting businessman.
But for Rashid’s father to have been a member of the House of Qajar—the father he’d believed to be nothing more than a tailor—then he must have been a member of the royal family...
The wheels of his mind started turning. ‘So who was my father?’
‘The Emir’s nephew...’ the vizier paused again ‘...and his chosen successor over his own son who he judged as being too self-centred and weak.’
His nephew? His chosen successor? ‘But if what you say is true...’ Rashid ground out the words, still not convinced by the story he was hearing ‘...why was he living here in Australia? What happened?’
The older man took a sip of his milk and returned it to its coaster, every move measured and calm and at odds with the turmoil Rashid was feeling inside.
‘Your father