Chapter Seven #3
It didn’t take long to find what Yara was talking about. There were photos of him and Liliana, not just of last night, but there were photos of them kissing by the lake, even a picture of them staring into each other’s eyes on the underground.
‘Tomorrow’s papers are going to be full of it,’ Yara sighed. ‘Both here and there.’
‘Yara, I had no idea…’
‘I know you didn’t,’ she sighed. ‘I should thank you really—I have every reason not to marry you now. The thing is, Rafiq, I know you didn’t do this for me.’
‘I didn’t.’
Yara knew him well enough to know that his no had meant no.
‘And that scares me, Rafiq.’
‘Scares you?’
‘These photos have been taken months apart. The way you hold her tells me it’s serious.’
Rafiq was silent.
‘So,’ Yara asked. ‘What have you told her?’
‘Yara, stop.’ He could not think of Yara now and her damn secret. His only thought was Liliana waking to this disaster and the hell that was about to enter her world.
Oh, he knew how bad this would be.
But Yara made it all about her. ‘I have long dreaded you falling in love.’ She started to cry. ‘It isn’t just torture that drags out our secrets, Rafiq.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Love makes you bare your soul.’
‘Yara, how many times do I have to tell you I’m not going to…’ He paused then, for it dawned that he couldn’t tell even Liliana the truth—that he wasn’t the cheating bastard the media now claimed him to be. ‘Could you…?’ He stopped himself from asking Yara to share with Liliana her secret.
‘Maybe we should just get married, Rafiq. I think it would be easier. While my father was initially furious with you, my mother seems to think this has all happened because we waited too long.’
‘Let’s just see what happens,’ he said far more calmly than he felt.
‘I’m scared. Please, promise me that you haven’t told her.’
‘Yara,’ he said, his voice flat, ‘I gave you my word.’
And his word meant an awful lot.
‘Balach, I can help,’ Rafiq insisted. ‘With your daughter’s surgery.’
‘Oh, so you’re a doctor?’ he sneered.
‘I am crown prince.’
It was the first time he had said it out loud and in doing so it acknowledged Khalid’s death and twisted the knife that felt lodged in his heart. Yet, there was an authority to those words, his new title held weight, and even if they were sworn enemies Rafiq saw Balach’s spine straighten.
‘I would see she got the surgery she requires. The best hospital, the best doctors…’
Balach was silent.
‘I don’t ask you to trust me,’ Rafiq said. ‘I ask you to come to Al-Zahir with me. You and your wife and the baby. I am too weak to make it alone.’
‘It’s too dangerous,’ Balach said.
But Rafiq could see him waver.
By Monday, Liliana was walking from the tube to work in a rather tight pencil skirt she had found in her old wardrobe—though she’d probably been eighteen the last time she’d worn it.
Her mother had given her a pale blue silk top to wear and in the cupboard under the stairs she’d found a pair of wedges.
Gosh, it wasn’t really the best look for such a high-end fashion house but for today it would just have to do.
Only it wasn’t the rather cobbled-together look that was troubling Liliana as she made her way out of the underground. It wasn’t even the thought of facing her colleagues, and their inevitable questions about her incredibly dashing date…
It wasn’t even Rafiq…
Rather, it wasn’t entirely Rafiq that consumed her mind this morning, but a thought that for weeks she’d been trying to ignore. She’d kept telling herself that things would be fine. They’d used protection after all…
Except.
Seeing Rafiq and finding out about his might and power had told her she could bury her head no more.
Pausing outside an out-of-hours chemist, she caught sight of her reflection in a mirrored panel and knew she had to find out one way or the other.
And then work out what to do.
Stepping in, she made her purchase and slipped the test into her vast bag.
She’d do the test tonight, Liliana told herself as she made her way to work…
There were photographers gathering outside the offices, and she guessed they had someone famous inside.
Honestly, some celebrities squeezed in these appointments at the oddest hours, but then all thought stopped.
A hand gripped her upper arm and a body blocked her and she had the feeling of being enveloped by another.
And just when surely she should have been drenched in terror, instead, without turning her head, before she could offer a startled shout, she knew that it was Rafiq.
She recognised his scent; her skin knew his touch.
‘What on earth…?’ And then fear arrived as she realised Rafiq was pulling her towards a car, the door being held open by one of the suited men she’d seen on leaving the ball. ‘Get off me…’
‘Be quiet,’ he warned, ‘don’t make a scene, they haven’t spotted you yet.’
‘Who?’
‘The press.’
And it dawned she was not being kidnapped; she was being bundled into a vehicle for her own protection—the reporters were there waiting for her! In the back of his vehicle, behind darkened windows, she found out why.
‘Our affair has been exposed.’
‘Affair?’ She gave an incredulous laugh and shook her head. ‘Hardly!’
‘Liliana, you need to listen carefully.’ His voice was grave and she saw then the dark rings under his eyes and the grim expression on his face. ‘There are photos of us all over the place. My people are trying to get them taken down as we speak. I assure you this will be sorted.’
‘What photos…?’ She gave a bemused shake of her head.
‘We danced once…’ And barely at that, she thought, recalling how he’d held her at a distance, like some duty dance with an aunt at a wedding.
‘We didn’t so much as kiss…’ But then her voice faded as she looked down at his phone and she saw a photo of them in much earlier days, sitting on the tube, and both smiling into each other’s eyes.
Her own eyes widened, and she looked urgently to him.
‘We’re not doing anything…’ But as he swiped the images her voice turned off, as if a remote control had been touched and the sound snapped off.
There by a dark lake they embraced…their first kiss recorded, their beautiful private first contact now shared for all to see.
‘So what?’ She leapt to their defence. ‘We’re not hurting anyone, we’re both single.’
‘Correct,’ he said, and then she closed her eyes as the ‘but’ came. ‘But in the eyes of my people and the people of Al-Nawar…’ He hesitated, and it was the first time she had seen him falter.
‘Let me see the headlines.’
‘First let me explain.’
‘No,’ she retorted, and when he didn’t hand over his phone, she found a charger, and plugged in her own.
‘Liliana, if you hadn’t run off the other night, I would have told you all of this,’ he said as her phone came to life and she sat skimming the articles, swiping through photos.
‘It says here that your fiancée was in London that day. That she visited you at your home.’
‘Yara is not, nor has she ever been, my fiancée.’
‘I think your people might dispute that fact. It says here that you’re promised to each other.’
‘It has never been official. That is a promise our parents made.’
She breathed in sharply as another woman’s face came on the screen. She had long black hair and stunning almond-shaped black eyes, and was as polished and elegant as the cheat that sat beside Liliana now.
She felt ill as she read the headline: ‘Princess Yara’s Heart Shattered.’
‘How could you?’ She shook her head and handed him back his phone. There was nothing more she needed to see, not with Rafiq present anyway. ‘Do you know what? I don’t even want to hear your excuses. Can you ask your driver to drop me home?’
‘You can’t go home yet. I can guarantee that the press is going to be there.’
‘If he isn’t going to take me home then I’ll get out now and make my own way.’
‘Liliana, you need to hear what I have to say.’ He glanced in the direction of his driver. ‘We’ll talk properly when we’re alone.’
‘I never want to be alone again with you,’ she retorted. ‘I mean it, Rafiq, just take me home.’