Chapter Eighteen
“Well?” Omar asked when the last girl was led away and Jamil retired to his bedchamber.
“The blonde,” Derek replied without hesitation.
“And the other two?”
“I thought the black wench was already dismissed.”
“Not if you care to have her.”
“And deal with that hostility? No, thank you. Just the blonde will do, and I’ll pay for her myself.”
“Jamil would not hear of it.”
“Then what happens to her when this is over? And the others I summon? You never did answer that.”
“They will be given handsome dowries and found good husbands.”
“Christ!” Derek swore softly. “Why wasn’t I told that before now?”
“Because it can make no difference. Believe me, Jamil will not mind if you use half his harem. He will probably thank you for this excuse to bring his total women down to a number that will not wear him out. You did not really think he would keep those women you favor?”
“I hadn’t thought that far ahead. But I’m sure he wouldn’t thank me if I go through all his favorites.”
Omar chuckled. “Why do you think he has provided you with one of your own?”
Derek grunted. “And his wives? Would he get rid of them, too?”
“They are still the mothers of his sons. They would remain in the harem.”
“Never to be favored by him again?” Derek guessed.
“That need not concern you—”
“For God’s sake, Omar, stop treating me with kid gloves. I’m not going to change my mind about the switch, but I want the truth.”
Omar wouldn’t look at him. “Then no, he would never again summon them to his bed.”
Derek let out his breath slowly. “I had forgotten how bloody possessive a Muslim can be about his women.”
“And you are not?” Omar asked with some skepticism.
Derek thought about it for a moment, but he had to admit, “No, I can’t say that I am.”
“Not even your fiancée?”
Derek chuckled at the reminder that he had a fiancée, for in truth he hadn’t thought of Caroline for days.
“I adore her, Omar, but since I don’t intend to be the most faithful of husbands, I can’t really complain if she should eventually decide to take a lover or two.
It won’t change the way I feel about her. ”
“You have become more English than I thought.”
“I had ten years here and nineteen there, Omar. Did you really expect me to be exactly like Jamil?”
“No, but you are still like him, more than you realize,” Omar replied.
Derek wondered, after the whipping he had just witnessed. He had been appalled when Jamil had not stopped it immediately.
Omar hadn’t been affected one way or the other. “It is well you had this opportunity to see how quickly his Nubians respond to any threat,” he had told him.
“I wouldn’t exactly call what she did a threat,” Derek had gritted out. “How could he be so severe—?”
“I suppose you refer to her being given to the guards?” Omar inquired, not considering those few strokes of the lash anywhere near severe.
“But that is nothing for concern. At most, there will be only a handful not on duty to receive her, and they know better than to abuse such a gift. They will tend her wounds and treat her with care.”
He hadn’t felt it necessary to add that because she was a nonvirgin slave who was unacceptable to her master, her use was mainly carnal, to be offered to anyone her master chose to give her to. “Besides, it was a lesson for the other two.”
A lesson that the blonde was revolted by, if her reaction to Jamil was any indication. She despised him, and not even the concessions he had made for her changed that.
Derek had to force the memory away. “About the whole harem being paraded before me tomorrow,” he said now. “It won’t be necessary. Just give me the names of the women Jamil won’t mind losing.”
“Jamil is not going to like it when he comes back and finds he has sacrificed nothing, while you—”
“Don’t worry, Omar,” Derek interrupted the warning. “I’ll be sure to summon at least one of his favorites. That ought to appease him.” And he knew exactly whom, for he was certain that one of the women he had seen earlier tonight was the missing Miss Charity Woods.
“Thank you,” Omar said, surprising Derek.
“For what?”
“For loving your brother.”
Later, after Derek had retired for the night, he found he couldn’t sleep for still thinking of the blonde. Who was she? Would he recognize her name if he heard it?
Not that it mattered. Princesses, grand ladies, peasants, they were all the same here if they were unfortunate enough to be captured; slaves, without rights, capable of being used, misused, sold, resold, even killed, all at the whim of their owner.
And after hearing Haji Agha’s explanation of how this girl had been captured, Derek knew he was indirectly responsible for her being here.
How he felt about that he wasn’t at all sure.
Ironic, as Jamil humorously thought, was putting it mildly, especially now that technically she belonged to him.
What was he going to do with her? He knew what he would like to do.
Christ, from the moment her veils had been removed, he had been unable to take his eyes off her.
Granted, she was too thin even for his taste.
He liked at least a little flesh on his women.
But that didn’t seem to matter when she stood before the screen, so close, and he experienced the most incredible excitement, knowing what Jamil was going to do and waiting for him to step away from her.
And when her small, perfect breasts were in his view, his flesh reacted instantly, filling, swelling, aching for her touch.
But would he actually do anything about it?
She was a virgin. She was not here willingly.
She was English, for God’s sake! And more to the point, she held Jamil in abhorrence after what he had done tonight, and he would be taking Jamil’s place.
How could he in good conscience take advantage of her, knowing all that?