Chapter Six #2
‘The announcement was made with one hundred percent agreement from Omrhain.’
‘It was?’ Malik asked, shocked that Hana’s father would have done such a thing.
‘I’m afraid the princess’s actions took the matters out of our control. News spread much more quickly than either myself or her father could contain.’
Malik snatched up the man by the shirt across his chest. ‘If I find even an ounce of proof that you had anything to do with that news getting out, Ehsan, that you would have jeopardised the princess’s reputation so casually, it is not your position in my court that you will have to worry about, but your life,’ he threatened in a growl.
Nothing would have made Malik risk Hana’s future in such a way—not even Al Surrahin.
‘It wasn’t me, Your Highness, I swear. Your return was put on the public schedule and when you didn’t arrive, the journalists and entourage waiting for your arrival became worried. Especially after the accident that befell your brother. We had to tell them something.’
‘You told them we were married!’ Malik roared.
His world reeled and he forced himself to unclench his fist. Ehsan dropped awkwardly back to the ground. A cold sweat broke out over the back of Malik’s neck.
He’d thought he’d had it all under control.
That they’d be rescued, the princess returned to Omrhain and he to Al Surrahin with no one the wiser.
That they would go back to their lives as though the last twenty-four hours on this island were nothing but a dream cast by a beautiful jinn who had infuriated him and made him laugh.
Who had made him crazy enough to hope, to want.
Who had him sharing confessions and confidences under the howling winds of the storm that he’d never told another.
Naively, he’d hoped those confessions would be whisked away never to be heard again—but now they had to be worn, borne for the rest of their lives.
I want a family.
A family he couldn’t ever give her. He’d never be able to take that risk. But to honour that promise he’d made to himself, to the children he’d never sire, he would deny Hana the one thing she truly wanted.
He bit back every single curse he knew, guilt gouging invisible scars deep into his body.
‘What’s going on?’ a small, very feminine voice asked from behind him.
Malik gave in to the urge to close his eyes. His head fell back and he wished that he could take back the last two days. Unconsciously, he blocked the view from the doorway with his body.
‘Ma— Your Highness?’ Hana asked again, hastily correcting herself when she realised that Ehsan was still present.
He looked over his shoulder at her, taking in her appearance. She’d changed back into her wet clothes, which hadn’t miraculously dried overnight. He cursed. What a mess. She couldn’t arrive in Al Surrahin dressed like that. Quickly his mind veered towards the practical.
He looked back at Ehsan. ‘Did you bring changes of clothes?’
The man nodded to the bags on the floor by the door.
‘When you are both ready, the helicopter will take us to the private jet waiting at a suitably discreet location,’ Ehsan explained.
Malik glared at the man, even though he could hardly place the blame for this sorry situation on him. Gritting his teeth, Malik hauled the bags into the villa and slammed the door shut, not wanting anyone to witness how he was going to explain all this to Hana.
He had to forget the ease and the softness he’d experienced on the island and return to Al Surrahin as the leader they needed him to be.
As a husband to a wife.
Everything he’d tried to persuade her he could never be, as much for her as it had been for him, came back to mock him. Taunt him. She looked at him with trust in her eyes. A trust he didn’t deserve. His heartbeat pounded in time with the thumping in his head.
She was too naive, too hopeful, too deserving. And still he couldn’t, wouldn’t, give her the things she wanted so damn much.
And it was that, he realised that made him the true monster.
‘We need to get changed,’ he explained, nodding to the bags on the floor by his feet.
‘Because?’
He took a breath.
‘News of our situation was not kept as quiet as we could have hoped.’
Hana’s eyes widened, her realisation slightly slower than his own had been.
‘Omrhain and Al Surrahin had to come up with a reasonable explanation. There were concerns over my safety and your whereabouts and…’
Her hand rose to her mouth.
‘The only recourse was to tell our countries that we remained in Omrhain to marry.’
Hana swayed where she stood in the centre of the room and he almost went to reach for her, but she lifted a hand to ward him off.
He wondered if she’d ever realise how ironic it was. That everything she’d done—disguising herself, sneaking in to the spa—had been an attempt to ensure that when they met, she didn’t look at him with the kind of horror that she now looked at him with.
The kind of shock that could almost have been laughable. If it wasn’t so cruel.
What had she done? Hana pressed shaking fingers to trembling lips. What had she done?
‘We can’t. You…you…’ she stuttered, not quite able to bring herself to say, You don’t want me.
Her heart caved in her chest and the floor felt unsteady beneath her feet.
‘I don’t understand,’ she said, the words little more than a whisper.
Malik inhaled slowly as if seeking some kind of forbearance. It was something she’d seen her siblings do time and time again when it had come to her. And she hated seeing Malik do it.
‘Apparently my return was reported on the official schedule and when I didn’t appear—’
‘Your absence was noted,’ Hana finished.
Malik nodded.
‘But we’re not married. There was no imam, no signing of the marriage contract,’ she said helplessly.