No.

Who would ever believe that Pete O’Hanlon would have even looked at the last virgin in the sixth form? But it would still be a total nightmare for her parents.

Terrifying for a little boy.

Zahir was right. Her home, the place where she could hold out against the world, knowing that her parents would support her, whatever she did, whatever it cost them, was no longer a haven.

As she straightened, stood on her own two feet, she shivered. ‘It doesn’t matter about me, Zahir, but I can’t leave my family to deal with this on their own. I have to get my parents and Freddy out of there too.’

Freddy.

There it was. Zahir had known. He’d heard this man’s name on her lips, and seen her face as she’d spoken of him, but even while his head had understood what she was telling him, his heart had refused to believe it. Had clung to some forlorn hope…

It was his heart that had called her his beloved.

That she could never return his feelings, that he would never be her habibi, made no difference. She had made the nightingale sing for him, her smile had made the stars shine beneath his feet. She had given him a moment that he would carry with him always, but in doing so had brought this horror crashing about her. The least he could do in return was offer his protection to her and to all those she loved.

Even now, as she looked up at him, as he felt the flutter of her pulse against his palm, he could scarcely believe that she loved another man. Her eyes seemed to tell him that all she wanted was for him to hold her against his heart, enfold her in his arms. Keep her from harm.

‘It is done,’ he said. ‘Call them and tell them to be ready.’

She had mockingly called him ‘Galahad’ and she was right to mock. Even now, when there were a dozen things he had to do to make this happen, he wanted nothing more than to hold her, promise her his world.

‘Zahir…’ His name on her lips was so sweet, but he did not look at her as he stepped back.

Did not dare look. What he was feeling meant nothing. He wasn’t Galahad offering her a pure heart. There was no fairy tale, no romance here.

Worse, no honour.

All he’d had to offer Diana Metcalfe was one night in his bed and, in making that offer, he’d broken the cardinal rules on which he’d so prided himself. Never to become involved with anyone who might get hurt. There wasn’t a thing he could do to prevent that now, other than give her sanctuary.

‘Call your family while I talk to James and make the necessary arrangements so that we can leave before someone uses your cellphone to track us here.’

‘Where are we going?’

Not we. Never we. He could not go with her…

‘You and your family…’he could not bring himself to say her lover’s name ‘…will be my guests at Nadira Creek for as long as you need a refuge. And I promise you that, while you are there, it will be off limits to journalists.’

Off limits to him.

Zahir retrieved his jacket from the rear of the car, dug out his own phone and, leaving Diana to call home, he rang James Pierce.

‘Just listen,’ he said, cutting him off before he could start. ‘I want a private jet ready to leave Farnborough airfield early this evening.’ He checked his watch. ‘No later than seven o’clock. As soon as that’s arranged, call Sadie Redford and tell her to send someone she trusts with her life to pick up a party of three and their luggage from Diana’s home…’

He opened the car door.

‘…I’m sorry, Freddy. Please, sweetie…’ Diana paused with the endearment on her lips, looked up. Her eyes were full of tears but there was nothing he could do. No comfort he could offer her. No comfort for him…

‘I need your address,’ he said. She blinked, not quite with him. Never with him…‘For James.’

‘Oh, right.’ Then, ‘Actually, it might be better if they leave the house by the back way through Aunt Alice’s. Her garden backs on to ours. Ninety-two, Prince Albert Street.’

‘Aunt Alice’s,’ he repeated. ‘Will she be coming too?’

She almost smiled but the dimple didn’t quite make it. ‘No, Zahir. She’s not a real aunt, just my mother’s best friend.’

He nodded, walking away from the car as he gave James the details. ‘Tell Sadie Redford the change in plans. Tell her…Tell her I’ll bring the Mercedes back to London when I’ve dropped Diana at the airport. She can have someone pick it up at the hotel.’

‘You’re not going with her, then?’

There was something in James’s tone that put an edge in his voice. He ignored it. ‘Why would I do that when I’m a guest at the Mansion House tonight? Something you might mention to any journalist you encounter who expresses an interest in my immediate plans. But you’ll have to cancel the Paris trip. I’m bringing forward the announcement of Ramal Hamrah Airways to tomorrow morning and I’ll be going home straight after that.’

Ameerah would not forgive him for missing her party, but neither would Hanif and Lucy appreciate a Pied Piper trail of journalists invading their children’s party.

At least he would make his mother happy. Hopefully give his father the grandson he desired. He owed them that.

CHAPTER NINE

IT WAS a nightmare.

Zahir insisted on driving-and he was right, she was in no fit state to handle the big car-pushing the speed limit all the way to Farnborough. He’d been kind, gentle with her, but it didn’t take a genius to see that he couldn’t wait to rid himself of her.

Who could blame him?

The moment they arrived at the airfield-one favoured by the kind of men for whom the private jet was the standard form of transport and ironically a regular run for the limo drivers-he made his excuses.

‘I have to go,’ he said as, with one of the VIP hostesses standing by to whisk her away, he made a formal little bow. ‘Your family will be with you very shortly.’

‘You’d better get a move on,’ she said, forcing herself to look at her watch, to look away from his beautiful face, even though she knew it would be the last time she’d see him. Doing her best to keep it light. ‘It won’t do to keep the Prime Minister waiting.’ For heaven’s sake, she barely knew the man. Why then, did it feel like the end of the world? ‘But try not to get a speeding ticket or that’ll be another black mark against my name.’

‘I’ll take care, but if I miss the dinner the press will leap to the conclusion that we are…’ He faltered, a gesture filling the gap.

He was protecting her? Or was he protecting himself?

It didn’t matter!

‘You don’t have to draw a picture, Zahir. Go. Now. I’ll be fine.’

And with another bow he turned and walked away from her. It was odd. He was wearing a casual suit, and yet in her mind he was wearing robes…

‘Would you like to freshen up while you’re waiting, Miss Metcalfe?’ The hostess, who had been standing at a discreet distance while Zahir had been with her, tactfully eased her into the sanctuary of a luxurious washroom where she offered a box of tissues.

‘I’ll come and fetch you when the rest of your party arrive.’

It was only then that she realised that tears were pouring down her face, dripping on to her shirt, soaking it.

Try as she might to forget, all she could think about was Zahir dismissing the dinner as unimportant when he was suggesting they sail across to France in his yacht. But for a freak wave they might even now be putting into some quaint Normandy harbour where she’d be waking in his arms to a French dawn, unaware of the furore…

She shook her head. It would, in the end, only have made things worse. She’d done the right thing. Even if it meant that Zahir thought she was…

Well, he must have a pretty low opinion of a woman who’d responded so fervently to the kisses of someone who was practically a stranger when she was involved with another man.

Had wanted him to do more than kiss her.

No wonder he’d dropped her and run.

She made an effort to stem the flow of tears she had no business shedding. Tidied herself up, directed the hand-drier at her shirt-as shirt days went, this was having a bad one-to dry herself off.

Putting on a front before her mother arrived.

Some hope.

She must have broken some kind of record with her packing, because Diana was still struggling to put on lipstick with a shaky hand when the hostess came for her.

Sadie’s father, Daniel Redford, the man who owned Capitol Cars but now left the day-to-day business to his daughter, had brought her family to the airfield in the back of the old black London cab that he used as a town car. Clever of Sadie. Far less noticeable than one of the burgundy Capitol cars. And kind too, to call on her father to help out an employee who’d given her such a headache.

‘I’m so grateful, Mr Redford…’ Oh, damn, the tears were threatening again.

‘It was no trouble. I enjoyed the cloak-and-dagger. We got away clean as a whistle,’ he said. Such a sweet man. ‘And don’t worry about the yard,’ he added, a reassuring hand to her elbow. The hacks are getting short shrift there. It’ll be nothing but a nine-minute wonder, you’ll see.’

Her mother, who’d apparently rushed home from work when the phone calls had started, was not sweet.

On the contrary, she was livid, and it was only Freddy’s presence that kept her from speaking her mind. Her father, painfully, seemed unable to look at her. Even Freddy-normally the sweetest-natured of boys-had turned sulky because she’d missed the parents’ evening at school.

So much for putting him first…

Maybe it was a good thing that Zahir hadn’t stayed to witness the fact that not one member of her family was talking to her. The ‘not again…’ looks her mother was giving her. At least until they were ushered aboard the private jet, at which point she was too distracted by the kind of luxury that only the super-rich could afford to keep it up.

It was dark, the middle of the night, when they arrived at Nadira Creek. Even so, the air was soft, warm, scented with exotic blooms, and, as she looked up, the stars were like diamonds scattered over black velvet.

Zahir was right. It was awesome.

Like the villa that had been put at their disposal. What she’d seen of it was like something out of a dream. Not that she’d seen much. They were all too shattered by the swift turn of events, the rush, the tension.

But finally Freddy was tucked up and at last she was able to get out of her working clothes and take a shower in a bathroom that was about the size of her bedroom back home, using the kind of soaps that she’d only ever heard of.

Afterwards, wrapped in the softest towelling robe, she checked on her parents. They were already asleep, but, when she tried to follow suit, her mind wouldn’t let go. All she could think about was Zahir. What he was doing. What he was thinking.

Had he been mobbed on arrival at the Mansion House? Probably not. With heads of state and cabinet ministers attending, security would be tight.

At the hotel?

Almost certainly. Not that he would say anything. He’d just have given the waiting photographers one of his show-stopping smiles. The kind that meant nothing.

But what was he feeling?

Anger. With himself, no doubt, for behaving like a fool. But with her too, for what he must feel had been her deceit.

She might not have lied about Freddy and if he’d asked her outright she would have told him the truth. But what she hadn’t said had left him with a contradiction and he would not, could not, think well of her.

When the pale silver edge of dawn filtered through the lattice shutters of the balcony it came as a relief. She pushed one back and caught her first glimpse of Nadira Creek, shimmering, a pale and milky pink in the early morning light.

Shreds of mist clung to cliffs that rose on the far side of the water. Draped itself like silk chiffon amongst the date palms and what, unbelievably, looked like pomegranate trees in the gardens that sloped away from the terrace below her.

If yesterday had ended on a nightmare, today was beginning with something like a dream.

She quickly showered, dressed and, after looking in on Freddy, still dead to the world, she went downstairs to a huge sitting room where sofas, cushions and beautiful rugs were strewn across the dark polished floor.

But she didn’t linger there.

Wide French windows stood open to an arcaded courtyard and she walked out into the misty dawn, drawn by the sound of water trickling down a narrow rill to steps that led down to a lily-covered pool. Beside it, a raised open-sided pavilion was almost hidden beneath a vast fig tree.

Like the house, it was furnished with luxuriously rich carpets and silk cushions, inviting her to curl up and sleep until the world forgot her. Before she gave in to the temptation, a phone resting on a low carved table, the only thing that was out of place in this Arabian Nights fantasy, burbled softly.