Sheikh's Captured Bride: The Sheikh's Prize / The Sheikh's Son / Captured by the Sheikh

‘I don’t but, even allowing for a fair amount of exaggeration and invented stories, there is room for me to doubt the likelihood that in one brief encounter I have fathered your child,’ Zahir fielded very quietly.

‘I didn’t think it was very likely either, but we’re both young and healthy, it was the wrong time of the month for me to have an accident and clearly you have killer sperm,’ Saffy told him drily.

‘Don’t make a joke of it,’ Zahir growled.

‘I can’t prove it’s your baby until after it’s born,’ Saffy murmured ruefully. ‘DNA testing is too risky during pregnancy. On the other hand you could think back sensibly to that day in the tent and appreciate that ironically you are the only lover I’ve ever had.’

Zahir frowned, winged ebony brows pleating above questioning dark as night eyes flaring with disbelief. ‘That is not possible.’

‘Forget the newspaper stories and your prejudices and think about it rationally,’ Saffy urged with quiet dignity, determined not to allow him to continue to cherish doubts about who had fathered her child. ‘You’re not stupid—I know you’re not. I was a virgin.’

All colour bled from below his olive-toned complexion as he stared back at her with smouldering golden force and she recognised the exact moment when he recalled the blood stains on the bed because he suddenly swore in Arabic, tore his stunned gaze from hers and half swung away from her, his lean brown hands clenching into fists. ‘If that is true, I have greatly wronged you,’ he bit out rawly.

‘We wronged each other a long time ago,’ Saffy cut in. ‘I chose to share that bed with you. It was my decision and this is my…er, problem.’

‘If it’s my child, it’s mine too and I don’t see our child as a problem,’ Zahir retorted with a harsh edge to his dark deep voice. ‘We’ll remarry just as soon as I can arrange it.’

‘Remarry?’ Saffy gasped in wonderment. ‘You have to be joking!’

‘Our child’s future is too serious to joke about and it can only be secured through marriage.’

‘And we all know how that turned out the last time,’ Saffy returned doggedly, fighting to think logically because his proposal had shaken her to her very depths. Was he serious? Was he really serious?

‘When my father died and I took the throne, everything changed in Maraban,’ Zahir declared levelly. ‘We would be able to lead normal lives now. You’re pregnant. Of course, I want to marry you.’

Saffy was reeling from a dozen different reactions: disbelief, scorn, anger, frustration among them. Zahir was set on taking charge as usual. He wasn’t reacting on a personal level, he was reacting as a public figure, keen to hide an embarrassing mistake within the respectability of marriage.

‘I don’t want to marry you just because I’m pregnant.’

‘And what do you think your child would want?’ Zahir shot that icily controlled demand back at her. ‘If you don’t marry me, you will deprive that child of a father and of the status in life he or she has a right to enjoy. Without marriage, the child will have to remain secret and it will be almost impossible for me to establish a normal relationship with him or her.’

In one cool statement, Zahir had given Saffy a lot to think about, but then faster than the speed of light her child had gone from being a line on a test wand to a living, breathing being, who might well question her decisions at a later date. For the first time she appreciated that she could not continue to put her own wants and needs first because, whatever she chose to do, she would, one day, have to take responsibility for the choices she had made on her child’s behalf.

‘We could get married just to ensure that the baby was legitimate…and then get another divorce,’ she suggested tautly.

Brilliant dark eyes flamed golden as flames. ‘Is that really the very best you can offer? Is the prospect of being my wife again such a sacrifice?’

Saffy studied the floor. She thought of the wicked forbidden delight of his passion, recognising that on that level everything between them had radically changed. She looked up, feeling the instant mesmeric pull of him the moment she saw his lean dark face. Her heart hammered inside her, her mouth running dry.

‘Couldn’t you give our marriage a second chance?’ Zahir asked huskily.

‘It’s too soon to consider that,’ Saffy argued. ‘The first thing I need to do now is see my doctor and confirm that I am pregnant. Then we’ll decide what to do. Look at this from my point of view. When you arrived here, you asked me to be your mistress…now suddenly you’re talking marriage, but I don’t want to get married purely because you accidentally got me pregnant.’

Zahir surveyed her with stormy intensity and the atmosphere thickened as though laced with cracked ice. ‘I believe in fate, not accidents. What is meant to be will be.’

Saffy rolled her eyes, compressed her lips and stood up. ‘You shipped me out to the desert for seduction, not fatherhood. You brought this roof down over our ears—you sort it out!’

‘Marriage will sort it out,’ he contended stubbornly.

‘Oh, if only it were that simple.’

‘But it is.’ Before she could even guess his intention, he had closed a hand over hers. His brilliant gaze sought and held hers by sheer force of will. ‘Right now, it’s the best choice you can make. Let go of the past. Trust me to look after you and my child. I will not let you down.’

‘And would you agree to a divorce at a later date?’ Saffy prompted shakily, more impressed than she wanted to be by his promise of good intentions.

‘If that’s what you wanted, if you were unhappy as you were before, yes,’ Zahir agreed grittily, not choosing to add the unpleasant realities that would accompany any such decision on her part. Complete honesty was not possible. What really mattered was getting that ring back on her finger and securing their child’s future. ‘This is not about us, this is about our child, what he or she needs most.’

‘If you really mean that…’ Saffy drew in a ragged breath, terrified of the confusing thoughts teeming through her head. She was trying very hard to put the welfare of her child first and not muddy the waters with the bitterness of the past and the insecurity of the present. He would keep his promise: she knew that. On that level she trusted him and she quite understood that he wanted their child to have the very best start in life possible. They owed their child that chance.

‘I do,’ Zahir confirmed levelly.

‘Then on that basis, I agree.’ So great was the stress of making that announcement that Saffy felt light-headed again as all the little devils in her memory banks began queuing up to remind her of how vulnerable she would be if she put herself in Zahir’s power again.

Zahir released her hand. ‘I’ll organise it.’

He got as far as the door before Saffy called him back to say tautly, ‘I want a proper wedding.’

‘Meaning?’ Zahir sought to clarify.

‘No hole-in-the-corner do in the embassy for me this time,’ Saffy spelled out with scorn. ‘I want a bridal gown and a family occasion with my sisters as bridesmaids and all the rest of the wedding hoopla.’

Taken aback by the admission, Zahir literally paled.

‘Those are my terms and I won’t budge on them,’ Saffy completed doggedly.

CHAPTER SEVEN (#uc6c2b963-afd5-531a-a618-9d4631118a46)

‘ARE YOU REALLY sure about doing this?’ Kat looked tense and anxious and Saffy immediately felt guilty.

What had she been thinking of when she dragged her family into all of this? A shotgun wedding, no less. Her sister, Kat, didn’t need the stress but she had insisted on organising the wedding within the space of one incredibly short week and had proven that if sufficient money was thrown at a challenge, it could be done. Saffy studied her reflection in the mirror. Her gorgeous designer wedding dress was a classic, nipped in at the waist for shape and falling in fluid folds to her satin-clad feet. She wasn’t wearing a veil: the hairdresser had piled her hair up and topped it with the magnificent sapphire and diamond tiara Zahir had sent to her. Matching drop earrings sparkled with every movement she made.

‘Saffy?’ the attractive redhead pressed. ‘You know, it may be your wedding day but it’s still not too late to change your mind. You don’t have to marry Zahir. You don’t have to do this to please anybody.’

Looking reflective, Saffy breathed in deep. ‘I really do want to give our baby the chance to have two parents. None of us ever had that. My sisters and I had you and you were a brilliant stand-in Mum,’ she told Kat warmly. ‘But I’d like to try it the old-fashioned way before I try to go it alone.’

Kat frowned. ‘You’re not in a very optimistic mood for a new bride.’

‘I’m being realistic. Zahir will commit to being a father—I know that about him and I respect him for it. If marriage works for us, it works, and if it doesn’t work, at least I’ll have tried,’ Saffy muttered ruefully.

‘I just can’t believe you got involved with him again. It’s like fatal attraction without the bunny boiler. I mean, five years ago Zahir broke your heart and I don’t want him doing it again.’ Her sister sighed unhappily. ‘Mikhail has checked him out and he says Maraban is stable now and that Zahir seems to be one of the good guys.’

‘I could’ve told you that,’ Saffy interrupted heatedly.

‘And there’s no sleazy stories about him either,’ Kat added in a suitably quiet undertone. ‘Obviously there’s been women but not in the kind of numbers you need to worry about.’

Saffy ground her teeth together in silence, wishing that her Russian billionaire brother-in-law had minded his own business when it came to Zahir. Even as she thought it she knew she was wronging the man. Undoubtedly Kat’s concerns about her sister’s bridegroom had prompted Mikhail’s investigation into Zahir’s reputation. ‘He would never be sleazy,’ Saffy declared, suppressing her recollection of that invitation to be his mistress.

‘Are you upset about Emmie refusing to come today?’ Kat asked ruefully.