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‘Of course! You came first on your accountancy course, so Rashad will be getting a top-notch employee. I’m so glad I wasn’t wrong about him. I always thought Rashad was a decent and trustworthy young man,’ Beth contended happily. ‘Where will you be working?’

      ‘Bakhar.’

      ‘Oh, my goodness, this new job will be abroad! I should’ve thought of that possibility,’ her mother exclaimed. ‘We’ll all miss you so much. Are you sure this is the right thing for you?’

      ‘Oh, totally.’ Tilda kept right on smiling although her jaw was beginning to ache.

      Her supposed new career move was the sole topic of discussion amongst her siblings that evening. As none of them was aware of the severity of the family financial problems, the assumption was that Tilda had won her dream job. ‘I suppose working abroad will be a nice change for you,’ Aubrey, her brother, commented vaguely before he went back upstairs to swot. A year her junior, he was exceptionally clever and, like many intellectual people, quite removed from the practicalities of life.

      Her teenaged brother, James, gave her an impressed look. ‘You can earn a fortune tax-free in the Middle East!’

      ‘Will you go to work on a camel every morning?’ her little sister, Megan, asked hopefully.

      Her other sister, Katie, was more thoughtful and less easily convinced by the surface show of normality. As the sisters got ready for bed in the room they shared, the teenager’s blue eyes were troubled. ‘What was it like for you seeing Rashad again? Didn’t you just hate him?’

      ‘No, I got over all that a long time ago,’ Tilda whispered, not wanting to waken Megan.

      ‘But you’ve never really gone out with anyone since him.’

      Turning her head to the wall, Tilda shut her eyes tight. ‘That’s nothing to do with Rashad. I mean, relationships aren’t for everyone,’ she muttered. ‘I’ve had a few dates—they just haven’t led anywhere.’

      ‘Because you’re not interested … the guys always are—’

      ‘I haven’t got time for a man.’

      ‘You had time for Rashad when he was around.’

      Stinging tears foamed up behind Tilda’s lowered lids. She swallowed back the ache in her throat and told herself not to be so foolish. She then lay awake for half of the night fretting about how her family would manage a hundred and one different tasks without her help. She was also aware that she had to sort out Scott. Those twin concerns screened out the even bigger worry about how she would handle Rashad. The next morning she handed in her notice at work and when she had finished for the day she caught the bus to her stepfather’s house.

      ‘What do you want?’ Scott demanded menacingly on the doorstep.

      ‘If you ever try to take money from my mother again, I’ll report you to the police,’ Tilda told him. ‘If you threaten or hurt any member of my family, I’ll also go straight to the police, so leave us alone!’

      The furious resentment with which the older man hurled a tide of abuse at her convinced her that her warning would scare him off. Like most bullies, Scott usually avoided people who fought back and concentrated his aggression on milder personalities.

      She was waiting for another bus when her mobile phone went off.

      ‘I thought your stepfather was history,’ Rashad’s voice remarked with crystal clarity in her ear.

      Surprise almost made Tilda jump a foot in the air. ‘I thought you were in New York!’

      ‘I am.’

      ‘So how do you know I’d been at my stepfather’s house?’

      ‘My security staff are superb at surveillance. I told you I would watch over you,’ Rashad drawled lazily. ‘Why were you visiting Morrison?’

      Tilda cast a harried and cross glance up and down the street, which was as busy as most residential areas were at that time of the evening. But there was no sign of anyone paying her particular attention; if there had been she was in the right mood to give them a piece of her mind. ‘None of your business. I can’t imagine why you’re taking the trouble to put Nosy Parkers on my trail!’

      ‘Nothing is too much trouble when it comes to my favourite concubine.’ An unholy grin of amusement slowly curving his handsome mouth and putting his formidable cool reserve to flight, Rashad relaxed his lean, powerful body back into his office chair and listened to the line being cut with a furious click. There was a powerful buzz to his every exchange or encounter with Tilda. That truth disturbed him…

      CHAPTER FIVE

      THE car door of the Mercedes opened. The chauffeur bowed low and the bodyguards fanned out. Her heart beating very fast, Tilda climbed out and walked into the hotel, striving to appear indifferent to all the heads turning to look in her direction. The lift was held for her benefit. Moments later, she was ushered into an opulent suite and shown straight into a bedroom where a complete change of clothes awaited her.

      Her palms were damp as she unbuttoned the jacket of the ordinary navy trouser suit she had worn. She undressed with great care. Leaving home had upset her and keeping up the cheerful front had been a challenge. It was her second visit to this London hotel. Her first had taken place over a week earlier, when a couple of hours had passed while she had been comprehensively measured for a new wardrobe. Both trips had been organised by an anonymous voice over the phone. She’d had to put on pressure to find out exactly when she would be flying out to Bakhar. From Rashad himself, she had heard not a word. While she was by no means keen for any unnecessary contact with him, that silence had done nothing to lessen her apprehensions about her future.

      Tilda donned the cobweb-fine silk and lace lingerie. Each item was a perfect fit. She had never known anyone who wore stockings. She liked her underwear plain and comfortable, not designed to present the female body in a provocative way. The gossamer-thin bra and briefs offered nothing in the way of concealment. In spite of the warmth of the room she shivered. She slid into the beautifully made blue dress and eased her feet into the delicate high-heeled shoes. She was reaching for the matching light coat when the very expensive mobile phone lying on the bed rang.

      After a moment of hesitation, she answered it. ‘Hello?’

      ‘Leave your hair loose,’ Rashad murmured huskily.

      It was an effort to find her voice. ‘Right.’

      ‘The phone is yours. It enjoys enhanced security. Wear the jewellery. I’m looking forward to seeing you at the airport.’ Rashad rang off.

      Moving with as much enthusiasm as an automaton, Tilda tucked the fancy phone into the designer handbag on the bed. A jewel box reposed on the dressing table. She flipped it open, anxious eyes widening at the sight of the dazzling platinum and diamond set pendant and drop earrings. Her hands all thumbs, she put the jewellery on. She unclasped her hair and reached for a comb. He had always loved her hair. A tremor ran through her slender length. At that instant she was tempted to hack her hair off to within a few inches of her scalp.

      But how would her desert prince react? Suppose that hair was her main attraction in his eyes? Suppose he took one look at her shorn of her crowning glory and rejected her at the airport? It was not a risk she could afford to take. Her lovely face tightening, she tidied her hair and slid into the light coat. Her reflection in the mirror mocked her, for the conservative outfit adorned with the eye-catching jewellery was very stylish. On the surface she looked like a lady, she conceded bitterly, but both she and, more importantly, he knew that beneath the elegant restraint of her outer garments she was dressed like his favourite concubine.

      She travelled to Heathrow in an enormous limousine embellished with tinted windows. She was walking through the airport terminal when someone called her name. She came to a surprised halt and turned her head and was instantly targeted by a blinding onslaught of flashing cameras borne by running people. In the commotion questions were shouted at her while

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