LITMIR.BIZ

      Chapter Eight

      SULTAN AZHIL AL Ruyi arrived in Manhattan with typical fanfare for what was billed as his “low-key appearance” at the United Nations, insofar as he was capable of “low-key” anything. He was greeted by the unctuous Ruyian consul general, who was also his cousin, and a phalanx of other diplomats when he touched down at a private airfield outside the city. The convoy delivered him to the St. Regis on Fifth Avenue, where Azhil proceeded in all his glory to the vast and luxurious Presidential Suite that had been meticulously prepared according to his particular specifications.

      Where Zair waited for him, like the obedient half brother and grateful diplomatic appointee he’d been most of his life, with a number of the Ruyian attachés who reported to him and therefore to the sultan. He rose when Azhil entered the suite, his brother’s eminent feet loud and sure on the checkered marble floor of the suite’s spacious foyer, like the drummers who sometimes led Azhil’s motorcade through the streets of the capital city in Ruyi. Zair bowed deeply, respectfully, as his brother finally strolled into the living room.

      Like all the rest of the sultan’s many minions.

      Zair hid his fury and betrayal beneath the politician’s smile he’d been practicing all his life. He did his best to blend in with the graceful, silk-lined walls, the stunning views of this most acrobatic of cities arrayed around them, and when his brother gave him the same effusive half hug of greeting he always did, Zair returned it.

      “Ah, my brother!” Azhil cried the same way he always had when he saw Zair, with every appearance of sincerity and even a hint of affection. “It has been too long!”

      Because it was sincere, Zair reminded himself as he waited for Azhil to confer with his aides, to take the telephone calls he’d refused while in flight, to override his personal assistant’s directions to the private butler who waited on him. This was not a betrayal as far as Azhil was concerned, this deliberate framing of Zair to take a potential fall someday, this hand-feeding of explosive information to detract attention from the true ringleader of this sick circus. This was business as usual. This was no doubt the reason Azhil had elevated Zair from the ranks of the by-blows in the first place.

      Azhil might even enjoy his company the way he’d always pretended he did, Zair reflected as he took a respectful step back from the center of the room and waited to come to his brother’s attention once more, as was proper. But enjoying his company didn’t mean Azhil would change his plans for Zair. Why should it?

      Finally, the formal greetings and initial reports of the lower-ranking members of the Ruyian diplomatic mission were finished. Zair dismissed the attachés to their jobs and their hotels or lodgings at the consulate, to prepare for the upcoming week of meetings and the small ball the consulate was throwing the following night.

      Azhil dispatched the various members of his entourage to their duties, and when he and Zair were left more or less alone, made his way to the sofa in the suite’s wood-paneled library, gesturing for Zair to join him in one of the far less comfortable chairs around the coffee table. A deliberate move, Zair understood. The intimacy of the library setting spoke of their familial connection, but placing Zair in a higher, stiffer chair while Azhil lounged comfortably was meant to make Zair deeply aware of his subordinate position. Much like a naughty schoolboy in the headmaster’s office.

      They spoke of policy and diplomacy. Zair briefed him on a number of matters of state, took the sultan’s counsel on all of them as was customary, and when they’d finished the business portion of their meeting, smiled his more personal smile and settled back in his chair as if he found it perfectly comfortable.

      Azhil wasn’t the only one who could play these games. He might have made Zair his US ambassador for his own selfish reasons, but Zair was a damned good one.

      “Tell me your family is well,” Zair said when they were both settled with drinks and the last of Azhil’s aides had stepped away to give this part of their conversation the illusion of privacy, and his brother smiled.

      “Ahmed—” Azhil’s eldest son and his heir apparent “—finished Cambridge this year. Time passes more quickly these days.” He smiled benevolently and then continued, as Zair had anticipated he would, because he always did, into his favorite refrain. “As you will find out yourself, God willing. The blood of Ruyi is gold to be shared, brother, not hoarded.”

      It occurred to Zair to wonder, then, how many illegitimate children of his own Azhil had collected in his reign as sultan, and if he gathered them all into the palace the way their father had done. And whether Azhil’s typical insistence that Zair hurry up and procreate was motivated by familial feelings or, more likely, the fact that Zair resembled him so strongly. Did he want a broader pool of a look-alikes for him and his sons to utilize? The possibilities were endless once Zair allowed himself to think the way Azhil obviously did.

      And Zair didn’t know if he’d kept himself deliberately blind all these years, to avoid knowing the answers to these questions—or if he’d known all along that there were so many of these things he didn’t

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