The Oil Tycoon and Her Sexy Sheikh (12 page)

“Sheikh Khaled?”

He looked up in surprise. “Jamil?”

“The party from Kuwait will be arriving within the hour. They are expecting you to welcome them at the palace.”

Khaled shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. My father will be there.”

Jamil coughed. “They already know your father, sir. They have made the journey in order to meet you.”

Damn him for being right. It would be an unthinkable snub to the Kuwaiti delegates if he left the country now. Saqat was a small country in a volatile part of the world and it needed to remain on friendly terms with its neighbors.

“They are bringing the medal to honor your brother.”

That settled it. He owed it to Djalil to be there. His brother had fought with the Allied troops against the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and lost his life. The least Khaled could do was stand up to receive the Kuwaiti medal in his honor.

Olivia would understand that.

…

Olivia stared unseeingly at the magazine on her lap. Now that she was finally on the plane that would take her away from Saqat, she was free to indulge herself with thoughts of everything she was leaving behind.

Everything meaning Khaled.

Mr. Damn Bastard Idiot Bloody Sheikh Khaled Doctor Saqat, as she now liked to think of him.

Her head filled with involuntary memories. Khaled’s husky voice, whispering nonsensical endearments in her ear that sent shivers of pleasure down her spine. His eyes, deep, dark, and tender whenever they were watching her. His fingers weaving their clever patterns across her body. His head, flung back in sheer delight when he was standing at the helm of his yacht. His warm, sexy scent that she couldn’t get enough of.

Khaled laughing at her and with her. Khaled wrapping his arms around her and keeping her warm. Khaled dancing with her last night alone in the ballroom and between the cool linen sheets on her bed. Khaled who had finally made her see that she wanted more from life than to be CEO of MCI Oil. Khaled, who called her by her mother’s special nickname.

She would never fall asleep in his arms again, nor be woken with his kisses. She wouldn’t have him there, challenging her to do better, to be better—not just because it could earn her greater success, but because it was the right thing to do. He wouldn’t be around to tease her out of her sweaters when she was too warm, or to remind her to put on more sun block when she was starting to burn.

Olivia flicked over a page in the magazine randomly. She glanced at the picture of a half-naked actor who was apparently the sexiest man on the planet. She frowned. He was supposed to be sexy? He looked boyish, unkempt, and vacant. Was that really what other women wanted?

If it was, maybe it would make it easier for Olivia to find the kind of man she wanted. She didn’t believe that out of the billions of people on the planet, Khaled was the only one who could make her happy. There had to be someone else. It was simply a matter of finding him.

He wouldn’t need to be like Khaled. It was fine if he wasn’t as tall or good-looking. She didn’t need a man whose smile could fill a whole room with its warmth. She only needed someone who would care for her, who would understand her, and love her. It couldn’t be too hard to find another man like that. Could it?

Only it had taken her nearly thirty years to find Khaled, and even then she hadn’t realized it at first. Hadn’t known that the fiery attraction she’d felt from their very first meeting would only grow and deepen as she came to know him better. What if he hadn’t persevered? He might have listened to all her protests at the beginning. He might never even have kissed her that first time, if she’d said no, and she wouldn’t ever have known.

A splash of something landed on the magazine. Olivia wiped it away and looked around to see what had been spilled. A second splash followed. Tears were gushing down her cheeks now. Furiously, she scrubbed them away, blinking hard in a desperate attempt to control herself. More tears. Damn the man. Everyone around was carefully looking away to give her the illusion of privacy, but it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter that she was sobbing like a child while sitting in business class. It didn’t matter that she would never be CEO. It only mattered that she’d met Khaled, loved him, and had to walk away.

Nothing was going to make that better.

Nothing could.

Chapter Eleven

It was raining in Aberdeen. Mist obscured the sea and the city. Olivia pulled her coat tightly around her neck as she hurried to the taxi. She gave the directions to Dalneith House and sank back against the seat. She’d made this journey a thousand times, out of the city toward her home. This was the first time it hadn’t felt like home.

She checked her watch. Her father would be at the office for a couple of hours yet, which left plenty of time to put her plan into action. She made her arrangements with the taxi driver and then ran up the steps to the familiar gray house. Upstairs, she undid the suitcase she’d taken to Saqat, digging out the business suits and chucking them into a messy pile on the floor. The T-shirts and shorts she left, and the spotty bikini that had worked its magic on Khaled so well.

Olivia took the tissue-wrapped packages she’d bought at the Saqat airport out of their glossy bag and added them to her case. She removed the orange dress, letting its silk slide through her fingers. It hardly seemed possible that it was only last night when she’d worn it, when Khaled had broken off his betrothal. For a few brief, magical moments, she’d allowed herself to hope. Foolish. He’d never promised her anything and she’d known he wasn’t free to do so. Olivia hung the dress up swiftly, hiding it behind her gray suits. She wouldn’t wear it again.

There wasn’t much more to her packing. Some extra underwear, a few more T-shirts, and a pair of jeans. She chucked in a pair of flip-flops and a couple of novels she’d been meaning to read for ages. Done. A quick shower and she’d be on her way back to the airport.

She switched on the tap and waited for the water to run warm before she undressed. When she finally stepped under the flow of water, she felt the tension begin to ease in her neck and shoulders. As she worked the soap over her body, she washed away the last traces of Saqat.

It was over. Khaled needed to marry his sensible Saqati bride, and he’d be kept busy taking over the reins of power from his father. He wouldn’t have time to remember her.

She would remember him. But she couldn’t live her life remembering an unattainable dream. Moping around over a man she couldn’t have was a waste of time.

She stepped out of the shower and quickly toweled herself dry. She’d chosen a light cotton jersey dress to wear for the journey, but for the sake of the Scottish weather, she added a cardigan and a pair of woolly tights that she could dispose of on the plane. Where she was heading, she wouldn’t need them.

She ran a comb through her hair, scanned her room to make sure she hadn’t forgotten anything important, then picked up her suitcase and went downstairs to call a cab.

At the sound of a car crunching on the gravel driveway, Olivia opened the front door.

Damn. Not the taxi, but her father returning early from work.

“You should have told me when you were arriving,” Oliver said. “Let me take your case for you, lassie.”

“No.” She held on tightly. “I’m just leaving, Dad.”

“Leaving?” He paused. “But you’ve only arrived.”

“I’m not staying. You were right. I need a break.”

“Aye, well. I’d hoped you’d spare a few days for Scotland first.”

“Why?” She couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice. “There’s nothing here for me now. No job to keep me busy. No company to work for.”

“You’re angry about the CEO position. I know you’d hoped I’d give it to you.”

Olivia sighed. It wasn’t worth trying to explain. He wouldn’t understand. He never had. “Yes, I’m angry.”

“It’s better this way, lassie.”

“Better for whom?”

He came toward her, a tentative smile on his lips. “Better for you, Olivia. You can enjoy life for a wee while. You know, you never needed to work so hard.”

She stared at him. “Of course I did. You told me you wouldn’t employ me unless I was better than all the other candidates. What else was I supposed to do?”

“Ah, Olivia.” He shook his head. “You were supposed to enjoy yourself.”

She frowned. He wasn’t making any sense. “I can’t stand here talking. That’s my taxi waiting outside the gate.”

“Where are you going?” Oliver called after her.

“Somewhere warm!” she shouted over her shoulder. Somewhere warm, where she wouldn’t need a fire, a glass of whisky, and a pair of strong arms holding her close to stop her from shivering.

…

Mad dogs and Englishmen, they said, went out in the midday sun. With her fair skin, Olivia was much too cautious to follow their example. In the past week, she’d established a simple routine for her days with an early morning swim, followed by breakfast and a walk. After lunch she took a siesta. Most days she didn’t sleep, but she lay on her bed in the cool, darkened room and read for an hour or two. When the worst of the heat was gone, she put on her bikini again and ventured out to the pool. Sometimes she swam, often she simply stretched out on a lounger, slathered herself with high-factor sunblock, and lay back to enjoy the warmth of the Caribbean sun.

It was a novel experience doing nothing. She’d always assumed she was the sort of person who couldn’t do nothing, but here on the lazy beaches of St. Lucia, a million miles from MCI Oil’s Aberdeen offices, it turned out to be rather easy.

Olivia reached out to pick up her cocktail and sipped at the delicious pineapple drink, grateful for its icy chill. Adjusting her sunglasses, she lay back and basked in the late afternoon sunshine.

Other than the sound of an occasional plane overhead, this pool was wonderfully quiet. There was another, much larger, pool on the other side of the resort where families tended to gather, and the infinity pool behind the main hotel building had a floating bar that drew the honeymooning couples. She preferred the privacy of the little pool, even if she did have to get up to order another drink.

She’d surprised herself on this holiday. It was the first time she’d traveled completely alone, without the security of business colleagues to make arrangements and plan ahead. The absence of colleagues was a welcome relief, but the absence of a plan was an unexpected benefit. No deadlines to meet, no meetings to schedule, no flights to coordinate. She’d booked her luxury beach hut for a month, but if she felt like it, she could stay longer or leave sooner.

Some days she went for a massage or an aromatherapy session. Once she’d hired a scooter and taken a trip into the nearest town. Tomorrow she had booked a scuba diving lesson. She had a snorkel that she used to explore the rock pools and coral reefs just off shore, but she wanted more.

The Caribbean Sea wasn’t the Persian Gulf, but these shores rivaled the Saqati waters for richness of marine life. The hotel offered trips on glass-bottomed boats for tourists, but Olivia had no desire to take one. Not unless the boat was being driven by an Arab sheikh who would lie beside her, identifying and describing everything they were seeing. But St. Lucia was disappointingly lacking in Arab sheikhs.

Which was the reason she’d chosen to come here.

Olivia felt a faint sense of irritation when a shadow passed over her, and its owner sat on the lounging chair next to hers. Many empty loungers surrounded the pool, so why would someone choose to intrude on a lone sunbather? She shut her eyes, turned her head to the other side, and did her best to ignore the sounds of a can being opened and then more rustling.

She couldn’t ignore the dollop of freezing cold sunblock dropped in the middle of her stomach. Olivia shot upright. “What the hell was that for?”

“You were burning.”

“No, I wasn’t.” She looked down to check. She was always thorough with her sunblock and there was no sign that she’d missed anywhere.

“Better to be safe than sorry.”

She hadn’t imagined it. That deep, husky voice couldn’t belong to anyone else. She looked through her sunglasses, then lifted them up and checked again. Definitely Khaled. Here. In St. Lucia. Sitting next to her.

Olivia scooped off the excess cream and automatically put her hand out to wipe it off on his stomach. He tensed. She froze, watching his muscles twitch millimeters from her touch. Cautiously, she withdrew her hand, shaking it so that the sunblock dropped onto the ground. She wiped her hand on her towel and sat up.

“Khaled, what are you doing here?” A sudden, horrifying thought gripped her. “You’re not on your honeymoon, are you?”

His eyebrows shot up in horror that matched her own, and she breathed a silent prayer of relief.

“No, I’m not on my honeymoon. I came to find you, of course.”

“Of course?”

He took hold of her hand and pulled her round so that they were facing each other, knees almost touching. Olivia instinctively pushed her lounger back, but Khaled grasped its steel frame, holding it so that she couldn’t go far.

“I’m sorry it took me so long, Livvy.”

“What took you so long?” His eyes were smiling at her, but his lips were straight and his jaw tense.

“Finding you.” He reached up and she thought he was going to stroke her face, but he merely lifted a strand of hair and tucked it behind her ear. “Your father had no idea where you were.”

She bit her lip. “I told him I was going somewhere warm.”

“Yes. Well, that narrowed things down a bit, but I’m afraid I needed a few more clues.” He was almost smiling now.

“You seem to have tracked me down without too much difficulty.” She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She was supposed to be getting over him, not having him chase her all over the world.

He shrugged. “I have contacts.”

“Of course you do.” He’d have contacts everywhere, she supposed. Presumably that was one of the perks of being royalty.

“It took longer than I’d hoped. I should have been here a week ago.”

“Should you?” She had no idea what he was talking about.

“I—we—shouldn’t have been here at all. I should have caught up with you before you ever left Saqat. I wanted to tell you everything that morning. Hell, I wanted to tell you before then, but I couldn’t. I didn’t dare raise your hopes until I knew for sure it would be okay.”

“Knew what? Khaled, you’re not making any sense.” A week ago? What had he needed to tell her before she left Saqat? He’d told her everything, hadn’t he? About Saqat Oil. And Aliya. And Mrs. Damn Bastard Idiot Bloody Sheikh Khaled Doctor Saqat.

He ran a hand through his hair. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. Just explain. And make it quick. I have plans this evening.”

“Plans?”

He hadn’t been expecting that of her. Well, good.

“None-of-your-business plans.” Plans involving room service and a good book, but he didn’t need to know that.

“Oh. Well.”

“Get on with it, Khaled.”

“Right. Right.”

He was nervous. She’d seen him afraid, angry, upset, but never nervous. It was interesting.

“So you remember we were planning to set up a new oil company?”

“I remember telling you that you should.”

“Yes. Well, we are.”

“And you tracked me down here to let me know? Thanks.”

“Livvy—Olivia—please, just listen, would you? I need to say it all first. Then you can say anything you want.”

“Fine.” She was curious to know what was so important to him.

“We are still working out many of the details of the new company, but the council and I are agreed that the company should seek to employ as many Saqati nationals as possible. In that way, the industry will rejuvenate our education system. We will need our own qualified engineers, IT specialists, and marine technologists. The board members and all the senior management must be Saqati by birth or by marriage. We know that it will be slower, but it will give us the freedom to do things our way.”

“Your way.” He was adjusting well to his royal role, it seemed.

He gave a self-deprecating grin. “Well, maybe. I am to be the chairman of the board.”

“Terrific. Well done. I’m pleased for you, but I fail to see how it makes any difference to me. You could have just phoned to tell me or sent me an email. Written a damned letter. You didn’t need to fly halfway round the world to find me and tell me in person.”

“We’ll need some experts,” Khaled continued slowly. “Senior employees with years of experience in the oil industry.”

“Yes. We’ll I’m sure there are plenty of good people out there.” They didn’t all have to be Saqati citizens. The new company could seek advice without appointing people to the board.

“We’ll need a CEO with the guts to stand up to the chairman of the board.”

Olivia rolled her eyes. “You’re not that frightening.”

“I hope not. Will you do it, Livvy?”

Her jaw literally dropped, but Khaled was still watching her earnestly.

“Me?”

“You. I can’t imagine anyone better qualified.”

“I’m not a Saqati citizen.”

“Not by birth.”

Her heart skipped several beats. By birth or by marriage, he’d said. Which meant…

“I can’t… I can’t just marry some Saqati man for the sake of a job.”

Khaled reached for her hands, rubbing his thumbs soothingly over her wrists. “I was hoping you could be persuaded to marry one Saqati man in particular.”

“So that I can be CEO of Saqat Oil?”

He dropped to his knees before her. His eyes held hers and his hands were warm around her own. “So that I never have to let you go again.”

“Khaled?” she whispered.

“Livvy.” He reached up to caress her cheek. “Darling Livvy, I love you so much. I know it’s too much to ask. You’d have to make all kinds of sacrifices to move to Saqat and be my wife. You’ve seen what life is like at the palace.” He shook his head. “I wish I could make it all different for you, but I’m stuck with it.”

Olivia tried to speak, but he laid a finger on her lips. “Let me finish, sweetheart. You know my father is dying. Very soon I will be the emir.”

She wrenched her hands free, to hold his face and assure him of her comfort. She bent her head to drop a kiss on his temple.

“My life will be one of duty and protocol. I have to lead my country into the future and it will be hard. I… Oh, hell. Please do it, Livvy. Please say you’ll be with me.”

She wanted to say yes. He’d talked of marriage, and she yearned to be with him, no matter what the circumstances, but she knew it wasn’t that simple. The last time they’d spoken, he’d told her he’d made his choice of a suitable bride, and he’d made it quite clear that she didn’t measure up. She dropped her hands to her side and looked him in the eye. “What about the woman you’re going to marry?”