Trusting A Sheikh (Playgrounds of Power 1) (24 page)

"I'm sorry, Chloe. I was a fool." He finally admitted, unable to meet her gaze, his voice croaking with emotion.

"No, dad – it's fine. I understand what it must mean to you. And I didn't know until a couple of days ago – you know, how badly his father had actually treated you…"

"I've got to apologize to Tariq." Her father muttered under his breath. "I'm ashamed…" He tailed off.

"Ashamed of what?" Chloe asked, surprised. She'd never heard her dad talk in this introspective manner before – he'd always been a sort of idealized figurehead for her, so this was new and unsettling.

"Ashamed." Her father began, pushing himself off the wall and beginning to sound more authoritative, more composed and more under control. "That I allowed myself to treat a guest like I just did. I've shamed myself, and your mother."

"Dad…" Chloe began, doing her best to hide the slight sense of mirth in her voice. "I think your reaction was understandable, given your history. I'm not sure you
shamed
mom – that's a bit, I don't know, old-fashioned, don't you think?"

"Maybe it is." Her dad agreed, walking with his head still hung slightly in embarrassment back towards the kitchen. "But when you get to my age, you're set in your ways, Chloe."

"Dad." Chloe said again, in the kind of tone of voice that practically halted her father in his steps. "I'm proud of you."

"You're proud of me?" Her father said with astonishment. "After the way that I just acted? It was childish."

"No, I'm proud that you admitted it. I suppose – well, I don't know really. I suppose that's the way you raised me…"

"No, Chloe. I'm proud of you, and I shouldn't have let my own personal feelings interfere with how I treated you. Especially," he smiled with embarrassment, "given how wrong I was."

"Don't worry about it." She smiled, closing her hand into a fist and raising it in front of her – an old tradition between the two of them. "Truce?"

"Truce." Her father agreed with a grateful smile, meeting her fist in the air with a gentle bump, before affectionately resting his arm around her shoulder. They walked back into the kitchen intertwined, only to face the concerned looking gazes of their respective partners.

Chloe's mother was the first to break the silence. "Things… all sorted out then?" She asked hopefully.

"I think so." Nabil agreed with a smile. It may be that I –." He paused, hanging his head again slightly in shame while searching for the right word. "No, scratch that. I definitely overreacted. Tariq – I hope you can bring yourself to forgive me? The way I treated you was not only unfair, but unacceptable. I'd understand if you can't bring yourself to – I'm ashamed that I could treat someone – particularly a guest in my home – the way I treated you. My daughter," he turned to Chloe with a loving and apologetic look, "has educated me on the sacrifice you've made to be with her, and I can't thank you enough…" He tailed off, as though he didn't know how to finish his long, heartfelt apology.

Tariq sat there for a second considering his response, and Chloe looked to him nervously. She didn't think that he would react badly to her father had just said – but then, she knew he must be in a delicate emotional state, perhaps more than any of the rest of them, given that he'd just cut his family off…

"Don't mention it." He said casually. "No offence taken."

"Are you sure?" Nabil asked uncertainly. "I mean, what I did was unacceptable –."

Tariq cut him off with a smile. "I mean it, no offence taken! Listen – I understand why you had the response you did, and I don't blame you, not one bit." He looked round the table, saw Chloe's grateful smile and her mother's relieved expression. "Anyway… How about that dinner I was promised?"

The request broker fee tension, and as Chloe's mother sprang into action, rattling pots and pans and preparing a feast the likes of which hadn't been seen since the return of the prodigal son, Chloe linked arms with her lover. She pulled him to one side and whispered into his ear.

"That meant a lot to me. Thank you."

27

^"
Y
ou’re sure?"

"I am, I'm afraid." Chloe said into the cell phone cradled in her hand. "To be honest, I'm not sure that I fit in with this kind of job. I didn't mind doing it when I was all the way down the pyramid just helping out, but I think it took trying to do the Gloucester job to teach me that maybe I'm just not cut out for this… I'm sorry, Rachel." She said sadly.

"Nonsense, dear." Rachel replied firmly. "It's your choice, and I'm not going to stand in your way. The only thing I would say, though, is that most people don't have a single client in their entire careers with as much… baggage as Prince Tariq arrived with. If you did change your mind, I can almost guarantee you'd never have to deal with something that challenging again."

"Thanks, Rachel." Chloe replied. "But it wasn't so much the challenge – it was coming to the realization that, Tariq excepted, I'm not sure that these are the kind of people I want to spend the rest of my life around, you know what I mean?"

"I do." Rachel replied, her voice quavering with sadness this time. "Although, if I'm not wrong, you're just about to jet off with Prince Tariq, aren't you?"

Chloe flushed, glad that Rachel couldn't see that her legs were draped over the Prince right at that moment as they sat in the back of one of the Gloucester's Rolls-Royce Phantoms on their way to the airport. "That's kind of different…"

"I'm sure it is." Rachel chuckled. "I don't mind either way, as long as you're happy. Have a good trip, alright Chloe? And keep in touch, won't you."

"Don't worry about that, I'm sure I'll be around like a bad penny."

"You better be." Rachel smiled, and on the other end of the line, hung up.

"How did that go?" Tariq asked with a concerned look on his face. "Everything okay?"

Chloe smiled back at him reassuringly. "Don't worry about it – it's not your fault. I just didn't feel like I was cut out to work in that business forever. Far too stressful! Especially with people like you knocking about…"

"I just want to make sure that you don't feel like I'm forcing this decision for you in any way…" Tariq said, his face still wrinkled with worry. "I know I came in and messed up your life, I feel guilty about that – I really do."

Chloe chuckled and gave him a little kick with her heel, which was resting on his muscular left thigh. "Who says you made the decision for me? Trust me, you don't have that kind of clout – not yet, anyway. Even if my father seems to like you, I still haven't made my mind up…" She smiled cheekily, to make sure he knew she was joking. By the look on his face, she hadn't fooled him in the slightest.

"Well as long as you sure?" He smiled back sweetly.

"I am. And anyway, I'm pretty excited – it's not often, well never now that I come to think of it, that I get to fly in a private 747…"

"Oh, I see how it is." He joked. "You're only into me for my money, is that right?" He pouted, staring back at her behind his long, batted eyelashes.

The Rolls-Royce Phantom slowed as they reached the gated exterior of Heathrow airport, and the driver rolled down his window as the guard waved them over. "Papers please." He asked in a strong Essex accent, and the driver handed them over without argument.

The guard looked over, shining a torch at their passports, even though it was the middle of the day. Still, Chloe thought, it was November in England and therefore miserable, overcast and raining, so maybe he really did need the extra light.

"My apologies, Prince Tariq." The security guard said, touching his hands to his cap like he was in an old movie. "I didn't mean to delay you…" He looked nervous, as though he might have made a mistake.

Tariq rolled down his window and beckoned the poor man over, smiling. "Are you new?" He asked.

"Yes, first week on the job, sir." The man answered, awkwardly bobbing his head.

"You didn't delay me, don't worry about that. Keep doing your job, alright?"

"Yes sir." The man smiled back. "And sir – thank you."

"Don't worry about it." Tariq smiled, reaching out the window and patting the man on the shoulder.

The guard rushed, beaming, to slide open the heavy metal gates and let them through.

"That was kind of you." Chloe smiled. "What made you do it?"

"If the last few days has taught me anything, it's that there's always space for a good deed." Tariq smiled as the car started moving again. "Maybe if my father spent more time being a normal human being, he wouldn't have cracked. Did you ever watch Star Wars?"

"No." Chloe smiled seriously. "Why do you ask?"

"No reason, really." Tariq said as they pulled up by the huge green and gold Royal 747. "I feel like my father somehow turned to the dark side – it's a bit cartoonish, really. But I've been thinking, you know, he wasn't always that way – something must have changed inside him. I want to make sure that that never happens to me."

The car drew to a halt. "Don't worry." Chloe said, her heart almost splitting with warmth for this kind, grieving, lovely man. "I don't think you could ever do that – and I would never let you." She pecked him on the cheek, her lips lingering for a second on his warm skin.

"I'd better not let you go then." Tariq grinned. "Come on, let's get going." He hopped out the car, and Chloe followed him eagerly – excited beyond belief to see inside the huge private plane.

"Where are we going, anyway?" She asked curiously as they walked up the stairs. "Where are you taking me?"

"To be honest with you, I really hadn't made up my mind. Where do you fancy going? The world is our oyster, after all." Tariq smiled.

Chloe looked at him as they reached the top of the stairs. "Don't you need to file a flight plan or something? I'm not an expert, or anything like that, but I'm pretty sure you need to let people know where you're going – don't you?"

"You do." Tariq allowed, chuckling. "Usually, anyway. But when you have one of these." He patted the side of the massive, Saudi liveried aircraft affectionately. "You can pretty much go where you want. It's a diplomatic aircraft – nobody is going to stop it. It's one of the little perks…"

"That's alright then." Chloe smiled, rolling her eyes – it was just another new feature of this life she seemed to have stumbled into. How her father would react if she told him, she'd never know.

"Champagne, Miss?" A smiling flight attendant asked.

"Oh, thank you." Chloe smiled, then turned to Tariq. "I've never had that before…"

"You better get used to it." He smiled, clinking his delicate champagne flute against hers. "It's one of the only perils of having access to billions of dollars, you know, there's always someone offering you a drink. I hate to think what kind of state my liver must be in."

"You don't have to drink it, you know…" Chloe laughed.

Tariq raised his glass to his lips. "Trust me." He said. "When it's this good, you really do. Now tell me – where do you want to go?"

"Anywhere?" Chloe asked, her mind's eye wide at the prospect of picking any holiday destination in the world. "You mean it?"

"I do." Tariq agreed with a wide grin on his face. "After all, I've got plenty of time on my hands now that I'm no longer an envoy of the Saudi government. I need to do something…"

Chloe pondered. Usually, as a family, they'd holidayed in her mother's native Norway, or at the very best somewhere else in continental Europe. Chloe didn't want to do that again, nice as it had been – now that she had access to this massive plane, she wanted to go somewhere entirely different. "In that case," she said with a glint in her eye, "– how about Australia?"

Tariq raised his eyebrows. "It's a long flight…"

"That's alright." Chloe said airily. "You've got a bed on this thing, don't you?"

The wicked glint in Tariq's eye confirmed her suspicions.

"Well, come on then!"

28

^"
E
ighteen hours."

"What was that?" Chloe called from around the corner.

"Eighteen hours, this fight lasts. We have to refuel in Hong Kong halfway through."

"Can't we do one of those midair refueling things?" Chloe called, rustling something or other in the room next door.

Tariq chuckled. "If only. Nice as this plane is, it's not a military plane, I'm afraid. All that would happen if we tried to call up a refueling tanker is that we would probably crash into the hose and we'd all die a fiery death in the ocean…"

"That doesn't sound very promising." Chloe replied.

"No, it doesn't, does it? Why did you pick Australia, anyway? Just because it was the furthest country you could think of?" Tariq asked.

The rustling next door stopped, and Chloe rested an arm on the door frame. "Well –." She began, swinging herself around the frame and revealing the luxurious lingerie that she had just put on. "I figured if I was going to join the mile high club, I was going to do it in style…"

Tariq inhaled at the sight – it was incredible; she was incredible.

"My God, Chloe –." He said.

"Yes?" She replied, sweetly, fishing for a compliment.

"You look… Amazing." He breathed.

"Don't I always?"

"Yes, of course." He allowed, too smart by half to fall into a trap like that. "But you look extra amazing right now."

Tariq was lying on the bed, supporting himself by his arms, and staring at Chloe with his jaw practically resting on his chest. She felt incredible, turned on, and powerful at the realization that she could have this impact on the man, a man she was beginning to realize that she… Loved? Perhaps it was too soon, but Chloe couldn't deny that she felt things for Tariq she'd never felt for another man. And he did things to her that no other man could do…

"I'm glad." She said simply, walking seductively over towards him, sashaying her hips. It was her turn to return the favor.

Ordinarily, Chloe wouldn't have felt confident enough to wear
this
particular outfit, but in front of Tariq she felt that anything was possible, she knew that he wouldn't judge her, only find her endlessly attractive. The thought was game changing, exhilarating – suddenly Chloe realized that she could live out her every fantasy without any fear that something might go wrong. And she was about to.