One Desert Night - By Maggie Cox Page 0,9

window of his small Fiat in silence, reflecting on returning to the place where she had lost her heart to a handsome, enigmatic stranger–a stranger she had dreamt about almost every night for the past three years. The dreams endlessly replayed that incredible night they had spent together under the desert stars.

‘Zahir.’ She murmured the name softly.

Not for the first time she wondered where he was and what he was doing. Was he marred to a girl from his own land now? Was he father to a child that played happily at his feet and made him ache with pride? Did he ever think of Gina and remember the incredible instant connection they had shared? Or had he relegated it to a moment of madness he regretted because she’d callously rejected his invitation to return in preference to forging ahead with her career?

Chewing down hard on her lip, she felt her insides flip in anguish. She’d wanted to make her father proud and honour her mother’s memory, but in doing so she’d sacrificed perhaps the one real chance of happiness she would ever have. Bad enough that she hadn’t seen Zahir again after that one night, but to think that he might despise her for the choice she’d made was a psychological blow beyond cruel. Please, God no…

‘What did you say?’

Realising she had spoken out loud, Gina glanced round at her erudite bespectacled colleague, her face hot. ‘Nothing…just thinking aloud for a moment.’

‘I can’t believe you’ve been to Kabuyadir before. What was it like?‘ Jake asked conversationally as he negotiated the route to the long-term car park.

Shutting her eyes for an instant. Gina felt it all come flooding back–the scent of exotic spices and incense, the sound of languages with their origins in ancient Persian and Byzantine empires, the vibrant glowing colours of the wares in the marketplace, and the fragrant perfume of the Hussein’s garden that was hypnotically carried on the sultry wind.

Most of all she recalled Zahir’s strong boned face, and eyes so chocolate-dark that one arresting glance had been enough to steal her heart and keep it his for ever…

‘Whatever description my words could give you wouldn’t do it justice. Why not just see for yourself when we get there?’

He sent her a smile as he parked. ‘All right, then. I will. By the way, how’s Professor Collins doing? What’s he working on at the moment?’

Jake’s tone had both admiration and curiosity in it, and Gina kept her expression as neutral as possible. Usually she tried to stick to a policy of keeping her personal life well out of her professional, but she supposed it was inevitable that her ambitious young colleague would be curious. He had confessed to her from the very first that he was Jeremy Collins’s ‘greatest admirer’ because of what he had achieved in his long and distinguished career.

‘I have no idea what he’s working on, but he’s been a bit under the weather lately, to tell you the truth. Thankfully I found him a new housekeeper, who seems very thoughtful and caring, so I’m trusting he’ll be okay while I’m abroad.’

She hoped she didn’t sound as anxious as she felt. Suddenly her father seemed worryingly forgetful and fragile, and her heart bumped a little beneath her ribs when she thought of him struggling with the daily chores most people found easy.

That was why she was so thankful that she’d found Lizzie Eldridge. As his new housekeeper she would be just perfect. A forty-something single mum of an eleven-year-old, she was down to earth and immensely practical, as well as kind. She and Gina’s father had hit it off straight away. He was in safe hands, she thought as she wheeled her suitcase across the concrete to the dropping-off point for the bus that would take them to the airport entrance.

‘I can’t wait to see the jewel “in the flesh” as it were,’ her companion enthused as he walked beside her. ‘That central diamond–or Almas, as they call it–is quite something. The owner can’t be short of a few quid, seeing that he’s the local Sheikh an’ all, so I wonder what’s made him think of selling it?’

‘That is surely none of our business?’ Gina responded with an arch of her brow. ‘All I know is that it’s a tremendous privilege to study the history of such a jewel…a jewel that research had corroborated hails from seventh-century Persia.’

‘Hmm…’ Unrepentant, Jake grinned. ‘I wonder what he’s like, this “Sheikh of Sheikhs” as he’s known?