The Sheikh's Undoing Read Online Free PDF

the west to be educated by his father, he had excelled in everything he’d done. He’d swum and ridden and played tennis—and he spoke five languages with native fluency.
    Sometimes, Isobel had gazed at him with wistful wonder from afar. Had watched as he was surrounded by natural blondes with tiny-boned bodies and swish flats in Chelsea.
    Until the day he had spoken to her and made a lonely little girl’s day.
    He’d have been about seventeen at the time, and had come to the sanatorium to ask about a malaria injection for a forthcoming trip he was taking. Her mother had been busy with one of the other pupils and had asked Isobel to keep the young Prince entertained.
    Initially Isobel had been tongue-tied—wondering what on earth she could say to him. But she couldn’t just leave him looking rather impatiently at his golden wristwatch, could she? Why, her mother might get into trouble for daring to keep the young royal waiting.
    Shyly, she had asked him about his homeland. At first he had frowned—as if her question was an intrusion. But a brief and assessing look had followed, and then he had sat down so that he was on her level before starting to talk. The precise words she had long forgotten, but she would never forget the dreamy way he had spoken of desert sands like fine gold and rivers like streams of silver. And then, when her mother had appeared—lookinga little flustered—he had immediately switched to the persona of confident royal pupil. He hadn’t said another word to her—but Isobel had never forgotten that brief encounter.
    It had been over a decade later before their paths crossed again. She had gone back to the school for the opening of a magnificent extension to the library and Tariq had been there, still surrounded by adoring women. For one brief moment Isobel had looked at him with adult eyes. Had registered that he was still as gorgeous as he was unobtainable and that her schoolgirl crush should sensibly die a death. With a resigned little shrug of her shoulders she had turned away and put him right out of her mind as of that moment.
    The new library was fabulous, with softly gleaming carved wooden panels. Tooled leather tables sat at its centre, and the long, leaded arched windows looked out onto the cool beauty of the north gardens.
    By then Isobel had been a secretary—working in a dusty office for a rather dry bunch of lawyers in London. It hadn’t been the most exciting work in the world, but it had been well paid, and had provided her with the security she had always craved.
    There’d been no one in the library that she knew well enough to go up and talk to, but she’d been determined to enjoy her time there, because secretly she’d been delighted to get an invitation to the prestigious opening. Just because she’d been educated at the school free, it didn’t mean she’d been overlooked! She’d drunk a cup of tea and then begun to look at the books, noting with interest that there was a whole section on Khayarzah. Picking up a beautifully bound volume, she’d begun to flick through the pages, and had soon been lost in thepictures and descriptions of the land which Tariq had once made come alive with his words.
    She’d just got to a bit about the source of the Jamanah River when she’d heard a deep voice behind her.
    ‘You seem very engrossed in that book.’
    And, turning round, she’d found herself imprisoned in the Sheikh’s curious gaze. She’d thought that his face was harder and colder than she remembered—and that there was a certain air of detachment about him. But then Isobel recalled the sixth-former who’d been so kind to her, and had smiled.
    ‘That’s because it’s a very engrossing book,’ she said. ‘Though I’m surprised there’s such a big section on your country.’
    ‘Really?’ A pair of jet eyebrows was elevated. ‘One of the benefits of donating a library is that you get to choose some of its contents.’
    Isobel blinked. ‘
You
donated the