The Desert Prince's Mistress. Sharon Kendrick

to almost every woman with a pulse he was the perfect man, full-stop. The darling of the British stage and screen, with his long legs and lazy charm and the lock of hair which flopped so endearingly over one of his soulful eyes and which had women itching to smooth it away for him. She had worked with him once but had never fancied him, which was fortunate given that he was now sharing her flat. He had moved in as a temporary measure, when he had been between homes and then had liked it so much that he’d never bothered moving out again. It felt like home, he told her.

      And Lara didn’t mind a bit. He was sweet and intelligent and trustworthy—even if he did sometimes tease her about Maraban and her friendship with its ruling family—yet, deep down, she knew she could not possibly confide in him about the letter, or her worries about the effect it might have on Khalim. He simply wouldn’t take it seriously. In fact, sometimes she wondered if he ever took anything seriously.

      But he was resourceful, she knew that—far more resourceful than she felt in this weird, jittering state of having discovered something momentous and not having a clue about what to do with that discovery.

      ‘Jake?’

      ‘Lara?’

      ‘Just say…just say you wanted an introduction to someone and all you knew was the place where they worked—how would you go about meeting them?’

      He batted his outrageously long lashes. ‘This is a man, I take it?’

      ‘Er, yes. How did you guess?’

      ‘I know women,’ said Jake smugly. ‘And you have that kind of secretive, bursting excitement kind of look which immediately tells me that it’s something to do with a member of the opposite sex. Am I right?’

      That might be the easiest way to explain it, surely? Jake wouldn’t ask too many questions if he thought she had a simple crush on a man.

      ‘Sort of,’ she prevaricated.

      ‘Another actor?’ he hazarded.

      Lara shuddered. ‘You know I’d sooner walk into a pit of deadly snakes than get involved with an actor!’

      ‘Why, thanks,’ he said wryly.

      ‘You know what I mean, Jake.’

      ‘Yeah, sure. Feckless commitment-phobes with fickle hearts—that’s us actors!’ He drank some wine and then gave the pot another stir. ‘So who is he?’

      Lara had been doing her homework. ‘A businessman.’

      ‘Successful?’

      ‘I…think so.’ The company was in Darian Wildman’s name, which meant that he was successful, surely?

      Jake’s eyes narrowed. ‘You haven’t met him?’

      ‘Er, no.’

      ‘Curiouser and curiouser. What happened? You saw him at a party and were smitten, decided he was the man for you, but before you could do anything about it he’d left, yes? So you asked around a bit, found out his name, and now you’re hot on his heels, pursuing him?’

      ‘It was nothing like that,’ Lara said weakly. ‘And it’s far too complicated to explain. I just want a chance to meet him, that’s all.’

      Jake threw a handful of coriander into the pot. ‘Phone his office.’

      ‘On what pretext?’

      ‘Make something up! You’re an enterprising woman, Lara—and you’re an actress! Play it by ear—and once you’re standing in front of him I am sure he will be completely dazzled by your wild dark hair and amazing blue eyes. The rest, as they say, is up to you!’

      Lara finished her wine and held her glass out for a refill, studiously ignoring Jake’s look of surprise—she rarely drank more than one, but tonight she felt she needed it. Could it be that simple? But why not? After all, what did she have to lose? She wasn’t saying that you could know everything you needed to know about a person in one short meeting, but surely it would tell her whether he seemed a decent kind of man. And it would make up her mind whether she told him what she had discovered.

      Or whether Khalim should hear about it first.

      ‘That’s very good thinking, Jake,’ she said slowly. ‘Very good thinking. I’ll give it a go.’

      ‘I don’t know why you should sound so amazed!’ he said drily. ‘Just because I’m known for my boyish good looks doesn’t mean that I don’t have a few brain cells rattling around inside my head. Now, stop acting like I’m your servant and go and measure out some rice—that’s if you want to eat this side of Christmas!’

      She laughed and began to help him—he was so easy to get on with, but she knew deep down that was only because she didn’t fancy him, nor he her. If she had, or he had, then their no-effort compatibility simply wouldn’t exist. It wasn’t that Lara was a cynic where men were concerned; she just preferred to think of herself as someone who was realistic.

      They ate supper and watched a video of one of Jake’s films, while he tore his own performance to pieces. In fact, Lara’s resolve not to think any more about the situation lasted all the way until bedtime, but then she lay sleepless, looking at the ceiling for a long time, while moon shadows danced before her eyes and doubts began to creep into her mind.

      She had the strangest feeling she was courting danger, as if she was standing on top of a high cliff and preparing to walk over the edge into the unknown—an unknown far more scary than just her usual uncertainty about the future. But that was just her imagination, she told herself as she finally drifted off to sleep. All actresses were cursed with an excess of imagination.

      And in the morning everything looked different—as it so often did. It was funny how daylight seemed to put everything into perspective. She told herself that she was being stupid and ridiculously melodramatic—as if unable to separate her working life from her real life. Except that when she stopped to think about it ‘real’ life had taken on a very different meaning ever since her friend had married into Maraban’s royal family!

      Even Lara’s mother had been taken aback by it all, and she was fairly used to the bizarre. In the past, if Lara had telephoned blithely to say that she was appearing as a tomato on a commerical for a new brand of soup, her mother had been merely interested. Yet for once she had been lost for words when Lara had announced that she was being Rose’s bridesmaid when she married her prince, and would be wearing cloth of gold and a fortune in ancient jewellery for the day.

      It had been easy enough to find the number of Wildman Phones, but not so easy to find the courage to dial the number, and when she did her nerve nearly failed her. But her drama training saved her. Pretend it’s a job, she told herself—and maybe in a way it was. If not a job, then a mission—to be a good friend to people she cared about.

      She drew a deep breath. The only way to get past receptionists was not to sound nervous or diffident but to brazen it out. ‘Darian Wildman, please,’ she said smoothly, as if she had known him all her life.

      ‘I’m afraid that Mr Wildman is out of the office all day.’

      Damn! Lara gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘That man! Why the hell didn’t he bother telling me? And he’s left a whole stack of important papers behind,’ she said, half to herself, then sighed and adopted a confidential one-woman-talking-to-another tone. ‘Do you know where he can be reached?’

      There was the briefest of pauses. ‘Sure. He’s out casting all day. Let me see…yep! Hold on, I’ve got the address here—do you have a pen?’

      The receptionist obviously wouldn’t have won any prizes for maintaining the privacy of her boss, thought Lara.

      ‘Fire away,’ she said calmly.

      The receptionist rattled off an address in Golden Square, which Lara knew was right in the centre of London, just a breath away from Nelson’s Column.

      ‘What’s he doing there?’ Lara asked