Modern Romance Collection: June 2018 Books 5 - 8. Jane Porter

of riding a horse that she’d been so scared of and now loved and appreciated was fabulous. Khalid loved Khalifa and she loved him.

      So much, so dangerous, Millie thought. Where did she imagine this was leading? She wasn’t stupid. She’d be going home soon. Her dreams of becoming a marine engineer had been put on hold, but she’d pick them up when she went home, while Khalid’s destiny kept him here, wrapped up in a life of duty, which he would never renounce.

       He would need a wife to sit beside him on the Sapphire throne.

      She actually shuddered at the thought, and couldn’t bring herself to picture the woman who would support him in everything he did; give him children, live with him and love him. His marriage was sure to be reported in the press, and she would have to be happy for him. It wouldn’t be easy, but was the price she had to pay for this...

      She stiffened with misery, and that was enough to alert Khalid to a problem. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked. ‘There isn’t far to go now.’

      She’d gone far too far already, Millie thought. How would this highly charged expedition end? In tears? Or triumph? In understanding? Or in the same fog in which she had instigated their meeting when the Sapphire returned to King’s Dock? She had never been happier than she was now. Wasn’t that enough? Some people didn’t have this much. Was she being greedy? Weren’t a few days of true happiness better than none?

      Khalid had slowed the pace of his stallion, and his arms were gentle as she rested back against his chest. Did he feel the same need she did to stretch every second remaining to them into an hour, a day, until there were no days left?

      Perhaps sensing that her thoughts were racing on into the future, he reined in at the top of a dune, and asked, ‘Why don’t you tell me about your ambitions?’

      Millie was speechless as she looked at the view. Miles of rolling sand dunes, with what appeared to be a lush, green park right in the middle of them. And in the centre of that, there was a glittering oasis, like a wide, tranquil, crystalline lake, hidden away in the heart of the desert.

      ‘Your ambitions?’ he prompted.

      It seemed mundane to talk about her college course after that, or the complexities of a boiler and the satisfaction of tinkering with an engine and hearing it throb into life. But that was her life, Millie thought. And she loved her life. This was Khalid’s life.

      ‘Miss Francine’s been kind to you?’

      ‘Miss Francine is the best woman in the world,’ Millie exclaimed sincerely. ‘More than a surrogate mother, she’s been the grandmother I never knew, as well as my friend and the special person I confide in, and know I can turn to if ever there’s a problem.’

      ‘I hear she turns to you.’

      ‘You hear a lot of things,’ she remarked with amusement.

      ‘And your ambition to be a marine engineer? You could work on my ships.’

      ‘How many do you have?’

      ‘Enough to keep you busy.’

      Millie smiled. Khalid truly lived in another world. ‘I love to see the way things work,’ she admitted. ‘Making them run more efficiently is my passion. A new engine is like a new friend to me. I can’t rest until I know what makes them tick, and how I can help them.’

      ‘A noble career,’ he commented. ‘Lucky friends, lucky engines.’

      She laughed. They both laughed. He nuzzled her face in a way that felt so intimate, and then he turned Burkan and rode on.

      * * *

      Millie was quite open about her hopes and dreams when it came to her career, but what did she do for entertainment? he wondered, having discovered that he cared more than he should.

      ‘I’m a bluestocking,’ she said when he asked the question. ‘I read, study, read some more.’

      ‘But you must go out?’

      ‘Are you jealous?’ she asked, turning in the saddle to stare at him.

      Yes, he was, he discovered. ‘Would you prefer me not to be?’

      ‘I don’t think that’s in your nature. You’re a warrior through and through.’

      She was correct. The thought of another man touching Millie roused him to a passion he wouldn’t have believed.

      ‘I love Miss Francine,’ she volunteered, perhaps wanting to bring the tension level down. ‘So I rarely go out during my holidays.’

      ‘You made an exception for me?’

      ‘Of course I did,’ she said easily. ‘Don’t pretend you’re surprised.’

      ‘I’m not surprised. Being as devastatingly irresistible as I am—’

      ‘You are,’ she said, turning to give him a frank look. ‘At least, to me.’

      She was so open it twisted the knife in a heart that must turn cold towards her, to protect Millie from the reality of their respective destinies. They rode in silence for a while after that.

      ‘During term time,’ she said eventually, ‘I’m far too busy studying to have time to socialise.’

      He was relieved in one way, but not in another. ‘You need a life, Millie.’

      ‘I have a very good life, thank you,’ she returned briskly. ‘And my private life is—’

      ‘Yours to know and mine to imagine?’ he suggested in a relaxed tone.

      ‘Exactly,’ she agreed.

      * * *

      There was only one certainty, and that was that she was in over her head, Millie concluded. It was impossible to be this close to Khalid and not care about him, and her caring ran deep. She was falling a little more in love with him with every passing minute. It was no use pretending. She was his, and she was devoted to him. Maybe she couldn’t have him long-term, but her heart didn’t care about that.

      ‘Look,’ he said, distracting her.

      She turned her head quickly, maybe too quickly as she followed his pointing finger, and just for a moment she felt dizzy and disoriented. It was a strange feeling...something she’d never felt before, but her head quickly cleared in time for her to agree with him that no photographic images could ever have prepared her for the reality of an oasis. They had rounded the base of a dune, and now she could see it spread out in front of her, like a sapphire set in gold. She couldn’t even see the far side, and hadn’t imagined it was so big. The water was so clear she could see the dark rocks underneath. And another Bedouin tent had been erected on the sugar-sand shore. The pavilion might have come straight from her dreams with its billowing blindingly white sides set against the blue of the water and the lush of the green shrubbery.

      ‘Swim?’ Khalid suggested as Burkan began to toss his head at the scent of water. ‘We all deserve it, don’t you think?’

      He didn’t expect an answer, Millie thought as Burkan took off down the dune. She screamed, but with excitement as the big horse almost lost his footing. How they stayed on board, she had no idea. Somehow Khalid managed to control the powerful stallion as it slithered and then righted, before slithering down again, and not for one moment did she feel in any danger. Between Khalid and his big horse, which was almost like an extension of himself, she knew she was safe.

      ‘Okay?’ he asked when they finally arrived panting and snorting—she was panting, horse was snorting—on level ground.

      Laughing with shock, fright, happiness and excitement, she exclaimed, ‘I’m fine. That was amazing.’ This adventure might be reckless, and very dangerous to her heart, but every second was blissful, and she would remember it all her life. ‘I’m better than fine,’ she exulted as Khalid set her safely on the ground.

      ‘But stiff, I