The Royals Collection. Rebecca Winters

he was glad to be rid of. There was nothing wrong with his manner towards her. There was nothing but pure concern in his eyes, though Jazz doubted the traditionalists would see it that way.

      ‘I’m going to check on your horse,’ he called back as he left the building.

      ‘Thank you.’ She was uncomfortably aware of the increasing clamour of the crowd outside the clinic as the people waited for news of their princess.

      ‘I must go to them and explain,’ she told the nurse, struggling into a sitting position.

      The nurse gently pushed her down again. ‘We can do that for you,’ she said firmly. ‘Forgive me, Princess Jasmina, but you’re not going anywhere until the doctor’s had chance to take a look at you. You might as well rest back. There’s nothing for you to worry about. His Majesty has already been informed.’

      Great! Jazz’s breath left her body in a shuddering sigh. She could imagine Sharif’s reaction. Having had her beg him to arrange a marriage for her, he now discovered she was here with Tyr.

      Needless to say, by the time the nurse took her blood pressure, it was sky-high. The nurse peered at her over her spectacles. ‘Even if the doctor gives his okay, I’m going to insist that you stay here and rest. This equipment tells me you’ve been badly shaken up.’

      And not just by the fall from her horse, Jazz thought.

      Tyr needed space from Jazz and time to think. He still hadn’t got over the shock of finding her here in Kareshi, and now there was the sensation he’d caused to deal with on top of that. He wouldn’t risk losing the people’s trust. Nor did he want to damage his friendship with Sharif. Taking some of the elders aside, he decided to sort it out.

      Their reaction threw him.

      ‘No, no, no,’ he said, smiling as he shook his head to make his position clear. ‘We’re not planning to get married.’

      ‘But you must,’ the headman said in a tone that brooked no argument.

      Tyr was still smiling, still convinced that this couldn’t be a serious suggestion on the part of the headman, but his laughing gaze was met by an unwavering stare. ‘All right.’ Taking it in good part, he clapped the old man on the back. ‘We’ll sort this out—

      ‘Apparently not,’ Tyr murmured as the old man walked away. ‘Later,’ he called after him.

      The headman raised his hand, but only in acknowledgement that he’d heard Tyr, and nothing more.

      He got a really bad feeling. That encounter with the headman of the village had suggested that nothing would yield to good humour in this situation. And in truth, fudging an issue wasn’t his style. He was straight down the line. So far he’d done nothing to let these people down and he wasn’t about to start now.

      He placed a call to Sharif, but couldn’t get through. Leading his horse out of its stable, he sprang onto its back and headed out of the village. This was a mess that should never have happened. Jazz Kareshi, innocent princess, and the ruthless killing machine? If her people knew his history, would they be so keen to make a match between them? He couldn’t do that to Jazz, so the only thing he could do was to leave Kareshi.

      And how was he going to do that, when he was tied by his love for the people? His work here wasn’t done.

      As each insoluble point jabbed at his mind, he spurred his horse on until they were racing at a flat-out gallop. He only reined in when he spotted a Bedouin encampment in the shadow of the dunes. Changing his balance, he slowed the horse. For a while he just let the reins hang loose as he watched the people going about their daily lives. The Bedouin were purposeful and contented. He had always envied the nomadic lifestyle, and it was only recently that he’d lost the urge to move on. He loved the desert, and he wouldn’t abandon Jazz, not when he was responsible for the situation she was in. He would stay and see this out, and when everything had settled down again—

      He’d turn his back on Jazz and leave?

      That was the safest thing to do. Safest for Jazz.

      Turning his horse, he headed back to the village. The only thing he could be sure about was that he wasn’t going anywhere until this mess was sorted out.

       CHAPTER EIGHT

      AS SOON AS the doctor said she could go and the nurse released her, Jazz called the palace to arrange for the helicopter to pick her up and for her wilful, snake-shy stallion to be collected. She could have ridden him back if the nurse hadn’t mentioned a storm closing in. She wouldn’t risk her horse, so it was down to hoping the weather would hold long enough for the helicopter to fly in, and then back again to the palace.

      And now she was grateful to the women of the village for being so kind to her. After standing vigil outside the medical facility, they insisted on taking Jazz to the unmarried women’s quarters, where they said she’d be safe until the helicopter came to take her home. Having grown up with her brother in the palace, she found it a fascinating experience to be drawn into village life. Everyone was so friendly, and it made her think again how much she had missed female companionship, and how her life could change for the better if she only allowed it to. She’d had the warmth and friendship of the Skavanga sisters since Britt married Sharif, and she could have the friendship of these people too, if she stayed in Kareshi.

      Once inside the women’s pavilion, it surprised Jazz to see that, along with the more traditional trappings she might have expected, like silken cushions and low brass tables bearing platters of fruit and jugs of freshly squeezed juice, a large space had been allocated to a bank of computer screens faced by no-nonsense office chairs.

      ‘Our benefactor is Tyr Skavanga,’ one of the women explained, her sloe eyes warm with admiration behind the traditional veil. ‘He bought all the equipment and installed it for us. It’s like a miracle. The world comes to us. We can even Internet shop.’

      As the women started to laugh, Jazz joined in the fun, but it did make her wonder if she was the only one being left behind where progress was concerned.

      ‘Distance learning,’ the same woman explained, jolting Jazz back to the present.

      They joined a group of women clustered around a screen. ‘We all want to be able to work like you, Princess Jasmina,’ a young girl exclaimed, springing up.

      ‘Please, won’t you sit down again?’ Jazz insisted. ‘I’m here to learn all I can from you.’

      Reassured, the girl continued, ‘Thanks to this link with the outside world, set up by Tyr Skavanga, we can learn to become the teachers of the future.’

      Tyr Skavanga...Tyr Skavanga...

      And there was so much to do here—so much enthusiasm for progress surrounding her. What was she thinking? Leave Kareshi? Was she mad? What was she so afraid of? Tyr at the party flashed into her head; Tyr rescuing her after the fall from her horse; Tyr—

      Just Tyr, Jazz realised, because Tyr represented a time that was lost, and everything she feared about the future. It wasn’t Tyr’s fault he was so brutally masculine, but, though she was bold in every other area of her life, Jazz had always had a fear of men and sex—Tyr and sex—because all she knew about sex was colourful and sometimes terrifying rumour.

      As the women continued to chat easily to her, Jazz knew exactly what she had to do—and it didn’t include the Emir of Qadar. Sharif would be mad with her for wasting his time and she couldn’t blame him. There would be diplomatic repercussions, but this was where she belonged. She could be of some real help to her brother here.

      And then the bombshell dropped.

      Another, bolder girl asked Jazz how she had dared to love an outsider.

      All the women went quiet as they waited for her answer.

      ‘An outsider?’ Jazz queried cautiously.

      ‘Tyr