The Tarnished Jewel of Jazaar Read online

  “Do I detect a Texan accent?” he asked.

  Zoe bit her bottom lip as a memory of her home in Texas bloomed. The last time she had felt as if she belonged to a family. Once she had been loved and protected; now she was chattel for her uncle.

  “You have a very good ear,” she answered huskily. “I thought I had lost the twang.” Along with everything else.

  “Texas is a long way from here.”

  No kidding. But she knew what he was really asking. How the hell had she wound up in Jazaar? She’d wondered that many times herself. “My father was a doctor for a humanitarian medical organization and he met my mother when he visited Jazaar. Didn’t anyone tell you about me?”

  “I was told everything I needed to know.”

  That made her curious. What had been said about her? She wasn’t sure if she wanted to know. “Such as?” she asked as she watched the servants bringing plates of food to the dais.

  He shrugged. “You are part of this tribe and you are of marriageable age.”

  She waited a beat. “Anything else?”

  “What else do I need to know?”

  Her eyes widened. His indifference took her breath away, but she knew she should be grateful for it. It was better that he had not asked any questions or dug for information. He would have discovered what kind of woman he was marrying.

  Zoe barely ate anything from the wedding feast. She usually had a healthy appetite—some felt too robust—but tonight the aromas and spices were overwhelming. Immediately after the meal a procession of guests approached the dais to congratulate the happy couple. She was glad that no one expected her to speak. She barely listened to what was said, too aware of the man sitting next to her.

  “You will have your hands full with this one, Your Highness. She’s nothing but trouble.”

  Zoe glanced up when she heard those words. She knew she should keep her head down, but she was surprised that someone would warn the Sheikh. Weren’t they trying to get rid of her by marrying her off?

  Yet she had never got along with the wife of the wealthy storekeeper. The older woman had forbidden Zoe from entering the store. But Zoe was used to being excluded and had frequently managed to make her purchases through strategy and stealth.

  “She’s an incredibly slow learner,” the older woman continued. “It doesn’t matter how hard her uncle slaps her, Zoe keeps talking back.”

  “Is that so?” the Sheikh drawled. “Perhaps her uncle is the slow learner and should try a new approach?”

  Zoe jerked in surprise and immediately ducked her head so no one could see her expression. Was he questioning Uncle Tareef’s methods? She thought men sided with one another.

  “Nothing works with Zoe,” the storekeeper’s wife informed the Sheikh. “Once she burned the dinner. Of course she was punished. You’d think she’d learn her lesson, but the next day she poured an entire pot of hot pepper in the dinner. Her uncle had blisters inside his mouth for weeks.”

  “It wasn’t my fault he kept trying to eat it,” Zoe said as she glared at the woman. “And at least it wasn’t burnt.”

  Zoe cringed inwardly when she recognized her mistake and immediately bent her head as if nothing happened. There was a long, silent pause and Zoe felt the Sheikh’s gaze on her. She instinctively hunched her shoulders, as if that would make her smaller. Invisible.

  “I hope your cooking has improved,” he said.

  Zoe nodded cautiously. It was a lie, but he would never find out. She was grateful that he’d ignored her outburst, surprised that he didn’t comment on it.

  He was probably saving it all up for later, she decided, as the tension vibrated inside her. She was going to face one monstrous lecture after the ceremony.

  “When all else failed,” the older woman valiantly continued, “Zoe was forced to treat the sick until she learned how to behave. She has taken care of the poor women for years.”

  Zoe knew that the task of treating the ill was reserved for servants in the tribe, but she didn’t care. It was what she wanted to do. The science of nursing and the art of folk remedies fascinated her.

  “Zoe,” Nadir said, “you no longer have to treat the sick.”

  Zoe frowned, not sure how to answer. “That’s not necessary. I’m not afraid of hard work and I’m very good at it.”

  “Zoe!” the storekeeper’s wife said in a scandalized tone, her eyes dancing with delight. “A Jazaari woman must be humble.”

  Nadir rose from his seat and Zoe couldn’t help noticing how tall and commanding he was. He motioned for the most exalted elder to approach the dais. Zoe’s stomach twisted sharply and she tasted hot, bitter fear in her mouth. What was the Sheikh doing? She had displeased him. Somehow she would be punished for it.

  The older woman smiled victoriously and walked away with a spring in her step as the elder approached. Zoe was angry at herself for letting the old bat rile her.

  The Sheikh placed his palm against his heart and told the chief elder, “You have honored me with Zoe as my bride.”

  The elder couldn’t hide his surprise and the nearby guests started to whisper excitedly behind their hands and veils. Zoe didn’t feel any relief. Instead, she battled the trickle of suspicion. Honored? He didn’t know the first thing about her.

  “I gladly accept the duty to protect her and provide for her,” the Sheikh continued, his voice strong and clear. “She will want for nothing.”

  Her suspicions deepened as the buzz of conversation swelled. What was this man up to? She had learned firsthand that when a man made those kinds of promises it was very likely he would do the opposite. Like when Uncle Tareef had promised to take her in and look after her. Instead he’d stolen her inheritance and she’d become an unpaid servant in his household.

  “And as your Sheikha,” Nadir announced, “she will spend her days and nights tending to me.”

  Zoe lowered her head as the guests cheered. Anger swirled inside her chest. The tribe was thrilled that she pleased the Sheikh. He wasn’t going to let her leave his side and she wouldn’t have time to nurse the sick because she had the honor of being at his beck and call.

  The man had no idea how important it was for her to work. Before her parents died Zoe had volunteered at the local hospital with her mother. It had been exciting and she’d known then she wanted to have a medical career like her father’s.

  Her dreams of practicing medicine with her father had been shattered when her parents died in a car accident and suddenly she had found herself living in a foreign place with people she didn’t know. She had suffered through the language barrier, strange food and an unwelcoming tribe. But when she’d watched the healer treat the sick, Zoe had felt she was back in familiar territory.

  In a matter of months she had become the healer’s assistant. It was supposed to be a punishment, but she had wanted to learn. When Zoe noticed that the poor women were reluctant to seek medical help from a male healer, she gradually took on the female patients. It was her way of continuing her family’s legacy, and practicing medicine had become her lifeline.

  She had finally found a way to stay away from Uncle Tareef’s house and focus on something other than her difficult situation. And when she handled a medical emergency she felt the same excitement she had when she’d been back home in the local hospital. Taking care of women in need had let her find a sense of purpose. It was the one thing that kept her going.

  And now the Sheikh wanted to take that away from her? Zoe closed her eyes and tried desperately to control her temper. She had to give up the one thing that interested her, the one thing she was good at, because Nadir didn’t like it? It wasn’t fair. She wanted to argue right here and now.

  What was she upset about? Zoe slowly opened her eyes. What Nadir wanted didn’t affect her life. She wasn’t going to stay married long enough for him to take her interests away from her.

  “I must say you surprised me.”

  Zoe looked at the tall and slender woman who was now sitting next to her—her
cousin Fatimah. Zoe clenched her teeth as she braced herself for what she was sure would be a few unpleasant moments.

  Fatimah wore a shimmering green gown. Heavy gold jewelry dripped from her ears, throat and wrists. She always made a glamorous and dramatic impact wherever she went.

  “I didn’t think you would do it,” Fatimah told Zoe in a breezy, chatty tone. “I know how you Americans believe in love matches.”

  Zoe didn’t respond. She had never liked her cousin, and they weren’t friends. Fatimah would not form an alliance with an outcast like Zoe. Instead, she preferred to feel powerful by preying on the defenseless, and Zoe had seen her in all her destructive glory. Now she noted the dark look in her cousin’s eyes. Fatimah was on the prowl for trouble and had found her target.

  Her cousin bestowed a tight smile upon her. “I can’t wait to tell Musad.”

  Zoe did her best not to flinch. “Please do.”

  She hoped she was getting better at not reacting to his name. Musad had once represented a fragile yet blossoming love in a world of quicksand filled with hate and indifference. Now his name reminded her that no man could be trusted.

  “What should I tell our old friend?” Fatimah asked as she studied Zoe’s face closely. “Shall I send him your love?”

  Zoe shrugged, refusing to let the word “love” pierce her wrung-out heart. Musad had ceased to matter a year ago, when he’d moved to America without a backward glance. She had filed him under “lesson learned.”

  Zoe leaned back in her chair as if she didn’t have a care in the world. “Tell him what you want.”

  Fatimah rested her hand on Zoe’s arm and leaned forward to whisper, “How can you say that, considering how close you were?”

  Zoe felt the blood leaving her face as icy fear seeped in her veins. Fatimah knew. She saw it in the malicious glow of the woman’s eyes. Somehow Fatimah knew about her forbidden liaison with Musad. She was the one who’d started the rumors that were beginning to percolate in village gossip.

  Zoe had to get away. She had to silence Fatimah. If she breathed a word of this to her family … to the Sheikh …

  “Zoe?”

  Zoe looked up to see her aunts and other female cousins. They were smiling. Real smiles. It was unlikely that they had heard Fatimah’s accusation. Zoe wanted to sag with relief.

  “Come, Zoe.” One of her cousins unceremoniously pulled her from her chair and her female relatives surrounded her. “It’s time to prepare you for your wedding night.”

  Her wedding night. Her stomach twisted sharply and she battled back nausea. Her aunts smiled and giggled as they swept her out of the courtyard and up to the honeymoon suite. She hunched her shoulders as corroding fear, thick and searing hot, bled through her body. It pooled under her skin, pressing harder and harder, threatening to burst through.

  It suddenly sank into her. She belonged to the Sheikh. A man they called The Beast. She was married to him. Married.

  Her married cousins were offering words of advice, telling her how to please her husband, but Zoe didn’t hear a word of it. There was a desperate energy among the women. Their laughter was a little shrill, their advice raw and uncoated.

  Zoe didn’t resist as the women settled her in the center of the bed. She knelt on the mattress, her hands folded in front of her, her head bent down. She wanted to jump out of bed and run, but she knew these women would bring her back and guard the bedroom.

  She closed her eyes and took a deep, jagged breath. She heard the women leaving the room, their laughter harsh as they tossed her more marital advice. She had always thought her wedding day would be different. In her daydreams it had been full of laughter and joy, not to mention love.

  The reality was much bleaker. Zoe slowly opened her eyes. She was marrying because she was out of options and running out of luck. She was taking a leap of faith, believing she could use this marriage to her advantage. But she might have given up more than her freedom to a man who was a dangerous stranger.

  What had she done?

  Pure terror clamped her chest. She felt the room closing in on her as she tried to gulp in the hot air. Dark spots danced before her eyes.

  “I can’t do this. I can’t sleep with him,” Zoe said aloud. She thought she was alone until Fatimah answered.

  “He’s required to consummate the marriage,” her cousin said as she straightened Zoe’s skirt, making it a smooth circle on the bed. “Otherwise it’s not acknowledged.”

  “Required?” Zoe’s stomach gave a sickening twist. That sounded so clinical. So unromantic.

  Fatimah cast an annoyed look in her direction. “That’s why you have the last ceremony on the third day. It’s based on an ancient law to celebrate the consummation of the marriage.”

  Zoe’s jaw dropped. “Are you kidding me?”

  “And if you aren’t to his liking,” Fatimah said, giving her a sidelong look, “he can throw you back.”

  Zoe frowned. “Throw me back? You mean back to your family? No, he can’t. Nice try, Fatimah, but I’m not falling for another one of your lies.”

  “I’m not lying,” Fatimah swore, flattening her hand against her chest. “The Sheikh did that to his first wife.”

  First wife? Zoe drew back her head and stared at her cousin as surprise tingled down her spine. What first wife? “What are you talking about?”

  “Didn’t anyone tell you?” Fatimah’s face brightened when she realized she would get to reveal all. “Two years ago the Sheikh was married to the daughter of one of the finest families in the tribe. Yusra. You remember her?”

  “Barely.” Yusra had been drop-dead gorgeous, ultra feminine and the perfect Jazaari girl. Zoe had privately thought Yusra was a spoiled brat and a bit of snob. She had been glad when her family left the village.

  “It was a fabulous ceremony. Unlike any I’ve ever seen. Don’t you remember it? It was better than yours.”

  “I probably wasn’t invited.” She was an outcast. She was either ignored or bullied. Any member of the tribe could publicly humiliate her without consequence. They all knew her uncle wouldn’t protect her. They had all witnessed the treatment she’d received under his cruel hand and followed his lead.

  “Well, the third day of the ceremony had barely started when he tossed Yusra back to her parents.” Fatimah gave a flick of her wrist, the jangle of gold bracelets loud to Zoe’s ears. “In front of the entire tribe. He said she was not to his liking.”

  If he’d had a problem with his first choice of a wife, he was definitely not going to be pleased with her. “He had sex with her and then dumped her? Can he do that?”

  “It caused a huge scandal. How is it you don’t know any of this? You were living here when it happened.”

  Zoe probably had heard about it but thought it one of those “bonfire stories.” She had heard plenty of folk tales that were designed to scare boys and girls into behaving properly.

  She was in so much trouble. Her knees wobbled as a wave of fear crashed over her. If she didn’t have sex with the Sheikh he would send her back to her family. If she did have sex with him she might well have had the same problem. “So basically this ancient law is a return policy?”

  “It’s rarely used. A man has to have a very good reason to invoke it. Unless you’re a sheikh, of course. Then no one will question your actions.”

  “But—”

  One of Zoe’s aunts peeked inside the room. “Fatimah, what are you still doing here?” the woman said in a fierce whisper. “The Sheikh is coming.”

  “Good luck, Zoe,” Fatimah said with a sly smile as she slipped out of the room. “I hope you can satisfy the Sheikh better than his last bride.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  WHAT was she going to do? Zoe glanced wildly at the open windows and the colorful gauzy curtains fluttering in the breeze. No, she couldn’t escape that way.

  Even if she got out safely she had no place to hide. She had learned that over the years, after her failed attempts to run away. No one would provid
e her with sanctuary and the desert was a deathtrap. She had barely survived the last time.

  She was trapped and she needed to come up with a plan. Zoe squeezed her eyes shut as the panic swelled in her chest. Think, think, think!

  Her mind was locked on only one thing: chastity was highly prized in a woman, and she wasn’t a virgin.

  The tribe had very strict rules about sex outside marriage. The men were punished, but not as harshly as the women. Zoe tried to block out the memory of the scars her female patients had from being caned and whipped.

  A man like the Sheikh would demand an untouched bride. Zoe’s stomach cramped with panic. She had known that before she accepted the arrangement, but had thought she would be safe once the marriage contract was signed. It had been a risk, and it had backfired.

  The door opened and Zoe went still, her breath lodging in her throat. She heard the guests offering their best wishes over the jubilant music. The jumble of noise scraped against her taut nerves. She wanted to scream, to bolt, to break down and cry, but she carefully lowered her head and clasped her hands tightly.

  She flinched violently when the door closed and Zoe winced at her response. She needed to please the Sheikh, not offend him.

  “Would you like a drink, Zoe?” he asked softly as he slipped off his shoes next to the door.

  She wordlessly shook her head. Her mouth was dry, her throat ached, and she wished there was alcohol to numb her senses. But she didn’t think she could accept a drop without choking.

  How was she going to get through the night? Maybe he wouldn’t notice that she wasn’t a virgin? Her head ached as she tried to plan. Perhaps she could fake her virginity? She wasn’t sure if she could get away with that strategy. From what she had heard about her husband he was very experienced, with an insatiable sex-drive.

  She heard his cloak fall to the ground. Something soft followed. Zoe couldn’t help but look, and discovered the Sheikh had removed his headdress. His hair was short, thick and black.

  He didn’t seem any less intimating. If anything, her husband appeared even harder, more ruthless. His profile was strong and aggressive. Power came off him in waves. She was aware that this was a man in his prime.