Penny Jordan Tribute Collection. PENNY JORDAN
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‘A heart attack?’ she faltered. ‘I…’
‘It was his second,’ her aunt informed her, and then suddenly looked acutely uncomfortable, as though she had said something she should not have said.
‘His second?’ Petra had known nothing of this. ‘Then… when… when did he have his first?’ she demanded with a small frown.
Her aunt was becoming increasingly agitated.
‘Petra, I should not have spoken of this. Your grandfather never wanted… He swore us all to secrecy when it happened because he didn’t want your mother to feel…’
‘My mother?’
She gave her aunt a determined look.
‘I am not leaving this room until you tell me everything,’ she informed her sturdily.
‘Petra, you will be late. The car is waiting, and your grandfather…’
‘Not one single step,’ Petra warned her.
‘Oh, dear. I should never… Very well, then. I suppose it can do no harm for you to know now… after all, it was your mother your grandfather wanted to protect. He loved her so much, you see, Petra… He loved his sons, of course, but he had that love for her that a father will often have for his girl-child. According to my husband he spoiled her outrageously, but then I suppose that is an older brother speaking. When she left like that, your grandfather was beside himself… with anger… and with despair. He had planned so much for her…
‘Your uncle—my husband—found him slumped across his desk, holding your mother’s photograph. The doctor did not think he would survive. He was ill for a very, very long time. Oh… I should not have told you—not today,’ her aunt said remorsefully as she saw how pale Petra had gone.
‘All those wasted years,’ Petra whispered. ‘When they could have been together—when we could all have been together as a family!’
‘He missed her dreadfully.’
‘But my father wrote, sent photographs…’
Her aunt sighed.
‘You have to understand, Petra. Your grandfather is a very proud man. He couldn’t bear to accept an olive branch extended by your father. He wanted… needed to know that your mother still wanted him in her life, that she still loved him.’
‘She believed that he would never forgive her,’ Petra told her chokily, shaking her head.
‘When the news came that your parents were dead, your grandfather…’ Her aunt paused and shook her head. ‘It was a terrible, terrible time for him, Petra. He couldn’t believe it. Wouldn’t accept that she was gone, that he had lost her. When he had his second heart attack we honestly believed that it was in part because he simply no longer wanted to live. But mercifully he recovered. It was his greatest wish then that you might come to us, but your godfather—wisely, perhaps, in the circumstances, thought it best for you that you remained in an environment that was familiar to you. But your grandfather never gave up hoping, and when he knew that your uncle was to meet your godfather he begged him to try to persuade you to come here. I can’t tell you how happy you are making him today, Petra. I wish you every happiness, my dearest girl, for you most certainly deserve it.’
As her aunt leaned forward to embrace her Petra felt her eyes burn with emotional tears.
In a daze she made her way out to the waiting car and her grandfather. Suddenly she was seeing him with new eyes. Loving, compassionate eyes. As she sat beside him she reached out and touched his hand. Immediately he clasped hers.
‘You may kiss the bride!’
Petra felt her whole body clench against the pain of what was happening. Unable to move, she felt the coldness thrown by Rashid’s shadow as he bent towards her.
She waited until the last possible second to turn her head away, so that his dutiful kiss would only brush her cheek and not her lips. But to her shock, as though he had known what she would do, as she moved so did he, lifting his hand so that to their audience it looked at though he were cupping the side of her face in the most tender gesture of a lover, unable to stop himself from imbuing even this, a formal public rite, with the possessive adoration of a man deeply in love.
Only she knew that what he was actually doing was preventing her from turning away from him, that he was reinforcing to her his right, his legally given right as her husband, to demand her physical acceptance of him.
His mouth touched hers, and she trembled visibly with the force of her anger. She had believed in him, trusted him, loved him, but all the time he had been deceiving her, lying to her. How could she ever trust her own judgement again?
She would have to be constantly on her guard against it! And against him?
He moved, the smallest gesture that brought his nose against hers in the merest little touch, as though he wanted to offer her comfort and reassurance. Another lie… another deceit… and yet for an instant, caught up in the intensity of the moment, she had almost swayed yearningly towards him, wanting it to be real!
Suddenly Petra felt desperately afraid. She had thought in her ignorance that it would be enough simply for her to know what Rashid was to stop herself from continuing to love him, but now, shockingly, she wasn’t so sure!
She hated him for what he had done; she knew that! So why did he still have the power to move her physically, to make her want him?
What was she thinking? Was she going crazy? She did not want him. Not one tiny little bit! Fiercely she pushed against him. To her relief he released her immediately.
The ceremony was over. They were man and wife!
‘I never knew that Rashid’s middle name was Blaize.’ That was her cousin Saud, flushed and excited, openly proud of his new relationship with his hero.
‘Petra, my dear, your father would have been so proud had he been here today.’
Numbly Petra smiled automatically at the American Ambassador.
‘Petra, you look so breathtakingly beautiful,’ his wife, an elegant Texan with a slow drawl said with a warm smile. ‘Doesn’t she Rashid?’ she demanded, causing Petra to stiffen, the tiny hairs on the back of her neck lifting as Rashid turned to look at her.
‘She is my heart’s desire,’ Rashid responded quietly, without taking his gaze off her.
‘Petra, take him away and hide him before I turn green, you lucky girl,’ the Ambassador’s wife teased.
‘I am the one who is lucky,’ Rashid corrected her.
‘He certainly is,’ Petra chimed in brittly. ‘Today he isn’t just gaining a wife, are you, Rashid? He’s gaining the opportunity to design a new multi-million-pound-complex, and—’
‘I’m certainly going to need some good commissions if I’m to keep you in the style your grandfather is accustoming you to.’ Rashid cut across her outburst in a light drawl that masked the icy, glittering look of warning only she could see. ‘At least if that necklace you’re wearing is anything to go by.’
‘Yes, it’s gorgeous,’ another of the guests enthused.
Petra tensed as she felt Rashid’s hand beneath her elbow.
‘I don’t know why you’re so determined to play the adoring husband,’ she told him bitterly.
‘No, I don’t suppose you do,’ he agreed.
‘Why didn’t you tell me that your second name was Blaize?’
He gave a small dismissive shrug.
‘Does is it matter? Rashid or Blaize—I am still the same man, Petra. The man who—’
‘The man who lied to me and trapped me,’ Petra snapped at him. ‘Yes, you are.’
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