Page 211 of Modern Romance March 2025 (5-8)

She pulled back and looked pointedly at the door. It was time to get back to reality.

He got the message.

“I’ll go,” he said. “This was fun.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

THIS WAS FUN.

In the shower, Val dropped her sponge three times before she gave up and let hot water cascade down on her back and shoulders. She was tired—every bone in her body ached, it seemed—but she’d also never felt so alive. Her body thrummed with a lot of things, but none of it was regret.

Yes, she’d been impulsive, immature, unprofessional even, but it had been nearly a decade since she’d done something for herself in this way. Since she’d given in to what she wanted without considering the consequences. Had it been worth it?

The tingle between her legs suggested that it had been very much worth it. Val began to scrub herself vigorously in small circles on her smooth brown skin. It was startling to feel so different and yet look exactly the same. But shewasthe same, she told herself sternly. She would emerge from the bathroom. She would put on one of her plain work outfits and do her job. Desmond would do his and there would likely never be any reason for them to interact again.

She’d besafe. And if she had been as prudent with her husband as she was being today, she’d have saved herself a whole lifetime of hurt.

Val watched grimly as the bubbles slid toward the drain, then stepped out of the shower. She dried herself, hung the towel up and went through her usual routine—a generous slathering of baby oil, a generous spritz of apple-vanilla perfume, and as if to make up for her behavior the night before, she dragged on the most forbidding of her wool work dresses, one with long tight sleeves and a stiff linen collar. A glance at the clock told her she’d barely taken fifteen minutes to get ready. She wouldn’t even be late to see Hind this morning. She shouldered her bag, making a point ofnotlooking at the disheveled bed behind her, and opened the door. What she saw turned her blood to ice.

There was Desmond, talking animatedly and Hind, with a silver tray in her hands.

And Sheikh Rashid, looking angrier than she’d ever seen him.

No, not angry. The man’s face was florid with rage. She registered dimly that Desmond was trying to placate the older man, but she was too shocked to pick up more than a word or two. The few she did register landed like lead weights in her brain.

Appalling. Unprofessional. Disgrace.

What did he think happened? Well, that much was clear. He’d likely seen a very disheveled-looking Desmond Tesfay emerge from her room this morning, and his daughter—who in his eyes was young and impressionable and innocent—had spent the day with him.

Val didn’t have a single word with which to defend herself.

“Val,” Hind was saying, and the girl tugged her hand. Val meekly allowed herself to be steered back into her room, and Hind shut the door on the two men. The sheikh’s voice faded away, and Hind, her eyes as round and glistening as the enormous diamond solitaires she wore, thrust the tray in her direction.

“Baba marched me down here to apologize for ditching you last night,” she said. “Apparently someone saw me coming in and snitched, but we saw Desmond coming out of your room. What…?”

At the confirmation of her worst fears, Val covered her burning face. She wouldnotgive in to the final humiliation of crying in front of her charge, however desperately she wanted to.

“You and DesmondTesfay?” Hind’s voice was high with incredulity. “But you’re so—”

Proper? Boring? Old?They were all possibilities, and each one was worse than the last, as well as being completely true. “That’s enough, Hind,” Val said sharply, somehow summoning her professional tone even though her body was hot with embarrassment. “You did plenty yourself last night.”

“And it’s all forgotten now, thanks to you!” the girl said almost gleefully. “Baba’s going tokillyou. But Desmond Tesfay, Val. I mean,really.”

Val closed her eyes, willing Hind out of the room. The girl had no idea.

“I wonder what they’re saying,” Hind said. Val opened her eyes in time to see Hind pressing an ear on the door. A hard knock nearly made her tumble to the ground, and she scrambled backward as the sheikh and Desmond entered the room. The man’s face was as hard and cold as granite.

Val bit the inside of her cheek in an effort to show no emotion. He would fire her and cancel her visa. Her years of careful client cultivation in the Gulf would be lost with this death blow to her reputation. And her debt… What about her debt?

“I am extremely disappointed in you, Val,” said Sheikh Rashid.

Of course he was. “Sir—”

The sheikh held up one hand to silence her, his expression darkening. “You not only carried on a relationship behind my back, but you went as far as to marry—”

A marriage?What?

“—without my knowledge!”

---