Amjad’s provocation rose another notch. “But you remain stuck in the middle either way, bro.”
“You said you’d defer to my opinion. I should have known you would only if it coincided with yours.” Harres turned to Johara with long-suffering apology in his eyes. “I told Amjad that his theories of you being behind the jewel conspiracy and creating a scandal to force Shaheen to marry you cancel each other out. If the conspiracy bore fruit, Shaheen wouldn’t be prince. Why sabotage the status Amjad thinks you’re marrying him for?”
Amjad raised his hand in another impression of an overeager student in class. “I know that one!” Johara turned reluctant eyes to him. The man was electrically charismatic even when he insulted her with every breath. He met her eyes, and still talked about her as if she wasn’t there. “It’s a win-win situation for her. If the conspiracy works, she gets paid off big-time, Shaheen loses the title but retains his wealth and power as a businessman and sheikh, and she retains her chokehold on him in every way. Then, once she has all power in her hands, she negotiates the return of the jewels, at whatever price, through a third party, and has it all.”
Harres gave a hearty snort. “Sheesh, Amjad. You actually live with that thing you call a brain inside your head?”
“You envy me because you live with nothing inside yours? That must be how our head of homeland security and secret service got to be so trusting. I almost feel compelled to report this to the council. I bet they’d expel you from your post and toss you out on your ear if they got a whiff of you being such an oblivious romantic.”
Shaheen grinned at him. “Crown prince or not, Amjad, we outnumber you. How about we throw you out on your ear?”
Amjad swept his brothers a bedeviling smile, so secure in his power that he couldn’t be goaded into posturing. “Chill, boys. Haven’t you ever heard of the esteemed position of devil’s advocate?”
“You mean devil’s assistant.” Harres tsked. “Now of all times. You’re sick, Amjad.”
“I’ll live. But really, when better? Afterward, I’ll have to forever hold my aggression. And with Shaheen thinking with body parts that don’t include his brain, you were my last hope of someone seeing beyond the star-crossed drama unfolding here.”
At that moment the king called Shaheen and Harres away, leaving Amjad alone with Johara.
She waited until they were out of earshot. Then she pounced.
She grabbed Amjad’s forearm, dug her fingers into it with all her strength. She heard his surprise in the sharpness of his indrawn breath, saw it in the pupils that jerked to full expansion, engulfing the uncanny emerald of his eyes.
“Listen, Amjad,” she hissed. “I’m not in any condition to listen to more of your delightful theories about my cunning and long-term treachery. I’ve loved Shaheen since the moment I laid eyes on him, even before he saved my life. I thought living with my hopeless love was the worst thing that I’d ever feel. Then I came back into his life and realized he’s loved me as long and as fiercely, and my pain became agony. I feel like I’ve fallen into a nightmare, getting my impossible dream of having Shaheen, but in this terrible way. All I have to look forward to is a few months with him, if that, then a life without him, when he’ll love and need me and our baby as much as we do him, but be forced to live without us.
“So thank your demons that you’ve never loved like this and evidently can’t love anyone. You’ll never suffer the agonies and ecstasies of our soul-deep connection, or the despair I’m anticipating when I have to leave him. And I’m not letting you add to his troubles. So, to quote Shaheen, from now on, Amjad, shut up!”
She fell silent, glaring up at him, trembling with the emotions tearing through her, and thought if stupefaction took human form, it would be Amjad now.
When he remained silent, she let out the air in her lungs on a choppy exhalation. “Now take your mind off of me and concentrate those formidable powers of yours on the most important thing. The jewels.”
He shook his head, as if to wake up from a trance. Then he finally drawled, “It has always paid for me to think the worst and make amends later if need be. So I will do anything I can to atone for my attitude when—and if—I become convinced you are innocent.” He bent closer, as if to give her a mind and psyche scan. “So just answer me this, Johara—if you and your father are innocent, why didn’t you recognize the fakes?”
“I know why.” Johara jerked around at Shaheen’s declaration. He and Harres reached her and Amjad’s side again. “Berj has been sliding into depression, and his inability to focus on his job—and therefore his failure to notice the fakes—is the reason he’s retiring. Johara hasn’t been near the jewels since she left Zohayd twelve years ago.”
Amjad pursed his lips as he considered those rationalizations. “I still need to interrogate Berj.”
Shaheen exhaled. “The one thing saving you from a right hook to that implacable jaw of yours is that I don’t want to put a swollen hand in Johara’s during the marriage ceremony.”
“I can be your witness with swollen knuckles.” Harres’s feral eyes flashed on a mixture of sheer deviltry and pure danger.
Amjad whistled in mock admiration. “My, aren’t you two full of fine male aggression. Down boys. I’m going to question him as a legitimate party in the investigation, not as a suspect.”
Johara intercepted any reaction from Shaheen or Harres, stuck her face in Amjad’s. “You can interrogate me all you like, but don’t you dare go near my father.”
“We need him to examine the fakes,” Amjad persisted.
Johara shook her head emphatically. “I’ll do that.”
“Are you qualified?” She glared at him. He raised his hands in concession. “So you are. Fine. What’s your plan?”
“I’ll analyze the craftsmanship and come up with a list of possible forgers. There is a limited number of artists in the world capable of producing such almost undetectable duplicates. I’ve studied each extensively and can distinguish their signature styles.”
After Shaheen and Harres agreed that this was the best plan, Amjad stepped closer, curved his arm at her. She blinked up at him. What was this confounding man up to now?
“What are you up to now?” Shaheen echoed her suspicion.
Amjad eyes crinkled at him on what seemed to be an actual smile. “Johara needs to choose the jewels she’ll wear for your wedding. And since you, as her groom, are forbidden to see her from now till then—” Amjad looked at her “—I’m petitioning that she bestow the honor of escorting her to the vaults on me.”