The Billionaire Sheikh Ch. 03

"Does a pupil barrister not make that much?"

"I now have 1600 euro with taxes deducted as a paralegal. As a pupil with a law degree I will get 2100. But the consultants at PDG easily make 4500 euro a month. And the ones that got partner probably 400,000 a year. But I would like to go into law and not business advice."

"You best choose what you like best little one. When someone likes his job they often are good at it and people will start to pay for that."

He wondered why he felt deflated by the idea that this was their last trip in his jet. He was a loner was he not? He liked his solitude? She talked too much. She made him want to ride her all day while that was impossible nonetheless. He should go and visit his office in London and bed one of those needy socialites there!

-0-0-0-0-

Two months later sheikh Khalid slammed his fist on his desk. "BLAST!"

On the screen of his laptop an e-mail read: "Dear sheikh Khalid. Thank you for inviting me to the opening of the Rotterdam office but I have to decline the invitation. My thesis professor got really ill and his replacement had totally different ideas. He wants me to rewrite my whole thesis and be finished by the end of this month if I still want to get my degree this university year. I took two months of unpaid leave at PDG to be able to do so. They were not amused to say the least. That is why I am replying to you from my personal e-mail address. If I would show up at the party and not at work I think they would create a lot of trouble and I need my income. I am so sorry to have to decline. I would have loved to see how the office turned out with all the furnishings. And I would have loved to see you again as well. I liked our detective binge watch nights."

Crap, crap and crap! On impulse he had written an invitation to her and her grandmother. Because to be honest he had been looking forward to see that little one again. To see her innocence and her honesty. Her joy and her beauty. Her wisdom for someone that young.

He knew how much they were paying her. She probably earned as much by just doing his cases and she had spent three weeks doing damage control here in the Gulf. He clicked open his financial program and looked up how much he had been paying PDG last year. They charged 500 euro for an application but arranged the flight and hotels too. It saved his firm a lot of hassle. It seemed they were paying the Amsterdam office around 10,000 a year and the Hong Kong office 25,000.

He grabbed his phone and dialled the number of his in house legal consultant.

"Mustafa, can you come and have a word for a moment?"

A few minutes later his private secretary announced Mustafa. The old man lowered himself in the offered chair.

"Mustafa if I poached the lawyer from PDG - remember that beautiful Western girl? - how much time do you think she would spend on the cases she now does for us there? Suppose I would offer her a tax free salary of 2,500 a month could we make that profitable? She was telling me she might leave them to broaden her knowledge and become a barrister."

"Well my sheikh I think she would only spend one day a week on what is now done by PDG so that would be quite a steep salary. We pay Amsterdam now between 500 and 1500 a month."

"But" the old man suggested. "I could train her to handle the labour law of all the Asian migrant workers we employ on the fleet as well. The contracts and such. I like to slow down a bit in the near future and would be happy to train her but there is a language problem. Domestically she does not speak Arabic nor has a local law degree."

"Well we could offer that as part of the deal. Study part-time while working and have a very intensive language training."

"Yes my sheikh but I think I will only have enough legal work for two or three days a week for her. If we grant her one day to study what will we have her do the other days?"

"I am not into charity. If I pay her a handsome salary to secure her PDG services she will have to work hard all week. Even if part of it might be carrying my briefcase."

Come to think of that. It would be quite a pleasure having her around. He pictured her accompanying him to far trips to his shipyard in Taiwan or to his London office.

"I do think Mustafa that for certain business trips taking her as an extra member of our team might be a good idea. I am planning to look into some American projects and for a country that is quite anti-Arabic it might help that one of our team is a Western young woman."

"Yes my sheikh and she is very clever and I always liked working with her over the internet. It was too bad I was in hospital for my heart surgery when she came those weeks to work from here. I had liked to meet her. She sent me a nice book to read."

-0-0-0-0-0-

Weeks later Lisa was typing her last chapter of her thesis. She wondered how the reception would be at the sheikh's new office. Her manager was such an asshole. It could only be good to nurse good relations with a client. So the sheikh liked her and Omi. Then be grateful. But she was sure some high honcho was now eating canapés and mingling with sheikh Khalid. She wished he would come and sleep in her bed again. His arm around her, his beard tickling the skin of her shoulder.

Good grief girl you will never see him again apart from in a newspaper article!

The doorbell rang. Who could that be this late in the evening? With Omi taking a bath before bedtime she was the one who had to go and see who it was. She climbed down the stair and opened the door and look straight into the face of sheikh Khalid who was lifting a great box in his arms.

"Sheikh! You!... here..."

"Salaam miss Forest. I gathered you and Omi would like to sample some of the food I offered my guests. And I came to make you an offer. Can I come in?"

She waved him in and lead him to the kitchen where he put the box on the table.

"Khalid, dear boy. How good to see you", said her grandmother coming into the kitchen dressed in her robe. "Are you staying the night?"

"No grandmother of Lisa I regret I can only stay for a short while. I landed on Maastricht Aachen airport on my way home. Please try some of this food. This is humus a spread made of sesame and chick peas. This is Baba Hanous a salad made from eggplant. Meatballs with cinnamon and bulgur. Roasted chicken. Olives, cheese. And this is camelmilk, dades."

He waved his hand over all the small boxes he had packed inside of the big one. The old lady was beaming.

"I have to talk to Lisa for awhile grandmother. Please try some in the meantime. I hope I can speak with her in the garden if that is all right with you."

"Yes Khalid dear. You two can go and lock the chickens in for the night and talk about what you want to tell her."

Lisa looked at him wondering what this was all about. In the old romance novels this was the moment the lord would propose to his virginal love interest. She opened the door to the courtyard and stepped into the waning light of a balmy summer evening.

-To be continued.