Sheikh Protector

When her child was eighteen, she would reveal the truth and leave the decision up to her or him.

“Would it be possible to call a taxi?” She flashed Karim her most polite smile, refusing to be intimidated by him.

Given her social and economic background, she’d spent half her life being intimidated by the wealthy and powerful, by people in charge. But she’d had to get over that in a hurry when she had joined a nonprofit organization and had to interact daily with the elite. And over time, she’d learned that they were just like everybody else, with the same joys and fears and virtues and weaknesses.

Not that she could see Karim having a whole lot of fears or weaknesses. He had faced that car bomb down, cool as anything, and the memory of the incident was still making her heart beat faster.

“May I ask what your plans are?” He had his hands in his pockets as he rested his dark gaze on her. He might as well have been carved of solid rock, he looked that unmovable. But he was quick—she remembered him diving for her from his car. He loomed larger than life.

Exactly the kind of man she needed to avoid at all cost. She swallowed to wet her mouth.

“I’m going back to the hotel and probably flying out tonight if I can change my flight. I’m truly sorry about your brother.” She was, and she needed time to deal with the sudden news. But she needed to get away from Karim Abdullah’s searching gaze first.

“Perhaps you could tell me why you were looking for him?” His voice was even and low, with the sort of tone that made it clear he wasn’t a man to mess with.

She’d gotten that message already.

“We were friends. I thought I’d stop by to see him. You know, long time no see. A chance to catch up. That sort of thing.” She flashed him another winning smile.

He watched her as if he could see right through her, and she didn’t appreciate how nervous he made her. It had nothing to do with the four-inch scar that made him look like a desert warrior despite his elegant suit. The overwhelming sense of power that emanated from him was what she was leery of.

“Thank you for your hospitality.” She got to her feet and stepped around him, half expecting him to stop her.

He didn’t. “Were you going to tell Aziz that you are carrying his child?”

She was halfway across the room, but the words stopped her more effectively than anything else could have. She was too scared to turn around and look at him, afraid of what he might read in her face.

“I’m not—”

“The paramedic took your blood in the ambulance. The hospital called with the results,” he said in an icy tone. “You’re not the first woman to come looking for him after one of his foreign escapades. I assume you’re here for money?”

She winced, because that came uncomfortably close to the truth. “It’s not Aziz’s child,” she lied. She would manage on her own somehow. She didn’t want this dark sheik to have any kind of hold on her.

“My thoughts precisely, but I’d just as soon be sure. I want the case closed once and for all. I hope you won’t mind a DNA test when the child is born.”

She’d be long back in the U.S. by then, protected by U.S. law. They couldn’t take her baby away at that point, even if they could find her, which she would make sure they couldn’t.

“No, of course not.” She schooled her face and chanced a look at him.

His expression remained unreadable, only his eyes darkened further, if that was possible. “Good. I hope you’ll like your rooms. I’ll introduce you to the staff this afternoon. You can pick your personal maid then.”

The air got stuck in her lungs as she stared at him, startled. Was he completely nuts? “I’m not staying.” She wanted to be very clear on that.

He paused for a moment. “That’s a good strategy. Reverse psychology.” He inclined his head with a small smile. “I give you this, you seem smarter than the others. But whether you prefer to stay or go has no bearing on anything. Your child might be the grandson of a king, and as such, one of the heirs to the Beharrainian throne.” He watched her closely.

She felt the blood drain from her face. She’d known that Aziz was one of the king’s cousins. But she knew they hadn’t had a close relationship. And the king had a son. She hadn’t taken succession into account. It wasn’t something someone in her life and position thought much about.

“I’m sure you already considered that,” he went on. “I hope you won’t be disappointed to hear that a child, even if proven to be Aziz’s son, would not be at the front of the line of succession. But in the line nevertheless. You must understand that I cannot allow you to leave the country until the bloodline is determined. Our very law would forbid it, except with the permission of the father. Aziz is gone. As his brother, I’m responsible for you and your baby.”

If ever a sentence had the power to stop her heart, this was it. She was getting sucked in, losing control, the very thing she’d been most afraid of. She shouldn’t have come here.

“This is insane. I have nothing to do with you. You can’t keep me here. I’m an American citizen.” She backed toward the door, relaxing marginally when he stayed where he was.

“You will find that in Beharrain, Beharrainian laws are given a priority over ideals of foreign countries thousands of miles away.”

Was there a hint of threat in his steely voice?

She kept moving, but he still didn’t follow. Not even when she reached the hallway and ran to the left, not knowing which way the exit was, but wanting to get away from him and the nightmare this trip was turning into.

Before long she’d reached a palatial marble foyer. The front door was open, but there were armed guards at the wrought-iron gate that led to the street.

“Excuse me,” she said when they wouldn’t move out of her way. Maybe they didn’t speak English.

Step aside. Please, step aside. She wanted to get out before Karim decided to come after her. She didn’t think he would let her go this easily. She glanced behind her, then back at the men who looked as unmovable as the seven-foot-tall brick walls that surrounded the property.

“I need to leave,” she said slower and louder, knowing that was unlikely to make a difference. “Please.” She pointed toward the gate. They had to know what she wanted.

“You are to leave the palace only in the company of Sheik Abdullah,” one of them said after a moment, without looking at her.

So the language barrier wasn’t an issue.

Her breath caught. Desperation rose inside her—desperation, fear and anger. She shouldn’t have come. She had thought she would be able to keep her child safe while giving her or him the kind of large family she never had. But she understood now that wasn’t possible. To keep her baby safe and with her meant that she had to escape far, far away from here. She would never give up control of her baby.

There had to be a way. She refused to accept that she, along with her unborn child, was a prisoner in a foreign land, held at the will of the Dark Sheik.

Chapter Two

She was fighting a losing battle. Sheik Karim Abullah’s palace was better guarded than the Pentagon. But Julia wasn’t the type to give up.

Since she had resigned herself to the fact that she wouldn’t be able to escape on the ground level, she went up, sneaking through the night. She wasn’t sure what she was hoping for, perhaps a large tree that came near one of the balconies. Trying something—anything—had to be better than sitting in her gilded prison of a room and crying her eyes out like she had done for the first half of the night.

She hated how weepy her overactive mommy hormones made her. This was not the time to give in to weakness. But she was emotionally exhausted and ravenously hungry. Hungry to the point that she was afraid her growling stomach would be heard.

She stole down the second-floor hallway, pausing in front of the first door. She pushed it open a fraction of an inch at a time and glanced around the lavishly appointed living room she discovered. Some sort of a suite. Other doors opened from here. The furniture was exquisitely made—all ornately carved wood—and was breathtaking even without her being able to make out the true colors of the luxurious fabrics in the moonlight.

Her gaze settled on a phone on a small, octagonal table. Her U.S. cell phone didn’t work here and there wasn’t a phone in her room. She wished she knew the number of the U.S. embassy by heart, and dialed zero, hoping to get directory assistance. Nothing happened.

She tried zero-zero, her stomach continuing to growl. No ringing on the other end. Zero-one. Just one. One-one. A disembodied voice said something in Arabic then the line went dead again. She gritted her teeth with frustration and took a banana from the fruit bowl next to the phone. An apple’s crunching might give her away. She peeled it then bit in, and nearly moaned at the soft sweetness that diffused on her tongue. Heaven.

Her food tray had been removed that afternoon on her request when the smell of food had made her nauseous. She had refused dinner on principle—not the smartest thing, in hindsight.

She grabbed another banana and was stuffing it down the front of her shirt when a small noise came from behind one of the doors opposite her. She froze, nearly ran, but stopped herself. She needed to find a balcony, a way out.

She picked a door that was half-open, figuring she would make the least noise that way, and found herself in a large bedroom. The space was dominated by a sprawling bed, draped in black sheets, that didn’t look slept in. A handful of papers lay tossed on the nightstand, next to a book.

Then her gaze was drawn to the source of the noise she’d heard before. A bathroom off the bedroom, lights on, the water running. She was facing a full-size, gilded mirror on the bathroom wall that was angled away from her. The picture it presented made her mouth go dry and her feet freeze to the tile floor. She swallowed the chunk of fruit in her mouth with some trouble.

Karim stood in an open shower with black mosaic tile and one of those drenching, foot-wide showerheads, water sluicing down his tanned skin. He stood with his back to her, so she had an unobstructed view of the scars that ran down his back, breaking up the otherwise perfect lines of the most incredible male body she had ever seen. He had his hands up, bracing himself on the wall, his head hanging as if deep in thought, tension evident in his corded muscles.