Her Desert Prince

Though his people believed in omens, he was more skeptical and refused to credit what he was feeling as anything more than a response to an attractive female. He hadn’t been with one in several weeks. Affairs of state for his father had kept him too busy.

This woman’s pallor didn’t diminish her fresh-faced, porcelain complexion. A slight fruity fragrance escaped the silkiest hair ever to touch his cheek. Wisps of it, not confined, framed classic features. Her feminine scent tantalized his nostrils and further weakened him in ways his mind refused to acknowledge.

Mustafa followed him to the helicopter where Tariq assisted in strapping her into the seat behind them.

“She was traveling to Al-Shafeeq.”

“Alone?” Rashad couldn’t imagine why.

“Yes.” Mustafa scratched the side of his cheek. “I thought it strange, too. Here is her passport.”

Rashad grimaced before putting it inside his pocket. “Is there anyone else who needs immediate treatment?”

“No, Your Highness.”

“Good, then I’ll fly her to the palace for medical care. Help is coming from Raz with provisions for you. They’ll be here soon.”

Mustafa nodded his thanks and once more Rashad started up the helicopter, this time heading for Al-Shafeeq. He reached for his satellite phone to call Nazir. His personal assistant at the palace would make certain the doctor for the royal family would be standing by ready to take over.

After a short flight, Rashad put down at the side of the palace. He let Tariq and the bodyguard lower the woman out of the helicopter. The less he had to do with this incredibly appealing female, the better. A team of medical people rushed forward and took her seemingly lifeless form inside.

Assured she’d get the best treatment possible, he told the men to climb back in the helicopter and he’d fly them back to Raz. Rashad still had business to finish up.

During the flight Tariq remained uncharacteristically quiet. Rashad cast him a side glance. “What’s on your mind, Tariq? I haven’t heard a word out of you.”

“It’s not natural for a woman to be out here alone. Especially one so young.”

“I agree, but this one is foreign, which explains a lot.”

“She is very, very beautiful. Some man will suffer if he learns the sand has claimed her. Let’s hope the doctor can save her.”

Rashad didn’t respond because Tariq’s words had sent an invisible wind racing over his skin, lifting the hairs on his bronzed arms and nape. That was the second time within an hour he’d felt a quickening. He didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all.

Anxious to get back to work on his new plans, Rashad set them down outside the main plant, only to hear his phone ring as Tariq exited the chopper. Rashad checked the caller ID; it was the doctor back at the palace.

His body tautened. The man was probably phoning to tell Rashad he’d lost his patient. And what if he had? What could that possibly mean to Rashad, except that he would feel sorrow for anyone who’d died in those circumstances? He finally answered the call. “Dr. Tamam?”

“I’m glad you answered right away.”

“Did I get the American woman to you too late?”

“No. She’s slowly reviving with the IV.”

Rashad released his breath, unaware he’d been holding it until he’d heard the news. “She was very fortunate. Is she coherent yet?”

“No, but that’s good.”

Rashad nodded to himself. “She’s going to be in shock while she recovers from her ordeal.” He waited for a response, but when it came, the doctor’s words surprised Rashad.

“This woman needs complete privacy, away from everyone. Do you have a suggestion, Your Highness?”

This was no normal request from the doctor, and Rashad was immediately alerted. Without having to think about it he said, “The garden suite.”

It was on the second floor of the palace with a rooftop view. A private passageway led to it from the main upstairs hallway. Because of its isolation from the rest of the palace, other members of the family had used it as their bridal suite at the beginning of their honeymoons.

No one would be occupying it again until his own wedding night, scheduled in six months. Lines darkened Rashad’s face at the thought.

“Good. The nurse and I will transfer her there immediately.”

Nothing else was forthcoming, which wasn’t like the usually loquacious doctor. An unsettling feeling swept through Rashad. “I’ll be with you shortly, Doctor.”

“I will be waiting for you.” Dr. Tamam clicked off.

The doctor who’d faithfully looked after his family for years had just ended the call before Rashad could ask any more questions. That alone told him the older man was keeping some information that would be for Rashad’s ears alone.

Like everyone else on the staff, the doctor kept his ear to the ground for anything that appeared suspicious. One could never be too careful where the safety of Rashad’s family was concerned.

Rashad entered the plant office, intending to work on some details needing attention, but he found he couldn’t concentrate. With a grunt of dissatisfaction, he decided to fly back to Al-Shafeeq to find out what was going on. After a quick shower and a meal in his own suite, he left for the other wing of the palace in one of his silk lounging robes.

There was a cultivated garden of exotic flowers by the patio of the garden suite. His mother, along with the gardeners, often tended it because she had a special love for them. Rashad had decided on this suite for their patient partly since the American was a rather exotic species herself. He thought of Tariq’s comment—very, very beautiful didn’t begin to cover Rashad’s description of the woman.

He opened the doors and nodded to the nurse who told him the doctor was still in with the American. Rashad walked on through the large sitting room to the bedroom. From a distance he saw the patient in bed with an IV drip hanging from the stand placed at the side. He drew closer. The doctor stood at the other side, checking her pulse. When he saw Rashad, he lowered the woman’s arm and moved toward him.

“How is she?” Rashad asked in a quiet voice.

“Coming along. I put something in her IV to help her sleep. Tomorrow she should be in better shape to cope with what happened. I’m leaving the nurse to watch over her during the night and give her oxygen if she needs it. I wanted you here because I’d like you to take a look at what I found hanging from the chain around her neck.”

Rashad’s brows formed a black bar before he moved past the doctor to see what he was talking about. Closer now, he could tell the IV was doing its job. There was more color in the woman’s cheeks. Her hair had been washed, and the wavy strands had a sheen like that on the sheerest wings of the butterflies hovering over the flowers in the garden. Her dark lashes and brows provided a contrast that made her even more stunningly beautiful.

The nurse had dressed her in a white cotton shift. A sheet had been pulled up to her shoulders, but he glimpsed a gold chain around her neck. He flashed the doctor a glance. “What am I supposed to be seeing?”

“This. I took the liberty of removing it at the clinic before I did anything else.”

As he glanced at the shiny object held in the doctor’s palm, Rashad drew in a ragged breath. It was a round gold medallion with a half moon inscribed—the symbol of the Shafeeq royal family.

Only when a new male member was born was another one minted. Rashad had been given his when he’d come of age at sixteen. They were all worn around the neck on a chain, but Rashad had broken with tradition and had asked for his to be fashioned into a ring he could use as his personal seal for important documents. He kept it in the desk of his office here at the palace.

For this woman from another continent to be in possession of one, let alone wearing it, simply wasn’t possible! Yet the truth lay in front of him, mere inches away.

How had she come by it?

Without hesitation he pocketed the medallion before returning to the woman. With great care he found the little catch to remove the chain, aware of the softness of her creamy skin against his bronzed knuckles; such skin the women of his tribe didn’t possess.

Their patient made a little sound, then moved her head to the other side, as if she’d felt the slight caress of his flesh against hers. He held his breath, half hoping she’d wake up so he could look into her eyes and see through to her soul to where she kept her secrets.

The other half of him hoped she’d stay asleep, thus prolonging the moment when she had to be told she’d almost died. There was a penalty for experiencing the terrible beauty of the desert. Sometimes the price was too great, but this foreign woman had been willing to take the risk. Why?

He stared at the medallion, fingering its smoothness until his jaw hardened. An ill wind boded no good. His mother had said it many times. Nothing about the woman or the medallion added up.