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  Marwan made a small sound of surprise. ‘Are you sure, Your Highness?’

  Zufar’s lips tightened. ‘Leave. Now.’

  The room emptied immediately. He kept his gaze fixed on the girl crouched before him, and slowly extended his hand towards her. Again, her gaze darted between his face and his hand, as if terrified he would do something unpredictable. Like bite. Or strike.

  He frowned.

  She reminded him of the skittish colts in his stable. The ones that demanded substantial time and patience to respond to his commands.

  Except he was in gross negative supply of either today. His marriage ceremony was scheduled to commence in less than two hours.

  Zufar leaned down and extended his hand further. ‘Stand up,’ he instructed, firming his voice.

  She placed her hand in his, scrambled upright, and immediately gasped and dropped his hand as if she’d been scalded.

  He ignored her reaction, his gaze moving over her, confirming that the drabness indeed extended from the top of the dishevelled tufts of dark hair peeking out of her beige scarf to the soles of her feet.

  Except, she wasn’t a girl as he’d initially surmised.

  She was long past adolescence, if the pronounced swell of her chest and the hint of curves beneath the clothes were any indication. She came up to his chin in her flat, tasteless shoes, her covered arms slender and her jaw holding a delicate strength.

  His eyes were drawn to her chest again. It was just her agitated breathing that was snagging his attention. Nothing else. He stepped back, folded his hands behind his back and assumed a gesture of ease that never failed to work on his horses.

  ‘What is your name?’ he asked again in a lower voice.

  Her gaze dropped to the ground and she mumbled.

  ‘Speak up,’ he said.

  Her chin jerked up a little, but her gaze remained, once again, on the tips of his shoes.

  ‘Niesha Zalwani, Your Highness,’ she repeated.

  Her voice was soft, smoky and lyrical, if a little too timid for his dwindling patience. But at least he was getting somewhere. He had a name.

  ‘What is your role here?’

  ‘I—I’m... I was a chambermaid until last week, when I was added to Miss Amira’s personal staff.’

  ‘Look at me when I’m addressing you,’ Zufar drawled. It took an interminable age for her head to rise once more. But eventually, her gaze met his, then promptly flitted down to rest on his nose. Zufar prayed for strength and continued, ‘Where’s your mistress?’

  Immediately her lower lip wobbled, her wide eyes grew haunted and her breathing turned agitated again. Zufar forced himself not to stare at the soft globes of her breasts or the pale creaminess of her throat as she trembled before him.

  ‘She...she’s gone, Your Highness.’

  Zufar’s fist threatened to ball again. Resisting the urge was difficult. ‘Gone where?’ he managed through clenched teeth.

  ‘I don’t know, Your Highness.’

  ‘Very well. Let us try another way. Did she leave alone?’

  Another frenzied twisting of her fingers, and then she cleared her throat. ‘No, Your Highness. She...she left with a man.’

  A detached, icy sensation stroked his nape. ‘A man? What man?’ he asked softly.

  ‘He did not tell me his name, Your Highness.’

  ‘But you are certain she has been taken against her will by an unknown male?’ he pressed.

  The woman before him bit her lip, drawing his attention to the plump, reddened curve of her mouth as she nodded. ‘Yes...well...’ Her distress grew.

  ‘Tell me what you know,’ he insisted.

  ‘I may be wrong, Your Highness, but she didn’t seem...unwilling.’

  The possibility that he’d been jilted arrived with ice-cold anger. Except, curiously, Zufar wasn’t enraged on his own behalf. Rather, the impending disappointment for his people, the chaos for his kingdom, was what caused his fists to clench behind his back.

  ‘Did she say anything? Did he say anything to make you think this?’

  ‘It—it all happened very quickly, Your Highness. But...’ Her hand disappeared into the folds of her skirt and emerged with a folded piece of paper. ‘He...he instructed me to give this to Princess Galila to hand to you.’ She held out the piece of paper, her slender fingers trembling.

  Zufar took it from her, his insides frozen as he unfolded the sheet he recognised as a torn piece of his own royal stationery.

  He read the message once. Then again.

  With a thick curse, he crumpled the heavy, embossed paper between his fingers, his fist clenched tight until it shook with the force of his emotions. The red haze of fury returned, deeper, steeping his lethal mood as he crossed to the window and pressed his fist against the wide pane.

  Before him, the palace grounds sprawled in sun-dappled splendour. Beyond the windows, the muted buzzing of an expectant crowd rolled over the horizon. Excited citizens and eager tourists who’d flown in especially for this occasion were anticipating a fairy-tale royal wedding of their King to his chosen Queen. The whole kingdom had been gripped in wedding fever for months.

  Only to have his heathen bastard of a half-brother claim in writing that he’d seduced and stolen his betrothed!

  In another life, perhaps, that tiny sliver of emotion piercing through his fury could’ve been called relief from yet another responsibility. But Zufar gave it absolutely no room whatsoever, because he now faced a monumental problem. Aside from the humiliation of announcing that he was no longer in possession of his fiancée, this arrangement had held great economic advantages for Khalia.

  He needed to find Amira. Confirm for himself that his half-brother’s claim was the truth.

  But how could he, when he had no idea where he’d gone? The dossier he’d collated on Adir when he’d first made his unforgettable appearance at his mother’s funeral had revealed he had no fixed abode, or, if he did, he’d kept it very well hidden.

  Even if Zufar knew his whereabouts, he had no time to go chasing after him. He acknowledged with a bitter laugh how well timed Adir’s revenge had been. His half-brother knew that doing this now would cause the most humiliation. The most uproar.

  Zufar wasn’t about to hand him that victory. Not in this lifetime.

  He whirled to face the young chambermaid. ‘When did they leave?’

  Her throat worked again. But this time she wasn’t silent for very long. ‘I brought her tea, and left her alone for just ten minutes.’ Her voice was wracked with nerves and anguish. She began to wring her hands again. ‘I had gone to get the royal jewellery when I heard the commotion.’

  ‘So you saw them leave together?’

  Her head moved in a shaky nod. ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you’re sure he didn’t harm her?’ Zufar demanded.

  ‘She—she didn’t appear in distress, Your Highness. She seemed...willing.’

  The tightness in his chest eased a tiny fraction. ‘How did they leave?’

  She pointed to the very window where he stood.

  Zufar’s jaw clenched tight. They were on the second floor, with nothing outside the windows but climbing vines. Granted, they were over a century old and sturdy enough to hold a horse, but had his barbarian brother really whisked his betrothed out of a second-floor window?

  ‘Did anyone else see them?’

  ‘Only Her Highness, the Princess, but they were almost on the ground when she came in.’

  Zufar frowned. Why hadn’t Galila informed him?

  Had she tried to stop them and been unsuccessful? Most likely Galila was keeping well out of Zufar’s way because she knew how he would take the news.

  ‘How soon after did you raise the alarm?’

  Guilt flickered across her face and her lower lip trembled once more.

  ‘Se
conds? Minutes?’ he snapped.

  She paled. ‘I—I’m sorry... I thought... I thought it was a prank.’

  ‘It wasn’t. And your failure to raise the alarm in time may have aided his getaway.’ Zufar was sure of it.

  She shrank further into the wall. He whirled away, tension threatening to break his spine.

  The scandal just waiting to be triggered by such a revelation struck him stone cold. But under no circumstances was he going to let that happen.

  He shoved the piece of paper into his pocket and closed his mind to the burning gross insult against his kingdom and his crown. He would deal with his half-brother later. For now he needed an interim solution to this situation. One that did not involve calling off his wedding.

  A quick glance around the room showed the suspended state of preparation.

  The gown that should’ve been adorning his bride-to-be by was draped over a mannequin, the heeled slippers peeking out beneath its hem.

  Detachedly, he inspected the rest of the room as he mentally ran through the list of other bridal candidates that had been presented to him when the subject of his nuptials first came up a year ago. Like most royal arranged marriages, although one choice had been favoured above the others, there were always contingencies in case of sudden unsuitability.

  Three of those candidates were downstairs, ruled out as potential brides to the King and reduced to honoured guests at his wedding. Could one of them be elevated to the position that would turn out to be a dream come true for them?

  Zufar’s lips twisted.

  There was no way to execute that plan without announcing to the whole world that he’d been jilted. That would only result in frenzied tabloid gossip the media would feed off for years.

  Not that any solution he came up with wouldn’t cause ripples. But keeping it under wraps until he was ready would control the beast.

  Which meant he had to keep the circle of trust as tight as possible while he found a quieter, interim solution.

  But to mitigate the uproar of impending scandal, he needed a bride; needed to ensure he was married within the next two hours before news that he’d been jilted got out.

  His reason for choosing his new bride would need to be explained, of course. That would be a problem for tomorrow.

  He turned away from the wedding gown and came face to face with the chambermaid. He’d forgotten about her. To be honest, she was barely breathing, striving to be as unobtrusive as possible. Zufar was surprised she hadn’t fled while his back was turned.

  Her wide-eyed gaze fixed on him, watchful and wary as she followed his pacing figure.

  He slowed to a stop on the next pass, an impossibly ludicrous idea taking root in his brain. ‘How long have you been in my palace?’ he asked.

  ‘All...um... Most of my life, Y-Your Highness,’ she stammered.

  He gave a satisfied inner nod. She would know his customs, know the value of discretion.

  Sweet desert stars, was he really entertaining this preposterous notion? ‘And how old are you?’ Zufar growled.

  She swallowed, her nostrils quivering delicately as she inhaled. ‘Twenty-five, Your Highness.’

  He stared at her for a full minute, then nodded briskly. There was neither chagrin nor prevarication in the decision his brain latched onto.

  He needed a solution, and he’d found one. His gaze dropped down to her twisting ringless fingers. ‘Do you have a husband?’ he asked.

  A deep blush flamed her cheeks, her gaze flitting away from his again as she shook her head. ‘No, Your Highness, I am unmarried.’

  Just to be sure, he probed deeper. ‘Are you committed to another?’

  Her mouth tightened for the briefest second, but she shook her head before she mumbled, ‘No.’

  He wanted to demand that she repeat that. To look him in the eyes while she did so. But time was slipping through his fingers.

  Zufar’s chest filled with grim purpose as his gaze sprang from the unsuitable woman before him to the wedding dress, and back again. She was roughly the same size as Amira, if perhaps a little bustier and wider of hip than his...former fiancée. Their heights too were similar and so, from what he could see beneath the blotchiness and drabness, was their colouring.

  Of course, Amira had held herself with more poise than this maid, years of first-class schooling and a finishing school in Switzerland undertaken for the sole purpose of her future role as Queen. The woman in front of him was nowhere near as polished.

  But he didn’t need a gem, just a polished stone to pass off as the real thing until he could resolve this situation quietly and on his terms.

  ‘Come here,’ he commanded evenly as he strolled to stand next to the wedding dress. Now he’d decided what to do, he couldn’t afford any more tears or, heaven forbid, tantrums that would further delay him.

  She presented him with that rabbit-caught-in-headlights look again, the pulse fluttering at her throat racing faster.

  Zufar bit down his exasperation. ‘You’re not deaf. I know you can hear me. Come here,’ he stated firmly.

  She jerked into movement, stumbling to a stop two feet away from him.

  He inspected her, noting that her eyes were in fact a dark amethyst, not the brown he’d thought, and that her eyelashes were far longer than he had initially noticed. Her mouth too was curved in a perfect little bow that, should it ever find its way into a smile, might salvage some of her dreariness.

  His gaze dropped, took in the lines of her neck, and again experienced a tiny bolt of surprise at how sleekly it curved to her shoulders, how delicate and flawless were her collarbones and skin.

  No, not a diamond, but perhaps a better quality stone than he’d first surmised.

  A quality stone, but still rough around the edges, he modified, when he noticed she was still twisting her fingers into an agitated mess. ‘Be still, little one,’ he commanded.

  She made a strangled little sound under her breath but her body stilled and her fingers stopped moving. He suppressed a need to tell her to straighten her spine and look him in the eye when he spoke to her.

  Such training was unnecessary for what he had in mind. All that would be required was for her not to collapse into a useless heap before he’d achieved his goal. And he had a way to ensure that happened.

  Decision made, he whirled away from her. As if they were in tune with his thoughts, a brief knock sounded on the door before Marwan and the rest of his aides rushed in.

  ‘Your Highness? Have you any news you wish me to relay to the royal guard? A starting point for the search for your intended, perhaps?’

  ‘We are past that, Marwan,’ Zufar said coldly, noting absently again that Amira’s absconding didn’t sting as much as it should. If anything, it was his half-brother’s insult that grated harsher.

  ‘Oh? Does that mean the ceremony is off?’

  Zufar glanced at the woman standing shell-shocked in the corner of the room.

  She looked even worse, as if a fresh bolt of lightning had hit her. His decision didn’t waver as his gaze objectively raked her.

  The wedding bouquet would occupy her skittish hands, veils would shroud her face, and heels would elevate her height and hopefully correct her posture.

  Beyond that, very little mattered.

  ‘No, it does not. The ceremony is still going ahead.’ He slashed his hand through the shocked murmurs echoing through the room. When he achieved silence, he continued, ‘I fully intend to be married in two hours’ time. Niesha Zalwani is to be my bride and everyone in this room will ensure that my wishes are fulfilled.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘TELL YOUR BROTHER I’ve not only seduced his precious bride but that she runs away with me willingly. Tell him I’m stealing away his future Queen, just as he stole my birthright.’

  Those were the most scandalous words Niesha had exp
ected to hear today, and possibly for the rest of her days. A day that should’ve been one of intense joy, but which had taken a wrong turn to hell about an hour ago.

  With the Sheikh’s appearance in his intended’s bedroom, she’d harboured hope that everything would be resolved.

  Except King Zufar al Khalia had just spoken words that simply didn’t make sense. For a moment Niesha wondered whether the shock of watching Amira Ghalib disappear from right under her nose had dislodged a few million brain cells.

  The man in front of her, the formidable, extraordinarily captivating tower of masculinity who prowled through his kingdom with harsh authority and power, commanding and receiving the loyal adulation of his subjects because he was simply that breathtaking, had just said—

  No. You did you not hear him right. It was impossible.

  Her thoughts were clearly echoed by Marwan, who sprang forwards. ‘Your Highness?’ His voice was ashen with disbelief.

  The King—her King, since she too was a subject of the Kingdom of Khalia—moved another step closer, bringing his earth-shaking life force even more dangerously into her space. He stalked so close she could almost see the ice crackling in his eyes, the contained fury vibrating his body.

  Niesha shrank away from the elegant folds of the wedding gown, the sheets of icy shock thawing into a cauldron of panic. She glanced around the room, selfishly wishing Princess Galila were still here.

  King Zufar’s sister barely noticed Niesha most of the time, but her kind smile when she did was far better than the fiercely domineering glower of her brother, and the tableau of horrified expressions spread in panorama before her.

  Perversely, those expressions were what hammered home the fact that she’d heard correctly. He’d used her full name. In connection to marriage. His marriage. Today. Shock gurgled in her throat.

  Her fingers moved then, connected with the soft, warm folds of the most extraordinary wedding gown she’d ever seen in her life. The gown that, finding herself alone in this room three nights ago, she’d secretly indulged in one insane moment’s fantasy of wearing herself to marry the ephemeral man of her dreams.