Handcuffed to the Sheikh, Too Read online

  She smiled too broadly, showing the lipstick on her tooth again. The overly bright expression looked false on her. "But everything is okay again. The punishment has been bitter, and the necklace has been returned."

  He was about to argue a few pricks of the conscience was no true punishment when a thought struck him, forcing him to consider Miss Spencer far more closely.

  She was correct. The necklace had been returned. Because she had returned it.

  He looked down into the dark heart of the ruby in his hand. The jewel was priceless. Traveling as she did on a private plane that he had granted diplomatic status, her bags would not have been searched. She could have taken the jewel for herself, had the treasure broken down into its component gold and jewels and made millions of dollars, or sold the historical artifact on the black market, to a collector, for much more.

  Instead, she had restored the Heart to him. Who on earth would do such a thing against their own best interests?

  Gwendolyn started backing away from him. Toward the ballroom. "Okay, so if we're done here, I'll—"

  "Why did you return the ruby to me?" he asked. His mouth dried as he spoke.

  Her scarlet lips twisted. "I don't mean to insult your staff. I hope you won't take any disrespect. The necklace is worth a lot of money and I wanted to make sure it got back to your collection without any problems."

  She spoke in such a reasonable tone, as if what she had done was to be expected from anyone.

  "No," he said, recovering the strength in his tone. "I don't mean why did you return the Heart to me personally. I understand and appreciate not entrusting something so valuable to a stranger. What I mean is why did you return it at all?"

  Her forehead wrinkled as if she struggled to make sense out of his words.

  "Because your necklace doesn't belong to me?" The phrase rose in tone at the end, like a question. "Who would keep something that wasn't theirs?"

  Anyone in the royal court of Hidd, he did not say. Nothing had been safe there. Everything he brought with him had disappeared. Or been bartered for favors. For safety.

  "Many people," he responded. "You could have taken the Heart out of the country easily, and one of our greatest treasures would have been lost forever. On behalf of Zallaq, I must thank you."

  "You don't have to thank me for not stealing from you." She cocked her head at him as if she had given him back a coin fallen from his pocket on the street. "If we needed to, everyone would have to thank everyone else all day long. I'd have to thank you now."

  Was the world tilted on its axis? Who was this bizarre creature who gave up millions of dollars because she felt it was the right thing to do?

  "I'd like one thing, though. If you're feeling like doling out favors."

  Ah. Now he was back on familiar ground. She wanted something in return. She had restored the jewel to gain something for herself, to earn some influence with him, though the back of his mind registered her father's pipeline project gave her a good deal of influence already.

  "What kind of reward did you have in mind? Shall we say a hundred thousand? Or perhaps one of these diamonds..." He slid the chain of the necklace through his fingers as the negotiation began.

  "What?" Her normally low voice rose an octave in surprise. "No, no, I don’t want money."

  "And so I offered the diamond," he pointed out.

  "The only thing I want," she said, "is for you to promise to let the person who accidentally took the jewels go. Don't pursue them, and don't put anyone in jail for this cri—" She was about to say "crime," no doubt, but caught herself in mid-word and quickly shifted. "Mistake."

  She could ask him for anything in his kingdom, and she asked him for nothing for herself? What was wrong with her? How could she survive to adulthood without protecting own best interests? He could not understand.

  For an instant, he felt almost guilty about taking advantage of her gullibility. Had she asked, he would have been obliged to give her his yacht, another item from the crown jewels, or even the palace they stood in. Instead, he could give her nothing. She invited it. He could go back on his word as soon as she left, if he desired.

  Her naïveté was difficult to watch. She may have reached the age of twenty-five without seeing the error of her ways, but he suspected she would soon learn an expensive and painful lesson.

  "If you wish it, then I will grant your request."

  "Thank you, Your Majesty. I appreciate your mercy more than you know."

  He nodded. Their transaction was complete. She began to make her way back to the party, her heels tapping on the marble balcony floor. Inside, her other acquaintances and her father must be waiting for her.

  "Wait," he ordered. The command surprised him. His voice had issued it without his mind's consent.

  She gave him a quizzical, almost confused look.

  He removed the perfectly folded square of silk from his tuxedo pocket and offered the fabric to her.

  "You have lipstick on your tooth," he told her.

  ***

  Thank God Zallaq wasn't a dry country, thought Gwen as she made her way through the schmoozing, laughing crowd to the cold sheikh's well-stocked bar to order a glass of champagne. She needed alcohol after her encounter.

  She'd been nervous about returning the Heart to its rightful owner, and she'd expected something exactly like his reaction. What entitled, self-important male wouldn't have responded the same way? Of course he'd wanted to know who the thief was, and how she was connected to them. But she'd promised Shadiah she would keep the secret, and no harm would come to her.

  At the time, she hadn't known if she'd be able to keep her promise, but the maid had been so desperate she hadn't known what else to do. Gwen had been pretty sure she wouldn't be interrogated for information. Then she'd actually handed over the necklace and something in the flawless sheikh's gold-ringed dark eyes warned her she didn't know him at all. For a few seconds, she'd imagined a harsh future including handcuffs and a dungeon.

  He had promised not to pursue Shadiah, at least. Then he had looked at her like she was an alien creature who wanted him to take her to his leader. He implied she was stupid because she hadn't stolen the ruby for herself. Bizarre. Sure, lots of people would. She wasn't one of them.

  The bartender spotted her and moved past several other men and women in designer clothes to take her order before theirs. Her cheeks flushed with heat.

  People shot her dirty looks whenever she received special treatment, blatant or not. Other women might like the perks, but she found the additional attention humiliating.

  Her father, on the other hand, was in his happy place, schmoozing with royalty. Across the massive white marble ballroom, he held court in a semicircle of some of the most attractive people on the planet. The sheikh, returning from the balcony himself, joined the group, taking his place at her father's right hand.

  He'd looked at her like she was alien? Ha! If they were from two different planets, she was the one from Earth. He clearly came from some distant star where they devoted all their time to breeding the ultimate specimen of male. With Sheikh Ithnan al Kalam, they had finally succeeded, but on the harshest of terms.

  Harsh was the exact word for him. His flawless body was tall and toned, but it wasn't made for touching. He was best admired from afar, for safety. His patrician nose dominated his face and gave him character, but it seemed designed for looking down at other people. His lips were the perfect combination of fullness and masculinity, but they weren't made for kissing, they were designed to hide the fangs.

  The most amazing thing about him was the eyes. She'd never seen anything like them. At the center, they were so black you couldn't tell where the pupil ended and the iris began. The edge was licked with amber flame.

  Those eyes were stunning, but they threatened to suck you in, to entice you to stare long enough to let the man behind them read the contents of your soul. It creeped her out. She'd felt the first time they'd met, shared an introduction and a diplomatic
handshake on the windswept tarmac of the airport. She'd had to break away from the gaze she felt leeching away all her secrets. Since then, she'd avoided him as much as she could.

  She'd seen him three or four times in the last week. Her father was "negotiating" terms with him, pretending to haggle for a pipeline. There had been dinner the first night, where His Majesty had tried to impress her father with amazing food and expensive champagne. Her father had drunk up the attention—and the wine. They'd traded polite words with the sheikh. What had she said? Something about how beautiful the country was, probably. After, she'd been happy to slip away to talk to less-intimidating people. People who were more in her league.

  She'd heard the legend. The al Kalam family were born with those distinctive eyes because they had a supernatural being in their family tree. A desert djinni had desired the sheikh's many-times-great-grandmother and impregnated her with their many-times-great-minus-one-grandfather. The djinni had given the woman three jewels: the Heart of Zallaq, the Palm of Askar, and the Eye of Saddad. The woman and her son had raised a citizen's army and freed the kingdom of Askar from the control of Rome.

  As she mused, she couldn’t help letting her gaze roam to where he stood across the room. Discreetly.

  The story was crap, of course. Djinn weren't real. But she could easily imagine Ithnan, or his older brother Walid, at the head of an army who followed him because they believed he had supernatural powers.

  There was a third brother, but when she'd asked about him, the diplomat she'd talked to had ignored the question and changed the subject. Not in the sheikh's good books, then.

  "Staring at my big brother, I see," said a male voice with the barest tinge of a Middle Eastern accent. "I have seen him do the same to you tonight, you know. I advise you to be careful."

  Gwen turned to see who was speaking, and whom he was speaking to. A pair of eyes rimmed with yellow gold met her gaze.

  "Your brother?" Before she was even finished talking, she realized how stupid she sounded. And for bonus humiliation points, she hadn't been observing him discreetly at all. Who else had noticed her staring? Sigh.

  She didn't stare at guys. She especially didn't stare at the rich guys who attended these kinds of parties. Most of them wanted to cozy up to her as a way of networking with her father. She'd avoided King Ithnan because he probably just wanted her to influence her father. But she had to admit he'd shown no interest in her at all until their balcony scene a minute ago. Now his interest was mostly mocking.

  Even though she knew he wasn't pretending to like her to get to her father, she still had a visceral negative reaction to him. Her stomach turned to concrete when he spoke.

  His Royal Highness Ithnan al Kalam of Zallaq reminded her of all the bad qualities of her father, but she couldn’t say why.

  The man standing in front of her also had otherworldly eyes, but they weren't the same as Ithnan's and Walid's. His irises had alien fire, but were a lighter brown, making the veins of amber less distinct. He wore Sheikh Ithnan's distinctive nose, though. He was slimmer than his brothers, still a gorgeous specimen of male beauty, but with more elegance than animal power. Less intimidating. More accessible. Far closer to the type of man she liked. But her mind kept wandering to Ithnan's wide shoulders.

  He grinned down at her. Since she'd never seen Sheikh Ithnan smile, the display widened the gulf between the two men. But no one could mistake the man's identity—Walid and Ithnan's youngest brother, Thalatha.

  "Yes." His grin had a touch of lunacy. "I’m Number Three."

  He meant his name. The three brothers had been named simply. In Arabic, walid was the word for number one. Ithnan was two. Gwen's throat tightened at the thought. Using a naming convention was for documents, not people.

  Stop, she warned herself. Don't judge a culture you don't understand.

  She forced a smile. "I'm Gwen."

  "Odd." Lines of confusion appeared at the bridge of his nose. "I thought your name was 'pipeline.'"

  Gwen stifled a wry laugh. Thalatha was as different from his brothers as the desert from the ocean. She couldn't imagine Ithnan going out in public with the tails of his bow tie askew, not having shaved for a couple of days, and—was that a button done up in the wrong buttonhole?

  What was that accent? So different from his brothers'. Walid spoke with a heavy dose of British. Ithnan had a more local tinge. Thalatha's sounded more familiar, but she couldn't place it.

  Something inside her relaxed an inch. She'd been exposed to her father's high-society world of stilettos and diamond cufflinks and champagne since she was nine years old, and she still couldn't shake the fear the whole room was about to point a finger at her and shout, "Fake! Take her away!"

  Thalatha didn't share the threatening perfection of his brothers. A girl could breathe around him. Except... his breath smelled of rum. Then she noticed he leaned against the bar heavily.

  He pulled a silver flask from the inside of his coat pocket and tipped golden liquid over the ice cubes in his tumbler. Odd, since the bar was open for business.

  "You're drunk." The words burst out of her. Whoops. She clenched her hand to keep from slapping her palm against her forehead.

  Thalatha grinned wider. Several well-dressed partygoers shot him evil looks before turning away, their noses in the air.

  "Want some?" He jangled his flask in the direction of her still-full champagne flute.

  "No." The word came out with a biting edge. Oops. He was still a prince, even if everyone looked at him with contempt and refused to discuss him. "I mean, no thank you, Your Highness."

  "Highness. Right, because I am so high and you are so low." He snorted as he closed the flask and made it disappear into his jacket. "Let us make an agreement. I shall not call you pipeline, if you agree to call me Thale, as my friends do."

  "Excuse me," she said, feeling the need to get out of there before something bad happened, like the prince deciding she was going home with him. She grabbed her drink from the bar. "I have to join my father, but it's been a pleasure talking to you."

  "I doubt that," he said. "He will eat you alive, you know."

  Gwen's heart pounded. Thale didn't have to say Ithnan's name for her to know whom he was talking about. She froze.

  "He does it to everyone." Thale tipped his drink in his brother's direction. "Do not trust him."

  "Won't be a problem," she assured him. Thale was just plain wrong about Ithnan looking at her. She peeked over her shoulder to prove her point.

  Cold, golden-rimmed eyes met her gaze. She looked away as fast as she could.

  Crap.

  Thale shoved away from the bar. She was stuck in place as he lowered his mouth too close to her ear. Hot breath pricked her lobe.

  "Do you know how he got Zallaq? He screwed over his own brother," he whispered. "Father wanted Zallaq, Askar, and Sadad to be reunited under my precious oldest brother. Making them into a single country again, as they had been under his grandfather, was the plan from the day Number One was born."

  These words were treason in Zallaq, she knew. Sheikh Ithnan's regime was as democratic as a hereditary monarchy got, but speaking against a country's ruler while standing in the ballroom of his own palace might be a dangerous idea. And if not actually life threatening, then just plain rude.

  She should walk away. She knew she should.

  "What happened?" She mentally kicked herself for asking.

  "Ithnan happened." Thale shrugged. "No one is quite certain. He wanted to rule and now he does. He takes what he wants, and damn anyone in his path."

  Thale took a step back, away from her. The whispers were over. She wasn't going to get any more information out of him.

  "Why are you telling me this?"

  "Why not? Do you not find the information interesting? One of his first acts as ruler of Zallaq was to burn the place he'd lived as a child to the ground. Then he wiped the country of Hidd off the map, making it part of Zallaq."

  She didn’t trust his casual
ness. He might dismiss what he'd done, but warning her off his brother didn't fit with the uncaring image he was trying to portray. Something about Thale was just off.

  "Watch yourself," he said. Then he faded into the crowd.

  ***

  An hour later, Jibril, his security chief, stood before Ithnan's desk in the royal study.

  Ithnan had occasional doubts about Jibril's loyalty. But he had doubts about everyone's loyalty. Jibril had never shown signs he could not be trusted, but that was no reason to let his guard down.

  Jibril stood in front of the desk and waited for his assignment. Ithnan felt the man would have waited for hours, silent and still, until his employer acknowledged him. As he himself had been made to wait, many times, in Hidd.

  Ithnan did not play such games. He drew the jewel from the inside pocket of his jacket and passed it to Jibril.

  "Please see this returned to the Royal Treasury," he instructed. "I don't have to tell you discretion is required."

  "Of course," Jibril responded, taking one of the most valued items in Zallaq without any kind of surprise. "May I ask how you discovered the Heart so I can make the appropriate security changes?"

  He informed his security chief of the details of the case, in brief, leaving out the name of the guest who had returned the necklace. Jibril did not press for names, which made Ithnan suspect his chief's investigations had already revealed some information.

  "I have a question, sir, if I may. Does tonight's incident have any effect on the other project?"

  Gwendolyn Spencer's face flashed in his mind, the confusion in her eyes, as if he spoke a language she did not understand. You don't have to thank me for not stealing from you.

  A jewel worth millions in her grasp and she returned it as if the ruby were a dirham she had borrowed from a friend. He still could not understand her actions.

  There was no reason for concern there, he assured himself.

  "What of the presence of your brother? If he should find out..."

  Ithnan had not expected Walid to arrive in Zallaq during the visit of Devoe and his strange daughter, but he should have. A brilliant move on Walid's part, minimizing the time Ithnan would have to influence Devoe in favor of Zallaq. In fact, when Ithnan had been lobbying the father, Walid had been paying attention to the daughter.