and, with a candour borne of urgency, they’d laid out their respective positions. Elena needed a husband to satisfy her Council; Aziz needed to marry within six weeks of his father’s death or he forfeited his title. They’d agreed to wed. They’d agreed to a convenient and loveless union that would give them the spouses they needed and children as heirs, one for Kadar, one for Thallia.
It was a mercenary approach to both marriage and parenthood and, if she’d been an ordinary woman, or even an ordinary queen, she would have wanted something different for her life. But she was a queen hanging onto her kingdom by a mere thread, and marriage to Aziz al Bakir had felt like the only way to keep clinging.
But for that to happen, she had to get married. And to get married, she had to escape.
She couldn’t get out of the car, so she needed to wait. Watch. Learn her enemy.
‘What is your name?’ she asked. The man didn’t even look at her.
‘My name is Khalil.’
‘Why have you taken me?’
He slid her a single, fathomless glance. ‘We’re almost at our destination, Your Highness. Your questions will be answered there, after we are both refreshed.’
Fine. She’d wait. She’d stay calm and in control and look for the next opportunity to gain her freedom. Even so terror caught her by the throat and held on. She’d felt this terrible, numbing fear before, as if the world were sliding by in slow motion, everything slipping away from her as she waited, frozen, disbelieving that this was actually happening...
No, this was not the same as before. She wouldn’t let it be. She was queen of a country, even if her throne was all too shaky a seat. She was resourceful, courageous, strong.
She would get out of this. Somehow. She refused to let some rebel insurgent wreck her marriage...or end her reign as queen.
* * *
Khalil al Bakir glanced again at the woman by his side. She sat straight and tall, her chin lifted proudly, her pupils dilated with fear.
Admiration for the young queen flickered reluctantly through him. Her attempt at escape had been reckless and laughable, but also brave, and he felt an unexpected sympathy for her. He knew what it was like to feel both trapped and defiant. Hadn’t he, as a boy, tried to escape from his captor, Abdul-Hafiz, as often as he could, even though he’d known how fruitless such attempts would be? Deep in the desert, there had been no place for a young boy to run or hide. Yet still he’d tried, because to try was to fight, and to fight was to remind yourself you were alive and had something to fight for. The scars on his back were testament to his many failed attempts.
Queen Elena would have no such scars. He would not be accused of ill-treating his guest, no matter what the frightened monarch might think. He intended to keep her for only four days, until the six weeks had passed and Aziz would be forced to relinquish his claim to the throne and call a national referendum to decide who the next sheikh would be.
Khalil intended to be that man.
Until that moment, when the vote had been called and he sat on the throne that was rightfully his, he would not rest easy. But then, he’d never rested easy, not since the day when he’d been all of seven years old and his father had dragged him out of his lesson with his tutor, thrown him onto the sharp stones in front of the Kadaran palace and spat in his face.
‘You are not my son.’
It was the last time he’d ever seen him, his mother, or his home.
Khalil closed his eyes against the memories that still made his fists clench and bile rise in his throat. He would not think of those dark days now. He would not remember the look of disgust and even hatred on the face of the father he’d adored, or the anguished cries of his mother as she’d been dragged away, only to die just a few months later from a simple case of the flu because she’d been denied adequate medical care. He wouldn’t think of the terror he’d felt when he’d been shoved in the back of a van and driven to a bleak desert outpost, or the look of cruel satisfaction on Abdul-Hafiz’s face when he’d been thrown at his feet like a sack of rubbish.
No, he wouldn’t think of any of that. He’d think of the future, the very promising future, when he, the son his father had rejected in favour of his mistress’s bastard, would sit on the throne of the kingdom he’d been born to rule.
Next to him, he felt Queen Elena tremble.
Twenty taut minutes later the SUV pulled up at the makeshift camp Khalil had called home for the last six months, ever since he’d returned to Kadar. He opened the door and turned to Elena, who glared at him in challenge.
‘Where have you taken me?’
He gave her a cold smile. ‘Why don’t you come out and see for yourself?’ Without waiting for an answer, he took hold of her wrist. Her skin was soft and cold and she let out a muffled gasp as he drew her from the car.
She stumbled on a stone as she came to her feet, and as he righted her he felt her breasts brush his chest. It had been a long time since he’d felt the soft touch of a woman, and his body responded with base instinct, his loins tightening as desire flared deep inside. Her hair, so close to his face, smelled of lemons.
Firmly Khalil moved her away from him. He had no time for lust and certainly not with this woman.
His right-hand man, Assad, emerged from another vehicle. ‘Your Highness.’ Elena turned automatically, and Khalil smiled in grim satisfaction. Assad had been addressing him, not the unruly queen. Even though he had not officially claimed his title, those loyal to him still addressed him as if he had.
He’d been surprised and gratified at how many were loyal to him, when they had only remembered a tousle-haired boy who’d been dragged crying and gibbering from the palace. Until six months ago, he had not been in Kadar since he’d been ten years old. But people remembered.
The desert tribes, bound more by tradition than the people of Siyad, had always resented Sheikh Hashem’s rash decision to discard one wife for a mistress no one had liked, and a son he’d already publicly declared illegitimate. When Khalil had returned, they’d named him sheikh of his mother’s tribe and had rallied around him as the true ruling Sheikh of Kadar.
Even so, Khalil trusted no one. Loyalties could change on a whim. Love was capricious. He’d learned those lessons all too painfully well. The only person he trusted now was himself.
‘Queen Elena and I would like some refreshment,’ he told Assad in Arabic. ‘Is there a tent prepared?’
‘Yes, Your Highness.’
‘You can debrief me later. For now, I’ll deal with the Queen.’ He turned to Elena, whose panicked gaze was darting in every direction, her body poised for flight.
‘If you are thinking of running away,’ he told her calmly, switching to English as the language they both knew, ‘don’t bother. The desert stretches for hundreds of miles in every direction, and the nearest oasis is over a day’s ride by camel. Even if you managed to leave the camp, you would die of thirst, if not a snake or scorpion bite.’
Queen Elena glared at him and said nothing. Khalil gestured her forward. ‘Come, have some refreshment, and I will answer your questions as I promised.’
Elena hesitated and then, clearly knowing she had no choice, she nodded and followed him across the camp.
* * *
Elena took stock of her surroundings as she walked behind Khalil. A few tents formed a rough semi-circle; she could see some horses and camels tethered to a post under a lean-to. The wind blew sand into her face and her hair into her mouth.
She held her hands up to her face, tried to blink the grit out of her eyes. Khalil pushed back the folds of the tent and ushered her inside.
Elena took a steadying breath, trying to compose herself. The only thing she could do now was learn as much as she could, and choose her moment well.
Khalil