After heavy initial damage, her plans were for the ultimate good. For who better than he to unite these kingdoms, lead them to a future of power and prosperity instead of the ruin they were heading for under the infirm hands of old fools and their deficient successors? He, the embodiment of the best of the Aal Munsooris? She was certain he’d one day surpass even her in everything.
He’d heard that before. According to Jalal, he already had.
But no matter what he’d thought her capable of, what she’d done had surpassed his worst predictions. And as usual, without obtaining his consent, let alone his approval, she’d executed her plans with seamless precision to force his “deserved greatness” on him. She’d been positive he’d come to appreciate what she’d done, embrace the role she’d tailored for him.
And she could have so easily succeeded.
Even Amjad, his oldest brother and now king of Zohayd, who suspected everything that moved, hadn’t suspected her. As queen of Zohayd, she had seemed to have as much to lose as anyone if her husband was deposed. Ingenious.
He recognized that convoluted, long-term premeditation in his own mind and methods. But he consciously confined it to business, driving himself to the top of his tech-development and investment field in record-breaking time. His mother used her intricate intelligence with every breath.
“Please, fasten your seat belt, Your Highness.”
He swept his gaze up to the flight attendant. He’d almost forgotten he was on board his private jet.
The beautiful brunette could have said, Please, unfasten me, for all the invitation in her eyes. She’d jump on the least measure of response in his attitude.
He regarded her with his signature impassiveness, which had frozen hardened tycoons and brazen media people in their tracks.
Her color heightened. “We are landing.”
He clicked his seat belt into place. “As I gathered.”
She tried again. “Will you be needing anything?”
“La, Shokrun.” He looked away, dismissing her.
Once she’d turned, he watched her undulate away, sighed.
He would order Khaleel to assign her a desk job. And to confine his immediate personnel to men, or women at least twenty years his senior.
He exhaled again, peered from his window at Durrat Al Sahel—the Pearl of the Coast—Azmahar’s capital. From up here he had an eagle-eye view of the crisis he’d been called upon to wrestle with.
He’d thought he’d seen the worst of it in the oil spill off the coast. The ominous blackness tainting the emerald waters was terrible enough. But seeing the disorganization and deterioration even from this altitude was a candid demonstration of how deep the problem ran. How hard it would be to fix.
His heart tightened as the pilot started the final descent, bringing more details into sharper focus.
Azmahar. The other half of his heritage. Decaying.
What a crushing pity.
He hadn’t thought he’d ever see this place again. The day Roxanne had walked out on him, he’d left Azmahar swearing he’d never return.
He wasn’t only returning—he’d promised to consider the kingship candidacy. He’d made the proviso that his return would be unannounced, that he’d make his own covert investigations and reach a decision uninfluenced by more sales pitches or pleas.
He was still stunned he’d conceded that much. From all evidence, this was one catastrophic mistake in the making.
Life really had a way of giving a man reason to commit the unreasonable.
After his fatherland had rejected him, his motherland claimed to be desperate for his intervention. Investigating if he could be the one to offer it salvation was near irresistible.
He also had to admit, the idea of redeeming himself was too powerful a lure. No matter that logic separated him from his mother’s treachery, the fact remained. Her actions had skewered into his very identity, which had already been compromised from birth by her influence. Her most outrageous transgression had tarnished his honor and image, no matter what his family said. Most of them, anyway.
Jalal had less favorable views. Of course.
Jalal. Another reason he was considering this.
His twin was another candidate for the throne, after all.
Then there was Rashid. His and Jalal’s best friend turned bitterest rival. And yet another candidate.
Was it any wonder he was tempted?
Trouncing those two blowhards was an end unto itself.
So whether it was duty, redemption or rivalry that drove him, each reason was imperative on its own.
But none of them was the true catalyst that had him Azmahar-bound now.
Roxanne was.
She was back in Azmahar.
He took it as the fates nudging him to stop trying not to think of her. As he’d done for eight years. Eight years.
Way past high time he ended her occupation of his memories, her near monopoly of his bitterness. He had enough unfinishable business. He would lay the ghost of her share of it to rest.
He would damn well exorcise it.
“… repercussions and resolutions, Ms. Gleeson?”
Roxanne blinked at the distinguished, silver-haired man looking expectantly at her.
Sheikh Aasem Al-Qadi had been her liaison to the interim government since she’d started this post two months ago. And she had to concentrate to remember who he was, and what he—hell, what she—was doing here.
She cleared her throat and mind. “As you know, this affects the whole region and many intertwining international entities, each with their own complexities, interests and ideas about how to handle the situation. A rushed study would only cause more misinformation and complications.”
The man raised an elegant hand adorned with an onyx-set silver ring, his refined face taking on an even more genial cast. “The last thing I intend to do is rush you, Ms. Gleeson.” And if he did, he knew nothing about her if he thought an inperson nudge would make her step up her efforts. She and her team had been flat out digging in that sea. “I’m merely hoping for a more hands-on role in your investigations, and if it’s available, a look at a timeline for your intended work plan.”
“I assure you, you’ll be the first to know when a realistic timeline can be set.” She tried on the smile she’d long practiced, formal and friendly at once, which always gained her cooperation. “And my team could certainly do with the highlevel insider’s perspective you’d bring to the table.”
After much cordiality and what she felt was a reaffirmed faith in her effectiveness, Sheikh Al-Qadi left her office.
She leaned against the door she’d closed behind him, groaned.
What was she doing here?
So this post was a politico-economic analyst’s holy grail. And she had been bred for the role. But it had brought her back to where she could stumble upon Haidar.
She’d been certain she wouldn’t. She’d kept track of him, and he’d never come back to Azmahar. And then, she was no longer the girl who’d fallen head over heels in love with him. She was one of the most sought-after analyst-strategists in the field now, Azmahar being her third major post. If the “ax lodged in the head,” as they said here, and she did meet him, she’d treat him with the neutrality and diplomacy of the professional that she was.
But she wouldn’t have risked it if not for her mother.
When