The Sheikh's Pregnancy Proposal

Outside, lightning flickered and, in the distance, thunder crashed. As Murphy’s Law would have it, the rain, which had been light earlier was now tropical.

Extracting the umbrella, Sarah paused by the antique double doors of the entrance, reluctant to step out into such a heavy downpour. A flicker of movement turned her head. She saw Gabe speaking to the tall, bald man who had checked her invitation.

Aware that in just a few seconds he could turn and see her standing in the foyer, watching him, she pushed open the doors and stepped outside.

As she descended the steps the wind, damp with rain and bitingly cold, sent a raw shiver through her. She came to a halt at the edge of the sheltered area. Flipping up her umbrella, she stepped into the wet and wild night.

The bottom half of her dress was almost instantly soaked. Water seeped into the soles of her boots as she threaded through cars that gleamed beneath streetlights. The parking lot seemed farther away than when she had arrived. In the murky darkness, the garish lights from the nightclub were overbright, although the steady thud of music was now muted by the sound of the rain.

Dragging soaked hair from her eyes and glad she was wearing waterproof mascara, she fumbled in her bag, searching for keys. She depressed the key lock, suddenly wishing she hadn’t parked quite so close to the nightclub. The lights of her car flashed and she headed for the welcome beacon of her small hatchback. As she opened the door, she became aware of a cluster of dark shadows congregated beneath the overhang of the warehouse-size building that housed the nightclub. Slamming the door closed, she immediately locked it, just in case the youths tried something silly.

She inserted her key into the ignition. The starter motor made its familiar high-pitched whine, but the motor itself refused to fire. Feeling a little desperate, she tried again, then a third time. When the starter took on a deeper, slower sound, as if the battery was becoming drained, she immediately stopped. She was no mechanic but, at a guess, the wind had driven rain under the hood and the electronics had gotten wet. The car wouldn’t start until she managed to dry the motor. If she kept using the starter she would also end up with a flat battery.

She considered ringing her mother then immediately dismissed the thought. Hannah was overseas on a buying trip for her interior-decorating business. Graham was still inside. As much as she didn’t want to ask him, he would have to help her. Groaning, she tried texting. When minutes passed with no reply, she bit the bullet and rang him. The call went through to voice mail.

Deciding that it would be a whole lot simpler to just walk back into the consulate to get help, Sarah grabbed her bag and stepped out into the rain, which had thankfully eased to a fine drizzle. A tap on her shoulder made her start.

“Having trouble, darlin’?”

She stiffened at the shock of being touched by a stranger and stepped away from the powerful whiff of alcohol fumes. “Nothing I can’t handle, thanks.”

He grinned hazily. “I’d sure like to help you.”

There was a stifled laugh somewhere behind him. With a jolt Sarah realized they had been joined by two more men, both of them like the first, darkly dressed, wearing leather and decorated with tattoos and multiple piercings.

The taller of the two grinned. “Don’t keep her to yourself, Ty. We’d all like to help the lady.”

Jaw set, Sarah debated trying to get back into the car and locking the doors, but decided against that. If she did, they could prevent her from closing the door and before she knew where she was, they would be inside the car with her and she would be in a worse position.

Rape. The horrifying thought shuddered through her. She was a virgin. She had saved herself for love and marriage. The first time she was with a man could not be because she was being forced.

Footsteps sounded across the parking lot. They were no longer alone. Thinking quickly, Sarah’s fingers tightened on her umbrella. It wasn’t much of a weapon, but she would use it if she had to. “I don’t need help. My boyfriend’s here. He’ll fix the car.”

“What boyfriend?” The taller man grabbed her arm as she edged away.

Jaw gritted, Sara brought the umbrella’s wooden handle crashing down on the man’s fingers.

“This one,” a dark voice murmured, as Gabe stepped around a chunky utility vehicle into the light.

Three

Rubbing bruised knuckles, the tall guy, who now didn’t seem large at all compared to Gabe, stumbled backward. “Hey, sorry, man,” he mumbled. “Didn’t know she was taken.”

Gabe glided closer. When he stretched out his hand, it seemed the most natural thing in the world to put her fingers in his. “Even if she wasn’t ‘taken’ you shouldn’t have gone near her. But, as you said, she is taken, so don’t bother her again.”

Tall Guy took another step backward. The other two had already climbed into a car decorated with dents. He held one hand up in a placating gesture as he fumbled open the rear passenger door. “Yeah, man. She’s yours. Totally. We won’t bother her again.”

He clambered into the car, which jolted into motion with a squeal of tires.

Gabe released his grip on her hand. “Are you okay?”

Sarah replaced her car keys in her bag. She was cold and her fingers were shaking, but she barely noticed because she was so focused on the fact that Gabe had come after her. She didn’t know how he had located her in the dark, or why he had walked out into the rain to find her, just that he had. “I am now, thank you.”

“Problem with your car?”

She blinked at the shift of topic. His gaze was still fixed on the taillights of the retreating car. The steely remoteness of his expression sent a chill down her spine. He looked more than capable of backing his flatly delivered challenge with physical force.

A fierce, oddly primitive sense of satisfaction curled through her. Gabe had not only come to her aid, but he had been prepared to physically fight for her.

When he repeated the question about the car, she realized he was deliberately distracting her from the nastiness of the encounter. Suppressing a shiver, she replaced her umbrella in her bag. “I think the electronics got wet.”

Gabe, who had walked around to the front of her car, took a sleek phone out of his pocket and stabbed a short dial. “Is there still a charge in the battery?”

“I stopped before it went flat.”

“Good.” Gabe spoke quietly into his phone in the same liquid Zahiri she had heard him use before then slipped the cell back in his jacket pocket. “Xavier will have a look at the car. He’s not a mechanic, but he spends a lot of his spare time tinkering with cars.”

She hooked the strap of her bag more securely over her shoulder. It was an odd moment to register that the wind had dropped, leaving an eerie calm after the storm. With mist rising off the wet concrete, wreathing the cars and forming a halo around the street lamps, the night now seemed peaceful.

With a reflexive shiver she rubbed at her chilled arms and tried not to let her teeth chatter. Now that she was no longer buzzing with adrenaline the cold seemed to be seeping into her bones. “I suppose Xavier is one of the sheikh’s bodyguards.” The remark was shamelessly probing but she didn’t care. She suddenly needed to know more about Gabe, what he did for a living, how long he would be in Wellington, when or if he was coming back—

His gaze glittered over her, making her aware of the soaked red dress clinging to her skin, her hair trailing wetly around her cheeks. “Only when the sheikh leaves Zahir.”

The answer was confusing, as if the sheikh was still in Zahir when Sarah knew him to be here, in Wellington. But with Gabe walking toward her, dark trousers clinging low on narrow hips, his jacket damply molded to broad shoulders, white shirt plastered to his chest so that the bronze of his skin glowed through, it was hard to concentrate on unraveling subtleties.

He frowned. “You’re cold. Have you got a coat in the car?”

“No c-coat. Someone at the consulate took mine by mistake.”

A moment later, his jacket dropped around her shoulders, swamping her with warmth and filling her nostrils with the scent of clean male and an enticing hint of sandalwood. An electrifying thrill shot through her, reminding her of the sharp, visceral jolt she had felt when Gabe had said she was his.

He was briefly close enough that she felt the heat radiating off his body, and she had to resist the urge to sway a few inches closer to that delicious warmth. Her fingers closed on the fine weave of the jacket lapels, hugging the fabric closer. Despite everything, all of the warnings she was giving herself, she couldn’t help loving that she was wearing his jacket, which was so large the sleeves dropped almost to her knees. After the nasty scenes with Graham and the leather-clad thugs, Gabe’s chivalry—his consideration, as if she truly mattered to him—was a soothing balm.

Gabe checked his watch. “Xavier’s on his way. If you’ll give me your car keys, he’ll take a look. In the meantime I suggest you come with me back to the consulate. There’s a guest suite there, so you can dry off while you wait.”

A vivid flash of the young woman flinging her arms around him made Sarah stiffen. “Won’t your...girlfriend mind?’

His expression registered his surprise at the question. “I don’t have a girlfriend. If you’re referring to the young woman who came into the lecture, she was a cousin I haven’t seen in years. She dropped in because she knew I was leaving in the morning.”

The relief that the pretty girl wasn’t a love interest was almost instantly replaced by the depressing confirmation that Gabe was leaving in a matter of hours.

His hand briefly cupped her elbow as he helped her step up onto the higher level of the consulate parking lot. “Is she the reason you left the lecture?”

Her mouth went dry at the bluntness of the question but after everything that had happened, somehow it didn’t seem as intrusive as it should have been. It would have been easy to say she’d had a fight with Graham and was upset, but the truth was, whatever she had felt for Graham had been utterly overshadowed by her response to Gabe.

He was leaving in just a few hours.

Lifting her chin, she met his gaze. There was no point trying to hide what was already clear to him. She had been hurt and disappointed when she had thought he was committed to another woman. “Yes.”

There was a moment of vibrating silence, filled by the muted sound of their footfalls on wet pavement, the distant wash of the sea and the slow drip of water splashing off a gutter. Sarah’s stomach tightened as Gabe directed her to a door at the side of the consulate building and held it for her. Somehow, in the space of a little over an hour they had achieved a level of intimacy that made her stomach tighten and her pulse pound. But her time alone with him was almost up. Soon they would be joined by other people and a conversation that had become unexpectedly important would be over.

As if to underscore her thoughts, the plump administrative official, Tarik, strode down the corridor toward them, disapproval pulling his brows into a dark line. She drew a breath, but it was already too late to ask Gabe the question that was burning inside her.

He knew she was strongly attracted to him and that was why she had left the consulate so quickly. But was attraction the reason he had come looking for her?

* * *

Gabe left Sarah freshening up in the guest room that opened onto his study and strode along the hall to his suite. The moment he had seen the thug lay hands on her replayed through his mind, making him tense. When he had registered the danger, the half-formed desires and intentions that had driven him out into the stormy night had coalesced into one burning reality.

He wanted Sarah Duval.

He hadn’t liked the fact that she’d had a date. He had liked it even less that the drunk thought he could simply reach out and touch her. Crazily, because Gabe barely knew her and had no interest in emotional attachments, his attraction to Sarah had coalesced into the kind of knee-jerk possessiveness he could not afford on the eve of his engagement. But, as hard as he tried to shake it, he couldn’t—for one simple reason. In his mind he had already claimed her.

As he unlocked the door, Xavier stepped out of the elevator and followed Gabe into the suite. Gabe grabbed a towel from the bathroom and began blotting his hair and face. “What’s the verdict on the car?”

Xavier shrugged. “We could have it going in half an hour if we put it in the consulate garage, but to get it there we’ll need to tow it and none of the hire vehicles have tow bars. The best-case scenario is that I call her a taxi.”

“No.” Gabe unknotted his tie and peeled out of his wet shirt and tossed both in the laundry basket.

The sensible thing was to do what Xavier suggested. The last thing he needed was a complication that would make the commitment he had to make in the morning even more difficult. But ever since Sarah had walked into the reception room, glowing like a fiery beacon in red, her dark hair a sexy tousled mass, the obligation and duty of his impending marriage had seemed secondary. When she had disobeyed all instructions and laid her hand on his ancestor’s sword, he had been entranced.

Somehow, the fact that she had knocked the sword, which was practically a sacred object on Zahir, off its bracket had only made her more interesting.

She was a history teacher. Against all odds, he found himself grinning.

Like no history teacher he’d ever seen.

Gabe strolled into his bedroom to find a clean shirt. In the past hour something curious had happened. He felt lighter and more carefree, as if a weight had lifted off him.

Because for the first time in years when he had looked at another woman, he hadn’t been haunted by thoughts of Jasmine.

He guessed the fact that Sarah was literally Jasmine’s polar opposite—tall and curvy with a steady, resolute gaze and hints of a fiery temper, instead of tiny and fragile and sweetly feminine—had helped. When Sarah had toppled Kadin’s sword, in some odd way the separation from his past had seemed complete. Jasmine had hated all of the old Templar relics and the violent history that went with them. Sarah had seemed fascinated. From the way she had wielded her umbrella in the parking lot, he was willing to bet she would not be averse to holding a sword.

He stared at his crisply starched shirts in the closet, looking for something that didn’t belong in a boardroom. Clothing that might indicate that he had a life. “I’m taking her home.”

Xavier muttered something soft and short. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. Neither will your father.”

Gabe shrugged into a dark shirt and buttoned it. The searing attraction that had sent him walking out into the night to find Sarah settled into grim determination. Xavier’s unease mirrored his own because it was a fact that Gabe didn’t want to just spend time with Sarah—he wanted her. Period. But just hours out from signing his life away, he was in no mood to deny a response he thought he would never feel again. “Right now a whole lot of things are happening that are not exactly good ideas.”

An outmoded financial system that did not allow for the foreign investment Gabe had been advocating for years, and the marriage that was Zahir’s financial rescue plan.

“The marriage is just an arrangement, you could have an—”

“No.” Zahir was Western, but it was also extremely conservative. And Gabe was clear on one fact: once he was married he would not dishonor his vows or his family’s integrity.

Xavier looked uncomfortable. “Sometimes I forget the pressure you’re under. But what do you know about this woman? She could be some hard-nosed journalist angling for a story.”

“Sarah’s not a journalist.” Gabe shrugged into a soft black leather jacket. “And she won’t go to the press.”

“You can’t know that. You’ve only just met her. You have no idea what she’ll do.”

Gabe went still inside as a memory flickered. Cold rain scything, a dark-haired woman, head down against the weather, stepping around a corner. As his hands had shot out to stop her caroming into him he had noticed that her hair had been scraped back and her face had been almost bare of makeup. She had looked like a history teacher. But it had been Sarah, her eyes that deep, pure blue, the faintly imperious nose and exquisite cheekbones, the soft, generous mouth.

Instead of tempering his attraction, the recollection had the disconcerting effect of deepening it. In that moment, Gabe recognized the quality that drew him to Sarah most of all—the fact that in the midst of all the superficiality of the social world he usually moved in she was exactly what she seemed, a refreshingly direct woman unafraid to reach out and take what she wanted. “I met her yesterday.”

Xavier’s brows jerked together. “That makes it even worse.”

Everything Xavier was saying was true. Normally he didn’t pursue women he had only just met. Because of his position, he accepted that security checks on the women he dated were a fact of life. But ever since he had woken up that morning he had been restless and in no mood to be controlled. “Relax. She doesn’t know who I am.”

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