The Desert Sheikh's Innocent Queen: King of the Desert, Captive Bride

“Didn’t have much of a choice.” He dark eyes rested on her face, his expression grim. “It was either that, or allow you to go before the Ozr Prison judge in two days’ time, and believe me, you wouldn’t have survived the sentence.”

Liv bit her lip and looked away, out the window. They were approaching the city center, which was far more cramped than the modern neighborhoods. Smoke rose from food stands on the street corners. “It would have been harsh,” she said.

“It would have been deadly,” he agreed.

“And I just wanted to have an adventure,” she said, her voice low. “I never imagined this nightmare.”

The driver slowed, then braked to a complete stop. The sheikh’s wireless phone suddenly rang and he answered it, his eyes on the line of police cars ahead.

“The nightmare,” he said, echoing her words as he hung up the phone, “isn’t over yet.”

Liv leaned forward to get a look at the police officers ahead. “What’s happening?”

“We’re to be questioned,” he answered shortly, his features hardening. Turning his head, he looked at her, a close, ruthless inspection that was as thorough as it was critical.

“Pull your headscarf forward,” he directed. “Hide all your hair and wrap the fabric across your mouth and nose so that as much of your face is covered as possible.” He retrieved the sunglasses from the seat and handed them to her. “And keep these on. Don’t take them off unless I tell you to.” Then he opened the car door and stepped out, slamming it shut behind him.

CHAPTER TWO

THE nightmare isn’t over yet.

Sheikh Fehr’s words rang in her ears as he walked from the car. The driver had locked the car doors the moment the sheikh left the vehicle and she watched Sheikh Fehr now, heart in her throat, as a group of uniformed officers approached him.

From inside the car she could hear their muffled voices outside. The officers practically surrounded the sheikh, but he appeared unruffled.

They were speaking Arabic and she understood nothing of what they were saying other than there seemed to be a problem, and from the way the officers kept gesturing to the car, their voices growing louder, she had a sick feeling that the conversation had something to do with her.

Several long minutes passed and then Sheikh Fehr turned to the car and opened the back door. Liv ducked her head as the officers crowded around to get a look inside. Terrified, she kept her head down, her eyes closed behind the oversized pair of sunglasses.

After what seemed like eternity the car door slammed shut and shortly after the sheikh climbed back in the car. The chauffeur immediately started the ignition and pulled away.

Liv nervously laced and unlaced her fingers. “Is everything okay?” she asked, as they left the narrower, old city streets behind for the wide boulevard that ran along the North Africa coast.

“Yes.”

When it became clear he didn’t intend to say more she added, “What did they want?”

“They wanted to know if I’d legally entered their country and if I’d done anything illegal while here.”

“Have you?”

“No and yes, but that’s not what I told them. I couldn’t tell them that or you’d be in one of their cars heading straight back to Ozr.”

“So what did you tell them instead?”

He hesitated a moment, then plucked the sunglasses from her face, calmly pocketing them inside his robe. “That I was escorting a female member of my family home.”

But he wasn’t, she thought, her uneasiness growing. “Did they believe you?”

His expression turned mocking. “They know who I am, and they saw I had the proper paperwork. There wasn’t much they could do at that point.”

He was setting her newly heightened inner alarm, the one that should have been working when she agreed to carry Elsie’s bag in her backpack.

Her inner alarm hadn’t been attuned to danger then, but it was now, and Liv knew from Sheikh Fehr’s tone, as well as his evasive answers, that there was something he wasn’t telling her. Something wasn’t right. She didn’t know what it was and she very much wanted to know. “The officers were upset about something,” she persisted.

He shrugged. “It’s a cultural thing.”

She leaned forward. “Tell me.”

“We’re a man and woman traveling alone together.”

“So?”

“We’re not actually related, which is illegal in Jabal.”

Liv sat back against the seat, her fingers curling into her palms. “So they could rearrest me,” she whispered.

“Not if we get out of here first.”

They reached the small business airport in less than thirty minutes, the airport built on the outskirts of the capital city. The chauffeur drove them through the airport gates and right out onto the deserted tarmac, pulling close to the jet’s stairs.

The jet was long, sleek and narrow, the body a shiny silver with a discrete gold-and-black emblem on the tail. Sheikh Fehr walked Olivia to the jet’s stairs. “Go ahead and board,” he told her. “I need to speak with the pilot about our flight plan.”

She nodded and, holding on to the handrail, climbed the steps. A flight attendant greeted Liv as she entered the plane.

“We’ll be leaving soon,” the flight attendant said, leading Liv to the grouping of four enormous club-style leather chairs that made up one of the plane’s sitting areas. “Do you have any bags or luggage for me to stow?”

Liv shook her head as she sat down. “I don’t have … anything,” she said, reaching for the seat belt.

“So your luggage has been sent ahead?” the flight attendant asked.

“Unfortunately, I’ve lost everything,” Liv answered, and suddenly, remembering how she’d been callously stripped and searched, she shivered. They’d confiscated everything that first night. Her backpack, her passport, her clothes, her makeup bag. All of it. The only thing she had was what she wore, and even that was a prison-issued robe and headscarf.

The flight attendant saw Liv shiver. “Cold?”

“A little,” Liv admitted, still chilled from the weeks and weeks in the dark, dank cell. It’d been so awful, so unbelievable. She still couldn’t understand how she’d ended up at Ozr. She’d never broken a law in her life—well, except for driving over the speed limit, and even then, it had been five miles over the limit, not twenty.

“Would you like a blanket?”

“Please.” Liv smiled gratefully.

“Poor thing. Have you been sick?” the flight attendant asked sympathetically as she crossed to the wood-paneled cabinet and retrieved an ivory cashmere throw and small pillow, the ivory blanket the same color as the supple leather seats.

Returning, the flight attendant unfolded the blanket and draped it across Liv’s legs. “And just between you and me, I think the air conditioner is a little too efficient. Now, how about something warm to drink? Coffee, tea?”

“Coffee, with milk and sugar. If that’s not too much trouble.”

“None at all.”

The flight attendant disappeared into the jet’s galley kitchen and Liv sank deeper into her seat. This was surreal, she thought, tugging the blanket up to her shoulders. An hour ago she was still locked up in Ozr and now here she was, on a private jet, being waited on hand and foot.

While Liv sipped her coffee on the plane, Khalid joined his pilot in the final preflight inspection.

“We’ve a change of plans,” Khalid told the pilot.

The pilot looked up from his clipboard. “We’re low on petrol. The airport refused our request to refuel.”

“I’m not surprised. We had a little problem on the way here.”

“Is that why we’re not going straight to Sarq?”

Khalid nodded. “Can’t risk involving my brother in this. There’s enough tension between Sarq and Jabal already. I won’t drag Sharif, or my people, into an international incident.”

The pilot’s attention was suddenly caught by a line of cars on the horizon. “Police,” he said, nodding at the line of cars racing toward them. “Are they coming for you?”

“That, or my guest, or us both,” Khalid replied, dispassionately watching the cars grow closer.

The pilot patted the side of the plane. “Then maybe it’s time to go.”

Liv looked up as Sheikh Fehr and the pilot boarded, the pilot drawing the folding stairs up and then securing the door. Sheikh Fehr stopped to speak to the flight attendant and then continued down the aisle to take a seat across from Liv.

“Are you not feeling well?” he asked Liv, seeing the blanket wrapped around her.

“I was cold,” she answered, feeling the engine turn on, a low vibration that hummed through the entire plane.

Sheikh Fehr’s eyes narrowed as he inspected her. “You are quite pale. I wonder if you’re coming down sick.”

“I’m not sick. Just chilly. But I’m getting warmer.” She started to fold the blanket up, but the sheikh put out a hand to stop her.

“Don’t,” he said. “If the blanket is keeping you warm, there’s no need to put it away.”

As the jet began to taxi toward the runway, she resettled the blanket on her lap and glanced at him from beneath her lashes. Against his white head-covering, his skin was a tawny gold, while his eyebrows were inky slashes above long-lashed eyes the color of bittersweet chocolate.

His features were almost too angular, too strong. His forehead was high, his cheekbones were prominent, even his nose was a trifle too long. It should have made him unattractive. Instead it gave him a rugged, and very primitive, appeal.

As she looked at him, a window behind his shoulder, she caught sight of a flashing red-and-blue light.

Her eyes widened as she spotted the line of cars trailing the jet.

The sheikh glanced out the window. “Police,” he said matter-of-factly.

She looked at him, her stomach tumbling, the fear returning. “What do they want now?”

“Us,” he answered.

Us, she repeated silently, as the jet began racing down the runway, faster and faster until they were off the ground and soaring up, up, into the air.

Liv sat glued to the window.

Within ten minutes they had lifted high above the congested streets of the capital, and as they climbed higher, green fields came into view before the green faded to a khaki gold, and then even the gold hue faded, leaving just pale khaki.

“What happened in Ozr?” Sheikh Fehr asked abruptly. “What did they do to you?”

Liv jerked her attention away from the landscape below. “Nothing,” she answered quickly, too quickly, and from the creasing of the sheikh’s eyes, she knew he knew it, too.

“Ozr isn’t a nice place,” he said. “I can’t imagine they were nice to you.”

She suddenly pictured her life of the past four long weeks. The terrible food, the lack of sunlight, the lack of exercise, the taunts, the accusations and the endless middle-of-the-night interrogations. “I’m here now.”

His jaw tightened. “Barely,” he answered quietly, his gaze meeting hers.

She suppressed a shiver and turned away, unable to hold his intense gaze, or dwell on her weeks in Ozr. She was out now. That’s what mattered. She was out and soon she’d be going home.

“The view is beautiful from here,” she said, determinedly turning her attention to the landscape below.

He gestured toward the stretch of brown and beige beneath them. “That’s the Great Sarq Desert. It begins in Southern Jabal and stretches through much of Sarq, my country, and is one of the largest deserts in Northern Africa, consisting of thousands of miles.”

“I’ve read quite a bit about the Great Sarq Desert,” she said shyly but eagerly. “I read that thousands of years ago the desert was once a lush tropical landscape, that there are elaborate rock paintings in the mountains depicting everyday life. Is that true?”

He nodded. “Yes, and scattered oases are all that’s left of that ancient tropical landscape.”

“Oases used by traders and their caravans,” she added, her gaze glued to the empty plains below. “Before the trip I was reading a book on the area, and it said that in ancient civilization the desert here was the corridor that linked Africa with the coast, and the world beyond. Everyone utilized the desert corridor. The Romans, the Phoenicians, as well as the early Greek colonists—” She broke off, flushing. “But of course you know all that. It’s just … new … to me.”

The look her gave her was frankly appraising. “I didn’t know American women cared about geography so far from their own homes.”

Her eyebrows lifted. “You can’t judge America, or Americans, by what you read in the news.”

“No?” he mocked.

“No.” She held her breath for a moment, battling her temper. “Just like it’d be unfair of me to judge all the countries in this area by what happened to me in Ozr.”

The rest of the flight passed in silence. Liv tried to blank her mind, desperate to ignore the questions and worrying thoughts racing through her head. She leaned back in her chair and turned her attention to the landscape below and for a short while, it provided the much-needed distraction.

The vast desert, with its contrasting hues of tan and orange, burnt amber and rust, maroon and even a few shades of purple, held her captivated as flat expanses of sand gave way to gently rising sand dunes, which led to even higher hills. She’d never thought the desert could have so many contrasting colors. It was breathtakingly beautiful.

Before long the hills completely disappeared and desert sand gave way to the Red Sea, the deep turquoise colors a vivid contrast to the view they had left behind. Liv was again craning her head to see out the window as they flew over the coast of the African continent. Brilliant blue water sparkled below as it suddenly dawned on her that they weren’t headed to Sarq but a different destination.

It had to be Dubai, she thought. It was one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the Middle East and a place very far removed from Jabal. “Are we headed to Dubai?” she asked, as the plane tilted slightly, giving her a wider view of the Arabian Peninsula looming on the horizon.

“No, we’re going to Baraka. I have friends there and you’d be safe. But tell me, how is it that a girl from a small Southern town knows so much about the Middle East?”

“I pour over travel brochures all day,” she said, but from his expression she could see he didn’t understand. “I’m a travel agent,” she added.

“So you’re a world traveler.”

She shook her head regretfully. “No. I don’t usually travel. I just book trips for other people. This is my first real trip. Until now I’d never been out of the U.S.”

Suddenly the nose of the plane tipped and they seemed to be changing direction again. Sheikh Fehr frowned and reached for his seat belt. The flight attendant moved toward them at the same time.

She knelt at his side and spoke quietly in Arabic. “The pilot said we’ve a problem. We’re dangerously low on petrol. We need to land almost immediately. Fortunately we’ve been given permission to land in Cairo.”

“Good. Thank you,” Khalid answered, glancing at Olivia, knowing that things were beginning to get a little more complicated than he liked.

By being diverted at the last minute from Baraka to Egypt he wouldn’t be able to process Olivia swiftly. He’d planned on having her checked out by a doctor then put on a private jet to New York tonight. Instead they were landing in Cairo, which meant they’d need to find a place to stay, and since he couldn’t use his preferred pilot and jet, nor the doctor he normally used, he’d need to find another way to get her quickly and quietly attended to. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be today, or tonight.

Olivia turned just then to look at him, her blue eyes wide, almost pinched, in her pale oval face. She was still wearing her headscarf, but the fabric was loose around her neck, exposing her delicate features.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, fear in her voice, the same fear that made her eyes turn to lapis.

“We’ve had a change of plans,” he answered.

Her forehead creased. “Another? Why? What’s happened?”

“Out of petrol, or as you Americans call it, gas. So we’re landing in Egypt instead of Baraka.”

He wasn’t sure what he expected, but her sudden smile stunned her, her blue eyes widening with excitement. “Egypt?” she repeated. “I was on my way to Egypt when I was arrested. Will we have time to see the pyramids in Giza?”

“Unfortunately not. We’ll be landing and hopefully taking off as soon as we refuel. We need to get to Baraka tonight.”

Her gaze searched his as if trying to see what he wasn’t telling her. “Why?”

“You want to go home, don’t you?”

She nodded slowly, clearly puzzled. “But if we don’t make it out tonight, we’ll just go tomorrow, right?”

He wasn’t ready to tell her that things were a lot more complicated than she knew.

For the past ten years he’d operated his version of an underground railroad. He specialized in rescuing innocent people and he’d enlisted some powerful friends to help him. People like Sheikh Kalen Nuri, the younger brother of Baraka’s King Malik Nuri, and Sheikh Tair, leader of the independent state Ouaha.

In the past few years Kalen and Tair had helped him with dozens of impossible rescues, and they’d pledged to help with Olivia’s, but first they had to get to Baraka.

“We want to reach Baraka tonight,” he said tersely, unwilling to give up his initial goal. “I need to make a few calls,” he added, rising from his seat. “Relax, try to get a little sleep. I will be able to tell you more once we’re on the ground.”

Twenty minutes later they touched down, the jet landing so smoothly that Liv didn’t even realize they were on the ground until the pilot began to brake, slowing the jet’s speed.

After taxiing to the terminal the jet sat on the tarmac, not far from the executive terminal. Khalid didn’t appear and the pilot hadn’t emerged from the cockpit.

Liv, seeing the flight attendant on the plane phone, flagged her down. “Are we refueling?” she asked.

But before the flight attendant could answer, Sheikh Fehr walked from the cockpit back to Liv’s seat.

“We’re staying in Cairo tonight,” he said. “I’ve a car waiting. Let’s go.”

Liv shot him an uneasy glance. He was angry. She felt his tension wash over her in dark brooding waves. Something had happened. Something not good.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, unbuckling her seat belt and rising to her feet. From her window she could see a black car outside, waiting not far from the plane.

“We can talk later,” he answered, extending a hand, his black robe with the gold embroidery swirling. “Come. Traffic will be heavy. We need to go.”

She put her fingers in his, shuddering at the sharp hot spark that passed between them. She wanted very much to take her hand back but was afraid of upsetting him.

Once seated in the car, their driver sped on and off highways and Liv marveled at the way Sheikh Fehr traveled.

She’d never met anyone who owned his own jet and employed his own pilot and flight crew. Even though she worked in the travel industry, she thought of flying as booking a ticket on a commercial airline, then going to a crowded airport for an endless wait in a long security line. Maybe it was just the U.S., but modern travel meant canceled flights, missed connections, lost luggage, no meal service and irritated flight attendants. In short, flying was far from luxurious, and definitely not glamorous. But Sheikh Fehr’s jet was sumptuous, as was his fleet of cars.

The fact that he had access to a fleet of cars in different countries, never mind the security, made her wonder about him, and his power.

What kind of man could accomplish the things he did?

What kind of man risked life and limb for a stranger?

Unless he did it for money.

Hiding her worry, she shot another glance his way. Could he be a mercenary of sorts?

The thought made her skin crawl, nearly as much as her disgusting black prison-issued robe and lank headscarf did.

Self-consciously she reached up and touched the headscarf she still wore. The flight attendant hadn’t worn one and Liv wondered now if it was still necessary. “Can I take this off?” she asked.

“Please. In Jabal we didn’t have a choice, but here in Egypt, and my country of Sarq, it’s optional.”

“Some women want to wear the veil?”

“They view it as protection, shielding them from leering eyes and inappropriate advances.” His gaze swept over her. “You will need something else to wear though. That’s obviously a prison-issued robe.”

Liv plucked at her robe’s stiff, coarse fabric. “I can’t stand this thing,” she confessed, her voice dropping. “It’s all I’ve worn since they arrested me and I hate it. I never want to put it on again.”

“You won’t have to. And once we’re at the hotel, I’ll make sure the robe’s properly disposed of.”

“Thank you.” Tears inexplicably burned the backs of her eyes and she had to squeeze her eyes shut to hold the emotion in. She was just tired. Overwhelmed by the day. There was no reason to cry. She’d be home soon. If not tonight, then tomorrow. And everything would be all right. She just needed to call her mom, or Jake. Once she heard their voices she knew she’d be okay.

“So we are staying in Cairo overnight?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

He shifted, shoulders shrugging impatiently. “My pilot was concerned about the plane. He was afraid there was a fuel leak and wanted it checked out before we flew again.”

“Sensible.”

“Yes.”

But from his tone, she knew the sheikh didn’t agree and she was hit with another wave of homesickness. She was tired of strangers, tired of short-tempered men and women. She just wanted to go home. Back to the people who knew her and loved her, and back to people she loved.

“Can I call my brother now?” she asked, her voice wobbly with the threat of tears.

“Maybe we should wait a little longer, until you’ve seen the doctor.”

His words were a one-two punch and Liv stiffened. “A doctor? Why?”

“It’s routine. Standard practice whenever someone’s been released—”

“How often do you do this?” she interrupted.

“Often enough to know that you need to be checked out and cleared for travel.”

“But I’m fine,” she insisted. She didn’t want anyone touching her, didn’t want anyone looking at her or poking at her or coming near her. She’d had enough of that at Ozr. “I’m fine.”

His dark gaze pierced her. “It’s not an option, Miss Morse.” His tone hardened. “You have to. I can’t take any chances. You’ve been in Ozr for weeks. The place is a breeding ground for all sorts of diseases.”

“I doubt I’ve caught anything and if I have, I’ll deal with it at home.” With my doctor, she silently, furiously added.

Sheikh Fehr might have rescued her from Ozr, but she couldn’t completely trust him. She didn’t trust anyone here anymore. These countries and cultures were far too different from hers.

Her longing for home had become an endless ache inside her. She missed her mom and brother. She wanted her mother’s delicious Sunday pot roast, and her melt-in-your-mouth mashed potatoes and the best brown gravy in the world.

She wanted Pierceville with its sleepy Main Street and big oak trees and the old Fox theater where they still showed movies. She missed Main Street’s angled parking and the drugstore on the corner and the two bakeries with their cake displays in the window.

“You won’t be given permission to leave the country if you’re not cleared for travel.” He spoke slowly to make sure he was heard. “And if you’re not cleared for travel, you don’t go home.”

Home.

That word she understood, that word cut through her fog of misery.

Turning away to hide the shimmer of tears, Liv stared out the car window, the stream of traffic outside a blur.

“Whose rule is that?” she asked thickly. “Yours, or the government’s?”

“Both.”

Biting her lip, it crossed her mind that maybe, just maybe, she’d jumped from the frying pan into the fire.