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  Then he turned and strode for the door, robe sweeping around his legs. As it closed behind him, Ronnie sank against the nearby wall, wondering what on earth would happen next.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Zadir found his brothers at the fountain in the garden, drinking coffee by lantern light and laughing about something.

  “Where’s Sam? I need her advice on something.” He could use some feminine input right now.

  Osman looked up. “She went to bed early. She’s got a crack-of-dawn conference call with someone she wants to make a film about.”

  “Rats. Then I guess I’m stuck with you guys.”

  “Thanks, brother.” Osman shoved him as he walked past. “Sit down and have a drink.” Zadir sank into a low chair while Osman poured him some honeyed local brew. “Why do you need advice? It seems like everything’s going fine. Ronnie is lovely.”

  “I know. She is.” She was even more beautiful than he remembered. Walking away from her when they were both aroused to the point of madness had almost killed him.

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  “She doesn’t know what she wants.”

  “Then you must tell her.” Osman smiled. His confidence was always impressive. And that was pretty much what he’d done with Sam, who had taken some convincing that it was her destiny to move to Ubar and become Queen.

  “It’s not as easy as that.”

  “You convinced her to come here.” Amahd leaned back in his chair. “So clearly she’s interested in at least a business relationship.”

  “I paid sixty thousand dollars to buy her time at a charity auction,” he admitted grimly. He’d told his brothers nothing of his madcap scheme, sure they’d mock him mercilessly. “And I set up the auction in the first place, so I could do it.”

  They stared at him, Amahd open-mouthed with astonishment. “You bought her?”

  “I bought her time. It was the only way I could think of to get her here. She’d ignored all my phone calls for weeks. I couldn’t even get her to say no to me.” He wasn’t going to admit that he’d multiplied the amount by ten to get her on the plane.

  Osman inhaled, his chest rising. “So essentially she’s here under duress.”

  “Not exactly, but it wasn’t her idea.”

  Ahmad shook his head and blew out a breath. “You’ve got a nerve.”

  “Now that she’s here she’s pretty excited about the project. She said it’s an adventure.”

  Amahd looked at him steadily. “That’s a good start. But take it slow. Don’t pull any of your fast moves on her.”

  Zadir tried to think of a response, but words failed him.

  Osman slapped his thigh. “You already did, didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t mean to. I just wanted to open the shutters in her room. And maybe give her a good night peck on the cheek.” He couldn’t believe he was admitting this to his brothers. “I kissed her. That’s all.”

  “Well, that’s hardly a big disaster. Did she kiss you back?”

  I think she started it. He frowned, not wanting to kiss and tell. “I’m not entirely sure what happened. All I know is that it was mind-blowing and intense and she was pretty upset afterward.”

  His brothers laughed. Which really ticked him off! “Be serious. She’s the one. I know it. Like Osman knew it with Sam. I’m afraid I’m going to screw things up.”

  “Sounds like you already have, brother!” Osman shook his head. “I still can’t believe you bought her. You should get extra points for being old-school.”

  “I think if he was truly old-school he’d have ridden to her house, thrown her over his shoulder, and carried her off into the night.” Amahd cracked open a nut and ate it.

  “Don’t think I didn’t consider that,” said Zadir. “The auction was a last resort. I got a friend from college who knows Veronica to set the whole thing up. She texted me this morning to say that the event raised half-a-million dollars for charity, so she’s thrilled with my harebrained scheme.”

  “And how long did you buy her for?” Osman peered at him.

  “Would you stop talking like that? I didn’t buy her. She agreed to stay for the weekend, and we’re visiting the site tomorrow so she can talk about designing my house. If I can get her on board with that, then at least I know she’ll come back.”

  “The weekend? So you guys are going all the way to the site, and back here and on a plane by the end of tomorrow?” Ahmad’s serious stare rattled him.

  “No, we’re staying there overnight.”

  “Then it will be Monday before she’s back.”

  “True.” Zadir cracked a nut with enough brute force to break an arm.

  “Does she know that? That’s more than the weekend. She won’t be back at work until Tuesday when you factor the return flight in.”

  “Would you stop looking for trouble? She knows the plan and so far she hasn’t complained.”

  “Except about you kissing her.” Osman mouth stretched into a sly grin. “Maybe she likes it too much and that makes her nervous.”

  Zadir drew in a breath. “How do I solve that problem?”

  “Don’t kiss her. Don’t touch her. Don’t even look at her that way.” Osman leaned back in his chair. “If she wants you, it’ll drive her completely insane.”

  Zadir stared at his brother. “I think you credit me with superhuman self-control.”

  “Where the woman of his dreams is concerned, I suspect any man can master superhuman self-control.”

  Zadir frowned. “I’m off to take a cold shower and get a good night’s sleep. Wish me luck tomorrow.”

  “Alarishim, brother,” said Osman with a smile. The ancient battle cry urged fellow riders to seize the day and make it theirs. “Alarishim.”

  Veronica rose and dressed early. Light streamed in through the high open windows and the scented air of the garden filled her senses. She’d thought she would have a quiet weekend at home in D.C. to go over her library plans and do some yoga, and now she was about to head off into a desolate wilderness with the one man she needed to stay far away from.

  She couldn’t believe she’d kissed him after all her efforts to keep her head. Today was going to be different. All business, all the time. Otherwise, when they were alone in their tent at night, he might assume that they could pick up where they left off last time—passionate lovemaking under the desert skies—and she wasn’t that kind of girl. She didn’t want a casual relationship that would leave her feeling lonelier than ever. And no other relationship was possible with a man who lived on the far side of the world and had women throwing themselves at his feet daily.

  She dressed in a long sleeved white linen crop top and wide matching pants with a fitted waist. She chose the most enclosed pair of sandals, which were silver. She could have gone to a cocktail party in this outfit, not a jaunt into uncharted territory.

  Her heart jumped when she heard a knock on the door. “Come in.” All business. Don’t stand too near him. Protect yourself.

  Zadir appeared in the doorway dressed in pale gray pants and a long-sleeved white T-shirt that set off his tanned skin and tousled hair. It should be a crime for a man to look that good.

  “I packed a change of clothes for tonight. We are only staying one night, right?” Being in Ubar was making her lose track of time, but she needed to be back by Wednesday to meet with the committee for the library competition. “It’s already Sunday.”

  “Yes, just one. I know you’re busy. I wanted you to meet my family and get a taste of the inhabited part of Ubar before we set out for the emptiest third of the old kingdom.”

  “I always seem to end up in the empty part with you, don’t I?” Their plane, diverted from its route to Bahrain, had crashed in the desolate Empty Quarter of the Saudi Arabian desert.

  “At least this time we’ll be there on purpose.”

  She picked up her bag and didn’t resist when Zadir took it from her. It was sweet of him to offer and there was no sense in getting into a pett
y wrestling match with a man whose very presence boiled her blood.

  Quick! Think about something else. “Why do you think your father gave you the most uninhabited part when he divided the land into three?”

  “It could have been by process of elimination. Osman’s the traditional heir, so he got the part with the palace and the old city of Nabattur. Amahd is in oil exploration, so he was given the part with the most oil, and I got the part on the other side of the Far Mountains. I think our ancestors mostly maintained it as a buffer between them and their enemies. There’s no agriculture, and the grazing is poor.”

  “Or maybe he knew that you develop real estate, so you could make something of it.”

  “If anything needs to be made of it.” He shot her a wry smile that made her insides shiver. “Wait until you see it. It’s pretty spectacular as it is.”

  They ate a quick breakfast of fruit and pastries, and set out for the mountains in a convoy of cars. She was expecting a Land Rover or a Jeep, but people around here seemed to consider a black Mercedes luxury sedan to be an all-terrain vehicle. Two armed guards manned the car in front, and two rode in a big van behind that probably held the supplies they’d need to stay overnight. Zadir drove their vehicle, and she sat in the passenger seat, resolved to keep her eyes on the road and off the driver.

  Oddly enough, they managed to chat easily about all kinds of innocuous subjects—the world economy, recent films, fads in architecture—and the journey whizzed by without even feeling awkward.

  As they drove, the distant range of brown-and-purple mountains grew closer, then began to loom above them and block out the sun.

  “How are we going to drive over these peaks?”

  Zadir chuckled. She avoided turning to get an eyeful of his dimple. “We won’t drive over the peaks, we’ll drive through the valleys.”

  “I don’t even see any valleys.”

  “We’ll follow the ancient tracks. I had some of my men come ahead yesterday to make sure there are no boulders blocking the way.”

  And to check for explosives. She kept the alarming thought to herself.

  “And it was passable?”

  “Absolutely. Trust me. I’ll make sure we don’t get stuck anywhere this time.”

  She laughed. But she was still nervous. Around Zadir, things went haywire. Still, she really hadn’t even noticed him trying to flirt with her so far today. He’d been very restrained. So that was good.

  The incline up was steep enough in places for her to grab the handle above her head. Loose gravel also littered the rocky trail, and at times the car slid alarmingly. Zadir didn’t seem worried. He drove along chatting as if they were cruising down the freeway.

  The descent was even more alarming—a bit like a real-life roller coaster—and her knuckles definitely grew white wrapped around the handle, but she was distracted by the spectacular view that spread out before them like a feast. The colors on this side of the mountains were different. Softer pastels rather than the harsh brown and purple, and the light seemed to bathe everything in a rich gold glow. An open plain of pale soil, scattered with sparse grasses, unfurled like a carpet below them.

  As promised, there was not a single structure or sign of civilization in any direction.

  Zadir’s hands gripped the wheel with cool confidence that reminded her of how he’d landed the plane among the menacing dunes of the Empty Quarter. He’d already proved himself the kind of man you could count on in a crisis. She didn’t meet too many of those.

  That he was funny and sweet and interested in her…. This would be too good to be true if he weren’t a foreign monarch. Really, you had to laugh!

  She snuck a glance at him, sure that he couldn’t be quite as handsome as the image in her mind.

  Regret crashed over her, along with a wave of desire. His features were strong and masculine but not so carefully sculpted that he looked like a male model. A fine haze of dark stubble under his cheekbones added dramatic shadow.

  Oh dear. She half expected him to turn to her and flash those blue eyes long enough to make her knees grow weak.

  But he didn’t. He kept driving, now talking about the education system in Ubar and how it didn’t prepare the kids for modern life.

  There weren’t that many handsome billionaires who actually cared about educating children, either.

  “You’re very quiet. Am I talking too much?”

  “No.” She smiled, keeping her eyes fixed on a pastel-painted mountain range in the far distance. “I like listening to you. You’re thoughtful and interesting. You’re going to make a good king.”

  “King of everything you see.” He laughed, making a sweeping gesture at the empty landscape. “It’s not exactly a weighty responsibility so far.”

  “That’s why it’s nice that you and your brothers are working as a team to tackle different problems in Ubar, regarless of whose boundaries they lie within.”

  “You’re right. None of us truly understands why my father decided to divide the kingdom, but it’s had the happy effect of drawing us all close together after we’d been living on different continents for far too long.”

  The car rolled down through the last rocky foothills, then picked up speed as they bounced over the smooth grassy terrain of the plain. “How did you choose the site for the house, when you have thousands of acres to select from?”

  “It chose me.”

  She turned to look at him, expecting him to turn to her with a cheeky grin or a teasing glance, but he still looked straight out the windshield.

  “That’s a rather enigmatic explanation.” Curiosity poked at her. “How exactly did it choose you?”

  “I was out riding and I fell into it.” She saw a smile tug at the corner of his mouth nearest to her.

  “Fell into it? Is it a hole?” That sounded like a serious architectural challenge.

  “More of a crevasse, really.”

  “And you expect me to design a house for it?”

  “It’s a challenging assignment, no doubt.” Now he did look at her, expression perfectly serious. “That’s why I didn’t mess around. I went straight to the best.”

  She narrowed her eyes and tried not to be distracted by his masculine beauty. “But you’d never even heard of me before we were in the crash together. It’s pure coincidence that you found me.”

  “Coincidence or destiny.” He was looking straight out the windshield again. “We were in that plane crash for a reason.”

  “We were in that plane crash because someone was trying to kill you.” She glanced around. The identical black sedans still cruised in front of and behind them. There was no place for a sniper to hide out here.

  “I should thank them.”

  “Don’t thank them yet. I haven’t agreed to design your house. And I’m even more doubtful about it now I know it’ll be a glorified hole in the ground.”

  Now he laughed, throwing his head back and giving her a view of his muscular neck. “You’re going to love it as much as I did, after I dusted myself off and managed to catch my horse.”

  “You’re sure about this?”

  “I’m sure about a lot of things.”

  She tugged her gaze away from him and back to the dramatic landscape. The only thing she could be sure of was that she needed to preserve her sanity, and it wouldn’t be easy with Zadir Al Kilanjar around.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  They drove across the plain for about twenty minutes, then a white flag on a thin pole appeared in the middle of nowhere and the car in front of them pulled up next to it. Zadir followed suit.

  “Where are we?”

  He smiled mysteriously. “You’ll see.”

  She climbed out of the car, frowning. They appeared to be in the middle of a flat, featureless plain of sparse, pale grass and tiny blue wildflowers. The third car stopped on the other side of them.

  “Well, you can certainly see your enemies coming from all directions.” There wasn’t even a single tree for anyone to hide behind. “O
n the other hand, they can see you, too.”

  Zadir snorted. “Enemies? Everyone I meet becomes my friend.”

  “Your confidence is impressive. What about the person who’s trying to kill you?”

  “He just hasn’t met me yet.” He winked. She ignored the effect it had on her insides.

  “What if it’s a she?”

  He cocked his head. “That’s an intriguing and worrying possibility.”

  “One of your past conquests who wants revenge, perhaps?” Now she was teasing him.

  “I haven’t made any enemies among my past lovers.” He spoke low, so the guards couldn’t hear.

  “Or so you think.” They were walking toward the white flag, and he walked faster so he was ahead of her. “Sometimes people hide their feelings.” Not that hiding your feelings was easy around Zadir. He had an unnerving way of bringing them to the surface.

  She expected him to turn and say something flirtatious, but he didn’t. He simply stopped and waited for her to catch up. When she was almost level with him she saw that the ground fell away in front of him, down a shallow ravine that was like a window into another world.

  The ravine sliced across the plane, a ribbon of lush green. Below the austere surface of the terrain, this alternate reality bustled with butterflies and birds that flittered from one shrub to another. Lush grass lay in wind-flattened swirls on the sloping ground. The greenery was interrupted here and there by big boulders patterned with colorful lichens.

  “Unbelievable.” It was like a slice of another country had been laid right through the middle of this one.

  “It must have been a riverbed.” Zadir stared down the green valley. “And there’s still water down there somewhere. Probably underground. That’s why it’s so green.”

  “Possibly it becomes a river again if there’s enough rain.”

  He shrugged. “It’s rare for us to get even one inch a month here. I doubt that would happen.”

  “I can see why you’d want to live here. It’s beautiful.” She watched a yellow-and-blue butterfly alight on a bright orange flower and draw its nectar.