LITMIR.BIZ

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to his nation. To his people.

      And to his child.

      Daria would want him to be kind to this woman. So he would try, though it went against his nature to be kind to anyone. He was not cruel; he was indifferent. He’d learned to be so over the hellish years of his childhood. If you did not care, people couldn’t hurt you.

      When you did... Well, he knew what happened when you cared. He had the scars on his soul to prove it. The only person he cared about these days was Kadir, and that was as much as he was capable of.

      He inclined his head briefly. “You may call me Rashid.” And then he added, “I suggest, however, you do not do it in front of my staff. They will not understand the informality.”

      She wrapped her arms around herself and rubbed her upper arms almost absently. “You can call me Sheridan, then. And I don’t see why you need worry about your staff. We won’t know for another week if there’s a baby. I can call you with the information, if you’d like. Then we can decide what to do if it’s necessary.”

      He blinked at her. She truly did not understand. Or she was being stubbornly obtuse on purpose. His temper rose anew.

      “You will not call me.”

      She frowned at his tone. “Fine. You can call me. Either way, we’ll work it out.”

      He clenched his fingers into fists in his lap. Stubborn woman!

      “There is nothing to work out. You have been artificially inseminated with my sperm. You might be carrying the next king of Kyr. There is no possible choice other than the one I offer you now.”

      “I honestly don’t think—”

      “Silence, Miss Sloane,” he snapped, coming to the end of his tether. “You are not here to think. You will accompany me to the airport, where you will board the royal jet. We will be in Kyr by morning, and you will be shown every courtesy while we await the results. Should you fail to conceive my child, you will be escorted home again.”

      Her jaw had dropped as he talked. He tried not to focus on the pink curve of her lower lip. It glistened with moisture and he found himself wanting to lean forward and touch his tongue just there to see if she tasted as sweet and delicate as she looked.

      The thought shocked him. And angered him. He did not want this woman.

      She was shaking her head almost violently now. A lock of hair dropped from her twist and curved in front of her cheekbone. She impatiently tucked it behind an ear.

      “I can’t drop everything and go away with you! I have a business to run. And my bank account, unlike yours, I’m sure, isn’t bursting with money. No way. No way in hell.”

      Her response stunned him. He shot to his feet then, his temper beginning to boil. He had a country to run and one crisis after another to solve these days. He had a council waiting for him, a stack of dossiers on potential brides to scour through and an upcoming meeting with kings from surrounding nations to discuss oil production, mineral rights and reciprocity agreements.

      And yet he was being thwarted by one small, irritating woman who refused to give an inch of ground in this battle. A people pleaser? She didn’t look as if she cared one bit about pleasing him at the moment.

      Rashid gave her the look that made the palace staff tremble. “I wasn’t giving you a choice, Miss Sloane.”

      She sucked in a breath, and he knew he had her.

      But then her face reddened and her eyes flashed purple fire and Rashid stood there in shock.

      “You think you have the right to make decisions for me? This is America and I don’t have to go anywhere with you. Not only that, but I won’t go. If I’m pregnant, we’ll figure it out. But as of this moment, we do not know that. I can’t just leave because you wish it. Nor do I intend to.”

      His entire body vibrated with fury. He was not accustomed to being told no. Not by his employees at Hassan Oil—a company he’d built on his own and still owned to this day, even if he’d had to turn over the day-to-day operations to a CEO—not by his staff in the palace, not by anyone anywhere in the past several years. He was an al-Hassan, with money and influence, and people did not tell him no.

      And now he was a king, and they really did not tell him no.

      But Sheridan Sloane had. She sat there on her couch, looking pale and delicate and too small to safely carry a baby for nine months, and spoke to him like he was her gardener. It infuriated him. And stunned him, too, if he was willing to admit it.

      No matter how much he admired her fighting spirit, he would not be merciful. He’d left mercy behind a long time ago.

      “Miss Sloane,” he said, very coolly and clearly. “It would be unwise to anger me. This business you run?” He snapped his fingers. “I could destroy it in a moment. I could destroy you in a moment. Continue to defy me, and I shall.”

      * * *

      Sheridan’s pulse skipped and slid like it was tumbling down a hill and couldn’t find purchase. He’d just threatened her. Threatened Dixie Doin’s. At first she wanted to laugh him off. But then she looked at him standing there, at his tall, dark form and the dark glitter of his eyes, and knew he was not only perfectly serious, but that he was also probably capable of accomplishing it.

      He was a king. A king!

      Of an incredibly rich, oil-producing nation in the Arabian Desert. She knew where Kyr was. Hadn’t they just had a crisis that was plastered all over the news? The king had been very ill and no one had known who his successor was going to be.

      She’d found it fascinating that a monarch could choose his successor from among his sons, and puzzling that he had not done so by that point. They were grown after all, and he must surely know which of them was best suited to the job.

      The fact he had not done so surely spoke volumes about him—or about his children. She wasn’t sure which.

      But the crisis had passed and Kyr had a king. This man. Rashid bin Zaid al-Hassan. Oh, yes, his name was imprinted on her memory now. She would never forget it again as long as she lived.

      Still, she had not been raised to blindly follow orders and she would not start now. Even though he terrified her on some level. He was so cold and angry, and he was a king. But he was not her king. Hadn’t her ancestors fought to divest themselves of kings?

      Sheridan cleared her throat. “It’s only seven more days until the test. You could stay in Savannah. Or maybe you could come back when the results are due. It seems far simpler than what you’re proposing.”

      He did not look in the least bit appeased. “Does it, now? Because your business, which has another owner and employees to help, needs your presence far more than a nation needs her king, yes? How extraordinary, Miss Sloane.”

      Sheridan pushed the stray lock of hair behind her ear again. How did he manage to make her feel petty when all she wanted was to continue to live her life as normally as possible until the moment when she found out if everything was going to change or not? She didn’t even want to contemplate what it would mean if she were carrying this man’s child.

      A royal baby. Madness.

      She twisted the cloth that she’d earlier pressed to her forehead. “I didn’t mean to suggest any such thing. But yes, my business is important to me, and I can’t leave Kelly to do everything by herself. I have menus to plan, and supplies to buy—”

      “And I have a peace agreement to broker and a nation to run.” He’d already dismissed her, she realized. He slipped a phone from his pocket and put it to his ear. And then he was speaking in mellifluous Arabic to someone on the other end. When he finished, cool dark eyes raked over her again. “You will come, Miss Sloane, and you will do it now. My lawyer has instructions to purchase your loan from the bank. I assure you he will accomplish this, as I am willing to offer far more than this business is worth.”

      Sheridan’s

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