LITMIR.BIZ

       CHAPTER TWELVE

      STERLING HADN’T MEANT to eavesdrop.

      She’d been enjoying the gala, held in the grand art gallery that was one of the jewels of the new Bakri City, a testament to the country’s bright new future. Or so Rihad had said in his speech earlier, in English, for the benefit of the foreign press. She’d allowed the phalanx of docents to lead her through the first great exhibit, on loan from the Louvre, and had honestly enjoyed looking at the collection of world-class, world-famous art.

      It had reminded her of her favorite way to spend a day in New York City: wandering aimlessly around the Metropolitan Museum of Art and losing herself in all the marvelous things collected there for the viewing, from paintings to metalwork to Egyptian tombs. Except here in Bakri City there was the sea on one side and the beckoning desert on the other, reminding her that she was across the world from the things she knew.

      It had been ten days since she’d realized that she loved Rihad. Ten long days and longer nights since she’d understood that she must leave him and, worse, Leyla, too. Every day, she’d woken up and vowed that it would be her last in Bakri, that she would find a way to leave the two people she loved most. Yet somehow, there was always another reason to stay.

      And here she was on yet another night, dressed in beautiful clothes as befit the queen she still had trouble believing was legitimately her. She’d smiled prettily on command, quite as if she couldn’t see the speculation in every gaze that met hers. As if she couldn’t hear the whispers that followed her around the great courtyard.

      As if she wasn’t aware that at least half of the people who spoke to her were thinking the word whore as they curtsied and called her Your Majesty.

      “Your daughter is the bright jewel of the kingdom,” professed one Bakrian aristocrat whom Sterling had recognized from her wedding. Where this woman and her husband, both possessed of crisp, upper-crust British accents when they spoke in their perfect English, had gazed back at her as if they couldn’t understand a word she’d said.

      “I certainly think so,” Sterling had said.

      “One can only hope she grows into her mother’s beauty,” said the husband, and Sterling hadn’t much liked that look in his too-knowing eyes when he said it, or the way he’d leaned closer than was strictly appropriate when he’d continued. “What a blessing it is for a daughter to become like her mother in every way.”

      It took a moment for Sterling to understand that this person had, in effect, just called her infant daughter a whore. A potential whore.

      She was going to ruin Rihad if she stayed. That much was obvious, no matter how he tried to dismiss it.

      But aside from worrying over her biological limitations and the genetic propensity for ruining children she might have inherited from her own terrible mother, Sterling hadn’t really given a lot of thought to how her presence in Bakri would destroy Leyla. She’d thought that as Rihad’s daughter in every way but her biology, Leyla would be safe. More than safe.

      You should have known better, sneered that internal voice that she knew came from her foster parents, across all those years, as if she was still standing in the middle of that cold kitchen waiting for the next blow to lay her out on the linoleum floor. You taint everything you touch.

      She’d ducked into one of the cordoned-off alcoves for a little breather after that unpleasant last encounter. She wanted to take a moment—only a moment—to let her face do whatever it wished. To drop her public smile. To simply not be on display.

      Sterling pulled in a deep breath, then let it out. Then again.

      And it was as she was preparing to walk back out and face it all again that she heard Rihad’s deep voice from the other side of the pillar that concealed her.

      “I have no worries whatsoever about the union between our countries,” he was saying in his crisp, kingly manner. “Nor can I imagine that Kavian has indicated otherwise, to your publication or to anyone else.”

      That meant it was one of the reporters, Sterling understood, and that was why she didn’t reveal her presence. She’d had enough of the press earlier, with their sugary smiles and all those jagged claws right underneath, sharpened on her own skin every time they asked her a pointed question.

      “Yet your sister remains at large.”

      “The Princess Amaya’s schedule remains private for obvious security reasons.” Rihad’s voice was so cold then it made Sterling’s stomach clench tight. “But I can assure you that no member of the royal family is ‘at large.’ Your information is faulty.”

      “Neither Kavian nor Amaya have been seen—”

      “His Royal Majesty Kavian ibn Zayed al Talaas, ruling sheikh of the desert stronghold Daar Talaas, is certainly not in hiding of any kind, if that is what your impertinent suggestion is meant to imply.” Rihad’s voice held dark warning then. “But he no more clears his schedule with me than I do with him. He certainly does not clear it with you. I would advise you to step away from this subject.”

      “Certainly, Sire.” The man’s voice made Sterling feel dirty. Tarnished. “My congratulations on your recent marriage.”

      Sterling winced then, at the thunderous silence that told her all she needed to know about the expression Rihad was likely wearing.

      “Tread carefully,” Rihad all but growled. “Very carefully.”

      “Certainly, Your Majesty, you must be aware that there is mounting concern among your subjects that a woman like that—”

      “A woman like that?” Rihad’s voice turned mild, which was her husband at his most volatile, even as that same old phrase knocked around inside of Sterling, leaving marks. New bruises to join the old. “By all means, enlighten me. A woman like what, exactly?”

      That was when Sterling moved. She swept out from behind the pillar and hoped it would be assumed she’d simply taken herself off to the powder room.

      Rihad stood squared off against a small, toad-like creature Sterling recognized as one of the paparazzi who had followed her every move in New York. She had no doubt that he was responsible for a great many of the horrible narratives that circulated about her to this day, as he’d taken after her as if Sterling was his pet project. He’d always looked at her as if he could see that truth buried deep inside of her. As if he knew how flawed and unwanted and ruined she truly was.

      Part of her wanted nothing more than to leave him to Rihad’s scant and rapidly eroding mercy, but she didn’t dare. Not now, after all the recent bad press and a museum filled with more reporters. She was already enough of a stone draped around Rihad’s neck, dragging him down. There was no need to add an assault-and-battery charge on her behalf to the list of her sins against this man.

      “Sterling,” the awful little man oozed at her. “We were just talking about you.”

      She

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