Claimed For The Desert Prince's Heir / A Shocking Proposal In Sicily. Heidi Rice

let his hand drop. Then he nodded. ‘Okay, go to the pond and bathe, I will pack up here. We must travel to the Golden Palace before nightfall. Speak to your relatives.’

      What? Panic clawed at her throat. ‘But I don’t have any relatives. Not since my grandmother died. Maybe if we just don’t tell anyone about…’

      ‘We cannot lie, that would be an even greater breach of honour,’ he interrupted her, his frown deepening. ‘If you have no relatives, then I will make the request for your hand to my brother. He is your employer, yes?’

      He was moving too fast. She didn’t want Zane and Cat to know what she’d done. She certainly didn’t want to put them in the middle of this situation. They would, of course, support her decision. They weren’t barbarians like Raif. But from the few times Prince Kasim had mentioned his half-brother it was obvious their relationship was problematic at best, and probably delicately balanced politically.

      Good grief, her stupidity could start a new war.

      The panic started to consume her.

       Breathe—just breathe. And don’t add any more drama than you absolutely have to.

      She forced her lungs to function. Struggled to think. ‘How far are we from the palace?’ she asked, as a plan began to form in her head.

      ‘A day’s ride, to the north,’ he said.

       Oh, thank goodness.

      ‘Okay,’ she said as a strange calmness descended. ‘I won’t be too long.’

      He grasped her arm. ‘Do not despair, Kasia,’ he said, his voice strained.

      Her heart beat heavily against her ribs.

      ‘We will find a way to make this work,’ he said.

      She nodded. Because she couldn’t bring herself to speak.

      Arguing with him was pointless. And she’d never been very good at disguising her feelings. If he knew how frantic she was, and how determined not to go through with this madness, he might not let her leave. But as she left, she couldn’t resist glancing over her shoulder.

      He stood, tall and proud and indomitable, trusting her to return.

      She couldn’t help hating herself a little as she headed towards the oasis, then doubled back through the trees. She didn’t take any time to saddle his horse, simply used the corral’s railings to mount the huge beast.

      She hadn’t ridden a horse for five years. But she had been an accomplished rider, as happy riding bareback as with a saddle. She prayed the ability hadn’t left her as she kicked her bare heels into the horse’s flanks. It snorted and reared, but she clung to its mane, her thigh muscles straining, the tenderness in her sex rubbing against the ridge of its spine.

      She heard a shout and saw Raif run out of the tent, his face a mask of surprise and then fury as his stallion cleared the fence in one bound.

      She dug her heels into the horse’s sides, bent her head low over its neck and allowed the beast to have its head, managing to direct it towards the north as it flew over the rocks and towards the dunes.

      Tears blurred her eyes, but she didn’t look back this time.

      She couldn’t.

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      ‘KASIA, IF SOMETHING happened to you, however traumatic, you know you can tell me, right?’

      Kasia stopped folding her recently unpacked clothes back into her suitcase. Her best friend, Catherine Ali Nawari Khan, stood with her back pressed against the door of Kasia’s chamber, her face a picture of concern and distress.

      Kasia nodded, determined to keep her voice calm and even. Or as calm and even as she could while the shame threatening to choke her since she’d arrived back at the palace an hour ago—heck, the shame that had been choking her since she’d galloped over the dunes and away from Raif’s encampment—expanded another few centimetres.

      ‘I just… I need to return to Cambridge.’ It was cowardly, but it was the decision she’d made as she’d ridden Raif’s horse.

      She’d made a terrible mistake, not just sleeping with Raif but not telling him about her virginity. She’d put them both in an impossible situation—a situation that could have constitutional implications for both countries if Raif continued his quest to marry her—and the only way to remedy the problem was to leave. And leave quickly, before he followed her to the palace.

      She’d had a lucky break, spotting the column of SUVs that had been sent out to search for her only an hour after leaving his encampment. They’d driven her straight back to the palace, where Cat and Zane had been waiting. There had been hugs and kisses, tears of joy and relief, but then had come the questions. What had happened to her? How had she survived after her vehicle had been buried? Was she okay now? Did she need a doctor?

      She’d devised a deliberately vague story. She’d been rescued by a tribesman who had taken her to his encampment and then loaned her his horse to return to the palace once the sandstorm had settled. But as soon as Zane had suggested they contact the man and thank him for his help, she had known her story wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny for long. Not least because she suspected Zane knew she wasn’t telling the whole truth. As soon as he’d tried to probe into the facts—why hadn’t the man given her a saddle, where were her shoes, where did they return the horse as it was clearly a valuable thoroughbred—Cat had intervened, insisting Kasia be given time to bathe and eat and recover from her ordeal. But she’d known it was only a matter of time before Cat’s concern got the better of her.

      Tears welled in her eyes. And Cat rushed across the chamber.

      ‘Kasia—oh, my God. I knew something was wrong.’ Gathering Kasia in her arms, she pressed a kiss to her forehead. ‘Did the man who rescued you assault you, is that it? Whatever happened, it’s not your fault, okay? You don’t have to leave. We’ll figure this out.’

      Kasia shook her head, scrubbing away the tears of self-pity. She didn’t deserve Cat’s concern, didn’t deserve her friend’s comfort. And she was going to have to explain herself. Admit the humiliating mistakes she’d made while at the same time protecting everyone—Raif included—from the consequences.

      ‘It’s not that, he didn’t assault me. In fact, it was the other way around. I actually… I shot him.’

      Cat’s eyebrows rose, but her gaze remained supportive and direct. ‘Is he dead?’ she asked flatly.

      ‘Goodness, no. He’s okay, it was only a flesh wound.’

      ‘All right,’ Cat said. ‘Well, that’s good, I guess,’ she added as if she weren’t sure.

      A raw chuckle burst out of Kasia’s throat. ‘How can it be good?’ she said. ‘I still shot him.’

      ‘So what? If he was assaulting you, he got what he deserved,’ Cat said, with complete pragmatism. And Kasia felt the tears scour her throat again.

      ‘But he wasn’t assaulting me,’ she managed through the emotion thickening her throat. ‘He was rescuing me from the sandstorm.’

      ‘And you both survived, so it’s all good,’ Cat countered, gripping Kasia’s arms. ‘But something else happened, right? Something that’s made you think you have to leave. And that’s not—’

      ‘I slept with him and now he’s insisting we get married because I was a virgin.’ The words burst out of Kasia’s mouth in a flood, silencing Cat.

      Her friend’s eyebrows rose again. ‘Okay,’ she said. Her eyes narrowed as she stroked Kasia’s arms in a gesture of solidarity Kasia wasn’t sure she deserved.

      ‘He