His Royal Prize. Debbi Rawlins

working with the horses. Brothers he had just met, had not known existed until a week ago.

      No, America was not so strange. Sharif had traveled to New York often while he studied at the university in London, and he had always enjoyed his visits. It was Texas that seemed odd to him, and the way his brothers embraced manual labor, even though they shared the same royal blood that flowed through his veins.

      Did they not understand what it meant to be heir to the throne of Sorajhee? To be sons of a king?

      Sharif massaged the tension knotting the back of his neck. More confusing than a desert mirage were the thoughts spinning incessantly like a whirlpool inside his head. He was not sure who he was anymore, or from where he truly came. For twenty-nine years he had been the firstborn, the only son of King Zakariyya and Queen Nadirah of Balahar. There had been no question he would ascend the throne. But now…

      His glance slid to Rose, the American woman who had borne him. She looked his way, her anxious blue eyes meeting his, and she stopped pouring tea. Her lips curved slightly. Only politeness made him return the tentative smile before he turned to stare out the window again.

      He was a fool not to have guessed he had been adopted. Or that he was of half-Western ancestry. All the signs were in evidence—the lighter eyes, the fairer skin. Although his eyes were a dark midnight-blue and not as pale as those of this woman who claimed to be his mother, he in no way resembled King Zak’s or Queen Nadirah’s dark, regal looks.

      There was a trace of English blood in Nadirah’s lineage they had said—an explanation he had easily accepted. They were his parents. Why would he not have trusted them to speak the truth?

      Bitterness taunted him, but he would not succumb. He understood the reason they had withheld the truth. The politics and public temperament of the time had prevented them from publicizing the verity of his birth—that he had secretly taken the place of their stillborn child. They had protected him, protected his rightful place on the throne.

      Rightful place. His insides clenched painfully, yet still the numbness threatened to engulf him. He almost welcomed the oblivion. What was his destiny? All his life he had been so sure of himself, his future as king. No more.

      His belly cramped again. Uncertainty was such a difficult pill to swallow.

      “Your mother is speaking to you,” he heard King Zak say, and Sharif turned slowly toward his father. His adoptive father. The only one he had ever known.

      Sharif wanted to tell him not to refer to this woman as his mother. Queen Nadirah was dead and buried for several years now. But she had been the one to sit at the edge of his bed when fever raged through his young body, or when his knees had been skinned raw from scaling the palace walls. He missed her every day.

      “I beg your forgiveness,” Sharif said with stilted politeness. “My mind was wandering.”

      Rose smiled. “That’s okay. I only asked what you’d like in your tea.”

      He eyed the tray of cups she had filled with the amber liquid. In her hand was a small porcelain bowl of sugar. It trembled slightly. “Do you not have servants to do this?”

      She blinked, a startled look crossing her face. “There’s a cook and housekeeper, and ranch hands to help with the horses, of course,” she said slowly, “but not the kind of servants you’re talking about.” A smile tugged at her mouth. It gave beauty to her weary features. “It’s been a long time since I’ve had anyone wait on me.”

      Stung by the reminder of her appalling imprisonment for the past twenty-nine years, Sharif’s gaze quickly slid away. Right into his father’s disapproving face.

      King Zak’s dark eyes narrowed, and he gestured toward the space beside him on the burgundy couch across from Rose. “Why do you not sit here with us? What is outside that so captures your attention?”

      Sharif remained stubbornly silent for a few moments and then said, “I would like Scotch instead of the tea, if you have it.”

      “Of course.” Rose immediately stood, ignoring Sharif’s father’s sound of disgust. “King Zakariyya? How about you?”

      “Thank you.” King Zak had risen, and he bowed slightly. “But I do not make it a practice to drink before six o’clock.”

      Sharif got the message of his father’s disapproval. He noted something else, as well. That King Zak could not seem to take his eyes off the American woman as she left the room.

      Distaste surged through Sharif. “I think I will go for a ride. I assume there is someone around who can saddle a horse for me.”

      “Sharif, we have been here only one day. Your mother is trying very hard to make you welcome. Be kind to her.”

      He turned to stare out the window again. “My mother is in the ground.”

      King Zak sighed. “We should have told you the truth sooner. Until not long ago I did not know your mother was still alive. Do not punish her for my error in judgment.”

      Sharif stared off in the direction where Rose had disappeared in search of his Scotch. “She is very beautiful.” He meaningfully met his father’s eyes. “Is she not?”

      After a long pause, King Zak said, “She has suffered greatly, locked away in the sanitarium for so many years because of a madwoman’s thirst for power. She did not abandon you and your brothers. It is because of her sacrifices that you are all still alive. Royal blood may not flow through her veins, but she has the wisdom and strength of a true queen. You should be very proud to be her son.”

      There was truth in his father’s words, Sharif knew. Rose had been a queen once, when she had married Ibrahim, Sharif’s birth father, and ruler of Sorajhee. She had possessed power and fortune herself, along with her brother, Randy, the heirs of a wealthy and important American businessman.

      When Ibrahim was assassinated, it was Randy in America to whom she had sent Sharif’s three brothers for safekeeping while she sought the truth behind her husband’s death. Before she could attain her goal, she was committed to a sanitarium in Europe.

      Sharif still did not know all the details. Only that he was born five months later, then taken from Rose and given to his parents. Everyone had thought Rose was dead. Even her brother. Until recently. She had not lived an easy life. And for that misfortune, he pitied her. He even admired her strength and courage. But he was not yet ready to embrace her as family.

      “I found the Scotch,” she said, smiling as she reentered the room, a bottle of fine aged Scotch in one hand, a crystal tumbler in the other. “I hope this suits you.”

      Everything at the ranch was of the finest quality: the furnishings, the art adorning the walls, even the china and crystal. The Spanish-style house itself was solid and spacious and possessed over a dozen bedrooms that overlooked a glorious lake. And the Arabian horses housed in the stables were of superb breeding. His brothers certainly had not grown up wanting. Still, none of this compared to the opulent palace where Sharif had spent his twenty-nine years.

      He wasn’t sure how that made him feel, or why it mattered. All three of his brothers seemed content. Genuinely happy. Sharif was the one who was suffocating from confusion.

      After accepting the glass of Scotch Rose poured, he downed the liquor in one gulp. “I will go for that ride now,” he said, and stoically met her startled eyes. “What time shall I return for dinner?”

      “Sharif.” His father’s sharp tone shook the air like sudden thunder on a clear night.

      Rose laid a hand on King Zak’s arm, and his expression immediately softened. “We eat around seven. But it’ll start getting dark before then, so be careful.”

      For a moment, his father’s gaze lingered on the American woman, and Sharif’s insides twisted at the longing he saw in those dark eyes. Anger and resentment sliced through him like a thief’s sharpened dagger.

      “I shall not be dining with you tonight.” Sharif walked toward the French