Desert Rogues Part 2. Susan Mallery

never been very good at.

      “What am I doing here?” she demanded. “Why did the king of Bahania ask me to come here for two weeks? And what are you doing here? You can’t have anything to do with what’s going on with me.”

      That last bit was more plea than forceful statement.

      Reyhan stared at her. His strong, handsome features could have been set in stone—or steel—for all they gave away.

      “Haven’t you guessed?” he asked with quiet amusement, as if she were a child who had just performed the alphabet song flawlessly for the first time. “The king is my father, and the invitation is as much mine as his.”

      Her mind went blank. Completely and totally. It was like losing the lights during a thunderstorm.

      The man next to her rose and squared his shoulders. Then he stared down at her with a haughty expression possibly honed through a lifetime of royal arrogance.

      “I am Prince Reyhan, third oldest son of King Hassan of Bahania.”

      She blinked. Not possible, she told herself as some semicoherent thought process began in her brain. Not possible, not likely and she refused to believe it.

      “A p-prince?” she asked, stumbling over the word.

      No. No. No. Emma stared at the man standing in front of her. He couldn’t be. A prince? Him? But they’d met at college. They’d dated. He’d taken her away with him and…hurt her dreadfully.

      “The king decided it was time for me to marry,” Reyhan told her. “There was no way I could agree to any match as I was already married. To you.”

      He kept on talking, but she wasn’t listening. She couldn’t. A prince? Married?

      “But I…” She swallowed and tried again. “That wasn’t real. Not any of it.”

      She remembered the quiet of the Caribbean island, the soft breezes, the lap of the ocean outside their hotel room. Reyhan had asked her to go away with him, and she’d agreed because she could refuse him nothing. At eighteen, she’d been more innocent than he’d realized. She’d been too ashamed to tell him she’d never dated before. He’d been her first, in every sense of the word.

      Years later, when she’d looked back on the blur of hot days and long, endless nights, she’d comforted herself with the fact that she’d been too swept up in thinking she was in love to refuse Reyhan anything. She would never have considered asking him to go more slowly, to give her time to adjust. As for their marriage—her parents’ lawyer had told her that had been a fake.

      For a long time the realization had nearly destroyed her. She’d hated her weakness where he was concerned. Hated that she could still want him, even as he’d used and abandoned her. Time had healed her enough to give her perspective.

      Reyhan’s dark eyebrows drew together. “What wasn’t real?”

      “Our marriage. You just did that to get me into bed. Or get a green card.”

      As soon as she spoke the words, she realized she might have made a mistake. Reyhan seemed to get bigger and taller as his temper grew. His anger was as tangible as the sofa she sat on, but a lot more frightening. His gaze narrowed and his mouth twisted into a disapproving and scornful line.

      “A green card?” he asked, his voice thick with tension. “Why would I need that? I am Prince Reyhan. I am heir to the king of Bahania. I have no need to seek asylum elsewhere. This is my country.”

      He spoke proudly and with the confidence of who knew how many generations of royalty behind him.

      “Yes, well.” She cleared her throat. At the time, him wanting a green card had made sense. But now…“So that’s not why you married me.”

      “It was not. I was in your country to continue my education. I earned my master’s degree there.” His expression turned contemptuous. “I honored you by giving you my name and my protection. As for trying to get you into my bed, the effort was hardly worth the meager reward.”

      She shrank back into the cushions. Humiliation joined the fear. As much as she tried to block out their nights together, they continued to haunt her. She supposed her part of it could be an illustration of what not to do on one’s wedding night and the few nights that followed.

      Not that it was her fault, she told herself, trying to grab on to a little temper to give her courage. She’d been the virgin. He should have done better, too.

      But if Reyhan hadn’t married her to get a green card or to sleep with her, why had he?

      “Are you sure the marriage was real?” she asked. “My parents’ lawyer said that it wasn’t.”

      “Then their lawyer was mistaken.” Reyhan glared at her. “You are my wife. That is why you were brought here. Now that you are in my country, in my home, you will treat me with respect and reverence. Is that understood?”

      The need to bolt for freedom grew exponentially.

      “Reyhan, I—”

      But she never got to say whatever she’d been about to blurt out. For just at that moment, a petite, curvy, beautiful young woman walked into the room.

      “This isn’t good,” the woman said. “I heard Emma had arrived and fainted at the sight of you. Is that true?”

      Reyhan turned his attention from Emma to the woman. His glare only deepened.

      The woman rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I know. You’re insulted. But don’t forget, I gave birth to your older brother’s firstborn, so you have to be nice to me.”

      “One wonders what Sadik sees in you.”

      The woman leaned close and smiled. “I’m a hottie. It’s a curse, but there we are.”

      Emma didn’t think things could get more shocking, but she was proved wrong when Reyhan actually smiled at the woman, then kissed her forehead.

      “Can you fix this?” he asked the woman.

      “I’m not sure if you mean Emma or the situation. If you ask me, the one who needs fixing is you.” She held up her hand before he could speak. “I’ll do my best. I promise. Now why don’t you give us some girl time together? I’ll answer Emma’s questions and make her feel at home. You can go work on your charm.”

      Reyhan raised his eyebrows. “I’m very charming.”

      “Uh-huh. Just a tip here. The ‘I’m Prince Reyhan of Bahania’ thing gets old really fast. Trust me. Sadik tried it on me, too.”

      “You’re a troublemaker.”

      “That’s true.”

      Reyhan nodded at Emma, then at the woman and left. Emma watched him go.

      “Is this really happening?” she asked, feeling both weary and more confused than ever.

      “It sure is,” the other woman told her. “Right down to you sitting in the middle of the Bahanian royal palace.” She plopped down next to Emma on the sofa and smiled. “Let’s start at the beginning. Hi. I’m Cleo.”

      “I’m Emma. Emma Kennedy.”

      Cleo looked her over. “Love the hair. My sister-in-law Sabrina puts red highlights in hers, but the color is nothing like this. Is it real?”

      It took Emma a second to process the question and realize Cleo wasn’t asking about the hair itself, but the color.

      “Yes, it’s natural.”

      “Me, too,” Cleo said, tugging on her short, spiky blond hair. “I put in gold highlights once, but was that a mistake. I thought I’d look more elegant and classy, which is so not going to happen. I’m stuck being a tacky bottle blonde for the rest of my life. No biggie. I mean I’m a princess, so now I can be royal and tacky, which I like.”