Promised to the Sheikh. Sharon Kendrick

      

Dear Reader,

      One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.

      There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.

      I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia to escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100th story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”

      So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?

      I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.

      Love,

      Sharon xxx

      Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.

      SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…

      Promised to the Sheikh

      Sharon Kendrick

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Contents

       Cover

Dear Reader

       About the Author

       Title Page

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

       CHAPTER THREE

       CHAPTER FOUR

       CHAPTER FIVE

       CHAPTER SIX

       CHAPTER SEVEN

       CHAPTER EIGHT

       CHAPTER NINE

       CHAPTER TEN

       Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

      THE man silhouetted against the shuttered window was not known as the Lion of the Desert for nothing. His skin glowed with tawny good health and his black hair was as thick as an ebony mane. The magnificence of his honed, muscular body had left countless women sighing with wistful longing and he carried about him an air of leonine grace and stealth.

      Sheikh Rashid of Quador was a man few would have the folly to cross, and consequently his mood was usually as lazily unperturbed as a lion who was master and king of all he surveyed.

      But for now his eyes glittered with icy displeasure.

      ‘Repeat yourself, Abdullah,’ he commanded, his deep voice as tightly controlled as a coiled whip.

      His manservant swallowed nervously. ‘Forgive me, Excellence—’

      ‘Repeat yourself!’ rang out the cold instruction.

      Abdullah cleared his throat. ‘There are…er…rumours sweeping the city, Sheikh.’

      A pair of jet eyebrows were raised in silent yet imperious question. ‘You dare to speak to me of rumours?’

      ‘When they concern you, Excellency, then, yes—it is necessary that I should do so.’

      ‘And?’ he clipped out.

      ‘Your people are growing restless, Sheikh.’

      The black eyebrows were knitted together and fierce possessiveness gleamed like steel from the narrowed eyes. ‘There is more rebellion underfoot? Insurrection that I must quash?’

      ‘No, no—nothing like that, Sheikh. Your people accept that you rule them with an iron fist. The people of Quador live happily. They have food in their bellies and the security of knowing that our profile in the modern world is a shining one—’

      ‘Enough of compliments!’ snapped Rashid. ‘I have no need of them!’

      ‘Indeed.’ Abdullah sighed, the expression on his face not unlike that of a person who was anticipating a particularly painful visit to the dentist. ‘The people of Quador wish to know why you have not yet taken a…wife,’ he finished, with a weak smile.

      ‘A wife?’ The set of Rashid’s lean body became dangerously tense and the hard, proud profile became stony. ‘My people have no right to concern themselves in such matters! I shall take my bride when the time is right—and I alone will decide when that time is!’ He thought fleetingly of Jenna and the black eyes gleamed anew, his voice transforming itself into a deceptively silky snare. ‘But there is something else you are not telling me, is there not, Abdullah?’

      ‘Indeed.’ Abdullah swallowed. ‘Reports from foreign newspapers have begun to infiltrate the internet—’

      ‘The internet!’ spat out Rashid. ‘This internet is nothing but the work of the devil! It should be forbidden!’

      ‘Yes, Exalted One,’ agreed Abdullah placatingly. ‘But if we are a member of the modern world, then it is impossible to halt progress!’

      ‘And what exactly has infiltrated the internet?’ demanded Rashid, his lush mouth flattening into a line of undisguised anger.

      ‘Your…er…your