Zohra’s heart thudded hard against her ribcage. Her chest was incredibly tight.

Across the vast hall her gaze met Prince Ayaan’s. And held it.

She had expected him to be just as isolated from her as he had been through the parade. And yet she could swear he was tuned to her every step, every breath, as if they were the only two people in the huge hall.

Her nerves stretched tight at the intensity of that gaze. It burned hot, alive, intense, and she realized she was the cause of it. That awareness between them—it had a life of its own.

Was he anchoring her or was she anchoring him to a path neither wanted to go on?

Sucking in a breath, she severed the connection and focused on something beyond his shoulder. An uncontrollable shaking took root in her.

She did not need his strength—imagined or real—and nor did he need hers.

The setting of the wedding, the festivities and joy around her—it was all getting to her.

“This marriage will be whatever you make of it.”

Zohra intended to set the tone for it from the beginning. And that meant remembering that she and the Prince were nothing but strangers brought together by duty.

A DYNASTY

OF SAND AND SCANDAL

A throne where secrets never sleep!

The Desert Kingdom of Dahaar has been beset by tragedy, scandal and secrets for as long as anyone can remember.

Those that reach for the crown are forced to pay a high price indeed. When duty calls, these royals must obey …

But these are children of the desert, and the fires of passion run hot in their veins.

And rarely does passion pair with duty.

This month read the first in this unstoppable miniseries by author Tara Pammi:

THE LAST PRINCE OF DAHAAR

The Last Prince of Dahaar

Tara Pammi

www.millsandboon.co.uk

TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a Mills & Boon® romance, which provided so much more excitement to a teenager than a mathematics textbook. It was only years later, while struggling with her two-hundred-page thesis in a basement lab, that Tara realised what she really wanted to do: write a romance novel. She already had the requirements—a wild imagination and a love for the written word.

Tara lives in Colorado with the most co-operative man on the planet and two daughters. Her husband and daughters are the only things that stand between Tara and a full-blown hermit life with only books for company.

Tara would love to hear from readers. She can be reached at tara.pammi@gmail.com or through her website: www.tarapammi.com

For my brother—

I’m so proud of the man you have become.

With such real-life inspiration, no wonder the hero of this book is such an awesome son and brother.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

EXTRACT

CHAPTER ONE

PUMP HIS BODY full of narcotics and fall into blessed oblivion? Or suffer a fitful sleep and welcome the madness within to take over?

Abuse his body or torture his mind?

It was a choice Ayaan bin Riyaaz Al-Sharif, the crown prince of Dahaar, faced every evening when dusk gave way to dark night.

After eight months of lucidity, and he used the term very loosely, he had no idea which he would favor on a given day.

Tonight, he was leaning toward the drugs.

It was his last night as a guest in Siyaad, the neighboring nation to his own country, Dahaar. He would be better off knocking himself out.

You did that last night too, a voice whispered in his ear. A voice that sounded very much like his older brother, who had spent countless hours toughening up Ayaan.

Stepping out of the blisteringly hot shower, Ayaan dried himself and pulled on black sweatpants. He had run for three hours straight tonight, setting himself a pace that lit a fire in his muscles. His body felt like a mass of bruised pulp.

He had kept to lighted grounds, to the perimeter of the palace. And every time he’d spotted a member of the royal guard—both his own and Siyaadi—his breath had come a little more easily.

Walking back into the huge bedroom, he eyed the bottle of narcotics on his bedside table. Two tablets and he would be out like the dead.

The option was infinitely tempting. So what if he felt lousy tomorrow with a woozy head and woolen mouth?

Another night would pass without incident, without an episode. Another night where he accepted defeat, accepted his powerlessness in his fight against his own mind.

Defeat...

He picked up the plastic bottle and turned it around, playing with the cap, almost tasting the bitter pill on his tongue.

A breeze flew in through the French doors, blowing the sheer silk curtains up. Dark had fallen in the past half hour, the heat of the evening touched by its cold finger.

Peaceful, quiet nights were not his friends. Peaceful, quiet nights in a strange place were enough to bring him to his knees, reducing him to a mindless, useless coward.

He was still a bloody coward, afraid of his own shadow.

Powerless fury roared through him, and he threw the painkillers across the empty room. The bottle hit the wall with a soft thud and disappeared beneath an antique armoire.

A quiet hush followed the sound of the bottle, the silence beginning to settle over his skin like a chilly blanket.

He grabbed the remote and turned on the huge plasma TV on the opposite wall. He had specifically requested the guest suite with the largest TV. Flipping to a soccer game, he turned the volume up so high that the sounds reverberated around him. Soon, his skull would hurt at the pounding din of it, the echoes ringing in his ears. But he welcomed the physical discomfort, even though at this rate, he would be deaf by the time he was thirty.

Walking around the room, he turned off the lights.

As his eyes became accustomed to the dark, he got into bed. A pulse of distress traveled up his spine and knotted up at the base of his neck. He curled his fists, focusing on the simple act of breathing in and out. He willed his mind to understand, to stop looping back at its own fears and feeding on them.

Sleep came upon him hard, a deceptive haven capable of snatching control from him and reducing him into a cowering animal.

* * *

Zohra Katherine Naasar Al-Akhtum slowly made her way through the lighted corridors toward the guest suite that was situated in the wing farthest from the main residence wings of the palace.

Her feet, clad in leather slippers, didn’t make a sound on the pristine marble floors. But her heart thumped in her chest, and with each step, her feet dragged on the floor.

It was half past eleven. She shouldn’t be out of bed, much less roaming around in this part of the palace where women were expressly forbidden. Not that she had ever heeded the rules of the palace. She just hadn’t needed to be in here until now.

Now...now she had no choice.

She straightened her flagging spine and forged on.

The fact that she hadn’t encountered a guard until now weighed heavily in her gut instead of easing her anxiety. It had been easy to bribe one of the maids and inquire which suite their esteemed guest was staying in.

Suddenly there she was, standing in front of centuries-old, intricately carved, gigantic oak doors. Zohra felt as if cold fingers had clamped over her spine.

Behind those doors was the man in whose hands her fate, her entire life, would lay if she didn’t do something about it. And she couldn’t accept that. If she had to give offense for it, take the most twisted way out of it, so be it.

Sucking a deep breath, she pushed the doors and stepped in. The main lounge was quiet, the moonlight from the balcony on the right bathing it in a silvery glow. But the bedroom in the back, the sounds of a...soccer game boomed out of it.

Was the prince having a party while she was getting cold sweats just thinking about her future?

Straightening her shoulders, Zohra set off toward the bedroom. Flashes of light came and went, the sounds so loud that she couldn’t distinguish one from the other.

She neared the wide entrance, crossed the threshold and came to a halt, her gaze drawn to the huge plasma screen on the opposite wall. It took her a moment to see through the flashes of light, to realize that there was no crowd in the room.

Scrunching her face against the loud noise from the speakers plugged in overhead and around the room, she searched for the remote. It was enough to give a person a pounding headache in minutes.

Flinching every time another roar went up, she walked around and found the remote on the bedside table. She quickly muted the television, the light from the bright screen casting enough glow to let her see the outline of the room.

With silence came another sound she hadn’t heard until now. A sound that turned her skin clammy. The hairs on her arms stood up. It began again. A low, muffled cry, tempered by the sheets. Like a scream of utter pain, but locked away in someone’s throat. She shivered, the agony in that sound crawling up her skin and latching on to the warmth.

Every instinct she possessed warned her to turn around and leave. She half turned on the balls of her feet, her neck cricking at the speed of it.

But the next sound that came from the bed was pure suffering. This time, it wasn’t locked away. Neither was it loud but more gut-wrenching for the accompanying whimper it held.

The sound ripped through her, breathing the anguish of an unbearable pain into the very air around her.

She wanted to curl up, brace herself against it. Or at least run far from it.

And yet the agony in that cry...she would never forget it in this lifetime.

Zohra turned around and reached the bed. She almost tripped on the heavy stool that lay at the side of the bed in her hurry. Clutching the silk sheets with her fingers, she hefted herself onto the high bed.

Her blood running cold in her veins, she pushed through the sea of crumpled sheets, until her gaze fell on the man.

For a moment, she could do nothing but study him. His eyes were closed, his forehead bunched into a tight knot and his hands fisted on the sheets with a white-knuckled grip.

White lines fanned around his mouth, a lone tear escaping from his scrunched eyes. His forehead was bathed in sweat, as he thrashed against the sheets.

Pushing the sheets away, Zohra reached for his hands and gasped. He was ice-cold to the touch. Another soft whimper fell from his mouth.

A wave of powerlessness hit her. Shoving it away, she grabbed his shoulders, even knowing that trying to move him would be truly impossible. With strength that surprised even her, she tucked her hands under his rock-hard shoulders when his muscled arm shot out.

That arm hit her jaw with a force that rattled her teeth. She half slipped, half tumbled to the edge of the bed. Darts of pain radiated up her jaw. She swallowed the lump in her throat and pushed herself back onto the bed.

This time, she was prepared for him. She moved to the head of the bed, avoiding his arms and placing her hands either side of his face. A groan escaped his mouth again, and his fingers clamped over her wrists.

His grip was so tight but she ignored it and shook him hard. And then tapped his cheek, determined to break the choking grip of whatever stifled him.

She couldn’t bear to hear that tortured sound anymore, not if there was any way she could wake him up.

“Wake up, ya habibi,” she whispered, much like she had done with her brother Wasim when her stepmother had died six years ago. “It’s just a nightmare.” She ran her hands over his bare shoulders, over the high planes of his cheeks. She kept whispering the same words, much to her own benefit as his, as he continued to turn his head left and right.

“You need to wake up,” she whispered again.

Suddenly his thrashing body stilled. His gaze flew open, and Zohra was looking into the most beautiful golden bronze gaze she had ever seen.

Her heart kicked against her ribs. With his hands still gripping her, she stared at him as he did her.

He had the most beautiful eyes—golden pupils with specks of copper and bronze, with lashes that curled toward angular cheekbones. But it wasn’t the arresting colors of his gaze that made her chest tighten, that made it a chore to pull air in.

It was the unhidden pain that haunted those depths. His fingers caressed her wrists, as though to make sure she was there.

He closed his eyes, his breathing going from harsh to a softer rhythm and opened his eyes again.

It was as though she was looking into a different man’s eyes.

His gaze was cautious at first, openly curious, next sweeping over her eyes, nose, lingering on her mouth, until a shadow cycled it to sheer fury.

It lit his gaze up like the blazing fire of a thousand suns.

He released her, pushed her back and she fell against the headboard with a soft gasp. He pulled himself up to his knees, his movements in no way reminiscent of the nightmare he had been fighting just moments ago. “Who are you?”

His words sounded rough, gravelly, which meant he had been screaming for a while before she had arrived.

Her chest tightened. “Are you okay?” she whispered, taking in the sheen of sweat on his forehead, the infinitesimal tremble in the set of his lean shoulders.

“How is that any of your business?” he roared. “I dismissed the guards hours ago. I was informed no one would be allowed into this wing per my orders. So what the hell are you doing here?”

That’s why no one had stopped her. And he had the volume on the TV set to that earsplitting level as if he had known...

Zohra frowned. “I saw you thrashing on the sheets. I had to help.”

“I could have hurt you.”

She instantly tugged the sleeves of her tunic over her wrists.

His face could have been poured from concrete for the tightness that crept into it. Only the slight flare of his nostrils and the incandescent rage in his gaze said he was still a man and not one of the concrete busts of long-gone emperors and warriors scattered around the palace. “Turn on the lamp.”

She leaned over and turned it on, her entire body feeling strangely awkward. The lamp was on her side and cast just enough glow to illuminate his face.

Ayaan bin Riyaaz Al-Sharif, the new crown prince of Dahaar was not what she had been expecting. The Mad Prince, that’s what she had heard the Siyaadi palace staff whisper about him. Yet there was nothing remotely mad about the man staring at her with incisive intelligence in his eyes.

There had been only a single picture of him, a grainy one, eight months ago when Dahaar had jubilantly celebrated his return. He had been pronounced dead five years ago along with his older brother and sister—victims of a brutal terrorist attack.

But nothing more about him had been revealed, nor had he appeared anywhere in public. Even the ceremony where he had been declared crown prince had been private, which had only fueled the media and the public’s hunger for information about him.

He had remained a shapeless, mindless figure at the back of her mind.

Until she had visited her father this afternoon. Weakened by a heart attack, the king had sounded feeble and yet his words had rung with pride and joy.

Prince Ayaan has agreed to marry you, Zohra. You will be the queen of Dahaar one day.

Suddenly, the Mad Prince had become the man who could bind her forever to the very world that had taken everything from her.

The reminder, however, did nothing to stem the quiet, relentless assault his very presence wreaked on her. She could no more stop her gaze from drifting over him than she could stop breathing.

He had a gaunt, chiseled look that added to the rumors swirling about him.

His face was long with a severe nose, a pointed chin, with cheekbones that were sharp enough to cut. His wavy, black hair curled onto his high forehead in an unkempt way. As if he had threaded his fingers through it and tugged at it viciously. The moment the thought crossed her mind, she knew it was true.

The tendons in his neck stood out. He was lean, bordering on thin and yet what flesh there was to him looked as if it had been carved out of rock.

A pale, inch-wide scar stretched from his left shoulder all the way to his ribs on the right side and beyond to his back. What could wield such a painful-looking scar?

Her empty stomach rolled on itself. How could a man withstand so much without...going mad?

The thought swept through her like a fierce cold wave, and she shivered.

His scrutiny as intent as her own, he said, “Hold out your hands,” in a tone that held raw command.

Zohra sucked in a breath and tucked her hands behind her.

He moved on the bed with lithe grace that would have been beautiful to savor if her heart hadn’t crawled into her throat. She was taller than the average Dahaaran woman and yet he towered over her.

The scent of him had a tang to it that made her suck in a quick, greedy breath even before she knew it. He tugged her hands forward in a sudden move.

Her skin stung where he had gripped her at even the slight friction of his fingers. He sucked in a deep breath. As though he was bracing himself. His fingers gentled as he pushed the sleeves of her tunic back.

Dark impressions framed each wrist. A chill surrounded them, and she had the strangest feeling that his emotions were at the center of it.

She tugged at her hands but he didn’t let go. “How long were you here before I woke up?”

The tension emanating from him rendered her mute.

“How long?”

He didn’t shout the words yet they radiated with utter fury. “Five, maybe six minutes. I didn’t know what to do.”

He let go of her hands with a jerk. “You were not supposed to be in here in the first place. And if you’re reckless enough to be, the minute you saw me, you should have turned around and walked out.”

She shook her head. “I would loathe myself if I just walked away.”

He ran a hand through his hair again, his movements visibly shaken. But he didn’t get off the bed, blocking her escape. “It is a quarter to midnight. I have asked you twice why you are here. If you will not answer me, I will summon the guard. Before you realize it, you will be out of a job, out of a livelihood. All for what? To get a little information on the Mad Prince? A quick photograph, is that it? Tell me who sent you here and I will show lenience.”

He thought she was a servant paid to gather information about him? “No one sent me here, Prince Ayaan.”

He became stiffer, if possible, the rigid line of his shoulders obvious in the feeble light. The bones at the crook between his neck and shoulders stood out in stark relief.

She didn’t want to antagonize him any more than she already had. She didn’t want to ponder about his nightmare, his reaction to her being a witness to it. If she did this right, she wouldn’t need to see him ever again nor hear the gut-wrenching pain she had heard in his cries.

“I...came here of my own volition. It was important for me to talk to you before you left tomorrow morning.”

Slowly, the annoyance in his expression shifted to watchfulness. And she fought the need to shy away from it, to hide from his intense scrutiny.

He knew.

She could pinpoint the exact moment he realized—the watchfulness turned into realization, a flare of color in those beautiful eyes.

That gaze moved over her in a slow sweep, lingering over her face for the longest time, seeing her with new eyes. This time, it wasn’t mere anger that colored it, but wariness, almost as if she had suddenly become dangerous to him.

“Of course you’re not a servant.”

He stepped off the bed as though he couldn’t breathe the same air for another moment. She stared at the broad expanse of his back. The scar streaked through his back too, like a rope bound around his body.

He pulled on a T-shirt and stood by the foot of the enormous bed, his hands behind him, as though waiting for her to come to her senses.

Heat spread up her neck and she gritted her teeth.

She had nothing to feel guilty or ashamed about. She had seized the only opportunity available to her. She had seen a man in the throes of a violent nightmare and tried to help.

She slid to her feet, the muscles in her legs trembling.

“What was so important that it had to be said in the middle of the night?”

This was it. This was why she had risked coming into his suite. And yet, her tongue felt as if it was glued to the roof of her mouth.

“Should I send word to King Salim?”

She stared at him, the sudden threat in his words, the raw command showing a different man. “There’s no need to involve my father in a matter that concerns me...us. I’m sure we can settle this between ourselves and come to a conclusion that is agreeable to both of us.”

CHAPTER TWO

SHE WAS HIS betrothed.

Ayaan felt the world tilting at his feet as what he had guessed curdled into undeniable reality.

This slip of a woman, who had the nerve to climb onto his bed and hold him through a nightmare, this woman, who was even now meeting his gaze with an arrogant confidence, was the woman he had agreed to marry just a few hours ago?

He hadn’t given her a moment’s thought. She was nothing more than a bullet point in the list of things he had agreed to in the name of duty.

He stood unmoving, the need to vent his spiraling frustration burning his muscles.

Her light brown hair was combed away into a braid. Her eyes were brown, huge in her long face. A strong nose and mouth followed, the stubborn jut of it saying so much about the woman.

She wore a light pink tunic over black leggings, a flimsy shawl wrapped loosely around her torso. Her outfit was plain for a princess, giving no hint as to what lay...

With a control he had honed tight over the past few months, he brought his gaze back to her face. He had indulged himself enough. How the woman looked, or what kind of a body she had, held no significance to him.

Her mother had been American, someone had mentioned it to him. But she was a copy of King Salim. The same no-nonsense air about her, the proud chin, the dogged determination it must have cost her to be near him during his nightmare.

He had no doubt about how violent he could get when caught in one of those nocturnal episodes. It was the reason he detested having anyone even within hearing distance. And despite every precaution he took to hide the truth, to spare his parents, they had already earned him the title of Mad Prince.

If only the world knew what a luxury madness was compared to his lucidity.

He didn’t want to marry this woman any more than he wanted the mantle of Dahaar. The latter, he had been able to postpone. The former...?

The people of Dahaar need reassurance that all is well with you, they need a reason to celebrate. They haven’t had one in five years. And Siyaad needs our help. King Salim stood by me when I had no one else to rely on, when I was crumbling under the weight of Dahaar.

Now it is time we return the favor.

Ayaan wasn’t prepared for it. He would never be.

How could he be, when he didn’t trust himself, when he didn’t know what could break him again, when he was constantly hovering over the thin line between lucidity and lunacy?

But he couldn’t refuse his father, not after everything he had gone through to rule and protect Dahaar, after losing his eldest son and daughter, losing Ayaan to insanity.

His parents had lost everything in one night, but they hadn’t broken. They hadn’t failed in their duty. He couldn’t either.

But suddenly, King Salim’s profuse excuses at tonight’s dinner made sense. His daughter’s absence had been an act of defiance. Not that Ayaan had cared that she was absent. On the contrary, he had been glad that he didn’t need to give the concept of his betrothed a concrete form until that moment was absolutely upon him.

And now here she was, pushing herself into his mind in a way he couldn’t just undo. Within five minutes spent in her company, he already knew more about her than he wanted to learn in a lifetime. She was stubborn, she was brave and the worst? She wasn’t conventional.

“I understood you were too ill to be out and about, Princess Zohra,” he said, forcing utter scorn into his words. “And yet here you are, walking around the palace at night, disrupting a guest’s privacy, offering insult.”

“Do not call me a princess. I have never been one.”

He was too...irritated to even ask her why.

He was chilled to the bone, as he always was when he woke up from one of his nightmares. “Fine. Please tell me why you are in my bed, in my suite, in the palace wing that is strictly forbidden to women, at the stroke of midnight. What was so important that you had to—”

“You were thrashing in the bed, crying out. I couldn’t just stand by and do nothing. Nor could I walk away and come back at a better time.”

“Are you deaf? Or just plain dense?” The words roared out of him on a wave of utter shame. He gritted his teeth, fighting for control over a temper that never flared. “Why are you here in the first place?”

The brown of her eyes expanded, her mouth dropping open on a soft huff. His uncivilized words chased away the one thing he couldn’t bear to see—her pity.

“If you think you can scare me into running away by behaving like a savage, it won’t work.”

He could have laughed if he wasn’t so wound up. Every inch of her—her head held high, the deprecation in her look, the stubborn jut of her chin—she was a princess no matter what she said. “If this were Dahaar, I would have—”

“But it’s not Dahaar. Nor am I your loyal subject dependent on your tender mercies,” she said, steel creeping into her words. “This is Siyaad. And even here, all those rules, they don’t apply to me.” Her eyes collided with his, daring him to challenge her claim. When Ayaan said nothing, her gaze swept over his features with a thoroughness that she couldn’t hide. Did she feel the same burn of awareness that arched into life suddenly? “I came to inform you that it’s not worth it.”

Ayaan had known only one woman in his life who had had the temerity and the confidence to speak to him like that—Amira, his older sister. A sliver of pain sliced through his gut. Amira had never let Azeez or him get by with anything. And it had been more because of her core of steel than because she had been born into an extremely powerful family.

He had a feeling the same was true of the woman who met his gaze unflinchingly.

“What is not worth it?”

“Marrying me.”

“Why are you telling me this instead of your father?”

She blinked but it didn’t hide the pain that filled her eyes. “I... He is not well. I could not...take the chance and risk making him worse.”

“Being here with me, persuading me why you are not worth it does not harm him?”

A shrug of those slender shoulders. “If you refuse me, he would be disappointed, yes. But not surprised.”

He frowned at her conclusion. “So you want me to do your dirty work for you?”

She took a deep breath and his curiosity mounted. “I’m not shy, willing, happy to be a man’s shadow—the kind of woman whose only mission in life would be to spew out your heirs every other year. I have never been and it’s not a role one grows into.”

Ayaan smiled, despite the irritation flickering through him.

The woman had gall. And even without her mission statement just now, it was clear she wasn’t a woman who could tolerate the traditional marriage their countries dictated.

Then why was King Salim pushing for this marriage? He had to know that Ayaan and his father would stand beside him without this marriage clause, and yet he had shown more enthusiasm for it.

“If you had attended the dinner and did your duty, I could have told you what I want in my wife.”

She shook her head, her breath quickening. “What is there to learn? The wives—they are nothing but bloodlines and broodmares. Even a harem girl probably has it better than the dutiful wife of the king. At least, she gets good sex out of the...”

He burst out laughing. His chest heaved with it, the sound barreling out of him. Even his throat felt raw in a strange way.

He couldn’t help taking a step toward her.

Pink stole into her cheeks, and she looked away from him, something unintelligible falling from her mouth.

Her long lashes cast shadows onto sharply fragile cheekbones, her mouth—unpainted and pink. The slow burn under his skin gathered momentum. He had never liked the scent of roses growing up, it had pervaded the palace, his own chamber and sometimes, even his clothes. Yet the scent of her skin danced beneath it, teasing, tempting, coated with her awareness of him.

“So you would prefer to be part of my harem instead of my wife?”

Her gaze widened, her mouth opening and closing. “This is my life we’re talking about.”

He came to a stop near her and leaned against the bed, enjoying the proximity of her presence. It didn’t fill him with the suffocating tension that everyone else’s did since his return. “You haven’t said a single word that would make me take you seriously, Princess.” She opened her mouth but he didn’t give her the chance. “All I see is a woman throwing a tantrum like a petulant teenager instead of doing her duty. What if someone had seen you come into my suite? You risk exposing yourself to ridicule and scandal, adding to your father’s burden.”

She didn’t like that. He could see it in her eyes. “Of course, you wouldn’t want someone petulant like me to be the future queen of Dahaar, would you?”

“So, this is all to prove a point?”

“I don’t have any duty toward Siyaad. And nothing will make me feel anything more for Dahaar either.” She took a deep breath, as though bracing herself. “Marrying me will only bring shame to you and the royal house of Dahaar.”

He covered the distance between them, knowing that she was baiting him yet unable to resist. “Why does that sound more like a threat and less like a warning?” he whispered.

“I’m simply telling you the truth. Whatever expectations you have of your bride, I will fail them.”

Ayaan frowned, regretting not learning more about her before he had given his word. “If this is about your expectations of this marriage, state them.”

Zohra tamped down the scream building inside her chest looking for an outlet. He wasn’t supposed to ask her what she wanted out of this marriage. He was supposed to sputter in outrage, call her disobedient, scandalous...

Any other man in his place would have called her behavior an insult. He would have gone straight to her father and broken the alliance.

“The only expectation I have of you,” she said, feeling as though she was stepping over an unknown threshold, “is that you use the power you have to refuse this marriage.”

A neat little frown appeared between his brows. “Unless I have a strong reason for it, it would be termed as an insult to your father, to you and to Siyaad.”

“Isn’t it enough that you have zero interest in marrying me?”

“I have zero interest in marrying anyone. But I will do it for—”

“For your country, yes, I know that,” she spat the words out, feeling that sense of isolation that had been her constant companion for eleven years. She had never belonged in Siyaad, never felt as if she was a part of it. “But I’m not duty bound as you are. All I want is the freedom to live my life away from the shackles of this kind. And if it is a crystal clear reason that you want, then I will give you one.”

“You have my full attention, Princess.” There was a dangerous inflection in his voice where it had been void of anything else before.

She wet her lips, praying her voice would hold steady when she was shaking inside. “I’m not future queen material. I don’t give a fig about duty and all that it entails. I’m educated and I’m smart enough to have my own opinions, which, I have been informed, are enough to drive a man up the wall. I’m a...bastard.” She had to breathe through the lump growing in her throat. “My father lived with my mother until I was seven but he...never married her. He became my guardian when she died.”

Not even by the flicker of an eyelid did he betray his reaction. “Is that all?”

Curse the man to hell and back. Desperation tied her insides into painful knots. “No, there’s one last reason—the most important of all.”

“Don’t stop now,” he said, his voice laced with mockery.

“I’m not a chaste virgin with an unblemished reputation.” Her chest was so tight she wondered if she was getting any air. “I would rather you refuse me now than claim that you’ve been cheated when you...find out.”

He ran his forefinger over his temple, his expression betraying nothing. Her heartbeat ratcheted up. “When I find out that you’re not a virgin?”

Fierce heat blanketed her, even as shock stung her. Why wasn’t the man throwing a royal fit even now? “When you find out that I was in love with another man, when you find out that I have spent four summers with him in a desert encampment...” She swallowed painfully, just the thought of Faisal slashing pain through her.

“That is...a valid reason for me to refuse you,” he finally said.

Zohra felt the most perverse disappointment. He had been unlike anything she had imagined until now.

“So are you prepared for your father’s reaction when I present him with this...reason?”

Her gut dropped to her feet. “What do you mean?”

“I told you. I have no wish to insult your father after everything he has done to stand by mine. You might not feel any duty to your country. But are you so selfish that you would put your father through this? He will not only be shamed by his daughter’s behavior but he will be so in front of an audience.”

She flinched at the distaste in his words. He hadn’t intended to back out for a second. Her gut churned with a powerless clawing. “I have no wish to weaken my father. I merely gave you the truth.”

His gaze was filled with a bitterness that cut through her. “Your ‘truth’ is only useful to me if I can quote it to your father’s face. Our fates are sealed no matter what you or I wish, no matter what skeletons we have in our closets.”

Zohra’s palms turned clammy. He was not backing out. Marrying a stranger, being locked forever into the cage of duty and obligation—the same duty that had ripped her family apart? She would take an uncertain future over that.

She sought and discarded one idea after the other, panic gripping her tight.

“Fine,” she said, her mind already jumping ahead. It had been a waste of time to come here. “I have only one choice left then.”

She turned around, determined to act before the night was up. She couldn’t stay in the palace, in Siyaad for another minute.

She was about to step over the threshold when a hand on her arm pulled her back. A soft gasp escaped her mouth as she was pushed against the wall with sure movements. The muscles in her arms trembled, her senses becoming hyperaware of every little detail about him.

Like the strong column of his throat as his chest fell and rose. Like the tingle in her skin where his fingers touched her.

“I suddenly have great sympathy for your father, Princess. My sister Amira is just as headstrong as you seem to be, but at least, she listens when Azeez or I...”

A dark shadow fell over his face. He had spoken of his sister as though she was still alive. She shouldn’t care about his pain, but it pierced through her anyway.

“Your sister? The one who died five years ago?”

He met her gaze. The pain in it flayed her open. “Yes.” His hands landed on either side of her face. He bent until she could see the light scar over his left eyebrow. Any grief she had seen a moment ago was gone. “Now, tell me what the only choice you have left is.”

She pushed at him, but he didn’t relent. “I’ve not given you the liberty to touch me, Prince Ayaan, neither to haul me around.”

“You should have thought about that before you barged into my room, Princess.” Mockery gave his mouth a cruel slant. “Whatever you do now, I will hold myself responsible for it.”

“You wouldn’t have even laid eyes on me until the wedding if I hadn’t forced my way in here. No one is responsible for my actions or my life but me.”

“I became responsible for you the minute I said yes to this alliance. And I won’t let you cause any more problems for your father.”

“This...” she couldn’t speak for the outrage sputtering through her “...this kind of archaic behavior is what I’m talking about. Your claim just proves how right I am in wanting to get out of this marriage, out of Siyaad.”

“So you’re going to run away in the middle of the night and expose your father to a scandal?”

“I owe my father nothing. Nothing. And I’m not running away, I’m going to exercise my right as an adult and leave. Neither my father nor you can force me into a marriage that I don’t want, nor can you stop me from leaving.”

He took his hands away from her. Not trusting his actions even for a second, Zohra straightened from the wall. Her knees shook beneath her.

“Fine, leave,” he said, displeasure burning in his gaze. “But you leave your father no choice either except to announce my betrothal to your sister. I understand she will be eighteen in a year.”

Bile crawled up Zohra’s throat and pooled in her mouth. How dare he? “Sixteen and a half. My sister is sixteen and a half.”

Only silence met her outburst.

She covered the gap between them, fury eating away at reason. She pushed at him, powerless anger churning in her gut. Saira would never go against their father. She had been born and raised in Siyaad, exposed to nothing but the incessant chatter about duty and obligation despite Zohra’s presence.

“You cannot do that. She...I won’t let my father or you...”

She fisted her hands and let out the cry sawing at her throat.

There was nothing she could do to stop her father from promising Saira in her place. And he would, without blinking. Zohra knew firsthand the lengths to which her father could go for Siyaad.

Her chest felt as if there was a steel band around it, the shackles of duty and obligation sinking their claws into her.

“Saira is innocent, a teenager who still believes in love and happily ever after.”

“And you?”

“They do exist. Just not in this world, in your world. And I will do anything before I let Saira’s happiness be sacrificed in the name of duty.”

“So you’re not completely selfish then.” He moved closer. “What is this world that I belong to, Princess, to which you don’t?”

“It’s filled with duty, obligations, sacrifice...what else? If Saira marries you, you will shatter her illusions, bring her nothing but unhappiness. You would marry a mere girl in the name of duty?”

Disgust radiated from him. “The very thought of betrothal to a sixteen-year-old makes my skin crawl. But Siyaad needs this public alliance. Your father’s heart attacks in the last six months, your brother’s minor status, the latest skirmish at the border? It has made Siyaad weak. This wedding means that the world knows that Dahaar stands by Siyaad. It’s the best chance your father, your people, have of retaining their identity. If something should happen to your father, your brother will have our protection.

“Knowing all this, you refuse this alliance? You risk your country’s future, your brother’s future by acting so recklessly?”

Zohra crumpled against the wall, the fight leaving her. She owed nothing to her father, nor to Siyaad. But Saira and Wasim...if not for them, she would have been so alone all these years. A stranger among her father’s people at thirteen—shattered by her mother’s death and the devastating truth that her father was not only alive, but that he was the sovereign of Siyaad and had a wife and six-year-old son and daughter.

If not for her brother and sister, she would have had nothing but misery. “I had no idea this would benefit Wasim.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

His derision felt like a stinging slap. But this was all her fault.

She had always made it her mission to learn as little as possible about the politics in Siyaad, she had rebuffed her father’s attempts to educate her, to make her active in the country’s politics. If she hadn’t sunk her head in the sand like an ostrich, she would have been better equipped to deal with this situation.

She ran a trembling hand over her forehead, shaking from head to toe. She was well and truly caught, all her hopes for a future separate from duty and obligation crumbling right before her eyes.

“If this is all for Siyaad’s benefit, why are you agreeing to this? You can snap your fingers and find a woman who will be your silent shadow. You clearly already dislike me. You can still refuse this, you can help Siyaad without—”

“Enough!” Bitterness rose up inside Ayaan, burning in his blood like a fire unchecked. He reveled in the anger, in the way it burned away the crippling fear that was always lurking beneath the surface eating away the weight of what his lucidity meant to him. “You think you are anything like the woman I would want to marry if it wasn’t for duty, if it wasn’t to repay the debt my father owes yours?” he said, filling his every word with the clawing anger he felt.

Every inch of color fled from her face and she looked as if he had struck her. And Ayaan crushed the little flare of remorse he felt.

It would have been better if his unwanted wife had been a woman who would scurry at the thought of being in the same room with the Mad Prince. But this defiant woman was what fate had brought him.

There was no point in railing against it. “There is very little that matters left to me, Princess. Except my word. And I would rather be dead than lose that, too.”

“Then, send me back when Wasim turns eighteen, when he doesn’t need your protection anymore, however long that might take. The world will still know that Siyaad has your support. You can claim that I was an unsuitable wife and I will not contest you. You can sever all connections with me and no one will point a finger.”

He shook his head, surprised at the depth of her anger toward their way of life.

To be rid of her when there was no need anymore was an infinitely tempting offer. But there would be no honor in it. “If I send you back, you will become the object of speculation and ridicule. That is a very high price for your freedom, Princess. It will always be tainted in Siyaad.”

He saw the tremor that went through her, the fear that surfaced in her gaze. But of course, she didn’t heed it. He already knew that much about this woman. “Anything is better than being locked in a marriage whose very fabric is dictated by duty and nothing else.”

“Marriage to me doesn’t have to be the nightmare you are expecting.”

“What do you mean?”

“I have very little expectations of my wife. She will live in Dahaar. She will do her duty in state functions by my side. She will be kind and thoughtful to my parents.

“I will not love her nor will I expect her to love me. I don’t even want to see her except in public. This marriage is purely for the benefit of my parents. And I don’t care what you do with your time as long as you don’t bring shame upon Dahaar. Our lives can be as separate as you or I want.”

She frowned, her gaze studying him intently. “What about an heir? Isn’t that part of the agenda that’s passed down to you? Produce as many offspring, male preferably, as soon as possible?”

“How old are you, Princess?”

“Twenty-four.”

“I thought I was too bitter for my age. I have no intention of fathering a son or daughter, Princess, not with you or anyone else, not until...” Not ever if he didn’t find control over his own mind. “How about we revisit the invigorating subject of procreation in say...two years from now?”

She swallowed, drawing his gaze to the delicate line of her throat. “How do I know you won’t change your mind...about everything?”

“I have enough nightmares without the added ones of forcing myself on an unwilling woman. Believe me, the last thing I want is to sleep with you.”

Her gaze sparked with defiance. “If I’m to be stuck in a marriage that will save my sister and benefit my brother, then I might as well be in one with a man who’s just as indifferent to it as I am.”

Ayaan frowned, something else cutting through the pulse of attraction swirling around them. Not only had she elicited a reaction he had thought his body incapable of, but she had annoyed, perplexed and downright aggravated him to the extent that she had so easily banished the backlash from his nightmare, the chills he would have been fighting for the rest of the night.

That she was able to do that when nothing else had worked in the past few months rendered him speechless, tempted him to keep her there, even if it was only to...

Shaking his head, he caught himself. Whatever relief she brought him would only be temporary. “If you have had enough of an adventure, I will walk you back, Princess.”

The smile slipped from her mouth, her gaze lingering on him, assessing, studying. She tucked her hands around her waist, loosened them and hugged herself again. Her indecision crystal clear in her eyes, Ayaan waited, willing her to let it go, willing her to walk away without another word.

Her gaze slipped to the bed and back to him, a caress and a question in it. Every muscle in him tightened with a hot fury. “Will you be okay for the rest of the—”

Forcing his fury into action, Ayaan tugged her forward. “Remember, Princess. You will be my wife only in front of the world. In private, you and I are nothing more than strangers. So stay out of things that don’t concern you and I will do the same.”

CHAPTER THREE

THE WEEK LEADING up to the wedding was the most torturous week that Zohra could remember, even though the wedding day dawned bright and sunny.

Prince Ayaan had left the next morning while Zohra and her family had traveled to Dahaara the day after that, renewed vigor seeping into her father who had been ill for the past month.

It was as though she could hear the ticking of the clock down to an unshakeable chain binding her to everything she hated.

With each passing moment, her confidence in her betrothed’s words faltered, the midnight hour she had spent talking to him becoming fantastic and unreal in her head. Especially as Queen Fatima, Ayaan’s mother, spent every waking hour regaling Zohra about Ayaan’s childhood.

The contrast between the charming, loving boy his mother mentioned and the dark stranger she spoke to in the middle of the night was enough to cast doubt over everything.

Would he not expect anything from her? What kind of a man didn’t even want to lay eyes on his wife?

She tugged the gold-and-silver bangles on to her wrists as the celebrations around the city blared loudly on the huge plasma-screen TV in her suite. The capital city of Dahaara had been decorated lavishly, very much a bride itself, albeit a much happier one, ready for a celebration unlike Zohra had ever seen or heard of.

The gold-and-red-hued flag of Dahaar with the sword insignia flew on every street, from every shop. A holiday had been declared so that the people of Dahaar could enjoy the wedding. Gifts had been flowing in from every corner of the nation—breathtakingly exquisite silk fabrics, handmade jewelry boxes, sweets that she hadn’t heard of before—each and every gift painstakingly overflowing with Dahaar’s love of its prince.

The telecast of the celebrations, the crowds on the roads, the laughter on the faces of adults and children alike revealed how much this wedding mattered to Dahaar. The whole world was celebrating. Except the two people who were irrevocably being bound by it.

“Zo, look now. There he goes,” Saira exclaimed, looking beautiful in a sheer silk beige dress that sparkled in the sunlight every time she moved. Zohra couldn’t help but smile at the innocence in her half sister’s voice. “Wow, Zo. I didn’t realize he was so...handsome.”

Unable to resist, Zohra turned and there he was.

Displayed in all his glory on the monstrous screen. The cameras zoomed in on him, and Zohra’s breath halted in her throat.

Handsome was too tame a word for the man she was about to marry.

The motorcade transporting him and his parents weaved through the main street with ropes and security teams holding off the public.

Shouts and applause waved out of the speakers. It was almost palpable, the din of the crowd, the joy in their smiling faces. King Malik sat with Queen Fatima by his side, Prince Ayaan opposite them, resplendent in a dark navy military uniform that hugged his lean body, the very epitome of a powerful prince.

She could no more stem her curiosity about him than she could stop staring at him on the screen. Zohra shivered despite the sun-drenched room. He looked every inch a man who was used to having his every bidding done before it was given voice. Until she saw the detachment in his gaze.

Even through the screen, she could see the tension in his shoulders, in the tight set of his mouth, in the smile that curved his mouth but never reached his eyes.

He was standing in a crowd of people that loved him, next to parents who adored him, seemingly a man who had the world at his feet. And yet she could sense his isolation as clearly as if he were standing alone in a desert.

The joy around him, the celebrations, the crowds—nothing touched him. It was as though there was an invisible fortress around him that no one could pierce.

Did no one else but her see his isolation, the absolute lack of anything in that gaze? Would she have seen it if she hadn’t seen him incoherent, and writhing in pain?

She swallowed and turned away from the screen. There it was—all the proof she had needed so desperately.

The truth of what he had said to her—that this wedding was solely for the benefit of his people, for his parents, was all laid out on the screen to see. Nothing but his sense of duty was forcing him to stand there, as it was forcing him to marry her.

The realization, instead of appeasing her, gave way to a strange heaviness that pervaded through her limbs.

She turned around, just as her father stepped into the room, dressed in the dark green military uniform of Siyaad.

She had done everything she could to avoid him once they had left for Dahaara. Busy as he had been in negotiations with King Malik and Prince Ayaan, it had been easy enough.

But, suddenly facing him in her bridal attire, the knot of anger she kept a tight hold on threatened to unravel. “Have you come to make sure I have not run away?”

Saira’s gasp next to her checked the flow of bitterness that pounded through her veins. Passing a worried look between them, Saira excused herself, having never understood Zohra’s antipathy toward their father.

“I know you’re not happy with this alliance, Zohra. But I never doubted that you would do your duty.”

There it was, that word again. It had broken her family apart, it had thrust her into an unknown world, and it had taken the life of her mother, who had done nothing but pine after the man she had loved.

She stood up from the divan and met his gaze. “I’m doing this for Saira and Wasim. I don’t want Saira to be sacrificed in the name of duty, too.”

He ventured into the room, and she braced herself for the impact of his presence. In the eleven years that she had lived in Siyaad, she had always stayed out of his way, made sure she spent the least amount of time with him.

“Is that what this marriage is to you? Can you not view it as anything else but sacrifice?”

“What else could it be? You didn’t ask me if I wanted this. That man,” she said, pointing her finger toward the screen, “didn’t ask me if I wanted to be his wife. You have reduced my life to an addendum clause on a treaty.”

His jaw tightened. “You will be the future queen of Dahaar, a woman who can have just as much power as she wants in the tri-nation region. Your education, your intelligence, they can be used to do good in Dahaar, Zuran and Siyaad, to pave way for new things, to change old ways, ways you have always called archaic. No one will ever dare question your right to rule along with Prince Ayaan. You will live the rest of your life with the utmost—”

“This alliance is nothing but a way to secure Siyaad’s future.”

He nodded, sudden exhaustion seeping into his face. “I am glad that Saira and Wasim mean something to you.” Unlike me, the words hovered in the air between them. “That means you will at least keep an eye on them.”

Zohra refused to feel guilty, refused to let him put her in the wrong when he had made an irrevocable decision all those years ago, when he continued to show again and again that Siyaad would always come first with him. “They are my family. I will do anything for them,” she said, forcing herself to speak the words. “They are the only reason I’ve stayed—”

“In Siyaad all these years, I know.”

The knot in her throat cut off her breath. She held herself absolutely still as he neared her, her gut twisting on itself. The sandalwood scent of him knocked her sideways, unlocking memories she had forcibly buried. Maybe if he had always been an absentee father, maybe if she didn’t remember her mother’s desolation, her own aching grief when she had been told one fine morning that her father was dead...

Only to learn after her mother had died that he had just walked away from them to take up the crown of Siyaad, that he had already had a wife.

His whole life with her mother and her had been a lie.

He pressed a kiss to her forehead, and the longing she fought broke free. But she couldn’t let it out. If she did, it would hurt her like nothing else could. So she turned the emotion engulfing her into a bitterness that had already festered for so long.

“I always wondered why you took custody of me when mom died instead of sending me to her brother. Living in Siyaad all these years, being a daughter, a bastard at that, I realized I have no consequence for you, no importance in your life. But now... Is this why? You knew I would come in handy for one of your many obligations toward your country?”

His mouth compressed into a tight line, a flash of anger in his gaze now. “When will you realize that Siyaad is just as much a part of you as it is of me?”

“Not in this lifetime.”

Resignation settled over his features. And suddenly, he was the man who had had two heart attacks in the space of six months. “Whatever I say is immaterial because you’ve already decided the answer.”

He clasped her cheek with his palm, his gaze drinking in every feature, every nuance in her expression. He is remembering my mom. Zohra knew that as clearly as if he had said her name out loud. Ever since he had suddenly reappeared in her life when she had been thirteen and dragged her to Siyaad, she had always understood one thing.

He had loved her mother just as much as her mother had loved him. And yet, he had walked out of their lives and put duty first.

“Ever since you were a little girl, you’ve always been stubborn. Incredibly strong but also stubborn.

“You’ve always decided your own fate, Zohra. You decided why I had left without ever asking me. You decided to hate your stepmother when you came to live in Siyaad, even though she had been nothing but kind to you. You decided you would have nothing to do with Siyaad or your heritage.

“You decided to love your half brother and half sister, you decided to stay in Siyaad for them when you turned eighteen. No one has or will ever tell you how to live your life.

“What you make of this marriage, whether you view it as a cage or your freedom is, as always, up to you.”

Saira came bursting into the room, pink high in her cheeks. “He’s arrived in the Throne Hall.”

Zohra didn’t need to be told again who it was that was waiting for her.

Her gaze anxiously shifting between Zohra and their father, Saira handed Zohra the bouquet of white lilies. Her palms were clammy as though she were walking to her execution rather than her wedding.

As the sweet scent of the flowers tickled her nose, Zohra took her father’s offered hand. For a moment, she couldn’t get her legs to move, couldn’t shake off the sudden fear that descended over her.

In the next, she was standing at the entrance to the Throne Hall, a vast chamber with a high, circular dome ceiling. The moment Zohra and her father crossed the threshold, traditional Dahaaran music blared to life from their left and right. The festive sounds set her heart thumping in tune.

A gasp fell from her lips. The whole setting could have been torn out of her worn-out copy of One Thousand and One Arabian Nights. Back when she had still been enchanted enough to believe the magical stories spun by her father, before the reality of duty and obligation had shattered her world, before the truth of a princess’s life had forced her to grow up too fast.

The hall was huge with at least a thousand gold-edged chairs on either side, leaving a carpeted path between for her to walk. The floor was cream-colored marble with inlaid jewels.

The carpeted path was strewn with red rose petals. Zohra followed the path with her eyes to the other end of the hall, where there was a wide dais. Sheer gold-and-beige-colored fabrics draped across the dais which was built of steps leading to a gold-edged throne, wide enough for two. Thousands of cream-colored roses, with bloodred roses here and there, adorned every step and surface of the dais.

And standing next to the throne, his navy uniform contrastingly starkly against the richly romantic background, a blur to her panic-stricken gaze, was her bridegroom.

Never for a moment had she imagined such a lavish wedding, or such a forbidding-looking man waiting for her at the end of it. She had imagined the same day with Faisal so many times. A simple wedding free of obligations and duty with the man she loved, both of them able to live the life they had wanted.

How had such a simple dream turned into dust?

Her heart thudded hard against her rib cage, her chest incredibly tight.

Across the vast hall, her gaze met Prince Ayaan’s. And held.

She had expected him to be just as isolated from her as he had been through the parade. And yet, she could swear he was tuned to her every step, every breath, as if they were the only two people in the huge hall.

Her nerves stretched tight at the intensity of that gaze. It burned hot, alive, intense and she realized she was the cause of it. That awareness between them, it had a life of its own across the vast hall.

Was he anchoring her or was she anchoring him onto a path neither wanted to go on?

Sucking in a breath, she severed the connection, and focused on something beyond his shoulder. An uncontrollable shaking took root in her.

She did not need his strength, imagined or real, nor did he need hers.

The setting of the wedding, the festivities and joy around her, it was all getting to her.

This marriage will be whatever you make of it.

For once, Zohra agreed with her father’s practical advice and she intended to set the tone for it from the beginning. And that meant remembering the prince and she were nothing but strangers brought together by duty.

* * *

Ayaan heard Zohra’s answer to the imam’s question, her voice crystal clear with no hesitation in it. The second time and then the third time, she gave her consent to the wedding.

Whatever doubts she’d had, no one would detect even a hint of it in her voice right then.

Or that she was, in any way, not fit to be the future queen of Dahaar. After she had left that night, he had wondered not only at his father’s decision to choose a woman with tainted birth—even if it wasn’t her fault—but even more, someone as impulsive and hotheaded as her.

But had his father seen the strength and poise she radiated with her very presence as she did now? Had he seen the assertiveness, the intelligence that shone from her gaze? Had he thought Ayaan needed an educated, even an unconventional wife to compensate for...

Suddenly it was his turn to give consent and the imam’s words washed over him.

He gave his consent, his promise to cherish, protect and love Zohra Katherine Naasar for the rest of his life, the words sticking in his throat.

Protecting her—that was the only promise he could keep and to do that, he needed to keep his wife as far from the reaches of his darkness as possible. He slipped an emerald ring, seated among tiny diamonds, onto her finger. And extended his own hand for her to do the same.

Her fingers trembled when they touched his, her movements betraying the anxiety she hid so well.

From everything he had learned about her, his bride belonged in a category of her own. And despite every warning aimed toward himself, he couldn’t tamp down his curiosity about her. Especially as, for the first time in eight months, he could remember every sensation, every scent—every minute of his encounter with her in exquisite detail.

His days, especially hours spent in someone else’s company, were usually a blur to him. Yesterday’s groom’s ceremony that his mother had observed with happiness glittering in her every movement was already a vague memory.

He’d had only silence to offer when his mother had told him how happy she was that he had accepted this alliance. For every hundred words she said, he had only one.

This morning had been the first time he’d faced Dahaar’s people since his return.

He had choked in the face of the joy, in the expectations of the people of Dahaar and the crushing weight of it. They cheered him on, they called him a survivor, a true hero when the truth was he was fighting every waking and sleeping moment to stop his reality from turning into a nightmare.

It was how he saw his life stretch in front of him. Isolated during the day and fighting his demons each night.

Until his bride had stood at the entrance to the hall.

He had sucked in a sharp breath, feeling as though a fog was falling away from his eyes. Suddenly, he had become aware of the reverent hush of the crowd as they watched her walk toward him, the festive strains of traditional music and the scent of the roses around the dais wafting up toward him.

Instead of the pristine white that tradition demanded, her dress was of the palest gold color with intricately heavy embroidery. It draped her torso in a severe cut, even the neckline revealing nothing but the palest hint of her skin. Thousands of tiny crystals stitched into the bodice twinkled every time she moved. It was cinched at her tiny waist and then showed off her long legs. Her hair was piled high and atop it sat a diamond tiara.

He had no doubt as to what statement she was making with that dress. Subtlety in any shape or form was apparently a strange concept to his bride.

His mouth curved, a lightness filling his chest.

The severity of the style did nothing but highlight the shape of her body—every curve and dip neatly delineated to satisfy his spiraling curiosity from that night.

Her skin glowed. She wasn’t the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Her features were too distinct and determined to play well with each other, but in that moment, there was no woman who would have suited better to be the future queen of Dahaar.

The longer he took in her beautiful face, the faster his heart beat.

His gut tightened in the most delicious way, a slow curl of heat unraveling in his muscles. He shuddered at the strangely dizzying sensation.

When the imam completed his prayer and she turned to look at Ayaan, the scent of her skin—rose attar and something else—teased his body into rising awareness.

She was his wife, his woman.

In name only, but in that moment, the primitive claim washed away everything else.

The music climbed a crescendo and the imam pronounced them man and wife.

She was now Princess Zohra Katherine Naasar Al-Sharif, the future queen of Dahaar.

Cheers and good wishes swept up through the hall. He let it all flow over him, fighting the inimitable weight of it, willing himself to focus on the happiness flowing around.

Hooking her hand through his, he led her down the steps of the dais and toward the area on the right to where the next ritual would take place. She had asked for the ceremonies to be completed the same day.

“What was the reason for this request?” he whispered at her ear, noticing her eyes light up as her brother Wasim hugged her. She said something to him and immediately the young prince of Siyaad cheered up.

It was the only time she fully smiled—when it was her half sister or half brother. For the rest of them, including her father, there was never a smile, at least not one that reached her eyes. Only a distance she clearly projected between her and the outside world.

Pity, because her smile held inexplicable warmth, almost a promise to chase away the shadows from the person she bestowed it on.

She stilled and turned toward him, her hand going to the sheer, gold-colored veil that fluttered from beneath the tiara. He leaned in and tugged it from where it had caught on the tiny crystal on her bodice. His fingers grazed the curve of her breast. She jerked back just as he did.

Her beautiful brown eyes flared. “I have no love for rituals that take three days. This way, my father can return to Siyaad tomorrow morning instead of waiting for another three days and spend energy he doesn’t have on—”

“I thought you didn’t care about your father.”

“I don’t. But it doesn’t mean that I want him to suffer. That would just...”

“Finally break through your stubborn head and show you what an ungrateful daughter you are.”

Zohra came to a sudden halt and stared at the man who was now her husband. They were surrounded from all sides by her father’s family and his own. And yet the scorn that had rattled in his words was just as obvious in his gaze. “Have I done something to upset you, Prince Ayaan?”

“No, Princess,” he said, lingering a second too long on the title. “Just telling the truth as I see it. It seems very few people dare to.”

“And you do?”

“I have taken an oath just now that I would protect you. Even if it has to be from yourself.”

“And of course, being a man, you have all the correct answers without knowing anything about my relationship with my father, right?”

One corner of his mouth turned up in mockery. “Have you noticed how every argument with you comes down to the fact that I am a man and you are not? One would think beneath all this contempt you show for duty and Siyaad, you’re just annoyed that you are not allowed to rule.”

His arrogance rendered her mute for a second. “I have never coveted the crown of Siyaad,” she said, angry with herself for letting him rile her so easily. “All it entails is that you endlessly sacrifice either your or your loved ones’ happiness at its feet.”

“As you are apparently unable or unwilling to see, I will spell it out for you, Princess. It seems your father has given you unfettered freedom while you didn’t even blink at the idea of betraying his trust. A princess of Siyaad, spending her summers in the desert, falling in love, the very life you have led is a testament to it. You’re standing here,” he said, laying his arm so casually against her waist that for a moment she lost track of what he said, “for no other reason than because you think you’re protecting your sister from a horrible fate.”

Her father and now Prince Ayaan, had both said the same thing to her.

Did they not see that it was their devotion to duty that had left her with no choice?

* * *

After more than an hour of mingling with guests, either strangers or her father’s family, who snubbed her or the courageous ones that veiled their insults cleverly, Zohra was to ready to escape when she found herself next to her new husband.

His nearness unsettled her, an extra layer of awareness sparking to life. Or maybe it was that he had a habit of saying things that burrowed under her skin.

A ten-layered white glazed cake that looked like a castle perched on the edge of a mountain was wheeled in front of them.

She laughed and turned toward him. “This has to be the best part of wedding a prince.”

His gaze lingered over her mouth a fraction too long before he responded. “A lesser man would take offense at that, Princess.”

His hand was callused and warm over hers as they cut the cake, his breath an unwanted caress against her skin. Maintaining her smile took more effort than it should have. “It’s a good thing you’re not a lesser man, or even the average. I didn’t think it was possible for anyone to be so...”

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