The Sultan's Reluctant Princess Read online

  She bit down on her lip. “What a waste it was getting divorced then,” she said shakily, unable to believe the conversation they were having.

  “Actually,” he pulled away from her, to reach for his jacket. “I have a confession to make.”

  Olivia looked up at him, but she was no longer worried. He loved her. Everything else was just details. With his love, nothing could bother her again. “Oh?” A smile spread across her face. “Can it wait? I just want to sit here and digest this for a moment.”

  “No.” He shook his head. “I’m afraid I need to lock down this discussion.”

  She arched a brow. “Kidnapping me again?”

  “Not this time.” His brow was knit together as he searched for the right words. “Our marriage was, apparently, an exaggeration.”

  She frowned, not completely comprehending. “What do you mean?”

  “Kalil failed to formalise matters.” His lips were compressed. Then he shook his head and smiled at her. “And, if I’m honest, I’m glad.”

  Olivia’s heart slowed and thudded. “You are?” Had she misunderstood? He did love her, didn’t he? “Why?”

  He lowered himself from the bed, to kneel before her. “Because, my beautiful, wonderful Olivia, it means I get to do things properly this time around. As you deserve. I remember you saying that I’d robbed you of your perfect proposal. And a ring you would look at with happiness for the rest of your days. So let me give you those things.” He lifted a velvet box to her, and clicked the top open. She lowered her gaze to the ring – it was not the one she’d worn previously. In the centre was a large green diamond, and it was surrounded by a circlet of bright white diamonds. The band was platinum, and encased with more diamonds. She gasped at its beauty. “The time I believed myself to be married to you was truly the most joyous of my life. I had never imagined I would want a wife, simply because I always thought I was complete. But I’m not. Not without you. Everything I want in life now means nothing if you are not by my side. Olivia Anderson, will you allow me the privilege of making you my wife for all time?”

  Olivia’s eyes filled with tears and she dashed them away desperately. She didn’t want to cry. She wanted to laugh and scream and jump. She nodded, and said, “Yes, yes, yes,” as she slid to her knees, so that they were at eye level and she could kiss him. Her arms wrapped around his neck, holding him to her, and her body pressed to his. “For the rest of my life, yes. For real this time.”

  He laughed softly as he reached behind himself and pulled one of her hands down, so that he could slide the ring onto her finger. Olivia stared at it, her mouth beaming across her face. “I love it.”

  “And I love you.”

  He grinned at his bride-to-be. His future had been planned from birth, but no one could ever have predicted the happiness he would find for himself. King or not, Olivia had given him a Kingdom of pleasure, and he would always strive to deserve her.

  EPILOGUE

  “What do you think? Are you enjoying yourself, Azeezi?”

  Olivia turned to her husband, the man she’d barely been able to speak to all day, and let her happiness show through the beaming smile she gifted him. “Enjoying myself?” She murmured, blinking up at him with a small shake of her head. “This is quite possibly the most elaborate first birthday party in the history of humankind.” Her eyes drifted to the two high chairs that were set up across the garden. The team of nannies that were a Talidarian necessity for royal babies hovered needlessly, seeing to spilled food and drinks.

  “They are our little prince and princess,” he said with a nonchalant shrug. “What fuss do they not deserve?”

  Olivia rolled her eyes. “But a party for a thousand delegates, more food than we could ever eat. It’s a little extreme.”

  “It is barely the size of our wedding,” he pointed out logically.

  “I know,” she laughed. “But our wedding was insane. Honestly, Tamir, sometimes I think you forgot that you married common ol’ me.”

  His expression sobered instantly. “I haven’t forgotten. And I have never forgotten, either, how fortunate I am that you loved me enough to forgive me my obstinate treatment of you.”

  Olivia linked her fingers through his, and squeezed his hands. “Forgiven and forgotten, a thousand times over, my love.”

  He shook his head. “The children look happy.”

  Their twins, Ali and Liane, had chubby little smiles despite the enormous day of adoration they’d endured. As the festivities continued to swirl, the children sat as marvellous little matching centrepieces. Still dressed in their finest hand-made outfits, which they’d worn for the official first birthday photographs, they looked as adorable as they were cheeky.

  “They are showing a far greater predilection for public life than I feel, even now,” Tamir agreed.

  “It’s just been such an extravagant party,” Olivia remarked, encompassing the formal topiaried garden that had been transformed into a fairy lit paradise for the occasion. “I think you should have taken my suggestion and taken us all to the beach for a quiet weekend of relaxing family time.”

  Tamir’s laugh was a gentle caress, and somehow, despite the number of well-dressed guests in their midst, Olivia felt almost completely alone with him. “We will do that too, Azeezi. I have made arrangements for us to leave first thing tomorrow.”

  “Oh, Tamir,” she squeezed his hand even tighter. “You have?”

  “You said it was your wish, and so of course.”

  “Oh, I’m so glad!” Her smile lit up her whole face. “The days have been so hot. I would have thought that two years in Talidar would have cured my English tolerance for heat – or lack thereof. But I find these summers as hard as ever to manage.”

  “Then we shall move to the beach,” he teased, whispering in her ear. His nearness sent her pulse tingling, rushing like fire through her veins.

  “The palace is here,” she pointed out logically.

  “Yes.” He nodded. “But I can fly back whenever I need to.”

  Olivia’s smile almost fell from her face. “You’re joking, aren’t you?”

  Tamir felt his heart turn over. “No. The house is built. It has taken over two years, but it is finally ready for us.”

  “I don’t understand,” Olivia exhaled in surprise. “You are suggesting we leave Liya?”

  He nodded. “From the moment we first travelled to the beach that day, and I saw the way your whole mood shifted, I have known it would suit you. I know I promised to talk to you about important things, but I wanted this to be a surprise.”

  Olivia’s heart was racing. “I had no idea it was even an option.” She gripped his arms, scanning his face. “You have to be here. You’re the Sultan.”

  His laugh was thick with affection. “And you are my wife, and your happiness is the most important thing to me. Many of my meetings can take place at our new palace. And I will travel as necessary. But you will be happy, and the children will grow up with more freedom than the capital allows them. Please allow me to do this for you, Olivia. I need to.”

  She shook her head slowly. “Why do you say that?”

  “Atonement?” He said with a small shrug.

  “Atonement? Oh, Tamir. You have nothing to atone for. You have given me a future so much brighter than I could ever have hoped for.”

  “Yes, but I will always regret the way our future came about.”

  “Don’t.” She lifted a finger to his lips, and her smile was overbright. “For the rest of our lives, which I hope are long and splendid, I never want to hear another word of regret. I married you because I loved you. I love you because I realised I couldn’t live without you. And here we are.”

  “Yes, here we are.” He looked around the room, still swarming with guests. With one small nod, he laid the groundwork for his next surprise. “There is one last part of the birthday celebrations.”

  “Oh, no.” She closed her eyes. “The twins will be getting tired.”

  “And the nan
nies will take them inside shortly,” he promised. “This is for you. The woman who brought them into being.”

  She frowned. “What is for me?”

  A curtain lifted, revealing a small orchestra, and at its front, Liam Marsh himself.

  “Oh, Tamir, what have you done?” She asked, askance.

  He put a hand beneath her elbow, and began to lead her to two chairs at the front of the lawn. “I missed the entire concert because I could not keep my eyes off you. I would rather like to enjoy it with you, this time. I want to enjoy it with you by my side.”

  She shook her head on a small laugh. “It’s too much.”

  “Nothing for you is too much.” He waited until she’d sat down, then moved to the seat beside her. He leaned closer so that he could whisper, “You do not know how jealous I was of Jack that night. The way you laughed at him and smiled at him. I wanted to be the only man who could bring that level of happiness to you.”

  Her chest thumped with sensation. “You are.”

  “I know.” He grinned, and laced his fingers through hers. “And you are the only woman who has ever driven me almost crazy with love. What do you think, Azeezi? Are we a good match?”

  She nodded wordlessly. “A perfect match.”

  “My thoughts exactly.”

  The music played, and they enjoyed it together. But it was not the brilliant songs that made her smile shine with the power of ten thousand stars. No, only the man next to her could do that. She smiled, as she knew she would, for the rest of her life.

  THE END.

  Following is an excerpt from THE VELASCO LOVE CHILD by Clare Connelly, available to purchase or hire from amazon.com.

  THE VELASCO LOVE CHILD.

  BY

  Clare Connelly

  “To lose thee, sweeter than to gain

  All other hearts I knew.

  ‘Tis true the drought is destitute,

  But then I had the dew!”

  -Emily Dickinson

  PROLOGUE

  It’s not like she actually had to sleep with the guy.

  No amount of money would lower Maggie’s standards to that degree.

  A lingering look would do. A hand on her back. Perhaps a kiss.

  Anything that would show her ‘mark’, in this case the gloriously handsome and rich Spanish wine mogul, for the cheating bastard he was. All she needed was a shared moment of intimacy that was damning enough for the agency’s photographer to catch. Proof for the poor wife, who’d suffered silently through affair after affair.

  Getting the sleaze to hit on her should be easy enough.

  Only, Maggie hadn’t taken on an assignment in years, and she knew she was out of practice. A flutter of nerves assailed her as she eyed herself in the washroom mirror. Nervous or not, she had still managed to look the part. Tall and slender, with auburn hair and a creamy complexion, Maggie had always been one of the agency’s best employees. Her years studying ballet gave her a litheness and grace that she took for granted.

  She frowned, as she ran a hand over the black silk neckline of the dress. To describe it as plunging would be the understatement of the century. It was slit almost to her belly button at the front, and at the back, it draped to just above her bottom. The dress was made of silk, and it clung to her curves like a second skin, to mid-thigh length. She put her hands on her hips and pulled a face when she saw the way the dress hitched up a little higher, to reveal even more of her smooth, creamy skin. She might as well have walked into the five star lobby stark naked, for all the dress did to cover her up.

  The slinky black number was a far cry from her usual clothes, she thought with a shake of her head. This life was so far in her past that she needed a magnifying glass to spot it in her rear vision mirror. If it hadn’t been for her cousin Miranda’s desperate pleas, she would never have agreed to this assignment.

  But Miranda had been desperate; her agency’s reputation was at stake, she’d declared dramatically. Maggie had still resisted. She was no longer interested in helping wives make their cheating husbands pay. But Miranda had pushed and pushed, reminding Maggie of the effort and work that had been involved in making the sleuthing business such a success.

  Finally, Maggie had relented, if only to get Miranda off the phone. And it was just one more night of her life, nothing more. And her curiosity had been piqued by the target’s description. Dante Velasco was, undoubtedly, a Big Fish. The money would be nice, too. The commission being offered to catch the Spanish wine mogul in the act would be enough to pay off Maggie’s overdraft altogether. Maybe even to service the coffee machine, she thought with a twist of her lips. With the exception of Miranda, no one knew she was undertaking the assignment. Though she’d hated lying to her best friend Rosie, it had been easier to say she had stomach flu and leave work early than to face Rosie’s big green eyes when they clouded with disappointment. Rosie had never understood Maggie’s agency work, and she would certainly not do so now. No. Lying was easier. So she’d left work and hopped onto a flight to Paris.

  Which left only the seduction bit.

  She’d done her research. Before his marriage to the glamorous Veronika (first name only, in true supermodel style) he had been a confirmed bachelor. The more obviously attractive his lover the better, and Maggie’s dress that night was nothing if not flagrantly obvious. Maggie had deduced that he was not one for subtlety, and not one for long-term relationships. He swapped lovers almost as often as he moved countries.

  There was one crucial way in which this assignment differed to the targets she’d dealt with in the past. Infidelity was not the issue. That had already been established, and the clever wife didn’t require evidence to justify a divorce. She wanted to make him pay through the teeth for having broken her heart though, and photographs of him with another woman would help attain that. Maggie had felt a short jab of compunction, initially, but then she’d thought of the poor wife, and any sympathy had evaporated. It was his own fault for playing around, after all.

  She lifted her hands and gave her hair a little tease, pushing the auburn curls at the roots so that they looked like she had just rolled out of bed. “Okay, Maggie. It’s now or never.” Her heels moved with a clickety clack across the highly sheened tiles of the foyer. As she approached the glass door entrance to the bar, a doorman swung them inwards, so that she could go in. That was the moment. The small moment she had to rethink her actions and walk away.

  She did not.

  The hotel bar was not busy, but even if it had been, she would have been able to pick Dante Velasco in the midst of a crowd. Had she not scoured the internet for photographs of him, she still would have just known. Men born to impossible wealth had a certain bearing about them. It was expressed in the way they held their shoulders square, their heads high, and the slight curl of disdain on their lips as though they knew they belonged to an elite echelon of society. She took a moment to steel herself for what lay ahead, and to inure herself to his obvious physical charms.

  Without heels, Maggie stood almost six feet tall. She’d donned a pair of stilettos that night, knowing they made her legs look as though they stretched forever. The moment she began to weave through the bar, she felt his eyes arrest on her. Dark eyes, she knew from photos, followed her as she walked with an exaggerated swagger to the front of the room. She stood far from him. Far enough that he wouldn’t think she was interested; far enough that he would have to pursue her.

  Though it was all a game of pretend, Maggie knew the way men worked. Getting a man like Dante to hit on her required him to truly be attracted to her. While she was playing a part, he was not. She leaned slightly forward, pretending fascination with the wine list. It draped her dress lower, and she knew he would be catching a good glimpse of cleavage if he were still looking.

  She just hoped he wouldn’t see the way her heart was banging against her ribcage.

  The one thing she’d overlooked was her manicure. When she’d worked for the agency full time, several years earlier, she�
�d always had a perfect set of false nails in place. Red and long, the kind of nails that men seemed to fantasise about. The kind of nails that were completely unsuitable for her new life, as the owner of her own café in Chelsea. The best she’d been able to do was to paint them herself with a black polish she’d grabbed at the airport. She ran a finger down the menu now, looking for a wine that would send the right message.

  Concealing her smile, she fixed the barman with a steady gaze, and said in her huskiest voice, “One of the Vin Ros 2012’s, thanks.” She cursed the civility afterwards. Women like she was pretending to be did not say ‘thanks’ to wait staff. She assembled a shroud of unapproachable formality around herself and stared straight ahead.

  “Would you like to start a tab, madam?” The barman spoke English with an obvious French accent.

  “Put it on mine,” Dante’s voice was low and gravelly, his accent like a Spanish summer on her skin. Maggie felt her heart stutter. As always, she experienced a sinking feeling of depression to realise that she’d hooked her target. Oh, it was the purpose of her evening, so she should have been relieved. Only Maggie always hoped against hope that these poor wives were wrong. That their husbands weren’t out trying to shag anything that moved.

  Her faith remained shaken; her hope unwarranted. In the two years she’d played her part in these undercover operations, not once had a single target turned her down.

  She concealed her disappointment and instead, angled her head to fix Dante with a slow, steady appraisal. She had to convince him that she was interested. That she was available. She needed him to do something that showed his despicable morals for the sake of the camera.