But within the palace walls, there was some need to remain shackled to the past. Maybe because they’d spent so many years within those walls, all the important formative moments of their childhood, practically growing up together. Kalif’s father had been stationed in the guard when they were fifteen, which meant that they became palacemates at the peak age of curiosity and friendship seeking, but also right when that relentless bloom of hormones made it impossible to keep Kalif strictly a friend.
She’d fallen for him then, and part of her thought that maybe she could only ever fall once. For one man. For him.
The Jeep swelled in silence as the palace came into view. Maybe he was thinking the same things. Maybe he was feeling the sting of an ending fantasy. She studied his thick forearms, the bulge of a vein that ran from under the bunch of his sleeve up toward his wrist. His face was impassive stone, eyes hidden behind dark aviators.
He squeezed the steering wheel, glancing over at her. “You’re thinking about me, aren’t you?”
“How could you tell?”
“The same way as always. My whole body gets warm.”
She tutted. “Then I’m surprised you haven’t called the fire department by now. Because you should be up in flames with how much I’ve been thinking about you.”
He grinned, sliding his sunglasses down his nose to look at her. “You think of that one yourself?”
“Your good looks drive me to lyricism,” she said in a singsong voice. Kalif snorted. Yes, this was just like old times. As warm and inviting as bathwater.
And for all the ways in which Paris was home, it didn’t have this. Her person. A soul mate. A partner with whom to view and experience life. Someone who’d known her since forever ago, a man who just clicked at her side.
Now that Kalif knew even more of her, the secret part she’d kept locked away especially for him, it was hard to see Paris as complete. No matter how much she loved it, it wouldn’t have the people she loved most.
The thought made her throat thick. She squinted out the window, studying the dry landscape.
Part of her had counted on this being just a brief visit. See her brother, meet his fiancée, and get reacquainted with a part of herself she’d left for dead.
She hadn’t planned on reviving this tender place inside her heart.
The Jeep jostled as they transitioned onto the cobblestone road leading up to the palace gates. Kalif nodded at the guard who opened the gate for them. The fierce neutrality of his face made a smile tug at her lips. He was so sexy. Even when he wasn’t trying.
“My body is warm again,” he said without even glancing at her.
She burst into laughter. Kalif maneuvered the Jeep into the royal garage. Once he turned the engine off, they sat inside for a few moments, gazing at each other.
“Are you tired?” She rubbed a thumb over his knuckles.
He shook his head. “Not when I’m looking at you.”
“Good. Then how about we have dinner sent to my room?”
“Sounds like a plan.” They kissed before exiting the Jeep, and flutters of excitement coursed through her. More than dinner, she wanted to tell Kalif what was percolating inside her. The confusing yet densely real declaration of love. Her hand found his as they wound their way through the paths leading up to the living quarters. It seemed obvious already; it wouldn’t be a confession as much as an acknowledgment. Had they really ever stopped loving each other?
Zatar found them halfway to Salari’s room, slowing once he spotted them. “There you are.” There was a knowing smirk on his face, probably because they were holding hands. “You made it back in time. I want to have a formal dinner tonight. To celebrate.”
Salari nodded, looking up at Kalif. It wouldn’t be exactly what she’d planned, but more alone time with Kalif would have to wait.
“There’s no better cause for a celebration,” Kalif said. The three of them walked down the path, the evening sun glowing bright on the western horizon.
“We’ll eat in fifteen minutes,” Zatar said, squeezing Salari’s wrist before jogging off. The two of them strolled slowly, arm in arm, toward Salari’s room. She tilted her head up toward the sun, feeling more content than she could remember ever feeling before.
Safe. Satisfied. And sated. As they neared her bedroom door, a guard came jogging up from behind.
“Captain Kalif.” He was out of breath, his eyes wild. “There are protesters at the front gate. It looks like it could be a mob.”
Salari gnawed at the inside of her lip as Kalif nodded, going rigid with his professional veneer.
“All right. I’ll be right there.” To Salari, he said, “I’ll be back as soon as I can. But don’t wait for dinner.”
She nodded as he ran off with the guard, watching his long, sure strides until he disappeared around the corner. She let herself into her bedroom, drinking in the familiar sights and scents with an appreciative hum.
It felt good to just know that the danger was gone. She drifted over to the walk-in closet to search for a change of clothes, her mind drifting to Kalif. Already missing him. Already wanting him to be back near her…preferably within arm’s reach. And though she’d love to stay in these shorts for Kalif’s sake, knowing how much he loved the view, she figured she should change into something more formal for the celebratory dinner with Zatar and Alex.
She snagged a peach chiffon dress off a hanger, gliding back into the bedroom. When she looked up, dread coated her insides, every inch of her limbs turning icy and hard.
A robed figure emerged from the shadows. A hood obscured their face, but the intruder very clearly held a weapon pointed directly at her face.
A gun.
* * *
The protesters at the front gates had one thing to complain about: Salari.
A few middle-aged women clung to the bars of the front gate, shouting “Whore!” over and over again. Behind them, men paced, holding signs that decried the failing state of Kattaharan purity. Other women cupped hands around their mouths, chanting about morals.
Kalif stood with his hands on his hips for a few moments, listening to their sad protest. So, word had definitely gotten out about Salari. But it couldn’t have been from that one shopkeeper. He squinted as he approached the gates.
“You all have thirty seconds to disperse,” he called out in a gruff voice, “or you’ll be placed under arrest and held in the palace cells overnight.”
The chanting didn’t stop, but a few men looked hesitant. Kalif repeated the threat, this time louder.
“Arrest me, then!” shouted one of the women.
Kalif motioned for a few of the guards to bring the willing protesters inside. The rest of the crowd started to disperse, only a few shouts drifting through the air behind them. Kalif and several other guards helped lead the handful of protesters toward the palace jail, a low block of cells sitting just inside the perimeter wall at the front gates.
Kalif didn’t respond to their jeers or their taunts. The women seemed like puritanical nut jobs, the likes of whom he hadn’t seen in a long time. Once they were safely behind bars and the guards were returning to their posts, Kalif headed for his room. He’d make it to dinner after all, and he couldn’t wait to lay eyes on Salari again. Even twenty minutes away from her felt like too much.
Besides, there was so much he wanted to tell her. He was desperate to get her alone again, to air some of these thoughts that had been clanking around inside him since they’d headed for the hideout.
The first item on the agenda: he loved her. And second: he wasn’t about to let her walk away and out of his life. Not a second time.
Because he could feel her questions and concerns, maybe even as intensely as she felt them. That sort of connection wasn’t one to overlook. Kalif showered quickly in his room and dressed as fast as he could, checking his watch along the way. Only a few minutes late. He hitched on his holster for good measure, just in case more protesters decided to interrupt dinner. The Balizars always started d
inner promptly, so he knew that Salari and the rest might well be underway already.
He nearly ran to the dining room. When he pushed into the long dining room, Zatar and Alexis looked up at him as they passed around a basket of flatbread.
Kalif cleared his throat as he went to his spot at the table. Salari’s seat was empty. As he settled into his seat, he asked, “Is Salari not here yet?”
“Surprisingly, no.” Zatar’s eyes were on a bowl of green sauce Alex handed toward him. “Probably still getting ready.”
Kalif clenched his fist under the table, the churning in his gut growing more raucous. Something didn’t seem right. And maybe all he needed was just to knock on her door and hear that singsong voice tell him, Just a minute! But maybe something had happened…
“I’ll go check,” Kalif said a moment later and stood to leave.
12
Salari blinked rapidly, trying to piece together what the hell she was looking at. The figure stepped forward out of the shadows. A feminine hand reached up, pushing the hood back and letting it fall away.
Dark hair framed an alabaster-pale face. Bright eyes that she knew but only in a distant way, like one knows a celebrity from their photos.
“Imelda.” Salari’s voice came out a shaky whisper. This was Imelda, the Princess of the Olden Isles, a distant nation state that so rarely was mentioned in the news. A place Salari had never visited, barely even thought of.
Imelda’s laugh came out so sarcastic it nearly burned. “So you do remember me. The woman whose life you ruined.”
All Salari could do was gape. “Wh…how…?”
“Oh, come on. Don’t act like you don’t know.”
Salari sputtered. “Know what? What are you doing here?”
“Once you slept with my fiancé, our fathers refused to let us marry. You stained the purity of our matrimony.” Imelda jutted the gun toward Salari, and her big lips curled into a scowl. “You stole the one man who I wanted to marry.”
“I never slept with him,” Salari said, backing up slowly as Imelda took threatening steps forward. “I swear to God. I was set up. They lied.”
“Oh sure. That’s what all whores say.” Imelda sniffed, her eyes turning to slits. “Do you have any idea what my life has become since you did that?”
Salari swallowed a knot of fear as Imelda pressed on. “I thought in the beginning that I might take my own life. I’d been betrothed to the Prince of Asodonia for years. Years. Everything was planned around him. My wedding. Our future children. My entire life.”
“Imelda,” Salari began.
“Enough!” Imelda’s voice came out a harsh bark. She stalked over to Salari, grabbing her by the hair. Salari inhaled sharply as Imelda dragged her toward the bedroom door. Salari hurried to keep up to avoid the painful yanking on her scalp. “Now you’ll come with me.”
Salari watched in amazement as Imelda opened the door and glided out as though she owned the place. Surely, this woman was crazy. Crafty, perhaps, and even clever…but also very crazy to think she could kidnap Salari from her own bedroom and just walk brazenly through the palace without getting caught.
It gave Salari a flicker of hope, until she noticed that the halls were empty. Each corner they turned…nobody. And then she realized: the protesters out front. They must have been a setup by Imelda to draw all the available guards out there. Salari’s heart rate picked up; she knew Zatar and Alexis were probably eating by now. The only chance she stood was if they noticed she was late. But would that be too long in Imelda’s clutches?
Salari’s mind raced as she stumbled through the halls of the palace at gunpoint. This can’t be real. The guards had caught the bad guy. This was supposed to be over. What the fuck did Imelda want with her?
“You won’t get away with this,” Salari said in a low voice, trying to hide the waver. Imelda jabbed the gun against her lower back.
“I don’t care. It’s time that you pay. I was supposed to be queen.” Imelda’s voice was a warning hiss. They wound down the paths through the raucous late evening, the bloated setting sun a brilliant backdrop to the chorus of crickets and squawks as they neared the zoo.
“But you are,” Salari said, racking her brain for the scant pieces of information she knew about Imelda simply from being part of the royal global network. “Or, you will be! Isn’t that great? I mean, I was exiled, so you—”
“Don’t try to spin this!” Imelda pushed her hard from behind. Salari stumbled, nearly tripping and falling on her face. She corrected her course once Imelda yanked on the back of her shirt, guiding her toward the zoo. “Besides, I have many reasons to make you pay. Not only did you ruin the perfect life I was meant to have, you got my cousin killed! Now my aunt has to mourn the loss of her eldest son, you nasty bitch!”
Questions pulsed through her. So the man captured in her bedroom must have been Imelda’s family…but how were they getting in? Imelda seemed to know her way around the palace, including how to find the zoo. She’d somehow gotten into the palace in the first place, and Salari was pretty sure she wasn’t invited by Zatar. She went through different scenarios in her mind, lightning fast, as Imelda pushed her through the zoo’s entrance gate, under the grandiose wrought iron emblem of a lion.
Right where she and Kalif had kissed the other night. Sadness streaked through her, made her legs wobbly as despair began to finally take root. She hadn’t even told Kalif how she felt. That she loved him. That she was ready to walk the path of forgiveness. That the past ten years had been hard, but they were worth it if it had finally led her back to him.
And now, she might never be able to tell him.
Horrid scenes flashed through her mind, the worst-case scenarios on hyper drive. She tried to push them out, to focus on escape routes, to think about every single crime drama she’d ever seen on television. Everything congealed into an unhelpful mush. Each step thudded through her feet. Imelda’s presence was a shackle around her neck.
“What are you planning on doing, Imelda?” Salari sniffed hard as Imelda grabbed her wrist, leading her up to the lion’s enclosure.
“Just going to have my cake and eat it too,” she murmured, fiddling with the gate lock. “Finally.”
* * *
Kalif hurried toward Salari’s room, a gnawing in his gut urging him to a run. When he got to the royal bedrooms, Salari’s door was ajar. He rushed inside, pushing the door back with his palm.
“Sali?” He strode through the bedroom, heading for the walk-in closet. She wasn’t in there, only her large luggage sitting splayed open and unattended, pairs of shoes strewn around.
Frowning, he walked to the center of the bedroom to do a second scan. The bathroom. He walked over and knocked first, pressing his ear to the door. Nothing. He pushed the door open tentatively, peeking cautiously until he could determine she wasn’t inside.
His frown deepened. Where was she? It wasn’t like her to be so late. He’d left her here over a half hour ago. There was no other place for her to be except here or the dining room.
He clenched his jaw as he thought. The open door was a sign, though he didn’t know of what. It stuck out to him as abnormal. Salari and Zatar always closed doors behind them. It was palace policy.
His legs were moving before he knew what to do next. When he caught sight of a junior guard, he barked out an order.
“Grab the rest of the unit. Princess Salari has gone missing.”
Saying the words felt silly somehow, as if it would turn out to be a misunderstanding and she was simply in the garden snipping a rose. But his gut told him otherwise. The junior guard nodded and ran off. Kalif stood in the hallway, fists clenched, surveying the space.
The hedge mazes. He would start there. He hurried to the tall line of hedges, expertly trimmed to precise ninety-degree angles. He burst through the entrance, tearing through the familiar narrow passageways.
“Salari?” His voice came out gruff; he could hear the tinge of panic. There was no response as he wound de
eper. “Salari, are you in here?”
His own footsteps were all he could hear. He reached the innermost passage of the maze and started winding his way out, careful not to lose sight of the carefully placed markers to aid a quick escape. By the time he wound his way back to the main garden path, his heart was pounding.
He ran back toward the bedrooms, spotting other guards doing sweeps of the adjacent areas. No signs anywhere so far. The rational part of his mind told him she might still just be on her way to dinner. He turned on his heels, jogging back toward the dining room. It wouldn’t hurt to check one last time. Just to have a clear mind.
Halfway there, he slowed, another idea creeping into mind. The zoo. And this time, his gut told him to run.
He jogged back through the halls, passing the bedrooms, out through the garden paths. Just as he crested the long, lonesome path leading back to the royal zoo, he heard the cries that told him he was right.
It was Salari. Screaming for her life.
13
“Don’t you fucking do that again!” Imelda pistol-whipped Salari so hard that she fell backward. An unintentional yelp escaped her, much less than the scream she’d sent out as a final, desperate plea for help. Imelda towered over her, the gun pointed between her eyes.
There were inside the lion’s cage now. Sala was nearby; Salari had seen the dim glow of her figure in the weak moonlight as they stepped inside the quiet enclosure. Imelda’s plan was becoming clear, and it looked less and less appealing as time went on.
Though it didn’t seem like she wanted to use the gun she’d brought. With how much threatening she did with it, it seemed obvious she didn’t intend to kill her with it. If killing her was really the end game, then the lion enclosure had to be the place. And maybe she was hoping the lion would do the killing for her.
The Sheikha’s Unexpected Protector: Desert Sheikhs Book Two Page 8
