And she knew. That the lengths Hesham had gone to, to hide from that man, what she’d always suspected had been at least a little exaggerated, had been warranted, and then some.

But ironically, because of the king’s ignorance of her true identity, he was giving her a way out of this horrific mess. He’d even provided the means for her to leave against Fareed’s will, what she might have never secured on her own.

“What will it be?” the king rumbled, a predator about to pounce and to hell with giving his opponent a running chance.

She looked him in the eyes, made her answer a solemn pledge. “I’ll leave. And I’ll disappear. Fareed will never find me again.”

The king had believed her.

But knowing that Fareed wouldn’t just let her go, he’d said he would give her every assistance in her disappearance efforts.

His men had delivered her to Fareed’s mansion to collect Rose and Ryan on her way to the king’s private airstrip. She’d phoned Rose ahead, told her to be ready, wouldn’t answer her confusion.

She now ran into the mansion, had reached the bottom of the stairs when his voice came out of nowhere.

“If you’re still trying to leave, Gwen, don’t bother.”

She stumbled with the force of the déjà vu.

Fareed was separating from the shadows at the top of the stairs like that first night he’d made her his.

God, no. Now this wouldn’t be the clean surgical amputation she’d hoped it would be.

He was coming down the stairs now, as deliberate, as determined as that other night. But instead of the passion that had buffeted her then, the void emanating from him did now.

“I’m not letting you and Ryan go, Gwen. And that’s final.”

She took one step back for each he took closer. But nothing stopped his advance. He was now mere feet away.…

Then two things happened at once.

Rose appeared at the top of the stairs with Ryan. And the king’s men, all six of them, who’d been waiting for her outside, entered the mansion in force.

Fareed swerved to advance on them in steps loaded with danger, putting himself between her and them, his expression thunderous.

“What’s the meaning of this, Zayed?”

The man who’d led the task force that had taken her to the king gave him a curt bow.

“Forgive me for the intrusion, Prince Fareed, but the king has changed our orders. Only this woman and her female companion will leave the kingdom. The child, Prince Hesham’s son, will remain—will be taken to him.”

Eleven

“This woman and her child are in my protection.”

At Fareed’s arctic outrage, her gaze slammed from Rose and Ryan—frozen like her at the top of the stairs—back to him.

“My father is never coming near either of them. As for all of you, you will leave my house, right now, or suffer the consequences.”

She’d never dreamed Fareed could look so lethal. And she knew. He would fulfill his threat without a second’s hesitation. He was ready to fight, go to any lengths, inflict or sustain any injury, in their defense.

A chill of dread ran down her spine. She’d tried everything she could so that it would never come to that. But— No, she could have left sooner, prevented this. Now it was too late.

The king had discovered Ryan’s identity.

The man called Zayed, what Gwen imagined desert raiders must have looked like, harsh and weathered and unbending, stood his ground. “Somow’wak, by the authority vested in me by the king, I order you to stand aside.”

Fareed barked a laugh that must have sent every hair in the place standing on end like it did hers. “Or what? You’ll tell my father on me? Do so, and take this message back to that uncompromising fossil while you’re at it, word for word. I’m not Hesham, and not only won’t he intimidate me, but he also wouldn’t want to make me his enemy. I will be if he even thinks of Gwen or Ryan again. And that’s his first and final warning.”

Zayed’s face clenched in a conflict of reluctance and determination. It was apparent he liked and respected his prince, wouldn’t want to fight him. But his allegiance, even if he didn’t appear to relish it, was to the king, and it was unswerving.

He finally said, “My orders were clear, Somow’wak. I can’t back down. Arjook, I beg of you, don’t force a confrontation.”

“That’s exactly what I’ll do, with anyone who dares threaten Gwen or Ryan.” Fareed advanced on Zayed, a warrior who had the same steel-nerved precision and efficiency of the surgeon. “I’ll go to war for them. Will you? Will he?”

She could feel Zayed hesitating as her mind churned, trying to work out how to exploit this standoff, take Ryan and Rose and escape them all.

But there was no way out. Either the king won, and she was thrown out of the country, or Fareed won, and he kept her here.

Either way, Ryan would end up being lost to her.

Suddenly, the simmering scene fractured.

Zayed made up his mind and gestured to his men. They advanced instantaneously, a highly organized strike force.

Two men ran past her and Fareed, targeting the stairs. She heard Rose’s shouted protests and Ryan’s alarmed crying as they advanced. Fareed intercepted Zayed and three of his men as they made a grab for her. She gaped in horror as violence erupted.

She cried out as a fist connected with Fareed’s face, as she heard the sickening impact of knuckles with flesh and bone. And she threw herself into the fight, blind now but to one thing: defending him, preventing any injury to him at any cost.

Fareed took the man who’d hit him down with one blow to the throat and Zayed with another to the solar plexus. The third man he took down with one roundhouse kick to the temple. He was fighting with the economy of the surgeon who knew the anatomy of incapacitation. She hit and kicked the man she’d attacked, but he finally managed to restrain her.

Fareed turned on him, rumbling like an enraged tiger. “Take your hands off her, Mohsen, or have them torn off.”

“Assef, Somow’wak—sorry, but you will stand aside now and let me complete my mission.” Mohsen produced his gun from his holster.

She drove her elbow into his gut with all her strength.

He gasped, staggered, but he tightened his hold on her neck. She choked, the world wavered and receded. She heard Fareed’s roar as if from a distance, saw his contorted face as he charged toward her and her captor, saw a gun pointing at him, from a hand beside her face. Dread for him swelled as she fought to sink her teeth into that hand…

“That’s enough!”

A roar reverberated in her bones, then she was snatched from the vise imprisoning her, and swept into the arms she’d thought she’d never feel again in this life. Fareed’s.

Her wavering gaze panned around. Emad was at the top of the stairs standing between Rose and Ryan and the men who’d gone after them, protecting them with his own body, like Fareed had done for her minutes ago. Fareed’s guards were cordoning the scene, four or five to each of Zayed’s men, pinning them at gunpoint.

“Took you long enough, Emad,” Fareed snarled as he took her deeper into his embrace, beckoned to Emad to get Rose and Ryan down and into his protection.

“My apologies, Somow’wak.” Emad led the shaken Rose who was clutching the bawling Ryan in a feverish embrace down the stairs, encompassing her by his side. Gwen bolted from Fareed’s arms, reaching out to Ryan who threw himself in her trembling ones.

Fareed’s footsteps almost overlapped hers, and the moment Ryan filled her arms, he took them both back into his own.

Ryan’s sobs subsided as soon as he found himself nestled between their bodies, his arms around her neck but his face buried into Fareed’s chest, recognizing him as their protector.