Once they were left alone to begin the event preparation, Sondra appraised the large room with a nod.
“Well then. Here we go.”
Robel sat down in an overstuffed chair and offered to take Nessa while Sondra got started. No more than ten minutes into her setup, a text came through to her phone.
It was the restaurant owner who’d agreed to cater the event. He sent a simple but devastating message: “The kitchen has caught fire!!!!! We cannot come tonight. I am sorry for inconvenience.”
Sondra’s stomach pitched to her feet, but instead of bemoaning, she leapt into high gear.
“Robel,” she said, noticing the tightness in her own voice. “The restaurant we booked has cancelled. They had a kitchen fire.”
His eyes went wide, and he didn’t say anything for a moment. She scrolled through her phone, pulling up the document of contingency plans.
“Shit,” he murmured. “A kitchen fire? That’s…”
“Unfortunate. Poorly timed.” She snorted, locating her emergency document. She did this for every event—made two or three backup plans, in case every single detail went awry. “What do you think about Khan Murjan?” She showed him her screen. The popular deli’s website shone out at him. He nodded.
“It’s a good place,” he said. “Great food.”
“Awesome.” She swiped to call, pacing as she waited for the owner to pick up. She’d alerted them earlier that week about being Plan B.
“What are you…” Robel began, but the restaurant owner picked up the phone and Sondra shushed him. She greeted the owner, explained the conundrum, and asked if they could come on short notice. In a matter of minutes, she had the backup catering in place.
When she hung up, Robel was watching her with lifted brows.
“That’s was efficient,” he commented.
“Yes. It comes with the occupation.” She sighed, giving Nessa an exaggerated smile. “But that’s what happens when you’re a professional event planner, right? Everything goes wrong, and you learn how to fix it!”
6
Everything goes wrong, and you learn how to fix it.
Sondra’s words echoed in Robel’s head the rest of the evening. Everything did go wrong. Not only the ill-timed kitchen fire, but the band Robel had recommended to play had called a half hour before the event, claiming a horrible highway crash had them in backed-up traffic and unable to make it in time to play.
Robel wasn’t sure if it was bad luck or just bad recommendations on his part.
Either way, Sondra was completely unfazed. She procured a replacement band almost as easily as she replaced the catering.
And somehow, everything came together even better than he’d imagined.
By the time seven p.m. rolled around, children filled the large space while flutes played in the background and papers and crayons were doled out on card tables for the children to fill with their letters. They were instructed to write letters to anyone they wished, but the theme was asking Papa Noël for something special. Some reporters showed up and interviewed Robel about the flawless event. All he could do was give credit to Sondra, who barely missed a step with Nessa perched almost continuously on her hip.
Robel mostly stayed put in his large overstuffed chair throughout the event. But with its placement in the center front of the room, most of the children mistook him for Papa Noël. Some claimed it was his very nice tunic; others said that they knew he watched over them. And in a way it was true—Robel watched over the country. It was his God-given duty.
So child after child filed through the line to hand letters to Robel. He collected them in a basket, reading some aloud, doling out as many kisses and hugs as he could. At one point during the event, he caught Sondra’s eyes from the across the room. She had a private smile on her face, one he wouldn’t mind seeing on her face a lot more often. He used the hand of the little girl in his lap to wave at her. That made her burst out in laughter.
Once the event was winding down and the band was packing up, Robel noticed Sesuna and Winta still hadn’t approached him with their letters. Still in the jolly spirit, he called out to them.
“Girls! Come over here!”
They approached reluctantly, frowning a little.
“What’s with the sadness on such a fun evening?” He gripped their shoulders, one in each hand. “Come now. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” Sesuna mumbled.
“Didn’t you like the event?” Robel leaned closer. “This was your idea after all. And what a good one it was.”
Winta shrugged.
“Let’s read your letters,” Robel said.
Both girls dodged him when he reached out. He furrowed a brow.
“Girls,” he chided.
“We don’t want you to see them,” Winta insisted.
Robel searched the room for Sondra, found her heading his way while chatting with the headmistress. He signaled for her, and she came over, beaming.
“What’s up, girls?” She flipped Sesuna’s hair as she came up.
“The twins don’t want me to read their letters,” he said, eyeing his sisters. To them, he said, “Now would you let Sondra read them?”
Sesuna and Winta recoiled, hiding their letters behind their backs.
“It’s okay, girls,” Sondra said quickly. “We don’t have to read them. Would you rather just take them home?”
Both girls nodded vigorously. Sondra turned to Robel. “That’s fine. Their letters might just be for them.” She offered a warm smile while Nessa clapped her hands. “Now are we all ready to go home?”
Sondra helped corral the twins through the door as Robel limped behind. He felt the familiar twang of frustration returning but tried to keep it at bay. He’d had a wonderful evening and didn’t want to ruin it with negativity.
But on the drive home, his ankle started throbbing. He needed to be horizontal, and fast. Sondra must have noticed him despairing because once the twins ran ahead toward the palace, she didn’t give him his crutches right away.
“You didn’t take your pain pills again, right?” she asked.
Robel huffed. “No.”
“And why wouldn’t you? With all this driving you insisted on doing on top of it?”
He shook his head. “I don’t need them. I’m strong.”
“You may be strong, but you still need to heal.” She handed him his crutches, a wry smile on her face. “Trust me, you’re practically made of steel. There’s no question how strong you are.”
Her little addendum made him pause, his gaze following her as she went to the backseat to unhook Nessa. He straightened, balancing on his good leg for a moment to find his full height. He took an appreciative drink of her slightly bent figure from behind.
When she stood, she startled. Maybe he was standing too close. Maybe he just couldn’t rip himself away.
“You’ve been on your feet a lot,” Sondra said after looking him up and down. “Are you sure you don’t want a massage or something?”
His pulse kicked up a notch at the suggestion. He squeezed the bars of his crutches, willing himself to say something smart. Reasonable. Something to shut down the desire strumming through his veins.
“I would love that,” he replied. She smiled, like maybe she was relieved, and the three of them made their way toward the palace from the garage.
“Let me get Nessa down to sleep first,” Sondra said. “She’ll have a bottle then fall asleep pretty quickly. Do you want to rest in my room while you wait?”
Robel could have lounged in her space for the next week. As soon as they stepped inside her room, he was overcome with the scent of lavender again. But it had a different undertone to it—something distinctly Sondra, he’d come to realize. A husky note, almost spicy. He eased into the armchair, mulling over this conundrum, as she carried Nessa into the adjoining room.
He overheard occasional words, followed by some shushing. After twenty minutes of blessed relaxation with his foot propped up, Sondra finally slid
out of Nessa’s room.
“She’s asleep,” she said with a sigh. She unhooked her earrings as she came his way, depositing them on a side table. There was something so honest about this moment. It felt like coming home. Even though that was the most absurd idea in the world.
He’d always been home, and this was as far from home as Sondra could get. But here, with her, bathed in her scent—it was home in a way that had nothing to do with the palace.
“That was fast,” he remarked, the heavy haze of lust descending over him as she neared. She unhooked her watch, dropped that alongside her earrings. Then she tugged off her sweater, revealing just a flimsy tank top beneath.
“This is going to be the best massage of your life,” she promised, toeing out of her flats. Robel couldn’t rip his gaze off her. He had half a mind to tell her, Keep going. Undress more.
“I’m sure,” he said, his voice a croak. She came nearer, stretching her wrists, watching him with that toothy grin that promised both pleasure and relief.
“You might never want another masseuse again,” she warned, taking her place behind the chair. She smoothed her palms over the tops of his shoulders, which sent a shiver down his spine. He was in trouble.
“I guess we’ll see about that,” he said, his cock perking up as her fingers dragged over his collarbone. She gave a low hum, then dug into his shoulders.
His eyes instantly fluttered shut, and his head hung forward. He wasn’t one for regular massages, but he could at least imagine that the stress since his accident had taken an unpleasant toll on his body. Sondra murmured about knots and tightness and too much stress as her magical fingers worked him, rhythmic movements that at one point elicited a moan from him.
She laughed, sultry and throaty. “Good, huh?”
“Almost as good as watching you salvage the event today.”
He could hear the smile in her voice as she responded. “It’s what I’m best at. Recovering from disasters. My favorite quote is, ‘We plan. God laughs.’”
He grunted a little as she worked her thumb over a spot on his neck. “How did you get so good?”
“At massaging? Or wrangling events together?”
“Both.”
“Well, I wasn’t always an event planner. For a little while, I thought I wanted to be a physical therapist. I started schooling and everything. But then I thought I didn’t want the hospital end of it so much, and maybe I just wanted to make people feel good. So I started learning massage. But then I realized I couldn’t do any of that long term. And I turned to event planning.”
He chuckled weakly. “A natural progression.”
“I planned my sister’s every single birthday party from the time I was six,” she went on. “I was the younger sister, too. She wasn’t always thrilled. But by the time I was sixteen, she had learned to trust me. I think that’s probably when I knew I wanted to make a career out of it. I just didn’t realize it was actually an option until much later.”
A few moments of silence passed by. His brain felt hazy from the endorphins flooding his body, thanks to her massage. He could hardly form words. “Well you have your fallback profession in massage,” Robel said. Her hands worked their way down over his biceps. He grabbed at her hands; he couldn’t stop it. He leaned his head back, meeting her gaze from over the top of him.
“Robel…” she began, something hesitant in her gaze.
“It feels amazing,” he whispered, searching the dark amber of her eyes. “But I need more.”
She sucked in a breath. His heart hammered in his chest.
“Kiss me.”
Her eyes fluttered shut for a moment, and then her lips drifted nearer, painfully slowly as though she were a feather drifting toward the ground. His hands tightened around her wrists once the cool velvet of her lips met his. Heat surged through him, between his legs, lighting up every inch of his skin. The scent and feel of her in his grip overcame him. He wanted more, so much more.
But she kissed hesitantly. So he deepened the kiss, pressing his tongue against her lips. Her mouth parted, and their tongues met. Electricity shivered through him.
When she pulled back, he saw the confusion in her eyes. She straightened, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth.
“Robel,” she started again, pacing along the far wall.
This wasn’t going to end well. He went limp against the back of the chair, pinching his eyes shut.
“Was it too much?” he broached.
“I just think it’s time for me to go to bed,” she said, wringing her hands. She rolled her lips inward, looking everywhere but at him. “I really should sleep. You know? It’s time.”
He heaved a sigh. That was his cue. He grabbed for his crutches and pushed to standing.
“It’s fine,” he said, trying not to let the stinging licks of rejection reach him until he was in his own bedroom. “I’m sorry if I overstepped.”
“No, no. You didn’t. I just—” she pinched the bridge of her nose, then shook her head. “It’s time for bed, is all. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Yes.” He clenched his teeth as he maneuvered out of her bedroom, steeling himself against the whiff of lavender on his way out the door. “Good night, Sondra.”
7
Sondra tossed for the billionth time that night, staring at the same dark square on the ceiling.
What on earth is wrong with you?
She turned onto her left side this time, hoping it might be the final shift that would allow her to sleep. But her mind raced all the same, going back to her embarrassing display in front of Robel earlier that night.
You had a sexy sheikh in your room, practically begging to make out. And you sent him away.
She groaned into her pillow, turning once more. It was ridiculous. Absurd. She had officially ruined any chance of anything sexy ever occurring. And why?
Because she was scared.
Scared shitless, in fact.
She’d have thought that celebrating her thirtieth birthday earlier that year might have knocked some hard-won confidence into her. And it had.
But then her sister died. And she became Nessa’s guardian. And she moved abroad. And every solid, stable thing she thought she knew about life had been completely tossed into the air.
Now that she was clinging to this job with a tenacity she’d never needed to have before, she couldn’t fuck it up. Even if every cell of her body wanted Robel…it couldn’t happen. It just didn’t seem right.
Her life was too messy. He was the freaking heir to the throne. None of it seemed right.
Usually she was the girl to welcome in any stray that needed her. She seemed to attract the men who needed fixing. And in her twenties, she’d been happy to lend a nurturing hand to all those lost boys posing as men.
But now, with Nessa in her life, all that nurturing needed to go to one place only. And she didn’t have any room to make the wrong choice. It wasn’t just herself anymore. Nessa’s entire future—and Sondra’s sister’s legacy—rested on the decisions she made.
And what a fun burden it was to bear.
By the time seven a.m. rolled around, Nessa stirred in her crib. Sondra had barely gotten any deep sleep, instead just lingering in dreamy half-awareness for most of the night. Another work day awaited her, and today she’d need coffee.
But how to approach Robel?
She dragged through her morning routine, left Nessa with the nanny, and headed quickly to the breakfast nook for a late breakfast. Nobody was there, which she was grateful for as she scooped up some biscuits and jam. She sipped a coffee on her way to her office.
Because she was dreading it, the morning flew by. Which meant that her noon meeting with Robel was here. She took a second coffee with her as a bolster, knocking gently on his office door.
“Come in,” he barked, muffled by the door. She pushed at it slightly, peering into his office. He stared at his laptop as he typed quickly.
“It’s me,” she said quietly, stomach pitching t
o her feet as she awaited some mention of her horrible faux pas the night before.
“I know,” he said, the hard edge gone from his voice. He still didn’t look at her, just focused on his screen. “Come sit down.”
She sidled into his office and took a seat in front of his desk. She drummed her fingers on her notebook, trying to do anything other than think about the kiss.
His mouth had been pure silk and heat. She could have kissed him for a full twenty-four hours. No breaths included. His gaze swept up to meet hers, and she nearly jumped, as though she’d been caught thinking about him.
“So. What’s new today?”
Definitely not still imagining your lips on mine. “Primarily getting together the gifts to be handed out at the St. Nicholas feast,” she said, keeping her eyes on her notebook. “They should be simple but useful, since they’ll be going to poorer families. I think gift cards might be the most useful.”
He grunted, finally turning to face her completely. She could feel his gaze sizzling over her, which made her want to sigh and talk about the kiss after all. Maybe they just needed to talk about it in the light of day. Or maybe she should quit now, fly home, and never think about it ever again.
“It’s a good idea,” he conceded. “But gift cards aren’t honored in the majority of Maatkaran stores. We need something that will have a greater impact.”
“Hmm.” She tapped her notebook as she thought, flipping through the pages where she’d jotted down more ideas. “Is there any way to have a standing agreement with the general stores to honor a coupon or some sort of card presented by the families? We could let them know; promise to pay back the coupons in full. Or maybe even with a little additional. Then you’ll be supporting more than just these families. The money is going into the economy, too.”
“I like it.” Robel crossed his arms, leaning back into his chair. His gaze still sizzled on her, so she smiled down at her page.
The Sheikh’s Christmas Lover: Christmas With The Yared Sheikhs Book Three Page 4