Flames for the Sheikh: A Royal Billionaire Romance Novel (Curves for Sheikhs Series Book 2)

by Annabelle Winters

  “I haven’t even had the food samples brought out yet,” Jenny said in surprise, looking up at the tall, pencil-thin woman. Jenny caught herself before she asked if Kabeer would be joining or not. “Don’t you want to at least SEE what the dishes look like?”

  “Food’s not my thing,” Yasmeena said with a shrug that was more a “deal-with-it” shrug than an apologetic one. “Unless it is something that our head chef has cooked. How is my brother’s cooking, anyway? Can the man even boil an egg?”

  Jenny’s heart jumped but she didn’t even blink. She had called Kabeer when she arrived in Dubai, but Kabeer had said he was staying in Bukhaara, immersing himself in the world of culinary arts, learning the fundamentals, getting it “under his skin.” It was something he needed to do alone, he told her.

  “It is my process,” he had said. “Every time I decide to dedicate myself to learning a new skill, I immerse myself in it completely for a period of absolute focus. I study every resource available. I watch the masters at work. I practice and experiment on my own. I pay for exclusive lessons if I need them. But I need to do it alone so I can feel free to fail, make a mess of things. It is my process, and when I am done I will be ready to be a head chef. I promise you that. I’ll have the basics down so damn right, that I will soak in whatever new things you have to teach me. Then I shall be all yours, Jenny.”

  Jenny had been heartened to hear his voice sound casual and friendly, even excited. That coldness was no longer there. Of course, that warmth, that passion, that HEAT was no longer there either, but that was for the best, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it?

  So “Immerse yourself, Chef,” is what she said, sounding as casual and friendly as she could in return. “The timing works out, actually, because the kitchen should be ready to go by then. We can get right down to work, and we’ll have a solid three months before launch to get ready. So do what you need to, and I’ll see you in three weeks!”

  It had felt good, that casual conversation with Kabeer, and Jenny had put down the phone feeling some confidence that they would in fact be able to work together just fine. So they had slept together. Big deal! She was an adult American woman! So she slept with a man that she’d now be working with! Happens all the time in America. Everywhere else in the world too! Successful women deal with shit like that!

  As for the pregnancy . . . well, successful women deal with shit like that too! And there was PLENTY of time to deal with that once the restaurant was up and running and she was on her way. Yes. Plenty of time. You’re fine. You’re good. Everything’s OK. Breathe. Inhale. Suppress. Repress. Bury and forget. Whew. Done. So easy! Whoop-dee-doo! All gone!

  Still, that simple phone interaction had relieved a lot of tension. It had felt good, good enough that she was more-or-less able to handle it like a grown-up when she saw his name in the gossip feeds, linked with a South American swimsuit model. (“Really, Kabeer?” was the only comment she allowed herself to make—in private, of course.)

  She had resisted the urge to check out a picture of the woman—the blurb of “swimsuit model” evoked a clear enough image. But two days after seeing the headline, Jenny reminded herself that the press Kabeer got would ultimately play into the overall marketing story for the restaurant, and so it was actually her business to see what this woman looked like!

  So she had pulled up a picture of the woman—Selena Rai, age twenty-three—on her phone while supervising the installation of a stainless-steel bar near the waiting area of the restaurant.

  Jenny had been distracted as the picture downloaded, and when she glanced back at her phone and finally saw what this Selena woman (girl, really…) looked like, she almost fell off her high chair.

  Because the woman was not an emaciated, hollowed out, ghost of a woman—the sort Jenny had pegged as Kabeer’s type. No, this woman had curves—SERIOUS curves! Wide, well-rounded hips. Healthy breasts that looked large and natural. Thick thighs that looked like they shuddered when she walked. And a booty that Jenny knew would show some cellulite if it hadn’t been Photoshopped to unnatural perfection. Granted, she was brown-skinned and tanned, with curly dark hair and full lips. She was also a bit(!) younger. But Jenny couldn’t help but think, as she scrolled through more pictures until she found a candid street-shot taken from a distance, that this woman sorta kinda looked like . . .

  “No,” she had told herself, quickly deleting the history in her phone browser and then putting the phone away. “Do not even start. You’ve made your choice, and it’s the right choice. Don’t lose your nerve.”

  Don’t lose your nerve, Jenny told herself now as she watched Yasmeena wait for an answer. You can answer Yasmeena’s simple question about Kabeer's cooking without revealing how messed up your feelings are about this, without revealing how you’re somehow handling the fact that you’re pregnant with his child while he is out there with some Brazilian swimsuit model, doing God-knows-what with her! Yes, she hadn’t told him yet—which was unfair in a way. But how could she? She didn’t know how he’d react! What if he didn’t want it. Didn’t want HER . . . now that she was . . .

  Oh God, she thought as she forced a surprisingly convincing smile and nodded at Yasmeena. Don’t cry. You cannot cry. It will all work out. You’re doing the right thing by keeping your focus on your goal, your work, your dream. Don’t blow it by losing your shit—at least not here, not now, not with this woman!

  “Kabeer’s in Bukhaara,” Jenny said pleasantly, that smile really hurting her face as she held it. “So no, I made the samples.”

  “Kabeer has returned to Bukhaara? When did he leave?” Yasmeena said with a quizzical frown.

  Now Jenny frowned. “Leave from where? The U.S.?”

  “Dubai, of course. He was here these past few weeks, was he not? Here with you?”

  “No,” Jenny said, blinking rapidly as she felt those thoughts and emotions banging at the doors in her head, like they were going to burst through and demand answers, demand action, demand resolution. Oh, God, was it a mistake not to tell him? Shouldn’t he know? Wouldn’t he be happy? It was more than sex, wasn’t it? He’ll be happy, won’t he? He’s not really sleeping with that Brazilian nymph, is he? He’s in love with me, isn’t he?

  In love with me? Are YOU in love with HIM?! A man you’ve known for less than two months, whom you’ve spent a couple of days with, slept with just once, and whose child you are now carrying . . . in SECRET? How does love fit into it? How CAN love fit into it?!

  And now she felt herself choking on her own emotion, gagging on her own thoughts, dizzy from her own paranoia. And suddenly she felt a bony arm on her shoulder, and it was Yasmeena who had come around to her side of the table, and Jenny looked into her gray eyes like it was a dream again, that surreal dream where she was a part of something, a part of this family . . . just like she was carrying a child of this family within her womb.

  “You know,” Yasmeena was saying as Jenny tried to blink away the tears before realizing that she wasn’t crying at all, that somehow she had maintained her composure while everything came apart inside her. So then why the hell was Yasmeena sitting by her, arm around Jenny, her tone conveying a warmth that seemed so unusual for this woman, so unexpected that Jenny told herself again that it was just a dream and perhaps she had been working too hard and sleeping too little and ohgod maybe the hormone things have started already and—

  “You know,” Yasmeena said. “In that very first meeting I realized Kabeer saw something in you, that he felt something for you. In the past ten years, do you know how many women Kabeer has brought into my presence, into his father’s presence?”

  Jenny just shook her head. She might look composed, but she knew she couldn’t trust herself to say even one goddamn word right now.

  “One,” Yasmeena said. “Just one, Jenny. Just you, Jenny. I know you did not realize it at the time, and the funny thing is, I do not think Kabeer realized it either! He was just going with his instincts, trusting his gut without really thinking it through explicitl
y.” Now she took a breath. “But I know my brother better than anyone. And his instincts have always been dead right, spot on, eerily prophetic. So when I realized that this woman who he was carrying up the stairway to our boat was the same woman whose business proposal and references impressed me, I knew I had to invest in your idea, bring you into the company.” Yasmeena touched Jenny’s arm in a strange, sisterly way. “I mean, Bukhaara Capital would have eventually invested in Globe anyway, but I did it right then because I wanted to . . . to bring you into the family myself. Yes, I wanted to bring you into the family myself, just in case my brother . . .” She sighed now, looked away for a moment like she was searching for the right words, and then turned back to Jenny. “What I’m trying to say is that alongside these otherworldly instincts that Kabeer possesses, there is also a perverse stubbornness in him, and sometimes he . . . how to put it . . . sometimes he purposely turns away from the direction his instincts are pointing. But it never lasts. He turned away from the Sheikhood for so long, but now he seems ready to turn back to it, to his country, his people, his God. And although I was not sure if he would make it through all the obstacles I set for him . . .”

  “Obstacles to what?” Jenny asked, speaking like she was in a trance.

  Yasmeena smiled, looking down for a moment before holding Jenny’s gaze and flashing an almost apologetic smile. “Obstacles to you, Jenny. Obstacles to claiming you! Many things have come too easy for Kabeer, especially women. I wanted him to understand what it means to want someone badly enough that you will oppose your family, disregard your business, even go against your tradition and culture to be with her.” Yasmeena laughed now. “I am a clear and logical person, but even I know that logic and reason have no place in matters of the heart. In matters of love. And so, although my logical brain told me it will be a publicity nightmare for your restaurant, I felt nothing but pure joy when Kabeer told me!”

  “Told you what?” Jenny said from that trance.

  “The news, of course!” Yasmeena said. “I did not reach out to you earlier because Kabeer told me not to, that he wanted it to stay private for now, at least until the Dubai location was launched. But I see no reason to not congratulate you right now, now that you have chosen to come to Dubai, to the Middle-East, to have his child in Bukhaara itself!”

  “Wait, what?” was all Jenny could say before she almost knocked over the round table as she ran for the bathroom, not sure if it was morning sickness or afternoon madness that was turning her inside out, upside down, twisted around.

  19

  Kabeer looked at himself in the mirror of the Presidential Suite at the Jumeirah Grand Hotel in Dubai. He touched his face, ran his hands along the stubble that was not as manicured as he would like. His hair was longer too, and there were bags under his normally sharp eyes from the sleepless nights, the harrowing days.

  He still could not believe he had lied to Yasmeena about Jenny being pregnant. But what was more unbelievable was his sister’s reaction! Ya, Allah, she had shouted with JOY! Has the world gone mad? I tell Yasmeena that this middle-class American woman, this woman that my sister called a whore to her face, to MY face . . . yes, I tell Yasmeena that this woman who apparently is “not photogenic enough” to be seen with me is carrying my child, the first of the next generation of Bukhaara’s royal family, and Yasmeena is HAPPY?!

  Kabeer was certain she would fly into a rage, perhaps even faint. She would curse him, curse her, curse the child even! She would say the child should never be born because it would bring disgrace on the house of Bukhaara, scandal to our people! That is what Kabeer expected from his sister.

  And that is what Kabeer wanted from his sister.

  Yes, he wanted Yasmeena to go down that same old path, asking him with fury if this is how a Sheikh conducts himself, spreading his royal seed amongst women he barely knows, brash American women with no understanding of Bukhaara, its people and culture. Yasmeena would say this was unworthy of a Sheikh, that HE was unworthy of being Sheikh.

  And Kabeer would agree.

  “You are correct, dear sister,” he would say to Yasmeena as he tried to contain a smile of victory. “I am not worthy of being a leader. I would only bring scandal to our people, shame to our family, cast a shadow on our nation. It must be you, dear Yasmeena. You must return to Bukhaara and take up the mantle of Sheikha. The people will remember you, and they will accept you.”

  But Kabeer never got a chance to play out that game, because Yasmeena broke the rules! And her joy was real, her happiness true, her look of delight so clear that she seemed like a child herself in that moment as she hugged me. HUGGED me! Allah, Yasmeena has not hugged me in years!

  Now he stared at his reflection in the mirror once again. He looked into his own green eyes that so often helped him get what he wanted, when he wanted, how he wanted. And then he thought of his sister, of what she had said to him after he had told her—after he had LIED to her—about Jenny being pregnant with his child.

  “Oh, Kabeer,” Yasmeena had said as she kissed him on either cheek. “Ya, Allah. God is great. It may not be according to tradition in so many ways, and there will be many who will shake their heads when the news spreads, but I do not care. I knew this woman was special from that first day, Kabeer.”

  “You called her a whore on that first day, Yasmeena,” Kabeer had said, flabbergasted at his sister’s COMPLETELY unexpected reaction.

  “I wanted to see your reaction, Kabeer! I have my instincts too, you know! We are the same blood. We come from the same line. I saw something in the two of you that day, and that side of me came out to test you, to test both of you. It was not fully conscious, perhaps not fully calculated—at least not at first.”

  “What do you mean ‘not at first,’ Yasmeena?”

  Yasmeena shook her head as if to clear it, her eyes still wide like a child’s. “The moment you told me you wanted to be the celebrity chef at Jenny’s restaurant, I knew I was right. I knew that even though you had not reasoned it out, your instincts were leading you, telling you to stay by her side, no matter what the consequences! That is all that is required for true love, my mother used to say! A natural, spontaneous willingness to do even the most silly, ridiculous thing to be with the one you love! And look, dear brother, I was right about not just you but her too! See how she has come here, to Dubai, a foreign place where she knows not a soul but you. No argument! No negotiation! She feels the pull of destiny too, just like I see it so clearly now! Ya, Allah, she may not know it, but she feels it! And that is enough for her! So I was right! And this child created from your union is the proof from Allah that I was right! Ya, Allah, our family is blessed with an heir. Kabeer, the child must be born in Bukhaara, after you are Sheikh. Oh, and the wedding. When will—”

  But Kabeer had cut his sister off at that point, mumbling something about how Jenny was very focused on the restaurant and did not want to be distracted by anything. After saying he wanted it kept quiet, Kabeer had left the room, his head spinning as he wondered how the hell he was going to handle this! Not only had his sister showed a side of her that he did not know existed, but what the hell was he going to do when Yasmeena found out that Jenny had cut off any personal relationship with him?! Not to mention the fact that she wasn’t pregnant!

  Ya, ALLAH, how could I possibly make things any more complicated! My life was so simple before this curvy little American woman with her big brown eyes showed up out of nowhere! Oh, God, I want to run. I want to run far away from this. From all of it!

  And so Kabeer ran. He left for Bukhaara the next day on his private jet, barricading himself in the Great Eastern Wing of the Royal Palace, spending his days and nights in a sort of trance as he wandered the empty rooms, absentmindedly stepping through the gurgling fountains where he and his brother had played.

  He allowed free rein of his thoughts and memories in those weeks alone—indeed, he did not have the will to hold them back any longer. In some way it was easier to deal with the past than the prese
nt!

  And it was only at the end of his self-imposed exile that those last words of his father played back to him, the soft sounds coming through on the warm breeze of a late afternoon:

  “Sometimes when you think you are running away from your destiny, you are in fact running straight towards it.”

  Two hours later Kabeer was in Dubai, walking through the private terminal his family kept at Dubai International Airport. He was done playing games. Done hiding from his past. Done avoiding his future.

  And his future was to lead. He knew that. He had ALWAYS known it. From the days of playing Follow the Leader as a child to the nights of leading college student protests in Paris to the afternoons in New York leading the Columbia Law Review sessions, Kabeer had always been in front, the first one there, the man everyone else looked to as an example. It was time to let the memory of Sirhan be just that—a memory, and not a chain that binds his feet to the past, preventing him from moving into the future, towards his destiny.

  No more lone wolf, he decided as he slapped his cheeks like he was waking himself out of a stupor, a trance, a haze. Yes, it is time for this lone wolf to lead his pack, lead his people, lead his country, lead his family.

  But first things first, he thought as he winked at his reflection, reminding himself that just because he wasn’t going to be a lone wolf anymore, it didn’t mean he wasn’t going to be an animal when he needed to be an animal, when he wanted to be an animal, when he CRAVED to be a goddamn animal!

  “Sheikh Kabeer Bukhaara is in the house,” he whispered in an exaggerated American accent to his reflection just as his attendant informed him the limousine was ready and waiting. “Sheikh Kabeer Bukhaara soon to be in YOUR house, Jenny Jones,” he said, that smile starting to emerge. “Yes, Sheikh Kabeer Bukhaara, arbiter of Allah’s will on this land. And for my first act I shall make true the prophecy I have spoken.” And he grinned that devilish grin full now, that wolf-smile one last time, the mischief burning in his eyes alongside the raw desire for this woman who he needed like a drug right now. “The prophecy that Jenny Jones, brown-eyed chef from Chicago, is pregnant with my child. Yes, I shall MAKE it true!”