The Sheikh’s Unexpected Son: The Blooming Desert Series Book Three

by North, Leslie

  Lise had been named in the article. Her full name, and she’d been given credit for the ideas she’d presented to Raed, including spearheading the pilot project. Her face heated while she read about how she’d taught him that change was a thrilling part of life. That anything could happen, if you kept an open mind and heart.

  In fact, most of the article was about her. It was about how he felt about her, and how she’d helped him grow, and how she’d shown him that a different life was possible.

  She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead. Maybe she was making all this up. But no—there were the words on her phone, the same as they had been when she’d started reading. Right there in black and white.

  “—and I would be remiss if I let her get away,” a voice read along with the last line of the article, and Lise looked up to find him standing there.

  With her.

  In London.

  Next to the bench, looking down at her with his eyes full of love and regret.

  “Hi,” he said.

  “Hi,” she managed.

  “I shouldn’t have let you walk away.” Raed had his hands in his pockets, his gorgeous face set in contemplation. “Of course, it’s your decision to leave or stay. But I should have fought for you.”

  “Why didn’t you?” Her mouth felt dry, and a breeze caressed the back of her neck. Why is he here? Her brain asked the question over and over and over, but it didn’t matter. What mattered was that Raed was with her. Now.

  He took her hand and pulled her upright, and just like the first time they’d met, she was struck by how tall and gorgeous he was, how muscular and solid. There was no way Lise could be imagining this. She put a hand out and touched his chest, her fingertips brushing against the fabric of his dress shirt. Yes. He was here.

  “Because I was cowardly.” He caught her hand in his and brought her knuckles to his lips to kiss. “I was too afraid of change to let go of what I’d already planned, even when the real meaning of my life was standing right in front of me. I want to be with you, Lise. I want to be with you and with Jake, and the rest will be what it will be.”

  “What about your foundation?” He couldn’t be giving that up. “What about all your plans? You wanted to be a…a titan of philanthropy by the time you were thirty.” They hadn’t been apart long, but Lise never wanted to let go of his hand.

  “You were right.” Raed looked her straight in the eye as he said it. “You were right about everything, but you were particularly correct when you asked me to focus my energies at home. There is so much to be done in Qasha. And I hope—” A quick glance down, and those dark eyes were on hers again, making her feel lighter than air, lighter than the sunlight. “I beg you for another chance. I see now. I see what’s real and what’s only an image, and you are real. Jake is real. And I want that. Please go back in there and turn down the job offer.”

  “I can’t,” Lise answered. Raed’s face fell, and Lise’s heart leapt out to him. She’d thought she might enjoy teasing him, if only for a few moments, but his stricken face wounded her to the core. She could never hurt him like this. “I can’t because I already did.”

  “What?” His eyebrows rose. Another chance at life—that was what she saw in his face. “But your career. Your security...”

  “Those don’t fulfill me.” Lise took his face in her hands, just wanting to touch him, but Raed leaned in first, pressing a kiss to her lips that felt like an apology and an invitation all at once. “This place doesn’t fulfill me. I want to go back to Qasha and be with you.”

  He wrapped his arms around her then, and it was the tightest embrace she’d ever known. “Don’t let go,” she whispered into his ear. “Please, don’t let go.”

  “I love you,” Raed murmured in her ear, and Lise thought her heart might take flight all by itself. The words thrilled her as much as any fireworks show, any promotion, any accomplishment ever could. More.

  “I love you too,” she said back. And she knew, in that moment, she would never tire of telling him that. She would never tire of being held in his arms. She would never tire of being home.

  22

  It seemed like the entire palace was waiting for them. Raed could feel the energy as they pulled up to the back entrance. He could feel it because his brother, the king of Qasha, had called him as soon as their plane touched down to tell them to hurry up.

  “I’m nervous,” Lise admitted as the driver stepped out to open the doors for them. “Your brother is the king.”

  “I know.” Raed gathered her in and pressed a kiss to her temple. “He’ll love you. Everyone does.”

  Lise took Jake out of his car seat and hugged him tight. “Here we are, back at Daddy’s house.”

  “Dada,” said Jake.

  The three of them went into the foyer in the back of the building, and there stood Raed’s brother Hamid with Tali. The family, waiting to see what he’d do. He could feel Lise tensing beside him, but Tali leaped forward and pulled Lise and Jake into a huge hug.

  “I am so glad you’re back,” Tali told her. “I wish you hadn’t had to leave in the first place. I know just how stubborn these men are and how to deal with them. The trick is making them feel like they’re in charge.”

  “We are in charge,” put in Hamid, and both women rolled their eyes.

  Nenet appeared behind them, followed by her cats. “If it hadn’t been for me...” She stepped forward and embraced Lise and Jake, too, whispering something in her ear that Raed couldn’t hear. Probably for the best.

  A crowd had gathered behind the royal family, and they parted to let Rafiq and Eliana through, followed closely by Jana. Hamid’s son was seven, and their daughter was one and already walking. Rafiq waved at them, a big, sweeping gesture, and they came to stand with the rest of the family.

  “Jana said everyone wanted to see you,” he whispered, and this got a laugh from the crowd. The entire palace staff had come out to see them. Jake ran for Jana then, and after a hug she put him down with his cousins. All three children immediately started running in a tight circle.

  “I see where this is going,” Lise said. “I’d love to freshen up before we have our reunion.” She nodded toward the exit. The guest house. Right.

  He put a hand on the small of her back. “You’re in the family wing of the palace now. I’ll show you the way.”

  “Now?” Her green eyes sparkled with delight.

  Raed swallowed down the last of his nerves. “Right now. In fact...” He got down on one knee, pulling a small velvet box from his pocket and balancing it on his palm. “Lise, you’re the love of my life. I hope you’ll join me as part of our family. And as my wife. I would be so honored if—”

  She cut him off with a kiss.

  The hallway burst into applause, and Rafiq shouted his approval. Jake came running over to Raed to see the box, and he tipped it into his son’s hands. “Give it to Mama.”

  Jake, proud of himself as ever, put the box in his mother’s hands. She opened it, and her eyes went wide with shock. “Raed, this is—”

  He stood, looking down at the ring in its box. “This is the ring my father proposed to my mother with.” It was a queenly piece of jewelry—an enormous diamond. He’d asked his mother’s permission to use it the same day he’d found Lise on that London bench, and Nenet had sent it by courier the same day.

  Nenet looked on, eyes glistening. “It will look so lovely on you, Lise,” she said.

  “My hands are shaking.” Another kind laugh. Lise gave him the box, and Raed had the pleasure of taking out that ring and slipping it onto her finger. He’d had to do some covert research to find out her ring size, and it fit perfectly.

  They were engaged.

  Raed pulled her close, Jake already toddling in circles around them, and whispered into her ear: “I can’t wait to get you alone. I want to see you wearing only that ring.”

  She batted him on the chest, then stepped in close and kissed him again. The staff and their family couldn’t hold
back their cheering. Too much excitement.

  * * *

  The hours tumbled into one another, the surprise engagement melting into a hasty changeover in Raed’s rooms and a lunch with Nenet and Hamid and Tali and the children and an afternoon in the garden under tents to protect them from the sun and on and on until they’d eaten dinner and the sun was setting, Jake’s head heavy against Lise’s shoulder. They made their way through the palace, tired and happy, and Lise tucked Jake into the crib in the new nursery in Raed’s apartments. She had no idea what the room had been before, but somehow in this process it had been transformed into a soft, elephant-themed room for Jake.

  He must have started the designers working before they came back, she realized. There hadn’t been enough time to do all of this today. He must have hoped.

  Back in his master bedroom, a lavish space that stretched out the length of the wing and was dominated by his bed on one side, he paced back and forth impatiently, stopping when she came into the room.

  “Come to bed.” Lise heard the royalty in his voice then, and it made her shiver. “I want to ravish you.”

  “Oh, no. That’s not happening.”

  His eyebrows shot up at her words, and Raed prowled toward her, looking more handsome and disheveled by the moment. He looked sun-warmed and determined, and this was the hottest Lise had ever seen him. “What did you say?”

  “I want to ravish you.” Her nerves lit up. How could he make her feel like this just by walking across a room? She was half nervous and half so aroused that she had to press her thighs together to keep her knees from giving out. “I want you to strip for me.”

  Raed’s eyes darkened, and a wicked grin curled the corners of his mouth. He stopped half a step from her, searching her eyes, then dipped his head to kiss the bare skin left exposed by her sundress. The kiss left her wanting more, wanting him, but he put more space between them and reached for the hem of his shirt. His abs were the first thing to come into the light, cut and hard, and he watched her watching him. Her mouth watered.

  Then his pants. Raed wore boxers underneath his dress pants, and he was already hard. Lise moved forward to touch him beneath the fabric, but he held up a warning finger. “Not yet, impatient thing.”

  Well. This was what she’d asked for. Lise let him take off the boxers and kick off his socks, which he managed to do in a surprisingly sexy way for a man wriggling out of his clothes. And then he was naked in front of her, holding his hands out, beckoning her close.

  She went to him, throwing all her weight against him and pushing him back onto the bed. Raed laughed as he fell, making it clear that he was letting her do this, and she knew from the solid strength of him that it would only ever be playful between them—playful and hot and wonderful. She climbed up over him.

  “We have a problem,” Raed murmured.

  “What problem?” Lise kissed his collarbone, straddling him, wanting to press the length of her body against him but trying to hold off, trying to wait as long as she could.

  “You’re not naked.” Raed reached down and tugged her dress over her head, then went to work on her bra while she kissed across his collarbone. The bra fell away, and then he was working her panties down over her hips in a tangle of limbs that ended with her sprawled over him, working to get back into position. Their lips met in a heated crash, and Raed’s hands moved down over her hips, holding them tight, and she rocked against him until he stopped her.

  Oh, it had been such a long day, so many hours of standing so close to him and breathing him in and feeling his fingertips on her and wanting more. Was this going to be what her entire life was? Lise hoped so. Raed dipped a hand between her legs, stroking what he found there and making a noise of approval.

  “Now that you’ve pushed me down on the bed, do you think I should tease you as payback?”

  “Please don’t,” she groaned, but if this was teasing, she liked it. He played over her sensitive folds and found her opening, sliding two fingers inside and curling them in an expert twist that made her moan again. Raed caught the moan in his mouth and pulled her down onto his fingers. Even on his back on the bed, he was still the one in control. Lise clenched around the fingers, rolling her hips, and Raed pulled his hand away.

  “No,” she whimpered, not entirely in control of herself, much less of him.

  “Hush,” he told her. “Or don’t.” And then he was lining himself up at her entrance and moving her down, down, down until he filled her completely. Inch by inch until he could go no deeper. Lise tensed again, and this time it was Raed who let out a hiss of pleasure. “Do that again.”

  She did.

  They moved together, her on top and him holding her in place, pleasure building in that space below her belly. It wound tighter and tighter and tighter, the pleasure pushing out all her other thoughts until Lise was left with nothing but Raed—Raed’s eyes watching her fevered face, Raed’s hands stroking over her skin, his hard length inside of her, taking and taking and taking. She shuddered to a hot climax, and he watched her through that, too, never taking his eyes off her.

  “What—what are you looking at?” The breathless words escaped her on a gasp.

  “You,” he said through gritted teeth, still working in and out of her in a steady, demanding rhythm. “I never want to stop looking at you for as long as I live. I’m going to look at you—look at you—”

  Lise pushed up against his chest, bearing her weight on him and clenching herself tight, sending herself into an aftershock of an orgasm and pulling Raed over with her. He was bare, and her heart thundered to life—this was how they’d gotten Jake, and she wanted more of that. Wanted Raed’s hands on her rounded belly and his gaze in the mirror and his body wrapped around hers at night.

  They came down from the peak, and Raed moved them, pulling them both up onto the pillows and stroking her hair back from her face, breathing hard. She could see in his eyes that it made him hot, what they’d done, and he pressed his mouth to hers. Then his hand slipped down and down until it came to rest against the soft flat of her belly.

  He said nothing. He didn’t need to say anything. She had his ring on her finger now, and she was home, where she belonged. “This is how it starts,” she said.

  Raed kissed her again, and she felt that new beginning in his touch. “Yes,” he said against her lips. “I can’t wait.”

  Epilogue

  A seven-year-old Jake tore through the town square, which was buzzing with people and celebration for the fifth anniversary of Raed’s foundation and its local success.

  “Mama!” Jake called. “I found my friends from school. They’re over—”

  Lise caught her son’s hands and spun him around. “You’re going to give security a heart attack if you keep disappearing into crowds,” she scolded him, her tone light. “You can’t make them chase you like that.”

  He stuck out his tongue, grinning. “They can keep up with me.”

  “Don’t make them work so hard.” Jake’s security detail arrived a minute later, jogging to the edge of the family group. Raed slid an arm around Lise’s waist and grinned down at Jake. She had no doubt her husband had encouraged him to give his security detail a run for their money, and she’d have a private conversation with him about that later—if they could keep their hands off each other.

  It was still hard, five years on.

  “Did you find the runaway?” Hamid stepped forward with Tali, their own children in and out of the group of palace advisors and close family friends. “Ah, there he is. I assume you’re keeping my men in shape.”

  “I am.” Jake lifted his chin. “When is the parade starting?”

  “Right now,” Lise told him, and they made their way to the raised platform set aside for the royal family. Skandar, Raed’s cousin, and his wife Gina met them on the platform, exchanging hugs and big grins. “We have a lot to talk about,” Lise whispered to Gina. She tickled her friend’s baby under the chin while their older child joined the fray. They’d all b
ecome close over the past few years. Raed stepped over to talk to his brother, and Hamid laughed.

  “Do we? Will it have to wait until after the celebration?” Gina’s eyes twinkled. Raed’s work had expanded to Skandar’s country with Gina’s help, and her work had come to Qasha, and now all of them were interconnected.

  “Maybe not quite that long,” Lise hedged. They sat down to watch the parade. She fanned herself in the heat, somehow managing to enjoy the speeches before the actual parade. There was a speech about the new scheme for granting oil contracts, which was met with big cheers from the crowd. And the first float to lead the parade was one from Lafayette College, which had started an annex in Qasharouz.

  Down below the platform, Lise could see the board from London HQ enjoying themselves, drinks in hand. She’d have to go join them later, but for now the shade of the platform felt almost sinfully good. They’d want to chat with her about plans for the upcoming semester.

  She was more than an instructor now. After five years, she was a full partner, and in addition to overseeing the language school, she taught a selection of Lafayette’s most prestigious courses in the new building they’d come together to build. Her staff of lecturers and admin were the best in the city, and she was the best director they’d ever had. Not that she’d admit to that out loud. But every day, she tried to be better.

  “Mama.” Jake pointed down. “The people from your work are here.”

  “They are,” she said.

  He frowned, his expression serious. “I want to be a teacher like you someday.”

  She took his hand in hers. “As long as it makes you happy, son of mine.”

  “Lise!” Ingeborg had climbed the stairs at the side of the platform, hauling along her husband, who looked vaguely lost even though they had to have been escorted there by palace security. Lise stood up and embraced her parents, who had made the trip for the celebration. “Your incredible work is an excellent excuse for a party,” Ingeborg said, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “I’m so impressed with you.”