Pregnant by the Sheikh(22)

“As if I wouldn’t see you coming a mile away.”

Antonio chuckled. “Go ahead, underestimate me. I’ll have you on my table again yet, Phantom.”

“Dream on, Bones.”

Then as it was their way, with the conversation over, they just terminated the call with no lingering goodbyes.

Afterward, he sat there staring ahead, his conversation with Antonio forgotten, his mind again full of Jenan and how he’d come to meet her.

She was part of the other side of his heritage. His mother was Safeyah Aal Ghamdi, a princess of the royal family in Zafrana, a cousin of the late king, Zayd Aal Ghamdi, and Jenan’s distant relative. His mother had left the region after her husband and son had been presumed dead thirty-seven years ago and had never come back. She’d never remarried, and had died four years ago in England.

Then when Zafrana’s king had died twenty-two years ago, the throne had gone to his closest male relative, his cousin Khalil, Jenan’s father.

His plan coming here had been simple. To reclaim his heritage, and punish the monster who’d murdered his father and caused Numair to rot in hell for a quarter of a century.

He was still working on providing irrefutable proof of his identity. With his father being dead almost four decades, it was hard to find anything with his DNA. Proof positive was to find his remains, so he was scouring the Mediterranean where his father’s yacht had sunk.

Once he found it, he’d reclaim his true identity. He didn’t fear exposure, like Rafael Salazar, who’d been abducted from his parents. No one in The Organization knew who Numair really was, having obtained him as an anonymous child from an orphanage in a faraway country. And he’d make his story work perfectly with the meticulous history he’d created for his Numair Al Aswad persona.

Once he decided to announce his real identity, he’d reveal the part where he’d survived the assassination attempt. His story would diverge from the truth when he’d claim he’d been found by a fishing fleet on the shores of Damhoor, a neighboring kingdom to Saraya, and taken to an orphanage there. A couple who’d been working there had adopted him almost immediately, but had never announced it since adoption was forbidden there, taking him to the States as their biological son. They’d told him he was adopted only when he’d been in his late teens.

The other truth he’d say was that it had taken him all that time to investigate his origins.

Until he proved them, he planned to prepare the playing field. And to punish Hassan. Before he exposed him for the murderer he was and throw him in a dungeon for life, he’d first disgrace and destroy him a bit at a time. Everyone should be happy with that, since all monarchs in the region wished he’d abdicate the throne to one worthy of it. But that wouldn’t be Hassan’s crown prince and his cousin, the much-loved Najeeb, but Numair himself.

If his cousins contested his right to the throne, which he fully expected they would, he had the power to curb them and any allies whose help they enlisted, and the finances to buy them all a few times over. If not, he could escalate to whatever level of conflict it took to make them bow down to him. He had no problem taking the throne in a coup. Or starting a war to claim what was his. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d instigated an armed conflict.

The other part of his plan had been to claim the other side of his heritage.

He’d come here bound on taking Zafrana’s throne, too, and saving his other homeland from its inept king. The only way to do this was through blood. Khalil’s blood. Through one of his daughters. Jenan had been the obvious choice, since her half sisters were so young. Then Hassan had made a bid for her, unintentionally trying to beat him to Zafrana with his same plan.

That had posed little change in his plan. Instead of claiming Jenan directly, he had to pulverize Hassan’s bid first. He’d intended to seduce her, impregnate her then marry her, becoming Zafrana’s de facto ruler during Khalil’s life through the marriage alliance. After Khalil’s death, when the throne became his child’s, he’d intended to rule as regent until his child came of age.

Then in mere hours, everything had changed. His one objective was now Jenan. Not because she was strategic to his plans, but because he had to have her.

Now he feared his marauding ways had alienated her.

He heaved up to his feet, his every muscle bunched as if in preparation for the fight of his life.

Not having her wasn’t an option. He wouldn’t retreat and change his approach. He’d escalate his attack, besiege her, leave her nowhere to run and hide.

Tomorrow night, Jenan would be his.

* * *

“You are my hero!”