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CHAPTER ONE

HIS EARS WERE playing tricks on him They must be

Otherwise they wouldn’t have relayed the unconscionable e to his brain that—

No

‘Repeat yourself,’ Sheikh Zufar al Khalia, current occupant of the throne of Khalia, breathed softly at the short, bespectacled senior aide standing before him

The ’s lowered, even tones were far worse than his bark Not that Zufar al Khalia, ly intelligent head of the exulted royal family, needed to lower hi

Marwan Farhat only aze for a handful of seconds before lowering his to the priceless Persian rug beneath his feet

‘Now, Marwan,’ Zufar insisted

‘We’ve been inforhness She’s not in her suite, and her maidservant thinks she’s been taken’

‘Thinks? So there’s no actual evidence?’

‘Uh I haven’t spoken to the servant hness, but—’

‘For all you know,somewhere in the palace, under the pretext of the foolish, pre-wedding nerves that normally afflict women on such a day, correct?’

Marwan exchanged glances with the other aides ‘It is possible, Your Highness’

Zufar heard the but not spoken, loud and clear ‘Where is this maidservant? I wish to speak to her myself’

The senior aide griirl is quite hysterical I don’t think it will be useful—’

‘Useful?’ The cold disbelief trapped in his chest expanded ‘Do you see what I’, Marwan?’ Zufar drawled in the soft, deadly voice that usually hushed his subordinates into fearful silence, as he rounded the ed to his esteerandfather