Carrying the Sheikh's Baby Read online

  Hired by the sheikh...

  And expecting the royal heir!

  When shy, academic Cat Smith is hired as a researcher by Sheikh Zane, she’s thrilled—and completely dazzled by their overwhelming chemistry! Cat knows a fling could compromise her professional credibility, but resisting Zane’s sensual caress feels utterly impossible. Until their passionate encounter has lasting consequences... Now carrying the heir to the kingdom means one thing—Cat must become Zane’s queen!

  Enjoy this scandalous royal baby romance!

  “So you want to have this child?” Zane asked.

  Cat shuddered; his eyes were stark with an emotion so intense it took her breath away.

  She nodded, because at least the answer to that question was easy. “Yes.”

  He brushed his thumb across her cheek, gathering another tear. “Then there’s only one answer to your question. We will be married and you will become my queen.”

  “What?” His confident, pragmatic tone shocked her almost as much as the proposal.

  His sensual lips tipped up into a smile that had her heart thundering against her ribs.

  “You must marry me, Catherine,” he said again, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

  One Night With Consequences

  When one night...leads to pregnancy!

  When succumbing to a night of unbridled desire, it’s impossible to think past the morning after!

  But with the sheets barely settled, that little blue line appears on the pregnancy test, and it doesn’t take long to realize that one night of white-hot passion has turned into a lifetime of consequences!

  Only one question remains:

  How do you tell a man you’ve just met that you’re about to share more than just his bed?

  Find out in:

  Consequence of His Revenge by Dani Collins

  Princess’s Pregnancy Secret by Natalie Anderson

  The Sheikh’s Shock Child by Susan Stephens

  The Italian’s One-Night Consequence by Cathy Williams

  Princess’s Nine-Month Secret by Kate Hewitt

  Consequence of the Greek’s Revenge by Trish Morey

  An Innocent, A Seduction, A Secret by Abby Green

  Look for more One Night With Consequences coming soon!

  Heidi Rice

  Carrying the Sheikh’s Baby

  USA TODAY bestselling author Heidi Rice lives in London, England. She is married with two teenage sons—which gives her rather too much of an insight into the male psyche—and also works as a film journalist. She adores her job, which involves getting swept up in a world of high emotions; sensual excitement; funny, feisty women; sexy, tortured men and glamorous locations where laundry doesn’t exist. Once she turns off her computer, she often does chores—usually involving laundry!

  Books by Heidi Rice

  Harlequin Presents

  Vows They Can’t Escape

  The Virgin’s Shock Baby

  Captive at Her Enemy’s Command

  Bound by Their Scandalous Baby

  Join Harlequin My Rewards today and earn a FREE ebook!

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  To my best mate Catri O’Kane, who helped me brainstorm this story on a road trip in West Texas!

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  EPILOGUE

  EXCERPT FROM THE TYCOON'S SHOCK HEIR BY BELLA FRANCES

  CHAPTER ONE

  Dr Smith, you need to come to my office ASAP. You have a very important visitor who cannot be kept waiting.

  CATHERINE SMITH PEDALLED through the gates of Cambridge’s Devereaux College at breakneck speed, her boss Professor Archibald Walmsley’s curt text making sweat trickle down her forehead and into her eyes.

  Braking at the side of the redbrick Victorian monolith that housed the faculty offices, she leapt off the bike and rammed it into the cycle rack before swiping her brow. Rounding the building, she spotted a limousine with blacked-out windows and diplomatic flags parked in the no-parking zone by the front entrance. Her heartbeat kicked up several extra notches.

  She recognised those flags.

  So that solved the mystery of who had come to visit her: it had to be someone from the Narabian embassy in London. Panic and excitement tightened around her ribs like boa constrictors as she raced up the steps—her mind racing ahead of her.

  A visit from the Narabian embassy could either be very good, or very bad.

  Walmsley—who had taken over as Devereaux College’s dean after her father’s death—was going to kill her for going over his head and applying for official accreditation for her research into the recent history of the secretive, oil-rich desert state. But if she got it, even he wouldn’t be able to stand in her way. She’d finally be able to get more funding for her research. Her heart thudded against her chest wall in a one-two punch. She might even get permission to travel to the country.

  Surely this had to be good news. The country’s ruler, Tariq Ali Nawari Khan, had died two months ago after a long illness and his son, Zane Ali Nawari Khan, had taken over the throne. A darling of the gossip columns as a baby—Zane Khan was half-American, the product of Tariq’s short-lived marriage to tragic Hollywood starlet Zelda Mayhew—he’d disappeared from the public eye, especially after his father had won custody of him in his teens. But there had been several credible stories the new Sheikh was planning to open the country up, and bring Narabia onto the world stage.

  Which was why she’d made her application—because she was hoping the new regime would consider lifting the veil of secrecy. But what if she’d made a major mistake? What if this visit was actually very bad news? What if the diplomat was here to complain about her application? Walmsley could use it as an excuse to end her tenure.

  She rushed down the corridor towards Walmsley’s office, breathing in the comforting scent of lemon polish and old wood.

  The pulse of grief hit her hard as she took the stairs to her father’s old office. This place had been her whole life ever since she was a little girl, and her father had taken over as the new dean. But Henry Smith had been dead for two years now. And Walmsley had wanted her gone—as a reminder of the man whose shadow he’d lived in for fifteen years—for almost that long.

  Buck up, Cat. It’s time. You can’t spend the rest of your life hidden behind these four walls.

  Turning the corner to Walmsley’s office, she spotted two large men dressed in dark suits standing guard outside his door. Her heart rammed into her throat, the crows of doubt swooping into her stomach like dive-bombers.

  Why had the Narabian embassy sent a security detail? Wasn’t it a little over the top? Maybe Walmsley’s reaction wasn’t the only thing she had to worry about?

  She brushed her hair back from her face and retied the wayward curls to buy time. The snap of the elastic band was like a gunshot in the quiet hallway. Both men stared at her as if she were a felon, instead of a twenty-four-year-old female professor with a double PhD in Middle Eastern studies. They looked ready to tackle her to the ground if she so much as sneezed.

  She forced herself to breathe. In, out—that’s the spirit.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she murmured. ‘
My name’s Dr Catherine Smith. Professor Walmsley is expecting me.’

  One of the man mountains gave a brusque nod, then leaned round to shove open the door. ‘She is arrived,’ he announced in heavily accented English.

  Cat entered the office, the hairs on her neck prickling alarmingly as Walmsley’s head snapped up.

  ‘Dr Smith, at last, where have you been?’ Walmsley said, his exasperated enquiry high-pitched and tense.

  Cat jumped as the door slammed shut behind her. Her anxiety levels increased, the boa constrictors writhing in her belly. Why was the dean fidgeting like that with the papers on his desk? He looked nervous, and she’d never seen him nervous before.

  ‘I’m sorry, Professor,’ she said, trying to read her boss’s expression—but his face was cast into shadow by the pale wintry light coming through the sash window behind him. ‘I was in the library. I didn’t get your text until five minutes ago.’

  ‘We have an esteemed visitor, who is here to see you,’ he said. ‘You really shouldn’t have kept him waiting.’

  Walmsley held out his arm and Cat swung round. The prickle of awareness went haywire. A man sat in the leather armchair at the back of Walmsley’s office.

  His face was cast into shadow. But even seated he looked intimidatingly large, his shoulders impressively broad in an expertly tailored suit. He had his left leg crossed over his opposite knee, one tanned hand clasping his ankle. The expensive gold watch on his wrist glinted in the sunlight. The pose was indolent and assured and oddly predatory.

  He unfolded his legs and leaned out of the shadows, and Cat’s wayward pulse skyrocketed into the stratosphere.

  The few photographs she’d seen of Sheikh Zane Ali Nawari Khan didn’t do him justice. High slashing cheekbones, a blade-like nose and his ruthlessly cropped hair were offset by a pair of brutally blue eyes, the colour of his irises the same true turquoise his mother had once been famous for.

  He had clearly inherited all the best genes from both sides of his bloodline—his features a stunning combination of his father’s striking Arabic bone structure and his mother’s almost ethereal Caucasian beauty. In truth, his features would almost be too perfect, but for the scar on his chin—and a bump in the bridge of his nose, which marred the perfect symmetry.

  Cat’s lungs contracted.

  ‘Hello, Dr Smith,’ he said in a deep cultured voice, his English still tinged with the lazy cadence of America’s West Coast. He unfolded his long frame from the chair and walked towards her—and she had the weirdest sensation of being stalked, like a gazelle who’d accidentally wandered into the lion enclosure at London Zoo. She struggled to get her breathing back under control before she passed out at his Gucci-clad feet.

  ‘My name is Zane Khan,’ he said, stopping only a smidgen outside her personal space.

  ‘I know who you are, Your Highness,’ she said breathlessly, far too aware of her height disadvantage.

  He spoke again in that same clipped, urbane tone. ‘I don’t use the title outside Narabia.’

  Blood rushed to her face and flooded past her eardrums. Then a dimple appeared in his left cheek, and her lungs seized again.

  Oh, for Pete’s sake, a dimple? Isn’t he devastating enough already?

  ‘I’m sorry, Your High... I mean, Zane.’ Heat charged to her hairline when his lips quirked.

  Oh. My. God. Cat. You did not just call the ruler of Narabia by his first name.

  ‘Sorry. I’m so sorry. I meant to say Mr Khan.’

  She sucked in a fortifying breath and the refreshing scent of citrus soap, overlaid with the spicy hint of a clean cedarwood cologne, filled her nostrils. She shuffled back, and her bottom hit Walmsley’s desk.

  He hadn’t moved any closer, but still she could feel that concentrated gaze on every inch of her exposed skin.

  ‘Are you here about my request for accreditation?’ she asked, feeling impossibly foolish.

  Why on earth would he have come all this way, to see her, over something that could be sorted out by one of his minions in the Narabian embassy in London?

  ‘No, Dr Smith,’ he said. ‘I’m here to offer you a job.’

  * * *

  Zane had to resist the unprecedented urge to laugh when Catherine Smith’s hazel eyes widened to the size of dinner plates.

  She hadn’t expected that. Then again, he hadn’t expected her. The only reason he’d come in person was because he already had a business meeting in Cambridge today with a tech firm who would be helping to bring superfast internet access to Narabia. And because he’d been furious once he’d received the reports from his tech people that someone at Devereaux College had been doing research on Narabia without his express permission.

  He hadn’t bothered to read the file they’d emailed to him about the female academic who had asked for accreditation. He’d simply assumed she would be frumpy and middle-aged.

  The very last thing he’d expected was to be introduced to someone who couldn’t be much older than a high-school student, with eyes the colour of caramel candy. She looked like a tomboy, dressed in slim-fit jeans, a pair of biker boots and a shapeless sweater that nearly reached her knees. Her wild chestnut hair—barely contained by an elastic band—added to the impression of young, unconventional beauty. But it was her candy-coloured eyes that had really snagged his attention. Wide and slightly slanted, giving them a sleepy, just-out-of-bed quality, her eyes were striking, not least because they were so expressive, every one of her emotions clearly visible.

  ‘A job doing what?’ she said, her directness surprising him as she eased further back against her boss’s desk.

  Looking past her, he directed his gaze at Walmsley. ‘Leave us,’ he said.

  The middle-aged academic nodded and shuffled out of the room, well aware his department’s funding was at stake because of this woman’s research.

  The woman’s eyes widened even more, and he could see the jump in her pulse rate above the neckline of her bulky sweater.

  ‘I require someone to write a detailed account of my country’s people, the history of its culture and customs to complete the process of introducing Narabia on the world stage. I understand you have considerable knowledge of the region?’

  His PR people had suggested the hagiography. It was all part of the process of finally bringing Narabia out of the shadows and into the light. A process he’d embarked upon five years ago when his father had let go of his iron grip on the throne. It had taken Tariq Khan five years to die from the stroke that had left him a shadow of his former self, during which time Zane had managed to drag the country’s oil industry out of the dark ages, begin a series of infrastructure projects that would eventually bring electricity, water mains and even internet access to the country’s remote landscape. But there was still a very long way to go. And the last thing he needed was for any gossip to get out about his parents’ relationship and the difficult nature of his relationship with the man who had sired him. Because that would become the whole story.

  He shrugged, the phantom pain searing his shoulder blades.

  This woman’s work threatened to throw the book he had planned to commission—stressing the country’s adaptability and new modern outlook—into stark relief if she found out the sordid truth about how he had come to live in Narabia. But shutting her down wasn’t the right response. He had always been a firm believer in challenging problems head-on. ‘Never trust anyone’ had been one of his father’s favourite maxims—and one of the many harsh lessons Zane had learned to embrace wholeheartedly.

  ‘You want me to write a book on the kingdom?’ She seemed astonished. He wondered why.

  ‘Yes, it would mean accompanying me to Narabia. You would have three months to complete the project but I understand you’ve already spent over a year doing research on the kingdom?’ Research he needed to ensure hadn’t already uncovered information he wished to conceal. r />
  She moistened her lips, and his gaze was drawn to her mouth. Even though she appeared to wear no lipstick, he became momentarily fixated by the plump bow at the top, glistening in the half-light. The surge of lust was surprising. The women he slept with were usually a great deal more sophisticated than this woman.

  ‘I’m sorry. I... I can’t accept.’

  He dragged his gaze away from her month, annoyed he’d become fixated on it. And annoyed more by her response to his proposal. ‘I assure you the fee is a lucrative one,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t doubt that,’ she said, although he suspected she had no idea how lucrative the fee he would propose actually was, certainly more than an academic could make in a decade, let alone three months. ‘But I couldn’t possibly write a comprehensive account in that time. I’ve only done preliminary research so far. And I’ve never written something of that magnitude. Are you sure you don’t want a journalist instead?’

  No way was he inviting a journalist to pry into his past. That sort of uncontrolled intrusion into his affairs was precisely what this carefully vetted account was supposed to avoid.

  Heat pulsed in his groin at her surprising show of defiance. He ruthlessly ignored it. However much he might want to devour that cupid’s bow mouth, he was not in the habit of seducing subordinates—especially not ones who looked about eighteen years old.

  ‘How old are you, Dr Smith?’ he asked, abruptly changing the subject.

  She stiffened and he suspected he’d insulted her with the question. She must be used to people questioning her credentials, which was hardly surprising—she didn’t look old enough to be in college, let alone to hold two PhDs.

  ‘I’m twenty-four.’

  He nodded, relieved. She was young and probably sheltered if she’d managed to gain that much education so quickly, but not that young.

  ‘Then you are still at the start of your career. This is an opportunity for you to make a name for yourself outside the—’ his gaze drifted over the worn leather textbooks, the musty academic tomes, all dead history to his way of thinking ‘—world of academia. You wanted official accreditation for your research into Narabia...’ Accreditation he would give her once he had final say on the content of her work. ‘This is the only way you will get it.’