Monarch of the Sands
An impossible love affair – with a sheikh! Francesca is shocked when family friend Zahid Al Hakam turns up on her doorstep. After all, he’s now the Sheikh of Khayarzah – England’s surburbia is hardly his regular stomping ground! But he is as achingly gorgeous as ever…and she’s certainly tempted by his invitation to come to the desert and work for him.Zahid finds the geeky, gauche teenager he once knew is now an understated beauty. Embarking on a secret affair is bittersweet – but, however all-consuming their passion, Zahid’s duty to his kingdom must surely come first?
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‘It’s just that you have grown up into a beautiful and very desirable young woman—and I’m finding it difficult to know how to react to you.’
It was such a stark and honest admission that it took Frankie completely by surprise. She looked at him in disbelief until she found herself blushing, and then glanced down at her plate, terrified about what he might read into her embarrassment. Did he have any idea that she had entertained stupid fantasies about him since the year dot?
For a full minute there was silence, and when the tension in the air had grown to such a point that she couldn’t take it any more Frankie risked glancing up into his eyes once more.
‘I don’t know what to say,’ she whispered.
And for once in his life neither did Zahid.
One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.
There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.
I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia to escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100>th story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”
So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?
I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.
Love,
Sharon xxx
Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.
SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…
With special thanks to Dr Lloyd Wood—
whose passion about oil discovery was contagious and helped make my heroine’s father become real.
And to Sarah of Smart Bitches,
who inadvertently inspired this story.
Contents
AGAINST her pale skin, the diamond flashed like a shooting star and Frankie gazed at it in wonder. Who would ever have thought it? Geeky, freaky Frankie O’Hara engaged to be married—and sporting a solitaire the size of a blueberry.
Spreading out her fingers, she watched as the precious stone caught the pale November light and glittered it back at her. Her father would have smiled and said that a diamond was nothing but a hard and highly refractive form of carbon—but to Frankie it was so much more than that. It was a symbol. It signified that a man loved her and wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.A handsome, successful man, too. Not the kind of man she’d ever have thought would be attracted to someone like her—not in the million or so years it took to make a diamond.
The low roar of a car disturbed her dreamy thoughts and Frankie blinked with surprise and a slight feeling of panic. Surely Simon wasn’t here already? Why, she hadn’t peeled a single potato for the celebration meal she’d been planning—and surely the chicken breasts hadn’t been marinating for nearly long enough?
She peered out of the window and the breath caught sharply in her throat as she saw the expensive and gleaming vehicle which was making its way up the drive, spraying little shoals of gravel in its wake.
That certainly wasn’t Simon—who drove a comfortable saloon indistinguishable from the many others which dominated the roads of this affluent area of suburban England. The car which was now pulling to a halt in front of the house was sporty, black and powerful and looked as if it would be more at home on an international racing circuit than in this quiet corner of the world. And she didn’t have to look at the driver’s hard profile to know exactly who was driving it.
