Protecting the Desert Heir
Pregnant, alone and on the run!Sterling McRae knows that powerful Sheikh Rihad al Bakri wants to claim the unborn heir to his desert kingdom. Her baby belongs to his brother, her best friend, and was conceived to protect him. But now he’s gone there is no one to protect Sterling and her child from the duty-bound fate that awaits them.When Rihad finds Sterling he wastes no time in stealing her away to the desert. But his iron control is soon shattered by this bold, beautiful woman and replaced by infuriating, inescapable desire. To secure his country’s future, Rihad must claim Sterling too…Scandalous Sheikh Brides, and the powerful men who claim them!These men will do whatever it takes to protect their legacies including claiming these women as their brides before a scandal ensues!Book 1: Protecting the Desert HeirBook 2: Traded to the Desert SheikhPraise for Caitlin CrewsHis For Revenge 4.5* TOP PICK RT Book ReviewFrom the first page to the brilliantly defining end, Crews’ gothic tale refines the priceless harrowed-to-healed love story. The festive holiday atmosphere heightens the twisted tale.His for a Price 4.5* RT Book ReviewCrews fills her poignant, non-stop drama-thon romance with acerbic humor and heart-rending dialogue and sets it in lavishness on soothing Aegean shores. The banter and sexual tension make this intense page-turner burn.Undone by the Sultan’s Touch 4.5* TOP PICK RT Book ReviewCrews’ intensely emotional, immensely dramatic, tastefully carnal page-turner tops the brand standard. Her uncompromising, imperious desert hero and tenacious, no-holds-barred heroine are awesomely genuine.
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âWhat is this? Where are we?â
âThis is an airport,â Rihad told her, in the same lecturing way sheâd used when sheâd ordered him not to use his mobile as he drove out of Manhattan. âAnd that is a plane. My plane.â
Sterling went so white he thought she might topple over where she sat. Her hands moved at once to the round swell of her belly, as if she was trying to protect the child within from him, and he hated it that there was some part of him that admired her for so futile a gesture.
âWho are you?â she whispered.
He suspected she knew. But he took immense satisfaction in angling closer, so he could see every faint tremor on those sinful lips. Every shiver that moved across her skin. Every dawning moment of horrified recognition in her deep blue gaze.
âI am Rihad al Bakri,â he told her, and felt a harsh surge of victory as her gaze went dark. âIf that is truly my brotherâs child you carry, it is my heir. And Iâm afraid that means youâll be coming with me.â
And the powerful men who claim them!
In their rival desert kingdoms the word of Rihad al Bakri and Kavian ibn Zayed al Talaas is law.
Nothing and no one stands in the way of these formidable and passionate sheikhs.
Until two exceptional women dare to defy them and turn their carefully controlled worlds upside down.
These men will do whatever it takes to protect their legaciesâincluding claiming these women as their brides before a scandal ensues!
Read Rihadâs story in
Protecting the Desert Heir June 2015
And look out for Kavian and Princess Amayaâs story, coming soon!
USA TODAY bestseller and RITA>® Award-nominated author CAITLIN CREWS loves writing romance. She teaches her favourite romance novels in creative writing classes at places like UCLA Extensionâs prestigious Writersâ Programme, where she can finally utilise the MA and PhD in English Literature she received from the University of York in England. She currently lives in California, with her very own hero and too many pets. Visit her at caitlincrews.com
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE LAST TIME sheâd run for her life, Sterling McRae had been a half-wild teenager with more guts than sense. Today it was more a waddle for her life than anything approaching a runâthanks to the baby she carried and had to protect no matter what, now that Omar was deadâbut the principle remained the same.
Get out. Get away. Go somewhere you can never be found.
At least this time, twelve years older and lifetimes wiser than that fifteen-year-old whoâd run away from her foster home in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, she didnât have to depend on the local Greyhound bus station to make her getaway. This time, she had limitless credit cards and a very nice SUV at her disposal, complete with a driver who would take her wherever she asked to go.
All of which sheâd have to ditch once she got out of Manhattan, of course, but at least sheâd start her second reinvention of herself with a little more style.
Thank you, Omar, Sterling thought then. The heels she refused to stop wearing even this late into her pregnancy clicked against the floor of the apartment building where she and Omar had shared his penthouse ever since theyâd met while heâd been a graduate student. A wave of grief threatened to take her feet right out from under her, but Sterling fought it back with grim determination and clenched her teeth tightly as she kept on walking.
There was no time left for grief or anything else. Sheâd seen the morning news. Rihad al Bakri, Omarâs fearsome older brother and now the ruler of the tiny little port country on the Persian Gulf that Omar had escaped at eighteen, had arrived in New York City.
Sterling had no doubt whatsoever that he would be coming for her.
There was every chance she was already being watched, she cautioned herself as she hurried from the elevator bankâthat the sheikh had sent some kind of advance team to come for her even though the news had broadcast his arrival barely a half hour ago. That unpleasant if realistic thought forced her to slow down, despite the hammering of her heart, so she appeared nothing but calm. It forced her to smile as she moved through the lobby, the way she might have on any other day. There would be no honoring Omar if she let herselfâand more important, her babyâfall into the clutches of the very people heâd worked so hard to escape. And she knew a little bit about the way predators reacted when they saw prey act like prey.
The more fearful you acted, the harder they attacked. Sterling knew that firsthand.
So instead, she walked. She sauntered
