Page 1 of Unknown Royal Baby

CHAPTER ONE

HISHIGHNESSISAMIBNRAFAT, Crown Prince of Zahdar, rose from the conference table, walking around it to the interviewee. ‘Thank you, Mr Drucker. This has been a most useful meeting.’

Avril stifled surprise. As His Highness’s assistant, it was her role to usher guests through the presidential suite before and after meetings.

Drucker realised that too. He couldn’t mask his excitement as his host personally escorted him from the room. The visitor didn’t even spare her a glance, much less say goodbye to her, though they’d had several conversations prior to today and he’d been surreptitiously checking out her breasts through the meeting.

Repressing a fizz of distaste, she focused on her notes.

It was some time before her boss returned. The hotel was one of London’s finest and the suite took up a whole floor.

When the door reopened she looked up, skin prickling in the way it always did when Isam was around.

He’d stripped off his suit jacket. Her gaze snagged on broad shoulders and a body that seemed all lean, hard muscle beneath his perfectly tailored shirt and trousers.

She drew in air, trying to slow her racing pulse. Clearly she wasn’t used to being around such masculine perfection! She needed to get out more.

The irony wasn’t lost on Avril. She hadn’t begrudged her cloistered life and now Cilla’s death had given her more freedom. Yet these past weeks she’d had to force herself out of the house. Grief lay heavy and she felt bereft. Cilla had given her stability and love for as long as she could remember. She didn’t want freedom at the cost of her great-aunt’s life. She missed the feisty, frail, wonderful woman.

Her emotions were all over the place.

That was why she was so unsettled. It wasn’t just the impact of being physically near her boss instead of separated by a continent.

He tugged his tie loose and undid two shirt buttons. ‘You don’t mind, do you, Avril? It’s been a long afternoon and I hate being trussed up in a suit.’

But you wear it so well.

She bit down the words. The fact he was even more attractive in person than in his photos was a shock she still grappled with after days working side by side.

It’s ridiculous. He pays your salary. You’ve worked for him for six months.

But her brain had trouble equating this stunningly handsome, charismatic man with the clever, demanding, yet approachable colleague she’d come to know and like via email, texts and phone calls. The man with whom she’d built a rapport, even, to her surprise, a level of friendship.

She was his only UK-based PA, working remotely. She was the conduit for his business interests in Britain while he lived in Zahdar or travelled the globe.

Yet sometimes, when he’d anticipated her next words during a long-distance call, or made her laugh with his wry, insightful humour, she’d felt they understood each other in a way that transcended business. Lately she’d felt closer to him than to anyone other than Cilla.

Avril fought an unfamiliar full-body blush. ‘Of course I don’t mind, Your High—Isam.’

His dark eyebrow had shot high in a look of mock severity. But when she used his name instead of his title he smiled his approval.

Absolutely, you need to get out more, when a man’s smile makes your stomach flutter.

Yet his familiar name tasted strange now on her tongue, though she’d been calling him that for months.

Isam in the flesh was an altogether more sensational being than the faceless colleague to whom she’d grown close.

She’d only ever dealt with him, not any of his other staff. Given the frequency of their communications and the growing understanding between them, he’d insisted on using first names. Avril had been surprised, but what did she know about the ways of royalty?

Yet what had seemed practical and easy when he was far away grew more difficult as they worked together in his private hotel suite.

Because now he’s not just your employer. He’s the sexiest man you’ve ever met. The first man ever to awaken those dormant feminine longings.

She hoped he had no idea how he made her feel. It was as if her life of sexual abstinence—because she’d had other responsibilities and no time for a boyfriend—finally took its toll.

She’d never had such vivid sexual fantasies as in the last couple of days, since Isam came to London. Last night she’d lain awake for hours imagining how it would be to touch him, kiss him, undress him.

Even now she couldn’t stifle the burr of excitement under her skin at being near him. Or the unfamiliar ache in her pelvis.

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