Free A Bride For The Sheikh by Katheryn Lane Page A

hadn’t told her, such as the fact that he was a royal prince. Maybe that was why he hadn’t told her who he really was. Maybe he wanted to have a clandestine affair with her and keep his engagement secret, or maybe the engagement was what he wanted to tell her about at the restaurant the other night. A thousand questions raced around her mind. She wished she hadn’t had the margaritas as they were stopping her from thinking straight and the sweet champagne didn’t help either.
    “It must be a bit of a shock for you, mine and Rashid’s marriage.” Chrystal must have followed her out.
    “I thought you were engaged, not married,” Angelina replied, trying to keep her voice steady. The last person she wanted to break down in front of was Chrystal Longhorn.
    “Married? Engaged? It all amounts to the same thing in the end,” Chrystal said, waving her arms around. The large gold bracelet on her arm clanged against the metal rail around the terrace. “Whoops! I must be careful with this. It was a present from Rashid.” She waved the bracelet in front of Angelina’s face. “He knows how much I just love gold jewellery.”
    Angelina remembered the large box of gold jewellery in the back of Rashid’s car. It must have been for Chrystal. “And he knows how much I love Mercedes cars,” Angelina retorted, though the minute the words were out of her mouth, she regretted saying them as such childish remarks only brought her down to Chrystal’s level of spitefulness.
    Chrystal put her face right up against hers. “I don’t know who you are, or where you’ve come from, but Sheikh Rashid’s mine. He might have given you a fancy car, but that was only as payment for screwing you.”
    Angelina winced at the idea of Rashid paying her for sex.
    “He did, didn’t he?” Chrystal asked. “He screwed you senseless.”
    Angelina didn’t reply.
    “He has a birthmark right here on his left buttock, doesn’t he?” Chrystal turned around and pointed to a spot on her tight little ass.
    Angelina nodded. She knew the mark that Chrystal was referring to. She remembered telling Rashid that it looked like a heart and he’d told her that he had two hearts and they were both hers. Perhaps only one of them was hers and the other was Chrystal’s, as she was obviously sleeping with him as well. Angelina tried desperately not to start crying.
    “I’ve lived here all my life,” Chrystal continued, “and I know all about Arab men and how they behave. Trust me when I tell you that Rashid’s just sowing his wild oats and having a meaningless fling with you. You must remember that he’s a royal sheikh. He can do and have whatever he wants. He’ll soon be tired of you. If you’re lucky, you might get a nice fat check at the end for your services. Now if you’ll excuse me, my friends are waiting inside for me.” Chrystal opened the glass terrace door and stepped inside.
    Angelina felt a gust of cool air coming from the house. She waited a few minutes and then followed Chrystal inside. She felt hot, angry, and slightly sick. All she wanted was to get back home and go to bed. She found Sarah as soon as she could and said she had to leave.
    “Of course. What a dreadful thing for Chrystal to do, to announce her engagement like that when she knew that you were seeing Sheikh Rashid. I’ll just go and get Carla.”
    Carla was their designated driver and had had only a few sips of the cocktails before switching to soft drinks. Both Angelina and Sarah had drunk too much to drive, so they had to wait for Carla to say her goodbyes to everyone before they could go. As they waited, Angelina was sure that the other women were talking about her. They kept on whispering together in small huddles and glancing furtively over at her. Chrystal just smiled in her direction in a sickly sweet way. Angelina had never wanted to get away from a situation so much in her life. Finally, they were ready to go and got into Angelina’s new car.
    “This drives