Free Sheikh's Ex-Girlfriend (Khayyam Sheikh Series #1) by Sophia Lynn

that?”
    Marid raised an eyebrow at his friend. “Well, I have known you for years, and even after you became the sheikh, I have never heard you say a single word about needing to look ahead for your children. I honestly thought that that was perhaps your mother's doing …”
    Nasim scowled. “If I have been thinking about it, it is not because of my mother. If anything, it is because of Ella.”
    “The American?”
    “ Yes, the American,” Nasim snapped. “You do not have to speak like that when you are the one who happened to tell me that she was in Dalal and all but engineered a meeting between us.”
    Marid grinned a little. “I wanted you to have a little fun, not to decide that you need to start looking at your dynasty and your bloodline. I take it that it's going well?”
    “Ella is not a 'little fun,' damn you. She's the only woman I've been unable to stop thinking about for more than a handful of moments since I met her, and now that she is a part of my life again, I will not have you implying that she's some kind of fleeting pleasure!”
    The teasing look fell off of Marid's face, and as Nasim glared at him, he looked over his friend more closely. “Nasim … this seems to have gotten a little more serious than I was aware of.”
    “You're damn right it has,” Nasim said with a sigh, passing his hand over his face. Suddenly, he felt as if he were a hundred years old. He knew that life was never as easy as he would wish it to be, and sometimes, very rarely these days, he could put off thinking about it. Perhaps that was what he had been doing with Ella, but at the thought of anything else, his mind rebelled.
    Marid came and sat down next to him, honest concern on his face. Sometimes it was strange to remember that he could be this serious or this worried.
    “I know you have a good memory,” Marid started slowly. “I don't think you have forgotten what happened five years ago.”
    “I cannot forget it,” Nasim growled. “It haunts me, and sometimes, when I see how it affects her to have been so rejected, it's like a pain I cannot escape from.”
    “So what has changed?” Marid asked. “If anything, things are more complicated now. You're not just a third son who can mostly go his own way. You are the sheikh, and the responsibilities that keep us in check are such that you cannot simply do as you please.”
    “Now who's talking like a matchmaking granny? You sound like an old hardliner who thinks we should close our gates to the world.”
    “No, I'm being practical,” Marid said. “Look, we both know I like my fun, but at the end of the day, I know what my responsibilities are. Sometime in the next, oh, say five or ten years? I will find a good Aranai girl who comes from the right family and has the right connections. We'll have a highly publicized courtship, we'll marry, and she'll bear me a few probably adorable children.”
    Nasim stared at him. “Sometimes I forget that you've been raised to be sheikh since the day you were born. You sound a little monstrous right now.”
    Marid grinned. “Merely practical, my friend. But believe me, if you decide that you want to make Ella more than a little bit of fun? You need to be ready for the rest that comes with it, and that begins and ends with your family.”
    At Nasim's pained look, he nodded.
    “I see that you take my meaning. Your American is wonderful, my friend, and I have known this for years. She is brilliant, she is beautiful, and she makes you as happy as ever a man was. However, she is an American, and you are the sheikh of Khayyam. There is a rift between you as wide as the Black Sea.”
    Nasim shook his head. He knew that everything his friend was saying to him was correct, but he didn't think he could stand to talk about it any longer.
    “So what's stopping you from simply lying down in the harness?” he asked. “If you know that your life is going to lead straight to a good Aranai girl who will give you adorable children, why