The Sheikh’s Sham Engagement: The Safar Sheikhs Series, #3

By Leslie North

Nasser Safar isn't what you'd call a long-term man. Over the last few years he's been raising funds for an education initiative for his Tribe, and while he's still focused on that, he's also been playing the field, trying to outrun the memory of the woman who left him. She chose her love for her sister over her love for him. It's a wound that still haunts Nasser, even while he continues the education project that had been their shared dream. 

Willow Everstone left the only man she'd ever loved after he'd given her an ultimatum: stay with him, or leave to care for her cancer-ridden sister and let him go. It was the hardest decision she ever had to make, and in the end she lost her chance at a future with the love of her life. Now, with her sister in remission, Willow is ready to follow her dream of bringing education to all parts of the world. Her first project? A newly minted international initiative...in Nasser's country. 

Neither Nasser nor Willow are happy having to work together to create the Tribe's new school. But when a visa issue almost kicks Willow out of the country—leaving her education initiative in limbo—Nasser offers an unconventional solution: a fake engagement. Despite their earlier reluctance, the marriage of convenience soon turns sultry glances into steamy nights. And when a surprise baby calls the "fake" part of their plan into question, they'll have to decide if they're willing to give their second chance at love a fighting chance, or leave their blossoming future behind.

This novel contains sexual content and profanity.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Relay Publishing
• Release date: Aug 27, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393331568

Book preview

1

Willow Everstone paced the foyer of the three-star hotel she’d been staying at for the past month. It wasn’t the best in Al Ghuman, the capital of Amatbah, but it was the best bang for her buck. She needed safe but spartan, which was essentially the tagline for the next few months of her life.

As the project manager for Amatbah’s newest education initiative—a series of hands-on schools that would hopefully boost literacy and comprehension rates for the entire country—she needed to be very strict with the allocated funds. She had a lot to oversee, a lot to take care of, and very little time to get this train chugging along.

She checked her phone. A car was on its way to pick her up to check out the construction site of the first school being built. Construction began three weeks ago, and she needed to make sure things were progressing according to plan. The king of Amatbah had his hands in this project, and not only was he the most revered person in all of Amatbah, Willow knew him in a personal context too.

He was the man she’d once thought would be her brother-in-law.

He was the eldest brother of her ex-boyfriend, the royal sheikh Nasser Safar. Which meant this wasn’t her first rodeo with the royal family. It had been almost two years since she’d spoken with anyone from Amatbah, but when this job opening showed up on her endless non-profit searches, she’d jumped at the chance. Even though it meant being within stone’s throw of her ex.

The man who’d rejected her so painfully that some mornings, she still couldn’t believe he’d done her like that.

The man who was on his way to pick her up right now.

King Fatim had confirmed it in his email the previous day, dropping the detail casually, as if it didn’t matter. Willow supposed it shouldn’t matter. Two years should be plenty of time for things to heal over and become less painful, and they were going on three since their split.

Still, it didn’t mean her stomach wasn’t in a knot waiting for Nasser to show up. Part of her hoped that Fatim had been wrong. The other part of her was darkly curious and excited to see Nasser. She tried to shove that part far, far down inside her.

Willow stopped pacing as a black sedan pulled into the cul-de-sac of the hotel. Her entire body prickled with anticipation. This had to be the royal car. It was shiny and new in a way that most cars in Al Ghuman weren’t. And everything associated with the Safar family reeked of wealth.

The car rolled to a stop in front of the steps at the hotel entrance. Willow stopped breathing as she waited for someone to get out.

The back door opened a moment later. Shiny alligator shoes were followed by a dark gray kaftan. Dark aviators hid the dark eyes that she’d gazed into for two entire years while they finished up college, fell in love, and thought they were the be all, end all.

Nasser was here. The epitome of Middle Eastern business chic. And grown up in a way she hadn’t expected after two years apart.

He strode up to her, wetting his bottom lip with his tongue. He looked so unaffected, so casual. Like maybe he didn’t even remember her. As he approached, she realized she’d been rigid. Paralyzed, practically, by the broad shoulders and that tawny skin lined by a precisely manicured beard. Unable to do anything other than gape.

He’d never kept a beard while in school. Its unexpected presence made heat surge through her limbs.

Willow.

The sound of her name from his lips made all sorts of emotions fill her body. Dammit, she hadn’t wanted this to be the way things still were. His rough bass could still unravel her, just from a few syllables.

Nasser. She forced a grin, straightening her back. Time to play the professional. Long time no see. She wasn’t sure what to do with her hands—hug the man? Offer a handshake like a disinterested acquaintance? Crumble into his arms in a needy heap? She clasped them behind her back.

He paused on the sidewalk a few steps away from her. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he wore a strained grin. I wasn’t expecting you to be the project manager. But let’s go, at any rate.

He led the way toward the car, gesturing for her to get into the back. He shut the door behind her then got in the other side. Old habits died hard, she supposed. He might have been a reckless, flighty, hotheaded boyfriend, especially at the end when they broke up after graduation, but he was still a gentleman through and through. Even if he still hated her, which she suspected might be the case.

In the back of the car, their unspoken sentiments weighed heavily. There was so much to say, yet there was nothing that needed saying. This was entirely professional—a work trip between two colleagues. A shiver ran through her. Would Nasser be her colleague the entire time? She didn’t understand why he was here, and after a few minutes of creeping through Al Ghuman traffic, she dared herself to speak.

So what’s your role on the project?

Nasser didn’t look at her, just stared out the window at the passing traffic. I’m what you might call the head of donor relations for the tribe. Donors are the primary source of funding for this project, so I need to have a full report ready when we meet each month.

Willow tried not to stare at him as he stared out the window, but it was impossible not to notice this man. He’d commanded attention even when they met in the middle of their undergrad at The Royal University of Amatbah. He had the type of gaze that could start a forest fire. His mere presence was electric—he could energize her just by looking at her. So it was probably for the best that he kept his eyes focused outside.

They didn’t need that sort of spark between them. Not again.

Because even though they had an unfortunate history, complete with a dramatic break-up hours before Willow returned to the United States to care for her sister, Willow was confident that this time things could remain civil. Their past didn’t need to dictate the present. Or their future as sort-of colleagues.

They could be normal. Professional. Acquaintances.

But as time dragged on in the burning silence of the car, Willow could barely keep her mouth shut. She was dying to say something. Anything. To hear his voice. How his family was, what was new in his life.

She allowed one question past her lips. How have you been?

Nasser finally turned to look at her. And this time, she could tell that he really saw her. The hard lines of his face softened. He took off his sunglasses so he could massage the bridge of his nose.

Very well, actually. He offered a small smile, which felt like an olive branch. Something in the air between them loosened, and a whoosh of air escaped her. Relief.

Seeing him again only proved that she did still care about him.

Only time would tell if it ran deeper than that.

2

Nasser buried his hands in his pockets, the golden evening sun beating down on his neck.

They were at the construction site, located on the distant outskirts of Al Ghuman. An hour-long drive out to this sandy little wasteland, where the only things on the road were the skeletal structure of the new school, a sprawling city of tents for the construction workers, and tight clusters of homes.

It didn’t look anything like the shiny international school Nasser had been envisioning, but he just kept reminding himself: in time it will get there.

And he really needed to focus on that, because if he didn’t? Then he’d focus entirely on Willow, and that was not how this project should begin.

Well…what do you think? Willow shielded her eyes against the sun to look back at him, hopefulness written across her face. She’d looked at him like that a thousand times before. Her chestnut hair glinted with hints of honey in the sunlight, green eyes practically gemstones as she watched him. Willow had always been a brunette bombshell, but now there was something different about her woven into all the familiar curves and expressions. Nostalgia tugged at him, and he forced his gaze off her and back to the site.

It looks…a bit depressing, actually, he admitted, which made her giggle. The tension between them had lessened only slightly in the car. He still hadn’t decided whether he’d forgive Fatim for not alerting him that he’d be picking up Willow today. It seemed like just the shitty older brother thing to do—send the previously heartbroken man to go spend an hour in a car with his first love without telling him.

Fatim was on a kick ever since that ancient law had brought him to his wife Calla. And good for them. Really. He just tried not to let the jealousy eat him alive.

Because Nasser had been in Fatim’s shoes once. Deeply in love with a gorgeous American woman, the girl of his dreams. And then she’d decided instead to abandon him, run away back to her home, even though Nasser had promised her the world and then some.

Good thing he was over it. Totally fine. After his two years of traveling the world and mending his broken heart in the arms of every pretty girl who looked his way, he could say he was healed now.

But as he and Willow strolled through the construction site, pointing out little things and talking about the future of this school, he couldn’t