ALEXANDRA SELLERS - Sheikh's Woman

A man turned and looked at her, too, his gaze piercing. He was strongly charismatic. Handsome as a pirate captain, exotically dark and obviously foreign. Masculine, strong. Anna blinked. There was a mark on his eye just like her baby’s. A dark irregular smudge that enhanced both his resemblance to a pirate and his exotic maleness.

“Anna!” he exclaimed. A slight accent furred his words attractively. “Thank God you and the baby were not hurt! What on earth happened?”

“Are you the doctor?” she stammered.

His dark eyes snapped into an expression of even greater concern, and he made a sound that was half laughter, half worry. He bent down and clasped her hand. She felt his fingers tighten on hers in unmistakable silent warning.

“Darling!” he exclaimed. “The nurse says you don’t remember the accident, but I hope you have not forgotten your own husband!”

Dear Reader,

Happy New Year from Silhouette Desire, where we offer you six passionate, powerful and provocative romances every month of the year! Here’s what you can indulge yourself with this January….

Begin the new year with a seductive MAN OF THE MONTH, Tall, Dark & Western by Anne Marie Winston. A rancher seeking a marriage of convenience places a personals ad for a wife, only to fall—hard—for the single mom who responds!

Silhouette Desire proudly presents a sequel to the wildly successful in-line continuity series THE TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB. This exciting new series about alpha men on a mission is called TEXAS CATTLEMAN’S CLUB: LONE STAR JEWELS. Jennifer Greene’s launch book, Millionaire M.D., features a wealthy surgeon who helps out his childhood crush when she finds a baby on her doorstep—by marrying her!

Alexandra Sellers continues her exotic miniseries SONS OF THE DESERT with one more irresistible sheikh in Sheikh’s Woman. THE BARONS OF TEXAS miniseries by Fayrene Preston returns with another feisty Baron heroine in The Barons of Texas: Kit. In Kathryn Jensen’s The Earl’s Secret, a British aristocrat romances a U.S. commoner while wrestling with a secret. And Shirley Rogers offers A Cowboy, a Bride & a Wedding Vow, in which a cowboy discovers his secret child.

So ring in the new year with lots of cheer and plenty of red-hot romance, by reading all six of these enticing love stories.

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

www.millsandboon.co.uk

is the author of over twenty-five novels and a feline language text published in 1997 and still selling.

Born and raised in Canada, Alexandra first came to London as a drama student. Now she lives near Hampstead Heath with her husband, Nick. They share housekeeping with Monsieur, who jumped through the window one day and announced, as cats do, that he was moving in.

What she would miss most on a desert island is shared laughter.

Readers can write to Alexandra at P.O. Box 9449, London NW3 2WH, U.K., England.

For my sister Joy,

who held it all together in the bad times

and makes things even better in the good

Prologue

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

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

She crouched in the darkness, whimpering as the pain gripped her. He had made her wait too long. She had warned him, but he’d pretended not to believe her “lies.” And now, in an empty, dirty alley, nowhere to go, no time to get there, her time was upon her.

Pain stabbed her again, and she cried out involuntarily. She pressed a hand over her mouth and looked behind her down the alley. Of course by now he had discovered her flight. He was already after her. If he had heard that cry…

She staggered to her feet again, picked up the bag, began a shuffling run. Her heart was beating so hard! The drumming in her head seemed to drown out thought. She ran a few paces and then doubled over again as the pain came. Oh, Lord, not here! Please, please, not in an alley, like an animal, to be found when she was most helpless, when the baby would be at his mercy.

He would have no mercy. The pain ebbed and she ran on, weeping, praying. “Ya Allah!” Forgive me, protect me.

Suddenly, as if in answer, she sensed a deeper darkness in the shadows. She turned towards it without questioning, and found herself in a narrower passage. The darkness was more intense here, and she stared blindly until her eyes grew accustomed.

There was a row of garages on either side of a short strip of paving. Then she saw what had drawn her, what her subconscious mind—or her guardian angel—had already seen: one door was ajar. She bit her lip. Was there someone inside, a fugitive like herself? But another clutch of pain almost knocked her to her knees. As she bent double, stifling her cry, she heard a shout. A long way distant, but she feared what was behind her more than what might be ahead.

Sobbing with mingled pain and terror, she stumbled towards the open door and pushed her way inside.

“Can you hear me? Anna, can you hear my voice?”

It was like being dragged through long, empty rooms. Anna groaned protestingly. What did they want from her? Why didn’t they let her sleep?

“Move your hand if you can hear my voice, Anna. Can you move your hand?”

It took huge effort, as if she had to fight through thick syrup.

“That’s excellent! Now, can you open your eyes?”

Abruptly something heavy seemed to smash down inside her skull, driving pain through every cell. She moaned.

“I’m afraid you’re going to have a pretty bad headache,” said the voice, remorselessly cheerful, determinedly invasive. “Come now, Anna! Open your eyes!”

She opened her eyes. The light was too bright. It hurt. A woman in a navy shirt with white piping was gazing at her. “Good, there you are!” she said, in a brisk Scots accent. “What’s your name?”

“Anna,” said Anna. “Anna Lamb.”

The woman nodded. “Good, Anna.”

“What happened? Where am I?” Anna whispered. She was lying in a grey cubicle on a narrow hospital trolley, fully dressed except for shoes. “Why am I in hospital?” The hammer slammed down again. “My head!”

“You’ve been in an accident, but you’re going to be fine. Just a wee bit concussed. Your baby’s fine.”

Your baby. A different kind of pain smote her then, and she lay motionless as cold enveloped her heart.

“My baby died,” she said, her voice flat as the old, familiar lifelessness seeped through her.

The nurse was taking Anna’s blood pressure, but at this she looked up. “She’s absolutely fine! The doctor’s just checking her over now,” she said firmly. “I don’t know why you wanted to give birth in a taxicab, but it seems you made a very neat job of it.”

She leaned forward and pulled back one of Anna’s eyelids, shone light from a tiny flashlight into her eye.

“In a taxicab?” Anna repeated. “But—”

Confused memories seemed to pulsate in her head, just out of reach.

“You’re a very lucky girl!” said the cheerful nurse, moving down to press her abdomen with searching fingers. She paused, frowning, and pressed again.