The Sheikh's Stolen Bride-To-Be

  THE SHEIKH’S STOLEN BRIDE-TO-BE

  By Holly Rayner

  Copyright 2017 by Holly Rayner

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part by any means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the explicit written permission of the author.

  All characters depicted in this fictional work are consenting adults, of at least eighteen years of age. Any resemblance to persons living or deceased, particular businesses, events, or exact locations are entirely coincidental.

  Table Of Contents:

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  ONE

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  Steph

  Stephanie was slacking.

  Sitting in her plush computer chair, she clicked through page after page of summer dresses, evaluating their design and style, thinking about how she would change them up to make them even better. As she clicked on the next item, a yellow sundress, a knock on her door startled her into clicking out of the internet browser.

  “Steph, do you have a minute?”

  It was her boss, Bill.

  Straightening her back and running her hands self-consciously along the sides of her blazer, Steph stood and smiled.

  “Of course, Bill. What can I do for you?”

  Bill was a middle-aged man with fluffy gray hair and a belly that protruded just a smidge too far beyond his vest. Not wanting to get on his bad side by recommending a different suit style that might work better with his body type, Steph looked away from the offending bit of belly and kept her gaze on her boss’ eyes as he took a seat in the chair across from her desk.

  “How long have you been working with us now, Steph?”

  She took a minute to calculate it out.

  “Two years now, not counting the two I interned.”

  Bill nodded. “Correct. You’ve done fantastic work in that time, and I’m getting to a place where I would like to promote you, you know.”

  Steph tried her best to look enthusiastic.

  “Wow, that’s amazing news!”

  Bill put up his hands. “Now don’t get excited just yet. The problem is that in this industry I really can’t promote you to a position that requires a college degree, no matter how experienced you are.”

  Steph’s shoulders slumped. Again with the college degree.

  “I know how unfair it is,” Bill continued, “and I know the circumstances surrounding your family’s position, but there is such a thing as student loans, Steph. It’s something to consider, if you ever want to get anywhere in this field.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Steph said, her tone respectful. “I’ll speak with my family about it and see what we can do.”

  Bill nodded, satisfied. “You do that. It would be a shame to lose you, Steph. You’re a good egg.”

  “Thank you,” she said again.

  Bill nodded and left her office, closing the door behind him. Steph stared at the thick wood for a moment before looking back at the exotic beach backdrop on her computer and sighing.

  College was important. She knew that. Her parents knew that. But Steph’s future wasn’t destined to be traditionally American. Her father, an Irish American, had made a fortune on Wall Street in the eighties. People called him “the lucky lender,” for heaven’s sake. The man had been able to produce money as though from thin air, which made him all the more interesting when he’d embarked on an arranged marriage to a woman from the Middle-Eastern country of El Farah—Steph’s mother.

  Steph had had a fairly normal childhood. Her parents had decided to raise her in the tiny town in Vermont where her father had grown up, and they had been the richest family in town. She had lived a privileged life, but her father had always instilled in her a sense of hard work, and Steph was not afraid to get her hands dirty. She was a country girl, after all, and knew how to look after herself.

  All of that had changed when the market crashed in 2008. At the tender age of 14, Steph had gone from being the richest girl in town to the poorest; her whole world twisted and tossed to the ground. She’d watched deep lines develop on her father’s face as they’d sold everything they owned and moved into a small two-bedroom house on the edge of town.

  One evening, her mother had looked at her with concern in her eyes. “We thought you would be able to make your own way in this world, Stephanie, with our wealth at your back. Now that it’s gone, we’ll have to reconsider. I advise you to prepare yourself for an arranged marriage someday, as it will be the best way for us to ensure that you are cared for.”

  At the time, Steph had cried and screamed and threatened to run away. How could her parents plan such a thing, taking away her choice of a partner, deciding her future for her? Her boyfriend at the time had offered to help her catch a train to New York and never come back. She had even packed a suitcase to do just that, before she had found him kissing another girl behind the gym.

  In that moment, an arranged marriage hadn’t sounded like such a terrible idea. If her parents, who cared for her welfare more than anyone, could help her find a decent man to spend her life with, who would provide the financial security she had been so used to as a child, was that really such a bad idea? In that moment, Steph resigned herself to her fate. She was a daughter of America and El Farah, and, in truth, she really didn’t belong to either.

  Opening up her browser again, she perused a few more dresses before losing interest. What was the point? If Steph had had her way, she would have been a fashion design major, maybe in Boston or New York. She had always had a talent for design, and her notebooks were filled with doodles and drawings of ideas. She was an artist stuck working at a bank. She had only gotten the job because of her father’s reputation, even though he had fallen so far. Names mattered in Vermont. People looked out for their own.

  Her eyes darted to the clock at the bottom of her computer screen, and she realized she could head home for the day if she wanted. Unwilling to spend another minute in that stuffy blazer, Steph shut down her computer and grabbed her work bag, waving goodbye to the tellers as she headed out the door.

  Summers in Vermont were perfectly mild. It was north enough that the temperature never really went above eighty degrees, and the state was lush with beautiful forests, clean lakes, and plenty of pond-side beaches. Steph couldn’t have asked for a better place to grow up.

  Still, while her childhood had been idyllic, adulthood was less exciting in a town with only a few hundred people in it. Most of her friends had left for colleges elsewhere, exploring the world, going on adventures. As she’d watched them through social media, wishing to go on her own adventure, she had realized that her best bet would be the marriage her parents had arranged.

  A marriage that so happened to be taking place in a few days’ time, in El Farah. Steph’s packed bag, with her traditional wedding dress inside, was sitting in her room at that very moment as she made her way down her town’s small main street toward an ice cream parlor. She slid out of her blazer and shoved it into her bag, relishing in the feel of the warm sun
on her skin.

  Thanks to her diverse parentage, Steph had an exotic blend of dark olive skin, straight black hair, and piercing blue eyes. She was petite, but she loved running, which gave her an athletic build. Stephanie O’Hanlon was a fighter. She was strong, and she had lived through her family’s complete financial breakdown, working to help her father deal with his grief while her mother did the same. They had stood together through the toughest of storms and come out on the other side, and Steph was proud of her family, different as they were.

  Bells jingled against the glass door as Steph walked into the ice cream shop. An old woman sat at the counter reading a newspaper.

  “It’s awfully quiet in here for how good the weather is,” Steph said.

  The woman looked up from her paper and smiled, her face crinkling like tissue paper. “The kids aren’t out of school yet, though they should be any minute. What brings you in here so early, Stephanie?”

  Steph shrugged, pulling out her wallet and perusing the flavors written on a chalk wall. “I went in early today, so I got to leave early. I’ll be gone for a while after tomorrow, so I want to make sure I stop in at all my favorite places first.”

  Steph didn’t want to think about never coming back. She was potentially about to marry a man in El Farah and call that country her new home, even though she had never seen it before. If she hadn’t been so desperate for adventure, for some kind of change, she would have told her parents to call off the deal. As it was, a man had already been selected, and he was waiting for her an ocean away. Steph wondered what he looked like. Did he like ice cream? Did they even eat ice cream in El Farah?

  Having made her choice, Steph ordered a caramel vanilla swirl in a waffle cone, going all out for her last stop in the store.

  “How long will you be traveling, honey? It must be exciting to see your mother’s home country for the first time!”

  June was an amazingly kind woman. She had run the ice cream shop since before Steph could even remember. It was comforting to always see her there, scooping out gallons of ice cream with her strong arms. Steph hoped to be just as strong as she grew older.

  “Oh, probably for some time. Several months at least,” Steph said, trying to avoid giving a real answer.

  She hadn’t told anyone about the circumstances of her trip. It just seemed so…unacceptable. Americans had a difficult time with the concept of arranged marriages. Steph herself had struggled with it, and for some reason she felt ashamed to admit that that was the purpose of her journey. She didn’t want to hear the comments—the judgement. So she had told people she and her parents were going on a long trip and left it at that.

  “Well we’ll certainly miss you around here. You enjoy that ice cream, and make sure to take lots of pictures for us, okay?”

  “I will,” Steph said, paying for her ice cream and stepping out of the shop just as a swarm of school kids swept past her to get their own summertime treats.

  With the amount of snowfall they got in Vermont, the number of snow days usually meant that school didn’t end until close to July. Steph listened to a couple of kids talking about summer break plans with longing in their eyes as they made their way to get their own ice creams.

  The town was settled on a large freshwater lake. Steph’s next destination was a bench that sat facing the mountains, and when she got there she plopped her bag on the ground and crossed her legs as she enjoyed every ounce of the best ice cream in the world. The mountains were reflected perfectly on the water. The caps were still coated with snow, as early into the season as it was.

  Steph would miss the snow, of course, though she loved warm weather. She had often stared at the backdrop on her work computer and gone into a daydream about spending a day with a handsome stranger on silky white sands, sipping punch from a coconut. Maybe El Farah had a beach like that. Maybe that was where her future husband would take her on their honeymoon.

  Steph’s stomach clenched with nerves. All day she had been alternating between excitement and complete and total terror. There was no way she could just marry some random guy, was there? But he wasn’t random, she reminded herself. Her parents had gone through an extensive vetting process, her father deferring to her mother, who had been raised with such traditions and knew what needed to be done.

  Steph had always been a bit of a romantic. It kind of came with the territory when one had an artistic soul. She had often daydreamed of finding a man herself and falling deeply in love, running off together to live the life of their dreams. Living in Vermont had effectively squashed that dream, really. There were few men around to begin with, and Steph had never had a connection with anyone that remotely resembled love. There was simply no future for her here, and she had to trust her parents enough to obey their wishes.

  After all, this was the twenty-first century. Divorce would always be an option if things didn’t work out.

  Finishing her ice cream, Steph pulled out her notepad and scribbled some designs for a ball gown she’d been thinking about, listening peacefully to the sounds of nature and getting lost in her art. After some time, the sun began sending blinding rays directly at her, so Steph packed up her bag and started walking home.

  While her house had once been settled on a hilltop overlooking the whole town, she now lived in a small, wooden-cabin-style home with her parents. Despite having lost his wealth, her father had maintained his connections, and he made a living as an accountant.

  When she arrived at the cabin, Steph opened the door and called out.

  “I’m home!”

  Her mother, Elora, came out of the small kitchen holding her hands up in the air. Smelling the scent of nail polish, Steph leaned over to see what color her mother had chosen.

  “Royal blue. That’s fitting, right?” Steph said with a grin.

  Her mother nodded. “It is. Royal blue is the wedding color of El Farah. That is why it is so incorporated into your gown. Did you give your notice to your employer?”

  “Um, not yet,” Steph said, and her mother gave her a stern look. “I’ve got an email going out to him tomorrow. It will be fine.”

  “Stephanie, a written letter as you sneak out the door is not a professional way to end a working relationship. You should go back right now and give proper notice.”

  “Why? I won’t be coming back. It’s not like I’m going to see him again.”

  Elora struggled as she went to cross her arms but then remembered her nails would be ruined by the gesture. Instead, she pointed a finger at her daughter. “That doesn’t matter. You may travel here again, and how would you feel facing Bill if you just leave him without the help he needs?”

  “I don’t want to have to say goodbye,” Steph whispered, casting her eyes down. “Besides, he told me just today that there’s nowhere for me to go in the company without a college degree, so he’s probably planning for this anyway.”

  At that statement, the fire left her mother’s eyes and her shoulders relaxed as she placed a comforting hand on Steph’s shoulder.

  “I know it seems scary now, but you’ll see. Look at your father and me, eh? He’s a good man. There are many of them out there, including the one we’ve found for you. I know you’ll be happy together.”

  Steph did her best to look excited. She imagined she wasn’t entirely convincing.

  “Now go wash up for dinner. Your father will be home any minute.”

  TWO

  Steph

  Steph was setting the table for dinner when her father walked in the door. Jerry O’Hanlon had once been a very handsome man. When age and strife had hit him, his hairline had begun to recede and his face was now more winkled than it ought to have been. Steph watched as he approached her mother and planted a cherishing kiss on her cheek before entering the dining room.

  “Steph! You excited for the big day?”

  Steph swallowed as she placed a fork and knife by her plate. “Thrilled,” she said, not looking him in the eye.

  “Oh, come now,” he said, his
eyebrows knitting. “Look what happened with your mother and me! Besides, this ceremony is a big part of your El Farahn heritage. You’ve never gotten to experience much of that side, and that’s probably my fault.”

  “I’ll certainly be getting a crash course this week,” Steph said.

  She had done some research on her mother’s homeland, of course. There had been numerous elementary school projects that focused on nationality, and she had always had a fascination with the place. The family had been planning their first excursion there—whenever Jerry could first get time off from work—when the market crashed, that dream going with it.

  Elora brought in a series of plates filled with delicious-smelling food. Raised in a middle-class family, Steph’s mother had been taught to cook and run a house like many other girls in her position, and she had a talent for using spices to bring out the flavor in anything she touched. Steph would miss her cooking most of all. She was decent at it, but she imagined she wouldn’t have to do much in her new situation anyway.