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Even to the point of just...understanding what had become of Cairo over the course of all these years.
Or she could jump out of a moving vehicle and try to run for it.
They clearly weren’t going to a major airport. They had passed Charles de Gaulle an hour ago, and she had no idea where they were headed. She also knew she didn’t really have a hope in hell of getting away from him. She didn’t have a phone. She could not be tracked. She had her backpack, which did have money in it, and if she could escape...
But then she would have to run, and he would only catch her. She should’ve been training to physically run, but she had been so certain that she would have time if this ever happened...
You were hoping it would never happen.
Yes. And it was a complicated hope. Of course it was. Because she had never wished lifelong captivity on Cairo. But of course, she had not wished to be caught up in their world again.
The whole of that world? Or just the version of it where you were promised to the wrong brother?
She shoved that thought aside and closed her eyes.
Cairo was alive.
He wasn’t dead.
And so there she was, slumped in the corner of the limousine, and when they finally pulled in to the empty airfield, she was still trying to find...something to hold on to. She’d thought the longer she sat with him, with this, the more real it would seem.
But no.
It all felt less and less possible as the minutes ticked by.
And then she saw it. Shiny and sleek, cutting quickly through the air before descending smoothly, the sound it made following behind it.
“My private jet,” he said.
“Right,” she responded. “Naturally. Of course you have a private jet.”
And she looked at him and realized. She had seen him. She had seen him in the media before. In society pages. But not under the name Cairo.
He was not the sort of playboy who posed for photos. There were often distant shots of him on yachts with half-naked beauties, sunglasses obscuring his face. She had not recognized him in those photos, though she’d be lying if she said she’d never stopped and given them a second look.
How could she not have realized it was Cairo? She’d looked twice at stories about Syed, because Cairo was the only man who’d ever made her look twice.
“Where did the name Syed come from?” she asked.
“One of my many names,” he said, a grin curving his lips. “For a royal is gifted with many. And easy enough to adopt so that I could fly under the radar.”
“You’re a billionaire.” She said it like an accusation.
“Yes,” he said. “Staging a reverse coup isn’t cheap.”
“How?People don’t just...become billionaires.”
“I had advantages. I had already taken on board the finest education the world had to offer, from the palace, of course. And then... I knew the right things to say. Knew some people to go to who could help me. Help me become somebody new. Help me navigate the system in England.
“I had nothing. Nothing but who and what I knew when I escaped. And now I have much. Much that I will pass on to my brother and to my people.”
“So the plane doesn’t belong to the royal family. It’s yours.”
“Yes, it is.”
She felt overwhelmed then. Swamped by just how unmatched she was.
He was international businessman Syed al Shahar, and he was one of the most famous and highly sought-after men in the world. He had allies in every corner, and more than that, resources. And they would be going back to a country where he was a prince. A sheikh. And there... Well, there she would have no allies at all.
