The Sheikh's Secret Love Child

  ***

  At the airport, Juliette checked her bags. Everything seemed so easy, so effortless. Italy’s legendary inefficiency seemed to have taken a day off, just so that her departure would go easily.

  Some part of her, deep down, wished it hadn’t. She wished there had been some snafu with her flight, or that there would be a cancellation, or that her passport would be wrong somehow; she wished for any one of the infinite things that could go wrong with an international trip. But, as she sat at her gate, waiting to board, nothing did.

  Nothing went wrong as the plane taxied to the runway and took off. Nothing went wrong during her layover in Dublin. Nothing went wrong when she got off the plane in O’Hare and headed to her domestic flight to Milwaukie. And nothing went wrong as she put her passport on the customs desk, in front of a tired, middle-aged, but friendly-looking customs agent.

  “And what was the purpose of your trip to Italy?” he asked her.

  It had been a long journey, and Juliette was tired. So tired, that she almost teared up. The answer that leapt to her mind wasn’t the answer she wanted it to be. She didn’t want to think that the purpose had been meeting Giancarlo, but that was still the thought that leapt unbidden to her mind.

  She cleared her throat.

  “I was studying,” she said simply. “I’m a translator.”

  The man nodded, stamped her passport, and handed it back to her. “Welcome home, Miss Combs,” he said, and called forth the next in line.

  Home. She was home. Whatever that meant.

  The Prince’s Scandalous Baby can be bought from retailers now.

  The Sheikh’s Captive Love, by Holly Rayner and Lara Hunter:

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