“Yes,” she said, kissing him. “I want to marry you and be with you for always. I love you, Rafe.”
Hassan pulled them apart. “All right, all right. Fine. So you want to marry my daughter. What makes you think I’ll say yes?”
Zara hugged her father. “Oh, Daddy, what else are you going to say?”
“Daddy,” he murmured. “Yes, it is better than father.” Hassan kissed her cheek. “I suppose you are right.” He glared at Rafe. “I’ll expect you to take care of her. She’s a member of the royal family.”
“I give you my word,” Rafe told him.
Hassan sighed. “This is not what I had planned,” he told his daughter. “You could have had a duke.”
“I’d rather have a sheik,” she said happily.
“I can see that. Then I must insist that you promise to wait a few months for the wedding. I want time to get to know you before this one whisks you away to the City of Thieves.”
She looked at Rafe who shrugged. “Seems reasonable. How long were you thinking?”
“A year,” Hassan said.
Rafe grinned. “Two months.”
“Six months.”
“Four months.”
“Done,” her father said. “Four months.” He drew his eyebrows together. “Four chaste months.”
“Not on a bet,” Rafe told him.
“I could still have you beheaded,” the king said conversationally.
Zara felt so happy, she thought she could fly. She slipped free of her father and cuddled up to Rafe. They were to be married. All her dreams had come true.
“There will be no beheading,” she told her father, then smiled at her fiancé. “That was my first royal pronouncement.”
“It was a good one,” he said and kissed her.