One Reckless Decision (Majesty, Mistress, Missing Heir & Katrakis's Last Mistress & Princess From the Past)

420 Pages·2014·2.81 MB·English

by  Crews Caitlin

Mills & Boon is proud to present three super novels in one collection by an
author we know you love and have made an international bestseller
Enjoy these three books by rising star
Caitlin
CREWS
One Reckless Decision
Contains
Majesty, Mistress … Missing Heir
Katrakis’s Last Mistress
Princess From the Past

One Reckless Decision
Majesty, Mistress…
Missing Heir
Katrakis’s
Last Mistress
Princess From
the Past
Caitlin Crews
www.millsandboon.co.uk
CAITLIN CREWS discovered her first romance novel at the age of twelve. It
involved swashbuckling pirates, grand adventures, a heroine with rustling skirts
and a mind of her own, and a seriously mouth-watering and masterful hero. The
book (the title of which remains lost in the mists of time) made a serious
impression. Caitlin was immediately smitten with romances and romance heroes,
to the detriment of her middle-school social life. And so began her lifelong love
affair with romance novels, many of which she insists on keeping near her at all
times.
Caitlin has made her home in places as far-flung as York, England, and Atlanta,
Georgia. She was raised near New York City and fell in love with London on her
first visit when she was a teenager. She has backpacked in Zimbabwe, been on
safari in Botswana and visited tiny villages in Namibia. She has, while visiting
the place in question, declared her intention to live in Prague, Dublin, Paris,
Athens, Nice, the Greek islands, Rome, Venice, and/or any of the Hawaiian
islands. Writing about exotic places seems like the next best thing to moving
there.
She currently lives in California, with her animator/comic-book-artist husband
and their menagerie of ridiculous animals.
Majesty, Mistress…
Missing Heir
Caitlin Crews
CHAPTER ONE
JESSA glanced up from her desk automatically when the door to the letting
agency was shoved open, and then froze solid in her chair.
It was like a dream—a dream she had had many times. He strode inside, the
wet and the cold of the Yorkshire evening swirling around him like a great black
cape.
She found herself on her feet without knowing she meant to move, her
hands splayed out in front of her as if she could ward him off—keep him from
stepping even further into the small office. Into her life, where she could not—
would not—allow him to be, ever again.
“There you are,” he said in a deep, commanding voice, as if he had satisfied
himself simply by laying cold eyes upon her—as if, unaccountably, he had been
looking for her.
Jessa’s heart thudded against her ribs as her head spun. Was he an
apparition, five years later? Was she dreaming?
“Tariq,” she said, dazed, as if naming the dream could dispel it.
But Tariq bin Khaled Al-Nur did not look like a dream. He was nothing so
insubstantial, or easily forgotten in the light of day. When she had known him he
had claimed to be no more than a wealthy, overindulged member of his
country’s elite class; she knew that he was now its ruler. She hated that she knew
—as if that knowledge was written across her face and might suggest to him that
she had followed his every move across the years when the truth was, she had
wanted only to forget him.
But she could not seem to pull her gaze from his.
Jessa found that all these years later she could remember every detail about
Tariq with perfect, shocking clarity, even as the evidence before her made it
clear that he was far better—far much more—than she had allowed herself to
recall. His features were harder, more impenetrable. He was more of a man,
somehow. It seemed impossible, but her memories had diminished him. The
reality of Tariq was powerful, alive—dazzling.
Dangerous.
Jessa tried to concentrate on the danger. It didn’t matter that her heart
leaped when she saw him, even now. What mattered was the secret she knew she
must keep from him. She had foolishly begun to hope that this particular day of
reckoning would never come. She looked at him now, clear-eyed thanks to her
reckoning would never come. She looked at him now, clear-eyed thanks to her
shock, though that was not the improvement she might have hoped for.
He was hard-packed muscle in a deceptively lean form, all whipcord
strength and leashed, impossible power beneath skin the color of nutmeg. Time
seemed to stop as Jessa stood in place, cataloging the harsh lines of his face.
They were more pronounced than she remembered—the dark slash of his brows
beneath his thick black hair, the masculine jut of his nose, and the high
cheekbones that announced his royal blood as surely as the supremely confident,
regal way he held himself. How could she have overlooked these clues five years
ago? How could she have believed him when he’d claimed to be no one of any
particular importance?
Those deep green eyes of his, mysterious and nearly black in the early-
evening light, connected hard with a part of her she thought she’d buried years
before. The part that had believed every lie he’d told her. The part that had
missed, somehow, that she was being toyed with by a master manipulator. The
part that had loved him heedlessly, recklessly. The part that she feared always
would, despite everything.
When he was near her, she forgot herself.
He closed the door behind him, the catch clicking softly on the doorjamb. It
sounded to Jessa as loud as a gunshot, and she almost flinched away from it. She
could not allow herself to be weak. Not with so much at stake! Because he must
know what had happened. There could be no other reason for an appearance like
this, here in the forgotten back streets of York at an office that was surely far
beneath his imperial notice.
He must know.
With the door closed, the noise of the evening rush in York’s pedestrian
center disappeared, leaving them enclosed in a tense, uncomfortable silence. The
office was too small, and felt tinier by the moment. Jessa’s heart hammered
against her chest. Panic dug sharp claws into her sides. Tariq seemed to loom
over her, to surround her, simply by standing inside the door.
He did not move, nor speak again. He held her gaze with his, daring her to
look away. Challenging her. He was effortlessly commanding even in silence.
Arrogant. Fierce.
He was not the easygoing playboy she remembered. Gone was his quick
smile, his lazy charm. This man was not to be trifled with. This man was the
king who had always lurked within the Tariq she’d known, who she’d but
glimpsed in passing here and there. A shiver traced cold fingers down her spine
and uncurled in her belly.
and uncurled in her belly.
He must know.
Her pulse sounded too loud in her ears. She could feel their tangled history
and her secrets all around her, dragging at her, forcibly reminding her of the
darkness she’d fought so hard to escape back then. But she had more to protect
now than just herself. She had to think of Jeremy, and what was best for him.
Wasn’t that what she had always done, no matter the cost to herself?
She let her eyes travel over Tariq, reminding herself that he was just a man,
no matter how fierce. And for all his regal bearing now, back then he had
disappeared without so much as a word or a backward glance or a forwarding
address. He was as treacherous and formidable as the exotic desert that was his
home. The exquisitely tailored clothes he wore, silk and cashmere that clung to
the bold, male lines of his body, did nothing to disguise the truth of him. He was
a warrior. Untamed and wild, like a shock of brilliant color in the midst of grays
and browns. He was a predator. She had known it then, on some deep, feminine
level, though he had smiled and joked and concealed it. Her body knew it now,
and horrified her by thrilling to it even as she fought for control. Her lungs felt
tight, as if he sucked up all the air in the room.
She had never thought she would see him again.
She didn’t know how to react now that he was in front of her.
“No,” she said, astonished to hear that her voice sounded calm even when
the world around her seemed to shimmer and shake. It gave her the courage to
continue. It didn’t matter how compelling he was. His being so compelling had
been the problem in the first place! She squared her shoulders. “No. You cannot
be here.”
His dark brows rose, haughty and proud. His hair, thick and black and a
touch too long for civility, seemed to sparkle with the autumn rain from outside.
He kept his impossible, haunting eyes trained on her face. How she had once
loved those eyes, which had seemed so sad, so guarded. Tonight they seemed to
see right through her. His expression was unreadable.
“And yet here I am.” His voice was low, husky, and held the barest hint of
the foreign lands he’d come from, wrapped in something both chocolate and
smooth. Dangerous. And once more—a blatant, unmistakable challenge. It hit
Jessa like a fist to the midsection.
“Without invitation,” she pointed out, pleased her tone was just this side of
curt. Anything to seem stronger than she felt. Anything to look tougher than she
was. Anything to protect Jeremy.
“Do I require an invitation to enter a letting agent’s?” he asked,
unperturbed. “You must excuse me if I have forgotten British customs. I was
unperturbed. “You must excuse me if I have forgotten British customs. I was
under the impression places such as these encourage walk-in clientele.”
“Do you have an appointment?” Jessa asked, forcing her jaw to stop
clenching. It was what she would ask any other person who appeared off the
street, wasn’t it? And really, why should Tariq bin Khaled Al-Nur be any
different?
“In a manner of speaking,” he said, his tone hinting at some significance
that was lost on Jessa, though she sensed he expected her to understand his
meaning. “Yes.”
His eyes traveled over her, no doubt comparing her to his memories. Jessa
felt her cheeks flame, in some combination of distress and fury. She had the
sudden worry that she fell short, and then could have kicked herself. Or,
preferably, him. Why should she care about such things? Nothing would change
the fact that she was an ordinary girl from Yorkshire and he was a king.
“It is nice to see you again, Jessa,” Tariq said with a dangerous politeness
that did not conceal the ruthlessness beneath. She wished he would not say her
name. It was like a caress. It teased at the back of her neck, swirled through her
blood, and traced phantom patterns across her skin.
“I’m afraid I can’t say the same,” she replied coolly. Because she had a
spine. Because she needed to get rid of him, and make certain he never returned.
Because their past was far too complicated to ever be brought out into the
present. “You are the very last person I would ever wish to see again. If you go
away quickly, we can pretend it never happened.”
Tariq’s dark jade eyes seemed to sharpen. He thrust his long, elegant hands
into the pockets of his trousers with a casualness Jessa could not quite believe.
The Tariq she’d known had been nonchalant, at ease, but that man had never
existed, had he? And this man in front of her was nothing like the man Tariq had
pretended to be. He was too hard, too fierce.
“I see the years have sharpened your tongue.” He considered her. “What
else has changed, I wonder?”
There was one specific way she had changed that she could not possibly
share with him. Did he already know it? Was he baiting her?
“I have changed,” Jessa said, glaring at him, deciding that an offense was
better than any defense she might try to throw up against this strangely familiar
man, who was much more like steel than the lover she remembered. “It’s called
growing up.” She lifted her chin in defiance, and could feel her hands ball into
fists at her sides. “I am no longer likely to beg for anyone’s attention. Not