“You are the driver who works for the American football player?” the princess asked.

“Yes.”

“My brother, His Highness, Prince Aamuzhir, is in town. He is a fan of American football. You will bring your employer to meet him tonight. His Highness is staying on the eighteenth floor.”

“I can’t do that.”

The princess wasn’t used to anyone telling her something couldn’t be done, and her eyebrows arched like a cat’s spine. “Faiza! You will personally make arrangements with this driver and see this is done.”

Faiza nodded, her head still bowed. She led Piper from the suite to the elevator. As soon as the doors closed, Piper threw up her hands. “Faiza, I can’t make Coop do anything, let alone this.”

“But the princess has ordered it,” Faiza said earnestly.

“The princess is going to be disappointed.”

Faiza’s forehead puckered. “Can you not persuade him?”

“This is the United States,” Piper said as gently as she could. “I know it’s hard to understand, but we don’t care here about what foreign princesses want.”

Piper watched the play of expressions on Faiza’s face move from despair to fear to resignation. Piper couldn’t bear it. “This isn’t your fault. I’ll go back and explain.”

Faiza regarded her sadly. “Do not trouble yourself. This is my difficulty. If I had not mentioned to my friend Habiba that you work for a famous American football player, none of this would have happened. Habiba means no harm, but she likes very much to talk.”

“But you’ll be the one punished.” Piper knew it was true, and the injustice infuriated her. She was further enraged when the elevator doors opened and the bright light of the lobby revealed what she hadn’t noticed before. Faiza’s dark purple hijab didn’t quite hide a bruise on her cheekbone.

Rage boiled through her. A pair of stern-faced guards stood near the elevator. She grabbed Faiza’s arm. “I don’t feel good. Help me get to the restroom.”

Faiza regarded her with concern, but she was accustomed to serving others, and she immediately directed Piper past the disinterested guards and across the lobby to the ladies’ room. No one was inside. “Who hit you?” Piper demanded. “Did the princess do this?”

Faiza touched her cheek. “No. It was Aya.” The distasteful way she uttered the name spoke volumes. “Aya is in charge of Her Highness’s servants. She likes things done quickly, and I was too slow.”

“And the princess allows her to hit the other servants?”

“She does not notice.”

“She should!” They were alone, but Piper automatically lowered her voice. “Your aunt in Canada… Would she let you stay with her if you could get there?”

“Oh, yes. She has told me this. Every time we come to the United States, I dream of going to her, but it is impossible. I have no way of getting there, and even if I did… If I was caught…” Her dark eyes were as empty as an old woman’s looking at her own death. She shook her head at the futility of such a thing. “I must find my happiness in knowing how deeply my khala keeps me in her heart.”

“That’s not good enough.” The royal family was leaving tomorrow night. Piper hesitated. “What if there was a way to… get you into Canada?”

This was crazy. Piper had no idea how to get Faiza away from her employers and across the border.

Faiza’s face was a playground of emotions, with hope and defeat riding opposite ends of a seesaw. Defeat quickly won out. “I would do anything, but there is no possibility, my dear friend. Your kindness means much to me.”

Kindness wasn’t enough. All the way home, Piper thought about helping Faiza escape. It wouldn’t be easy to get her out of the country. But it might be possible.

All she needed was a little help…

9

“You want me to do what?” Cooper Graham snatched a cherry lollipop from his mouth.

She’d cornered him in his rooftop garden, where he was nurturing his cucumbers before the first frost could get them. Even though October had arrived, the garden’s high brick walls, multiple levels, and comfortable lounging area formed a beautiful oasis. Raised vegetable beds held cool-weather crops of leeks and spinach; beets, turnips, and broccoli. Big glazed pots and stone jardinières displayed mixes of rosemary and zinnia, parsley and dahlia, lemongrass and marigold. She hadn’t liked discovering he’d built this garden himself. It upset some of what she wanted to believe about him.

“You’re an adrenaline junkie,” she pointed out, crumpling some mint leaves in her fingers. “This should be right up your alley.”

“You really are taking medication. Crazy pills!” He plopped the lollipop back in his mouth and returned to the cucumbers.

“A deeply offensive comment,” she said with a sniff. “But I’ll rise above.”

“You do that.”

As she moved around a pot of pepper plants to get closer, she noticed a potting table tucked behind the wooden lattice that defined the garden’s lounging area. Something on top caught her attention. She gave herself time to regroup by going over to investigate. “What’s this?” She held up a perfectly rounded ball of hard-packed dirt, one of half a dozen sitting on top of the table.

“Seed bomb. Unlike you, I have no ethics.”

“Meaning…?”

“I’m a guerrilla gardener. Some clay, peat moss, and a batch of seeds shaped into a ball. That’s all it takes.”

She was starting to get the picture. “You’re an urban Johnny Appleseed. You toss these into empty lots.”

“It’s getting too late in the season now. Best times are spring and early fall. With a little luck and some rain at the right time, a hardscrabble plot of dirt starts to bloom.” He reached across the cukes to pull off a few yellowed tomato leaves. “Coreopsis, coneflowers, black-eyed Susans. Maybe some prairie grass. Fun to watch.”

“How long have you been doing this?”

“Two, three years. I don’t know.”

“I thought you were laundering drug money.”

He grinned for the first time since she’d cornered him. “You did not.”

“Well, not really, but…” As interesting as this side of him was, she hadn’t lost sight of her goal. “Maybe I should start from the beginning.”

“Or maybe you shouldn’t. You realize, don’t you, that you blew your cover at the club last night with your jujitsu moves? Nobody’s going to buy you as my social media specialist any longer.”

Something she’d already figured out. Church bells chimed in the distance, and she plunged ahead. “Her name is Faiza. She’s only nineteen, and she’s been working for the family since she was fourteen. She’s sweet and smart, and she only wants what we take for granted. A chance to be free.”

He scowled at a ragged bean plant.

“She dreams of going to nursing school so she can take care of preemies, but right now, she’s little better than a slave.”

He ripped up the bean plant and tossed it aside, crunching on what was left of the lollipop. She moved in on him. “Please, Coop. It’s Sunday. The club’s closed. All you have to do is go to the Peninsula tonight and have a manly chat with the prince. Think of it as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get an insider’s look at a different culture.”

He tossed the lollipop stick in a compost bin. “I’m happy with the culture I’m already in. Except for my thieving waitstaff…”

A tiny red sugar crystal lingered at the corner of his mouth, and the memory of that ridiculous kiss came back to her. She instinctively licked her lips. “Your waitstaff is basically honest. And if everybody felt the way you do, there’d be no hope for international peace and understanding.”

“Thank you, Miss Universe.”

“I’m merely pointing out that you’re being very narrow-minded.”

He jabbed a soil-crusted finger at her. “At least I have a mind. And I seriously doubt my spending a night reliving my glory years with a Middle Eastern oil baron is going to do squat for international relations. As for the rest of your plan…” He shuddered. “I’ve done a few things in my life I’m not proud of, but what you’re asking is creepy.”

“It’s heroic! It’s a chance at redemption for the sins of your past.” Like that kiss, she thought, but he hadn’t brought it up and neither would she. Although he seemed to be thinking about it. How she knew that, she wasn’t certain. Maybe she simply felt it. Or maybe it was something else… The calculating look in his eyes. A certain wiliness… What was he up to?

He dipped his head and brushed the corner of his eyebrow with his thumb. “If I were going to do this… which I’m not… I’d expect something in return. What are you prepared to offer?”

“What do you want?”

“An interesting question…”

He started smoking her with his gaze. Burning right through her lame-ass chauffeur’s outfit. Peeling off every ugly piece of it. And taking his time with it. She might not be smart about everything, but she was smart about this, and she rolled her eyes. “Stop messing with me. You can have any movie star you want, and you’re only trying to make me squirm. Just like last night. Well, guess what? It’s not working.”

“Are you sure about that?” The words slid from his lips, all silk and seduction.

“I’m pretty much un-squirmable.”

“Is that so.” He stroked the side of his jaw, leaving a dirty smear behind. “Did I ever mention what a bad lover I was when I first started out?”

One thing she had to say about Coop Graham: he was unpredictable. For a reason all his own, he’d decided to steer them into dangerous waters. She needed to back off, but she couldn’t do that, not with the way she’d responded to him last night. That meant it was kickoff time. “I don’t believe you did,” she said.

“I got lots of complaints, so I had to work at it. Treat it as a job.”

“Put in the extra practice time, right?”

“Precisely. When I think of the mistakes I made…”

“Mortifying, I’m sure.”

“But I kept my eye on the ball.”

“Only one? Curious. Oh, well, I hope your deformity didn’t make you too self-conscious. I’m sure you could still-”

“I finally got the hang of it when I was about-”

“Thirty-six?”

“Eighteen. I was a fast learner. All those older women willing to take a young kid like me into their loving arms…”

“Blessed are the merciful. But…” She smiled her own wily smile. “As entertaining as this is, you don’t have any interest in me. Both of us know you are completely out of my league.”

At first he seemed to appreciate her acknowledging this indisputable fact, but then his expression clouded over. “Hold on. Last week you told me how you’re a real man-eater.”

“There are limits. You’re an entirely different species from the Officer Hotties of the world. Way above even my head.”

He actually seemed miffed. “Now why would you say something like that about yourself? Where’s your pride?”

“Firmly entrenched in the real world. You belong in bed with superstars. Look at me. I’m thirty-three years old. At best, I’m average-looking, and-”

“Define average.”

“I have ugly feet, I’m at least ten pounds overweight.”

“For a cadaver.”

“And… I don’t give a crap about clothes or the way I look.”

“Now that part is true. As for the rest… You’ve heard of power blackouts. All I’d have to do is turn off the lights.”

He said it with such mustache-twirling, over-the-top villainy that she would have laughed if so much hadn’t been on the line. Instead, she advanced on him. “Let’s get serious. A woman’s life is at stake. I need you to do this. And your better self-assuming you have one-needs for you to do this.”

He’d gotten wise to her tactics, and her swipe had no effect. “Try again, Sherlock. That wasn’t even a first down.”

She’d run out of arguments, and she slumped against the brick terrace wall. “Do you have a better idea?”

“I sure as hell do. Mind your own business.”

She took a deep breath, then slowly shook her head. “I can’t.”


***

Coop popped one of the small yellow pear tomatoes in his mouth. It didn’t go well with the remnants of his cherry sucker, but he needed to stall. She was right. He’d been messing with her. Trying to make that wrongheaded kiss seem as meaningless as it should have been.

He gazed over at her. She looked so damned disappointed in him. Like she’d caught him torturing a kitten. What she wanted was over-the-top and doomed to failure, but he still felt about two feet tall, an emotion he hadn’t experienced since his college coach had deservedly called him out for too much partying.

“All I’m asking for is an hour,” she said. “Two at the most.”

He never let anybody put him on the defensive, yet that was exactly what she’d done. She saw herself as some kind of knight-ess in shining armor, and she expected him to join her crusade. She worked for him, damn it. He was the quarterback, and she didn’t get to call the plays. “You’re asking for a lot more than that.”