In Too Deep by Brenda Jackson, Olivia Gates Page A

she looked forward to being Carmen Aiken Birmingham again.
    She smiled, liking the sound of that and deciding to show him just how much when they returned home later. Life was good but being with the man you love, she decided, was even better.

THE SHEIKH’S BARGAINED BRIDE
    OLIVIA GATES

 
    To the many fabulous ladies who made this novella and this exciting miniseries come to life.
    My senior editor, Krista Stroever, for the wonderful premise and the unstinting guidance, and authors Brenda Jackson, Yvonne Lindsay, Catherine Mann, Katherine Garbera and Emily McKay for all the fun and helpful collaboration.
    It was a great experience working with you all.
    I can’t wait to do it again!

One
    T hree weeks ago, Sabrina Grant married the man of her dreams.
    Sheikh Adham ben Khaleel ben Haamed Aal Ferjani was a prince—literally—who’d charmed and captivated her from the moment she’d set eyes on him. He was everything a woman couldn’t be creative enough to hope for. She loved him with every fiber of her being.
    And she’d never thought she could be so miserable.
    How had she ended up like this? Alone, discarded? This was the last thing she’d imagined when she’d said “I do.”
    But then, she couldn’t have imagined anything that had happened in the six weeks since her father’s heart attack.
    It had been late May, less than a week after she’d finished her postgraduate courses, and she’d been about to go home with two master’s degrees in hand, when she’d been hit with the terrible news. She’d hurtled to his bedside, struggling with her anxiety as well as his, while fieldingthose who’d come to pay tribute to her father, Thomas Grant, multimillionaire vineyard and winery owner. The stress had almost wrecked her…until his best friend had come to visit, accompanied by the most incredible man she’d ever seen. Adham.
    She was bowled over. And to her stunned delight, he seemed as taken with her. The best part was that she was sure his interest had nothing to do with her father’s fortune. Beyond being second in line to the throne of the staggeringly rich desert kingdom of Khumayrah, he was the owner of the largest horse farm in the States, with a fortune that made her father’s look like change.
    Adham started coming every day, enthralling her more each time. He kept her company in her vigil at her father’s bedside, took her for meals and walks. His companionship bolstered her while each touch inflamed her. By the time she begged for him and he took her, it was only three weeks into their relationship, but she’d already stumbled head over heels in love with him.
    Then the next day, her father told her that he was being discharged, and that Adham had asked for her hand in marriage. She was overwhelmed by relief and happiness. Her father was going to be okay, and Adham loved her as much as she loved him.
    But she crashed down to earth when she talked to her father’s doctors. They said they were releasing him only because he’d asked to die at home. There was no use performing open-heart surgery, or even a heart transplant, since his other systems had been severely damaged, and he had only a few days to live.
    Both her father and Adham agreed on an immediate wedding so that her father could witness it. She wanted to give him whatever happiness she could in his last days, butit was heart wrenching to know he wouldn’t live to see her building a family with the man of her dreams.
    Hours after the wedding, her father slipped into a coma. He died twenty-four hours later.
    After such a tragic start to their marriage, it was the last thing she expected to have Adham whisk her away from her family home in Long Island, to deposit her in a mansion of his in New England and return to his obligations and duties. He came home only fleetingly, but certainly not to her.
    She at first thought he was giving her time and space