Chapter 1




“Oh thank goodness you’re all here!” Shantra exclaimed after bursting into the salon where the family normally gathered for drinks before dinner. Previously, this period of the evening had been a special time when the five siblings would gather and talk about their day. But now that Ramzi and Turk had found the loves of their lives, their quiet time as a small family had been sporadic, almost non-existent some weeks. Her two older brothers tended to prefer dining alone with their spouses rather than as a family.

“What’s going on, little one?” Ramzi asked.

“Don’t call her that,” Ramzi’s wife, Mia, commanded as she waddled into the room. Her pregnancy seemed to be more pronounced every day, as was her grouchiness because of the pregnancy. She loved children, but she wasn’t in love with being pregnant.

Ramzi immediately walked over to his wife and put a hand around her very large, very pregnant waistline. He suspected that she was tired since her French accent was a bit more pronounced than normal. But she’d insisted on joining the family for dinner tonight although he wasn’t sure why. “Why not? I’ve always called her that. She’s the smallest one in the family. The name fits.”

Mia accepted his help in sitting down, then sighed with relief when she was ensconced in the comfortable chair with her feet on a low ottoman. At that point, she turned to glare up at her husband. “Because she hates it.”

Ramzi’s dark eyes moved back to his youngest sister in time to see her lashes lower, indicating that his beautiful wife was correct but his baby sister was too kind to ask him to stop. “Got it,” he finally said and kissed the top of Mia’s dark head.

“What’s going on, brat?” Rais, the middle of all of them but the youngest of the brothers, walked into the room and over to the bar to pour himself a drink. Of the five, there were three older brothers. Ramzi, the oldest, was the current Sheik of Kilar. Then there was Turk, who had taken on the role of Minister of Defense. The youngest brother, Rais, was the Minister of Finance and a genius at making money and forcing the business world to bend to his will. The brothers were significantly older than the sisters and, therefore, more protective. After several years of dealing with the insanity of three brilliant, creative and mischievous sons, their mother had demanded daughters and so Ciala, the fourth in the Sumara clan, arrived. And very soon after that, Shantra, the youngest, came into the world.

Shantra’s eyes snapped and she glared at her brother. Unfortunately, he was too big to care about her anger and too arrogant to change. Remembering this quickly, her glare turned to a smile. She wasn’t going to change her brothers, so she might as well accept them and focus on the positive aspects of their personalities, even though some days it was extremely hard to remember those facets.

“You’re in trouble,” Turk mumbled. He shook his head as he escorted his wife, Raven, into the room. Raven was a brilliant doctor who was also pregnant with their first child.

“Who is in trouble?” Raven asked, walking next to her husband as he helped her into the chair next to Mia. She looked up at her husband, her eyes questioning if he was the man in trouble.

“Don’t look at me,” he replied, shaking his head. Holding his drink, he waved towards the youngest brother. “Rais is the one causing problems.”

“Tonight,” Raven mumbled under her breath, knowing her husband too well. In response, she felt his hand slide under her hair, his strong fingers stroking along the edge of her neck, exactly where he knew she was extra sensitive. She yelped slightly and started to move away from him with a laugh, but his hand wouldn’t relinquish the gentle hold.