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Moving back to the bedrooed out of her comfortable sweats and T-shirt and pulled on a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt War shoes the lights of the limo lit up the darkness outside her bedroo to their party They were leaving, and they were leaving her alone Just as she had asked

Picking up her cell phone she called a cab, then grabbed her purse and made her way quietly downstairs to wait on the transportation, and hopefully to keep anyone else fro The intercoed at the wall next to the door Stepping to it, Paige accepted the summons

"A Plus Cabs," the voice on the other end announced

"Coe pressed the security lock and before the cab was passing through the open gates Daniel Conover alking into the foyer fro of the house

"You can follow me, or you can wait for ainst the wall opposite her, his dark blond head tilting to the side as he regarded her curiously

"You know I can’t allow you to leave," he stated

"But you will," she told him "Otherwise, I’ll call the authorities next I’ll have you charged with kidnapping and i he suspected it But She w19;t certain, and that hat hed He flexed his broad shoulders beneath the cotton shirt he wore and straightened from the wall He looped his thuh jeans and gave her a curious little smile "You’re as stubborn as your brother, you know"

"So everyone says," she sniffed "Funny, he always seee moved past him as he opened the door for her She walked outside to the cab

Just a few hours, she pro to worry her fa to risk her life or her bodyguards But she needed to go ho, too-empty house she was usually in alone

And she needed the space to figure out how to sit back and accept her brother’s protection, her father’s offer to pay the bills while the situation was being resolved, and to decide which wasthe brother she would lose if she didn’t walk away fro to be impossible toarea, a bedroo tub That bathtub had been the selling point for her The electric fireplace sat in front of the overstuffed couch and was the focal point of the rooh to cook and entertain a few friends in

It was hers She paid the bills, stocked the cabinets, and lived comfortably and happily on the salary she earned at the advertising fire

The floors were hardwood, gleas beneath the s area

She didn’t have a television, yet For entertainment she used her laptop, which she had left at her brother’s She’d been so busy in the past year that she hadn’t really had time to watch television or enjoy movies as she once had

She’d missed her home while she had been at Khalid’s Her brother’s ho, too private perhaps The suites were self-contained except for eating, and his house staff was alwaysit to her room

She’d been lost there, and lonely At first, she’d been sequestered there by herself, then with Khalid’s return it had been one lecture and arguo insant>

As she placed her purse on the sain The ring tone was a set of strident cy she answer the phone quickly

She ignored it

Pushing her fingers through her hair she walked through the aparthtened a pillow on the bed thenarea where she turned on the electric fireplace and collapsed on the large pillows in front of it

She felt exhausted

Fighting with Khalid always left her feeling as though she had just run a y and ic

At the end of the day, what it caical or not, she washouse, unable to visit friends, unable to feel safe and secure in her own home because Khalid’s father was a crazy bastard

He’d kidnapped their mother when she was seventeen, forced her to marry him and immediately raped her and forced her to conceive

She’d been locked in a harem, forced to spend her days with only one pursuit, that of pleasing him

Her mother had lived in hell while she had been ihold, and only a stroke of luck had afforded her escape

Pavlos Galbraithe, her then-fiancé and now Paige’s father, had learned of thebetween Marilyn and Azir Mustafa while Marilyn was visiting faypt Mustafa, he had been told, had been insistent onMarilyn He’d been entranced by her flareen eyes

He’d made her so uncomfortable with his stares and his disapproval each time she spoke that she had excused herself and returned to her room Only to have her cousin, upset and concerned by Mustafa’s attitude, convince her to co so irate

The next day, Marilyn had disappeared

But still, Pavlos and his future brother-in-law, Henry Girard, wouldn’t have had a chance of gaining entrance into the fortress or rescuing Marilyn if she hadn’t found her oay out through a secret door in the stronghold’s outer wall A wall that had surrounded the private gardens of the Mustafa haree’s mother had in essence rescued herself and her newborn son, Khalid Mustafa The baby Azir had forced on her, yet one she had come to adore

Pavlos and Henry had been outside that wall, searching for the same secret door they had heard existed that led into the harem They had been there as the stones seeure had slipped out