“This stretch of road is famous,” Masoud said.

Eloise could see why. The bit of highway they were on connected the newer part of the city to the old town, and in between the two areas, the area was undeveloped. To her right, she could see vast, untouched deserts, sprinkled here and there with speckles of green. To her left lay the ocean, gleaming in the sunlight, equally vast.

It seemed miraculous that she could be sandwiched between sand and sea like this. It was so beautiful.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” she told Masoud.

“Have you ever been to Lebanon?”

She laughed. “No.”

“I don’t understand the joke.”

“No joke. It’s just that I’ve never been anywhere. This is my first time traveling outside the United States.”

She saw his eyes widen. “At all?”

“It’s not like here,” she pointed out, feeling slightly defensive. “The U.S. is a huge country. There are plenty of diverse places you can go without leaving.”

Now, he smirked. “Are you calling my country homogenous?”

She grinned. “I guess that would be a strange claim to make on this particular road.”

“It would certainly be one I’ve never heard before.”

“But you’re royalty,” she pointed out. “People probably don’t tell you all kinds of things.”

“My uncle is royalty. I’m just Masoud.”

“Aren’t you a sheikh? I read…”

“You read?”

Eloise felt like a stalker. “Well, I did do some research before I came out here.”

“Research! On me?”

“I like to be prepared.”

“And what did your research tell you?”

“That your uncle is the ruling sheikh, but that the title belongs to all the men of your lineage. Sort of like princes in Western Europe, I guess? I also learned that your cousin is next in line to the throne, and that he’s a year younger than you, so you’re not likely to ever reign yourself.”

“No,” he agreed. “There are a number of people ahead of me in that line, thank goodness.”

“You don’t want to rule?”

“Would you?”

“I don’t know,” Eloise confessed. “I never thought about it before.”

“It’s a huge responsibility. The wellbeing of the entire country rests on the shoulders of the ruling sheikh.”

“But you’re a good leader,” Eloise said. “You handle Khan Capital successfully.”

“And that’s as much responsibility as I want out of this life,” Masoud said.

Eloise shrugged. “Well, fair enough. I guess I’d like the opportunity to build something. Create something. But I’ll never get that working as Patrick’s assistant.”

“Why don’t you leave?”

“I need the money,” Eloise admitted.

She was surprised at how easy she found it to be honest with him. She was speaking openly in a way she did with hardly anyone in her life, as if she had forgotten entirely who she was talking to. This man was royalty, but she was talking to him like he was a close personal friend.

To shut herself up, she turned her attention back out the window. Masoud was taking an exit that led deeper into the desert.

“Where are we going?” Eloise asked.

“Showing you around the old town is the least I can do,” Masoud said. “You’re a guest in my country, and you’ve never been anywhere before.”

“Are you sure you have time to spend the day with me?”

Eloise felt strange. Aside from her parents, she didn’t have anyone in her life who had entire afternoons free to devote to her and her entertainment. It felt as if she must be taking Masoud away from something that would no doubt be more important.

But he simply laughed at her question. “It’s as you said: I’m not the ruling sheikh. I’m not needed on any royal business.”

“What about business business?”

“I only had one meeting scheduled for today, and that was with you.” He shrugged. “It ended early.”

“And you wouldn’t rather be…I don’t know, spending time with friends of yours? Or family?”

“Eloise. If you do not want to spend the afternoon with me, you can simply say.”

“No, I do! I just don’t want to take you away from something important.”

“You need to trust me,” he said. “Trust that I’m looking out for my own responsibilities.”

“I do.”

She would try.

The car slowed as they entered the old town. Immediately, Eloise could sense the history of the area. Whereas the part of the city she’d been in so far had been similar to cities she’d known in the U.S., with skyscrapers and steel buildings, this area was adobe and brick roads.

She felt as if she’d stepped into another century. There were cars here, but there were also rickshaws towing passengers. Street vendors sold their wares from stalls set up on either side of the road, hollering to Eloise and Masoud as they passed. Masoud navigated slowly down the street, occasionally beeping his car horn to give warning to the many children running around.

“Welcome to old town Yahari,” he said.

“You were right,” Eloise had to concede. “Your country is diverse.”

“Just wait.”

“For what?”

She got her answer almost immediately. Masoud rounded a corner and there, lying straight ahead, was a building that could only be the palace.

It was massive, bigger than the hotel in which Eloise was staying, though not as tall. The sun glinted off it, making Eloise wonder about its construction—was it inlaid with gems, perhaps? She wouldn’t have been surprised. The colors were incredibly bright, even from here, and Eloise let out a gasp.

“It’s gorgeous,” she breathed, unable to look away.

“It’s pretty nice,” Masoud agreed.

“Pretty nice? It’s the most beautiful building I’ve ever seen!”

“Well, that can’t be. You live in America!”

“We’re not exactly famous for our stunning architecture.”

“What about all your libraries? I know you have some beautiful libraries.”

“Okay, I guess so, but…what are you doing? Why are we having an argument? This place is breathtaking. Admit it.”

“I suppose it is.”

“How can you be so cavalier about it?!”

Masoud shrugged. “The palace has always been a part of my life. It’s not shocking to me. It’s just my uncle’s house. It’s where I go when I want to visit with my cousins. I have holidays here.”

Eloise thought of her own uncle and his tiny apartment in Los Angeles.

“That must be crazy.”

“Crazy?”

“Intense, I mean.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Masoud said. “It’s all I’ve ever known.”

“You know,” Eloise said, “You’re just like a character in a story I wrote once.”

“You write stories?”

“Oh no, not anymore. I did when I was younger. I used to think I wanted to be a writer, before I discovered how impractical that kind of thing is.”

“Is it impractical?”

“To make a good living writing? Yes. Most people go into business and are happier for it.”

Masoud nodded slowly, as if he was considering what she had said. “Tell me about the story you wrote.”

“When I was a child, I loved to write fairy tales. I wrote about kings and princes and the adventures they had, and about brave princesses who lived in beautiful castles.”

“Like this one.”

“Even the castles in my imagination weren’t as beautiful as this one. But I had written this piece that was probably hundreds of pages long about Princess Haley and her prince, Jack, and all the adventures they had together.”

“These are people you invented?” Masoud asked.

“Kind of. I think Haley was mostly me, to be honest. She was a girl the same age I was at the time, and she discovered she was a princess and went to live in the castle. It’s a pretty common fantasy among little girls.”

“You wanted to be a princess.”

“I did,” she admitted.

“How would you like to be a princess, now? Just for today?”

Eloise felt a tingle run down her spine. “What do you mean?”

“With me as your guide, you can see the city the way few people ever do. We can spend the day together getting the treatment royals are entitled to. And then, when you return to Gainsborough, you would always know that you were a princess for a day, and he was nothing.”

Eloise hesitated. It sounded wonderful, almost too good to be true. To be princess for a day? It was the fantasy that had dominated her childhood, and here was a man offering to make it come true for her. All she had to do was say yes and she would be royalty for the day. She would be crazy to turn it down.

And yet, there was something about the way he’d presented the offer. When you return to Gainsborough…was he just doing all this because he was angry at Patrick? Eloise wasn’t proud of the way Patrick had conducted himself in today’s meeting, and she had often found him difficult to work with, but at the end of the day, he was still her boss. She was loyal to MAFA Financial, and that meant she was loyal to Patrick.

Was the offer Masoud was making her his own private way of getting revenge?

No. It couldn’t be, she reasoned. There was no way Patrick would ever know what had happened today. It was possible Masoud was trying to plant a seed with her that would end with the events of the day being revealed, leaving Patrick feeling jealous or betrayed. But all she would have to do would be to keep her silence. She could enjoy the day Masoud was offering her, guilt free.

“Okay, she said. “I’d love to.”

* * *

The afternoon was like something out of a fairy tale.

Yahari’s old town, Masoud explained, dated back centuries, to long before the Industrial Revolution changed the face of Al-Zhera. The wall around the city had once been a defensive measure, preventing foreign enemies from entering. Now, however, Al-Zhera’s boundaries had been built out several miles in all directions, and the wall was a crumbling artifact of a bygone era. In places where it had eroded, children climbed it and jumped down. Dogs ran along the perimeter, begging to be thrown scraps. The cobbles left the road uneven and precarious, and Eloise had to cling to Masoud’s shoulder, stumbling in her heels.

“Are you all right, Your Highness?” he asked, catching her after she tripped for a third time.

Eloise giggled. It was funny to see Masoud taking this princess business so seriously. “I’ll be fine.”

“Why don’t we duck in here?” He pulled her into an open-fronted building, passing between two columns to enter. “The floor is more level.”

It was. In fact, it was a mosaic of carefully arranged tiles, and Eloise gasped at the beauty of it. “What is this place?”

“The old temple. It’s no longer in use—it was built to house ancient rituals that no one practices anymore—but like most of the old town, it was never removed.”

“It shouldn’t be,” Eloise said, breathless. “It’s beautiful.”

“But useless.”

“That doesn’t matter. It’s history. It has to be preserved.”

Masoud smiled. “I think so, too. I’m glad you agree. Now, come see this.”

He led her to the back of the temple where another mosaic was inlaid into the wall. Masoud placed his hand on it, carefully arranging his fingers, and pressed inward. To their right, a narrow door slid open.

Eloise gasped. “What’s that?”

“It’s an escape door,” Masoud said. “The priests in the temple could use it in case of an invasion, to get themselves and their people to safety.”

“Where does it go?” Eloise asked.

Masoud smiled. “Would you like to see for yourself?”

She hesitated. “Is it safe?”

“Perfectly.”

“Then yes, I’d like to. Please.”

He led her through the door and into a narrow passage. Eloise found she could touch the walls on both sides of her, which was helpful, because the darkness once the door was closed was stifling. She felt anxious, suddenly, without the light at her back.

“Are you sure this is safe?”

“What is it you’re afraid of?”

“I don’t know.” She thought about it. “What if someone’s down here?”

“No one even knows this passage is here. It’s a secret from all but the royal family.”

“And me,” she pointed out.

“And you.”

“Well, if you told me, couldn’t someone else in your family have told the secret? And what if that person…I don’t know, got drunk at the bar and told everyone?”

“No,” Masoud said. “We would know if that had happened.”

“How would you know?”

“Because of where the tunnel leads. If anyone knew about it and had access, it would have been discovered when they emerged.”

“Where does it go?”

His hand was on her shoulder, squeezing reassuringly. “Wait and see. I promise you’ll be glad you did.”

Eloise felt her way forward. The walls seemed to be made of concrete or something similar—cold, hard, uncomfortable. The floor of the tunnel, however, was dirt.

“This isn’t very princess-like,” she said.

“Believe me,” Masoud said, “you would feel differently if the city was under attack and you were one of the few people who had a safe place to hide.”

“Why isn’t the ground paved? It seems like that would have been easier than putting in these side walls.”

“That’s so you can move quietly,” Masoud said. “We wouldn’t want our footsteps to give us away.

Eloise was starting to get caught up in it all. It felt as if she actually was a princess on the run from the attacking armies of another kingdom. For a moment, she wished she was wearing something beautiful instead of her business suit. It would have been fun to make her way down this corridor in a ball gown, maybe slightly dirty or torn from the harrowing adventures she’d been through already, and finally get to…well, wherever they were going.

The tunnel started to slant upward noticeably.

“This way,” Masoud said. “We’re almost there.”

“I think I can see light. Am I hallucinating?”

He laughed. “No. That’s where we’re headed, Your Highness.”

“In this scenario, aren’t you still a sheikh? You wouldn’t have to call me by my title.”

“No, in this scenario, I’m your personal valet. My job is to make sure you get where you’re going safely and have everything you need, Your Highness.”

Eloise giggled.

“Pardon me.” Masoud stepped in front of her and reached out into what appeared to Eloise to be nothing but darkness.

A moment later, a door slid open before her. It was wider than the one through which they’d entered, and the frame was ornate, wooden and carved into curlicues. The wood was a dark teak.

Eloise placed a hand on it, observing its details. “This is really nice.”

Masoud stepped through the door and extended a hand to Eloise. She took it and let him help her through. She found herself in a large, domed room with an incredibly high ceiling and a tiled floor.

“Where are we?”

“The royal palace,” Masoud said, favoring her with a deep bow. “Welcome home, Your Highness.”