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Her first mistake was forgivable, even if it went against a lifetime of royal protocol. She was high on Lottie Finch and Lottie was high on her, so neither of them checked in with the members of her detail, the minders who had swirled at the edge of Zynara’s vision all her life.

The valet held open the door of her car and Zynara smacked Lottie on the arse as she tripped in first. That produced a giggle that was pure rocket fuel, and Lottie slid across the seat to make room for Zynara.

Her hands were already on Zynara’s lapels pulling her in for a kiss as she gave the order to the driver.

“My city apartment, please—” but the rest was stolen from her lips.

She always used her staffs’ names when she spoke to them, and maybe if Lottie hadn’t been shifting around in the seat she’d have noticed.

But Lottie’s thigh was over her own and there was a perfect split up her evening gown that meant Zynara could run her palm over all that gorgeous flesh and squeeze it hard.

She could swallow the moan Lottie made into her mouth and push her hand higher, slip it under the fabric, around the mind-blowing swell of her backside to where she utterly failed to find lace underwear of any kind—and the rest of her mind collapsed completely.

“All through that game—?” she murmured. “Are you telling me you’ve been naked under your dress all this time? For me?”

Lottie gave her just the perfect amount of cheek for Zynara to slap it away. “Who else, princess?”

“How many times am I going to have to order you not to call me that?”

She could taste the sass before it came.

“At least a hundred more, Qasira—”

But it was then that the driver took an unnecessary turn.

Zynara finally looked at him. It was dark. His face was even darker under the peak of his cap.

“Where is Massan?” she asked.

The sensation of Lottie stiffening in her lap made it real. They both swung around to check for the car that always followed with her detail. Four black SUVs surrounded them instead. The driver reached one arm back.

Lottie moved like a blur. She seized the gun and twisted it out of the man’s hand before Zynara had fully registered the weapon was even there.

Without wasting a move, Lottie yanked his arm back and pushed her knee into the back of his elbow.

There was a sickening snap, an appalling yell and the car veered sharply into the other lane.

“Get down!”

Lottie was already vaulting forward. She had the gun trained on the driver as she barged her way into the front seats. When the driver punched the side of her face, she simply shot him in the chest.

Tyres screeched and the car swerved again. Zynara was thrown against the door.

“Out you get, arsehole,” Lottie sang. She was a small tornado in the passenger seat—unclipping the man’s seatbelt with one hand, correcting the steering with the other, backfisting the man to the nose when he continued the fight, then popping his door.

She booted him onto the road with a feral grunt and slid into his seat like it was nothing.

“Keep your bloody head down, Niz!”

Even in the chaos, Zynara felt herself warm at the use of her nickname—a split second later, the first bullets struck the car and she did as she was told. Lottie drove like a Formula 1 driver, steering with her knees as she dropped the magazine from the handgun and inspected the ammunition.

“Fuck’s sake!” She slammed the weapon back together, swerved through traffic, then flung them into a side street. Lights flooded in behind them. At the end of the street, another two vehicles hemmed them in from the front.

“Fuck!” she drawled, like this was an irritating inconvenience and not a threat to her life.

She tugged on the handbrake and spun them to a stop.

“Busy night. Friends of yours, princess, or does your little bro want his pocket money back?” Another spray of bullets rattled against the car.

“Arse holes! I was having a really nice evening.”

A group of men jumped out of the SUVs and advanced on them down the street, firing as they came.

Lottie ignored them. She leaned over and rummaged in the glovebox. Her voice turned bright and chatty as she did. The same damned cheeky tone she used to wind Zynara up. Zynara blinked.

“Nice bulletproof glass though, princess. Totally rate that. Is that shit expensive? Come on, come on, give me something” —the curve of her backside came into view as she disappeared under the front passenger seat— “Oh, hello, gorgeous! Come to mama.”

Despite herself, Zynara rolled her eyes. Lottie had found a semiautomatic and she chuckled gleefully.

“HK SP5. Nice! I have always wanted one of these!” She slapped in a mag. “Okay. We are playing my game now. Cover your ears, babe.” She opened the sunroof, winked at Zynara, then rose up through it like an angel.

Zynara watched with awe as Lottie fired, calmly and with control, taking out the advancing silhouettes one by one, not even flinching at the gunfire. The last man hit the ground and there was silence.

Lottie flopped back into the car like it was a convertible and they’d been on their way to the beach. Zynara tried not to find her wired grin insanely attractive.

“Let’s go!”

“What—? Where—?”

“Never had to run for your life before, princess? You are missing all the fun. We can go anywhere , but we’re not hanging around here.” She tugged off the wig, floofed out her curls and grabbed Zynara’s hand. She was wild, beautiful, stark raving bonkers—and everything Zynara wanted.

They ran—their heels ringing off the street, their breath sharp in the 3am air, their hands locked together, their laughter edged with adrenaline. Five blocks deeper into the backstreets, they burst into a too-bright kebab shop, and collapsed against the wall.

The owner opened his mouth.

“Two halal snack packs to go,” Lottie told him. “Yalla!”

Zynara wrapped her fingers around Lottie’s throat and kissed her. Hard.

“You’re— you’re the Qasira!” the owner blurted.

“And I just saved her life,” Lottie crowed. “I want all the sauces, okay? I deserve all the sauces.”

“You never, ever shut up, do you?” Zynara whispered. She pressed Lottie back against the wall and thrust her thigh between her legs. The woman was literally vibrating against her.

“Make me, princess.”

“You know I will,” Zynara breathed.

“Order up!” the owner called frantically. He thrust two large takeout boxes of loaded fries across the counter and Zynara pulled out her phone to pay for them. “On the house, Qasira.”

Zynara thanked him, but Lottie was already laughing again and pulling her away. “Let’s keep running, Niz!” she called. “Let’s run forever!”

She wanted to run to the end of the world with this girl.

Common sense kicked in eventually, as it had to. There’d just been an attempt on the Qasira’s life. There were five dead bodies in a downtown street, murdered by a non-citizen and in the presence of royalty. There was a lot of cleaning up to do.

They ate their meal on the edge of the medina in a hanging garden brushed with moonlight. Water from a fountain provided a white noise static and they made their respective calls—Zynara to Sami, and Lottie to whoever Lottie answered to. Sami already knew. He insisted she come in.

“Now, Niz. Get to the club immediately.”

“We’re safe,” she protested. “We haven’t been followed.” As wild as the night had been, she was still holding Lottie’s hand, and she didn’t want to let it go.

“The only reason I’m not completely furious with you is that I know you’re with Lottie Finch. Get here now, Highness.”

Zynara sighed. There it was—her royal title and the limit of her freedom.

What would happen, she wondered, if she didn’t?

If she tugged Lottie’s hand and left Ain Zargiers forever?

She could focus on the science and forget about politics.

She could work anywhere—it didn’t need to be here.

They could run away together, go wherever they wanted to, the entire world at their feet. Lottie would follow her, wouldn’t she?

But what if she did run. What kind of Ain Zargiers would remain after her brother had drained it of its wealth—and its spirit?

Did she really want her country to become the type of place where money could execute whoever it didn’t like in the streets at night?

Where rich thugs trampled on the rights of the people and democracy died under their designer shoes?

Of course she didn’t.

She and Lottie crept into Sami’s bar at four in the morning and were greeted by the usual phalanx of suits from his security team. Two people met Lottie as well. Zynara didn’t miss that one of them was the girl from Malik’s house who’d been there when the Saudi prince died. It was a tangled web.

“The women from my detail,” Zynara asked, duty and responsibility settling on her shoulders like a familiar weight. “Are they okay?”

“Unharmed,” Sami confirmed. “This was definitely Malik. He’s gone too far this time. We have to take this to your father.”

“No.”

“This was a deliberate and deadly attempt on your life—”

“We don’t actually know that was his plan. It was Lottie who escalated things—”

“For fuck’s sake, Niz!”

“And my father has already lost so much,” Zynara told him. “He doesn’t need to know his two remaining children are trying to kill each other. I will deal with Malik.”

Sami blew out an unimpressed sigh, deeply impatient.

“How? Are you going to reclaim your right to the throne? Are you going to rule? Are you going to have him convicted of murder and send him to jail?” Zynara didn’t see his exasperation because she couldn’t take her eyes off Lottie who was getting a similar dressing down on the other side of the room.

She felt it, though. “No, of course not. You’re just going to let it slide.

Disappear back into your physics and your chemistry as if the rest of the world doesn’t matter. For fuck’s sake, Niz—”

“He’s my brother .”

“He’s a psychopath.”

“He is my family and my problem. I will deal with it.” Zynara was out of patience too. She felt her voice harden and ice over in a way Sami didn’t deserve, but she’d had plans for Lottie Finch all night and she needed her now. “Are we done here? You can do your job without me holding your hand?”

“Alright, alright,” Sami huffed. He grimaced at the look Zynara turned on him. He put a hand on her arm. “Don’t be like that. I was worried—” Zynara shook him off. “There’s a car waiting to take you back to the palace,” he finished.

She stalked across the room, took Lottie’s hand and pulled her away. The driver tried to argue with her, but she was the Qasira and, in the end, he obeyed. She didn’t want to be at the palace. She wanted to be free.

By the time they entered her apartment on the 150th floor of the Burj Al Saqr, she and Lottie had found each other again.

The bath was cold and most of the candles had burnt down to nothing, but she laid Lottie down in the middle of all the rose petals and loved her differently—softly, gently, with a fullness in her heart she’d never felt before, with something that definitely tasted like potential—like hope —on the tip of her tongue, and she trailed it all over every inch of the incredible bewitching bewildering woman beneath her.

“Oh… Qasira…” Lottie whispered.

She wasn’t even making fun. Zynara could see the devastation in her eyes. The same inevitability that coursed through her.

“I’m in danger of loving you, Lottie Finch,” Zynara admitted.

Lottie gave a weak chuckle, the remnants of her unflappable ego rising for one exhausted, compulsive dig.

“Oh, my poor, silly princess.” Her whisper was so soft.

Her hand on Zynara’s cheek was all the tenderness Zynara had once calculated she could live without.

“You already do. It’s okay. How could you not?

I don’t even know why you’re fighting it. I love you too.”

And Zynara was deeply concerned that that was true.