Billionaire Prince by Minx Hardbringer, Jenna Chase

The Prince
    Watching her on the security camera has me more excited than I’ve been in years. Until the moment I saw Lorelei slipping the sapphire and diamond necklace and crown into her purse, I felt dead inside.
    Most people would love to be me, and I know how arrogant that sounds. I’m rich, I’m royalty, and I can have anything and everything I want. The problem is that after three decades of living that way, having everything handed to me has become dull. I long for a challenge. A statuesque blond challenge in the form of a beautiful jewel thief.
    I knew as soon as I saw her that I had to have her, and she gave me every reason I need to keep her. In my country, the crime of theft carries a hefty prison sentence. It could be worse than prison too. Especially since the jewelry she stole are part of the royal jewelry collection gifted to my country a hundred years ago by the French.
    My father would have had her hands cut off, but I’ve changed things. He’s a senile old man now, and that has allowed me to put an end to the violence of his reign. I’ve helped usher in a new era of peace and prosperity for our little country, but now I need an heir.
    The laws of our country will allow my younger brother to contest my claim to the throne if I don’t have a male child by the time I’m thirty-five. Since that’s only a few years away, it’s time I start making babies to secure my rule. The problem is, I don’t have a wife.
    I think I just found one.
    I didn’t have her arrested at the palace because I didn’t want my father or brothers to get to her before I had the chance to speak with her. The way the question suspected thieves is a little more intense than the methods I want employed on my future wife. We no longer torture people, but we don’t make it pleasant either.
    I’m having her taken to my compound, so I go down and meet my driver in the palace’s underground parking garage. The trip from the airport will take just under an hour, so I have time to make it to the compound and prepare for her arrival.

Lorelei
    I’m sandwiched between two huge men, and I’m glad the air conditioning in the SUV is on full blast. I’ve tried to get them to tell me why I’m being detained, but they just look at me skeptically and tell me I know why.
    I do know why, and I’m trying not to panic.
    My stomach churns when I realize we aren’t going to the palace. I watch out the window in horror as we take the highway around the capital city. If we’re not going to the palace, the only other possibility I can think of is one of the country’s three secret, or not so secret anymore, prisons.
    If that’s where we go, I’m as good as dead. No one will ever hear from me again. I took my first job stealing jewels for Vigo because my grandmother was sick and couldn’t afford the treatment for her cancer. I answered an ad looking for young, attractive women who were athletic. I thought it was for acting or modeling, but it turned out he was recruiting jewel thieves.
    After the first job, he blackmailed me into doing more. My last job was in Germany, and it was a narrow escape. I told him I wanted out, and that I didn’t care if he turned me in. In my opinion, going to prison is better than dying. At least, American prison is better than dying. Grandma is healthy again, and I don’t want to do this anymore.
    So, Vigo sent three armed men to my grandmother’s house to hold her hostage until I stole the Najadin crown jewels. Now I’m going down for a crime I never wanted to commit, and I can’t save my grandmother.
    Tears start to spill down my cheeks, and the big guy hands me his handkerchief. It’s a surprisingly sweet gesture given the circumstances.
    “Thank you.” I say and wipe my cheeks.
    “I know you’re worried, Ma’am, but we don’t cut people’s hands off anymore.” He says with a slight smile.
    That’s about the time that the house comes into view. A high fence surrounds it, but other than that, it