The Oil Prince (Contemporary Romance)
Read The Oil Prince (Contemporary Romance) Online
Authors: Kate Goldman
Published by Kate Goldman
Copyright © 2015 by Kate Goldman
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems – except in the case of brief quotations in articles or reviews – without the permission in writing from its publisher, Kate Goldman.
Table of Contents
“Hey! Jerk!” Emily screamed after a car that had just driven over a puddle and splashed her. The driver did not even stop. She watched the car until it disappeared. She was annoyed that the driver did not even pull up to check that she was fine. Emily was just on her way back home after having gone for a walk on a Sunday afternoon. She looked down at her jeans, they were soaked. She growled and tried to wipe them with her hands but it was of no use. She sighed and just started walking again.
She walked down the street and turned around a corner, quickening her pace to get home earlier. As she was passing the gas station on the corner, she started contemplating going into the convenience store to pick up a few items. Then she remembered her dirty, wet jeans and thought about how bad she must look in them. As she approached the shop, she saw a parked Bentley. She recognized the last digits on the license plate, it was the same car that had driven over the puddle earlier.
There was a man leaning against the car. He was wearing a white shirt and a pair of black trousers. He had caramel-colored skin, dark eyebrows, a straight medium-sized nose, a well-trimmed beard, and jet-black hair. He was looking at his phone. Emily quickly approached him. “Excuse me,” she said.
He had dark eyes and a cold stare. “Can I help you with something?” he asked Emily. His voice was deep and cold. It sent shivers down her spine.
“Yes,” Emily replied. “Earlier you drove over a puddle and it splashed me.” His eyes dropped to the obvious wet patch on her jeans and back up to her face. She was not very tall. Her skin was a nice caramel color. She had very curly light brown coils of hair tied up into a messy bun. She had brown eyes and medium-sized lips.
“So do you want money for dry cleaning?” he asked her. He did not really understand what her point was. Either way, she needed the money to dress a little bit more elegantly. Even if she had not been splashed by the water, she was still dressed untidily. She hadn’t even brushed her hair.
Emily frowned at him. He was quite rude. “A simple apology would be fine,” she snapped.
“Apology?” He raised his eyebrows. He was definitely not going to apologize. He was not used to doing so, and he never really had to.
“Yes, an apology.”
He put his hand in his pocket and fished out his wallet. He pulled out a few hundred dollars and attempted to give them to Emily. She looked at his hand and laughed sarcastically.
So he is one of those arrogant rich
men,
Emily thought to herself.
“I do not want your money,” she said to him.
“Not enough?” he asked and fished out more money.
“I don’t want your money!” Emily raised her voice. It was so insulting, and she could not understand why he was behaving that way. “Why can’t you just apologize like a normal person?” she asked.
“Did you not come here to be compensated?” he asked.
“No, I did not.”
He scanned her body from head to toe. “You could use the money. Your wardrobe is in need of assistance,” he said to her. Her dress sense was not up to par. He was used to seeing women dressed better than that.
“Excuse me? You have not even seen my wardrobe.”
“I have seen enough,” he said with a slight frown on his face.
“Don’t insult me.” Emily placed her hands on her hips.
“I was not insulting you.”
“People like you are a waste of time.”
“People like me?”
“Yes! You rich people think that you are above everyone else. I am just wasting my breath here.” Emily rolled her eyes and walked off. There was no point in arguing with him. It seemed that he was not going to apologize to her.
The man just shrugged his shoulders and watched her walking away. He went through life not having to apologize for anything. He was the way he was. It surprised him that she had not taken the money from him. After all, that was what most people wanted from him anyway, minimum-wage earning people were easily bought. All he had to do was wave a few dollar bills at them and they would do whatever he wanted them to do.
On Monday Emily went to the office of the company where she worked after attending several meetings in the morning. “Hi, Rachel,” Emily greeted the receptionist on her way in.
“Hello, Emily,” the receptionist replied. “Prince Fady asked that you see him as soon as you arrived,” she added. Emily gave Rachel a questioning look.
“Does he want a report or something?”
“I am not sure what the reason is.”
“Okay.” Emily quickly dashed into her office to drop off her bag and then she headed to Prince Fady’s office. His secretary greeted her when she arrived and escorted her in. Emily bowed her head to the sheikh. “Good afternoon, Prince Fady,” she said to him.
Prince Fady was a prince of a Middle Eastern country called Al-Bisha. He was the second eldest son. There were four boys and two girls in total. His family owned an oil company and they had extended their business to the U.S. Their branch in Dallas was responsible for receiving their imported oil from Al-Bisha and then selling it to some U.S. companies from Dallas. They also had a few oilfields in Dallas and Houston, and a refinery in Dallas. Prince Fady had been managing the Dallas branch. His role included meeting with business partners, inspecting the imported oil, and recruiting the engineers and geophysicists. He was very hands-on with his work. He was quite meticulous. Emily had been working for him for just two years and in that time, she had quickly gained his recognition due to her hard work and intelligent ideas.
“Miss Gibson, come in.” Sheikh Fady smiled at Emily. The sheikh was sitting on one of the sofas in his office.
“You wanted to–” Before Emily could finish speaking, she noticed that there was another man sitting across from the sheikh. He was dressed in navy blue trousers and a white shirt. He was looking down at his phone. She gasped when she recognized him. “Oh my,” she said.
“What is the matter?” the sheikh asked her.
“Your guest, I’ve met him before.”
“Really?” the sheikh asked. “Basil, do you know her?” he asked the man. The man looked up and saw Emily standing there. He frowned, he recognized her from the previous day. She looked at him with the same displeased expression. At least this time she was dressed well and her hair was brushed.
“I do not. I just met her yesterday,” Basil replied.
“Come join us,” the sheikh said to Emily. She reluctantly went to join them. “It is good that the two of you have already met,” he added.
“Why? Who is she?” Basil asked. He put his phone down.
“This is Emily. She is one of the petrophysicists.”
“She works here?”
“Yes.”
“As a petrophysicist?” He couldn’t believe that Emily was one of the people that analyzed the physical properties of rocks and land before drilling. It was the petrophysicists who concluded whether to drill and how to proceed. He could not see Emily doing that kind of job.
“Yes.”
Basil grunted. He was very shocked. He would have expected her to work at some retail shop as a counter service assistant or in an office as a secretary. Emily could hear the judgment in his voice. Clearly he was surprised. She narrowed her gaze at him and wanted to swear at him but she could not, since her boss was sitting right there. She also wanted to let him know that she had a master’s in geophysics and had graduated at the top of her class.
“Emily, this is my younger brother, Basil,” Sheikh Fady said. Her eyes flew open.
“Brother?” she asked.
“Yes, and he will be around for a while. I will get to the point. We have the opportunity to work with Magenta Oils. I would like to us to supply methane to them. This gives us an opportunity to expand into the methane business. Basil is going to be in charge of this project and I need you to work with him.”
Emily had a thousand questions running through her mind. At first she thought that it was great that they were going to work with Magenta Oils. It was one of the biggest oil companies in America. “Me?” she asked. The second thing that went through her mind was the fact that she was going to work with Basil. She did not want to work with Basil.
“Yes.”
“No,” Basil said. He did not want to work with Emily, either. His father the king had sent him to Dallas because he was so sick of Basil not working at the family company and being irresponsible. He was always getting in trouble, and it was reflecting badly on the royal family. The king had warned him many times but Basil did not listen. So the king wanted to revoke his title as prince and cut off all his finances, but Fady had suggested that Basil work with him in Dallas on this new project. The king agreed. If Basil failed or refused, then he would have his title revoked. Basil had no choice but to comply.
Fady raised his eyebrows when Basil said no. “Basil?” Fady said.
“Must I work with her?” Basil asked. Fady was not surprised that Basil spoke his mind. His younger brother never held back his thoughts. What surprised Fady was the fact that he did not want to work with Emily. He wondered what transpired when they met, that made his brother not want to work with her.
“Yes, I chose her because she is the best.”
Emily looked surprised, but pleased. She felt warm inside after hearing Fady’s words. He was the boss but they did not work together that often. They had worked together on a couple of projects and he approved of her work, he said things like “good job” or “good” but he never called her the best. Emily had a small smile on her face. It quickly faded when Basil responded to Fady.
“Really?” he asked sardonically.
“Yes. So I need the two of you to work together,” Fady replied. He wanted Emily to work with his brother because he had seen her work, she was highly organized, very intelligent, and good at her job. He could see that she had the potential to progress even further.
Basil sighed. “How will this work?” he asked.
“My assistant is printing out the paperwork. I will have her give both of you copies, and then the two of you can start the planning and decide how you want to start. I will provide you with a team to work with.”
“What kind of paperwork?” Basil asked.
“Details about the land, budget, the workers, everything regarding the project.”
“How long will it be for?” Emily asked.
“We have three months to provide 200 barrels,” Fady replied. Emily’s eyes widened.
“It is a bit much,” Emily replied. They hadn’t even started drilling yet. It was hard to know if the land would produce 200 barrels, and they only had three months to produce that amount. Emily could foresee a bumpy couple of months ahead.
“Yes, it is. I suppose that they have other suppliers approaching them. Can you handle this project?”
“Yes, I can, your highness.” Emily always loved to challenge herself when it came to her work. She never gave up on a project without trying.
“Good. You may return to your work,” said Fady.
Emily got up and left the room. She was full of mixed emotions. She was excited to have an opportunity to gain new experience. However time was limited, and they were dealing with a big company. The pressure was definitely on. Because of her initial meeting with Basil, she was not keen on him. He was not polite. She did not want to work with him but she did not have a choice.
“So how did you and Miss Gibson meet?” Fady asked Basil after Emily had left the room. Basil sighed furiously before he replied. “It could not have been that bad,” Fady added.
“It was that bad,” Basil said.
“What happened?”
Basil narrated the incident back to his brother. He was still not pleased about it. Back in Al-Bisha, no woman would ever speak to him like that. Fady laughed a little as he listened to his brother speaking. “She was not that bad,” Fady said.
“Is that you being humorous? I did not appreciate her speaking to me like that. She should have just taken the money and left.”
“You should have just apologized.”
Basil frowned at Fady. “I was not the one driving,” he said.
“She did not know that,” Fady replied.
“That is not my fault.”
“It partially is. You cannot just offer money to people like that and insult their dress sense in the same token.” Fady found the situation a little bit amusing. He would have never pegged Emily as a feisty woman but then again his brother’s impudence was to blame for her reaction.
“Her wardrobe needed assistance. Do I really have to work with her?” Basil asked.
“Yes, you will have to. Just keep it professional. It will only be for three months. Besides, she is not that bad to work with.”
Basil sighed. “Are you confident that this will work? Three months is not a long time,” he voiced his concern to his brother. Basil had no choice but to get this project completed, it was better than losing his title. However he was still worried about the project.
“Yes, I am confident. You can do it,” Fady replied. He could see potential in his younger brother. He had a PhD in engineering. Basil was very intelligent but he was lazy. He was not interested in working for the family company. After he graduated, he never used his degree. He spent his days either in his villa or on a yacht partying and traveling.
