Girl in the Bedouin Tent

CHAPTER TWO

CASSIE’S eyes flicked from his flattened mouth to the tiny trickle of blood drying on the burnished skin of his neck. She drew a slow breath as he picked up the paring knife, but relaxed with a shiver of relief when he merely wiped it clean on a snowy cloth and began to pare an orange. Mesmerised, she watched the precise way he sliced the peel, the supple flick of strong wrists and the deft movements of his long fingers.

‘I’m not accustomed to waiting.’ Steel threaded his smooth voice and she started.

‘And I’m not accustomed to being abducted!’

Straight black brows winged up. ‘Abduction? That changes things.’ He stilled, his eyes on her.

Cassie had the feeling he saw deep, beyond the overdone make-up, the decorative henna on her hands and feet and the dark cloak. That he saw right down to the woman trying desperately to conquer fear with bravado.

The silence lengthened. She should be pleading, demanding help. Persuading him with her eloquence. Words were her stock in trade, after all. Yet something in his steady, assessing gaze dried the words on her tongue. Her agitated pulse slowed a fraction.

When at last he spoke again his tone was light. ‘You must forgive my curiosity. Being attacked with a knife is something of a novelty. It makes me inquisitive.’

His lips quirked up at one side and Cassie’s heart gave a tiny jump of surprise.

She wanted to trust him, but could she?

Was he in cahoots with her abductors?

‘You mean the chain didn’t give it away? The fact that I might be here against my will?’ Cassie lifted her chin. If only anger could melt the hard metal that kept her captive!

‘I’m afraid I had other things on my mind.’

She felt an unwilling flicker of appreciation at his self-deprecating humour. He was a cool customer. Being attacked by a desperate woman wielding a knife hadn’t ruffled his composure one iota!

Nor had it affected his exquisite manners. With another graceful movement he reached for a ewer and bowl and silently invited her to wash her hands. Despite her dire situation, or perhaps because of it, his old-fashioned courtesy soothed her shredded nerves.

Slowly Cassie extended her hands over the bowl. He poured water over her fingers, waited till she rubbed them clean, then poured again.

He passed her a towel of fine cotton, careful not to touch her. Cassie drew in a quick breath of relief and dried her hands, trying not to notice that even his hands were attractive—strong and well shaped.

Instead she concentrated on the soft comfort of the towel. How different the luxury here compared with the Spartan tent where she’d been held!

Only the best for a royal sheikh.

‘Besides,’ he continued as if uninterrupted, ‘the chain could have been a ploy.’

‘A ploy?’ Cassie’s voice rose and her body froze in outrage. ‘A ploy? You think I’m wearing this thing for fun? It’s heavy and uncomfortable and … inhuman!’

And it made her feel like a chattel, a thing rather than a person.

Cassie pulled the thick cloak tighter round herself, seeking comfort in its concealing folds.

The abduction had been shocking and terrifying, but being tethered with a chain like an animal plumbed the depths of her darkest fears. It put her captors’ intentions on a new and horrible level.

Even her mother, whose life had revolved around pleasing a man, had never faced a reality so brutal.

‘As you say. Even in this lawless part of the world, I didn’t expect to find kidnap and slavery.’

At her wide-eyed stare he went on. ‘In the old days, centuries ago, slaves were held that way.’ He nodded curtly to the chain that snaked across the floor towards the bed. ‘It’s a slave chain. I thought it possible Mustafa had used it symbolically, rather than seriously.’

‘You thought I might have agreed to this? That I chose to dress this way?’ Cassie snapped her mouth shut, remembering her struggles as the women had stripped her clothes away. The horror when they’d produced this gaudy outfit that barely covered her breasts and drew attention to every curve.

She remembered too the searing look, quickly veiled, in this man’s eyes when she’d been brought before him in the communal tent. It had heated her as no fire could.

‘I didn’t know what to think. I don’t know you.’

Cassie drew a calming breath. Finally she nodded.

He was right. He knew as little of her as she did of him. The chain could have been a stage prop worn for effect—there to spice the jaded appetites of a man who got turned on by the idea of a woman totally at his mercy. A woman with no function but to please him.

Was Amir that sort of man?

Without warning that ancient memory broke through her weary brain’s defences again. The one memory she usually kept locked tightly away. Of Curtis Bevan, who’d been her mother’s lover the year Cassie turned sixteen. How he’d strutted around her mother’s apartment with condescending pride, knowing everything there was bought with his money. Even his lover. How he’d turned his proprietorial eyes on Cassie that day she’d come home for Christmas—

‘Cassie?’

The sound of her name in that soft-as-suede voice shattered the recollection. She looked up into a cool obsidian gaze that she would swear saw too much. Her breath snared and for a moment she foundered, caught between her nightmare past and the present.

Deliberately she straightened her shoulders.

‘For the record, I don’t want to be here! When you came in I thought …’ Her words dried at the recollection of what she’d thought. That he’d come here for sex. That it wouldn’t matter if she was unwilling.

‘You thought you had no choice.’ His voice was low and his expression softened. ‘The pre-emptive strike was a good move. A brave one.’

Cassie shook her head. ‘Just desperate.’

It had become clear within seconds she had no chance against him. He’d subdued her so quickly, lashed her threshing limbs into immobility and toppled her with an ease that merely reinforced his physical superiority.

Whatever happened now she had more sense than to try to overcome this man physically. She needed him fighting for her, not against her.

‘Who is this Mustafa? What makes him think he has the right to give me to you like this?’

Amir shrugged, his wide shoulders drawing her unwilling gaze. She told herself her fascination with his sculpted features, his aura of power, was because he was her only hope of getting out of here.

‘Mustafa is a bandit chief. He rules these mountains down to the border with Tarakhar. We’re in his camp.’

Silently he offered her a plate of orange segments and dates. It was her first food in over twenty-four hours.

Yet she hesitated, wondering at the possibility it had been tampered with. That fear had kept her from devouring it earlier while she waited alone, frantically trying to break the chain.

But he had no need to drug her. She was already at his mercy.

Determined, Cassie forced her mind from the insidious thought.

Carefully she reached for a piece of orange. Its flavour burst like sunshine in her mouth, stinging like blazes where she’d bitten her tongue during their skirmish. Her eyes almost closed in sheer bliss despite the pain. She swallowed and reached for another piece.

‘You were going to tell me how you got here.’ The dark voice jerked her attention back to the man seated opposite her.

His hooded eyes gleamed with an expression she couldn’t name. Was it curiosity, as he’d said? Had she imagined that flash of predatory male interest when he’d first seen her and again as she lay beneath him?

Cassie recalled his touch on her bare skin and shivered. Anxiety swirled in her stomach, and a flutter of something else she couldn’t put a name to.

‘I was travelling through Tarakhar by bus.’

‘By yourself?’ Was that disapproval in his tone?

Cassie’s spine stiffened. ‘I’m twenty-three and more than capable of travelling alone!’

Circumstances had forced Cassie into independence early. She’d never had the luxury of relying on others. Besides, her destination—a rural town near the border—wasn’t on the tourist route. She’d had to travel overland for the last part of the journey.

‘Visitors are welcomed and treated with respect in Tarakhar. Yet it’s advisable not to travel alone.’

‘So I’ve discovered.’ Cassie shot him an eloquent look, her ire rising. Anger, she’d found, was preferable to fear. How dared he blame her for what had happened? She was the innocent party!

‘A travel warning for foreign visitors might be useful. Perhaps you could have one issued since you’re in charge?’ Her voice dropped to saccharine sweetness. ‘Maybe something about travellers being fair game for kidnappers?’

His eyes narrowed, yet she couldn’t read his expression.

Finally he nodded. ‘You’re right. Action must be taken.’

Cassie watched the grooves deepen around his mouth and wondered what action he had in mind. Despite his stillness and his relaxed pose, she sensed he wasn’t nearly as laid-back as he appeared.

Finally she asked the question she’d been putting off. ‘You said Mustafa rules these mountains.’ She paused, delaying the inevitable. ‘Aren’t we in Tarakhar any more?’

‘No. We’re no longer in my country but in the neighbouring state of Bhutran. It’s Mustafa’s tribal territory and he rules with an iron fist.’

Cassie’s heart plunged. She’d already experienced the iron fist. But she’d hoped, prayed, they were still in Tarakhar, where help might reach her. Where Sheikh Amir had authority. Bhutran was a lawless state—notoriously so.

Despair threatened to swamp her but she fought it. Her only hope lay in not giving up. She still had to find a way out of here.

Cassie forced herself to reach for the fruit platter. She needed energy to escape.

Amir watched her devour the fruit with delicate greed. The combination of feisty opponent, all flashing eyes and quick tongue, with soft femininity intrigued him. More than he could remember being intrigued in a long, long time.

In repose her lips were a soft pout of invitation, glistening with fruit juice. The tip of her pink tongue appeared now and then to swipe the excess moisture. Amir realised her sensuality was innate, not contrived.

Yet it wasn’t anything as simple as sexual magnetism alone that intrigued him.

The moment Mustafa had presented her in a flourish of generosity her sparking gaze had sizzled across the space between them, piercing Amir’s boredom at the gathering’s false bonhomie and crude revelry.

Later, through his fury at her attack, he’d still registered her pliant body cushioning him and her delicate scent: desert rose and warm woman.

He’d known women, had women in all sorts of circumstances. It had become rare for one to quicken his pulse.

She reached for a date and her cloak slipped enough to reveal the smooth, pale skin of her collarbone, her cleavage. The cloak slid again to show straining midnight blue silk. The material scooped indecently low, revealing far too much of one full, perfect breast.

He recalled how she’d looked in the skimpy dancing costume. She was all lush curves, with a slender waist accentuated by what he’d thought at the time was merely a decorative chain.

Amir yanked his gaze away. He needed to focus!

‘Why were you travelling in this region?’ The border country wasn’t a sightseeing area.

Violet eyes clashed with his before she looked away, hurriedly securing the gaping front of her cloak.

‘I’ve been accepted on to a volunteer programme, teaching English to adults for a couple of months.’

‘You’re a teacher?’ He tried not to let his surprise show. Obviously these weren’t her normal clothes. Look at the way she’d just covered up. Yet still he found it difficult, imagining her in a classroom.

‘It’s not my field back home in Australia, but they were eager for volunteers and it sounded … fulfilling.’

This woman grew more interesting by the moment. He could picture her at home in a bustling, lively city. She was so full of energy and opinions. Teaching in a provincial school was the last place he’d imagine her. ‘How did you get here?’

One neat hand clutched the coarse fabric of her cloak and her jaw hardened.

‘The bus broke down in the foothills near the border. Apparently it was a major mechanical problem, something that couldn’t be fixed quickly. All the passengers headed off across country to their own homes. There was just me and the driver left, and then.’ She shrugged, a jerky little movement that belied her show of casualness. ‘Then we heard a sound like thunder.’

She flashed a look at him. Behind the defiance he detected a shadow that might have been fear.

Instinctively Amir leaned towards her, only to straighten abruptly when she recoiled.

It wasn’t a reaction to which he was accustomed.

‘Horsemen came galloping down from the mountains. They grabbed me.’ Her voice flattened to an emotionless pitch that anyone less observant might mistake for insouciance. ‘I lost sight of the driver in all the dust and milling horses.’ She paused. ‘He’d been kind to me. I … don’t know what happened to him.’

‘You needn’t fear for him. A report of the raid came through as I travelled here. The driver is recovering from concussion in hospital.’

Anger ignited in Amir’s belly. For Mustafa to have led a violent raid and the abduction of a foreign national inside Tarakhan’s borders the day before Amir’s visit was little short of a direct insult.

Yet it wasn’t Mustafa’s arrogance that rankled. It was what had been done to this remarkable woman. Terrified, abducted and abused, she still managed to hold her own, challenging him and giving no ground even when it was patently clear she was dependent on his goodwill.

Was it her vulnerability or her courage that sliced straight through the diffidence he wore like a second skin?

Long dormant emotions stirred uneasily.

It was understandable he’d feel pity. Yet when had he truly cared on a personal level about anyone? Cared for anything but work or his own pleasure?

His lips twisted. He hadn’t.

Amir was self-sufficient and glad of it. He’d never experienced love, even as a child. Nor had friendship been permitted with the other boys who, with him, had learned the ways of a Tarakhan warrior under his uncle’s stern eye.

With the ease of long practice Amir turned his mind to more important matters.

Tonight he’d been the polite guest, playing the game of diplomacy and courtesy to the hilt. He’d allowed Mustafa to bask in the honour of hosting a man far more powerful than he could ever hope to be. Tomorrow his host would find a change in his revered guest.

Mustafa might live in a chaotic nation where the rule of law barely existed, but he’d soon discover the Sheikh of Tarakhar was no pushover. Earlier Amir had been impatient at the need for slow negotiations when an all-important personal arrangement required his attention at home. Now he looked forward to making Mustafa squirm.

‘The driver’s really OK?’

Amir saw concern on her pale features and felt a stab of admiration. Despite her own situation she was worried for the driver.

‘He’ll be fine. He was knocked unconscious, which would be why he didn’t raise the alarm about your kidnap.’

A tide of impatience rose that he was sitting talking when every nerve screamed for action. Amir was about to surge to his feet when her expression caught his notice.

She pretended strength and insouciance, yet her posture was a little too perfect. Instead of lounging on the comfortable cushions she sat erect, as if ready for anything, even sudden attack. She’d flinched earlier at his exclamations of outrage. Obviously she still didn’t trust him. How could she?

Amir subsided onto the banked cushions.

‘You’ve been with Mustafa’s men since the abduction?’

She nodded slowly, and he couldn’t help but read significance into the fact that this time she didn’t elaborate. He’d already learned she wasn’t afraid to express her opinion.

What had they done to her?

His stomach clenched at the possibilities.

Cassie watched him pour juice into a chased goblet that looked as if it dated from the time of the crusades. Who knew? Perhaps it did.

His hand, the colour of dark honey, looked strong and capable as he held it out to her.

‘Thank you.’ She reached to take it from him, careful only to touch the cool metal. She remembered the heat of his skin on hers, the curious sensation when he touched her, and knew better than to risk further contact.

He was too disturbing, even now when he sat with easy composure, drawing out her story, each movement measured and non-threatening. She couldn’t forget her sense of peril as she’d stared into fathomless dark eyes and that grim slash of a mouth.

What disturbed her most was the conviction the danger lay not only in his physical strength, his ability to subdue her bodily. It lay in that indefinable aura that tugged at her consciousness. The way her senses, though battered by kidnap and confinement, stirred when he gave that rueful half smile. When he apologised for being distracted, fighting for his life. When his eyes met hers and something unnamed sizzled through the air.

That didn’t stop her covertly noticing the slight shadow along his jaw that made him look like a sexy bandit, and the way his full lower lip and mobile mouth turned severe features into something far too appealing.

Cassie blinked, shocked. Her mind was wandering. She clasped her hands tight and leaned closer.

‘Now you know I’m here against my will, you’ll be able to get me away from here.’ Even outside his realm surely he’d be able to help her.

The silence lengthened. Her confident smile grew ragged.

The hastily stitched fabric of her defences began to unravel. Each second that ticked past shredded her nerves. The thud of her heart, so fast she felt dizzy with it, almost deafened her. He must help!

He couldn’t ignore what had happened to her. Finally he spoke. ‘Unfortunately it’s not that simple.’

‘Not simple?’ Her stunned voice echoed hoarsely. She felt betrayed. She’d counted on his assistance.

‘I’m afraid not. You need to be patient.’

Stiffening her spine, Cassie stared at the man sitting so imperturbably. Shadows from the lamps cast elongated shadows across the strong lines of his face, accentuating the way his hooded eyelids veiled his expression.

Didn’t he understand her desperation?

Unless he’d decided it was in his own interests not to help her.

Had she been gulled into a false sense of security by his calm questions and his mellow tone?

Breathing slowly, trying not to hyperventilate, Cassie told herself the Sheikh of Tarakhar couldn’t be interested in her. She had none of the sultry allure or seductive experience she imagined his lovers possessed. Despite the stark austerity of his clothes, he looked like a man who’d only settle for the best.

If it came to sexual skills, Cassie wasn’t in the running.

But then experience wasn’t always required. She knew that from bitter experience.

Surreptitiously she slid her hand under cover of her cloak to where he had carelessly abandoned the knife, holding his gaze unblinking all the while.

‘Sheathe your claws, kitten. You have no need of a blade now.’

Kitten! Indignation swamped doubt as her fingers clenched convulsively on the hilt of the fruit knife. ‘No?’ She tilted her chin.

‘No. I do not harm women.’ The glint in his gaze spoke of pride and outrage.

But she’d take no chances. ‘In the circumstances I know you’ll understand if I reserve the right to protect myself.’

Not by so much as a flicker of his eyelids did he move. Yet his features grew taut, the grooves beside his mouth deepening, the angle of his jaw becoming razor-sharp.

Amir regarded her with stunned curiosity. His word was not enough? He wasn’t to be trusted?

Surely she couldn’t believe him to be cut from the same cloth as Mustafa and his cronies?

It seemed she could.

She lifted her chin, revealing a slender throat that reminded him of her fragility despite her bone-deep defiance. Luminous skin caught his eye, so at odds with her gaudy make-up.

Something stirred inside. Respect for this woman who didn’t realise she had no need to keep fighting.

He thought of the long years he’d spent proving himself again and again, fighting against doubt, scorching disapproval and ever-present prejudice. That determination to keep fighting had got him where he was today. Who was he to insist she give up?

‘If it gives you comfort, then by all means keep the knife.’

He paused and smiled, expecting acknowledgment of his gesture. After all, to bear arms in the presence of royalty had been till recently a capital offence.

She remained stony-faced and he was torn between exasperation at her distrust and approval of her determination.

Amir gestured towards the outer wall. ‘But don’t try attacking one of Mustafa’s guards with it. They’re trained warriors. They won’t hesitate to use maximum force if attacked. You’ll come off worst.’

‘Tell me something I don’t know.’ Her eyes sparked fire. ‘You call them warriors? Kidnapping an unarmed woman? I thought the men here would have more pride.’

‘You’re right. Their behaviour blemishes honour.’

The mark branded him too. She’d been in his kingdom when abducted. It sickened him that she’d been plucked from his country and subjected to this.

‘Mustafa’s men will do what Mustafa tells them to.’

‘And you?’

She went too far this time.

‘Ms Denison.’ His voice rang with hauteur. ‘I give my word you have nothing to fear from me. The first I knew of your presence was when you were brought to me at the feasting tent.’

‘I …’ She faltered and her gaze dipped. ‘I see. Thank you.’

Like a balloon pricked by a pin, she seemed to deflate before his eyes. Instantly, regret lashed him. Where was his control? Strive as he might to reassure, his reactions to Cassandra Denison were too raw and unpredictable.

How to gentle her and win her trust?

He had a lifetime’s experience in pleasuring women. His lovers were well satisfied. But since adolescence females had pursued him. All he’d had to do was reach out and select the one he wanted. He treated them well, but he’d never had to exert himself to win a woman’s trust.

How was he to deal with this woman who defied yet intrigued him? A woman so reluctantly dependent on him?

CHAPTER THREE

‘WHY isn’t it so simple?’

‘Pardon?’

Cassie struggled to sound calm. ‘Getting me away from here. You said it’s not that simple.’

‘That’s right.’ He poured himself a drink, then raised a golden goblet to his lips.

Frowning, Cassie looked away to the table between them. There was something disturbingly intimate about watching the strong muscles of his burnished throat as he tipped his head back to drink.

Was it the stress of her situation that made her so hyperalert? Or the intimacy of this quiet lamplit haven, so peaceful after her recent trauma?

Slowly he lowered the goblet, and she had the unnerving feeling he was preparing to break bad news.

‘I’ve just arrived and I won’t be leaving for a week.’

Cassie nodded. ‘And.?’

‘And you will have to remain here till then.’