Annalisa narrowed her eyes against the setting sun.

A shadow. More than a shadow. A man. She made out broad shoulders and dark clothes. Remarkably, for this place, he was wearing what looked like a suit as he took a step down the dune, letting the slip of sand carry him several metres.

But as she watched his slow progress she realised something was wrong. Instincts honed by years of helping her father tend to the sick overrode her wariness. The stranger was no threat. He looked as if he could barely stay upright. Moments later she was racing towards him.

Her steps slowed as she neared and took in the full impact of his appearance.

Her breath hissed in her throat. Disbelief filled her. She blinked, but the image was clear and unmistakable.

A tall man, dark-haired, wearing a tuxedo and black leather shoes, was slipping down the dune towards her. His dress shirt was ripped open and filthy, revealing bronzed skin and the top of a broad chest. A dark ribbon, the end of a bow tie, fluttered against his collarbone.

His face was long and lean and so caked in sand she could barely make out his features. Yet the solid shape of his jaw and the high angle of his cheeks hinted at a devastating masculine beauty. His temple was a mass of dried blood that made her suck in a dismayed breath.

But it was his eyes that held her still as he slithered down the slope. Piercing blue, they mesmerised her. Such an unexpected colour here in a desert kingdom.

Many years ago there were two Mediterranean islands, ruled as one kingdom—Adamas. But bitter family feuds ripped Adamas apart and the islands went their separate ways. The Greek Karedes family reigned supreme over glamorous Aristo, and the smouldering Al’Farisi sheikhs commanded the desert lands of Calista!

When the Aristan king died, an illegitimate daughter was discovered—Stefania, the rightful heir to the throne! Ruthlessly, the Calistan Sheikh King Zakari seduced her into marriage, to claim absolute power, but was over-awed by her purity—and succumbed to love. Now they rule both Aristo and Calista together, in the spirit of hope and prosperity.

But a black mark hangs over the Calistan royal family still. As young boys, three of King Zakari’s brothers were kidnapped for ransom by pirates. Two returned safely, but the youngest was swept out to sea and never found—presumed dead. Then, at Stefania’s coronation, a stranger appeared in their midst—the ruler of a nearby kingdom, Qusay. A stranger with scars on his wrists from pirates’ ropes. A stranger who knows nothing of his past—only his future as a king!

What will happen when Xavian, King of Qusay, discovers that he’s living the wrong life?

And who will claim the Qusay throne if the truth is unveiled?

Find out more in the exciting, brand-new Modern Romance™ mini-series

DARK-HEARTED DESERT MEN

A kingdom torn apart by scandal; a throne left empty; four smouldering desert princes…Which one will claim the crown—and who will they claim as their brides?

Book 1. WEDLOCKED: BANISHED SHEIKH, UNTOUCHED QUEEN

by Carol Marinelli

Book 2. TAMED: THE BARBARIAN KING

by Jennie Lucas

Book 3. FORBIDDEN: THE SHEIKH’S VIRGIN

by Trish Morey

Book 4. SCANDAL: HIS MAJESTY’S LOVE-CHILD

by Annie West

Scandal: His Majesty’s Love-Child

By

Annie West

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Annie West spent her childhood with her nose between the covers of a book—a habit she retains. After years preparing government reports and official correspondence she decided to write something she really enjoys. And there’s nothing she loves more than a great romance. Despite her office-bound past she has managed a few interesting moments—including a marriage offer with the promise of a herd of camels to sweeten the contract. She is happily married to her ever-patient husband (who has never owned a dromedary). They live with their two children amongst the tall eucalypts at beautiful Lake Macquarie, on Australia’s east coast. You can e-mail Annie at www.annie-west.com, or write to her at PO Box 1041, Warners Bay, NSW 2282, Australia.

MILLS & BOON

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It was terrific working with you.

Thank you!

CHAPTER ONE

‘PLACE your bets, mesdames et messieurs.’

Sheikh Tahir Al’Ramiz glanced around the gaming table, at the crowd watching him with rapt attention, eager to see his next move. His gaze trawled past the stack of chips he’d won in the last hour.

A waiter hovered with a fresh bottle of champagne. Tahir nodded and turned to the woman pressed so eagerly against his side. Blonde, beautiful, accommodating. She’d turned heads from the moment they entered Monte Carlo’s opulent old casino.

She moved and the fortune in diamonds encircling her throat and dripping down her superb cleavage flashed in the chandelier’s mellow light. Her stunning evening dress of beaded silver was testament to the effect wealth and a world-class couturier could achieve.

She smiled, the sort of intimate, eager smile women had been giving him since adolescence.

He passed her a flute of France’s finest champagne and leant back in his seat, finally acknowledging what he’d felt all evening.

He was bored.

Last time it had taken him two days to tire of Monte Carlo. This time he’d just arrived.

‘Last bets, mesdames et messieurs.’

Stifling a sigh, Tahir caught the croupier’s eye. ‘Quatorze,’ he said.

The croupier nodded and moved Tahir’s chips.

A hush fell as the crowd sucked in its collective breath. People on the other side of the table hurried to follow his lead, placing last-minute bets.

‘Fourteen?’ said the blonde, eyes widening. ‘You’re betting it all on one number?’

Tahir shrugged and lifted his glass. Idly he noted how the faint tremor in his hand made the surface of the wine ripple.

How long since he’d slept? Two days? Three? There’d been New York, where he’d finally closed that media deal and stayed to party. Then Tunisia for some all-terrain racing, Oslo and Moscow for more business, then here to his cruiser in the marina.

Was his lifestyle finally catching up with him?

He tried to dredge up some interest, some concern, and failed.

With a flourish the croupier set the roulette wheel spinning.

Slender fingers gripped Tahir’s knee through the fine wool of his trousers. His companion’s breathing quickened as the wheel spun. Her hand slipped up his thigh.

Did she find the thrill of gambling, even by proxy, so arousing?

He almost envied her. Tahir knew that if she were to strip naked and offer herself to him here and now, he’d feel nothing. No desire. No excitement. Nothing.

She flashed him another smile, a sultry invitation, and leaned close, her breast pressing against his arm.

He really should remember her name.

Elsa? Erica? It eluded him. Because he hadn’t been interested enough to fix it in his mind? Or because his memory was becoming impaired?

His lips quirked briefly. Unfortunately his memory still functioned perfectly.

Some things he’d never forget.

No matter how hard he tried.

Elisabeth. That was it. Elisabeth Karolin Roswitha, Countess von Markburg.

Clamorous applause roused him from his thoughts. A cushioned embrace engulfed him as the Countess von Markburg almost climbed onto his lap in her excitement. Soft lips grazed his cheek, his mouth.

‘You’ve won again, Tahir!’ She pulled back, her eyes glittering with excitement. ‘Isn’t it marvellous?’

He moved his lips in what passed for a smile and raised his glass.

Tahir envied her that simple rush of pleasure. How long since he’d experienced that? Gambling didn’t do it for him any more. Business coups? Sometimes. Extreme sports? At least he got an adrenalin rush when he put his neck on the line. Sex?

He watched another woman approach. A dark-haired seductress wearing ruby drop earrings that brushed her bare shoulders and a dress that would have her locked up for indecency in a lot of countries.

And he felt not a flicker of response.

She stopped beside him, leaned down, giving him a view right down her dress, past unfettered breasts to her navel and beyond.

‘Tahir, darling. It’s been an age.’

Her lips opened against his and her tongue slicked along the seam of his lips. But he wasn’t in the mood.

Fatigue suddenly swamped him. Not physical tiredness, but the insidious grey nothingness that had plagued him so long.

He was tired of life.

Abruptly he pulled back from her hungry kiss. It was only months since they’d been together in Buenos Aires yet it felt a lifetime ago.

‘Elisabeth.’ He turned to the blonde still glued to his side. ‘Let me introduce Natasha Leung. Natasha, this is Elisabeth von Markburg.’

He nodded to the waiter, who produced another champagne flute.

‘Ah, it’s my favourite vintage,’ Natasha purred, standing closer, so her thigh slid against his. ‘Thank you.’

Over her shoulder Tahir caught the croupier’s expressionless gaze.

‘Place your bets, s’il vous plait.’

‘Quatorze,’ Tahir murmured.

‘Quatorze?’ The croupier’s impeccable reserve couldn’t hide the astonishment in his eyes. ‘Oui, monsieur.’

‘Fourteen again?’ Elisabeth’s voice rose shrilly. ‘But you’ll lose it all! The chances of getting the same number again are impossible.’

Tahir shrugged and, alerted by a discreet ring tone, dragged his mobile phone from his pocket. ‘Then I’ll lose.’

At the look of horror on her face Tahir almost smiled. Life was so simple for some.

He looked at the phone, frowning when he didn’t recognise the number displayed. Only his lawyer and his most trusted brokers had his private number. This wasn’t one of them.

‘Hello?’

‘Tahir?’ Even after so long that voice was unmistakable. Tahir surged to his feet, dislodging both the women clinging to him.

‘Kareef.’

Only something truly significant would make his eldest brother call him out of the blue and after so long. He turned his back on the table, gesturing to his companions to stay where they were. The crowd around him parted, as it always did, and he strode across the room to the privacy of a quiet corner.

‘This is an unexpected surprise,’ he murmured. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’

Silence. It stretched so long the back of his neck prickled.

‘I want you to come home.’ Kareef’s voice was as calm and familiar as it had always been.

But the words. They were words Tahir had never thought to hear.

‘I don’t have a home any more. Remember?’

A tiny part of long-dormant conscience told him he took out his old bitterness unfairly on Kareef. His brother wasn’t to blame for the disaster that was Tahir’s past.

He clamped his mouth shut.

‘You do now, Tahir.’ Something in his brother’s voice sent a tingle of premonition down his spine.

‘Our revered father would have something to say to that.’

‘Our father is dead.’

The words rolled like thunder in Tahir’s brain.

The brute who’d ruled his people and his family so corruptly was gone for ever.

The tyrant who’d betrayed his wife with a string of whores and mistresses. Who’d ruled his tribe by fear. Who’d thrashed Tahir time and again to within an inch of his life. Then had his thugs take over when Tahir grew old enough to defend himself against his father.

The man who’d exiled his youngest son when he’d finally done what the old Sheikh had probably secretly wanted and overstepped the mark completely.

Tahir had never been able to please his father, no matter how he tried. He’d spent his boyhood wondering what fault of his inspired such hatred.

But he’d long ago given up caring.

Tahir turned to look across the elegant room and its throng of late-night pleasure-seekers. In his mind’s eye it wasn’t the glamorous crowd he saw, the flirtatious and curious glances or the opulent display of wealth. It was Yazan Al’Ramiz’s bloodshot eyes, his bristling moustache flecked with spittle as he ranted and bellowed. The violent pounding of his clenched fists.

Surely Tahir should feel something, anything, at the news his tyrant father was dead? Even after eleven years’ absence the news must evoke some response?

A yawning void of darkness welled inside where once emotions had lodged.

He supposed he should have questions.

When? How? Wasn’t that what a child asked about a father’s death?

‘Still, I don’t feel a burning desire to return to Qusay.’ His tone was as blank as his mood. There was nothing for him in the land of his birth.

‘Damn it, Tahir. Stop playing the arrogant unfeeling bastard for a moment. I need you here. Things are complicated.’ Kareef paused. ‘I want you here.’

Something unfamiliar roiled deep in Tahir’s belly.

‘What do you need?’ Kareef had always been his favourite brother. The one he’d looked up to, in the long-ago days when he’d still tried to emulate his elders and betters. ‘What’s the problem?’

‘No problem,’ Kareef said in a curiously strained voice. ‘But our cousin has discovered he isn’t the rightful king of Qusay. He’s stood aside and I’m to take his place on the throne.’ He paused. ‘I want you here for my coronation.’

Tahir walked slowly to the roulette table.

Kareef’s news was momentous. To discover their cousin had been made King in error was almost unbelievable. He was no blood relation to the old King and Queen, but had been secretly taken in by them while they grieved the death of their real son. If it had been anyone other than Kareef telling the story Tahir would have doubted the news.

But Kareef would never make such an error. He was too careful, too responsible. He would make the perfect King for Qusay. Either of Tahir’s older brothers would.

Thank merciful fate their father wasn’t alive to inherit the throne! As brother to the old King and leader of a significant clan he’d been too powerful as it was—too dangerous. Having him rule the whole nation would have been like letting a wolf in amongst lambs.

A heart attack, Kareef had said.

No wonder. Their father had liked to indulge himself and hadn’t limited himself to one vice.

Tahir approached the gaming table. He saw his barely touched champagne and the two women waiting for him, both undoubtedly eager to give him whatever he desired tonight.

His lips curled. Perhaps he was more like the old man than he realised.

‘Tahir!’ Elisabeth’s voice was a shriek of delight. ‘You’ll never believe it. You won! Again! It’s unbelievable.’

The babbling crowd hushed. Every eye was on him, as if he’d done something miraculous.

Before him, piled high, were his winnings. Far larger than before. The croupier looked pale and rigidly composed.

Eager feminine hands reached for Tahir as his companions sidled close. Their eyes were bright with avarice and excitement.

Tahir slid some of the most valuable chips to the croupier. ‘For you.’

‘Merci, monsieur.’ He grinned as he scooped his newfound wealth safely into his hand.

Tahir lifted his glass, took a long swallow and let the bubbles cascade from the back of his tongue down his throat.

The wine’s effervescence seeped into him. He felt buoyant, almost happy. For once fate had played things right. Kareef would be the best King Qusay had known.

He put the glass down with a click and turned away.

‘Goodnight, Elisabeth, Natasha. I’m afraid I have business elsewhere.’

He’d taken but a few steps when the babble of voices stopped him.

‘Wait! Your winnings! You’ve forgotten them.’

Tahir turned to face a sea of staring faces.

‘Keep them. Share them amongst yourselves.’

Without a backward glance he strode to the entrance, oblivious to the uproar behind him.

The doorman thrust open the massive doors and Tahir emerged into the fresh night air. He breathed deep, filling his lungs for the first time, it seemed, in recent memory.

A hint of a smile played on his lips as he loped down the stairs.

He had a coronation to attend.

Tahir skimmed low over the dunes of Qusay’s great interior desert.

Alone at the helicopter’s controls, he put the effervescence in his blood down to the freedom of complete solitude. No hangers-on. No business minions seeking direction. No women with wide eyes and grasping hands. Not even paparazzi waiting to report his next outrageous affair.

Perhaps the barren glory of the desert had lifted his spirits? He even, for this moment, put from his mind what awaited him in Qusay.

His family. His past.

Yet he’d visited deserts in the last eleven years. From North Africa to Australia and South America, motor-racing, hang-gliding, base-jumping—always searching for new extreme ways to risk his neck.

Finally he recognised his mood was because he flew over the place he’d called home for the first eighteen years of his life. The place he’d never expected to see again.

But this realisation came as an almighty gust buffeted the chopper, slewing it sideways. Tahir grappled with the controls, swinging the helicopter high above the dunes.

The sight that met him sent adrenalin pumping through his body. The growing darkness filling the sky wasn’t an early dusk, as he’d thought.

If he’d been flying by the book he’d have noticed the warning signs sooner. Instead he’d been skylarking, swooping dangerously low, gambling on his ability to read the topography of a place that changed with every wind.

This was the mother of all sandstorms. The sort that claimed livestock, altered watercourses and buried roads. The sort that could whip up a helicopter like a toy, whirl it round and smash it into fragments.

No chance to outrun it. No time to land safely.

Nevertheless, Tahir battled to steer the bucking chopper away from the massive storm. Automatically he switched into crisis mode, sending out a mayday, knowing already it was too late.

Calmness stole over him. He was going to die.

The prodigal had returned to his just deserts.

He wasn’t dead.

Fate obviously had something far worse in store. Dehydration in the heat. Or, going by the pain racking him, death from his wounds.

The preposterous luck that had seen him win several fortunes at the gaming table had finally abandoned him.

Tahir debated whether to open his eyes or lie there, seeking the luxurious darkness of unconsciousness again. Yet the throbbing pain in his head and chest was impossible to ignore.

Even opening his eyes hurt. Light pierced his retinas through sand-encrusted lashes. It dazzled him and he groaned, tasting heat and dust and the metallic saltiness of blood. His hands and face felt raw from exposure to whipping sand.

He had a vague recollection of sitting, blinded by dust and strapped in a seat, hearing the unearthly yowl of wind and lashing sand. Then the smell of petrol, so strong he’d fought free of both seatbelt and twisted metal, stumbling as far as he could.

Then nothing.

Overhead the pure blue of a cerulean sky mocked him.

He was alive. In the desert. Alone.

Tahir passed out three times before he dragged himself to a sitting position, sweating and trembling and feeling more dead than alive. His brain was scrambled, wandering into nothingness and then jerking back to the present with hideous clarity.

He sat with his back against a sandbank, legs stretched out, and tried to ignore the brain-numbing pain that was the back of his skull in contact with sand.

He was drifting into unconsciousness when something jerked him awake. A rough caress on his hand. Gingerly he tilted his head.

‘You’re a mirage,’ he whispered, but the words wouldn’t emerge from his constricted throat.

The animal sensed his attention. It stared back, its horizontal pupils dark against golden-brown irises. It shook its head and a cloud of dust rose from its shaggy coat.

‘Mmmmah.’

‘Mirages don’t talk,’ Tahir murmured. They didn’t lick either. But this one did, its tongue tickling. He shut his eyes, but when he opened them the goat was still there. A kid, too small to be without its mother.

Hell. He couldn’t even die in peace.

The goat butted his hip, and Tahir realised his jacket pocket had something in it. Slowly, so as not to black out from the pain, he slipped his hand in and found a water bottle.

A muzzy memory rose, of him grabbing bottled water as he stumbled from the wreckage. How had he forgotten that?

It took for ever to pull the bottle out, twist off the lid and lift it to his lips. The hardest thing he’d ever done was drag it away after one sip.

Guzzling too much was dangerous. He risked another sip then lowered his hand. It felt like a dead weight.

Something nudged him and he opened his eyes to see the goat curled up close. In the whole vast expanse of desert the beast had chosen this place to shelter.

Gritting his teeth as he brought his left hand over his body, Tahir poured water into his palm.

‘Here you are, goat.’

Placidly it drank, as if used to human contact. Or as if it too was on its last legs and had no room for fear.

Tahir had just enough energy to recap the bottle before it slid from his shaking hands. His head lolled.

Beside him the warmth of that tiny body penetrated his clothes, reminding him he wasn’t alone.

It was that knowledge that forced him to focus on surviving Qusay’s notoriously perilous desert.

Annalisa drew water up in the battered metal scoop and sluiced it over her face. Heaven.

The huge sandstorm had delayed her journey into the desert. Her cousins had tut-tutted, saying it was proof this trip was a mistake. The sort of mistake she wouldn’t survive. But they didn’t understand.

Just six months after her granddad’s death, and her beloved father’s soon after, it meant everything that she come here.

Annalisa was keeping her last promise to her father.

It was wonderful to be here again, though sadness tinged the experience as she remembered previous trips with her dad.

She’d arrived this morning, spending the afternoon cleaning her camera and telescopic equipment. A day out here meant a day of heat and dust, and the luxury of having the oasis to herself was too much to resist.

She lifted another scoop of water and tipped it over her head, shivering luxuriously as the water slid through her hair, over her shoulders and down her back. Another scoop sluiced over her breasts and she smiled, revelling in the feeling of being clean. She wriggled her toes in the sandy bottom of the small pool.

The sun was setting and she should move to build up the fire before darkness fell.

She was just turning to get out of the water when something on the horizon caught her attention. She narrowed her eyes against the setting sun.

A shadow. More than a shadow. A man. She made out broad shoulders and dark clothes. Remarkably, for this place, he was wearing what looked like a suit as he took a step down the dune, letting the slip of sand carry him several metres.

Automatically Annalisa reached for her towel and wrapped it close, her actions slowing when she registered his strange gait. He didn’t use his arms to keep his balance on the treacherously steep slope and his movements were oddly uncoordinated.

Caution warned her to take no chances with a stranger.

No local would harm her. But this man clearly didn’t belong. Who knew how he’d react to finding a lone female?

But as she knotted the towel and watched his slow progress she realised something was wrong. Instincts honed by years of helping her father tend to the sick overrode her wariness. The stranger was no threat. He looked as if he could barely stay upright.

Moments later she was racing up the other side of the wadi towards him.

Her steps slowed as she neared and took in the full impact of his appearance.

Her breath hissed in her throat. Disbelief filled her. She blinked, but the image was clear and unmistakable.

A tall man, dark-haired, wearing a tuxedo and black leather shoes, was slipping down the dune towards her. His dress shirt was ripped open and filthy, revealing bronzed skin and the top of a broad chest. A dark ribbon, the end of a bow tie, fluttered against his collarbone.

His face was long and lean and so caked in sand she could barely make out his features. Yet the solid shape of his jaw and the high angle of his cheeks hinted at a devastating masculine beauty. His temple was a mass of dried blood that made her suck in a dismayed breath.

But it was his eyes that held her still as he slithered down the slope. Piercing blue, they mesmerised her. Such an unexpected colour here in a desert kingdom.

Even as he staggered towards her his tall frame looked improbably elegant and absurdly raffish. As if he’d drunk too much at a society party and wandered unsteadily off.

Then she registered the way he cradled his arms across his torso and fear escalated. Chest wounds? She could deal with cuts and abrasions. She was her father’s daughter after all. But they were days away from medical help and her skills only went so far.

Clumsily Annalisa raced up the dune, hauling the flapping towel tighter. Her heart thudded painfully as she fought to suppress panic.

She’d almost reached him when he stumbled and dropped to his knees, swaying woozily.

He stretched out his arms and looked up from under a tangle of matted dark hair.

‘Here, sweetheart.’ His voice was a hoarse whisper, thick and slurred, as if his tongue didn’t work properly. She leaned closer to hear. ‘Take care of it.’

His arms dropped and something, a small scruffy animal, rolled out as the stranger pitched to one side, seemingly lifeless, at her feet.

CHAPTER TWO

ANNALISA sat back on her heels and pushed a lock of hair behind her ear with shaky fingers. She trembled all over, her arms weak as jelly from exertion. Her pulse was still racing from shock and the fear she mightn’t be able to save him.

After a quick check she’d decided to risk moving the stranger to her campsite. His temperature was dangerously high and a night on the exposed dune could prove fatal.

But she hadn’t reckoned on the logistics of transporting a man well over six feet and at least a head taller than her.

It had taken an hour of strained exertion and all her ingenuity to get him down, dragging him on a makeshift stretcher. Most frightening of all he’d been a dead weight, not stirring.

‘Don’t you die on me now,’ she threatened as she checked his weak pulse and began cleaning the wound on his temple.

Head wounds bled prolifically. It probably wasn’t as bad as it looked, she told herself. Yet she found herself muttering a mix of prayer and exhortation in mingled Arabic, Danish and English, just as her dad had used to when faced with a hopeless case.

The familiar words calmed her, made her feel slightly more in control, though she knew that was an illusion. It would be a miracle if her patient pulled through.

‘It’s okay.’ A slurred voice broke across her thoughts. ‘I know I won’t survive.’ His eyes remained closed, but Annalisa watched his bloodied, cracked lips move and knew she hadn’t imagined his voice.

Hope surged, and a spark of anger born of fear.

‘Don’t be ridiculous! Of course you’ll live.’ He’d echoed her fears so precisely she lashed out, heart pounding in denial.

After a moment his lips moved again, this time in a twitch that might have signified amusement.

‘If you say so.’ Now his voice was weaker, a thready whisper. ‘But don’t fret if you’re wrong.’ He drew a shaky breath that rattled in his lungs. ‘I won’t mind at all.’

The words trailed off and he lay so still in the lamplight Annalisa couldn’t make out his breathing. Frantically she fumbled for his pulse. Relief pounded through her when she felt it.

She told herself it was better he’d slipped into unconsciousness again. He wouldn’t feel pain as she tended his wounds.

It was only later, as she placed a damp cloth on his forehead, trying to lower his temperature, that she realised the man had spoken to her in perfect English.

Who was he? And what was a lone foreigner doing in Qusay’s arid heartland dressed like some suave movie star?

Tahir ached all over. His head hammered mercilessly, as if a demolition squad had started work inside his skull. His mouth and throat were parched and raw. Swallowing felt like his muscles closed over broken glass. His body was stiff and weighted, bruised all over.

It was one hell of a beating this time, he realised vaguely. Had the old man finally gone too far?

Tahir couldn’t bring himself to struggle out of the blackness to take in his surroundings. Instinctively he knew the pain would be overwhelming when he did. Right now he didn’t have the strength to pretend he didn’t care.

His only weapons against his father were pride and feigned unconcern. To meet the old man’s eyes steadily and refuse to beg for mercy.

It drove his tormentor wild and robbed him of the satisfaction he sought from lashing out at his son.

No matter how bad the thrashing, how prolonged or vicious, Tahir never begged for it to end. Nor did he cry out. Not a murmur, not a flinch, no matter how remorseless his father’s ice-cold eyes or how explosive his temper. Even when Yazan Al’Ramiz brought in thugs to subdue Tahir and prolong the punishment, Tahir refused to give in.

There was triumph in facing down the man who’d hated him for as long as he could remember. That was little recompense for not knowing why Yazan loathed him, but it gave him something to focus on rather than go crazy seeking an explanation the old man refused to give.

Obviously Tahir wasn’t the sort to inspire affection.

Far better to be alone and self-contained.

He was stubborn and contemptuous enough never to give in. It was a matter of honour that every time, when it was over, he gathered his strength and walked away. Even if his steps were unsteady and his eyes clouded. Even if he had to haul himself along using furniture or a wall to keep upright.

Sheer willpower always forced him on. He refused to lie broken and cowed at the old Sheikh’s feet.

Tahir drew a shaky breath, awake enough to register the constriction in his chest and the pain ripping across his side. Broken ribs?

He couldn’t walk away this time. The realisation tore at his pride and ignited his stubbornness.

Something fluttered at his neck. A touch so light that for a moment his dazed brain rejected the notion.

There it was again. Something cool and damp slid from his jaw down his throat, then lower, in a soothing swipe over his chest. And again, from under his chin, the caress edged down, tracing blessed coolness across burning skin.

It stopped and, straining his senses, Tahir heard a splash. A moment later the damp cloth—he was aware enough now to realise what it was—returned, trailing across his pounding forehead and brushing damply at his hair.

He swallowed a moan at the pure pleasure of that cool relief against the searing ache in his head.

Was this some new torture devised by his father? A moment’s respite and burgeoning hope to rouse him enough only so he could feel more pain when the beating recommenced?

‘Go away.’ He moved his lips, worked his throat, but no sound emerged.

The cloth paused, then slid down his cheek in a tender caress that was almost his undoing. He couldn’t remember feeling weaker.

His skin burned and prickled, as if stung by a thousand cuts, yet the bliss of that touch made him suck in his breath. That sudden movement scorched his battered torso with a fiery ache.

‘Go away.’

He didn’t have the strength to withstand the lure of this gentle treatment. It would break him as the pounding fists never could.

‘You’re awake.’ Her voice was a whisper, soft as a soughing breeze. He racked his brain to place it. Surely he couldn’t forget a woman with a voice like that? Low and sweet, with a seductive husky edge that set it apart.

He didn’t know her. In his foggy brain that fact stood out.

She must be one of his father’s women. A new one.

Bitterness flooded his mouth, ousting even the rusty taste of blood. He should have guessed Sheikh Yazan Al’Ramiz would try something new to break his obstinate son. What better than the soft touch of a woman?

‘Leave me,’ Tahir ordered. But to his shame his voice emerged as a hoarse whisper. Almost a whimper.

‘Here.’ A firm hand slipped beneath his shoulder and a slim arm supported his skull, lifting him slightly.

Instantly pain shot through him. A stabbing spike of lightning shattered the blankness behind his closed lids and he stiffened against the need to gasp out his agony.

‘I know it hurts, but you have to drink.’ He heard the voice vaguely, as if through a muffling curtain. Then water, blessedly cool, trickled over his lips. Thought fled as he gulped the precious fluid.

Too soon the flow stopped.

He opened his lips to ask for more, heedless now of pride. But she forestalled him, her voice soothing.

‘Be patient. You can have more soon.’ She leaned close. He felt her warmth beside and behind him as he lay in her lap. Her scent, wild honey and cinnamon and warm female flesh, teased his nostrils and unravelled his thoughts. ‘You’re dehydrated. You need fluids, but not too fast.’

‘How long before he returns?’

‘He?’ Her voice was sharp. ‘There’s no one else. Just you and me.’

Tahir listened to her husky voice, a voice of untrammelled temptation, and suppressed a groan of despair. How could he hold out against the promise of that voice, those gentle hands?

In his weakened state Tahir had no reserves of strength. All he wanted was to have her hold him, nurse him against her undoubtedly soft bosom and pretend there was no such thing as reality.

How long before he begged for the first time in his life?

Damn his father for finally finding a way to break his resistance. She’d sap his willpower as no beating could.

‘Tell me.’ He struggled to sit higher, but was so weak the press of her palm against his bare chest stopped him. ‘When will he be back?’

‘Who? Was there someone with you in the desert?’ Urgency threaded her voice.

‘Desert?’ Tahir paused, his brows turning down as he fought to remember. Sheikh Yazan Al’Ramiz enjoyed the luxuries of life too much to spend time in the desert, even if it was the traditional home of his forebears.

She was trying to distract him.

‘Where is my father?’ he whispered through gritted teeth, as pain rose in an engulfing tide. ‘He’ll want to gloat.’

‘I told you, there’s no one here but us.’

His face hurt as he grimaced. ‘I may have been beaten senseless but I’m not a fool.’ He raised a hand and unerringly encircled her wrist where her palm rested against his chest.

She was young, her skin supple and smooth. He felt her pulse race against his fingers, heard her breath catch in the resounding silence that blanketed them.

‘Someone beat you? I thought you’d been in an accident.’

Finally, against his better judgement, he forced his weighted eyelids open. The world was dark and blurred. It took a long time to focus. When he did his breath seized in his lungs.

Damn the old man. He knew Tahir too well. Knew him better than Tahir knew himself.

She glowed in the wavering light, her smooth almost oval face pale and perfect. Her nose was neat and straight. Her lips formed a cupid’s bow that promised pure pleasure. His pulse leapt just from looking at it and, despite his pain, heat coiled in Tahir’s belly when she furtively swiped her tongue along her top lip as if nervous.

The slightly square set of her jaw hinted at character and a determination that instantly appealed to Tahir. And her eyes…He could sink into the rich sherry-tinted depths of those wide eyes. They looked guileless, gorgeous, beguiling.

Glossy dark hair framed her face. Not a stiff, sprayed coiffure but soft tresses that had escaped whatever she’d done to pull her hair back.

She looked fresh, without a touch of make-up on her exquisite features. She blinked, eyes widening as she met his gaze, then long lush lashes lowered, screening her expression.

She was the picture of innocent seduction.

His poor battered body stirred feebly.

If he’d had the energy Tahir would have applauded his father’s choice. How had he known that façade of innocent allure would weaken his son’s resolve more than the wiles of a glamorous, experienced woman?

Tahir remembered the first time he’d fallen for the mirage of sweet, virginal womanhood and scowled. Who’d have thought after all this time he’d still harbour a weakness for that particular fantasy? He’d made it his business to avoid falling for it again.

His hand firmed around hers, feeling the fragility of her bones and the thud of her pulse racing. Her face was calm but her pulse told another story.

Did she fear his father? Had she been coerced?

He grimaced, searching for words to question her. But his eyes flickered shut as the effort of the last minutes took its toll. His fingers opened and her hand slid away.

‘Go! Leave before he hurts you too.’ Even to his own ears his words sounded slurred and uneven. Tahir groped for the strength to stay awake.

‘Who? Who are you talking about?’

‘My father, of course.’ Walls of pain rose and pressed close, stifling his words, stealing his consciousness.

Annalisa lowered his head and shoulders to the pillow.

Shock hummed through her.

Looking into his searing blue eyes was like staring at the sun too long. Except watching the sky had never made her feel so edgy or breathless.

Even the sound of his deep voice, a mere whisper of sound from his poor cracked lips, made something unravel in the pit of her stomach.

Belatedly she looked around, past the lamp and the lowburning campfire, towards the dune where he’d appeared.

Had he been attacked? If so, by a stranger or by his father, as he’d claimed? Or was that a figment of a mind confused by head wounds? As well as the gash at his temple Annalisa had found a lump like a pigeon’s egg on the back of his skull.

For hours she’d been checking his pupils. Though what she’d do if he had bleeding to the brain she didn’t know. She couldn’t move him. It would be days before the camel train returned and this part of the country’s arid centre was a telecommunications black spot.

Fear sidled down her spine and she shivered. All night she’d told herself she’d cope, doing her best to rehydrate the stranger and lower his temperature.

Now she had more to worry about.

She got to her feet and searched her supplies. Her hand closed around cool metal and she dragged it out.

The pistol was an antique. It had belonged to her mother’s father, been presented to Annalisa’s father on the day he’d wed. A traditional gift from a traditional man. All the men of Qusay knew how to shoot, just as they knew how to ride, and many still had skills in the old sports of archery and hawking.

Annalisa’s father, an outsider, had never used the gun. As a respected doctor he’d never needed to protect himself or his family. But she felt better with it in her hand.

She’d brought it for sentimental reasons, remembering how he’d carried it on their trips into the wilderness.

Once more that dreadful sense of aloneness swept over her, pummelling her stomach and stealing the calm she’d worked so hard to maintain.

What if someone else was out there, lost and injured or angry and violent? She bit her lip, knowing she couldn’t search. If she left the oasis her patient would likely die of dehydration and exposure.

She returned to his side. His temperature was too high. She picked up the cloth but was loath to touch him again.

Despite the nicks and abrasions marring his face he was a handsome man. More handsome than any she’d met before. Even with deep purple shadows beneath his eyes and the wound at his temple. Dark stubble accentuated a lean, superbly sculpted countenance. Even his hands, large and strong and sinewed, were strangely fascinating.

Annalisa remembered the feel of his fingers encircling her wrist and wondered at the sensations that had bombarded her. She’d felt wary yet excited.

Her gaze slipped to his bare chest. She’d spread his shirt open to bathe him and try to reduce his fever.

In the mellow light from the lamp and the flickering fire he looked beautiful, despite the bruises marring his firm golden skin. His chest was broad and muscular but not with the pumped-up look she’d seen on men in movies and foreign magazines. His latent strength looked natural but no less formidable for that. As for the way his powerful torso tapered to a narrow waist and hips…Annalisa knew a shameful urge to sit and stare.

Even the fuzz of dark hair across his pectoral muscles looked appealing. She wanted to touch it. Discover if it was soft or coarse against her palm.

Her gaze strayed to the narrowing line of hair that led from his chest down his belly.

Annalisa’s pulse hit a discordant beat and staggered on too fast. Heat washed her cheeks and shame burnt as she realised she’d been ogling him.

Determined, she squeezed the cloth, took a fortifying breath and wiped the damp fabric over him.

She refused to think about how her hand shook as it followed the contours of his body, or about the alien tingle in her stomach that signalled a reaction to a man who, even asleep, was more potently virile than any male she’d encountered.

Tahir woke to pain again. At least the throb in his head didn’t threaten to take the back off his skull, as it had before. Only one jackhammer was at work there now.

His lips twisted in a rueful smile that felt more like a grimace from scratched, sore lips. He stirred, opening his eyes a fraction. Not darkness. Not bright daylight either. The light filtering through his lashes was green-tinged and shadowed.

He heard the soft stirring of the wind, breathed deep and inhaled the unique scent that was Qusay. Heat and sand and some indefinable hint of spice he’d never been able to identify.

A searing blast of confused feelings struck him, roiling in his gut, rising in his throat.

‘I’m not dead, then.’ The words, hoarse as they were, sounded loud.

‘No, you’re not dead.’

His muscles froze as he heard a voice, half remembered. Soft, rich, slightly husky. The voice of a temptress sent to tease a man too weak to resist.

She spoke again, ‘You don’t seem particularly pleased.’

Tahir shrugged, then stiffened as abused muscles shrieked in protest.

He didn’t explain his innermost thoughts to anyone.

‘Why is it green? Where are we?’ He kept his head averted, preferring not to face the owner of that voice till he had himself in hand. He felt strangely at a loss, unable to summon his composure, as if this last beating had shattered the brittle shell of disdain he used to maintain distance from the brutality around him.

Tahir blinked, amazed at how vulnerable he felt. How weak.

‘We’re at the Darshoor oasis, in the heart of Qusay’s desert.’ Her voice slid like rippling water over him and for a moment his hazy mind strayed.

Till her words sank in.

‘The desert?’ He whipped his head round then shut his eyes as a blast of white-hot pain stabbed him.

‘That’s right. The light’s green because you’re in my tent.’

A tent. In the desert. The words whirled in his head but they didn’t make sense.

‘My father—’

‘He’s not here.’ She broke in before he could cobble his thoughts together. ‘You seemed to think he was here too but you’re confused. You were…disturbed.’

Tahir frowned. None of this made sense. His father lived in the city, with easy access to his vices of choice: women, gambling and brokering power and money corruptly.

‘You seemed to think you’d been beaten.’

Instantly Tahir froze. He would never have admitted such a thing, especially to a stranger! Not even to his closest friends.

Who was this woman?

He forced his eyelids open again and found himself sinking into warm sherry-tinted depths.

By daylight she looked even better than she had the first time. For he remembered her now, this woman who’d haunted his thoughts. Or were they dreams?

‘Who are you?’ A swift glance took in hair scrupulously pulled back from her lovely face, an absence of jewellery, a long-sleeved yellow shirt and beige cotton trousers. She didn’t dress like a local in concealing skirts. Yet surely only a local would be here?

From where he lay, looking up, her legs looked endless. She moved and he watched the fabric pull tight over her neatly curved hip and slim thighs. A moment later she sat on the floor beside him, her faint, sweet fragrance tantalising his nostrils. Her shirt pulled across her breasts as she leaned towards him.

A jolt of sensation shot through his belly.

No. He wasn’t dead yet.

Perhaps there were some compensations after all.

‘My name is Annalisa. Annalisa Hansen.’ She paused, as if waiting for him to say something. ‘You arrived at my campsite days ago. Just walked out of the desert.’

‘Days ago?’ How could he have lost so much time?

‘You’re injured.’ She gestured to his head, his side. ‘My guess is you were in the desert for quite a while. When you reached me you were seriously dehydrated.’ She lifted a hand to his brow. Her palm was cool and curiously familiar.

He had a jumbled recollection of her touching him earlier. Of blessed water and soothing words.

‘You’ve been drifting in and out of consciousness.’ She leaned back, lifting her hand away, and Tahir knew a bizarre desire to catch it back.

‘Your little friend has been worried.’

‘Little friend?’ Automatically he looked past her, taking in the cool interior of the tent, the neatly stowed gear in one corner. A ripple of pages as a furtive breeze played across a book left open a few metres away.

‘You don’t remember?’ She surveyed him seriously.

‘No.’ He remembered just in time not to shake his head. He was no masochist and the pain was already bad enough. ‘I don’t recall.’

It was true. His thoughts were fluid and incomplete. He was unable to fix anything in his mind.

‘That’s all right,’ she said with the calm air of one who’d perfected a soothing bedside manner. Vaguely he wondered who this woman was, caring for him at a desert oasis. ‘You’ve taken a nasty knock to the head so things could be jumbled for a while.’

‘Tell me,’ he murmured, forcing down rising concern at his faulty memory. He recalled a casino. A woman all but climbing into his lap as the chips rose before him. He remembered a cruiser in a crowded marina. A party in a city penthouse. A meeting in a hushed boardroom. But the faces were blurred. The details unclear. ‘What little friend?’

The woman…Annalisa, he reminded himself…smiled. A shaft of sunlight pierced the interior of the tent, or so it seemed, as he stared up into her calm, sweet face.

‘You were carrying a goat.’

‘A goat?’ What nonsense was this?

‘Yes.’ This time her smile was more like a grin. Her dark eyes danced and she tilted her head engagingly. ‘A little one. Obviously it’s a friend of yours. It’s been foraging for food but it keeps coming back to sleep just outside the tent.’

A goat? His mind was blank. Frighteningly blank.

‘What else?’ he murmured. There must be more.

She shrugged and he caught a flash of something in her eyes. Distress? Fear?

‘Nothing else. You just appeared.’ She waited but he said nothing. ‘So, perhaps you could tell me something.’ She lifted a hand and tugged nervously at her earlobe. ‘Who are you?’

‘My name is Tahir…’

‘Yes?’ She nodded encouragingly.

A sensation like a plummeting lift crashed through the sudden void that was his stomach. Blood rushed in his ears as he met her gaze. The kaleidoscope of blurry images cascaded through his brain into nothingness.

‘And I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you.’

He forced a smile to lips that felt stiff and unfamiliar. ‘I seem to have mislaid my memory.’

CHAPTER THREE

FOR a man who couldn’t remember his name Tahir was one cool customer.

Annalisa read the shock flaring in his eyes and the way he instantly masked it. Ready sympathy surged but she beat it down, knowing instinctively he’d reject it.

Despite never having left Qusay, Annalisa had seen a lot in her twenty-five years. As her father’s assistant she’d seen the effects of accident and disease, the way pain or fear could break even the strongest will.

Yet this man, traumatised by wounds that must be shockingly painful, smiled at her with a veneer of calm indifference. As if he were one of her father’s scientist friends and they were conversing over a cup of sweet tea in her father’s study.

Yet none of her father’s friends looked like Tahir. Or made her feel that warm tingle of awareness deep inside.

Years ago, with Toby, the man she’d planned to marry, she’d known something like it. But not so instantaneously, nor so strong.

There was something about Tahir that she connected with at the deepest level. More than his extraordinary looks or the innate sophistication that had nothing to do with his beautiful clothes. Something that set him apart. She was drawn by his core of inner strength, revealed as intensely blue eyes met hers with wry humour, ignoring the unspoken fear that his memory lapse was permanent.

He comes from another world. One where you don’t belong.

She’d do well to remember it.

A pang shot through her and her calm frayed at the edges. Just where did she belong?

All her life she’d never fitted in. She was a Qusani but didn’t live as other Qusani women or fit their traditional role. She was poised between two worlds, belonging to neither. She’d been part of her father’s world, his assistant, his confidante.

But he’d gone, leaving her bereft.

‘What’s wrong?’ Tahir’s deep voice roused her from melancholy reflection. ‘Are you all right?’

Despite herself Annalisa smiled. Lying flat on his back, bruised and barely awake, his memory shot, yet this man was concerned for her?

She laid a reassuring hand on his arm. His muscles tensed beneath the fine cotton of his shirt. His warm strength radiated up through her fingertips and palm.

A zap of something jagged between them as she met those piercing eyes. His nonchalant half-smile disappeared, replaced by frowning absorption.

‘Nothing’s wrong,’ she said briskly, slipping her hand away. It tingled from the contact and she clenched it at her side. ‘Your foggy memory is normal. It should come back in time.’ She drew her lips up in a smile she hoped looked reassuring. ‘You’ve got two head wounds. Either would be enough to knock you about for a couple of days.’

Or do far worse. Ruthlessly she pushed aside the fear that he might be more badly injured than she realised.

‘You speak as if you have medical experience.’

‘My father was a doctor. The only doctor in our region. I helped him for years.’ She turned away, horrified by the way memories swamped her again, and the pain with it. ‘I don’t have medical qualifications but I can set a sprain or treat a fever.’

‘Why do I suspect you’ve done much more than that for me, Annalisa?’

The sound of her name on his lips was strangely intimate. Reluctantly she turned back, meeting his warm gaze, feeling his approval trickle through her like water in a parched landscape.

‘You’ve saved my life, haven’t you?’ His voice dropped to a low rumble that vibrated along her skin.

Annalisa shrugged, uncomfortable with his praise. Uncomfortable with her intense reaction to this stranger. She’d done all she could but he wasn’t out of the woods yet. Fear edged her thoughts.

‘You’ll be okay, given time.’ Fervently she prayed she was right. ‘All you need to do is rest and give yourself time to recuperate. And try not to worry.’ She’d do enough worrying for the pair of them.

Even now she couldn’t quite believe he was holding a sensible conversation. He’d drifted in and out of consciousness since he’d stumbled into her life, leaving her terrified but doggedly determined to do what she could.

‘I want to check your reactions.’ She moved to kneel at the end of the mattress. ‘Can you move your feet?’

She watched as he rotated his ankles and then lifted first one foot then the other. Relief coursed through her.

‘Excellent. I’m going to hold your feet. When I tell you, push against my hands. Okay?’

‘Okay.’

Gently she lifted his heels onto her knees and cupped his bare feet with her palms. A curious jolt of heat shot through her from the contact. She blinked and tried to concentrate.

His feet were long, strong and well shaped. For a moment she knelt there blankly staring, absorbing the sensation of skin on skin.

She’d never before thought of feet as sexy.

Annalisa’s brow puckered. She felt out of her depth.

‘Annalisa?’ His voice yanked her mind back and heat seared her cheeks. She kept her head bent and concentrated on what her father had said about head injuries.

‘Push against my hands.’ Instantly she felt steady pressure. She smiled and looked up, meeting his narrowed stare. ‘That’s good.’

Carefully she lowered his feet and moved up beside him, leaning over so he didn’t have to twist to face her.

‘Now, take my hands,’ she said briskly, adopting a professional manner. But it was hard when eyes like sapphires fixed unblinkingly on her. She wondered what he saw, whether he read her trepidation and uncertainty.

Large hands, powerful but marred by scratches, lifted towards her.

Not allowing herself to hesitate, Annalisa placed her hands in his. She told herself the swirling in her abdomen was relief that he was well enough to cooperate.

‘Now, squeeze,’ she murmured, ignoring the illusion of intimacy engendered by their linked hands.

Again the pressure was equal on both left and right sides. Her shoulders dropped a fraction as relief surged. For now the signs were good.

She moved to pull back, slide her hands from his. Instantly long fingers twined with hers, holding her still.

Her heart gave a juddering thump as their gazes meshed. She realised how she leaned across him, the heat of his bare torso warming her through the thin fabric of her clothes. The way his eyes flashed with something unidentifiable yet disturbing. Her breathing shortened. She felt vulnerable, though he was the injured one.

‘What are you checking?’ The words were crisp. Not slurred like when he’d called out in his sleep.

‘Just making sure your reactions are normal.’ She met his gaze steadily, refusing to mention the possibility of bleeding to the brain. ‘They are. You should be up and about in no time.’

‘Good. I find I have a burning desire to bathe. You said this is an oasis?’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Then there’s no problem getting water.’ He paused. ‘I’ll need someone from your party to help me get upright.’

‘There’s only me. And I don’t think bathing is a good idea yet.’

His eyes darkened in surprise. ‘You’re alone?’

She nodded.

‘You’re a remarkable woman, Annalisa Hansen.’ His grip loosened and she found herself free. Belatedly she remembered to straighten so she didn’t hover over him.

‘Do you do this often? Camp alone in the desert?’

She shook her head. ‘This is the first time I’ve been here alone.’ Stupidly her voice wobbled on the last word and his eyes narrowed. Abruptly she looked away.

It was almost six months to the day since her father died. Maybe it was the looming anniversary that sideswiped her, dredging up such grief sometimes she thought she couldn’t bear it.

Abruptly he spoke, changing the subject. ‘If you knew how much sand I’ve swallowed you wouldn’t begrudge me your help to get clean.’ He levered himself up on one elbow, then pushed himself higher to sit, swaying beside her.

He ignored her protests, setting his jaw with a steely determination and clambering stiffly to his knees. Finally she capitulated and helped him, realising she couldn’t stop him.

It was only later she remembered the look in his bright eyes as grief had stabbed her out of nowhere.

Had he read her pain and decided to distract her?

No, the idea was absurd.

Tahir cursed himself for being every kind of fool as he sat in the pool and let water slide around his aching body. He’d known moving was a bad idea, but he refused to play the invalid.

Bad enough that his brain wasn’t functioning. The more he tried to remember the more the ache in his skull intensified, matching the searing pain in his ribs. He let his thoughts skitter from the possibility the damage was permanent. He wouldn’t accept that option.

It made him even more determined to conquer his physical weakness.

Then there was the memory of Annalisa’s soft brown eyes, brimming with distress as she avoided his gaze.

Despite her brisk capability he sensed pain, a deep vulnerability. Looking into her shadowed eyes, Tahir had felt an overwhelming need to wipe her hurt away.

Enough to brave getting to his feet.

Fool! He’d almost collapsed. Only her support had kept him upright the few metres to the water. Now he sat waist-deep, naked but for the silk boxers he’d kept on in deference to her presence, wondering how he’d summon the strength to return to the tent.

Wondering how long he could keep his eyes off the woman who sat watchfully beside the stream.

It had been torture of a different sort, allowing her to undress him. Her soft hands fumbling at his trousers had been a torment that had made him forget for a brief moment the pain bombarding him. The sight of her kneeling before him, drawing his trousers off as he leaned on her shoulder, had evoked sensations no invalid should feel.

Then she’d waded into the water, supporting him. She’d been heedless of the way their unsteady progress had sent up sprays of water that soaked large patches of her trousers and shirt.

But Tahir hadn’t.

When he shut his eyes he still saw her lace bra outlined against transparent cotton, cupping voluptuous breasts that strained forward as she steadied him. He remembered the neat curve of her hip, the narrow elastic ridge of bikini underwear where her trousers plastered her skin, then the long supple line of her thigh.

Tahir’s mouth dried and it had nothing to do with the arid air.

He should be frantically trying to remember who he was. Trying to piece together the fragments of memory, like snippets of disjointed film, swirling in his head.

Instead his thoughts circled back to Annalisa. Who was she? Why was she here?

Despite the cool water, his groin throbbed as he watched her patting a spindly-legged goat.

Was he like this with other women? So easily aroused?

He remembered the woman at the casino. The one in beads and diamonds and little else, who’d been so amorous. The memory didn’t spark anything. No heat. No desire.

Tahir frowned. He had an unsettling presentiment he should be very worried by his reactions to Annalisa Hansen.

Bathing in the wadi had been a huge mistake. Annalisa bit her lip as Tahir mumbled in his sleep, his dark brows arrowing fiercely in a scowl. These last hours he’d grown unsettled and she’d feared for him, giving up her position by the telescope to sit at his side.

He rolled, one arm outflung, dislodging the blanket and baring his chest to the rapidly cooling night air.

She strove not to think about the fact that he was naked beneath the bedding. He’d barely made it back from bathing when he’d collapsed on the makeshift bed, shucking off his wet boxers with complete disregard for her presence. She doubted he’d even realised she was there.

But to her chagrin she had perfect recall. Detailed recall. A blush warmed her throat at the memory of his tightly curved buttocks, heavily muscled thighs and—

‘Father!’ The hoarse groan yanked her into the present.

Tahir’s head thrashed and Annalisa winced, thinking of the lump on his skull.

‘Shh. It’s all right, Tahir. You’re safe.’ Whatever nightmares his injuries conjured, they rode him like demons. He sounded desperate.

She leaned across, touching his forehead. His temperature was normal, thank God, but—

A hand snapped around her wrist and dragged it to his side. The movement caught her off balance. She tugged, but the harder she fought, the more implacable his hold, till she leant right across him. His frown deepened, and his firmly sculpted lips moved silently, the muscles of his jaw clenching beneath dark stubble.

He pulled. With an oof of escaping air she landed on him. Frantically she tried to find purchase without digging her elbows into his ribs, but his other arm came round her. There was no escape.

‘He sent you, didn’t he?’ The words were a low growl.

‘No one sent me.’ She tried to slip down out of his grip but he simply lashed his arm tighter round her back, dragging her till she lay over him, her legs sinking between his when he moved.

Heat radiated up from tense muscles and she stiffened. With each breath she was aware of his chest, his hipbones, his thighs like hot steel around her.

‘He knew what he was doing, damn him.’ Tahir’s voice was rough and deep, resonating up from his chest and right through her.

Annalisa struggled to ignore her fascination at being so close, encircled by him. Even with Toby, even when he’d taken her in his arms and talked of a future together, she had never been this close. This…intimate. He’d respected that in Qusay a woman’s chastity was no light gift to bestow. He’d promised to wait. Except their bright future had never eventuated.

‘Houri…’ Tahir mumbled, and his searing breath feathered her scalp. Tremors ran down her spine and spread in slow-turning circles through her belly. ‘Temptress.’

His grip eased and he smoothed a hand down her back. It felt so good she fought not to arch into his touch, like a cat responding to a caress. Spread across him, in full-length contact as he stroked her and murmured in her ear, Annalisa felt an unravelling in the pit of her stomach. A heat that was unfamiliar and edgy and worrying.

His hand moulded her buttocks, dragging her closer. The unmistakable ridge of male arousal against the apex of her thighs grew pronounced and she bit her lip as his caress rubbed her against it.

He didn’t know what he was doing. Yet the pulse building between her legs and the heat there proved that didn’t matter. She shuddered in horrified excitement at her own arousal.

Who’d known a man’s body could feel so very good?

‘Mustn’t…’ His voice died as his hands stopped their trawling caress. He drew a shuddering breath that pushed his chest to her breasts. Annalisa shut her eyes, willing herself not to react even as her nipples peaked in delight.

She waited a few moments then tried to ease away. Instantly his embrace hardened, imprisoning her.

Tahir grew quiet, his mutterings less vehement.

Annalisa waited ten minutes then tried again. Even in sleep Tahir held her tight, refusing to release her.

Telling herself she had no choice but to bide her time till he was completely relaxed, she gave up the unequal struggle to hold herself even marginally away. Her head sagged and her muscles went limp as she sank into him. She was going nowhere yet.

A shaft of early-morning light woke Tahir. Instantly the familiar low-grade hum of abused muscles, torn flesh and a battered head roused him to full wakefulness.

And something else. Sexual awareness.

More than awareness. Delight drenched him as he absorbed the full extent of his good fortune.

He lay on his side with Annalisa in his embrace. Her head was on his arm, her knees bent, allowing his bare legs to spoon in behind her. He breathed deep and the sweet fragrance of her hair filled his nostrils, shimmering there like a promise of pleasures to come. She was warm and curved, slim but rounded, exactly where it counted.

Not daring to breathe, Tahir gently flexed his fingers, cupping the exquisite ripeness of her breast. He’d pushed her shirt aside and her bra was soft, a thin layer of lace between his fingers and her feminine bounty.

His breath whistled out from contracting lungs and he cursed silently, not ready yet for her to wake and move away. It was clear that whatever had led to them sharing the narrow mattress, it wasn’t sex. Annalisa was fully clothed.

But clothes provided little protection. Not when he lay flush against her.

He shut his eyes, realising exactly how aroused he was. The sweet curve of her buttocks pressed against him in unconscious invitation. Her warmth enclosed him and he fought rising lust. Fought the need to thrust against her and appease the hunger eating at his belly. Or better yet, to tear those light trousers away and bury himself deep within her pliant, lush body.

Pain shot through him and Tahir realised he’d locked his jaw so tight it felt as if he might dislocate it.

Slowly he breathed, telling himself to move. He had no right to hold her like this. But he wanted…how badly he wanted her.

For long minutes he lay, tense and still, his instincts at war. His palm pressed against her breast and he couldn’t help tightening his grip, his fingers encircling her budding nipple.

Was this the sort of man he was? To take advantage of a sleeping woman? A woman who’d shown him nothing but kindness and not a hint of sexual interest?

His breath shuddered out, riffling her dark unbound hair.

He didn’t even know if he was married. Committed to a woman far away and worried about him.

The notion sliced like ice-cold steel through the searing heat of sexual excitement. Moments later he slid away, drawing back carefully so as not to wake her.

Every movement was torment.

The sun was high when Annalisa woke.

She remembered Tahir holding her with a strength that belied his injuries. Remembered realising she needed to wait till his nightmare subsided before escaping.

She recalled the unfamiliar but unmistakable response of her body to Tahir’s embrace. Her skin flushed all over as she remembered how she’d revelled in his hardness, his masculine power, even the musky spice scent of his freshly washed skin.

Hastily she tugged her shirt closed, grateful he wasn’t there to see how it had come undone during the night.

She suppressed panic that he wasn’t there. Surely that was a good sign—that he had enough energy to get up without assistance.

Nevertheless she didn’t linger. Despite his strength and his formidable determination he was far from well.

She saw him immediately she left the tent.

He sat with his back against a palm tree, long legs outstretched. He wore the trousers she’d washed and set aside for him. He wasn’t naked, as when he’d clasped her close. Yet Annalisa shivered as awareness trickled through her middle, igniting a scorching heat.

Memories of last night and her burgeoning physical responses swamped her. Guilt rose that she’d reacted so to a man who was vulnerable and in her care.

And confusion. In twenty-five years she’d never responded so to any other man.

With his broad bared chest and shoeless feet he looked untamed, elemental, despite his tailored dress trousers. Annalisa recalled the texture of that fine fabric. Even to her untutored touch she knew it to be of finest quality. Proof that Tahir came from a place far beyond here. That he belonged in another milieu.

Yet, sitting with the sunlight glancing off the golden skin of his straight shoulders, he looked at home. Like a rakish marauder taking his ease. Only the bruises mottling his ribs and the gash at his temple belied the image.

She followed the play of muscles across his chest as he leaned sideways. Annalisa tried and failed to ignore a disturbing new sensation deep in her abdomen.

It felt curiously like hunger.

‘Here.’ He hadn’t noticed her, but spoke instead to the tiny goat he’d carried into the oasis. It stood beside him, stretching up towards a scanty green bush. Tahir reached out an arm and drew a slender branch low enough for the animal to reach.

She didn’t know another man who’d bother. Here in Qusay, except for prized horses, animals weren’t cosseted.

Despite his outrageously potent masculinity, there was a softer side to him.

Had she imagined Tahir’s motives last night? She’d been almost convinced part of his abrupt determination to wash was because he’d seen the stupid tears misting her eyes when she thought of her father. Could he really have sought to divert her thoughts?

It seemed ludicrous, and yet…

‘Ah, Sleeping Beauty awakes.’ Eyes bright as the morning sun gleamed under straight dark brows. With his burnished skin and black-as-midnight hair those light eyes should have looked wrong somehow.

Yet Annalisa knew with a sinking certainty, as her pulse sped, that she’d never seen a more handsome man. His half-smile drove a deep crease up one lean cheek and her gaze fixed on it with an intensity that appalled her.

‘I hope you didn’t need me earlier,’ she murmured. ‘I can’t imagine why I overslept.’

‘Can’t you?’ This time he smiled fully, and Annalisa reached out to grab the tent post as her heart kicked and her knees loosened.

What was happening to her?

All her life she’d been sensible, responsible, dutiful. Never, not even on the brink of marriage, had she been swept away by the sheer presence of a man.

‘From the little I recall I’d guess you’ve been running yourself ragged caring for me.’

Annalisa blinked and made herself move from the tent. It felt absurdly as if she was stepping away from safety. But the only danger lay in her reckless response to those piercing blue eyes.

‘I packed up your telescope, by the way.’

Swiftly Annalisa turned to the place where her father’s telescope had been last night. The location hadn’t been ideal, close to the lights of the camp, but she hadn’t liked to move too far away in case Tahir needed her.

Swiftly she knelt to undo the battered case.

‘Thank you,’ she murmured, frantically trying to remember whether she’d covered the lens before going last night to sit with Tahir through his nightmare. If the wind had risen and blasted sand across the lens—

‘It seemed okay when I packed it up.’

He was right. There was no damage. Relieved, she sank back on her heels. ‘You know about telescopes?’

He shrugged. Unwillingly Annalisa followed the fluid movement of his shoulders.

‘Who knows?’ His lazy smile slipped and for a moment he looked grim, his eyes cooling to an icy blue.

‘I’m sorry.’ How could she be so clumsy? ‘I’m sure you’ll remember soon.’ Impulsively she stood and walked towards him, only to stop at his side, self-conscious.

‘No doubt you’re right.’ His easy smile belied the gravity of his expression. ‘Sit with me?’

Wordlessly she complied, settling out of arm’s reach.

‘I remember some things,’ he said. ‘More than before.’

‘Really? That’s fantastic. What do you recall?’ If he noticed her too-bright tone he said nothing. She’d spent days wondering who he was and how he’d got here. How much worse for him not to know?

Again that shrug. Annalisa slid her gaze from the play of muscle and tanned skin, forcing her breathing to slow.

‘Just vague images. A party. Lots of people, but no faces. Places I can’t identify.’ He paused. ‘And a sandstorm, big enough to block the light.’

She nodded. ‘That was just before I came out here.’

‘I remember the vastness of the desert.’ His eyes snared hers. ‘Which leads me to wonder how we get out of here and if you’ve got enough food to keep us both in the meantime.’

‘There’s plenty.’ Out of habit she’d catered for two. ‘As for transport, there’s a camel route through the oasis.’

‘And a camel train is coming back soon?’

Annalisa’s bright smile faded. ‘Not straight away. In a few days.’

She’d prayed they’d return early and take Tahir to hospital.

Now her desperation was edged with other emotions.

‘A few more days?’ he repeated. ‘Maybe more?’ His voice was disturbingly deep, his scrutiny so intense it was like a touch, and Annalisa sucked in a quick breath.

‘You and me, alone in the desert.’

She met his unreadable eyes. Her stomach dipped. She lifted her chin, battling emotions she didn’t understand.

Last night’s intimacy had changed everything.

For the first time their enforced solitude felt…dangerous.

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