A Reputation For Revenge (11 page)

The irony almost made him laugh. Kasimir envied her next husband. Because even though he was married to her now, Kasimir couldn’t be that man. He wasn’t her partner, or even her lover. Not even, really, her friend.

But he could be.

“After I pay you for the land,” he said, “you and your sister will be free of those old debts. You’ll be able to pursue your dreams.” He ignored the lump in his throat. “Whatever they might be.”

“You’re going to pay me?” she gasped. “I thought our deal was just a direct trade—the land for my sister.”

“And I always intended to pay you full market value,” he lied.

He heard her intake of breath. “Really?” she said wistfully.

No. He’d pay her double the market value. “Yes.”

“You don’t know what this means to me,” she choked out. “We won’t have to hide from those men anymore. We’ll be free. And if there’s any money left after the debts, Bree could use it to start her bed and breakfast.”

“Is that what will make you happy?” he said. “Using the money so your sister can fulfill her dreams?”

“Yes!” she cried. “Oh, Kasimir…” He felt her hand against his rough, unshaven cheek, turning him towards her. He saw the tearful glitter of her eyes. “Thank you. You are—you are…”

With a joyful sob, she threw her arms around him.

Kasimir’s arms slowly wrapped around her as her silken negligee slid against the bare skin of his chest. Their bodies pressed together in the bed, and as he felt her soft body against his own, he became all jumbled inside, twisted up and down and turned around.

He put his hand against her cheek. “Josie…” he said hoarsely.

In the shadowy tent, beneath the covers of the bed, he could see her beautiful eyes. He could barely hear her ragged breathing over the pounding of his own heart.

Her skin felt so soft beneath his fingertips. Her arms were bare and wrapped around his naked back. Their faces were inches apart. He wanted to kiss her, hot and hard and deep. He wanted to take her and let his promises fade like mist into the night.

Using every bit of willpower he possessed, he dropped his hand. He pulled away, rolling to the farthest edge of his bed.

“Good night,” he choked out.

Silence fell. Then she said softly behind him, “Good night.”

Kasimir heard her move to the other side of the bed. He exhaled, closing his eyes. He could still see her beautiful, innocent face, her curvaceous body sheathed in diaphanous silk, shimmering like waves in the flickering light.

He listened to the wind blowing against the tent, the distant whinny of horses, the call of servants’ voices across the encampment. And he still heard Josie’s voice, sweet and innocent, filled with the trembling edge between desire and fear.

But what if I touch you?
she’d asked.

Kasimir didn’t have to touch her to feel her. Lying next to her in the soft bed, with blankets warming them in the cool,
arid night, there was a desert of empty space between them, but her slightest tremble was an earthquake.

In just a few weeks, once her land was his, Kasimir would trade her for what he wanted most. He would seize control of Xendzov Mining. He’d get justice against those who’d wronged him. He’d finally win.

He should be glad. Excited. His teeth should have been sharpening with anticipation.

But as he listened to Josie’s soft, even breathing, all he could think about was what he would soon lose.

He glanced over at her in the darkness. She didn’t care about vengeance or money. She wanted to give away her fortune to make her sister happy. She gave everything she had, without worrying if she’d get anything back in return. She didn’t even try to protect her heart.

Thank you, Kasimir.
He remembered the joy in her voice when she’d thrown her arms around him.
You are… you are…

He was a selfish bastard with a jet-black heart. He’d kissed her, kidnapped her, kept her prisoner, but she kept forgiving him, again and again.

Rolling onto his back, Kasimir stared up bleakly at the swoop of the tent’s canvas, gray with shadow.

Was there some way to keep her in his life? Some way to bind her to him so thoroughly that she’d have no choice but to forgive him the unforgivable?

Two days later, Josie stared up at him with consternation. “You have to be joking.”

“Come on,” Kasimir wheedled, holding out his hand beneath the hot afternoon sunshine. “You said you wanted to do it.”

Glancing back at the tallest sand dune, she licked her lips. “I said it looked fun in theory.”

“You know you want to.” Wind ruffled his tousled black hair as he smiled down at her. He was casually dressed, in a
well-worn black T-shirt that hugged his muscular chest and large, taut biceps and low-slung jeans on his hips. He looked relaxed and younger than she’d ever seen him. He lifted a dark eyebrow wickedly. “You’re not scared, are you?”

Josie licked her lips. When he looked at her with that mischievous smile, he made her want to agree to absolutely anything.

But—this?

Furrowing her brow, she looked behind her. Three young Berber boys, around twelve or thirteen years old, were using brightly colored snowboards to careen down the sand, whooping and hollering in Berber, the primary language of the tribe, but the boys’ joyous laughter needed no translation.

Josie and Kasimir had been sitting outside the dining tent, lazily eating an early dinner of grapes, flatbread and lamb kabobs, when the boys had started their raucous race. As Josie sipped mint tea, with Kasimir drinking a glass of Moroccan rosé wine beside her, she’d said dreamily, “I wish I could do what they’re doing. Be fearless and free.”

To her dismay, Kasimir had immediately stood up, brushing sand off his jeans. “So let’s go.”

Now, he was looking at her with challenge in his eyes. “I have an extra sandboard. I’ll show you how.”

She scowled. “You know, saying something looks fun and being brave enough to actually do it, are two totally different things!”

“They shouldn’t be.”

“It looks dangerous. Bree would never let me do it.”

“Another good reason.”

Josie stiffened. “I wish you would quit slandering Bree—”

“I don’t care about her,” he interrupted. “I care about
you.
And what you want. Your sister isn’t here to stop you. I’m not going to stop you. You say you want to do it. The only one stopping you is you.”

She looked up at the dune. It was very tall and the sand looked very hard. She licked her lips. “What if I fall?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “So what if you do?”

“The kids might laugh, or—” she hesitated “—you might.”

“Me?” He stared at her incredulously. “Is that a joke? You’d let fear of my reaction keep you from something you want?” His sensual lips lifted as he shook his head. “That doesn’t sound like the Josie I know.”

She felt a strange flutter in her heart. Kasimir thought she was brave. He thought she was bold.

And she was, when she was with him. She barely recognized herself anymore as the downtrodden housekeeper she’d been in Hawaii. Tomorrow was New Year’s Eve, but for Josie, the New Year—her new life—had already begun.

She’d be able to pay off their debts. She hugged the thought to her heart like a precious gift. They’d be free of the dark cloud of fear that had hung over them for ten years, forcing them to stay under the radar with low-paying, nondescript jobs. Bree would be able to start her business. Josie would never feel like a burden again to anyone.

But it would come at a cost. Josie looked up at Kasimir. He could be a rough man, selfish and unfeeling, and yet beneath it all… he truly was a good man. His generosity would change her life.

But she would never see him again. And that thought was starting to hurt. Because she couldn’t kid herself.

She’d stopped thinking of their marriage as a business arrangement long ago.

Yesterday, Kasimir had taught her how to ride a horse. Very patiently, until she lost her fear of the big animals’ teeth and sharp hooves, until she started to gain confidence. She was still a little sore from their ride that morning, traveling across the dunes to the nearest village, to bring medicine from Marrakech. As she and Kasimir galloped back together across the desert, his eyes had been as blue and bright as the
wide Moroccan sky. She lost a new fragment of her heart every time he looked at her with that brilliant, boyish smile.

Just as he was looking at her now.

“Well?” His hand was still outstretched with utter confidence, as if he knew she would not be able to resist.

“Is it soft? Like powder?”

He laughed. “No. It’ll leave bruises.”

“Sounds fun,” she muttered.

“Do you want to try it or not?”

She swallowed, then looked at the boys zooming down the sand dune at incredible speed, on boards lightly strapped to their feet. Heard their roars of laughter and delight. Maybe it wasn’t hard. Maybe it was actually quite easy. All she had to do was make the choice.

Josie’s eyes narrowed. She was done being afraid—of anything. Done living a life smaller than her dreams.

Holding her breath, she put her hand in his own.

He pulled her close. “Good,” he said in a low voice. “Let’s do it. Right now.”

His face was inches from her own, and a tremble went through her that had nothing to do with fear. Every time Kasimir looked at her, every time he spoke to her, she felt her heart expand until she felt as if she was flying.

Let’s do it. Right now.

His grip on her hand tightened. Then he abruptly turned away, disappearing into a nearby tent. And she exhaled.

It had been torture sleeping next to him the last two nights. She’d been so aware of him beside her, it was a miracle she’d gotten any rest at all. Especially the first night, when they’d been talking so late into the darkness, and he’d told her he meant to pay for her land. She’d been so ecstatic that she’d thrown her arms around him. He’d held her so tightly, his eyes dark on hers, and for one moment, she’d thought, really thought, he might break his promise. And here was the really shocking thing…

She’d
wanted
him to.

Her lips had tingled as she’d waited breathlessly for him to lower his mouth savagely to hers and pull her hard against his body. She’d ached to stroke her hands down his hard, tanned chest, laced with dark hair. She’d yearned to feel his pure heat and fire. Her body still shook with the memory of how she’d wanted it. And looking at him, she’d known he felt the same.

But he’d hadn’t touched her.

When he’d abruptly turned away, she’d felt bereft—disappointed. Almost heartbroken.

Which made no sense at all. She admired commitment to promises, didn’t she? And while they’d been thrown together in a very intimate way, it wasn’t as if they had—or ever would have—a real marriage.

She needed to keep reminding herself of that.

Kasimir returned to the table outside the dining tent. He had two snowboards hefted over his shoulders as if they weighed nothing. “Let’s go.”

Smiling, and far lighter on her feet, she led the way to the top of the dune.

“Like being faster than me, huh?” he said, quirking his eyebrow.

She grinned. “Absolutely.”

“We’ll see.” He answered her with a wicked smile. “Sit down right here.”

Obediently, Josie plunked back on the warm sand in her cotton button-down shirt and soft linen pants. As he knelt on the sand in front of her, in his form-fitting T-shirt and loose cargo shorts, she wondered how brave she could really be. He’d promised not to kiss her.

But there was no rule about her kissing him.

“You’re going to love this,” he said, pulling off her sandals.

She shivered. His hands brushed against the hollows of her bare feet, and her mouth went dry. “I’m sure,” she murmured.

He was inches away from her. She could just lean forward
and kiss him. Press her lips against his. Could she do it? Was she brave enough?

Kasimir’s blue eyes met hers, and he smiled. She wondered how she’d ever thought him cold in Honolulu. Here, he was warm and bright as the blazing desert sun. “Are you nervous?”

“Yes,” she whispered, praying he couldn’t guess why.

“Don’t be.”

She gave a soft laugh. “That’s easy for you to say.”

He placed her bare feet into the straps attached to the board. Standing up, he grabbed her hands and pulled her upright. Josie swayed a little, getting used to the balance. She hadn’t been on a board in a long time. She tested the sand with a slight lean and twist. Without snow boots, the ankle support was nonexistent. Turning corners would be nearly impossible.

Kasimir stepped into his own modified snowboard, and his arm shot out to grab her when she started to tilt. “Ready?”

She felt a flash of dizzying heat with his hand on her arm. “Yes,” she breathed. “I just need a second to build my courage.”

“So.” He gave her a slow-rising grin. “Are you interested in racing me?”

“Racing?” Josie looked dubiously over the edge of the dune. It wasn’t as steep as some of the mountains she’d snowboarded in Alaska, but that was ten years ago. To say her skills were rusty was an understatement. And boarding down sand was going to be like sailing down a sheet of ice. “I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”

“I thought you said you liked being faster than me.”

“I do.”

“Then racing me should be right up your alley.” His masculine grin turned downright cocky. “I’ll even give you a head start.”

Laughter bubbled up to her lips, barely contained. He clearly believed he would be faster. “Um. Thank you?”

“And if you win, you’ll get a prize.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Your own private tent,” he said recklessly. “For the rest of the time we’re in the Sahara.”

Her lips parted. Somehow that prize didn’t excite her as much as it once would have. “And what about if you win?”

Kasimir looked down at her, and something in his glance made her hold her breath.

“You’ll share my bed,” he said softly, “and let me make love to you.”

S
HARE HIS BED?

Josie’s lips parted, her heart beating frantically as she looked up at him.

Let him make love to her?

She’d been trying to build up enough courage to kiss him. What would it be like to have him make love to her?

With a shuddering breath, she looked up at him. “I thought you said our marriage was in n-name only.”

“I changed my mind,” Kasimir said huskily. “You know I want you. And I’ve come to enjoy your company. There’s no reason we shouldn’t be… friends.”

“Friends who will divorce in a few weeks.”

“We could still see each other.” He looked at her. “If you want.”

Her lips parted. “If
I
want?”

“I would very much like to still see you, after we are divorced.” His blue eyes seared through her soul. “For as long as you are still interested in seeing me.”

Josie sucked in her breath. For as long as
she
wished to see him? That would be forever!

She looked back over the edge of the dune. It didn’t look so frightening anymore. Not with this new challenge. Not with her very virginity on the line.

But…

What about saving herself for love, for commitment, for a lifetime?

She looked back at him. Was Kasimir the man? Was this the time? Was this how she wanted to remember her first night, for the rest of her life?

Her heart pounded in her throat.

Should she let her husband take her virginity?

“Just so you know,” she said hesitantly, “my babysitter taught me to snowboard.”

“Even better.” He gave her a cheeky grin. “So with your head start, you have pretty good odds.”

She couldn’t help but smile at his smug masculine confidence. “Bree’s the gambler, not me.”

He gave her a long look beneath the blazing white sun.

“Are you sure about that?” he said softly.

On the other end of the dune, with a loud shout, the boys pushed off again, going straight down, good-naturedly roughhousing and cutting in front of each other as they skidded down the sand.

Josie closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and made her choice.

“I’ll do it.”

“Excellent.”

His blue eyes were beaming. He clearly expected that this would be no contest and that he would easily overtake her. He didn’t know that the entirety of the choice was still hers. Would she let him beat her? Or not?

Before her courage could fail her, she breathed, “Just tell me when to go.”

“One… two… three…
go!
”

Hastily, Josie tilted her snowboard and went off the edge, plummeting down the dune. Her body remembered the sport, even though her brain had forgotten, and her board picked up speed. For a glorious instant, she flew, and wild joy filled her heart—joy she hadn’t felt for ten years.

Then she remembered: if she won, she would sleep alone.

And if she lost,
he would seduce her.

Slow down,
she ordered her feet, and though they protested, she made them turn, her body leaning to drag the board against sand as hard and glassy as ice. It was hard to slow down, when her body yearned to barrel down the dune, like the reckless child she’d once been.

“You’ll never win that way,” Kasimir called from the top, sounding amused. “Turn your feet to aim straight down.”

Josie choked back a wry laugh. He had no idea how hard she was trying
not
to do that. A bead of sweat formed on her forehead from the effort of fighting her body’s desire to aim the snowboard straight down and plummet at the speed of flight. Couldn’t he tell? Couldn’t he see she was actually forcing herself
not
to win?

“Ready or not…”

Behind her, he pushed off the top of the dune. Smiling, she looked up at him as he glided past her on his snowboard. She saw the joy in his face—the same as when they’d galloped together across the desert that morning.

“You are mine now,
kroshka!
” he shouted, and flew past her.

Let me fly fast,
half her heart begged.

Let him seduce you,
the other half cried.

Then Josie turned her head when she heard a scream at the bottom of the hill. One of the roughhousing boys had lost control and crashed into the other, sending the smaller one skidding down the hard sand in panicked yells. The smaller boy, perhaps twelve years old, had a streak of blood across his tanned face and a trail of red followed him across the pale sand.

Josie didn’t think, she just acted. Her knees turned, she leaned forward and she flew down the hill. She had a single glimpse of Kasimir’s shocked face as she flew right past him. But she didn’t think about that, or anything but the boy’s face—the boy who moments before had seemed like a reckless,
rambunctious teenager, but who now she saw was barely more than a child.

She reached the bottom of the dune in seconds. Ten feet away from the boy, she twisted hard on her snowboard, digging in for a sharp stop, causing sand to scatter in a wide fan around the boy’s friends, who were struggling up towards him. Josie kicked off her snowboard in a single fluid movement and leapt barefoot across the hot sand.

“Are you all right?” she said to the boy in English. His black eyes were anguished, and he answered in sobbing words she didn’t understand.

Then she saw his leg.

Beneath the boy’s white pants, now covered with blood, she saw the freakish-looking angle of his shin.

She blinked, feeling as though she was going to faint. Careful not to look back at his leg, she reached her arm around the boy’s shoulders. “It’ll be all right,” she whispered, forcing her voice to offer comfort and reassurance. “It’ll be all right.”

“It’s a compound fracture,” Kasimir said behind her. She turned and got one vision of his strangely calm face, before he twisted around and spoke sharply in Berber to the other two boys. They scattered, shouting as they ran for the encampment.

Kasimir knelt in the sand beside her. He looked down at the injury. As Josie cuddled the crying boy, Kasimir spoke to him with incredible gentleness in his voice. The boy answered him with a sob.

Carefully, Kasimir ripped the fabric up to the knee to get a closer look at the break. Tearing off a corner of his own shirt, he pushed it into Josie’s hand. “Press this just below the knee to slow down the blood.”

His voice was calm. Clearly he was good in a crisis. She was not. She swallowed, feeling wobbly. “I can’t—”

“You can.”

He had such faith in her. She couldn’t let him down. Still
feeling a bit green, she took a deep breath and pressed the cloth to a point above the wound as firmly as she could.

Rising to his feet, Kasimir crossed back across the sand and returned a moment later with his snowboard. Turning it over to the flat side, he dug sand out from beneath the boy and gently nudged the board beneath the injured leg. He ripped more long bits of fabric from his shirt, giving Josie a flash of his hard, taut abs before he bent to use the board as a splint.

The boy’s parents arrived at a run, his mother crying, his father looking blank with fear as he reached out to hold his son’s hand. Behind them another man, dark-skinned, with an indigo-colored turban, gave quick brusque orders that all of them obeyed, including Kasimir. Five minutes later, they were lifting the boy onto a makeshift stretcher.

Josie’s knees shook beneath her as she started to follow. Kasimir stopped her.

“Go back to the tent,” he said. “There’s nothing more you can do.” His lips twitched. “Can’t have you fainting on us.”

She swallowed, remembering how she’d nearly fainted at the sight of the boy’s injury. “But I want to help—”

“You have,” he said softly. He glanced behind him. “Ahmed’s uncle is a doctor. He will take good care of him until the helicopter arrives.” He pushed her gently in the other direction. “He’ll be all right. Go back to the tent. And pack.”

Josie watched anxiously as the boy was carried to the other side of the encampment. He disappeared into a tent, with Kasimir and the others beside him, and she finally turned away. Dazed, she looked down at her clenched hands and saw they were covered in blood.

Slowly, she walked back to the tent she shared with Kasimir. She went to the basin of water and used rose-scented soap to wash the blood off her hands. Drying her hands on a towel, she sank to the bed.

Go back to the tent. And pack.

She gasped as the meaning of those words sank in. She covered her mouth with her hand.

She’d won.
By pure mischance, she’d won their race.

There would be no seduction. Instead, from this night forward, she’d be sleeping alone in a separate tent.

Once, Josie would have been relieved.

But now…

Numbly, she rose from their bed. Grabbing her backpack, she started to gather her clothes. Then she stopped, looking around the tent. Kasimir always dumped everything on the floor, in that careless masculine way, knowing it was someone else’s job to follow after him and tidy up. Looking across the luxurious carpets piled thickly across the sand, Josie’s eyes could see the entirety of her husband’s day: the empty water bucket of solid silver. The hand-crafted sandalwood soap. His crumpled pajama pants. And in a corner, his black leather briefcase, so stuffed with papers that it could no longer be closed, none of which he’d glanced at even once since the day they’d arrived here.

In the distance, she heard a sound like rolling thunder.

Tears rose to her eyes, and she wiped them away fiercely. She didn’t want to leave him. This was the place where they whispered secrets to each other in the middle of the night. The bed where, if she woke up in the middle of the night, she’d hear the soft sound of his breathing and go back to sleep, comforted that he was beside her.

No more.

When she was finished packing, she grabbed her mother’s tattered copy of
North and South.
For the next hour as she waited, sitting on the bed, Josie tried to concentrate on the love story, though she found herself reading the same paragraph over and over.

Kasimir’s footstep was heavy as he pushed aside the heavy cotton flap of the door. She looked up from her book, her heart fluttering, as it always did at the breathtaking masculine
beauty of his face, the hard edge of his jawline, dark with five o’clock shadow, and the curved edge of his cheekbones. His blue eyes looked tired.

Setting down the book on the bed, Josie asked anxiously, “Is he going to be all right?”

“Yes.” He went to the basin and poured clear, fresh water over his dirty hands. “His uncle put a proper splint on his leg. The helicopter just left to take them all to the hospital in Marrakech.”

“Thank heaven,” Josie whispered.

Kasimir didn’t answer. But as he dried his hands, she saw the shadows beneath his eyes, the tightness of his shoulders.

Without a word, she came up behind him. Closing her eyes, she wrapped her arms around his body, pressing her cheek against his back until she felt his tension slowly relax into her embrace.

A moment later, with a shudder, he finally turned around in her arms to face her.

“You were the first to reach him,” he said in a low voice. “Thank you.”

Her eyes glistened with tears. “It was nothing.”

Kasimir gave her a ghost of a smile. “You were much faster than I thought.”

“I told you my father and Bree were gone a lot,” she said in a small voice. “My babysitter was a former championship snowboarder from the Lower Forty-Eight.”

“You grew up in Anchorage, didn’t you?” He gave a low, humorless laugh. “Had a season pass at Alyeska?”

“Since I was four years old.” She gave him a trembling smile. “If it’s any consolation, I’m faster than Bree, too. She’s horrible on the mountain. Strap skis or a snowboard on her feet and she’ll plow nose-first into the snow.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“But you and I,” she said quickly, “it was a close race…”

“Not even.” He bared his teeth in a smile. “You won by a mile.”

With an intake of breath, Josie searched his gaze. “Kasimir, you have to know that I never meant to—”

“And I see you’ve packed. Good.” He glanced down at her backpack. “I’ll show you to your new tent.”

“Fantastic,” she said, crestfallen. Against her will, she hungrily searched his handsome face, his deep blue eyes, his sensual lips. She didn’t want to be away from him.
She didn’t.
“If not for the accident,” she said, glancing at him sideways, “the race could have ended very differently…”

“Josie, please,” Kasimir growled. “Do not attempt to assuage my masculine pride. That would just add insult to injury.” Picking up her backpack, he tossed it over his shoulder. “I’ll send over your trunk of new clothes later. You’ll likely only be here at the camp for another week or two.”

“Just me? Not you?”

He set his jaw. “I’m going to go look for your sister.”

“I thought you said it was too soon,” Josie said faintly.

He gave her a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “I’ll leave you and go get her. Both the things you wanted. It’s your lucky day.”

It was ending. He was leaving her. She thought of the time she’d wasted, longing for him to kiss her and doing nothing. Waiting—always waiting—with a timid heart!

“But you said you couldn’t trust me. That if you brought back my sister early, I might demand a hundred million dollars for my land.”

He gave a hard laugh. “You’re more trustworthy than anyone in this crazy, savage world. Including me.” Grabbing her upper arms, he looked down at her. “Serves me right,” he muttered. “I never should have tried to get around my promise.”

“Take me with you.”

His eyes widened, then he slowly shook his head. “It’ll
be better… for your sake… for both of us… it’s best that we separate.”

“Separate,” she echoed, feeling hollow.

“Until the land comes through.”

She swallowed. “Until we divorce.”

His lips curved into a humorless smile. “You know what, I’m almost glad I lost.” He tucked a loose tendril of her brown hair behind her ear, then looked straight into her eyes. “Save yourself, Josie. For your next husband. For a man who can deserve you. Who can love you,” he added softly.