Heather Graham (7 page)

Dazed and covered with sand, she stared in disbelief as he kept coming, the stallion seeming to fly across the dunes, the man part of a distant, mysterious past. She didn’t think to be alarmed at first, or even to worry if the nine-foot fall from the camel’s back had left her in one piece: She simply stared.

She stumbled to her feet, spitting sand, as the man and the mount, with the seven or so retainers behind him, circled her, their frightening Arabic hoots and cries and chants piercing the silence of the desert. The beauty of the approach had been so startling it had seemed to take place in slow motion; suddenly everything seemed to happen at once.

Her camel balked again and ran away with feet flying awkwardly, and she was standing alone. Some riders approached Raj, and he called out something panicky in Arabic as he was led away between them.

And then
he
, still upon his magnificent stallion, was staring at her. His eyes were coal flames. They sizzled beneath the sun; they seemed to set fire to her soul. His skin was the bronze of a Bedouin; his thick mustache and beard covered a chin of insolent, angular strength. His brows were heavy and bushy, his nose prominent with a hawkish hook. And when he smiled, slowly, insolently, arrogantly, his teeth were perfect and white against the full mouth and dark beard.

“What do you want!” Alex demanded, hoping her voice held the defiance her trembling body lacked. He just stared at her, still smiling. Who was he? she wondered, again bemoaning the fact that she had chosen hieroglyphics over Arabic continually in school. Atop the stallion, the man with the dark Arabic eyes and haunting facial contours was a more formidable opponent than she had ever expected to face. No, he wasn’t just formidable. This man was terrifying.

“You made my camel run away!” she snapped, drawing desperately on whatever bravado she could summon. “You do realize that it is terribly rude to burst upon people this way—”

She didn’t get any further. The sinewed muscles in the stallion’s haunches convulsed, and the horse was moving—toward her.

“Now wait a minute …” Alex automatically began to back up. It did her no good. The horse broke into a prance and moved directly beside her, and even as she turned like a cornered deer, floundering in the sand and scrambling to flee, the man’s arms caught her squarely around the middle and she felt herself being hoisted through the air and precariously balanced belly-down over the shoulders of the stallion. The man snapped out a single word in Arabic, and the animal’s muscles bunched beneath her. She grabbed desperately at the saddle trimmings for balance as they broke into a canter.

It was difficult to talk; it was difficult to do anything other than pray that she would not fly off the racing horse, and try to draw air rather than sand into her lungs.

And yet, despite the rise of basic survival instincts, Alex found strength somewhere to scream out her rage. “You can’t do this to me! I’m an American. Stop this horse! Let me go at once. I’ll have the embassy on you for this! I’ll call out the entire United Nations!”

Laughter, full, deep, rich and husky, was his only response. Eventually she tired after she had called him every name she could think of—her vocabulary of profanities was quite extensive after all the years she had spent with her father and predominantly male workers. She threatened him with everything from being boiled alive to being drawn and quartered. Then she even remembered a few phrases in Arabic, two of which her father had taught her when she had begun to comb the bazaars of Cairo with him in search of authentic antiquities.
“Ibiid yaedaek! Kif wae illae sae’ asrokh.”
Keep your hands to yourself! Stop or I’ll scream!

Great words. They might have an effect upon a wayward youth in a crowded bazaar, but it was blatantly obvious this maniacal Arab couldn’t care less whether she screamed or not. There were certainly no
bolis
, police, around to help her.

She grew more and more angry—and frightened. No, Alex, she warned herself, don’t be frightened! Stay mad! Don’t let this man know you are anything but indignant and furious.

He merely grew more amused.

And she fell silent, focusing her inward curses upon some vague form of punishment for Kelly, who, it seemed, had wished this entire bizarre occurrence upon her. And when she finished cursing Kelly, she cursed Jim for having sent her to Sheriff, and when she finished cursing Jim, she started again with her greatest, most vicious vengeance upon the true root of her present humiliation—D’Alesio!

She knew there was no way that she could be imagining this. Not when every inch of her flesh was being jounced and bruised; not when the sand flew around her, blinding her, pelting her skin; not when she could feel the heat and lather of the stallion and the broad steely hand of the insolent Arab, splayed across her back, holding her firmly.

It had to end. She was bruised from head to toe. She wasn’t terribly sure she would ever walk again. It seemed that she had swallowed half the desert.

The racing horse had slowed to a more agonizing trot. A second later the animal halted, and she would have fallen were it not for the power of the hand upon her back. She tried to look up and blink the blinding sand from her eyes.

They were … somewhere. A vast number of tents stretched before her, a relief from the monotony of the desert. Grass grew in tufts at the stallion’s hooves; she could hazily make out a cluster of date-nut trees. From somewhere nearby came the blessed sound of splashing water and children’s laughter.

An oasis. They had reached an oasis. And the tents were large and numerous.

They had stopped in front of a particular tent, she realized quickly. A young woman greeted the Arab who was holding her with soft, quiet curiosity. She was adorned in beautiful silks, from the gauze veil that enhanced the beauty of her face rather than hid it, to her tight jewel-encrusted bodice and sheer ballooning trousers.

Alex suddenly felt herself plucked upward again by a grip about her abdomen, as easily as if she were a kitten gripped by a mother cat. And then she was set—plopped, actually—on her feet. To her vast relief, she was able to control the spinning of her mind and body and stand without falling.

She turned furiously to the man. “I demand—”

He broke in unceremoniously, not addressing her but the young Arabian woman. In the rapid brushfire of words that passed between the two, Alex could make out only one word:
haemmaem.
Bath …
bath!

“You bastard!” Alex shrieked, fighting tears of rage and disbelief. The arrogant Bedouin had insolently abducted her and raked her across the sands, and now he had the nerve to command that she have a bath. She wanted to scream with incredulity, humiliation, fury and fear.

She did start screaming, her fists clutched tightly to her sides. The Arab gave her a suave, cool smile, flicked his stallion’s haunches lightly with his whip and trotted smoothly away.

A
LEX’S REACTION WAS SPONTANEOUS
. Blind rage brought power to her bruised limbs; she stooped to fill her hands with sand and tore after the horseman, coming within five feet of the prancing stallion. To her great satisfaction, the Arab was taken by surprise as she tore in front of him and showered him with the sand—and a few strident curses for good measure.

Her temporary victory was washed away in the tidal fury of his dark eyes. He blinked only once, dismounted from his horse and started after her with swift, calculated steps. Instinctively Alex turned to run, but she didn’t know in which direction to head. She took off, but too late. The steel vise of his arms came around, catching her, hefting her up and over his shoulder with effortless agility. Very close to tears, she shrieked and pounded on his back, all to no avail. His strong, assured gait brought her back to the tent and inside the goatskin flap.

She landed unceremoniously on an already bruised section of her derriere with her now unpinned hair creating a tangled and blinding web before her eyes. Struggling for breath, she tossed back her hair in time to see her abductor stalking from the tent, her final view of him being of his black-draped back.

She lunged to her feet to accost him again, but even as she rose, two large and swarthy Bedouins passed before her, bowing and moving toward the flap. They were smiling, but the message in their eyes was firm; she needed no translation to realize that they were guards and would obstruct her forcefully were she to attempt an exit.

Biting down on her lip to quell the tears that rose within her, Alex tried desperately to regain some composure and assess her situation logically.

Logically! Dear God, it wasn’t a classroom, it wasn’t even an ancient tomb with hieroglyphics to be analyzed and transcribed. She had been taken prisoner in the middle of an alien desert, by a dark and apparently all-powerful Bedouin, who had ordered that she have a bath.

Oh, dear God! This was impossible; outrageous. No, it wasn’t impossible, because it was happening.

Don’t panic, Alex. Don’t panic. She realized suddenly that she was studiously chewing the nail of her left forefinger. She quickly wrenched her fingertip from her mouth and spun around to survey the tent.

Again, all she could think of was Arabian nights. The floor was sand, but over the sand beautifully woven Persian rugs were scattered. There was a massive canopied bed with silk coverings and a multitude of throw pillows; larger pillows decked the floor around an especially large rug. Turkish coffee brewed in a canister above a small fire at the far end of the rug; a tray with dates and nuts and fruits sat near it. Several divans, also decked in colorful silks, rounded out the room; spaced between them were teakwood tables and trunks.

It was an exotically beautiful place, she thought fleetingly. Even the inner skin of the tent had been dressed in billowing silk. The colors were those of the rainbow, bright and yet soft.

And in the far rear of the tent, silently watching Alex, was the stunningly pretty Arab girl. Her eyes were large and sympathetic as she stood quietly beside the tent’s one other accessory—a large, ornately embossed metal bathtub with four huge feet that resembled those of a jackal.

Steam rose in fragrant mists from the tub. The girl inclined her head slightly toward Alex and swept her arm invitingly across the rise of the mist.

Alex crossed her arms firmly over her chest, tapping her fingers upon her arms. She smiled grimly. “Not on your life,” she said with sweet, unfaltering determination.

The girl appeared to be sincerely upset. She spoke quickly in husky tones to Alex, but all Alex could make out was the Arabic for “please,”
min fadlak.
The girl again motioned to the tub, her expression pleading.

Alex shook her head. “I’m sorry. No.”

The huge, doelike eyes of the girl became both sad and resigned. With delicate little steps she started toward the tent flap.

Alex heard her soft Arabic as she began speaking to the Bedouin bruisers. A second later both men ducked beneath the flap and stood behind the girl as she again addressed Alex in sorrowful tones.

For several seconds Alex stared at her blankly, wondering what on earth the girl was saying and once more lamenting her sketchy Arabic. Then the girl lifted her hands in a universal gesture of exasperation. The two men started toward Alex, and everything the young woman had been trying to say became crystal clear. She could step into the tub of her own accord—or she could receive some assistance from the bruisers.

Alex immediately leaped backward, lining her hand toward the men.
“Kiff! Kiff!”
she exclaimed, thankful she remembered the word for “stop.” The men paused, and she wished heatedly that she could smash both their faces as they smiled their superior amusement.

Everyone in the tent knew she was going to step into the bath under her own power. Bowing like amiable housemen pleased to have served her, they backed out of the tent, only to take up their positions on either side of it once more.

Alex grated her teeth and stared with animosity at the Arab girl, who continued to survey her sorrowfully. She attempted to smile, and Alex sighed. Begrudging every step she took, she gingerly approached the tub.

Even in high school and college Alex had never been the type to run around the girls’ locker room nude. It bothered her to disrobe with the young Arab girl near, but she knew it would bother her a great deal more to be forcibly disrobed by the pair of guard dogs. With little finesse she ditched her Arabian robes and scrambled from the khaki trousers and shirt she wore beneath them, then crawled hastily and with even less grace into the elaborate tub. At first the impact of the heated water on her flesh almost made her cry out, but after the initial shock, the permeating, soothing heat felt delicious. Alex closed her eyes for a moment, savoring the relaxation of her bruised and abused muscles.

Her eyes flew open again as she felt a touch upon her arm. The young Arab woman stood beside her.

Touch me again, Alex thought, and you’ll be in for a fit you won’t believe.

But the woman merely handed her a vial and touched her own hair. Shampoo, Alex thought, nodding as she accepted the vial. The woman moved away discreetly and took a kneeling position upon the center rug to check the brewing coffee.

The water in the tub was oiled. It smelled faintly and pleasantly of almond and jasmine, and the feel against her skin was luxurious after the scorching sun and blistering sand.

It was absurd to appreciate being forced to take a bath, but for a brief moment of gratitude, Alex was thankful. A large Greek sponge floated upon the surface of the water, and she realized quickly that soap was within the sponge.

She had no choice but to take the bath, she might as well enjoy it. No choice … Alex scrubbed her skin with a fury as she again fought desperately to be calm and analytical. Where was she? In an oasis—an oasis in the direction she had been traveling. It was logical to assume that this oasis was the domain of Ali Sur Sheriff. Had it been the powerful sheikh himself who had abducted her? But she knew that Sheriff spoke English; he had, if memory served her, spent time in the United States. And even the official in Abu Dhabi had assured her Sheriff was civilized.