Pure Desire [Pure 3] (Siren Publishing Allure) (14 page)

Allura stammered, “Dunst? Dunst is here? I mean—not here…in town—Dunst is back in the territory?”

“This Dunst man seems to be a problem,” Noor said, watching Allura closely.

“No.”

“Yes.” Allura gave him the evil eye, a blatant warning to shut his mouth, which her brother ignored.

“Dunst and Allura have a bit of a history.”

“We do not,” she snapped.

“Sis, you almost married the man. I would say that is more than a past. Thank god Father had the insight to stop you from making a serious mistake. You were young, foolish, and clueless about how to judge a man’s character. It’s nothing to be ashamed about.”

“This Dunst hurt you, Allura?” Noor’s tone was level.

“No.”

“Yes, he did, sis. He crushed your heart, but in hindsight, it was worth your suffering. If you had married Dunst, your life would have been horrific, and I would have had to kill the bastard. Dunst is one of the best cattle rustlers, but he isn’t the marrying type. You were too young and infatuated, confused about love versus lust.”

Allura rolled her eyes dramatically. Channing talked too much. She glanced at Noor, who had become rigid, and she wondered why.

“Father thinks Dunst might still be holding a grudge as well. After all, marrying you would have immediately elevated his status from ranch hand to one of the richest son-in-laws this side of Texas. I can see why he might be bitter. Mind you, I don’t care what his grudge is, if he tries anything he is a dead man,” Channing said.

“You need help? I wouldn’t mind going along and meeting this man,” Noor said.

“That isn’t necessary,” Allura said.

“I wouldn’t mind if you tagged along, but Father will feel better if you stay behind and watch over things while we’re away.” Channing wiped his mouth and stood up. “Well, we need to ride out. Sis, stay out of trouble. Noor, keep your eye on her. I wouldn’t put anything past Matt Graham to try and do something foolish if he knows Father and I are away.”

“I won’t let her out of my sight.”

Allura waited until Channing left the room before she spun around in her chair and hissed at Noor. “I don’t need you or anyone else to follow me around like I’m incapable of handling myself.”

Noor pushed his plate aside. He leaned forward, sat his elbows on the table, and matched her stare. “I never said you did. However, if you are my responsibility while your family is away, I take the task seriously. When do we ride over to the McFarland spread?”

“You think I should just forget what you did last night?” she said tersely.

Noor’s lips curled upward in the corners. “I don’t think you ever will, sweetie.”

Allura tossed her napkin down. “You know what I’m talking about. You hurt my feelings. Though I should not tell you that, like all men, you will probably try to use it to your advantage. My god, why I have any feelings for you continues to puzzle me. After all, it’s not as if we have known each other for a lifetime…or a full week. This is ridiculously insane what is happening.”

“If you only knew,” Noor mumbled.

“Do you care to explain your comment?”

“I will tell you when we ride to the McFarlands’. Shall we?”

Allura folded her arms like a defiant child. She glowered at him. “Mister, if you think I want to go anywhere with you after what you did to me, you are sadly mistaken. Luck would be on your side if I ever speak to you after today…this minute.”

Noor tilted closer, his tone dropped an octave. “Do you know how hot and bothered it makes me seeing you all flushed, breasts heaving and straining against your bodice? Those damned nipples poking at me, sweetie. My cock is so hard, I’m surprised it hasn’t drilled through the tabletop. Settle down. You and I both know you will not only speak to me again but damned well enjoy it.”

“Don’t be so sure of yourself. In fact, I’m thinking about asking you to leave here and ensure you never step foot on our ranch again. I can have you escorted from the property by a few ranch hands.”

Noor gave her an insolent smile that wasn’t a smile at all. “Sweetie, this is between you and me, and if you involve anyone else, you are signing their death certificate. I will kill the bastard who touches me. Hell, if a man touches you, he’s as good as dead, too.”

Allura huffed, and folded her arms beneath her breasts. “I have a good mind to follow through on my threat and have you tossed off our land by a dozen men, if that’s what it will take. I should.”

“You want me to go?” he said challenging.

“I’m thinking about asking you to leave.”

“I heard you the first time…yet, here we are—make up your mind,” he said smoothly, unconcerned.

Allura scooted back from the table. “I will show you the McFarland ranch because I promised to, unlike
some
who start something and not finish it. Unlike
some
people, making a commitment means a lot to me.” She eyed him, gathered her skirts, maneuvered around him, and walked to the door. “I will see you outside when you are ready, but I swear if you don’t appear in ten minutes, all agreement is off, and I will ride without you. Then you can find the damned McFarland ranch by yourself, if you can.” She turned to leave when Noor called her name. Allura halted abruptly, looked over her shoulder at him. “What do you want now?”

“Leave this ranch without me, and I will spank your ass when I catch up to you.”

“My god, you are incorrigible.”

“I’m serious, Allura.” His eyes never left her, not even to blink.

She bet he was, not that it mattered one wit to her.

Chapter Thirteen

Allura refused to talk to him. Even though they had traveled a leg, she remained distant and quiet. After several attempts, he thought it best to let her stew—whatever that meant. He had heard Channing use the phrase and assumed it was like simmering or calming down.

Allura’s silence gave him time to think. He contemplated since this morning on how he was going to explain why he was here. He practiced his exact words, several times, and now his explanation sounded more insane than last night when he reasoned through the explanation.

They rode past the mountains and wilderness and followed a trail that took them along the river edge until a stretch of land appeared, flat and sparse, with a few boulders and trees making up the landscape. By Texas standards, he was a city boy.

The city was fast-paced and a hub of activity. Sanguine was a continuous hustle and bustle of movement regardless of what time you ventured into midtown people were everywhere. Some set at curbside restaurants eating, others shopped, enjoyed the endless entertainment of bars and street bands, and then some merely let the walkway autotran move them along the fairway while they mingled. The city’s architecture art within itself, boasted of modern-techno buildings constructed of metallic, glass, and shiny metal buildings that rose into the pale purple sky where endless routes winded and curved between the towering structures. The ultrafreeway carried vessels whizzing them in and out through the sky, everyone going nowhere in a hurry.

Texas quietness was conducive for napping, when on Sanguine the thought never entered his mind. He normally functioned on fumes, worked to exhaustion until he couldn’t go anymore, and then collapsed into bed and slept like the dead, only to wake and start the routine over again.

Here he learned to decompress because he had no choice. With no criminals to apprehend, drug czars to pursue, or psychopaths to hunt down, one had no choice but to bask in the serenity of the simple life. It took some getting used to. He got edgy for action, anything to get his adrenaline pumping or something equally stimulating.

He glanced at Allura and said, “I apologize a thousand times. What else do I need to do?” She pretended to have interest in the bland terrain and refused to acknowledge him. He moved his mount closer, grabbed her reins, and forced the animal to stop.

As soon as the horse halted, she dismounted and made a beeline for the cluster of trees just over a small ridge. When he caught up to her, she was sitting on a large rock with a flat surface staring off toward the water. She was ready for a fight, her arms folded, chin tilted upward, and a determined expression on her face that was far from tolerant.

Everything about her said “back off.” She even went as far as to put her hand up in front of his face when he walked up. Luckily, he wasn’t deterred easily, and captured her wrist just in case she wanted to take a swing at him. With Allura, he couldn’t be sure of her reaction to anything. She looked pissed, and last night proved to him what type of woman he was dealing with. Allura would give him hell. Go tit-for-tat, and not give him an inch if he stepped out of line. It had to be madness. The thought made him immensely elated.

“This is not how I wanted to do this, but you’re giving me no choice.” She struggled. “Calm down. Let me explain…I need you to listen to me.” She opened her mouth. He pressed his fingers against her lips. “Shhh…five minutes. Okay?”

Noor stepped back, reached into his pocket, and withdrew the egg. He activated the device, held it for her to see, and then connected.

Allura’s eyes widened. She stared at the communicator as Sterns’s voice filtered through the thin air. She whirled around and looked behind her, then back at the egg and Noor, and then her mouth dropped open.

“Who said that?” she whispered, glancing over her back before examining the transmitter with curiosity.

He flipped the mute on. “The voice came from this mechanism.” Allura shook her head no. She tried to push away, as if it frightened her. He kept her beside him and motioned for her not to say a word.

“Superior Sterns, I’m checking in, sir.”

“It’s about damned time, Rynoir. You try and avoid me again by scrambling the frequency and setting privacy mode, and I will bounce you back down to a street cop so fast your head will spin.”

Noor said, “I was dealing with a situation, and it was unsafe to keep transmitting. I contacted you to let you know I’m getting close to finding the target and should have something positive to report within the next few hours.”

“You had better. The time to reenter the atmosphere is getting closer. If you don’t secure the target and get ready to bring her here, it’s no telling when you might get another opportunity. The command center is counting down—twenty-four minus one hours. Miss that window, and I return a piece of Tupperware to your family to entomb.”

Noor ended the frequency and shoved the egg into his pocket. He tried to gauge Allura’s reaction, which was bewildered and apprehensive. She just kept gawking at him. He sat down beside her to allow her a moment to process what she had just heard.

“What was th–that thing you just showed me? Where did the voice come from? I went to a circus one time, and a man was very good at throwing his voice. He called himself a ventriloquist,” she whispered.

“He was my superior who lives on another planet, in another time…the future. A place called Sanguine where I came from.”

Allura rambled, “He was very good. The entire time he performed the crowd was silent, stunned by his magic.”

“Allura, even if I were a magician, which I’m not, how would I make an egg talk? I’m telling you, I’m from the future, sent here to find you and bring you back to my planet.”

“Then there were the dancing bears, little people…clowns and juggling. It was all entertaining.”

He held her cheeks between his fingers. She tried to turn away. “No, look at me and listen to what I’m telling you. This is real…I come from a place you can’t imagine. My government sent me back in time to find the legacy to a planet called Oridus. The city is in turmoil because the current emperor is insane and needs—”

“Stop it!” She tried to run.

Noor shook her to get her attention. “The emperor killed his wife and child, who was the next Intended who could dethrone him. The only people who were capable of ending his rule unless another descendant of the Agaci lineage was found, and produced a child. You are that woman.”

Allura merely stood fixated on Noor. Then she smiled and said, “Kirby had a fondness for whiskey and sometimes he drinks to excess. When this happens, he makes up the most outlandish tales, and if you don’t know him, he can be believable.”

Noor blew air hard through his nose. “I’m not drunk.” He took out the egg and handed it out to her. She acted afraid to touch it. He opened her palm and laid it there. “It works like this. You tap here.” He showed her step by step how to activate the device. When the small wings opened, lights started swirling, and she dropped it.

Sterns’s voice sounded. “Rynoir! Rynoir!”

Noor picked up the communicator, deactivated it, and put it back in his pocket, but not before showing Allura it wasn’t a real chicken egg, even though he knew she had to realize it already. He had to continue to make a point.

“I’m telling the truth. You don’t want to believe me because it’s against everything you know. In your heart, you believe me.”

Allura covered her mouth with both hands and shook her head back and forth. “This is insane. You look…appear as human as me. You talk with an accent of some sort, but I thought maybe you were from somewhere in Europe or another foreign place I’ve only read about,” she said quietly. Refusing to blink and wide-eyed, she watched him suspiciously. “Just because you have a toy I have never seen before, I’m supposed to believe you’re from the future. People invent things all the time. That is what science is about. A degree I mastered at the university, by the way.”