by Lynne Graham
‘I can’t stay…’ He breathed thickly.
She swayed, passion-glazed eyes locked to him. ‘You can’t stay?’
‘I found you asleep and carried you to bed but I only came home to change. I have Majilis to attend this afternoon.’ Stunning eyes fully screened by his lush black lashes, he was already endeavouring to straighten the clothing she had disarranged and smooth his tousled black hair.
Faye breathed in so deep she thought the top of her head might fly off to release the surplus air. Disbelief held her fast but she didn’t even know what he was talking about. ‘You…you have Majilis…you’re going out?’
Tariq flashed her a rather sardonic look of amusement. He shrugged back his wide shoulders with sensual cool. His slow-burning smile mocked her. ‘Only minutes ago you told me you didn’t want to be here. You change direction like the wind. Even I did not expect a single kiss to win the battle…’
Faye might as well have been turned to stone by that speech. She closed her eyes: she dared not look at him lest he saw her raging mortification. She was drowning in self-loathing but still she could feel the pulsing ache of the hunger he had roused in her. How dared he speak to her like that? How dared he gloat?
‘So you think you’re irresistible?’
‘No…you make me feel irresistible. Small distinction,’ Tariq contradicted on his fluid passage to the door. ‘You’re hot for me. I’m sure other men have enjoyed the same response. But, right now, you’re mine alone.’
‘Do you know how much I hate you?’ Faye snapped, her hands knotting into defensive fists.
‘Why would I care? What is that to me?’ Arrogant head thrown back, his dark deep-set gaze pierced her like an ice dagger. ‘I want to possess you. I want to lie with you all through the night and make love to you as and when I want. But that is all I want from you.’
CHAPTER FOUR
LONG after Tariq had gone, Faye stared at the door, her fingernails still biting sharp crescents into her palms. His honesty had devastated her. Sex was all he wanted. For goodness’ sake, had she expected him to confess to a tortured longing to know her heart and her mind instead? And why on earth did she feel so hurt by that admission of his? It was not as if she still cared about him. In fact, it was ridiculous for her to still be so sensitive!
A light knock sounded on a door at the other side of the room and she spun round. A pair of smiling young girls, who bore little resemblance to the crushed individuals in little Prince Rafi’s retinue, entered.
‘We are Shiran and Meyla. Your lunch is ready, my lady,’ one of them informed her shyly.
Faye discovered that through that second door lay a whole host of other apartments, each as exquisitely appointed as the next. Was she in the harem? It scarcely mattered. Now that her adrenalin was leaping again, all she could think about was escape. Presented with a fabulous array of dishes all laid out on a low table in a superb reception room next door, Faye sat down to eat. Checking her watch and seeing that it was almost two in the afternoon, she then asked for a phone.
Once again, she dialled the number of her stepfather’s portable phone.
‘Faye? Adrian’s out!’ Percy sounded immensely cheerful. ‘We’re at the airport—’
‘Good. How soon will you be on a flight home?’
‘Another half-hour. Look, I can’t talk long. Adrian’s in a shop but he’ll be back in a minute. I told him that you flew back home this morning. He wouldn’t agree to leave Jumar if he knew the truth,’ Percy admitted without a shred of embarrassment.
‘You’re really worried about me, aren’t you?’ Helpless bitterness tinged Faye’s unusually sarcastic response.
‘Come on, Faye. It’s my bet you’re in the lap of luxury right now and it’s not like His Royal Highness is some bloke you don’t fancy! Let’s face it, you’ve been a right wet weekend ever since he dumped you—’
Faye closed her eyes and said, ‘I just don’t believe I’m hearing this—’
‘Well, now you finally got your prince, so I don’t see why you should be complaining or feeling sorry for yourself.’ Percy was warming to his theme, having rationalised events to his own satisfaction. ‘I think our Adrian has done you a favour.’
‘Thanks…thanks a bundle!’ Riven with resentment, Faye slung aside the phone in disgust.
Escaping from the Muraaba palace would be a challenge. She had two options, neither of which struck her as that promising. Borrow a horse and try to sneak out in disguise or conceal herself in a car that was about to leave. First, she asked Shiran if the palace had stables and where they were and then she made a series of requests. The maids’ eyes widened in surprise and confusion at the items she asked to be brought to her but they went off to do her bidding.
Her suitcase arrived, along with the food and bottled mineral water she had requested and the set of male robes and the headdress. Those last two demands were fulfilled with a great deal of giggling curiosity. Maybe the maids thought she was going to try and dress up as a man and spring some stupid childish prank on Tariq, not to mention a less than inviting midnight feast of bread and water.
Finally alone, Faye changed into trousers and a shirt and crammed the supplies along with her passport into her capacious backpack. A courtyard lay outside her bedroom. Using the elaborate wall fountain there as a foothold, Faye climbed the perimeter wall. Never having had the slightest fear of heights, she could have walked the wall blindfold. Traversing it, she continued along the walls of the eerily empty courtyards next to her own. Forced to climb higher at one point, she crossed a balcony so that she could ease herself down onto the flat parapet surrounding a giant domed roof.
Progress was slow but only twice did she have to risk touching ground level again to cross between buildings. Perched on the low sloping stable roof, she watched a couple of grooms leading a magnificent black horse out into a big flashy motorised horsebox. Bingo! She dropped down onto the cobbles in a shadowy corner and donned the robes she had in her backpack. Then she waited for a chance to board the horsebox.
When the men paused to talk, she made a run for it. Hurrying up the ramp into the box, she saw there was only that one horse on board. Startled by her entrance, the stallion threw up his head, his hooves clattering and banging on the boards. Faye dived into the furthest stall and crouched down to hide herself as best she could.
The ramp went up with a hydraulic hiss and minutes later doors slammed and the engine fired. The horsebox rocked over the cobbles, making the stallion fuss even more. Halting, presumably for the gates to be opened, the vehicle then turned, not towards the city as she had hoped, but in the other direction. Oh, great, she thought in exasperation. So now she would most probably have to take the horse as well. No way would she try hitching a lift in a country where, outside of the city, absolutely nobody seemed to walk.
How far would Tariq go in an effort to retrieve her? Might he simply shrug with fatalistic acceptance and just let her go? Faye recalled the look on his face when he’d mentioned those cold showers and felt hot all over. No, Tariq would not be cool about her vanishing act. All over again, she would be damning herself in his eyes. Refusing to concede that she was welching on their agreement, she grimaced at the noisy fretful movements of the stallion. Arabians were highly strung and this was the horse she was planning to steal and ride if need be?
The horsebox ground to a slow, jolting halt. Of course, they were stopping; the stallion was becoming frantic. Standing up, she approached his stall, talking in a low, soothing voice, calming him with confident hands. He was very responsive. She heard the ramp being unbolted. Holding the stallion’s reins with one hand, she undid the gate of his stall. Was she mad to take such a risk? But the stallion was already surging forward, eager to leave a confinement he clearly hated, and without further hesitation Faye threw herself up into the magnificent leather saddle.
What happened next was just a blur. The hydraulic ramp went down and full daylight flooded in, momentarily blinding her. She had a
fleeting impression of startled dark faces but by that stage the stallion was already plunging out past them, heading like a bullet for the flat salt plain that bounded the layby in which the horsebox had parked.
Faye gave the beautiful animal his head and let him gallop. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know where she was for she had studied that map in detail. Basically all she had to do was stay out of sight of the road and skirt the edge of the desert until she reached the city limits. At some stage she would have to pass the horse over to someone to be returned to the palace but that was really her only source of concern.
She was surprised by the strength of the breeze that blew her hair back from her face. However, it felt wonderful after the claustrophobic interior of the horsebox. Even so, it was still incredibly hot and she stopped to open her backpack and, disdaining the male head covering, she covered her head with a scarf. She noticed then that there was a faint haze over the sun.
Within the first sweltering hour, the salt plain gave way to sand and their pace slowed, but that was only what she had expected. However, when the landscape began changing again from sand and scrub to dunes that began to build from almost imperceptible rises in ground level into gradually steeper gradients, Faye’s brow pleated in dismay. She had not been prepared to see deep dunes on the careful route she had traced for the simple reason that there was none close to Jumar City. Obviously she had drifted too far out into the desert.
Stark unease assailed Faye. But for the rushing sound of the wind that was getting steadily stronger, the silence beat at her ears. The light seemed to be fading, only it couldn’t be, she told herself, for it was barely five in the evening. She had at least three more hours of daylight, plenty of time in which to complete her journey. However, the sun now lay behind a peculiar reddish haze and dark clouds were gathering in a sky as grey as a stormy sea.
So it was going to rain, she thought, possibly even a full thunder and lightning job. The stallion snorted and jerked, a nervous ripple running through his powerful haunches. Of his own volition, he broke into a canter, resisting her efforts to pull him back. He was far too strong for her to hold and he plunged wildly up the side of a steep dune. That was when she heard the thwack-thwack sound of an approaching helicopter above the wind.
‘Calm down, boy…’ she urged as the horse began to buck.
She tried to hang on but she was thrown and she hit the sand like a stone. The silky soft grains provided an unexpectedly hard surface and she was winded. By the time she caught her breath, removed the backpack which was digging into her spine and began to rise to her feet, the helicopter had landed and a male figure was striding towards her.
It was Tariq, but Tariq as she had never seen him before. She had the momentary sense of time having slipped back for before her stood a male who was every inch an Arabian prince in his regal splendour. He was sheathed in black gold-edged robes, worn over a pristine cream undershirt, a kaffiyeh covering his proud head, his clothing flowed back from his hard, muscular physique in the teeth of the buffeting wind. She collided with blazing golden eyes that had an electrifying effect on her already leaping nerves. Behind him, obedient as a pet dog and now infuriatingly calm, trotted the black stallion.
‘Are you insane to run into the desert in a sandstorm?’ Tariq roared at her with raw force. ‘But you will suffer now too for I will not leave Omeir here to die—’
‘Sandstorm…d-die?’ Faye stammered in shock.
Tariq was already swinging round and vaulting up onto the stallion’s back. Omeir was the horse, she worked out. Leaning down, Tariq hauled her up in front of him in a manoeuvre that made her awesomely aware of his masculine strength, not to mention his superior horsemanship. His sense of balance was superb.
‘Tariq…how did you—?’
‘Keep quiet!’ he bit out above her head. ‘Don’t you realise how much danger we’re in?’
As he sent the stallion leaping forward at a breakneck speed, she caught a last glimpse of the helicopter sitting abandoned on the sand. Danger? Yet he had come for her alone. Sandstorm? The sky was beginning to glow the most spooky red. Involuntarily, she shivered, clutching her backpack beneath her arm. Omeir galloped full spate along a wadi between the dunes. The wind lashed her cheeks, carrying grit that stung and dust that made breathing a choking challenge. She bent her head, closed her eyes. He’s not getting away with doing that, so why should you? Guilt almost ate her alive at that point.
A little while later, she squinted from beneath the scarf she had pulled down over her brow. A whirling terrifying wall of sand the height of the sky was folding in. The sand already borne on the wind was fast reducing visibility but she saw the big dark irregular shape of a rocky outcrop looming ahead. Shelter? Barely thirty seconds later, Tariq swept her up and dropped her down onto the sand and, for a stricken moment, she honestly thought he had decided to dump her because her weight was slowing him and Omeir down too much.
Plunged into craven panic, trying to stay upright in a gale threatening to blast her off her feet, she cried, ‘Tariq?’
‘Move!’ Tariq was already behind her and only as he thrust her forward did she register that the mouth of a cave lay directly ahead of them.
Faye stumbled into the sandy interior on legs as weak as paper straws. Omeir surged deeper into the cave to stand sweating and shivering. Faye turned round just in time to see an uprooted date palm pitch into view and land only a few yards outside the cave. She fought to catch her breath in the sand-laden air, eyes huge, shaken face pale. Until that moment, she had not appreciated just how violent and destructive a sandstorm could be.
‘You might have killed us both…you might have killed Omeir. Though he knows this oasis well, he was too frightened to find his way here on his own!’ Closing a hand over her taut shoulder to steady her, Tariq pressed her through a break in the rock walls. ‘The ground falls steeply here…watch your step.’
The passage opened out into another cave. The first thing Faye noticed with relief was the improved quality of the air and then she recognised the unmistakable sound of flowing water.
But for the pale linen of his undershirt glimmering in the darkness, she could hardly see Tariq. Feeling her way along the rough wall with a trembling hand, she dropped her backpack and slowly sank down onto the sandy floor. The last thing she expected and probably the last thing she wanted just then was for Tariq to strike a match and light an oil lamp.
She blinked in disconcertion. Flickering light illuminated soaring pillars of ancient rock and the glimmering pool of water refreshed by an underground stream. It also showed her a sight which at any other moment would have struck her as pure comedy: Omeir virtually squeezing his girth through the same passage by which they had entered and trotting over for a noisy drink at the rock pool.
With pronounced reluctance, Faye focused on Tariq. ‘Obviously you and wonder horse have been here before.’
Tariq slung aside his gold-bound kaffiyeh, luxuriant black hair tousled above his hard, bronzed, dusty features. She literally saw his even white teeth grit. He dropped down lithely by the edge of the water and splashed his face, using the cloth he had flung down as a towel. ‘So it amuses you to be sarcastic and flippant when you have done wrong…that is no surprise to me.’
This time, it was Faye’s teeth that gritted. It had been an incredibly long day and she ached in places she had not known she could ache. More galling still, that exhausting ride into the desert had been a total waste of time and effort. Emotions already high after what she had endured, hot temper now bolted through her at the speed of light. His tone was so outrageously pious and superior, she leapt upright again with clenched fists. ‘Go on…call me a cheat and a liar for trying to—’
‘Run away?’
‘I wasn’t running away!’ Faye launched at him even louder, pride stung by that label. ‘You gave me no choice. You forced me—’
‘I forced nothing. You agreed to my terms.’
Soft, full mouth tightening, Faye i
gnored that succinct and unwelcome reminder. ‘My departure was my way of letting you know that, just like you, I won’t surrender to blackmail—’
‘I did not employ blackmail in any form.’ Rising to his full imposing height, fabulous cheekbones taut, Tariq subjected her to a scorching appraisal. ‘Give me one good reason why I should have agreed to settle your brother’s debts and demanded nothing in return!’
At that blunt invitation, Faye simply saw red. Percy’s smug words on the phone earlier had stung her pride like acid. In speedy succession, she recalled every piece of hurt and humiliation she had suffered since first meeting Prince Tariq ibn Zachir. Then she breathed in so deep, she trembled and gave him on her terms what she considered to be one very good reason. ‘After what you did to me a year ago, I don’t think it would have been such a big deal for you to give me one free favour!’
Tariq elevated an imperious brow. ‘What I did to you?’
‘You turned what should have been the happiest day of my life into a nightmare! You don’t even know what I’m talking about, do you?’ Faye’s voice shook on that realisation. ‘I’m talking about my wedding day. You asked me to marry you. You let me put on a wedding dress and wear something blue—’
‘Something blue?’ Tariq questioned with frowning bewilderment. ‘What is this “something blue”?’
‘And all the time you knew that you were going to turn right round and divorce me straight after the ceremony. Not because you’d had a change of heart but because you had planned it that way from the start!’ Faye’s long-repressed sense of injustice was now rising as fast as her voice pitch. ‘You asked me to marry you but you didn’t mean one word of that proposal. I trusted you but you betrayed my trust.’
In receipt of that condemnation, Tariq strode forward, his gaze flaming molten gold. ‘How you can accuse me of betrayal when you conspired with your stepfather to set me up for blackmail?’