Guarding the Princess

by Loreth Anne White

  He said nothing.

  “I can’t have that kind of photo of myself out there, Brandt.” Her voice was crisp, her eyes hard.

  Coolness settled in his gut. “You think I’m actually going to sell these to some cheap tabloid?”

  Something crossed her face, and the cold in his stomach hardened. He snorted harshly when she didn’t reply, and he put the camera down. “Even out here, you’re managing your image.” Brandt couldn’t keep something out of his voice. Bitterness—jealousy. He didn’t even know himself what was suddenly biting, eating at him right this instant. Maybe it was the fact she’d chastised him.

  “Brandt—”

  He jabbed a stick into the flames. The fire exploded a flurry of hot orange sparks that shot up into the night.

  “Brandt! Look at me.”

  He turned his head. Those eyes—God, those smoky, sensual eyes, lambent in the firelight—were boring into him. And those lips.

  He knew what those lips tasted like.

  The memory of her naked rose in his mind, luminous skin shimmering with water. The dark wet delta between her thighs. His groin went hot at the thought. Good thing she didn’t know what photos he’d already stolen like a thief in the night.

  “What?” he said when she didn’t speak.

  “Tell me why you wanted to take photos. Tell me what you were planning to do with them.”

  “Keep them,” he said simply. “It’s what I do, Dalilah. These days I shoot with a camera, not a gun, if I can help it. I shoot rare and beautiful things, things with meaning to me. Images I return to so that I can be reminded of what I value in life. Or what stands to be lost.”

  Her eyes shimmered, nose pinking slightly.

  “And for God’s sake,” he snapped, “give me some credit. The last thing I’d want is His Royal Highness of Sa’ud, or his lackeys, finding these and hurting you because he thinks you’ve tainted your image by being out here with me or something. What in hell do you think I am? I don’t want anything to goddamn do with the world and all its tabloid crap out there!” He flung his arm out wide gesturing toward the window, the night, anger rising irrationally in him as he lost the battle to tamp it down.

  Like that bloody bull elephant, he needed to go take it all out on a tree or something.

  He sucked in air, deep, and attempting to moderate his tone, he spoke more quietly. “And you know what, that’s why Omair trusts me with you. He knows I’m not going to blab my mouth about saving your ass from Amal.”

  Brandt realized the irony as soon as the words came out of his mouth. Yeah, maybe Omair trusted him to save Dalilah and keep quiet about it, but no doubt Sheik Al Arif also trusted his old merc buddy Brandt Stryker to keep his big grubby hands off his engaged little sister.

  “Because, believe me, Dalilah, Omair is going to want to keep this whole damn mission quiet. When he comes to pick you up, he’s going to ship you somewhere safe while he goes after Amal himself, now that he has a lead on him, and he doesn’t want international authorities stopping him while he metes out his own kind of desert justice. That’s my bet. You’re the bait that has finally lured Amal Ghaffar out of the African woodpile.” Brandt reached over, took her empty mug, and tossed the dregs onto the fire with a sizzle.

  A strange look crossed Dalilah’s face, as if he’d hit something raw and close to the bone.

  “Is that what you think—that, my brothers are using me as a lure? And that’s why they never told me about Amal? Because that’s bull.”

  He shrugged. “Maybe they didn’t plan it that way, but it works now that Amal has been flushed out. Omair can end this war once and for all.”

  She stared at him, eyes big, shining, then she swallowed, looking vulnerable, overwhelmed.

  And suddenly Brandt felt bad. He wanted to hold her, protect her. But an image of Carla curled into his mind. It was a night like this. Just Carla and him. Her big dark eyes searching his—that same look of smoky allure and vulnerability. So feminine. So sexy. It pressed all his male buttons. Heat prickled over Brandt’s skin.

  He winced suddenly as the memory of Carla’s screams sliced through his brain. The memory of her naked body, being tortured as he was forced to watch. He swallowed, his pulse beginning to race, claustrophobia biting at him.

  And for a nanosecond, Dalilah’s face was Carla’s. Past and present began to collide—walls seemed to be closing in. Amal and his men coming, just like those men had come for Carla. Sweat began to pearl on his brow.

  Dalilah was watching him oddly. Brandt lurched to his feet, grabbed his gun and the headlamp.

  “Get some sleep,” he snapped, desperate to fight the PTSD nipping at the corners of his brain. He didn’t want her to see him like this. He didn’t know how far he was going to be pulled back this time. “Where are you going?”

  “To get more wood. I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

  Outside, in the endless, cold dark, Brandt relieved himself then went looking for more wood. He dumped a fresh bundle outside the window, and peered inside.

  She was bundled up in the sleeping bag, face turned into the corner, fast asleep. Good. She needed it.

  He slid his back down the outside wall, knees propped up, gun at his side. Switching off his headlamp, he dug into the pocket of his cargo shorts for his flask. He took a shot, then another, then a third, his eyes watering as he put his head back against the wall and stared up at the velvet sky spattered with stars.

  He knew why he was getting these flashbacks again. He was falling for Dalilah, and it scared the crap out of him. It was also pathetic—the princess and the pauper? He gave a soft snort and took another drink.

  Even though she was obviously physically attracted to him, too, so what? They had sexual chemistry. That’s all it was. She might as well be attracted to the palace manservant. He was simply the wrong side of the proverbial tracks.

  After another swig from his flask Brandt cared a little less, and a nice soft buzz blurred the edges of his mind. He allowed himself to slip into the comfort of the whiskey’s warm embrace.

  Then suddenly he heard her voice again in his mind.

  What are you seeking alcoholic relief from, Brandt…why do you take pictures, Brandt…?

  He hated the hypocrisy in himself. Yes, he sought relief from his memories, from the flashbacks. Through mindless sex. Plenty of drink. Death-defying adrenaline highs. But still, he’d been compelled to shoot photographs in war zones—needing to keep touchstones, to remind himself why he’d done what he had in the past. And why he had to stop killing. The photos still hung on the walls of the house he’d built on his farm.

  It was his private hell—this dichotomy inside him.

  But the images that truly haunted him were not captured on film. Those he would never escape.

  They rose now from the dark depths—Carla’s beaten, abused body. The pierce of her screams, like knives in his heart. The image of men raping her as the buildings around them burned. The pain, the impotence, of being shackled to a pole, bleeding, forced to watch, to hear, to smell. That was the thing he’d tried to kill with whiskey. But it didn’t work like that—you couldn’t just go in like a surgeon and blot out one part of a whole.

  And there were other images, going further back, also burned onto his retinal memory, but deeper, as if he’d shot them on film himself. His ex-wife, caught naked with his own brother in their marriage bed.

  Their mauled son lying in the grass. His brother shooting Brandt’s dog.

  This part of Brandt’s past had been buried very, very deep, and he didn’t like to let it surface. Ever. But Dalilah had opened a fissure, and slowly it had been oozing to the surface.

  Brandt drank some more, watching the sickle moon rise higher, the stars move over the heavens like a giant celestial timer. He emptied the flask and allowed bush sounds to embrace him, like a familiar and safe lover—crickets, frogs, the rustle of a porcupine not far from him. The distant cackle of a hyena. The whoosh of an owl hunting overhead in
the darkness.

  Then suddenly, a soft, guttural huff.

  Brandt went from drunk to stone-cold sober so fast it felt like an electric shock zapped his body. Quietly, he clicked the safety off his rifle, chambered a round, reached slowly up for the Petzl lamp on his forehead, clicked it on. Shadows leaped and shimmered as he scanned the darkness.

  A pair of eyes glowed green, looking right at him maybe twelve feet away. The wide-spaced eyes of a big predator. Jesus. A chill washed over him and Brandt pushed himself slowly to his feet, his light and gun trained on the animal. It moved across the beam and he saw a ghostly pale pelt. Dark mane. Lion. Male. Huge. Every nerve inside him screamed to flee. Brandt swallowed, holding dead still—facing the animal square, his brain racing. The lion’s tail swished and the beast gave another soft warning cough. He was unafraid. Alone, which was unusual. Dangerous.

  Slowly Brandt reached for the windowsill behind him.

  The animal came closer, jaws slack. It was breathing him in, testing the air around him, getting his scent.

  Brandt eased up onto the sill.

  The lion’s tail swished again.

  Ever so carefully, Brandt dropped back into the room.

  He paused, keeping the beam of his light on the male’s face.

  It edged a little closer. Too curious. Brandt saw scars on side of its face, across the top of an eye. It was an older male, with no pride. Exiled. Hunting alone. This was trouble.

  Brandt’s gaze flicked to the fires inside. He eyed a glowing log. Should the lion leap and his first shot not hit true, he’d grab that log as a next resort. Finger curling around trigger, he hissed softly.

  “Yaaa.”

  The lion moved its head, flicking its tail.

  “Yaaa!” Brandt yelled louder, waving his arm. Then he released a huge imitation roar.

  The lion’s tail swished as the beast licked its jowls. Then it broke its gaze with Brandt, and like a ghost, slid back into the night, ceding territory.

  Goose bumps chased over his skin as Brandt tried to swallow. His heart was hammering, mouth bone-dry.

  The bush night sounds filtered back into his consciousness but he continued to glare into the blackness where the lion had vanished.

  Had he even seen it? A solitary old male lion, doomed to prowl the veldt alone. Never mate again. Never be part of a pride. Never watch over a territory for his own family of felines. Destined to live out the rest of his life around the fringes of others’ existence.

  Tautona.

  The hair on the nape of his neck prickled. The animal had chased him back inside where he should’ve been all along, close to his principal. The weird feeling down his neck intensified and Brandt’s gaze slid over to the dying embers in the fire. He became conscious of how bitter the cold weighing down from the night sky had become. His attention flicked to Dalilah.

  She was curled in the sleeping bag, hair a thick soft fall over her cheek. Brandt inched over to look at her face.

  Her skin was bloodless. Lips the wrong color. She was shivering. He dropped quickly to his knees, setting the gun beside him.

  “Dalilah!” He shook her shoulder.

  She was unresponsive.

  Brandt felt her skin with the back of his fingers. She was ice-cold, and her pulse was weak. Hypothermia. Brought on by the sudden freezing temperatures. Compounded by injury, shock, dehydration, exhaustion—it had all been creeping up on her, a perfect storm of triggers that he’d missed. His fault.

  “Dalilah!” Brandt slapped her face lightly.

  Nothing.

  Panic licked through his gut.

  Hypothermia could kill in a situation like this. He shouldn’t have left her! He hadn’t noticed how cold it had become—he’d allowed the fires to burn too low, been too absorbed in the resurfacing of his own nightmares.

  For an instant he was paralyzed, hurtling down, down, down, back into the black tunnel of his Carla nightmare…caring for his principal so much that he’d been blind to the danger signals that had led to the loss of her life. Then in his mind’s eye, suddenly, the green eyes of Tautona gleamed back. Predatory. Powerful.

  Yes. Power. Focus. Do this.

  Brandt’s mind turned razor-sharp. Just because something terrible had happened once before, it didn’t mean he was doomed to repeat it. He could not allow the past to stop him from securing this woman a future.

  “Dalilah!” Brandt slapped her face again and he began urgently rubbing her arms. “Come on, girl, stay with me. I am not going to let you do this! I will not let you die!”

  Chapter 12

  Her thick lashes fluttered and her eyes opened slowly.

  “Brandt?” she murmured, confused. “Where…are we?” Her words were slurred. But she was lucid—that was the main thing. Brandt’s heart almost bottomed out of his chest with relief.

  But she was not in the clear, not by far. Even moderate hypothermia could kill if left untreated. He needed to warm her core temperature stat.

  Quickly he built up the fire, but the crackling flames weren’t radiating as much warmth through the building as earlier—the heat was being sucked up into the clear sky.

  He pulled the hot bricks and small rocks away from the edge of the fire. Allowing them to cool partially, he filled the kettle with water. While he waited for the water to boil, Brandt rubbed her arms gently. Rough handling in this situation, he knew, could spark deadly heart rhythms.

  “I’m making you some hot, sweet tea, okay? You want some tea, Dalilah?”

  She murmured something, turned her head away.

  “Dalilah, look at me, talk to me!”

  “Cold,” she murmured. “So cold.”

  The water was starting to boil. There was slightly more warmth in the room as flames continued to grow and steam rose. Brandt tossed more logs onto the fire. Moving as fast as he could, he ripped off his shirt. Bracing against the chill, he quickly wrapped one of the warm bricks in the fabric. Unlacing his boots, he removed them and took off his socks. Into each sock he stuffed a heated rock, then he emptied his pockets and unhooked his knife, GPS and other paraphernalia from his belt. Undoing his belt, he dropped his pants, cursing his habit of not wearing underwear. It wasn’t unusual—many safari guides went commando, a practice born of convenience, and comfort. It kept one cool and dry in often-terrible humid heat. But there was no time to even think about that. He wrapped another warm brick in his shorts. Needing more insulation, Brandt scanned their supplies. The sarong! The kettle started to boil as he removed the sarong from under her head and rolled it around the other warm brick.

  Brandt unzipped Dalilah’s sleeping bag, untied the sling he’d replaced after their shower, then quickly opened her shirt and placed the heated stones in high heat-loss areas—under her armpits, groin, next to her neck. He wrapped her up, zipped the bag closed, made sweet tea, then knelt beside her and held her head up.

  “Drink,” he urged.

  She started sipping, but still no color returned to her skin, no warmth. Tongues of panic licked deeper. Brandt set the mug down and took her face in his hands, looking directly into her eyes. “Dalilah, listen to me. You’ve got moderate hypothermia. If it gets any worse, we’re in serious trouble, and we have no way of getting medical help out here. I’m getting into that sleeping bag with you.” He unzipped the bag again as he spoke, moving fast to snuggle in beside her so as not to allow any more heat to escape.

  Ensuring the hot rocks and bricks were in position, he zipped them both up inside the bag and slid his arms into her shirt, pulling her body close against his naked one, wrapping himself around her.

  “I know it’s not comfortable,” he whispered. “But it’s a hell of a lot better than freezing to death.” He wriggled in closer, hooking his leg over her, drawing her tightly against him as he found the best and snuggest fit against the curves and dips of her body. He drew part of the sleeping bag up over her head.

  Brandt had always had a high metabolism, had always given off tons of heat. Unfetter
ed by clothes, it came off him in waves now. Insulated in this high-end, and thankfully large sleeping bag, along with the heat radiating from the hot rocks, he started to cook. And finally he could feel her body warming.

  Emotion burned into his eyes. He held her tighter, rubbing her arms gently, wrapping himself around her, enveloping, protecting. And as he lay there with Dalilah in his arms, as the fear began to slowly abate inside him, something raw and powerful and long dead awakened in its place. Protective instinct. It stirred now inside Brandt with the quiet ferocity of a sleeping dragon being roused from hibernation. And it came with a powerful desire to nurture, to hold. And to be held in return. It was raw, and it made him vulnerable.

  It made him want something he hadn’t wanted in years. A partner. A lover. Commitment. A sense of future shared.

  Brandt closed his eyes, aching with the pain of the sensation, and with remorse—for almost failing Dalilah. For failing Carla. For having lost his faith in love all those years ago because of his ex-wife, Yolanda, and his brother.

  He kept rubbing her arms gently, and when he felt the shivering stop, her body softening against his, sweet emotion blossomed through his chest.

  Brandt placed his fingers against her neck, feeling for her carotid. Her pulse was strong again, steady.

  “Warmer?” he whispered against her ear.

  “Hmm,” she murmured. “Tired. Very tired.”

  “Sleep, Princess,” he whispered tenderly against her ear.

  She fell into a deep sleep, her curves pressed into his, her breathing going deep and rhythmic. Brandt felt tears pooling in his eyes, and he let them wet his cheeks as he breathed in deep, snuggling closer, breathing in her scent—a fragrance of flowers from the shampoo she had used under the waterfall.

  And for a moment he was suddenly vaulted way back to his youth, when he met the first woman he’d ever loved. A woman he knew he would marry from the instant he laid eyes on her. When she did accept his proposal he was king of the world. Everything was possible, right was right and wrong was wrong and the future was as open and infinite as the Botswana sky above him.