The Cowboy & The Belly Dancer (Heartbeat)

by Charlotte Maclay

  Perspiration that had sheened her body dried in the cool air and she shivered. Would Parker have the power to protect her? The thought echoed hollowly in her mind in the same way their footsteps echoed in the marble chamber. Once again she heard the words of Rasheyd’s curse, words that had been etched forever in her memory.

  The beam of Parker’s flashlight flicked around the chamber as it widened into a room. When it landed on the pedestal, he sucked in a breath.

  “My God...” He hurried forward and knelt to study the emeralds and rubies inlaid in the four ivory elephant tusks that made up the base of the pedestal. “No wonder Rasheyd was after these. They’ve gotta be worth a fortune.”

  Incredulity still filling his eyes, he said, “You knew. You knew these jewels were here.”

  “And all the while you doubted that I spoke the truth.” In an astonishing moment of insight, Nesrin realized nothing she could have said would have made Parker believe her story until he saw the evidence for himself. Just as nothing she had ever done had gained her the love she sought from her father, the man who had wagered against her future. In some strange way, the realization lifted a terrible burden from her shoulders. For nine hundred years she had lied to herself about her father’s love. No longer.

  It was then she spotted a heap of tattered rags in the shadowed corner of the room.

  Hesitantly she advanced on the pile of debris. Death was here, in the air she breathed. It tasted bitter on her tongue.

  “Parker, shine your light in this direction.”

  From the shapeless form two eye sockets appeared. Skin dried to the texture of leather pulled taut across the sharp outline of cheekbones, the natural mummification in the absence of air and moisture preserving the body as carefully as if it were a museum piece. The jaw hung open in mute appeal. As the light swept the length of the rag-covered heap, Nesrin noted its fist clasped in futile anger against an unseen enemy. The dark outline of a snake circled the leatherlike skin of the dead man’s thumb.

  “Rasheyd.” She spoke his name in whispered awe. Like her fears, the sound echoed hollowly.

  Parker bent over to peer more closely at the skeleton. “Looks like he must have gotten trapped down here and couldn’t get out.”

  “Perhaps the infidels attacked the village and Rasheyd hid here.” She looked up the stairway toward the small square of sunlight. “For some reason, his powers failed him and he could no longer open the door. He died here...in the same darkness to which he had condemned me.” The irony of Rasheyd’s death conjured little sympathy for the evil man with Nesrin.

  “This is the guy you’ve been afraid of all along?”

  “My tormentor, yes. Foolish of me, wasn’t it, to fear him when he was already turning to dust. He no longer had any power over me, yet I trembled in my heart in terror of him.”

  “When soldiers hit a beachhead they’re more afraid of what their imagination has told them is going to happen than what’s really there. It’s not that unusual to be scared of ghosts. At night, when I was a kid, I used to be afraid of what was in my closet, and then in the morning I’d realize there wasn’t anything there at all, except maybe the shadow of an old teddy bear sitting on the shelf.”

  Turning to Parker, she said, “We can go now.” There was nothing here she needed, and at last she could put her fears of Rasheyd away. His curse no longer had power over her. She was free at last...to do what? she wondered.

  “You don’t mean for us to leave the jewels here, do you? My God, they’re worth a fortune. You could buy half the state of Colorado with them.”

  “I had forgotten.” She blinked, trying to find herself in the shifting of time and place, of ancient curses and modern greed. “Take them for your ranch, to pay your moneylenders.”

  “Nesrin, I can’t do that. You found them. They rightfully belong to you.”

  “It is better that you and the children have them.” Perhaps in some way the jewels would bring Parker the happiness he would not accept from her.

  “Well, I sure don’t want our modern-day Rasheyd to get his grimy hands on them.” He tugged at the pedestal. Granted, the jewels would solve his financial problems and secure his dream of a horse ranch. But it wouldn’t be fair to Nesrin to claim the treasure for himself. He’d simply have to count on his hired hands having finished breaking the horses in time to meet his contract deadline with Rutherford Mildon.

  “I don’t think this pedestal is going to come loose,” Parker said, “and it’s too heavy to carry anyway. I’ll have to pry the stones out of their settings.”

  He began working on the stones one at a time. “If nothing else, these little babies are likely to be our ticket out of the country. There’s still a chance Rasheyd and his men may catch up with us. We could use a little insurance.” He held out his hand. “Give me the lamp. I’ll put them in there.”

  Parker laboriously removed each of the precious gems and dropped them into the lamp. He could still hardly believe Nesrin knew how to find—and get into—this secret room. It would have taken an archaeologist years of painstaking research to find this place. Clearly she’d been here before.

  He didn’t even want to consider the remote possibility that the rest of her story was equally true. He couldn’t quite handle thinking of her as a genie. What man would be comfortable with a woman who popped out of lamps and cast spells with the sweep of a see-through veil?

  When they emerged from the cellar, night had fallen as only it could in the desert. Quick and complete in an instant, darkness like velvet shrouded the landscape.

  Parker leaned the shovel against the side of the truck. “Looks like we’re stuck here for the night. Without a decent road to follow back to town, we’d either get lost in the dark or break an axle.”

  “Abdel provided us with supplies, did he not?”

  “Yeah. There’re some rations and a couple of blankets.”

  “Then we shall stay. I will find fuel for a fire.”

  Parker hadn’t intended to be stranded in the middle of the desert with Nesrin. In spite of the vast empty landscape beyond the truck, the darkness provided a unique sense of intimacy. The rest of the world could have vanished for all it mattered. There were simply two people. Alone.

  And one of them had a libido that kept cranking along in high gear no matter what Parker told himself.

  He tried counting to a hundred. Instead of being distracted, he found himself watching her robed shadow moving like a woman of mystery around the campsite they’d set up. When she bent over the small fire she’d started, her long hair shifted forward like a curtain. Then she lifted and tilted her head to swing the long strands back out of the way. He wanted to learn all of her most private secrets, memorize the nuances of her most subtle mannerisms.

  There sure wasn’t any place to take a cold shower, so he splashed some lukewarm canteen water in his face. He remembered the unique musky flavor of her skin, and her warmth. He took a big drink of water. In no way did it slake his thirst.

  Abdel had been right about a woman’s feet. If that was all you could see, they became strangely intriguing. Nesrin’s toes were beautifully shaped, long and slender, and the high arch of her foot made him think of how he wanted her arching up to his body. The entwining slender gold chains around her ankle drew his attention with a promise that her calf would be equally well shaped.

  What he wouldn’t give to be able to kiss that artistically formed ankle right now and hold her delicate foot in his hand. Not tickling, but massaging her tenderly. He’d like to place a moist kiss in the most sensitive spot he could find. His tongue would explore new territory until...

  Damned if he wasn’t tempted to get into the truck and drive them back to town as best he could, forgetting about the risk of broken axles. At least driving would keep his mind occupied with something other than thoughts of burying himself deep inside Nesrin’s sweet, velvety warmth.

  He gritted his teeth. He wasn’t going to lay a hand on her. For her sake, he could deny t
he wanting that kept gnawing at his gut. Self-control. Discipline. That’s what he’d been taught.

  The lesson had never been more difficult.

  They ate dried meat that tasted like cardboard, nibbled on dates, and washed it all down with a weak tea sweetened with sugar. The tiny flame from the camp fire cast a flickering glow across Nesrin’s classic features, first highlighting her slender nose before moving on to draw attention to her cheekbones, a determined jaw and, finally, her full, sensuous lips.

  In the distance, a wolf howled at the rising moon. The eerie sound undulated across the desert.

  “Sounds like we’re not entirely alone,” he said.

  Nesrin shivered, remembering the sound from her youth. “When I was young, there were times when the wolves became too bold, stealing into the village to snatch babies from their mother’s arms, or to attack old women when they carried water from the well. The men would hunt them down on horseback and slaughter them with their lances.”

  “Sounds like some of them got away.”

  “They are a very cunning breed.” Perhaps more shrewd than the villagers had been, for they were gone and the wolves remained.

  Made restless by the night sounds, she stood. “It was on nights like this that I danced for my father’s friends. They smoked and watched, and I dreamed that someday a young man would see me and choose me as his bride.” She unfastened her robe. Slowly it settled to the ground in a dark puddle around her feet.

  “Nesrin, I don’t think...”

  She snapped her fingers to a beat only she heard. Tonight she needed no castanets, no flute to carry a melody that was a part of her soul. Her pulse set the tempo. No man had ever chosen her, and the man she would have had denied his love. She would not lie to herself. She could not make Parker love her, any more than she had been able to force her father to grasp the fragile bond of love she had offered him in childish innocence.

  But here, in the ruins of her past, she could pretend for one night, unfettered by fears that had held her captive for so long.

  Beginning slowly, she began to sway. With the circling of her hips, she set the veils of her skirt in motion swirling around her. Bonelessly, her arms imitated the rolling curves of desert dunes stretching to the horizon. Or alternately beckoned to the stars. Her body flowed with feminine knowledge. Of man. Of woman. Of the beginnings of civilization.

  By wiles learned artfully nine hundred years ago, Nesrin lured Parker to her. Soon they would partner in a dance as old as time.

  “Nesrin...you’re so damn beautiful.” His face glistened with sweat, his eyes filled with desire, and his voice was rough with wanting. “If you keep this up...dammit, I can’t be responsible...”

  She spun her spell around the fire. Seducing with her eyes. Enticing with her fluid movements. Until he stood before her.

  He groaned as he pulled her into a collision with the hard length of his body. His mouth covered hers. Hot. Achingly passionate. And when she gasped at the fury of his taking, he plunged his tongue inside. She responded with her own murmur of approval. Elation swept through her that his need of her was so great. At this moment, in this place, she willingly accepted the substitute he proffered for the love he could not give. Not forever, she reminded herself. Only for this one night.

  She gave herself over to the urgency of her own need. Without guilt, she sought satisfaction.

  He pulled her down onto the sleeping blankets that had been stretched beside the fire. “If you want me to stop, say the word,” he pleaded even as his hands stripped her of the flimsy costume she wore. “I’ll find a way to stop. I swear it.”

  “I want this as much as you.” Perhaps more so, since she realized they would never be together like this again.

  His hands were all over her. Hot and stroking. Discovering intimate places she had not realized existed. And his tongue. Praise be! His tongue laved erotically on flesh that yearned for its warm, damp roughness. And then he suckled, deeply drawing her nipples one at a time into the moist cavern of his mouth.

  Dimly she realized in this spell, as in all those she cast with her mystical powers, things had gotten out of hand. She was no longer in control and would not have wanted it otherwise. He was magnificent.

  When she was breathless and writhing, he rose above her. The star-filled canopy of the night sky outlined his head as he entered her. Possessed her. She shuddered at the impact of his total dominance, and arched up to meet him.

  She scored his back with her fingernails, traced the shape of muscles that rippled across his back. Her legs tightened around him. She cried out. She could not escape the tension that built within her, though she struggled for release.

  It came in a burst of sweet pleasure.

  Parker stroked into her even more heavily. He was irresistible. A moment later his cry of satisfaction lanced out into the vastness of the desert, and in the far distance a wolf howled in answering approval.

  Time took on an undefined quality, much as it had during long periods while Nesrin had been in the lamp. But now she felt the comfort of Parker’s weight, and his breath rasping moistly against her ear. She drifted.

  At some point, she realized he was no longer a part of her, and she moaned in protest. Later she was aware of him covering her with a coarse blanket against the chilling night air.

  She nestled into the heat of his body.

  Before dawn he took her again. More slowly this time, but with just as much hunger, and a backdrop of stars that had shifted and reformed themselves.

  The sun was full up when she awoke.

  Parker’s side of their makeshift bed was empty. Again.

  She mentally cursed in a half-dozen languages. Didn’t he realize a woman liked waking up in a man’s arms?

  In that instant, the realization that he could not love her any more than her father had made Nesrin so angry she was ready to spit date pits. What did they think she was? Chopped lizard?

  She was worth more than that. Much more. And Parker was about to find that out for himself.

  Chapter Eleven

  Parker studied his reflection in the truck’s cracked side mirror and cautiously drew the razor blade across his whiskers. The morning chill gave no hint of the oppressive heat that was to come. Just like he didn’t have a clue how a man could tell the difference between love and old-fashioned lust. Assuming there was such a thing as love.

  Parker had always been told that showing emotion was a sign of weakness.

  A man parachuted into enemy territory without blinking an eye. If you could manage to do it without sweaty palms, so much the better.

  Even in peace time, friends died in the military, particularly in an outfit like Special Forces. So you didn’t get too close to anyone. You never revealed too much of yourself. That way you didn’t become vulnerable.

  Emotions were volatile.

  They confused the hell out of Parker. So did Nesrin.

  She’d touched him in some deep place last night, activated a set of nerve endings that didn’t react in a nice, ordered way. For the first time in his life he’d been totally out of control.

  He didn’t like the feeling.

  In the mirror he caught the reflection of Nesrin walking toward him.

  As he turned, Nesrin drew in a steadying breath. Valiantly she tried to ignore the fact that he had not yet put on his shirt and wore only khaki pants. She didn’t want to think about his bare chest, or the light smattering of curly hair that arrowed beneath his belt.

  “Good morning,” she said with forced brightness.

  His gaze flicked over her, his expression confused then hurt. “You don’t have to follow the local custom about being covered from head to toe when we’re out here in the middle of nowhere. I like to be able to see you.”

  “You have never seen me, Parker Dunlap. Not as I really am.”

  “Honey, I figure I saw all there is of you last night. And I definitely approve.”

  “Then perhaps this also will please you.” She slid
her hand into the folds of her skirt. Closing her eyes and concentrating with great care, she produced a mourning dove that perched on her finger. The bird cooed softly.

  A smile twitched the corners of Parker’s mouth. “A tame bird? Where’d you find him?”

  “I conjured him from thin air.” With her other hand she delved into her gown to produce a pair of doves. Except three appeared when she held out her arm, each of them scrambling for a secure position. She lofted one into the air.

  “Hey, that’s impressive.”

  “Not really. It was one of the first conjuring spells my father taught me. Even a young genie can master this small bit of magic.” In this case, with a slip so minor only another genie would know she had erred.

  His lips shifted into a grim line. “Nesrin, let’s cut the talk about—”

  “Perhaps you would care for a whole flock of doves, master. Like the black birds that attacked the wasps at your ranch?”

  “You’re talking crazy. Maybe it’s the water—”

  Birds poured from her raised fingertips, lifting into the air with soft, cooing calls, and the whisper of wings. They circled above the truck.

  Parker’s eyes rounded. “Did you find a set of magic tricks down in that cellar?”

  “Would you prefer buzzards? I can produce those, as well.”

  “No.” Sweat beaded his forehead. “Look, why don’t we head on back to town? When we get there—”

  She produced a levitating ball. The crystal orb spun right in front of Parker’s nose.

  “Nesrin, what the hell are you doing?”

  “Convincing you I am well and truly a genie.”

  “These are just tricks. You can see them at any magic show in the country.”

  “Is that so?” She fumed. As a genie she might not be all that skilled, but she had more facility than a simple magician who used sleight of hand to accomplish his tricks.

  She focused on Parker’s belt buckle. Instantly his belt pulled free from both ends.

  He grabbed at his pants. “What the hell? What are you doing?”