Dazzle The Complete Unabridged Trilogy (182 page)

Daliah leaned out again. Where
was
he? Surely the smoke
wasn't
that
thick. He had to be there.

And there he was! Dashing toward the rope just as the roof
directly under his feet began to buckle, crack, and—

She stared down in openmouthed horror.

It was caving in!

'Najib!' she screamed as she saw him lunge for the rope.

For a horrible split second she saw him outlined against
an enormous gaping hole of yellow, and then there was a
tremendous roar, as if all the fires of hell had burst through
the earth. The helicopter surged skyward and sped away from
the palace.

Daliah squeezed her eyes shut.
Too late! Oh, Najib, Najib
. . .

When the helicopter landed at the edge of the runway, she
was still weeping, refusing to open her eyes. As the rotor
clatter slowed, she could hear the screaming engines of the
waiting jet. Somehow it no longer seemed important that she
had escaped. She wished she had died in the conflagration with
him. At least then they would be forever together.

Gentle hands prised her grip loose from the doorframe, and a soft, familiar voice was saying, 'Daliah! Daliah! Everything's
all right now, my love.
Daliah!
Look at me, my darling.'

Her heart stopped. She was hearing things. She—

Strong arms engulfed her, and she slowly opened her eyes.
The camouflage grease on his face had been supplemented by
head-to-toe soot, and his hair and eyebrows were seared and frizzled, giving him the appearance of an electrocuted mad
scientist.

Her pulse raced and her heart kicked in. He
had
caught
hold of the rope! She let out a shout of joy. He was
alive!
And
to prove it to herself, she threw her arms around him.

'We'd better hurry,' the helicopter pilot's voice intruded.
'The jet's ready to take off.' Daliah pulled her head away from
Najib's and looked over at the sleek silver plane. The pilot
was right. The jet was straining and shuddering, the brakes
barely holding it in place.

Chapter 28

He was in the lair of the dragons.

The torrent of flames roared like a million bellowing beasts,
and the boiling light was brighter than a thousand exploding suns. Lithe figures of gold leapt and dervishes danced around
Abdullah, their flowing veils fluttering and billowing and surg
ing in parodies of lovers' embraces.

He heard the roar of the flames as a choir, and through
the fiery garments of the twisting, writhing dancers he caught
glimpses of a golden staircase, and beyond that, behind the
clouds of camphor steam from the boiling fountain, he caught
tantalizing glimpses of towering gold doors.

They were the golden gates to Paradise.

He was in ecstasy.

The Exordium sang in his mind with a heavenly chant.
In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful. Praise be
to Allah, Lord of the Creation, the Compassionate, the Merci
ful, King of Judgment Day!

Oblivious of the heat, he stretched out his hands, welcoming
the flickering tongues of gold fire to dance along his sleeves.
Slowly, arms extended, he staggered toward the golden staircase to Paradise. He was filled with glory and exquisite pain,
awash with the climax of multitudinous orgasms. He could
feel the fires of holiness cleansing his boiling blood, shooting
up his legs in ravenous greed.

And then the sky was rent asunder, the stars scattered, the oceans rolled together, and the dragons all around turned on
him and roared.

Abdullah screamed in madness as his flesh melted from his
bones like dripping wax. In that ghastly split second before
death he knew that he'd been tricked. This was not the way
to eternal Paradise!

On this, his Judgment Day, Allah had flung him into the
cauldron of eternal hell.

They had almost reached the boarding stairs when the plastique exploded and the palace blew asunder. For an
instant the night flashed and became day. Najib flung Daliah
to the ground and shielded her with his body. The shockwave
came in a roll and rocked the jet above them. A brief sand
storm whipped and lashed.

The heat wave that immediately followed felt hotter than
the noonday sun. Debris rained for half a mile all around,
and the pipeline across the sands ignited, creating a crackling
curtain of fire as far as the eye could see.

Slowly, Daliah crawled to her knees and looked around.
The palace was gone.

And then Najib was helping her to her feet and they were
scrambling the last few steps to safety.

Chapter 29

The engines changed pitch as the 727-100 nosed down through
shreds of white cloud on its final approach to Newark International. The thirteen-hour flight from Tel Aviv was nearly
over. It had been unlike any flight Daliah had ever taken—
and she grinned at the thought that this was a life-style to
which she could become very easily and very, very quickly
accustomed. She and Najib had spent most of the flight in the
big luxurious bed in the aft cabin. What better way was there
to while away all those thousands of miles than by making love
and sleeping?

Still, she would be glad to be back on the ground. She was anxious to be back in New York and have Najib carry her
across the threshold into her new home—four entire floors of
the Trump Tower. The first thing she intended to do was to
banish all the help and lock herself up with him for one entire
glorious week. Just the two of them.
Alone.

They could use the rest.

The last five days had been hectic. There had been the media
circus to contend with, then Ari and Sissi's delayed wedding,
and finally her parents had hosted an impromptu engagement
party for her and Najib. She was pleased that Tamara found
Najib delightful, and gratified that most of her parents' Jewish
friends seemed, if not exactly overjoyed at the prospect of her
marrying an Arab, at least accepting of that fact.

And then, finally, when they'd boarded the jet, she'd got
her wish—to be alone with Najib and not have to share him
with anyone.

His proximity gave her a cosy, serene security. Was this the
way she would always feel, she wondered, or would the
novelty of wanting to be at his side at every moment wear off
in time? She laughed at herself. As long as he was hers, and
she was his, that was all that mattered.

She turned to him and clasped one of his hands in both of
hers. He looked so handsome and so gentle, and yet under his noble features he was as strong as steel; if he hadn't been, she
wouldn't even be alive. Passionate, sensuous, powerful; he
was a man who could hold his own beside her. She didn't have
to worry that anyone would ever make the mistake of calling
him Mr. Boralevi.

'Do you know what I was just thinking?' she asked him
softly.

'Were you maybe thinking what
I
was thinking?' he retorted
with a wicked little laugh.

'Hmmm.' She grinned back at him and drew him close. 'I
believe so.'

He gave a little sigh. 'Unfortunately, our fuel tanks are
nearly empty. A thirteen-hour flight is all this plane can
handle. Otherwise, I'd be the first to suggest circling for a
while.'

She wagged a finger at him. 'In that case, you owe me one!'

'The moment we get home!' he promised fervently. Then
he smiled. 'It won't be long. Customs is only a formality, and
then it's into the limo, across the river, and up in the lift.
Thirty minutes. Maybe forty, depending on the traffic.' He grinned again. 'Do you think you can wait that long?'

She sniffed and turned her face away. 'If I'm forced to . . .'

A small welcoming committee was clustered in the terminal
after they were rushed through customs.

'Yoo-hoo! Daliah!' The shrill Brooklynese shout came from
Patsy Lipschitz; even a nearby jet taking off couldn't muffle
her stridency.

'Oh, no.' Daliah looked panic-stricken. She recognized
Jerome and Patsy easily enough, but . . .

She did a double-take. A long stare proved that it really was
Cleo, and Daliah let out a squeal of pleasure and rushed for
her. 'Miss Cleopatra, honey!' she cried, hugging her and
laughing. Then she pulled back. 'I almost didn't recognize
you!'

The change Cleo had undergone during the past three weeks
was astounding. Cleo's casual urchin look had been shed,
along with the corn-rolled hair and ubiquitous men's trousers
and T-shirts that had seemed to constitute her entire ward
robe. In fact, Daliah had never before seen her friend wearing
a dress. Now, seeing her dressed like a lady for the first time,
she could only stare as though struck dumb.

Cleo was a gorgeous sight, from the slim black turban with
its foot-long black feather sticking rakishly up in the air, to
the beautifully tailored indigo-and-black Jean-Louis Scherrer
dress and the black kid gloves encircled with three huge gold
bracelets on each wrist. She was even wearing makeup, and it
was masterfully applied, accentuating her extraordinarily high
cheekbones and adding a regal exoticism to the slight slant of
her eyes.

It took a moment for Daliah to find her voice. 'What's happened to you? Why the fancy get-up? Is there a wedding or a
funeral?'