Nan Ryan (18 page)

“Tell Mustafa his death at my hands will be neither easy nor quick,” said the Sheik, his eyes now a fierce burning black. “I will see to it he is tortured in cruelly exotic ways that even he with his sick, twisted mind could never imagine.”

The deafening sound of
gunfire ceased as abruptly as it started and the camp had returned to its relative nighttime quiet, but Temple didn’t dare move or make a sound. She stayed where the Sheik had placed her, lying on her back beneath his massive bed. Trembling in the darkness, she was unsure what she should do.

She knew the fighting was over, but she had no idea who had won the fierce battle. Nor was she sure which side she hoped were the victors. The surprise attack might well have been designed to free her from her captors.

Maybe her family had learned of her abduction and hired mercenaries from a rival Arab tribe to ride into the Sheik’s village under the cover of darkness and set her free. Maybe this was to be her last night held captive in this remote desert stronghold. Maybe as she lay here hidden in the Sheik’s tent, her liberators were anxiously searching the camp for her. Maybe she should get up, rush outside, and immediately make her presence known.

Quick on the heels of all those hopeful maybes came another maybe, this one so dreadful that Temple felt her throbbing heart almost stop its beating.

Maybe the Sheik had been slaughtered in the attack!

Into her racing mind flashed the horrifying vision of Sharif lying dead in the desert moonlight, his lean brown body riddled with bullets, his black eyes fixed in a sightless stare at the heavens.

Temple blinked away the terrible image and swallowed convulsively when light suddenly poured into the shadowy bedroom. She held her breath. Waited. And winced when a strong hand closed firmly over her upper arm. Her head snapped around, and she squinted to see.

And exhaled with mild disappointment and great relief when she saw the distinctive ruby ring shimmering in the half-light.

But she screamed in shock when, pulled swiftly from under the bed and hauled to her feet, she stood facing a tall, menacing man she hardly recognized as the Sheik. Bare chested, unshaven, and wild-eyed, he was shiny with sweat and splattered with drying blood. His left shoulder was dripping fresh blood down his muscular arm, and directly beneath his right eye an abrasion on his high cheekbone was caked with dirt and blood.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his voice uncommonly rough, his scrutinizing gaze sliding over her. He didn’t wait for a reply.

Before she could speak he was turning her about, patting her down with a bloodstained hand, searching for any telltale signs of injury or wounds.

“Will you stop it!” she protested, clutching her covering sheet with one hand and attempting to push him away with the other. “I’m fine! Just fine.”

He paid her no mind. His fingers firmly encircling her wrist, he held her to him and examined her carefully, much to Temple’s rapidly rising anger and aggravation. Needing to convince himself she was unharmed, he continued—over her indignant objections—to touch and probe and check, running his hand through her unbound hair, over her throat, along her bare arms, across her back and shoulders, and down her slender, sheet-draped body.

Eyes squinted in concentration, the Sheik momentarily shifted his intense gaze from her to the divan on which she slept each night. His chest constricted when he saw that it was riddled with bullet holes. He turned back, looked at her directly, and Temple caught the strange new softness that had come into his eyes. She saw his hand tremble slightly as he lifted it toward her cheek.

She turned her head to avoid his touch and found her face only inches from his bare left shoulder. Her lips fell open and her eyes widened.

She pulled free of his imprisoning grasp and murmured in surprised concern, “You … you’ve been shot.” Her slender fingers rose automatically toward his wounded shoulder.

“It’s nothing,” Sharif said, catching and staying her hand before she could touch him. “A small flesh wound.” He set her back and said, “I’ll have hot water sent in so you can clean up.” He indicated the bloodstains left by his exploring hands on the white sheet wrapped around her. He turned and walked away, saying over his shoulder, “Take my bed for tonight. I’ll sleep on the divan in the main room.”

Temple followed him. “But what about your wound? It needs to be washed and dressed and—”

“Tariz will do it.”

“I’ll help him,” she said, relieved to hear that the little man of whom she’d grown quite fond was safe.

“No need.”

“I
am
helping,” she announced, following right behind him, her green eyes riveted to his bleeding shoulder. “Does it hurt awfully bad?” she asked in a soft voice.

“Not a bit,” he lied, so weak and light-headed that he made a misstep and stumbled.

Temple’s slender arms were around him in an instant, steadying him, supporting him. Her hands clasped across his hard, sweat-slick abdomen, her cheek pressed against his blood-splattered brown back, she said, “It’s all right. I have you.”

“No,” he said, speaking so softly she didn’t hear, “you do not.”

But as he said it, the Sheik’s dark eyes closed helplessly, and it wasn’t from the pain. It was from the relief of knowing this beautiful golden-haired woman was unharmed.

That, and the dizzying pleasure of having her soft, bare arms wrapped tightly around him.

The Sheik sat alone on a dune and gazed across the heat haze into the endless deserts.

A week had passed since Mustafa’s men had invaded his camp, and he still worried and wondered if the Turkish emir had somehow learned of Temple’s presence. It didn’t seem likely. Naguib was a brave and trusted courier who over the years had delivered many a secret message to allies scattered across Arabia. A fearless man who would gladly give up his life before allowing a missive to fall into the wrong hands, Naguib had undoubtedly reached Baghdad and sent the telegram to Temple’s family in America.

Nodding his head, Sharif convinced himself that all was well. He was worrying needlessly. Nobody knew he was holding an American heiress captive in his desert village.

Nonetheless he would take every precaution to ensure Temple’s safety. It was up to him. She was in his care.

The night of the raid, while she’d assisted Tariz in cleansing and dressing his shoulder wound, he had told her exactly who the invaders were and warned her that if Mustafa’s men ever got their hands on her, she would pray for death.

“Never leave the village alone,” he’d concluded with as much authority as possible.

Temple, standing above him, preoccupied with cleaning the dirt and dried blood from his wound, had given no reply.

His jaw hardening, he had clutched her arm, made her stop what she was doing.

“Look at me, Temple.” His tone of voice had made both Temple and Tariz jump. Temple had looked into his eyes and he’d asked, “Did you hear me?”

“Yes,” she’d said, exasperated. “You said look at you.”

“I
said
you are never to leave the village alone.
Never!
Promise me you won’t.”

She’d hesitated, finally said, “I promise.”

But now, as he sat here alone worrying, he wondered if she’d actually paid attention to his warnings. Knowing her, he doubted it. She was foolish and stubborn, a dangerous combination.

Temple Longworth was dangerous in more ways than one.

Sharif felt his lower belly tighten, felt himself stir and surge against the fabric of his snug riding breeches. He cursed himself for his weakness, cursed her for having such power over him.

He muttered oaths and ground his teeth. The mere sight of her made him long to take her in his arms. Just thinking about her heated the blood in his veins. He’d had only a fleeting glimpse of her beautiful body the night he had angrily torn off her white dress, but the vision was stamped indelibly on his brain. He could call it up whenever he wished. But he couldn’t black it out when he wanted to forget.

He would never forget.

If he lived to be a very old man whose eyesight failed, he would still be able to see the naked, pale-skinned Temple kneeling on the bed with her golden hair spilling around her shoulders. By Allah, she was a temptress no mere mortal could resist.

Sharif exhaled heavily.

It was agony to sleep in the same room with her each night, knowing she was only a few feet away, naked and vulnerable. How many times had he been tempted to get into bed with her when she was sleeping? To kiss her into partial wakefulness and touch her before she realized what was happening and take her before she was fully conscious?

Awake or asleep, he dreamed constantly of making love to her. No matter how hard he tried to ignore her, he couldn’t. He was acutely aware of her every second of every day. And night.

He should never have brought her here. Should never have captured her. It was all a terrible mistake, and one for which he was destined to pay for eternity.

He thought he’d planned so well. The strategy had been simple. Kidnap Temple and send a wire to her powerful uncle in America, informing him that when he stopped shipping ammunition to the Turks, Temple would be released, unharmed.

The abduction had been a last resort. How many years had he and the old sheik before him attempted, through every diplomatic source available, to persuade DuPlessis to stop the flow of ammunition from their American factories to the bloodthirsty Turks.

They had never listened.

Sharif reached into his pocket, withdrew the spent brass shell casing he always carried. He opened his hand and stared at it, recalling the story the old sheik had told of finding this very casing in his, Sharif’s, tiny hand when he was discovered in the desert with his dead father and dying mother.

Sharif closed his hand.

His tanned jaw clenched and ridged in frustration, then he willed himself to dismiss from his troubled thoughts the worrisome woman and her reason for being in his desert camp. Soon she would be gone.

But not, Sharif knew instinctively, soon enough.

The bullet nick on Sharif’s right cheek showed pink against the darkness of his olive skin. And beneath his heavy robes, a bandage still covered the healing bullet wound on his left shoulder.

As he had done several times each day since being hit, Sharif flexed his injured shoulder, lifting and lowering it in a circular, testing motion. He winced at the searing pain and gritted his even white teeth. Perspiration dotted his hairline as he forced himself to continue the punishing, loosening-up exercises. He was determined to work the stiffness out of his shoulder muscles before tomorrow’s guests arrived.

The throbbing pain, the agonizing soreness, Sharif kept to himself. Only when he was alone did he groan and grind his teeth and wince with pain. He had learned, by example, that a respected tribal chieftain showed no weakness. Ever. The old sheik never allowed anyone to know of his suffering, either physical or mental. Not even at the end, when he endured intolerable pain before, mercifully, dying.

In those last moments, when Sharif, with unshed tears stinging his eyes, knelt beside the bed, Sheik Aziz Ibrahim Hamid told him, “The Prophet said, ‘You must not weep or cry over your dead.’” Sharif knew the man he called father was reminding him he was
never
to cry before anyone. Not even at the loss of a loved one.

How many times, since he was a boy, had the old sheik told him, “A successful leader of men must control and conceal his emotions, lest he be perceived as weak in the eyes of his followers and his enemies.”

Sharif knew the truth and importance of that statement. He knew as well that few tribes commanded more respect than his own, and few chieftains had followers as loyal as those who served him and his father before him.

So he sat alone on the sand dune far from the village and worked his stiff shoulder muscles and tight biceps and aching arm, flexing and flinching and making faces. He had always kept himself in perfect physical condition, his steely muscles toughened by years of the strenuous desert life. He would not allow a simple flesh wound to slow him down. He was determined to get in top form for the welcoming festivities planned for tomorrow’s visit of Sheik Hishman Zahrah Rahman and his tribe.

Sharif knew that as a part of the celebration he would be required to take part in the ceremonial
Ardah
.

He smiled wryly.

It wouldn’t do for a tribal leader known across North Africa as
El Siif—
the Sword—to be unable to perform the ritual Sword Dance.

Temple stood outside in the shade of the lance-supported canopy, watching Sharif through narrowed eyes. She had casually sauntered out when, from inside the cool interior of the tent, she had heard his men calling out to him.

Acting nonchalant, pretending that she had no idea he had returned, Temple stood there under the shade canopy, watching as the Sheik appeared on the horizon, silhouetted against the burning sun. She watched as the white-robed chieftain neck-reined Bandit, his prancing white stallion, down a long slanting dune east of the camp directly toward the maze of tents and palm trees.