The Sheik Retold(70)

"Never hesitate once you have the weapon in hand. You have lost the advantage of surprise."

I spun around with a gasp. He still faced away from me, but he had tracked my every move in the dressing table mirror. He stood slowly and came toward me with quiet deliberation.

"Stabbing a man in the back takes considerable strength. You must be able to penetrate through thick muscle and a considerable barrier of bone. Are you sure it is the approach you wish to take? It is rarely fatal. I have already survived it once, after all."

He stood directly in front of me now. I still held the knife in my clenched fist. He closed his hand over mine. I thought he would twist it from my grasp.

"You would do better to plunge it into my heart." He raised it to a position just below his left breast. "But you must thrust from below and between the ribs thusly." He angled my wrist upward and traced the area in question with the knife tip, drawing a tiny red line. "You see? But it is also very difficult…for a woman." He then raised the knife to trace a line across his throat. "I would advise it best to simply slice me here as I sleep, but when you do, be sure to cut below the Adam's apple. It is much cleaner that way."

He released my hand and turned away.

"Please!" I whispered. "You mock me, but I swear blood will be shed if you do not release me. If not yours…it will be my own."

His spun back to me and waved his hand with a scoffing sound. "You are not such a coward to take your own life."

"Do you truly wish to test me?"

His expression remained impassive, but his pupils flared.

I shut my eyes and raised the knife to my own breast, inhaling deeply, steeling myself for a single thrust, a death stroke. Could I have done it? I will never know. He wrenched the knife from my grasp before I could decide. His mouth compressed as his gaze met mine. "I believe this is mine."

"But there are many other means by which a life can be taken if one is so determined," I argued. While the survival instinct was strong in me, so was my obstinacy, and I was resolute that this intolerable situation would end now—one way or another.

"And you are so determined?" he asked. His attitude and tone were careless, but there was a peculiar look of unease in his eyes. "You would choose death over life with me?"

"It is not my wish," I replied. "But we cannot go on like this any longer. I cannot live like this! I will never give you the blind submission you want. I will never lie as a dog at your feet! I refuse to be a mindless slave to you. You can no more command my obedience than I can command your love. I will never give you one without the other, and you will never admit that you care for me," I broke off in a whisper.

With a pang, I noted a telltale twitch in his jaw, but it remained clamped shut. Nevertheless, for the first time, I saw self-doubt in his eyes and something else I didn't recognize. After a protracted silence, he gripped both of my shoulders and backed me slowly toward the bed. I gazed up into his eyes. "No, Ahmed. It is finished for me. Never again will I—"

To my surprise, he pressed a finger to my mouth…and then his lips met my forehead.

"Sleep, ma belle." He stroked the backs of his fingers gently over my cheek. "All will be different in the morning."

Hours later I drifted off to sleep to the final verse of the Kashmiri Love Song in a familiar and haunting baritone, "Pale hands, pink tipped, like lotus buds on those cool waters where we used to dwell… I would rather have felt you round my throat, crushing out life, than waving me farewell."





CHAPTER FIFTEEN


When I awoke I was stunned to see my riding clothes laid out in preparation for me with my bags neatly lined up beside them. I could hardly believe my eyes. I dressed in extreme haste, feeling as if it were all some magical mirage that would suddenly evaporate. I fumbled with my last buttons and raked trembling fingers through my unruly hair before slipping noiselessly through the curtains.

I entered the outer room with a stifled gasp at the sight of a stranger, a figure in a silk shirt, riding breeches, and high brown boots leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and his face hidden in his hands. I gazed in incredulity as my eyes ranged over the long length of him to linger on his bent head. Divested of the flowing robes that had seemed essentially a part of him, I almost didn't recognize him. "Ahmed?" I whispered.

When he lifted his head to me, it was indeed the face of a stranger. Clean-shaven and devoid of his native headdress, only the bronze of the sun betrayed his desert origins.

"All is in preparation," he said. "We shall start for Bou Saada as soon as you have broken your fast."

I gaped. Even his voice sounded different to me. "Bou Saada?" I repeated dumbly.

"It is a market town one hundred miles to the north. When Raoul and I passed through, there was an English officer making inquiries after you—the same one who so ineffectually begged your hand in the hotel gardens."

"Lieutenant Arbuthnot?" I clasped my hand to my mouth. "Jim is looking for me?"

"Yes. It was Arbuthnot." The signature black scowl that so often darkened his brow had returned. "It has only been a few days. He is likely still there or at least nearby." His voice was strangely flat and dull. With a little start, I realized he was speaking English. I swayed dizzily in disbelief. "You are really letting me go?"