One Hot Desert Night Read online

  As he was, but not only for food. “I suppose I could accommodate you.”

  “Gee, thanks. I’d hate to start foraging for wild berries since I doubt I’ll find any.”

  “Berries actually are a possibility.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Please don’t tell me we’re about to trek through the desert to pick berries.”

  She brought about his smile that arrived more often in her presence. “No need for that. Now if you will follow me, I will bring our meal to you.”

  “Gladly.”

  He guided her around the bank of the aquifer and across the small wooden bridge he had built with his own hands. Once they reached his private quarters, he told her, “Wait here, and I shall return shortly.”

  “Hurry,” she called out to him as he entered the bunker. “Or I’m going for the granola bars I brought with me.”

  He strode into the supply room to retrieve the container housing their meals. After he returned to Sunny, he nodded toward the pair of large crimson pillows next to the bed. “We will sit here to dine.”

  Sunny lowered herself onto the cushion and crossed her legs before her. “I’ve heard of breakfast in bed, but never lunch next to the bed. So what’s on the menu?”

  After he took his place on the opposing pillow, Rayad opened the cooler, lifted the platter, set it between them and uncovered it. “This is the palace chef’s specialty. Shawarma on taboon bread, topped with hummus and olives.”

  She picked up the sandwich, studied it briefly and then took a bite. “This is delicious,” she said. “And I can’t wait to dive into the dates and cheese.”

  He might have to dive into the nearby pool if he kept watching her mouth as she ate—and imagining how that lovely mouth would feel on his body. Instead, he handed her a bottled water, small silver plate and white cloth napkin. “Please eat as much as you would like. We have another tray for our dinner if this is not enough.”

  She paused midbite and frowned. “I thought we’d be heading back before dinner.”

  He tamped down his disappointment, with effort. “I had planned to have the evening meal here, beneath the stars.”

  Sunny mulled that over for a moment before she addressed him again. “I have to admit that sounds tempting, as long as you have me home before midnight in case I turn into a pumpkin.”

  “Pumpkin?”

  She laid the sandwich down and dabbed at her mouth. “You know the story. Fairy godmother. Handsome prince. Young girl with evil stepsisters... Never mind. I tend to forget we’re not culturally on the same page.”

  “Actually, I do know the fairy tale. Yet if my recollections are accurate, the young woman’s gown turns to rags at midnight. I do not recall the threat of becoming a pumpkin.”

  Her laughter gave Rayad surprising joy. “Apparently, you can be very literal in your interpretation of folklore.”

  “Do you believe in these fairy tales?”

  “If you’re referring to happily-ever-after, I’m on the fence. My grandparents have been married for over fifty years and seem to still be in love. But my mother, and I use that term loosely, went from one man to the next, so obviously, she’s never found what she was looking for in a relationship.”

  “And your father?”

  She turned suddenly sullen. “I have no idea who he is. I did some investigating a few years back and after seeing the possible prospects, I gave up the search. Some things are better left unknown.”

  He would have to agree with that in terms of his past. “My parents have been wed over thirty years, although their marriage was arranged. However, they seem genuinely fond of each other.”

  “Fond isn’t the same as love. I sincerely hope for Piper’s sake that forever love does exist. But I’m certainly not looking for a charming prince to ride in to rescue me.”

  “You do not strike me as a woman who needs to be rescued.”

  “Are you sure that’s not what this is all about?” she asked. “The noble sheikh attempting to save me?”

  He would be foolish to believe he could save her when he had already failed another. Yet in some small way he needed to try in an effort to atone for his transgressions. “I am an ordinary man spending time with an extraordinary woman who needs a respite.”

  “You’re definitely not ordinary, and I’m anything but special. But I do appreciate the compliment and that you’re concerned about my well-being.”

  He reached out and touched her face. “As I have said before, I appreciate a beautiful woman whose humility prevents her from realizing her true worth. However, beauty is not only about physical traits. It involves the soul, even one that is injured. Yours might be wounded, yet it makes you no less attractive.”

  “Before we head in that direction,” she began, “I’d rather talk about something more pleasant.”

  At some point he hoped she would talk to him about her experience. Since that would not happen in the imminent future, he opted for a suggestion that did not involve conversation. Perhaps not his first option but one that best suited her situation. “Would you wish to swim?”

  She averted her eyes. “I’m not sure I’m ready for that.”

  “Did you not pack your suit as I suggested?”

  “I have it.” She finally raised her gaze to his. “I also have a reminder of my recent experience. A not so pretty scar.”

  “Show me.”

  “Maybe later.”

  Needing to encourage her, Rayad pulled his shirt over his head and tossed it aside, revealing his own scars. “I received this six years ago,” he said as he pointed to the jagged line on his left side. “The bruise on my right is from the broken ribs. On my back you will find a random pattern of slashes, compliments of a murderous insurgent who held me hostage and attempted to beat information from me.”

  Her green eyes widened. “How did you escape?”

  Barely with his life. “My captor made the mistake of freeing my hands to move me to another chamber. He suffered a broken jaw for his efforts, and I managed to steal away without detection.”

  “I know all about fighting for freedom.” Her tone hinted at a very real fear.

  “Each scar we earn in our lifetimes has a story, Sunny. Every wound marks a challenge that we have overcome. If you will not show me your scar, then I implore you to tell me your story.”

  She drew in a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “If I do this, will you promise not to tell Piper the details?”

  He worried the details were much worse than he had first presumed. “As I told you previously, what is shared between us, remains between us.”

  “I’ll try to be brief.”

  “Take as much time as you need.”

  When a long span of silence passed, he thought she had reconsidered. Then finally she began to speak. “We were staying in a small village in Angola, covering a story on a group of aid workers. We knew going in that the area drew a dangerous criminal element due to the diamond trade. I don’t think I realized how dangerous until that night.”

  As she hesitated again, Rayad took her hands into his. “You believe your attackers were a part of this element?”

  She shook her head. “I’m not sure. I never saw them. They spoke broken English, and their accents had a Spanish note to them, but that’s not what they were speaking because I know Spanish.”

  “How did you come upon them?”

  She shifted on the pillow, a certain sign of discomfort. “Cameron and I were staying in a small bungalow in the center of the village. We’d had an argument about our future. He wanted to settle down and return to the U.S. and get married and have kids. I wasn’t ready for that, and he knew it, but he kept pushing me. When I told him it might be best if we parted ways since we didn’t want the same things, he demanded I leave and find somewhere else to spend the night. H
e insisted he didn’t want to spend even one more minute in my presence. I decided to go for a walk until he calmed down.”

  He muttered an oath aimed at the man’s disregard for his partner’s safety. “He should not have allowed you to leave. He should have been the one to leave.”

  She sighed. “He realizes that now. He feels very guilty about the whole incident.”

  “As he should.” In an effort to return to the abduction, Rayad asked, “What happened when you went on the walk?”

  As if she could not tolerate the contact, she wrested her hand from his and gripped the pillow on either side of her thighs. “I was upset, so I wasn’t aware of my surroundings. I passed by an alley and was ambushed. Someone pushed me to the ground and taped my mouth shut before I could even scream. They blindfolded me before I could get a good look, but I know there were at least two of them. One held me down, and the other tied me up.”

  “Is that where they kept you captive?” he asked, though he knew that most likely was not the case.

  “No,” she answered, confirming his suspicions. “Someone carried me to a small house, although I didn’t know that at the time. I only knew I was put in some sort of tight space, like maybe a closet. I heard a door close, but I couldn’t see a thing, and I could barely breathe, thanks to the tape on my mouth. I felt like I’d been buried alive.”

  “And that is the cause of your fear of enclosed spaces.”

  “Yes, it is,” she continued. “I did get a periodic break when every now and then, I’d get yanked out, put in a chair and slapped around for unknown reasons other than I was an American journalist, or so I assumed.”

  His stomach pitched at the thought of anyone raising a hand to her. He had to pose a question that, depending on the answer, could change everything. A question he had presented Piper, yet he could not trust the answer. “Forgive me for asking, but were you sexually assaulted?”

  She released a laugh that held no humor. “One of them tried. He came into that closet, closed the door and pawed me. He whispered things in my ear that I didn’t understand, but I could just imagine what he was saying, and it wasn’t pleasant. I still remember the way he smelled, like booze and sweat, as he climbed on top of me and tore at my clothes. I try not to think about it.”

  When Sunny seemed to mentally wander away, Rayad asked, “Do you wish to stop now?”

  “There’s more,” she said, as if unburdening had become a total necessity. “The second time he came to me, he was more forceful, and that’s when I started to realize it was only a matter of time before he...before it happened. And after that, I sensed they would kill me. The fight-or-flight response took over because I knew I had to find some way to escape.”

  “You fought him?”

  She sent him a slight smile. “No. After he ripped the tape from my mouth, I knew what was going to occur if I didn’t get away from him. I started to retch and told him I was going to throw up when he tried to kiss me, which wasn’t far from the truth. I said I needed air or a bathroom or something. He dragged me out of the room by my wrists, pulled me to my feet then barked out an order to his partner. The next thing I knew I was being dragged somewhere. When I felt a breeze I realized I was outside, but I was terrified over what might transpire next.”

  “Clearly, you evaded them, or you would not be here,” he said after a long pause in the conversation.

  She drew in a ragged breath before continuing. “Luckily, my tormentor’s partner untied my arms and legs, and that’s when I saw my chance to kick and bolt. Before I could do that, I heard a voice whisper in my ear, ‘Run.’ And I did, as fast as I could. I stumbled while trying to remove the blindfold, but I recovered quickly and kept running. Then I heard the gunshot and a bullet whizzing by my head.”

  Rayad gritted his teeth against the force of his fury. “He gave you your freedom and then attempted to kill you?”

  “It wasn’t a he.”

  That temporarily shocked him into silence. “Your captor was a woman?”

  “Yes, and I believe she wanted me to escape. I also believe she shot at me in an effort to convince her partner she tried to prevent me from getting away.”

  “After all that they did to you, you still believe in their humanity?”

  “Her humanity. She may have been caught up in some Bonnie-and-Clyde scenario. She might have even been jealous that I was receiving her cohort’s attention. I’ll never know her motives or exactly why they targeted me.”

  “You believe these two were possibly lovers?”

  “Maybe. I just remember him repeating the name Emma or maybe Erma, but it always sounded so sarcastic.”

  A possible clue to her abductors’ nationality. “It was most likely irmã, Portuguese for sister.”

  “That would explain the accent and why she let him have his way with me. A sick sibling relationship for sure. Regardless, she did allow me the opportunity to escape, and for that I’m grateful.”

  Her attitude, though honorable, took him aback. “I unfortunately cannot share your sense of compassion. I have no use for any person, male or female, who systematically tortures another.”

  She rested a palm on his forearm. “I can only imagine why you might feel that way in your line of work. But I have to continue to believe that most people are inherently good, or at least have some goodness in them. Otherwise, I might have totally withdrawn and stopped living for fear of running into bad guys around every corner. That is no way to exist.”

  He admired her strength. He appreciated her courage. He did have difficulty understanding her benevolence. “You’re a brave woman, Sunny McAdams. Braver than many men I have known. Are you brave enough to show me your scar now?”

  She came to her feet and gave him another smile. “Since you know the story behind it, I guess you should know it all. And since we’re going swimming, you’re going to see it all. So now I’ll go change into my suit in the bunker, if you’ll tell me how to open the disappearing door.”

  He stood and returned her smile. “Press the red button. It is unlocked.”

  “Okay.” She turned then paused and faced him again. “I happen to love life, Rayad, and that makes me a survivor. I’m positive you’re a survivor, too, and that’s why we’re drawn to each other.”

  When she walked away, he pondered her words. He had survived some of the worst scenarios, including one that had happened several years ago. Yet on that day, a part of his soul had died. He was not certain he would ever recover what was left of it, or to halt the search for the people who murdered his wife and child.

  * * *

  Sunny was surprised by how quickly she had revealed the details. Telling Rayad most of the abduction story surprisingly hadn’t been that difficult, once she’d started talking. Wearing a swimsuit in front of him wasn’t going to be quite as easy. He would then see remnants of the one detail she hadn’t bothered to mention, though she wasn’t quite sure why.

  As soon as she’d put on the tasteful two-piece, her hand automatically went to the raised welt located right below her collarbone—and then came terrifying memories of the knife slicing her skin, followed by the warning issued by her terrorist in barely recognizable English.

  Do as I say or next time, I cut higher.

  She shook off the recollections as she wrapped herself in the towel she’d packed, holding it closed above the scar. Eventually, she would have to reveal it, but not until she was safely sequestered in water.

  On that thought, Sunny made her way back to Rayad, careful to keep the towel clutched at her throat. But when she arrived, he was nowhere to be found.

  Suddenly, he emerged from the reservoir like a gorgeous, golden-skinned god, a sensual smile curling the corners of his sexy mouth. He swam toward her until he found his footing and stood only a few inches from the stone bank. “I had begun to believe you had reconsid
ered.”

  She visually followed a droplet that trickled down his sternum to where the water line circled his lower belly. She couldn’t help but notice the beginnings of a thin stream of masculine hair traveling south from below his navel. She couldn’t help but wonder if he was wearing swim trunks. “I haven’t been gone that long.”

  “It seemed like an eternity.”

  Pretty words from a very pretty—in a macho sort of way—bad boy. “How’s the water?”

  “Temperate enough. Are you coming in, or do you wish to stand there and admire my aquatic skills?”

  She’d been admiring a lot more than his skill a moment ago, and imagining all sorts of things. “If you’re that good, maybe I should bow out and watch.”

  “If you do not swim all that well, I will assist you.”

  Sunny’s competitive streak kicked, prompting a little temporary white lie in the form of playing the consummate helpless female. “How deep is it?”

  “At the moment, I am standing on a narrow ledge that drops off into the depths behind me. I have never located the bottom, though I have tried.”

  She laid a dramatic hand above her breasts. “Wow. You’re well over six feet, so that means it must be really deep.”

  “Do not be afraid.”

  She wasn’t anything of the sort, and she planned to show him. With that in mind, she walked to the edge to study where Rayad was standing and to gauge the depth of the water behind him. Then in one fell swoop, she tore off the towel and executed a dive into the pool.

  After Sunny surfaced several feet away from Rayad, she slicked her hair back with one hand and almost laughed when she saw the puzzled look on his face. Time to end the charade. “I happened to be on my high school swim team for four years, and I served as lifeguard during the summer. I’ve never been afraid of water.”

  Without saying a word, he shot toward her, using his long, powerful legs to consume the distance between them in a matter of seconds. “I suspected you were not being truthful,” he said as he slid his arms around her.

  She continued to tread water, well aware that not much separated them, both in space and in clothing, yet she wasn’t the least bit afraid. In fact, her reaction had nothing to do with fear and everything to do with feminine need. At least he’d put on swim trunks so she wasn’t tempted to act on those desires—yet. “I thought I’d done a pretty good acting job.”