Whatever happened now she had more sense than to try to overcome this man physically. She needed him fighting for her, not against her.
‘Who is this Mustafa? What makes him think he has the right to give me to you like this?’
Amir shrugged, his wide shoulders drawing her unwilling gaze. She told herself her fascination with his sculpted features, his aura of power, was because he was her only hope of getting out of here.
‘Mustafa is a bandit chief. He rules these mountains down to the border with Tarakhar. We’re in his camp.’
Silently he offered her a plate of orange segments and dates. It was her first food in over twenty-four hours.
Yet she hesitated, wondering at the possibility it had been tampered with. That fear had kept her from devouring it earlier while she waited alone, frantically trying to break the chain.
But he had no need to drug her. She was already at his mercy.
Determined, Cassie forced her mind from the insidious thought.
Carefully she reached for a piece of orange. Its flavour burst like sunshine in her mouth, stinging like blazes where she’d bitten her tongue during their skirmish. Her eyes almost closed in sheer bliss despite the pain. She swallowed and reached for another piece.
‘You were going to tell me how you got here.’ The dark voice jerked her attention back to the man seated opposite her.
His hooded eyes gleamed with an expression she couldn’t name. Was it curiosity, as he’d said? Had she imagined that flash of predatory male interest when he’d first seen her and again as she lay beneath him?
Cassie recalled his touch on her bare skin and shivered. Anxiety swirled in her stomach, and a flutter of something else she couldn’t put a name to.
‘I was travelling through Tarakhar by bus.’
‘By yourself?’ Was that disapproval in his tone?
Cassie’s spine stiffened. ‘I’m twenty-three and more than capable of travelling alone!’
Circumstances had forced Cassie into independence early. She’d never had the luxury of relying on others. Besides, her destination—a rural town near the border—wasn’t on the tourist route. She’d had to travel overland for the last part of the journey.
‘Visitors are welcomed and treated with respect in Tarakhar. Yet it’s advisable not to travel alone.’
‘So I’ve discovered.’ Cassie shot him an eloquent look, her ire rising. Anger, she’d found, was preferable to fear. How dared he blame her for what had happened? She was the innocent party!
‘A travel warning for foreign visitors might be useful. Perhaps you could have one issued since you’re in charge?’ Her voice dropped to saccharine sweetness. ‘Maybe something about travellers being fair game for kidnappers?’
His eyes narrowed, yet she couldn’t read his expression.
Finally he nodded. ‘You’re right. Action must be taken.’
Cassie watched the grooves deepen around his mouth and wondered what action he had in mind. Despite his stillness and his relaxed pose, she sensed he wasn’t nearly as laid-back as he appeared.
Finally she asked the question she’d been putting off. ‘You said Mustafa rules these mountains.’ She paused, delaying the inevitable. ‘Aren’t we in Tarakhar any more?’
‘No. We’re no longer in my country but in the neighbouring state of Bhutran. It’s Mustafa’s tribal territory and he rules with an iron fist.’
Cassie’s heart plunged. She’d already experienced the iron fist. But she’d hoped, prayed, they were still in Tarakhar, where help might reach her. Where Sheikh Amir had authority. Bhutran was a lawless state—notoriously so.
Despair threatened to swamp her but she fought it. Her only hope lay in not giving up. She still had to find a way out of here.
Cassie forced herself to reach for the fruit platter. She needed energy to escape.
Amir watched her devour the fruit with delicate greed. The combination of feisty opponent, all flashing eyes and quick tongue, with soft femininity intrigued him. More than he could remember being intrigued in a long, long time.
In repose her lips were a soft pout of invitation, glistening with fruit juice. The tip of her pink tongue appeared now and then to swipe the excess moisture. Amir realised her sensuality was innate, not contrived.
Yet it wasn’t anything as simple as sexual magnetism alone that intrigued him.
The moment Mustafa had presented her in a flourish of generosity her sparking gaze had sizzled across the space between them, piercing Amir’s boredom at the gathering’s false bonhomie and crude revelry.
Later, through his fury at her attack, he’d still registered her pliant body cushioning him and her delicate scent: desert rose and warm woman.
He’d known women, had women in all sorts of circumstances. It had become rare for one to quicken his pulse.
She reached for a date and her cloak slipped enough to reveal the smooth, pale skin of her collarbone, her cleavage. The cloak slid again to show straining midnight blue silk. The material scooped indecently low, revealing far too much of one full, perfect breast.
He recalled how she’d looked in the skimpy dancing costume. She was all lush curves, with a slender waist accentuated by what he’d thought at the time was merely a decorative chain.
Amir yanked his gaze away. He needed to focus!
‘Why were you travelling in this region?’ The border country wasn’t a sightseeing area.
Violet eyes clashed with his before she looked away, hurriedly securing the gaping front of her cloak.
‘I’ve been accepted on to a volunteer programme, teaching English to adults for a couple of months.’
‘You’re a teacher?’ He tried not to let his surprise show. Obviously these weren’t her normal clothes. Look at the way she’d just covered up. Yet still he found it difficult, imagining her in a classroom.
‘It’s not my field back home in Australia, but they were eager for volunteers and it sounded … fulfilling.’
This woman grew more interesting by the moment. He could picture her at home in a bustling, lively city. She was so full of energy and opinions. Teaching in a provincial school was the last place he’d imagine her. ‘How did you get here?’
One neat hand clutched the coarse fabric of her cloak and her jaw hardened.
‘The bus broke down in the foothills near the border. Apparently it was a major mechanical problem, something that couldn’t be fixed quickly. All the passengers headed off across country to their own homes. There was just me and the driver left, and then.’ She shrugged, a jerky little movement that belied her show of casualness. ‘Then we heard a sound like thunder.’
She flashed a look at him. Behind the defiance he detected a shadow that might have been fear.
Instinctively Amir leaned towards her, only to straighten abruptly when she recoiled.
It wasn’t a reaction to which he was accustomed.
‘Horsemen came galloping down from the mountains. They grabbed me.’ Her voice flattened to an emotionless pitch that anyone less observant might mistake for insouciance. ‘I lost sight of the driver in all the dust and milling horses.’ She paused. ‘He’d been kind to me. I … don’t know what happened to him.’
‘You needn’t fear for him. A report of the raid came through as I travelled here. The driver is recovering from concussion in hospital.’
Anger ignited in Amir’s belly. For Mustafa to have