His attentions switched back to Hannah. ‘It’s called prioritising, my little dove.’
Hannah felt her stomach muscles tighten at the reminder that the last hurdle was still to be negotiated. At least most of the quivering was associated with fear. Some of it...well, it wasn’t as if she were struck dumb with lust, but a little dry-mouthed maybe? Previously her fear levels had given her some protection from the aura of raw sexuality this man exuded, but she felt it even more strongly when he hooked a finger under her chin and looked down into her face for a moment before letting his hand drop away.
The contact and the deep dark stare had been uncomfortable, but now it was gone she wasn’t sure what she felt. She gave her head a tiny shake to clear the low-level buzz—or was that the jet engines? She was clearly suffering the effects of an adrenalin dip; the chemical circulating in her blood had got her this far, but now she was shaking.
‘Sit down, belt up and switch off your phone,’ he drawled, wondering if he hadn’t been a bit too tough on her. But she acted tough, and looked... His eyes slid over the soft contours of her fine-boned face. She was possibly one of the few women on the planet who could look beautiful after two days in a ten-foot-square prison cell.
She sat down with a bump because it was preferable to falling. Had she thanked him yet?
‘Thank you.’ Hannah had been brought up to be polite, after all, and he had just rescued her.
She closed her eyes and missed the look of shock on his face. As the jet took off she released a long, slow sigh and didn’t open her eyes again, even when she felt the light brush of hands on her shoulder and midriff as a belt was snapped shut.
Was it possible that she had jumped from the proverbial frying pan straight into...what? And with whom? It was only the knowledge that he carried the personal message from her father that had stopped her tipping over into panic as her imagination threatened to go wild on her.
‘If you would like anything, just ask Rafiq. I have some work to do.’
She opened her eyes in time to see her rescuer shrug off his imposing desert robes to reveal a pale coffee-coloured tee shirt and black jeans. The resulting relaxed image should have been less imposing, but actually wasn’t—even though he appeared to have shrugged off the icy-eyed hauteur that had reduced the aggressive colonel to red-faced docility.
He might be dressed casually, his attitude might be relaxed when he glanced her way, but this didn’t change the fact that he exuded a level of sexuality that was unlike anything she had ever encountered.
He took a couple of steps, then turned back, his dark, dispassionate stare moving across her face. So many questions—Hannah asked the one that she felt took priority. ‘Who are you?’
His mouth lifted at one corner but the dark silver-flecked eyes stayed coolly dispassionate as he responded, ‘Your future husband.’
Then he was gone.
‘IS THERE ANYTHING I can get for you?’
The words roused Hannah from her semi catatonic state. She surged to her feet and flung the man mountain before her a look of profound scorn before pushing past him into the adjoining cabin, which contained a seating area and a bed on which her tall, rude rescuer was stretched out, one booted foot crossed over the other, his forearm pressed across his eyes.
‘I thought you were working.’
‘This is a power nap. I want to look good in the wedding photos.’
Breathing hard, she stood there, hands on her hips, glaring at his concealed face—noticing as she did the small bloody indentations on the sides of his wrist, presumably from where the hawk had landed on his bare skin.
‘Can you be serious for one moment, please?’
He lifted a dark brow and with a long-suffering sigh dropped his arm. Then, in one sinuous motion, he pulled himself up into a sitting position and lowered his feet to the ground.
He planted his hands on his thighs and leaned forward. ‘I’m all yours. Shoot.’
Hannah heard shoot and shuddered, recalling the scene on the tarmac where but for his lightning reflexes there might have been more than one bullet discharged—a disaster narrowly averted.
‘You should put some antiseptic on those.’
His dark brows twitched into a puzzled line.
She pointed to his arm. ‘The bird.’ She angled a wary glance at the big bird. ‘You’re bleeding.’
He turned his wrist and shrugged in an irritatingly tough fashion. ‘I’ll live.’
‘I, on the other hand, am feeling a little insecure about being on a plane with a total stranger going...’ she gave an expressive shrug ‘...God knows where. So do you mind filling in a few blanks?’
He nodded. She didn’t sound insecure. She sounded and looked confident and sexy and in control. What would it take to make her lose it? It could be he was about to find out.
‘My father sent you?’
He tipped his head in acknowledgement and she gave a gusty sigh of relief. ‘He sends his love.’
‘I’m sure Dad appreciates your sense of humour, but I’m a bit...’
‘Uptight? Humourless?’
Her blue eyes narrowed to slits. She had very little energy left, and being angry with him was using it all up. She took a deep breath and thought, Rise above it, Hannah. People had said a lot worse about her and she’d maintained her dignity.
It was a power thing. If they saw it got to her they had the power and she lost it. It didn’t matter who they were—school bullies, journalists—the same rule applied. If you showed weakness they reacted like pack animals scenting blood.
‘I’d prefer to know what’s happening, so if you could just fill me in...? Tell me where the plane is headed and then I’ll let you sleep in peace.’
‘Surana.’
The mention of the oil-rich desert state fired a memory. That was where she’d seen the crest on the plane before, and it fitted: her father had called in some favours. She knew he counted the King of Surana as a personal friend; the two men had met forty years earlier at the public school they had attended as boys. The friendship had survived the years—apparently the King had once dandled her on his knee but Hannah had no recollection of the event.
‘So Dad will be there to meet us?’
‘No, he’ll be waiting at the chapel.’
Hannah fought for composure. Was this man on something? ‘Hilarious.’ She tried to laugh but laughing in the face of the ruthless resolve stamped on his hard-boned face was difficult. She hefted a weary sigh and reminded herself she was free. It was all up from here, once she got a straight answer from this man. ‘This is not a joke that has the legs to run and run.’
His broad shoulders lifted in a shrug that suggested he didn’t care. ‘Look, I wish it were a joke. I have no more wish to marry you than you have me, but before you start bleating for Daddy ask yourself what you would have preferred if I’d offered you the option back there: marrying me, or spending twenty years in a boiling-hot jail where luxury is considered a tap shared by several hundred. Or even worse—’
‘How does it get worse?’
‘How about the death penalty?’
‘That