As Petra watched Blaize watching the girl she wondered what he was thinking. He said something to one of the men he had been speaking with, who inclined his head as though in deference to Blaize before going over to the girl and bending towards her.
What was the man saying to her? Petra wondered jealously. What message had Blaize given the man to give her? Had he told her that he would see her later? The girl was getting up. She looked at Blaize, a proud, challenging flash of dark eyes, before walking slowly away, her hips swaying provocatively as she did so, her spine straight.
How could any man resist such an invitation? Petra wondered bleakly. Why would a man like Blaize even try to do so? And why, oh, why did a woman like her have to fall in love with him?
The evening was drawing to a close. People were finishing off their drinks and retiring to their pavilions.
Petra looked towards Blaize, who was still talking to the falconer and some other men. The dancer had disappeared, and Blaize was showing no signs of coming over to her or even looking at her.
Tiredly Petra got up and made her own way to their pavilion, collecting her things and then heading for the shower block. Too much was happening to her too quickly. Since arriving in this country she had been forced to confront aspects of herself and her feelings that it was very hard for her to accept.
Suddenly, standing beneath the warm spray of the shower, she longed achingly to be able to turn back the clock and return to a time when she had known nothing of the complexities that meeting her grandfather would bring. A time when she would have laughed out loud in disbelief if anyone had suggested that she would fall in love with a man like Blaize.
The camp was settling down to sleep when she made her way back to her pavilion. The soft glow of the lamps added to the air of mystery and enticement of its interior.
Someone had placed a dish of dates on one of the low carved tables in the sitting area, and silk cushions were placed invitingly on the floor in front of it, but Petra had no stomach for the sweetness of the dates—no stomach for anything, really, she admitted, now that her heart was soured by the anguish of her unreturnable love for Blaize. After all, even if he were by some impossible means to return her feelings, how could there be any future for them?
It wasn’t a matter of money. That didn’t come into it. Blaize could have had nothing and she would have loved him proudly and joyously. But how could she feel anything other than disquiet and distress at loving a man who used himself in the way that Blaize did? It was that which hurt her more than anything else! Even more than thinking about him with another woman? The belly dancer for instance?
Petra curled her hands into small fists. Where was he now? He was not in his room. The fabric covering the entrance to it was tied back so that she could see that the space beyond was empty.
Unlike hers, the ‘walls’ of his room were hung with darker, heavier fabric, which if anything was even more richly embroidered in gold than her own. Opulent fur-mimicking throws were heaped on the bed. There was a beautiful rug on the floor and a dish of sweet almond cakes on the table in front of the divan, along with a pot of richly fragrant coffee.
It was a setting fit for an Arabian prince, Petra reflected admiringly. And a retreat to which that same prince could bring the dancing girl of his choice, a dangerous inner voice taunted her.
Quickly Petra suppressed it. Blaize was no prince, Arabian or otherwise, and as for the dancing girl…
But where was he? Virtually the whole camp seemed to have settled down to sleep, and yet there was no sign of him.
Restlessly Petra paced the small pavillioned sitting area, tensing as the opening flap was abruptly pushed back and Blaize came in. He was stripped to the waist, a towel round his shoulders, his hair damp, and as he came in he brought with him the scent of the night and the desert—and of himself.
Petra felt her insides turn softly, compliantly liquid, longing pulsing through her as she gazed helplessly at his body.
She hadn’t truly appreciated its magnificence the first time she had seen it, hadn’t been able to sense its male capacity for sensuality and female pleasure, but now she could.
Abruptly her eyes narrowed, her gaze focusing on the angry claw-marks on his arm, which were still oozing blood slightly. Immediately the earth rocked beneath her feet and she was savaged by her own jealousy.
He had been with the dancer, and she had clawed her mark of possession on him!
Her mark of passion!
Before she could even recognise what she was doing, never mind stop herself, Petra had clenched her hands into small fists and advanced on him, demanding furiously, ‘Where have you been? As if I didn’t know! Was she good? Better than the rich tourists who pay you for your favours?’
‘What…?’
Like lightning the changing expressions chased one another across his face, frowning disbelief followed by a warning, taut concentration. In its place followed an even more dangerous flash of sheeting anger and his mouth compressed and a tiny nerve pulsed in his jaw.
But Petra was in no mood to heed warning signs, and her eyes glittered with a fury every bit feral as his as she stated sarcastically, ‘Silly me! I thought the whole purpose of us being here together was to convince the outside world that we are lovers! But obviously I was wrong and it’s not! No—what’s obviously far more important to you than honouring the arrangement we made is enjoying the… the sexual favours of an… an oversexed belly dancer. But then of course the two of you have something in common, don’t you? You both sell your sexual favours for money and—’
Petra gave a small squeak as she was suddenly lifted off her feet. Her arms were in a vice-like grip as Blaize held her so that their eyes were on the same level.
‘You should check your facts before you start throwing insults like that around,’ he told her, biting the words into small barbed insults, his mouth barely moving as he hurled them lividly at her. ‘If you were a man—But you aren’t, are you?’ he demanded, his voice suddenly changing to a soft sneer as he added, ‘You aren’t even much of a woman… just an over-excited, over-heated virgin, aching with curiosity to know what it’s all about. No, don’t deny it. It’s written all over you—all over every single one of those big-eyed looks you keep on giving me when you think I don’t notice. You’re just desperate to find out what sex is, aren’t you? Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but you just don’t have what it takes to encourage me to let you find out!’
Every single word he had uttered had found its mark, and Petra felt as though she was slowly dying from the pain of the wounds he had inflicted. But there was no way she was going to let him see that—no way she was going to stop fighting…
‘You mean that I haven’t offered you enough money?’ she taunted him recklessly.
‘Enough money?’ To Petra’s disbelief, he threw back his head and laughed harshly.
‘Despite what you so obviously think, it isn’t money that turns me on, Petra, that makes me want a woman, ache for her so I can’t rest until I possess her in every way there is. Until I wake up with her beside me in the morning, knowing that her body still wears my touch, inside and out, that she is so much a part of me that she still smells of me. But you don’t know anything about that, do you? You know nothing about a man’s desire… the compulsion that drives him to want a woman. Shall I show you? Is that what you want?’
Petra knew that she ought to deny what he was saying… refuse what he was offering her. But all she could do was let her gaze cling helplessly to his, her body motionless in his arms as he lowered his head towards hers!
As his lips touched hers she made a tiny almost mute sound at the back of her throat. Now she knew what it