beside him, his hand squeezing hers with a grip of steel, the second man guarding their rear as together they scaled the low dune, shouts of panic and accusation now building behind them.
Adrenaline fuelled her lungs and legs—adrenaline and the tantalising thought that as soon as they were safe she was going to set her father’s arrogant mercenary right about how to treat a princess.
From the camp behind came an order to stop, followed by the crack of rifle fire and a whistle as the bullet zinged somewhere over their heads, and she soon forgot about being angry with her rescuer. They would not shoot her, she reasoned. They would not dare harm a princess of Jemeya and risk sparking an international incident. But it was dark and her captors were panicking and she had no intention of testing her theory.
Neither had she any intention of complying with the command to stop, even if the man by her side had any hint of letting her go. No way would she let herself be recaptured, not when Mustafa’s ugly threats still made her shudder with revulsion. Marry a slug like Mustafa? No way. This was the twenty-first century. She wasn’t going to be forced into marrying anybody.
So she clung harder to her rescuer’s hand and forced her feet to move faster across the sand, her satin slippers cracking through the dune’s fragile crust until, heavy and dragging with sand, her foot slipped from one and she hesitated momentarily when he jerked her forwards.
‘Leave it,’ he snapped, urging her on as another order to stop and another shot rang out, and she let the other slipper be taken by the dune too, finding it easier to keep up with him barefoot as they forged across the sand. Her lungs and muscles burned by the time they had scaled the dune and plunged over the other side, her mouth as dry as the ground beneath her bare feet. As much as she wanted to flee, as much as she had to keep going or Mustafa’s men would surely hunt her down, she knew she could not keep going like this for long.
Over the sound of her own ragged breath she heard it—a whistle piercing the sky, and then another, until the night sky became a screaming promise that ended with a series of explosions bursting colour and light into the dark night. The cries from behind them became more frantic and panicked and all around was the acrid smell of gunpowder.
‘What did you do to them?’ she demanded, feeling suddenly sickened as the air above the camp glowed now with the flicker of flame from burning tents. Escape was one thing, but leaving a trail of bloodied and injured— maybe even worse—was another.
He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, and she wanted to pull her hand free and strike him for being so callous.
‘You did want to be rescued, Princess?’ Then he turned, and in the glow from the fires she could make out the dark shape of someone waiting for them, could hear the low nicker of the horses he held. Four horses, one for each of them, she noted, momentarily regretting the loss of her shoes until she realised all she would be gaining. She didn’t care if her feet froze in the chill night air or rubbed raw on the stirrups. It was a small price to pay for some welcome space from this man. How she could do with some space from him.
‘Surely,’ she said, as they strode towards the waiting horses, ‘you didn’t have to go that far?’
‘You don’t think you’re worth it?’ Once again she got the distinct impression he was laughing at her. She looked away in sheer frustration, trying to focus on the positives. Her father had sent rescuers. Soon she would see him again. And soon she would be in her own home, where people took her seriously, and where men didn’t come with glinting eyes, hidden smiles and hands that set off electric shocks under her skin.
She could hardly wait.
She was already reaching for the reins of the closest horse when his hand stopped her wrist. ‘No, Princess.’
‘No? Then which one’s mine?’
‘You ride with me.’
‘But there are four …’
‘And there are five of us.’
‘But …’ And then she saw them, two more men in black running low across the dunes towards them when she had been expecting only one.
‘Kadar,’ he said, slapping one of the men on the back as they neared, making her wonder how he could tell which one was which when they looked indistinguishable to her. ‘I’m afraid the princess didn’t think much of your fireworks.’
Fireworks? she thought as the man called Kadar feigned disappointment, her temper rising. They were only fireworks?
‘Apologies, Princess,’ the one called Kadar said with a bow. ‘Next time I promise to do better.’
‘They served their purpose, Kadar. Now let’s go before they remember what they were doing before the heavens exploded.’
She looked longingly at the horse she had chosen, now bearing the man who’d been waiting for them in the dunes. A man who, like the others, was tall and broad and powerfully built.
Warriors, she guessed as they swung themselves with ease onto their mounts. Mercenaries hired by her father to rescue her. Maybe he had spent his money wisely, maybe they were good at what they did, but still, she couldn’t wait to see the back of them.
Especially the one who took liberties with his hands and with his tongue.
‘Are you ready, Princess?’ he asked, and before she had time to snap a response she found herself lifted bodily by the waist onto the back of the last remaining horse, her impossible rescuer launching himself behind and tucking her in close between him and the reins, before wrapping a cloak around them both until she was bundled up as if she was in a cocoon.
‘Do you mind?’ she said, squirming to put some distance between them.
‘Not at all,’ he said, tugging the cloak tighter and her closer with it, setting the horse into motion across the sand. ‘We have a long way to go. You will find it easier if you relax.’
Not a chance.
‘You could have told me,’ she said, sitting as stiffly as she could in front of him, pretending that there was a chasm between them instead of a mere few thin layers of fabric. She tried to ignore the arm at her back cradling her and wished away the heat that flared in every place where their bodies rocked together with the motion of the horse.
‘Could have told you what?’
‘That they were only fireworks.’
‘Would you have believed me?’
‘You let me think it was much worse.’
‘You think too much.’
‘You don’t know the first thing about me.’
‘I know you talk too much.’ He hauled her even closer to him. ‘Relax.’
She yawned. ‘And you’re arrogant and bossy.’
‘Go to sleep.’
But she didn’t want to go to sleep. If she went to sleep, she would slump against him, closer to that hard wall of his chest, closer to that beating heart. And princesses did not fall asleep on the chests of strangers mounted on horseback. Especially not strangers like this man: arrogant. Assuming. Autocratic.
Besides, she had stayed awake most of the last night. It would not hurt her to stay awake a little longer. She looked up at him as they rode, at the strong line of his jaw under the mask, at the purposeful look in his dark eyes. Then, because she realised she was staring, she looked upwards to where it seemed as if all the stars in the universe had come out to play in a velvet sky.
She picked out the brightest stars, familiar stars that she had seen from her suite’s balcony at home in the palace.
‘Is it far to Jemeya?’
‘Too far to travel tonight.’
‘But my father, he will know I am safe?’
‘He