who’d been crossing these sands for millennia and had their own ways of functioning day and night in such an inhospitable wilderness. Yet for all that it had a terrifying beauty.
No sign of brown mountains sweeping across the horizon like a tsunami today. Maybe Rafi had been right and it hadn’t been her appointed time to die. Instead fate had delivered her into his arms. She closed her eyes, trying to shut out her thoughts of him, but it did no good.
From the first moment she’d heard his deep voice and had felt his hand swallow hers—even before she saw him—she’d felt him to her very soul.
“Lauren? We’ve arrived.”
At the sound of his voice, she let out a little cry of surprise and opened her eyes. She’d been so buried in her own torturous thoughts, she hadn’t realized they’d landed.
“If you’re feeling unwell, we’ll return to the palace.” What made him think there was something wrong? She didn’t understand.
He opened the door and got out. When she climbed forward, he put an impersonal hand on her upper arm to assist her as she jumped into the sand, but an electric current ran through her body just the same. They’d landed in a valley with gigantic mounds of sand spreading in every direction. The pilot stayed at the controls. The other man climbed out and walked a distance off.
Stunned to be that little granule of sand again, she looked all around before flicking Rafi a glance. “Where did it happen exactly?”
“According to the pilot, beneath this mound in front of you. I flew your body from here to the palace in the hope you could be revived.”
She gasped because the sand dune in front of her rose at least twenty feet. Its smooth crescent shape ran the length of the horizon. Lauren took several steps forward, but with each thrust, her foot sank and it took effort to pull it out.
How foolish of her to think she could come out here and find anything, let alone her medallion! It was buried here somewhere, forever. The knowledge seemed to bring an end to an era for Lauren.
Her grandmother, her grandfather, the medallion—all were gone. The end of the beginning or the beginning of the end? Whatever, it was written in the sand now.
Her shoulders started to shake as tears began falling. She hung her head because she was beginning to sound like Rafi. She needed to get out of here and start a new life for herself, maybe in America? Wherever, she knew she needed to be somewhere far away from everything that reminded her of the past, away from him.
She felt him approach her side. Her body came alive whenever he was around and the sensations were so new, so different that they upset her. She didn’t know where to go with her new feelings for him. “You warned me, Rafi, but please don’t say anything. I only need five more minutes.”
The suffocating air was so hot that the moisture evaporated as it dripped off her chin. Though he obeyed her, he didn’t go away. Instead he wrapped his arms around her neck from behind so the tears fell on his bronzed skin. He pressed his chin in her hair and drew her into him in a protective gesture where she felt the steady pounding of his heart against her back.
For the moment he was comforting her like he might a child. Unfortunately the warmth from his hard-muscled body and his great strength increased her desire for him. She’d known such desire existed after listening to her grandmother, but she’d never felt its power until now.
This physical thing between them was sublime torture for her, tapping into her deepest emotions. She couldn’t hold back the tears. They burst over the dam. How long she sobbed, she didn’t know. Twice now she’d fallen apart in his arms.
She couldn’t fathom leaving him and this place where life and death had taken on an entirely new meaning. Her grandmother had been faced with the same decision, but somehow she’d found the will to walk away from King Malik.
How did she do that?
Lauren didn’t have Celia’s resolve. Never to see Rafi again …
Ashamed because she was making a spectacle of herself, she sniffed hard and moved out of his arms to walk back to the helicopter on her own. This time it was the other man who helped her inside. She thanked him and the pilot before Rafi climbed in and shut the door.
Once more they were off, winging through the sky with no trace of clouds. Nothing but hot, hot blue, the sun reflecting off the sand sculptures below and the haunting profile of a man who was larger than life to her. Larger than her grandmother’s sheikh. For the rest of Lauren’s days, that picture would remain indelibly carved on her consciousness.
The men talked back and forth. She noticed Rafi speaking into his headset. Lauren could imagine that they had much more to do with their time than ferry around the American who must appeared spoiled to them, but as she was a guest of the king, they had their orders. When she got back to the palace, she intended to stay in her room for the rest of the day.
Rafi put out a hand to help her down from the helicopter. “Enjoy your afternoon. We’ll talk later,” he said before walking swiftly away in another direction, taking her heart with him. Nazir stood by to escort her back to the palace.
Now that another duty was done, Rafi could get back to his job as head of security. That was as it should be, she told herself, but her pain at watching him disappear sent her on a churning, downward spiral as she followed Nazir along various corridors.
She thought they looked different from the other ones. Before she could question him, Princess Farah came out of a set of doors wearing riding clothes. She smiled at Lauren.
“I’m so glad you are back. I just returned from a horseback ride with my husband, come inside and have a swim with me. We’ll eat lunch by the pool.”
“That sounds lovely, but I didn’t bring a suit.”
“I have many I haven’t even worn.” She glanced at Nazir. “Thank you for finding her.” He said something back in Arabic and walked away.
They entered a fabulous octagonal room with a round swimming pool and a high ceiling of fretwork and inlaid tiles. “You were looking for me?”
“Yes. I thought you might like to go riding with me, but found out you’d already left your suite.”
“Your father arranged for me to fly out to the place where the sandstorm hit.”
The princess looked shocked. “Why would you want to do that?”
“It sounds silly now, but I lost a piece of jewelry my grandmother gave me when the sandstorm hit, and I hoped I might see it in the sand. Rafi told me it would be buried. Of course, he was right.”
Farah’s liquid dark eyes were filled with compassion. “I’m so sorry, but compared to your life, something material isn’t so important in the scheme of things.”
“You’re right, Your Highness.” It belonged to the past.
The princess smiled and showed Lauren to an anteroom where she could change. When she came out again in a yellow bikini, she discovered they had company. Farah made the introductions.
Of the three black-haired sisters, Lauren found herself staring at the eldest, Samira, who had the look of Lauren’s mother. Samira was forty-one with five children. She’d brought her two youngest to the pool, an eight-year-old son and a five-year-old daughter.
Of course, she was older now than Lauren’s mother had ever been. Still, Samira reminded her of some of the pictures in her wallet of Lana, and it gave Lauren’s heart a tug to see the resemblance.
Basmah was thirty-nine and had four children. She’d brought along her youngest twin daughters, just turning four.
Farah explained that she and her twin brother Rashad were both thirty-four. Lauren saw the longing and love in Farah’s eyes whenever she looked at her nieces and nephews. They were all adorable and got in the pool with Lauren without hesitation.
After