LITMIR.BIZ

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of the sandals and tinkled softly at her every step. Her hair was gold, too, and tumbled forward in silken disarray around her downcast face.

      “Do you like your reward, Mr. Knight?”

      “She is…” Damn it! Cam cleared his throat. He hadn’t expected anything like this golden creature and it had thrown him. The sultan knew it; he could hear it in the bastard’s oily voice. “She is an amazing sight, Excellency.”

      “Indeed.” Asaad smiled. “I will have her brought closer, yes?”

      The obvious answer was no. This woman was a trap. It didn’t take a genius to know that. Cam had been wined and dined; he’d been entertained with a crazy game of desert polo. Asaad had softened him up and now he was moving in for the kill. An hour with this houri and he’d sign the contract, no questions asked. He’d be too sated to do anything else.

      At least, that was what Asaad figured.

      And, damn, it was tempting. Cam could imagine what it would be like to spear his hands into that spill of hair, raise the woman’s face so that he could see if it was as perfect as the rest of her. He could imagine tasting her breasts, stripping away that gold thong…

      “Mr. Knight?”

      Cam shrugged as if getting a better look at the woman didn’t matter.

      “As you wish, Excellency.”

      The sultan snapped his fingers. The men dragged the woman forward. When they were a few feet away, she raised her head and looked straight at Cam.

      His breath caught in his throat.

      She had wide-set eyes the color of the Mediterranean, fringed by incongruously dark lashes. A small, straight nose. A delicate chin and a mouth—God, what a mouth! It was meant for things men dreamed of in the dark hours of the night.

      Cam felt himself turn hard as stone, his erection so swift and powerful that he had to shift his weight to ease the discomfort of it.

      Asaad barked an order. The guards shoved the woman forward the final few feet. She stumbled, then regained her footing. One of the men snarled a word and she obeyed what must have been an order to bow her head again.

      “Well, Mr. Knight?” Asaad’s voice was a purr. “What do you think?” Smiling, he stepped closer to the woman, caught a handful of her hair and jerked her head up. “Is she not exquisite?”

      “She is—she is very beautiful.”

      “Yes. She is. She has spirit, too. A magnificent creature, yes?”

      What was she? A woman from the harem? But her hands were bound. Why?

      “She is, Excellency.” Cam paused. He didn’t want to sound too curious. If he did, Asaad would probably stretch out whatever game they were now playing. “Is she a prisoner?”

      The sultan sighed. “Yes. Unfortunate, don’t you agree? What you can see of her is beautiful.” Asaad slid his meaty hand down the woman’s throat, over her breast, cupped first one mound of flesh and then the other. When she tried to jerk away, his fingers clamped around her wrist. “But her soul is ugly.”

      Cam looked at the sultan’s meaty fingers, biting into the woman’s flesh.

      “It’s difficult to imagine that a woman like this—any woman, for that matter—could do something so terrible it would anger a man like you, Excellency,” he said, hoping the barbarous lie would work.

      It seemed to. Asaad’s grip loosened.

      “You are correct, Mr. Knight. I am a kind man. A generous one. But Layla pushed me beyond human endurance.”

      The name suited the setting. So did her costume. But the blue eyes and golden hair threw him. They were rare in this place. Hell, they were all but unknown.

      “I imagine you are thinking she is not from here.”

      Right on the nose, you greasy bastard. Cam smiled lazily, as if it were something that really wasn’t of much interest. “I did wonder, yeah.”

      “I bought her,” the sultan said matter-of-factly. “Oh, not the way it sounds, I assure you. We are an ancient culture, sir, but we abhor slavery. No, the lady came to me willingly. She is a dancer. That is what she prefers to call herself but really, she is… I think your word is whore.”

      Cam nodded. He understood. He’d been in this part of the world before. Women like this called themselves models, actresses, dancers…but Asaad was right. Basically they were whores for sale to the highest bidder.

      The blonde stood straight and tall under his scrutiny. Was she trembling? Maybe, but the wind blowing in from the desert was cool and she was damned near naked. That could explain it. So could the fact that she was Asaad’s prisoner. From what he’d seen of things, that would make anybody tremble.

      Asaad leaned closer. “I met her on holiday in Cairo. She was performing in a club. I sent her a note… Well, surely you know how these things go.” He dug his elbow into Cam’s ribs, as if buying a whore’s favors was something they had in common. “Layla is a woman of, shall we say, significant talent. That is why, when it came time to return home, I offered to take her with me.”

      Cam shot another look at the woman. Her head had come up; she was staring almost blindly into the darkness beyond the courtyard and yes, she was definitely trembling.

      Not that it meant a damn to him.

      “And she accepted,” he said, making it a statement instead of a question.

      “Of course. She knew it would be worth her while. All went well for a few weeks. She was inventive. Imaginative.” Asaad gave a deep sigh. “But I wearied of her. A man needs variety, is that not so?”

      “Wouldn’t sending her back to Egypt be simpler than making her your prisoner, Excellency?”

      The sultan threw back his head and laughed. “You are an amusing man, Mr. Knight. Yes, of course. Much simpler. And that was what I attempted to do. I made arrangements to send her home—with a substantial bonus.” His smile faded. “Yesterday, just before she was to leave, I learned she’d stolen a priceless jewel from my chambers. This, after all I’d given her! When I confronted her, she tried to put a dagger between my ribs.” Asaad let go of Cam’s elbow and stepped back. “I have been trying to decide what to do with her.”

      What to do? How to do it, the sultan surely meant. The penalty for theft and attempted murder could only be death. That the woman had survived a day was something of a miracle. Tomorrow, she’d be food for the vultures. But tonight…

      And then Cam understood. Asaad had a plan, and it was as transparent as glass.

      The woman was shaking, she was on display—but she was docile. Why? If her life was at stake, why wasn’t she pleading for mercy?

      There could only be one reason. The sultan must have promised her mercy. All she had to do to was follow his orders, and those orders surely involved Cam.

      She was to be a gift.

      He’d take her to bed, she’d perform tricks that would keep him from thinking and Asaad would let her live. But why? Was she supposed to put a knife in Cam’s belly while she feigned passion? No. Asaad would want him alive until he signed the contract.

      Maybe the son of a bitch just wanted to watch through a hole in the wall. Maybe his men were going to break in and grab him while he was screwing the woman.

      Maybe that was the night’s real entertainment.

      “Don’t look so grim, Mr. Knight. Layla tried to kill me. She doesn’t warrant your concern.”

      “Frankly, Excellency,” Cam said with a man-to-man grin, “my only concern—if you want to call it that—is over the world’s loss of the lady’s considerable talents.”

      “Indeed.” The sultan leaned toward him. “Then you will be happy to hear

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