LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

where I can show you…teach you…’

      Katrina stared at him in dismay, hoping that she had misunderstood him, but it was obvious from the look on his face that she had not.

      ‘Richard, you simply can’t behave like this! We have to go to the wadi. The others will be expecting us…’

      ‘They think that we’ve had to turn back,’ he announced calmly. ‘I told them that you weren’t feeling very well. It was a good idea, I think, to get you to drink that water, which had some sleeping tablets in it.’

      Katrina stared at him in horror.

      ‘Richard, this is ridiculous. I’m going to telephone the others right now and—’

      ‘You can’t do that, I’m afraid.’ He gave her a self-satisfied smile. ‘I’ve got your mobile. I took it out of your bag when I stopped to tell the others we were turning back.’

      Katrina couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

      ‘This is crazy! Let’s just go and join the others and forget—’

      ‘No!’ He silenced her passionately. ‘We are going to the oasis. I’ve been planning how to get you to myself for days, and this is the perfect opportunity and the oasis is the perfect place. It is in the empty quarter of the desert, a veritable no man’s land, and this should appeal to you, Katrina, with your love of this region’s history. It was once used as a stopping-off place by the camel trains.’

      Katrina stared at him. Her throat had gone dry and her heart was thudding uncomfortably hard with apprehension. It wasn’t that she was frightened of Richard exactly, but there was no denying that his behaviour pointed uncomfortably towards, if not an obsession with her, then certainly an unpleasant and unwanted preoccupation with her, just as Bev had shrewdly suspected.

      ‘Look, there’s the oasis,’ Richard declared unnecessarily as the dusty track wound between a rocky outcrop revealing a clutch of palm trees and other vegetation, beyond which lay the blue shimmer of water.

      As Richard stopped the vehicle Katrina acknowledged that in different circumstances—very different circumstances—she would have been entranced and fascinated by her surroundings.

      The vegetation surrounding the oasis was unexpectedly lush and thick, especially on its far bank. At one time surely a river must have run here, for what else could have carved a path through the steep rocky escarpment on the other side of the oasis? Perhaps even a waterfall had plunged down the smooth, sheer rock face.

      Certainly there must be an underground spring filling the oasis itself, or perhaps an underground river. But, undeniably beautiful though the oasis and its surroundings were, Katrina had no wish to remain there on her own with Richard.

      Somehow she doubted that he would be responsive to any attempt from her to persuade him to abandon his plans, which meant that if she was to escape she would have to find a way to distract him long enough to allow her to get her hands on the vehicle’s keys and drive off in it before Richard could stop her.

      ‘I’ve brought a tent with me and everything else we will need.’

      ‘Oh, how clever of you!’ Katrina told him, trying to sound impressed. ‘I’ll stay here, shall I, whilst you unpack everything?’

      Richard shook his head at her.

      ‘No, I’m afraid you can’t do that, my dear! I haven’t gone to all this trouble to have you do something silly like trying to run away from me!’

      He couldn’t make her move, Katrina comforted herself, but a few seconds later, after she had told him quietly that she was not prepared to get out of the vehicle, she realised she had under-estimated the lengths he was prepared to go to.

      ‘Well, in that case, my dear, I’m afraid you leave me no option but to use these.’ He reached into his pockets and produced a pair of handcuffs. ‘I really wish it wasn’t necessary to do this, but if you refuse to do as I ask then I am going to have to handcuff you to the door of the vehicle.’

      She had been wrong not to feel afraid of him, Katrina acknowledged as a cold sweat broke out on her skin. He had already locked the doors of the vehicle and if she allowed him to handcuff her inside it then she’d be trapped.

      ‘It would be nice to have some fresh air,’ she conceded, trying to keep her voice steady. ‘Perhaps I could sit by the oasis whilst you unpack everything?’

      ‘Of course you can, my dear,’ Richard agreed, smiling at her. ‘Let’s go and find somewhere comfortable for you, shall we?’

      She mustn’t give up hope, Katrina told herself stoutly five minutes later. Richard was escorting her to the oasis, his behaviour more that of a jailer than a would-be lover.

      ‘This will do,’ he announced, indicating one of the palm trees, but as Katrina walked towards it he held back. When she caught the warning chink of metal on metal she knew immediately that it was the handcuffs he had shown her earlier. Without stopping to think, she started to run, her flight from him as panic-stricken as that of a delicately boned gazelle. Fear drove her forward, towards the narrow pass between the steep rocks, oblivious to the sound of vehicles being driven fast over the bumpy terrain and the cries of warrior horsemen. Too late to realise what those sounds were, she burst through the pass and into full view of the group of fugitives.

      They were led by El Khalid, but it was one of his young lieutenants who saw her first. He swerved the battered Land Rover he was driving round so hard that he almost overturned it.

      Behind Katrina, at the pass between the rocks, Richard fell back in terror, and then turned and ran towards his own vehicle, ignoring Katrina’s plight. He leapt into it and started the engine, driving back in the direction he had come as fast as he could.

      Katrina, though, was oblivious to his desertion of her.

      The air around her was thick with choking dust, the last dying rays of the sun striking blindingly against the metal of the vehicle racing alongside her. The driver was leaning out of the window, one hand on the steering wheel, the other reaching for her, a lascivious grin slicing his face.

      Immediately she turned to run back the way she had come. Unwanted though Richard’s attentions were, she could deal far more easily with him than she could with what she was now facing, but to her horror she recognised that her escape route was already being blocked off by the horse and rider bearing down on her even as she still tried to run from him.

      The sound of his horse’s hooves mingled with the fierce cries of the men surrounding her. He was so close to her that she could feel the heat of the horse’s breath on her skin. Her heart felt as though it were about to burst. She saw him draw level with her and bend low in his saddle, his hand coming out, and then unbelievably she was being lifted off the ground and swept up onto the horse’s back in front of him, as his prisoner.

      Sobbing for breath, her heart pounding sickly, her face pressed against the coarsely woven cloth of the tunic he was wearing, she could do nothing other than lie there, forced to breathe in the smell of the fabric, with its faint lemony scent. Katrina stiffened. She now realised the lemony cologne, like the scent of the man himself, were both immediately familiar to her. The drumming of horse’s hooves became the drumming of her own heart as she struggled to twist her body so that she could look up into his face.

      As she had expected all she could see of it were his eyes—gold-flecked, reminding her of a tiger’s eye. Her heart leapt and banged against her chest wall as she looked into them and saw them flash gold sparks of molten anger back at her.

      Quickly she turned her head, too shocked to withstand the contempt in his eyes. In the distance she could see the four-wheel drive disappearing as Richard drove himself to safety, having left her to her fate. Tears welled in her eyes and one rolled down her face to land on the golden warmth of the male hand holding the horse’s reins.

      His mouth hardening, he shook it away. He murmured to the horse as he wheeled round and started to head back to the group

Скачать книгу