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She hadn’t believed him. It had to be a threat meant to keep her in line. But it had not been a threat; it had been a fact.
Running away had not been an option. Her uncle had placed her under guard.
“For your own protection, Anoushka,” he’d said, so earnestly that anyone who didn’t know the truth would have believed him.
She’d even resorted to pleading—until she saw what pleasure that gave him. He had stolen her freedom. Her future. All she had left was her pride. She was determined to keep it, so she’d stopped pleading, stopped showing him any emotion at all. She refused to talk to him or join him at the functions he organized. Instead, she’d kept to her rooms and to the palace gardens.
“You need taming,” her uncle had said with grudging admiration. “The Tharsalonian king will enjoy that.”
But she’d refused to think about the Tharsalonian king until two days ago, when she’d been told she was being escorted to him…
Bang!
The door to the shed flew open.
Heart pounding, Annie struggled to her feet as two of her captors stormed into the room.
The ambassador’s wife whimpered and cowered in the corner. One of the men laughed, pointed his fingers at her and mimicked pulling a trigger.
The other man came for Annie, unshackled her, grabbed her by the arms and dragged her through the shed. When she stumbled, he kicked her in her backside and propelled her out the door.
At first, it was hard to get her bearings. She was dizzy. Disoriented. And the sun, setting over the jagged mountain peaks to the west, was in her eyes.
Sun or no sun, she was freezing. Her teeth chattered, which seemed to amuse everybody. Every instinct she possessed warned her to show no weakness. So she took a deep breath and concentrated on maintaining self-control.
Gradually, her vision cleared. She looked about her. If by some miracle she had a chance to escape later tonight, after her captors had drunk themselves into a stupor, she’d have a mental map of the place.
The camp was in a grassy meadow. The bandits’ vehicles—falling-apart Toyotas and a couple of ancient American trucks—were parked to one side. Smoke from half a dozen cooking fires rose into the sky.
Heavily armed men—Annie upped her initial estimate to forty or more—stood around in small groups. They had bearded faces, filthy hands and clothes. They were laughing and passing bottles of a colorless liquid that was probably vodka from hand to hand.
Some kind of celebration was underway.
Three men stood ahead of her under the branches of a tall pine. The man in the center was enormous, well over six feet tall and weighing at least three hundred pounds. From his bearing, she knew he was leader. Her fate surely lay in his hands. He was looking straight at her. She knew she was expected to look down and show submission.
The hell with that.
She kept her head up and her eyes on him. Seconds dragged by. Then he motioned her forward.
Her chin went up.
He folded his arms over his massive chest and said something. The men who’d taken her from the shack laughed. Her heart pounded, but she kept her face blank. No way was she going to show how frightened she was, and neither was she going to jump and obey commands.
The bandit who’d kicked her jabbed her with his rifle. She staggered forward. That sent everyone into paroxysms of laughter.
Annie’s eyes narrowed. Without thinking, she swung around and glared at the man who’d poked her with the rifle.
“Put down that rifle and let’s see just how brave you are!”
Did anyone know what she’d said? They certainly understood her tone of voice. It drew a long “oooh” from the crowd, as well as more laughter. She spun on her heel, drew her tattered silk gown as close around herself as she could, and strode towards the fat man.
“Princess,” a voice whispered.
She shot a quick glance to the side and saw the American ambassador, hands tied, face bloodied and bruised.
“My wife?”
She hesitated, but only for a second. “Your wife is fine.”
