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This was insanity but it was a beautiful insanity. It made no sense but it didn’t matter...it was not about logic, just need. A need she had never felt before, a need a million miles from the feelings Gregory’s awkward kisses had summoned.
The sound of the groan that vibrated in his powerful chest escalated the dizzying excitement swirling through her veins. And when he dragged her in tight, sealing their bodies together and flaunting the hardness of his erection against her belly, Abby felt a primitive thrill sweep through her as she kissed him back.
And then, as quickly as it had begun, it was over. He had physically picked her up and set her a few feet away from him.
She blinked like someone coming up for air and then the realisation hit home and a moment later scalding humiliation.
‘Sorry.’
What for?she thought. Not fancying me?
‘I know it’s not me...it’s you.’ Papering over her humiliation with pride, she lifted her chin. At least now she had that ability to take control of an awkward situation, unlike in her teens, when her much-anticipated date with one of the cool boys was revealed as a joke... Like kissing a wet fish! he’d told his friends at school. ‘I never thought otherwise,’ she lied.
‘You need medical attention, not—’
‘A roll in the hay...’ she inserted, having learnt from bitter experience that it was always better to mock yourself before your detractors got the chance. ‘You are totally right,’ she agreed, thinking, The only medical attention I need involves a shrink’s couch!
What the hell was she doing?She’d never acted like this in her life... The memory of his hands and mouth on her only moments ago made her want to hide from embarrassment, a feeling she remembered from her school days when she had been isolated, become a target for the cool girls and sniggered at by their boyfriends because she was too tall and thin and that swot who put her hand up in class. The situation had culminated in the fake date that had made her retreat even farther into her shell—at least she had got incredible grades.
It was hard to find an equivalent bright side to this situation.
‘I’m ready when you are...oh, and I hope you’re keeping a tab of how much I owe you for your time and...’ She stopped, biting down on her inside lips as her eyes fell from his—what was the going rate for saving someone’s life?
Zain shrugged off the insult. If he’d taken offence it would have been easier but his understanding expression made her feel even more of a total idiot!
‘How about we call it...?’ An expression she couldn’t put a name to flickered across his face before he produced one of his inimical shrugs. ‘Let’s just call it good timing.’
He could call it anything he liked. She still didn’t have a clue what he really meant.
‘Fine.’
It was hard to project ‘distant and aloof’ when you were sitting in front of someone on a horse going very fast, so Abby was deeply relieved when the walled city with its iconic towers and minarets came into view.
It was bizarre but after everything that had happened to her it was the humiliation of throwing herself at him like some sort of sex-starved groupie that was eating away at her.
She was mad at herself, mad for setting herself up for the knock-back and for caring about it, and mad at him. Especially mad at him!
It wasn’t until the first security checkpoint, some way outside the city limits, came into view that it occurred to her that they might have some difficulty re-entering the city.
Getting out had been complicated enough and then they had had a stack of stamped and signed documents. Now she didn’t even have her passport and the man with her looked exactly the sort of dangerous character that would ring alarm bells.
Maybe he was thinking the same because he brought the horse to a halt before they reached the actual checkpoint, dismounting and telling her to do the same.
She ignored the hand he extended and, though her solo dismount almost ended in disaster, she hadn’t accepted his help, which at that moment was all that mattered, a childish display of defiance but the only defence she had against her humiliation.
‘Have you got the right permits? Shall I talk to them?’
‘Stay here.’
It wasn’t clear if he was talking to her or the horse but he didn’t look back, so presumably it never crossed his mind that either of them would disobey his command.
She watched as he walked straight up to the men in uniform and hoped he wasn’t going to take the same high-handed attitude with them.
The conversation only lasted a few minutes and the guards’ guns had stayed across their shoulders. That had to be a good sign, didn’t it?
Her anxiety climbed as the minutes ticked by. Were they grilling him? When he turned and began to walk back towards her she felt a wave of relief that vanished when one of the guards followed him, jogging to catch up with the tall, dominant figure. A telltale flame of desire that Abby wanted badly to deny ignited low down in her belly as she watched him.
It took for ever for them to reach her and the expression on his arrestingly beautiful face gave her no clues as to how the discussion had gone, but no one was waving any guns, which was a step in the right direction.
