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She resisted rubbing her brow and giving him ammunition to imagine her some pitiful, weak damsel in distress.
“Are you okay?” he asked gruffly.
She might have been if it wasn’t for the smirking stares that practically burned into her back from his men. “I’ve been worse, I’m sure,” she said ungraciously. “Now if you could hurry and get us to the nearest city, I’ll be a whole lot better.”
She expected many things, but not the short, sharp burst of laughter from his mouth, his shoulders for a moment shaking with mirth. “You are too funny,” he said, then urged his camel back around to where his men waited.
“What is so funny about that?” she gritted, vaguely insulted by his mirth even as she was fascinated by it. To have photographed him in full laughter would have made her day. Instead her camera was wedged between her breasts and his back.
He turned his head to look at her, his dark eyes assessing hers. That was when she noticed his ridiculously long lashes, absurd really, for a man. Her red-gold lashes faded into obscurity unless she used oodles of mascara.
He sighed. “I’m saving your life. Let’s just leave it at that.”
“And I’m grateful,” she said, “I really am. But I’m not rolling in money, okay? I don’t owe you anything.” She glanced at the hostile men ahead. Weren’t they the same men who’d been amused at her expense just a few seconds ago? She cleared her throat. “I don’t owe any of your men one red cent.”
When the rider—she guessed she was a pillion passenger—burst out laughing once again, the other men glanced with grinning speculation and surprise at one another. Her stomach contracted and she bristled. Was she nothing more than the butt of his jokes?
“I’m glad I amuse you,” she said frostily. “Or do you treat all women with this superior level of condescension!”
“No.” The savage barely withheld his amusement. “Only you.”
He commanded his camel into a trot while his men’s laughter echoed in her ears and left her face hot, and with no choice but to grip onto the maddening leader’s waist or risk falling to the ground.
Chapter Three
Hamid couldn’t remember the last time he’d enjoyed himself so much. The girl—no, thewoman—pressed behind him was both alluring and entertaining. She fascinated him with her red-gold hair, sparkling green eyes and vivacity for life. Not to mention her zero decorum.
How nice to battle wills with a woman who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind. A woman who didn’t scrape and bow and who clearly had no idea who he was. He intended to keep it that way, too.
He’d already taken his men out of earshot while she’d retrieved her camera to tell them not to speak with her lest they give him away. He wanted to stay an anonymous stranger and bask in the experience of being an equal.
But as the first mile became ten he vacillated between desire with her breasts squished enticingly against him and distress from the damn camera chafing his skin below his shoulder blades.
No harem girl he’d ever met put their own possessions above his comfort. They knew better…were trained to alleviate his every ache, including the throbbing ache between his thighs.
That this soft western woman with her distinct Australian twang for an accent hadn’t yet complained blew his mind. He imagined her tender, pale skin would be burned to a crisp from the bright sun, her flesh bruised and battered with the rubbing motion of the saddle from the camel’s every stride.
He supposed not every female was fragile and delicate, just as not every Australian woman was a deeply-tanned, blonde surfer who lived in the sun.
“What is your name?” he asked gruffly.
She shifted a little behind him, then said weakly, “Holly. Holly Petersen.”
“Holly, would you mind removing the camera embedded in my back?”
One of his men sniggered and Hamid turned a baleful eye at Essam. The man couldn’t quite hide his twitching smirk, though he did a fair impression of respectfully turning his head away. His men were no doubt thanking Karma for his discomfit after he’d left them behind and had his safety compromised.
He sighed in relief as she plucked the camera from the indent in his back. Perhaps hehadbeen foolhardy escaping from his men for a handful of blessed minutes. But he had no regrets. Not even for bringing this woman into his camp.
As Sheikh of Imbranak he was risking much by keeping this single western woman in his tent. If the news leaked it wouldn’t go down well with his people at all.Too bad. He refused to leave her alone to possibly die. The heat and lack of water weren’t the only things to fear in the desert. Marauders, snakes, scorpions and hungry predators roamed the area.
His whole body tensed. She was too trusting. He could have as easily been one of the many brigands living in the desert. The depraved groups of men were little more than felons and would have happily shared her around to all the men to satisfy their urges.
So what are you planning for her?
He drank deeply from his skin, the date liquor sending a nice burn to the pit of his stomach. She was no harem woman. She was a headstrong westerner with her own views and ideals. And that was what probably fascinated him the most.
His cock twitched yet again at the thought of taming her, then having her cry out in surrender as he buried his cock deep between her creamy thighs. He stifled a groan. He’d been in the desert for five days and intended to stay another five. He only managed to get away every three or four months, which meant he rarely went without sex for more than a few days.
