THE AL MAKTABI BROTHERS

Kings of the desert…Masters of the bedroom!

Razi al Maktabi

This prince has two passions: business and women. His playboy days might be numbered when duty beckons, but there’s always time for one final fling! As he takes the Phoenix throne, Razi will work the same magic on the Isla de Sinnebar as he has on every woman of marriageable age—but what happens when he finds out he’s going to be a father?

Razi was last seen cavorting in RULING SHEIKH, UNRULY MISTRESS in Mills & Boon® Modern Heat™!

Ra’id al Maktabi

Darker than night and twice as dangerous, Razi’s older brother sits on the Sapphire throne of Sinnebar. Scarred inside and out, Ra’id is a powerhouse of strength and command. He rules his heart like his country—with an iron will. Now one woman is about to come between him and his throne!

Find Ra’id ruling in Mills & Boon®Modern™ Romance!

Susan Stephens also writes for Mills & Boon® Modern Heat™ !

Ra’id strode across the beach, holding Antonia in his arms as if she weighed nothing, while she linked her hands behind his neck and snuggled her face against his chest. It was the easiest thing in the world to believe they belonged together, and that this was their island with no outside world to complicate or muddy the water.

There was no tomorrow here, no yesterday—there was only now, with the ocean lapping rhythmically on a sugar sand shore, and a sickle moon and diamond stars to light their way. There was just one man, one woman…

There was only this…

Master of the Desert

by

Susan Stephens

MILLS & BOON®

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Susan Stephens was a professional singer before meeting her husband on the tiny Mediterranean island of Malta. In true Modern™ Romance style they met on Monday, became engaged on Friday, and were married three months after that. Almost thirty years and three children later, they are still in love. (Susan does not advise her children to return home one day with a similar story, as she may not take the news with the same fortitude as her own mother!)

Susan had written several non-fiction books when fate took a hand. At a charity costume ball there was an after-dinner auction. One of the lots, ‘Spend a Day with an Author’, had been donated by Mills & Boon® author Penny Jordan. Susan’s husband bought this lot, and Penny was to become not just a great friend but a wonderful mentor, who encouraged Susan to write romance.

Susan loves her family, her pets, her friends and her writing. She enjoys entertaining, travel, and going to the theatre. She reads, cooks, and plays the piano to relax, and can occasionally be found throwing herself off mountains on a pair of skis or galloping through the countryside. Visit Susan’s website: www.susanstephens.net—she loves to hear from her readers all around the world!

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CHAPTER ONE

SHE had the figure of a glamour model, the face of an angel—and she was threatening him with a knife.

It wasn’t every day his ocean-going yacht was boarded by a barely clothed virago. What few clothes remained on the young girl’s bruised and scratched body were ripped and sodden, and the knife she was brandishing looked as if it had come from his galley. In her other hand, she was holding a hunk of bread and cheese, stolen from the same place, he presumed.

Was a French baguette worth killing for?

Probably, he mused, remembering he had persuaded a top French boulanger to open a branch in Sinnebar.

As the merciless sun sliced its way through the mist, his first impulse was to get the pirate princess into the shade, but he remained still, not wanting to provoke her into anything more reckless than she had already attempted. She was young, barely out of her teens, but had clearly been through some sort of trauma. He took in the tangled mass of blonde hair and bruised face with slanting blue-green eyes, more wounded than wounding. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he said calmly.

‘Don’t!’ she threatened, jabbing the sultry air with her knife.

He held the laugh, relieved she was okay. Mist hung tenaciously, making visibility poor; she must have climbed up on deck while he’d been in the sea checking the hull for storm damage.

‘I’m warning you!’ she exclaimed, though he hadn’t moved.

If she backed away another inch, she’d be over the side.

Her shock at seeing him had forced her into the role of aggressor, he concluded, remaining still so as not to alarm her. She hadn’t recognised him or she would have put down her little knife. ‘Why don’t you give me the knife?’ he suggested, knowing if she had meant to attack him she would have done so by now. ‘Or, better still, throw it overboard?’

She bared her teeth at that to give him a little warning growl, like a kitten with a toothache. ‘Don’t you come any closer,’ she warned, ‘Or I’ll—’

‘You’ll what?’ He disarmed her in one absurdly easy move. There was a flash of warm flesh beneath his hands, then it was all shrieking and clawing as she fought him as if to the death. ‘Wildcat!’ he exclaimed, feeling a sharp thrill of pain as she dug her sharp, white teeth into his hand. Resigned to capture, she couldn’t take her eyes off the much bigger knife he wore hanging from his belt. ‘I have no intention of harming you,’ he reassured her.

She had no intention of listening, which left him dealing with a wriggling desperado, who drummed his deck furiously with her tiny heels as he steered her towards the opening leading to the lower deck and his first-aid kit. Finally losing patience, he bound her arms to her side and swung her over his shoulder. ‘Stop that!’ he instructed as she arched her body and pummelled his back. ‘Do you want to bang your head?’

She went rigid as he padded sure-footed below deck into what was an all-purpose space on the ocean-going racing yacht. She was still in shock, he registered as he set her down on the one and only seat. All home comforts had been stripped away below deck to make room for necessary equipment, but as he’d been trialling on this voyage rather than racing there was plenty of fresh food on board—hence the bread his pirate wench had stolen. He had brought other supplies and small comforts along to make his time aboard more pleasurable, including the cushions he’d laid out on deck so he could sleep beneath the stars.

When the girl groaned and put her head in her hands, his first thought was to rehydrate her. He reached into the cold box for a glucose drink. ‘Here,’ he said, loosening the top and offering it to her. Her expression didn’t change. She remained stiffly non-responsive, staring ahead with her jaw set in white-faced fright.

‘Drink it, or I’ll hold your nose and pour it down your throat.’ He’d used similar shock tactics years back when his younger brother Razi had refused to take his medicine.

Just like then, she retaliated with a furious, ‘You wouldn’t dare!’

One look from him was enough to settle that argument. She held out her hand. He gave her the bottle; she gulped down the contents greedily.

‘When was the last time you had something to drink?’

She refused to answer. Swiping the back of her hand across her mouth, she raised blue-green eyes to his face. Chips of glacial ice would have held more heat.

No surrender, he concluded. And as for apologising for trespassing on his yacht? Forget it.

Tugging on the first top that came to hand, he began heating water to bathe her wounds. Blocking her escape with his body, he reached into a cupboard for antiseptic, lint and cotton wool. Adding a splash of disinfectant to the water, he stuffed a blanket under his arm and turned around. ‘Here—put this round you.’

She flinched and refused to look at him, drawing her legs in defensively, but it was when she crossed her arms over her chest that he finally lost patience. ‘I’m not interested in your body,’ he assured her, only to be rewarded by a tiny squeak of protest from a girl who was clearly accustomed to being admired. Proving the point, he put the bowl down and tugged the blanket tightly round her slender shoulders, trying not to notice that one lush, pert breast was partially exposed.

Seeing his momentary distraction, she snatched the blanket from him, holding it so tightly closed that her knuckles turned white.

‘Don’t flatter yourself.’

She was safe from him—too young, too reckless, plus he resented the intrusion. Any other time or place and he would have had her removed from his presence.

But she was tougher than she looked or she would have been reduced to a hysterical mess by now. She was an irritation, but she was also courageous, he concluded, and a breath of fresh air after the painted harpies who regularly served themselves up at court for his perusal.

There was only one thing wrong with the girl: she reminded him of someone else. Those tangled locks and slanting eyes held an echo of his father’s mistress, a woman who had destroyed his mother’s life and who had referred to Razi—the step-brother he couldn’t have loved more if they had shared the same blood—as the worst mistake she had ever made. That woman might be dead now, but she had left disaster in her wake, and as far as he was concerned she had defined his father’s weakness. It had been a fatal weakness that had stolen his father’s attention away from his country and its people. With that lesson guiding him, things had changed for the better since he had assumed control. There was no longer chaos in Sinnebar, and his people knew that he would never repeat his father’s mistake and become a slave to his heart.

He refocused as the girl shifted restlessly on the bench. ‘I’m going to bathe your scratches before they turn septic,’ he informed her crisply.

She recognised a command, but to his astonishment something in her eyes said she would dearly like to strike him. ‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you,’ he warned grimly, at which she scowled and slumped back like the spoiled teen he thought her to be. ‘When did you last eat?’ he demanded as he assessed her wounds and general condition.

Her stomach answered this question with an imperative growl, and then he remembered the hunk of bread she’d dropped on the deck. ‘When I’ve finished, you can eat.’

She tilted her chin at a defiant angle to stare haughtily past him.

So, let her go hungry—though he was forced to concede he admired her nerve. He liked the electricity between them too, but neither of these things would affect how he dealt with her. He would administer basic first-aid and then turn her over to the authorities. ‘Arms,’ he prompted brusquely, and then, deciding he would teach her what it meant to risk her life in the Gulf, he demanded, ‘Don’t you know anything about maritime law?’

Her flickering gaze suggested not.

‘If I report your actions to the ruling Sheikh in Sinnebar…You have heard of the man known as the “Sword of Vengeance”, I take it?’ He had the satisfaction of seeing her pale. ‘If I tell him that you came aboard my yacht, stole my food and threatened me with one of my own knives I would imagine the most lenient sentence he could hand out would be life imprisonment.’

‘But you wouldn’t!’

Even as she protested her eyes were narrowing in defiance. He liked her fire. He liked her voice. He liked…‘Report you?’ he rapped, calling his wayward thoughts back to order. ‘That depends on you telling me exactly how you got here. And be completely honest with me; I shall know at once if you lie.’

Hearing the menace in his voice, she slowly unfurled her legs as if deciding a temporary truce was her only option. ‘You were moored up, and so I thought…’

She’d take her chances, he silently supplied, feeling a beat of lust as she held his gaze. She spoke English well, but with the faintest of Italian accents. ‘You don’t look Italian,’ he said, dropping it in casually.

‘I had an English mother,’ she explained, before her mouth clamped shut, as if she felt she’d said too much.

‘Start by telling me what brought you to the Gulf and how you arrived on my yacht.’

‘I jumped overboard and swam.’

‘You swam?’ He weighed up her guarded expression. ‘You’re telling me you jumped overboard and swam through these seas?’ His tone of voice reflected his disbelief.

‘For what felt like hours.’ She blurted this, and then fell silent.

‘Go on,’ he prompted, continuing to bathe her wounds.

‘Before the mist closed in, the boat we were on was hugging the coastline.’

‘“We”?’

She shook her head as if it was important to concentrate. ‘I could see this island and was confident I could make it to the shore.’

‘You must swim well,’ he commented.

‘I do.’

She spoke without pride, and, taking in her lithe strength, he was tempted to believe her. But she must have swum like an athlete to survive the storm, and however capable she believed herself to be she was no match for the dangerous currents and unpredictable weather conditions in the waters of the Gulf.

The girl had stirred some instinct in him, he realised. It was the instinct to protect and defend, and he hadn’t felt that so strongly since his brother Razi had been young. ‘What made you jump overboard?’ He had his own suspicions, but wanted to hear it from the girl.

Her face grew strained as she remembered. ‘Our boat was attacked.’

‘I’ll need more than that.’ If his suspicions were correct, his security forces would need all the information he could glean from her. ‘Was your boat attacked by pirates?’

‘How do you know that?’ The terror in her eyes suggested she thought he was one of them. In fairness, she had had quite an experience, and he was tempted to comfort her. It was an impulse he resisted.

‘I suspected as much, and you just confirmed it. And I’m not a criminal,’ he added when she continued to stare at him as if he had just grown horns. ‘Quite the contrary—I bring people to justice.’

‘So you’re a law-enforcement officer?’

‘Something like that,’ he agreed.

Partially reassured, she settled back. ‘I was lucky to escape with my life,’ she said, echoing his thoughts exactly. ‘I escaped.’

And now she was over-doing it with a dramatic hitch in her voice. As she looked at him, as if trying to gauge his reaction, he suspected she was used to playing someone—an older brother, perhaps? She was out of luck with him. He wasn’t so easily won over. ‘You are lucky to have escaped with your life—and I’m not talking about the pirates now. You boarded my yacht without permission. I carry arms on board and wouldn’t hesitate to use them. What use would your little knife have been to you then?’

Colour rushed to her cheeks while her intelligent eyes sparkled like aquamarines. He didn’t need a further reminder to put some distance between them. He picked up the radio, to call the officer on duty and let him know the girl had been found and was safe—and when he turned to look at her he felt another bolt of lust.

She couldn’t stop shaking and the man didn’t help. She had never imagined such a combination of brutal strength and keen intelligence existed, let alone in such a perfectly sculpted form. His manner was proud—disdainful, even. He was magnificent. He only had to touch her for her body to react as if he was caressing her intimately. There was just one thing wrong. She could be as bold and determined as she liked, but she was way out of her depth here, and he frightened her. She was a flirt, a tease, and was used to getting her own way, but she had never met a man so hard—so hard on her. She wasn’t used to indifference. She was spoiled—she was the first to admit it—spoiled, both by a brother who adored her and by the attention of half the world’s men. If anything, there were times when she wished herself invisible. This was not one of those times.

But why should the man be interested in her? He was out of her league—older, tougher, better looking and more experienced in every way. She had left her comfortable cocoon back in Rome to learn about life, but never had she anticipated learning quite so much quite so fast. She didn’t even know if this man was more trustworthy than the pirates, and only had the fact that he had bathed her wounds to go on. Would he have done that if he had intended to harm her?

However caring that might make him seem, she refused to be reassured, or to relax her guard. There was something dangerous about him. At least when the pirates had attacked she’d had the chance to jump overboard, but she suspected this man had lightning reflexes and slept with one eye open. Right now he was talking on the radio in a husky tongue she guessed must be Sinnebalese. She had studied the language before setting out on her journey, and could pick up a word or two, but frustratingly not enough. She could learn more from his manner, Antonia decided, which was brisk, to the point and carried an air of authority. He was someone important—someone people listened to—but who?

He made no allowances for the fact that she was young and vulnerable, and she couldn’t decide if she liked that or not. Her brother smothered her, believing she required his constant supervision, whereas this man was more like a warrior from one of her fantasies, and had no time to waste on indulging her. Tall, dark and formidably built, in her dreams she would think of him as a dark master of the night, intense and ruthless, the ultimate prize—in reality, he made her wish she had never left home.

She continued to watch him furtively through a curtain of hair. She’d had no alternative but to board his yacht. She had swum to the point of exhaustion, and when she’d seen his boat looming out of the mist she hadn’t thought twice about seizing her chance.

As soon as he finished the call, she quickly drew up her feet and locked her arms around her knees, burying her head to avoid his penetrating stare. But he was ignoring her again, she realised, peeping at him.

She studied him some more as he moved about the cabin. He was spectacularly good-looking, with deeply bronzed skin and wild, black hair that caught on his stubble. The firm, expressive mouth, the earring, the look in his eyes, his menacing form all contributed to the air of danger surrounding him. He might look like her ideal man, but this was not one of her fantasies, and she was so far out of her comfort zone she was having to make up the rules as she went along. But there was no question he could melt hearts from Hollywood to Hindustan, and would certainly make a great Hollywood pirate, with those sweeping, ebony brows and that aquiline nose.

Then she remembered that real pirates were scrawny, smelly, ugly and mean.

As she whimpered at the memory of them, he whirled around. ‘What’s wrong with you now?’

‘Nothing,’ she protested. She’d get no sympathy here.

CHAPTER TWO

‘YOU must never put yourself in such a vulnerable position again,’ he told the girl sternly.

She looked at him in mute surprise, but he cut her no slack. If he eased up she’d think taking chances in the wilderness was acceptable, whereas he knew that if the visibility had been better, and helicopter gun-ships from his air force had been flying over the yacht when she boarded, his snipers might have shot her.

‘My boat was attacked by pirates,’ she protested. ‘I jumped overboard and swam for my life. What else was I supposed to do?’

He couldn’t remember the last time anyone had challenged him. In a world of bowed heads and whispering obedience, it was almost a refreshing change. But the girl’s safety came first, and for the pirates to be captured he had to warn her off ever doing anything similar again, and find out everything she could tell him. ‘Save the attitude,’ he barked, ‘And stick to the facts.’

She blinked and rallied determinedly, and as her story unfolded his admiration for her grew. It also made him doubly determined that she must learn from the experience. ‘You seem to have confused some romantic notion with reality,’ he observed acidly when she paused for breath. ‘This part of the Gulf is no holiday resort, and you’re lucky these are only scratches.’

It had been a relief to find that none of her injuries was serious and was what he might have expected after hearing she’d jumped overboard. ‘This will sting,’ he warned, loosening the top on a bottle of iodine. To her credit, she barely flinched as he painted it on. The only sign that it hurt her was a sharp intake of breath. She had beautiful legs, coltish and long, and her skin was lightly tanned, as if she had only recently landed in the Gulf. ‘What brought you to these shores—a gap year?’

‘Sort of.’

She winced—from fear of discovery that she was doing something she shouldn’t, he guessed—but before he could question her she hit him with, ‘What brought you here?’

No one questioned him. He had to forcefully remind himself that here on this desert island they were anonymous strangers and she couldn’t know who he was. He shrugged. ‘The storm.’

That was the simple answer. Sailing grounded him; it reminded him he was not only a king but a man, and that the man owed it to his country and his people to go hunting for his humanity from time to time. Whether he would ever be successful in that quest, only history would judge. ‘And where did you say you were heading?’ he prompted.

‘I didn’t say, but I’m heading for Sinnebar,’ she admitted grudgingly when he held her stare.

She was hiding something, he concluded when her gaze flickered away.

‘Do we have to talk now?’ she muttered, playing the hard-done-by card.

‘If you want the pirates to escape…’

‘No, of course I don’t,’ she declared, staring him full in the face.

‘Good. So tell me where the attack took place. Did you get a fix—coordinates?’ he pressed when she didn’t answer right away.

‘I know what you mean,’ she flared, but for the first time he thought she seemed disappointed in herself because she couldn’t give him the detail he required.

He gathered from what she went on to tell him that the pirates had taken advantage of the poor visibility to target an unsophisticated boat that lacked the latest radar equipment and alarm systems. ‘So you weren’t sailing your own boat when the pirates attacked?’ he guessed.

‘No.’

Burying her head in her knees, she tensed, but with the criminals still on the loose this was no time to go easy on her. ‘Sit up,’ he barked.

She snapped upright, and the look in her eyes suggested she was only now realising she might have jumped from the frying pan into the fire. He felt some sympathy for her. Dressed in cut-off shorts and faded top with a shark knife hanging from his belt, he was hardly a reassuring sight. ‘Come on,’ he pressed impatiently. ‘I need this information now, not sometime next week.’

She bit her lip and then admitted in a voice that was barely audible, ‘I hitched a lift on a fishing boat.’

‘You hitched?’ Words failed him. The girl’s naivety appalled him; the danger she had put herself in defied reason. ‘What were you trying to prove?’

‘Nothing.’

He doubted that. There would be someone back home she wanted to impress. ‘Couldn’t you have caught the ferry? Or was that too easy for you?’

‘I thought the fishing boat would give me a more authentic experience.’

‘More authentic?’ he demanded cuttingly. ‘So, you’re another tourist who thinks you can visit a foreign country with nothing more than your thirst for adventure and a bleeding heart in your survival kit?’

Her face paled. ‘It wasn’t like that at all.’

‘It was exactly like that. And then you wonder why you find yourself in danger? Keep your arms outstretched,’ he reminded her when she flinched.

His pulse was thundering with outrage at the thought of pirates in the sea off the shores of Sinnebar, though the girl had his attention too. He looked at her tiny hand and thought her courage all the more remarkable, given her petite frame. She was barely half his size, her skin-tone pale against his bronze. Her quick thinking had saved her, he concluded, and because her boldness was at odds with her fragile appearance the pirates had underestimated her. He would not make the same mistake.

Now she was speaking more, she went on to talk with passion of punishment for the pirates and compensation for the fishermen, which launched another unwelcome surge of arousal which he quickly stamped on. However soft and yielding she felt beneath his hands, her mind was not half so compliant, and he had no room in his life for complications. ‘What type of boat did they have? Never mind,’ he rapped, impatient to gather as much information as he could before placing a second call to the commander of his naval forces. ‘Just tell me the colour.’

‘It was a skiff,’ she said with mild affront. ‘Powerful engine; peeling white paint above the water-line; black below. And the interior was painted a vivid shade of aquamarine.’

‘A vivid shade of aquamarine?’ he murmured dryly. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Perfectly sure,’ she said, holding his gaze with curiosity, as if surprised to see the humour there. ‘Have I told you enough?’ she asked as he turned to use the radio.

‘More than I expected,’ he conceded as he prepared to place the call. ‘You did well.’

He could feel the heat of her gaze on his back as he fired off orders. He had become part of her desert fantasy, he guessed. Too bad; he wasn’t interested. There were plenty of women who knew the score, and this girl wasn’t one of them. Breaking radio connection, he turned to face her again.

‘Okay?’ she said hopefully.

‘Okay,’ he confirmed. ‘So now it’s all about you.’ He ran a cool stare over her. ‘Let’s start with your name and what you’re doing here.’

No name. She could have no name. Signorina Antonia Ruggiero must have no name. Whoever he was, this man was successful; successful people knew other people. And people talked. How good would it look for her to be branded a thief? Or, worse still, a demented creature with a knife? Before she’d even begun the work she’d set out to do.

‘You’re European,’ the man observed in a voice that strummed something deep inside her. ‘Although, like me, I suspect you were educated in England. Am I right?’

She took in the fact that his husky, confident baritone was barely accented even though he had spoken Sinnebalese fluently. ‘Yes, that’s right.’ Her own voice sounded hoarse.

‘Where in England were you educated?’ His keen eyes watched her closely, and the intensity of expression in those eyes warned her not to lie to him.

‘I went to school in Ascot.’

‘Ascot?’ There was a faint note of mockery in his voice. He’d heard of the very expensive girls’ school there. ‘So you’re a very proper young lady?’

Not in her head. One flash of this man’s muscular back when he changed his top confirmed she was anything but proper. ‘I try,’ she said primly.

‘What is such a well-brought-up young lady doing on my yacht, stealing my food and threatening me with a knife?’

His relentless stare sent ribbons of sensation flooding through her, making it hard to concentrate—but this was her best, maybe her only, chance to get to the mainland and it was crucial to forge a relationship with him. She also had to persuade him not to report her to the authorities to avoid being arrested the moment she landed. ‘I was hungry—thirsty. Your yacht was here; I took my chances.’

She flinched when he laughed. Short and sharp, it held no hint of humour.

‘You certainly did,’ he agreed. ‘Didn’t you think to call out when you came on board? You could have made some attempt to locate the owner before you stole his food.’

‘I did call out, but no one answered.’

His lips curved as he propped his hip against the bench where she was sitting. ‘So you helped yourself to whatever you felt like?’

‘I didn’t touch anything outside the galley.’ Must he move so close and tower over her?

‘And that makes it right?’

‘I’m sorry.’ She sounded childlike—plaintive, even—but was lost for something else to say.

‘Next time I’m in Ascot, I’ll wander into your house and see what I fancy taking, shall I?’

‘I don’t live in Ascot.’ The angry words shot from her mouth without any assistance from her brain and her reward was an ironic grin.

‘So, we’ve ruled out Ascot,’ he said.

Before he could delve any further, she swayed and clutched her throat.

‘Feeling faint?’ he demanded caustically, refusing to be fooled by her amateur dramatics for a single moment.

‘I’m fine,’ she assured him, matching him stare for stare. Whatever it took, she wasn’t about to let him see how badly he affected her.

‘You’re not fine,’ he argued, narrowing his eyes. ‘You’ve had a shock and need time to get over it.’

She hoped that meant a reprieve, and shrank instinctively from his intense maleness as he eased away from the bench.

‘Relax.’ His lips tugged with very masculine amusement. ‘You’re safe with me.’

Did he mean that to be reassuring, or was he insulting her? And was she safe? Could he be trusted? For once, she didn’t know what to think. The man’s manner was dismissive and abrupt, and his appearance…Well, that was rather more intimidating than the pirates.

There could be no guarantees, Antonia concluded, even if he had bathed her wounds. So was the flutter inside her chest a warning to be on her guard, or awareness of his sexuality?

‘Are you travelling alone?’

A shiver of apprehension coursed through her as she stared into his eyes. Why would he ask that? ‘Yes,’ she admitted cautiously. ‘I’m travelling alone—but people know where I am.’

‘Of course they do,’ he said sarcastically. ‘So your family allows you to wander the world without their protection?’

This time she couldn’t hold back. ‘They trust me.’ She was not defending herself now, but Rigo, the older brother who had cared for her since her mother had died six months after giving birth to her, her father having passed away shortly after that.

But the man pursued her relentlessly. ‘And breaking the law is how you repay your family for their care?’

‘I’ve already apologised to you for coming on board,’ she fired back. ‘I explained I had no option but to board your yacht.’

His hands signalled calm as her voice rose. ‘Lucky for you I was moored up here.’

She balled her hands into fists as a last-ditch attempt to keep her temper under control, but all it gained her was another mocking stare. But what a stare…She couldn’t help wondering how it would feel to have that stare fire with interest, or darken with desire.

‘I hope you’ve learned your lesson,’ he snapped, shattering that particular illusion.

‘Oh, I have,’ she assured him meekly. It was time to stop dreaming and accept the facts. She was far too young and inexperienced to interest a man like this. He thought her fragile and foolish, and couldn’t know her determination. She wasn’t fragile, and this trip was her chance to prove she wasn’t foolish. To prove to the brother she adored—who protected her, perhaps a little too much—that she could survive without his supervision. Not that she’d made the best of starts, Antonia conceded as the man held her gaze.

‘Tell me more about your family,’ he prompted.

Being the object of such an intense stare was both alarming and seductive, but she wouldn’t tell him anything that might risk her mission. She hadn’t come to Sinnebar on her own behalf, or as part of some ill-thought-out adventure, but to persuade the authorities in the country to open a branch of her brother’s children’s charity. Rigo’s work had already helped so many sick and disadvantaged children, and she had pledged to help him expand the reach of his charity across the world.

And there was a second reason, Antonia conceded silently. Coming to Sinnebar would give her the opportunity to track down information about the mother it broke her heart to think she couldn’t remember—not her voice, her touch, what she looked like or even the scent of her hair. She knew nothing at all about the woman who had given birth to her, beyond the fact that her mother had been very young when she’d died, and that before marrying Antonia’s father and moving to Rome she had apparently spent some time at the royal court in Sinnebar.

‘I’m waiting to hear about your family,’ the man said, slicing through her thoughts.

Antonia composed herself before replying, knowing it was important not to let anything slip. Rigo had drummed it into her from an early age that the truth was non-nego-tiable, though she might have to get used to twisting it where this man was concerned. ‘My family don’t know I’m here,’ she admitted, which was true in part, at least.

‘Your family don’t know you’re here?’ The man picked up the radio phone and held it out to her. ‘Don’t you think you’d better call them?’

No. Men like this, men like her brother Rigo, shared a common understanding. They would demand she return home immediately. Rigo might even insist on coming to fetch her, so once again she would be no more effective than a balloon, weightless and directionless as they batted her between them.

‘I’ll ring them if you don’t,’ he threatened.

‘No, please don’t.’ She reached out and then withdrew her hand, thinking better of touching him. ‘I don’t want to worry them.’ She mustered a steady stare. ‘Better to call them when I’m safely in Sinnebar and settled in a hotel, don’t you think?’

Worry them? Rigo would be down on her like a ton of bricks. Her brother only had to file a flight plan and he’d be over here. And what would that prove—that she was as headstrong and reckless as Rigo believed her to be? Her brother would never let her work for his charity then. And she had begged him for this chance to do a real job instead of accepting her brother’s generous allowance. It was a chance to do something for others instead of for herself. ‘The moment I’m safe on the mainland, I’ll ring them—I promise.’ She was taking a lot for granted by assuming the man would take her anywhere, but she had no option when there was everything to play for.

His eyes remained narrowed with suspicion, and then to her relief he shrugged. ‘You know your family better than I do.’

Yes, she knew Rigo. He could be a pain sometimes, but it was thanks to her brother she had enjoyed such a privileged childhood, which in Rigo’s language meant she could ride, ski, sail, fence and swim. More importantly, living with him had taught her how to survive a man like this.

As she watched him clear up the debris from the recent triage session, she offered to help. He ignored her. Closing the cupboard on his supplies, he turned to face her. ‘So all you wanted when you came on board was my food?’

‘What else?’ she said in bewilderment.

‘You weren’t thinking of stealing my yacht, for instance?’

Antonia’s cheeks flushed red. She had considered it.

He made a contemptuous sound, as if he already knew this, and then barked, ‘We’ll continue this conversation when you have no more excuses left.’

‘But, I—’

‘Not now,’ he snarled.

His tone only confirmed what she already knew—this was not a man to bend to her will, or to anyone’s will.

‘You will rest now,’ he said as if anything he commanded would happen immediately. ‘I’m prepared to give you time to get over the shock—but not much time. And don’t play me,’ he warned.

A shiver of awareness rippled down her spine. When he turned away, it was another opportunity to watch him again. Resting her chin on her knees, she realised that against all the odds she had grown calmer around him. Calmer and yet more unsettled, Antonia concluded, realising her libido had received an unusual boost. The man moved around the confined space with the confidence of someone who knew every inch of his territory intimately, and some of the openings were so small he had to raise his arms and coax his body through. He looked amazing at full stretch, like an athlete in the peak of condition. His air of command went with being super-fit, she supposed, though she found trying to pigeon-hole him in the outside world impossible. His frayed and faded shorts looked as if he’d hacked the legs off an old pair of jeans with the lethallooking knife hanging from his belt, and his top had definitely seen better days.

She gave up trying to work him out. He could be crew or he could own the boat—either way, she had to build bridges and hope they stretched to the mainland. She waited until the next time he squeezed past to attempt to make her peace. ‘I apologise for trespassing on your yacht and for stealing your food and the knife. Please believe me when I say I would never have used the knife. And please don’t report me to the Sheikh.’

‘I thought I told you to rest,’ he said, showing no sign of having accepted her apology.

There was no chance of ‘playing him’, as he seemed to think, Antonia concluded, and he’d done nothing more than care for her as he would care for a stray dog, so she could forget the fantasies. Using her so-called womanly wiles had got her nowhere. And there was something more, something that made her shudder to think about it. While he was helping her, she was safe, but should he ever turn against her…

‘What happens next is up to you,’ he snapped as if he had read these troubled thoughts. ‘All you have to do is answer my questions promptly and honestly.’

And that was all? Did he know how intimidating and fierce he looked? ‘I will,’ she promised on a dry throat. If all your questions are connected to the attack, she hedged silently.

CHAPTER THREE

THE man might terrify her, but she was determined to hold her nerve; so much depended on getting to the mainland. If only she knew who he was it might be easier to talk to him, but she had searched for clues to his identity and found none on the yacht. There was plenty of food and drink in the tiny galley and all sorts of fancy technical equipment—and, now she put her shopping head on, she realised the blanket around her shoulder was cashmere. But the man remained a mystery. Apart from his working clothes, he wore a strap around his wrist formed of black twine, and the gold hoop in his ear which she found sexy, but neither item was unique.

It wasn’t much to go on. She should have noticed the name of his yacht, but she had been so traumatised when she’d clambered on board her thoughts had been solely concerned with survival. She hadn’t even paused to think who the yacht might belong to. Food, drink and a fast ticket back to the mainland had been her only concern. And if she had to steal a sleek, sexy racing yacht to get there, so be it.

‘I don’t have all day,’ he warned. ‘The least you can do is tell me why you’re here.’

Even if she had been prepared to tell him the truth it was hard to think straight with his sexuality overwhelming her. Command was instinctive for him, while she was a girl used to getting her own way; theirs could be an explosive partnership.

In the realms of fantasy only, Antonia cautioned herself firmly. She had been so absorbed in sleuthing it took her a moment to realise that he was holding out the most deliciouslooking baguette. Slathered in butter, it had a wedge of cheese inside it so thick it would normally have fed her for a week. And she hadn’t eaten for…She couldn’t remember.

‘Is that for me?’ She granted him the first smile of the day as she reached for it.

He held it out of reach. ‘Talk first,’ he said brusquely. ‘You’ve had enough time to collect your thoughts. And if you can’t remember your own name…’ A quirk of his eyebrow was all it took to call her a liar. ‘Why don’t you start with your parents’ names?’

‘Both my parents are dead.’

‘And they had no name either, I suppose?’

Had she expected sympathy? Antonia’s skin prickled at this evidence of a man who was cold and remote. It underscored what she had already sensed about him, that you wouldn’t want him as an enemy, and as she stared into his eyes she wondered if she had never met anyone so removed from human feeling. He unnerved her to the point that she felt like voicing her mother’s name, almost as if it were a talisman that could protect her. But her mother’s name was too precious for that, and so she attempted a little sob instead. ‘Please, let me eat first. I’m s-so hungry…’

There was a moment of silence between them, and then, as if she had planned it, her stomach growled in anguish. ‘Please…’

She must have paled or swayed, or gasped for breath; all three were possible when the man was so close to her. ‘Eat, then talk,’ he conceded brusquely, handing over the baguette.

She dropped her gaze to hide her relief as she crammed the delicious roll into her mouth, going to heaven and back in the space of a couple of gargantuan bites.

‘Steady—drink something.’

He took the top off a bottle of water, which she grabbed from him gracelessly and gulped down.

‘Take a few minutes to let the food settle.’

His words might have seemed considerate, but the look on his face was not. He was telling her she had better not take longer than he expected to pull herself round. Brusque or not, his manner thrilled her. Why did it always have to be the pretty boys who wanted her, when what she wanted was a real man who could stare her in the eyes—a man like this man, who made her body tremble?

Clearly, his thoughts were not running in tandem with her. Far from returning her interest, he simply dumped another blanket on top of her in passing. He couldn’t have been more unromantic if he’d tried, while her head was full of him touching her in quite a different way.

‘You need to sleep,’ he said brusquely. ‘You’re still in shock. We’ll talk later.’

Sleep? Was he serious? He obviously thought he only had to issue a command and her eyes would close immediately. ‘Sleep here?’ She stared dubiously at the narrow bunk.

‘Yes, of course here,’ he rapped with a frown that would have sent grown men scurrying for cover.

‘I’m not sure I can sleep,’ she said honestly.

‘You can try,’ he insisted.

She reluctantly dragged the blanket close. Like the man, it held the fresh tang of the ocean, and like him it felt wonderful against her skin. But as she curled up on the bunk all her bravado fell away, leaving just longing and loneliness. However formidable he seemed, and however much of a threat he posed, he had made her feel safe. And that was such a good feeling, Antonia reflected, biting back tears.

She was physically and mentally exhausted, Antonia reasoned, impatient with herself for the weakness. Her emotions were in tatters, and no wonder, when in the short space of time she’d known him this brute of a man had turned her life plan on its head. She’d carried a mental image with her of returning to Rome in triumph after opening branches of Rigo’s charity across the Middle East. Eventually, she would return home and settle down—probably with some nice, safe man her brother had chosen for her. After which, life would go on pretty much as it always had, with lots of pats on the head for Antonia and not too many problems to worry her. And of course, her husband, like her brother, would adore her.

But now…

How was she supposed to lose her innocence to some lesser man now? The man had ruined her prospects of a nice, cosy future. And as for sex…

‘Relax,’ he insisted as she squirmed beneath the blanket. ‘No one’s going to touch you while I’m around.’

Especially not him, she gathered.

Throwing herself down on the bunk, she stretched out. Why had fate chosen to bring her to the attention of a man who had turned her world upside down with one contemptuous stare when he wasn’t even interested in her?

Tugging the blanket over her head, she determined that out of sight would mean out of mind—but how was that supposed to happen when she could hear him moving about, and when even the sound of his steady pacing was starting to soothe her? Then incredibly, thanks to the man’s strangely reassuring presence and the gentle rocking of the boat, her eyes drifted shut and she fell asleep.

His voice was muted, so he didn’t wake her as he issued orders to his Chief of Staff. The girl was sleeping soundly now, her blonde hair drifting in a curtain of gold to the floor. He turned away from that distraction to relay every detail his unexpected guest had been able to recall. When he ended the call, he went up on deck where a technicolour sky would soon darken to the impenetrable mantle of a desert night.

Time had passed rapidly since the girl’s arrival, and as he paced the deck he realised that just the thought of her was enough to unsettle him. It was as if the two of them had created some unusual energy, almost as if together they possessed the power to forge some new force. Having been only too glad to turn his back on her, he now found he was impatient for her to wake up. He wanted to test that energy to see if she would be like all the rest—outwardly intriguing, but ultimately shallow.

He remained alert while he paced, and realised now he was listening for her soft footfall, but all he could hear was the sigh of a restless sea and the rhythmical chirrup of the cicadas on shore. Leaning back against the mast, he allowed his thoughts to drift. They returned at once to the mystery girl—her clear, blue-green eyes hazed over with passion and the sight of her begging him for more…

He pulled away from the mast, shaking his head like an angry wolf, as if that could dislodge her from his thoughts. He had already decided she was too young for him.

But she was intriguing.

The trill of the satellite phone provided a welcome distraction, until he learned the purpose of the call. He had ordered that all his late father’s palaces be aired and cleaned before being redecorated and opened to the public, and it appeared they had found a locked room today. When his comptroller of palaces went on to advise him that they hadn’t been able to locate a key to the room, a thought occurred to him. Was it possible the room had belonged to his father’s mistress? There were so many secrets where that woman was concerned.

He commanded that they remove the door from its hinges—or break it down if they had to. Once they had gained access, if it proved to have been her lair, everything she had owned must be taken out and destroyed.

She must have cat-napped; when she woke there was no sign of the man. She guessed he was up on deck and, though sleeping under the stars sounded idyllic to her, she was beginning to feel guilty at the thought that she was taking up his one and only bunk. Sitting up and stretching, she realised it was still relatively early, and that he was unlikely to be asleep.

She wanted to see him again. She wanted to make a fresh start. She wanted him to see her differently. She had been so shocked at their first encounter she had acted foolishly, and hadn’t seen anything from his point of view, but now she had slept and felt refreshed she could understand his brusque manner. She was the trespasser, and yet he’d fed her and bathed her wounds. What had she done for him? She must earn her passage back to the mainland as cook, crew, anything he wanted—within reason, of course. The least she could do now was to take him a cooling drink.

The very least, Antonia concluded, her heart hammering with anticipation as she padded silently across the deck with a cooling lemonade she had decorated with a slice of lemon, an ice cube and even a sprig of mint she had found in the man’s supplies.

The dark shape loomed out of nowhere. She screamed and the drink went flying. The man yanked her in front of him and, dipping his head, demanded, ‘Do you never learn?’

She was trembling so much it took her a moment to speak, and then fury and shock turned her intended apology on its head. ‘“Are you all right?” might be nice,’ she raged back at him.

The man was already blazing with affront, which only increased at her outburst. Bringing his face close to hers in the most intimidating way imaginable, he snarled, ‘Do yourself a favour and learn how dangerous it is to creep up on me.’

‘Well, I’m sorry if I frightened you.’

‘Frightened me?’ He seemed surprised for a moment, and then, throwing back his head, he laughed, strong white teeth flashing in the moonlight.

She couldn’t even bring him a drink without making a mess of things, Antonia seethed inwardly. She could cope in her brother’s sophisticated circles in Rome without any trouble at all, but she couldn’t seem to get a single thing right where this man was concerned. And now she was in danger of ruining everything and losing her lift to the mainland. ‘Look, I’m sorry.’

‘Cloth,’ he snapped without sparing her a glance.

She bit back an angry retort, accepting he was right on this occasion. She shouldn’t have shouted at him or spilled lemonade on his deck. She should have remembered this wasn’t some pleasure cruiser and that she was here under sufferance. ‘I’ll get you a cloth.’

‘You bet you will. You made the mess, you clear it up!’

So much for her kind gesture! She should have saved some of the lemonade to toss over him. ‘I thought you might want a drink. Was it my fault you leapt out at me? And now you expect me to follow orders like a dog. You’ll be whistling for me next.’

‘Have you finished?’

His quiet way of speaking drew her attention to his lips. Taking herself out of danger range, she headed below deck at speed. She was going to stick with her original plan, which was to be useful to him so he would be more likely to give her a lift to the mainland.

She returned moments later with a fresh drink, a clean cloth and a new sense of purpose in her step. ‘Here,’ she said, hanging on to the cloth as she offered him the freshly prepared drink. She was bowed, but not defeated. If she had a hope of reaching Sinnebar, pride was not an option.

‘Where are you going?’ the man demanded as she carried on walking.

She waved the cloth at him. ‘To clean up.’

‘Sit down over there,’ he ordered, indicating a bulkhead well out of his way. ‘And please try not to fall overboard while I make a proper job of clearing up the mess you made.’

So she couldn’t even be trusted with a cloth? She hung on to it, expecting every moment he would snatch it from her. ‘I’d like to help,’ she said bluntly, amazed by the steadiness of her voice. ‘I’ve made a mistake—I know that, I’m pretty clumsy—but I’d like to put it right.’

There was a moment of silence, and then he saluted her with the plastic tumbler. ‘Do your worst.’

She saw the glint in his eyes. He was laughing at her, but she kept her temper under control. Apart from the lift she so badly needed, she was playing a very dangerous game with a man she didn’t know. There could be no mixing up of dreams and reality here. Placating him was her best, her only, option.

Once she’d cleared up the mess, she faced him again. ‘I realise I haven’t exactly got off on the best foot.’

She waited for him to contradict her. Any gentleman would. But this man wasn’t a gentleman, he was a barbarian, who angled his chin to stare at her with derision as if he were wondering how deep she would care to dig the hole before jumping into it. ‘Can we start again?’ she suggested, somehow remaining calm.

The sight of one inky eyebrow peaking made her cheeks flame red, but with her lift in serious jeopardy she wasn’t about to take any chances. ‘I’m prepared to work my passage back to the mainland, if you’ll just tell me what you’d like me to do.’

‘You could leave me in peace?’ he suggested.

Antonia’s jaw dropped. She was welcome everywhere. Except here, she concluded as the man directed a pointed glance at the companionway leading below deck.

‘Can I do anything more for you?’ he said pointedly.

‘Absolutely not,’ she assured him, spinning on her heels. She paused at the top of the steps to deliver her exit line: ‘You’ve done quite enough for me already.’

But as she spoke she glimpsed the island behind him. It looked so desolate in the fading light. Did she really want to be stranded there? ‘Just for the record, I really am sorry I made such a mess of things and spilled a drink, but you shouldn’t have leapt out at me.’

The man’s eyes narrowed threateningly.

She tensed and went on, ‘I only brought you a drink because—’

‘You felt guilty?’ He suggested. ‘And I’m guessing that’s a first for you.’

‘You don’t know anything about me.’

‘I know all I want to know.’

‘How can you say that?’ Because he didn’t want to know any more about her, Antonia realised, heating up with embarrassment. ‘What have I ever done to you? Why do you hate me so much?’

‘I don’t hate you,’ he said. ‘I don’t feel anything that requires that much energy. Let me spell it out for you,’ he offered. ‘I have neither the time nor the inclination to deal with spoiled brats who march into danger with their eyes wide open, expecting other people to bail them out.’

‘It wasn’t like that.’

‘How would you describe it?’

For once she was lost for words. ‘I’m going below.’

‘You do that.’

She had never been dismissed by anyone before, and the thought that it was so unjust forced her to turn one last time and confront him. ‘Why should I sleep below deck where it’s hot and stuffy, while you’re up here enjoying the breeze?’

‘Have you never been told “thank you, we’ll call you” after one of your dramatic performances? No, I guess not,’ he said wearily. ‘Well, there’s a first time for everything, I guess. Off you go,’ he prompted with a dismissive gesture.

‘I’m staying right here.’

He shrugged, turned his back and walked away.

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