'Oh!' She recoiled as though he had lashed her. 'You're impossible ! I'm sorry I said a word. And I didn't look at you like that. I ...'
A rain of dust eddied in a renewed onslaught of the wind and she turned her face away, almost glad of the pain it brought so that she could hide from his cold anger. The fierce gusts stilled for a moment and she
brushed at her eyes, then dropped her face against the shield of her arm. A great rage against the fates suddenly welled in her and she knew a childish desire to kick and beat her fists against their injustice. Why? She hadn't asked to be brought here. She hadn't wanted to come to Kadir. Raoul Germont had made her come here. All that she had been through during the past few days was his fault! She'd tried to fight him and he'd used the most unfair tactics of all; a strength she couldn't combat and the advantage of her own worst weakness. He'd deliberately made love to her that night in the garden and made her aware of him as a lover. For a few moments of gratification of sheer male egotism. And now she was stuck in a sandstorm with him, and all he could do was taunt her. If only she could erase every memory of him, and her own foolish weakness ...
'Why are you weeping?'
She shuddered at the sound of his voice. `I'm not.'
'You are.' Rockhaxd fingers grasped her chin and forced her to look up. Unfathomable eyes glinted down at her tearstained face. 'You are afraid?'
She jerked free. `No ! I—I've got sand in my eyes.'
I’ve sand in mine, but it does not make me weep.' `No, it wouldn't,' she mumbled bitterly.
There was a short silence, then he leaned over her and thrust a handkerchief into her hand. think we'd better remove that sand from your eyes. It is clouding more than your vision, Melissa.'
'Is it?' she flared. 'That's something you'll never understand.'
'What will I never understand?'
'How people really feel. Because you can't see further than your own narrow way. Your way. Never anyone else's. Only how you think people should be. You're so hard and arrogant you won't give people credit for feelings you've never experienced yourself.'
'Go on, Melissa,' he said after a pause. 'What are these creditable feelings which I don't possess?'
'Pity and compassion for other people's hopes and fears, and sufferings. People suffer as well as animals.' She stared at him fiercely and her hands clenched into small fists. 'You've despised me right from the start. Yes you have,' she cried as he made a sharp gesture. 'Ever since that day I took pity on that poor little brute in Casa you've treated me as though I were stupid and silly. Sentimental! Well, I am sentimental!'
She drew in a deep breath and turned away. 'That's the way I'm made and I'm proud of it. I don't want to be different and I don't care what you think of me,' she ended defiantly.
'But I think you do.'
don't, and—and I hope your head does ache! And I want to get out of here—and ...'
'Don't be a little idiot!' Like lightning he forestalled her blind bid for escape. 'Don't add foolhardiness to all those other failings. Yes, you listed them, not I.'
His hands gripped her shoulders, kept her a trembling defiant prisoner in his hold. would not have called you silly and stupid, but you are proud and stubborn, with the temper of a little desert cat. Will nothing tame that fierce independence?'
There was a flare of white now at the hard chiselled outline of his mouth and a muscle twitched in the lean jaw. He stared down into her transfixed gaze with eyes so intense she thought she must drown in their tawny depths. Then his arms fastened round her with the strength of coiled steel and his mouth descended to make its fierce claim.
The touch of his mouth was like fire. For a moment it consumed her, then she summoned the resistance of despair and fought to free herself.
'No !' She arched back over the coils of steel and turned her head despairingly. 'That's all you want from your women, isn't it? Physical submission. Well, you won't get it from me !'
She thrust her hands against his chest and felt the indrawn breath under the power of him. He held her without effort, and the tears of rage sparkled in her eyes. His mouth curved with amusement. 'You see, you are utterly feminine after all, my hotheaded little English miss. I think you have sand in your heart now.'
'You can say that. But at least I have a heart,' she spat. don't think you have. Let me go !'
`Not till I'm ready. No, my fiery little copperhead. I must prove that I possess a heart, and I must prove something else to which you seem blind.'
'You don't have to prove anything to me that I don't know.' She was shaking, fighting a weariness that crept insidiously through her limbs. 'And your own pride should shame you. Or are you proud of the physical strength that enables you to beat down a woman's resistance with sheer brute force?'
She stared him out, determined not to give an inch.
The hot acrid light lent a bronze sheen to the impassioned features that might have been hewn from the desert rock, and the hard muscular chest against which her hands strained only brought awareness of how puny her slender strength. Then she felt the passionate rise of his indrawn breath and for a moment she thought those arms would snap her like the brittle stem of a storm tossed flower.
No, Melissa,' he gritted. feel neither pride nor
shame. But I have a notion to teach you to know your own heart—and disabuse you of these strange notions you hold of me. You accuse me of lacking heart. You call me barbarian. You have a strange way of appealing to a man. I wonder if ever in all your sheltered existence you have been at the mercy of a real barbarian.'
There was the tight anger of passion in him now, a wildness matched only by the tempest beating around them. The wind shrieked over the roar of her own throbbing pulses and she fought the traitorous weakness that wanted to implore him to make a haven within which she could shelter. She twisted blindly to shield her eyes and cried bitterly : 'Only a barbarian would behave as you do. As for mercy ... I would as soon trust myself to the mercy of the desert than you!'
With a frantic effort she broke free and stumbled up towards the crest of the great ridge. Instantly the full force of the tempest caught her, spinning her helplessly in a vortex of flying dust. Blinded, spent beyond endurance, she crumpled on the seething ripples of sand. An oath was torn from Raoul's lips as he leapt up the dune. He bent over and scooped her up over
his arms and stumbled down to the scant shelter of the hollow. For a long moment he stared down at his burden with angry eyes, then shook his head and pressed the small face against his shoulder.
'Little fool! What are you so afraid of? Did you believe I'd ravish you against your will?'
'What do you expect me to believe?' A tired little sigh was lost against his shoulder as she kept her face stubbornly hidden.
'How little you know of a man's self-respect.' Abruptly he knelt and laid her down, to bend over her, hands pinned to the sand on either side of her. 'When I take a woman, Melissa, she must come willingly to me, wanting to belong to me with heart and soul as well as body. And then only if she loves me as completely and utterly as I love her.'
'If these are a sample of your methods you'll never find her,' she said brokenly.
'You think not?' Raoul's gaze bored down as though it would search out her very soul. 'But I have found her.'
'Then you'd better hope to God you get safely out of this.' With a desperate need for evasive action she brushed at her sand coated arms and finger combed through her disordered hair.
He did not move, nor did his gaze cease to search her face. As though she had not spoken he added, 'But I do not think she has found me—yet.'
Suddenly she dared not move and a new, uncanny stillness seemed to hang heavy in the air. It was as though even the tempest stayed its fierce breath and waited.
'Melissa, look at me.' His brown fingers curved
under her chin, forcing her to turn her head. `For how long are you going to defy the fates and your own heart?'
`I—I don't know what on earth you'
re talking about,' she said with a gallant attempt at lightness. 'Only a fool tries to defy the fates.'
`How true!' His exclamation was derisive, a note of triumph in it challenging the indignation darkening her eyes. 'And how the fates must smile at mortals who duel with words when they might exult with love.'
His lean face was unbearably close, his mouth only the distance of a heartbeat away, and her own heartbeats pounded as though they would choke her. His warm breath was a caress of intimacy on her brow and she raised a trembling hand. 'Raoul, don't ... unless you ...'
'Are you still afraid of me?'
She closed her eyes to shut out the compulsion of those tawny dark eyes. 'Should I be?' she parried in a whisper almost imperceptible in its weakness.
'How can I answer that for you?' His voice went dangerously quiet. 'Except to say I believe you are afraid of yourself.'
There was silence so potent she did not dare draw breath lest she shatter it and the last fragile tendril of defence. He said softly : `How long before you believe?'
Her lips parted, trying to form the despairing doubt of sanity, yet no sound would leave them. His fingers slid away from her chin and there was no contact now, except the magnetic quality of that merciless gaze. He did not move.
'Come to me,' he whispered.
The spell snapped its bonds. Her choked murmur of his name was lost in the engulfing tide that swept away her resistance. The heartbeat of distance was lost, crushed within the circle of his arms, the final captivity of his embrace. He kissed her eyes, her brow, the curve of her cheek, and then, with soul pervading sweetness, claimed her mouth. His arms, his kiss, his entire being seemed to merge with her own throbbing senses until she was lost in the wild sweet intoxication of his ardour.
When at last he drew back a little and looked down on her she was beyond stirring. She lay limp in his arms, her hair a tumbled cloud of coppery silk against his shoulder, and a sigh trembled through her. It was as though some great barrier had crumbled, as though some storm tossed sea had thrust her far beyond its reach, where she lay spent and drained, waiting till the tempest ebbed.
From a long way away she heard his voice, strangely unreal, triumphant. `Now do you believe?'
Her head swam. She fought and failed to dispel the headiness and the havoc, and turned her face blindly against his shoulder. 'Yes, I'll believe. Whatever you want me to believe. You've won,' she whispered on a sigh.
'Won?'
Her shoulders made a tiny shrugging movement of defeat, infinitely weary, as she whispered, `Yes—I hope you're satisfied with your victory.'
The arms slackened. He grasped under her hair, at the nape of her neck, made her face him. He looked hard at her, and his eyes glittered.
'Victory ! Mon Dieu! Is that what you believe of me? Do you believe I desire every woman I meet? And lay siege to her own desire? Mon Dieu!' he repeated despairingly. 'Can you not distinguish the real from the imitation?'
`I—I want to.' Her mouth trembled and bewilderment swam in. her eyes. 'But I—I'm afraid of you—if you don't ...'
'Afraid to love!' With a groan he cradled her close, his fingers taut and fierce in her hair. `How do I melt this stubborn little heart and make it hear mine?'
She stiffened, turned her head sharply, incredulity rushing over her as she met the burning intensity of his gaze. It couldn't be that which she saw in those eyes.
'What are you trying to say?' she whispered.
'Say? What am I saying with every part of me? Completely and utterly, as I have said to no woman until you came into my heart?'
`No other woman? You mean ... love?'
mean love. And you. And me.'
`Me?' Suddenly she was incoherent. Tremulous joy and wavering, disbelief and conviction all whirling with the echoes of the words he had spoken. His features blurred, her eyes misted even as the radiance curved her mouth, and she could only look at him with her heart shining from her eyes.
'And you? Say it,' he prompted urgently. 'Say it.'
'Oh yes . .' His hands were smoothing her temples, cradling the contours of her face as she made the trembling admission he demanded, and now at last all doubts and pride were swept away as the floodgates of love and longing opened.
She stole tender arms around him, caressed the proud head, strained to match the ardour of his loving with all the response she had craved to make, until everything ceased to exist outside their heaven of ecstasy.
At last he drew back, and the dark fire of love smouldered in his eyes. 'You will marry me very soon?'
'Very soon.'
'And you will try to love Kadir and my desert?'
T try, but never as much as I love you, Raoul,' she said softly.
'The way you say my name, with that funny little English lilt . . . I shall never tire of hearing you say it.' He brushed her lips with a lingering, feather light kiss. 'We will live half of the year in Casa, in the house by the sea which has known so much happiness. The singing birds will make their music for you, and Casa is but a short flight from your own shores of home. But I will enchant you so much you will not be able to be homesick.'
'You've enchanted me already,' she murmured, 'and made me feel as though I don't know if I'm on my head or my heels.'
'That is how love should make a woman feel. Enchanted with happiness.'
She let her head lie against his shoulder and mused for a moment, trying to regain her breath. Then she remembered something. 'Who is this Sonia?' she asked suspiciously.
'Sonia?' He started slightly, then a wicked gleam entered his eyes. 'You are jealous?'
'Appallingly. You have a great deal to answer before
I'm convinced.'
'Sonia,' he said slowly, 'is a most charming and beautiful woman. You will meet her very soon and you will love her, I'm sure.'
'Will I?' Her voice was dry.
'Oh yes. I have no secrets from Sonia, and she is not in the least secretive about the fact that she recently celebrated her sixtieth birthday.'
Melissa closed her eyes and laughed softly. 'You weren't going to marry Amorel?'
'My cousin?' He frowned. think you had better tell me all the rest of these odd notions you appear to have collected about me. What is this about my marrying Amorel?'
She curled closer to him. 'I'm betraying confidences, I suppose, but Amorel believed that your grandfather wished the marriage, and that you wished to honour his wish. Is that true?'
`Not in the sense my dramatically minded little cousin seems to have believed. It is true; a marriage between us would have delighted him, but only if it was a true love match. He was not in the least a ruthless, dominating person.'
Melissa was silent for a moment, then took joy in her new ability to confide in him. 'You're not going to force Amorel to stay ff she's unhappy, are you—darling?' she added softly.
His lips caressed her brow. 'Do you believe I would?'
don't know. You did say ... when we talked about it ...'
'You were so determined to fight me, weren't you?' he said tenderly. 'And because of that I responded as I
did. Do you still think I would force Amorel into a way of living in which she would be unhappy? Do you, my darling?'
She looked at him and then shook her head, impulsively catching his hand and cradling it to her face. 'Tell me about the house of the amulet, and the story of the amulet.'
He settled back, drawing her even closer and said slowly : 'It goes back to the time when my grandfather was a young man. He had quarrelled with his family, weary of the sterile provincial life which he felt was smothering him, and ran away when he was nineteen. He went first to Lebanon, drifted to Egypt, then Algiers, and finally to Morocco. He came to Kadir, then a tiny community, very poor, but with possibilities for a young man with vision. He began to plant, and soon prospered, but he shared his prosperity with those who worked for him and they came to love him. Then one day, when he was travelling far south on the fringe of the Sahara, he came upon a slave market. H
e was horrified, believing that French and English efforts were succeeding in eradicating this inhuman trade. But remember, this was more than sixty years ago, and even today slave trading still exists in isolated pockets in the Middle East,' he added grimly.
She shivered, and his arm tightened protectively as he went on : 'There was a young Berber girl, little more than a child, being led up on to the auction stage. She was trying desperately not to cry, and when the ghastly spiel started, the crude recital of her assets, my grandfather raged. He had a companion, a much older man, a hardened trader, who forcibly restrained him from attempting violent action. He suggested my
grandfather should buy her if he felt so squeamish, never thinking my grandfather would take this suggestion seriously. But he did, and brought her back to Kadir, where he offered her her freedom and restored her to her people. By then he was enchanted by her, and a few months later he married her.'
Raoul paused, and the lights of reflection were grave in his eyes. 'It was the beginning of a long and most wonderful partnership. But it bore a shadow. His family severed all connection, refused to recognise his marriage or the three children born of it. My grandfather never returned to France and never saw his family again, but before he died he told me he had no regrets.'
'What was her name?' Melissa asked.
`Tamzen,' he responded, 'and now I must tell you a little of our family so that you will understand how these events in which you have been caught came about. My father was the eldest son, Martine was the only daughter—she was the mother of Amorel—and Jules was the younger son. He became curious as to the relatives in France whom he had never met. When he was sixteen he went to France for a holiday and sought the family, and there became influenced by them. From that day he changed. He never forgave my grandfather for giving him Berber blood and did everything possible to erase all traces of it in himself. He became wild and arrogant, and finally left Kadir for good. The girl he fell in love with refused to marry him, and eventually he married a young widow in Marseilles and settled down to take over the business her late husband had left. Soon he was bankrupt and was forced to turn to my grandfather for money.
The house of the Amulet Page 15
