by Penny Jordan
They had arrived at the oasis late the previous afternoon to find a small but very luxurious encampment of traditional black pavilions erected close to the oasis, and smiling staff on hand to attend to their every need.
Once inside the large pavilion assigned to her, Sadie had been awed by its luxury and comfort. She even had her own private bathroom, complete with a shower.
But what she didn’t have was Drax. The oasis was beautiful, but her misery was making it impossible for her to enjoy and appreciate it. She hadn’t been able to eat the breakfast she had been served, and she had come here, to this quiet part of the oasis away from the tents, to hide her confusion and misery from everyone else and to try to decide what she should do.
And now here was Vere, who had been so charming to her, and so kind, but who just wasn’t the man she wanted and loved. While Drax, whom she did love and want, was behaving as though she did not exist. No wonder she felt so sick at heart.
‘Has Drax told you that we are having to cut short our stay at the oasis?’ Vere asked.
Sadie shook her head, unable to bring herself to admit that Drax hadn’t said a word to her since they had arrived the previous evening.
‘We have received a warning that a sandstorm is veering this way, far more severe than first expected, so regrettably we cannot remain.’
‘The oasis is lovely,’ Sadie told him listlessly. She had seen how much Vere loved the desert, and his own obvious disappointment made her feel that she should offer some kind of sympathetic response.
‘Indeed—but the desert can be fatally cruel to those who treat her lightly. Did you enjoy last night’s ceremony?’ he asked her.
‘Yes. It’s a heartwarming tradition.’ Sadie tried to sound enthusiastic.
‘We certainly think so,’ Vere replied. ‘Our family had always ruled Dhurahn, of course, but we celebrate the signing of the agreement because it signifies Dhurahn’s new era of peace between what were previously warring warrior tribes. When the agreement was signed, two doves were released as a symbol of peace and hope for the future. Drax and I have always celebrated the occasion at the oasis. As boys, it was something we looked forward to. To those born of the desert there is always that sense of homecoming and completion about living as our forebears did, in harmony with the desert, respecting its power over us. ‘You look unhappy,’ he added suddenly, in a quieter tone, catching Sadie off guard.
She could feel her emotions tightening her throat. She bowed her head, not wanting to shame herself by letting Vere see her tears. But to her surprise Vere leaned forward and took hold of her hand, raising it to his lips. His kiss was kind, but meaningless to her, Sadie admitted wearily. Just as every man’s kiss would be to her from now on. Because he wouldn’t be Drax.
Vere watched Sadie in silence. He could see how upset she was, and he didn’t want to upset her further. A little to his own surprise, Vere had discovered that the more he got to know Sadie, the deeper his feelings with regard to her had become. She would make a perfect royal consort as far as he was concerned. But now it seemed, from his behaviour towards her, that Drax no longer shared that view. It was, he decided, time that he spoke to Drax and found out exactly what was going on. He had held off questioning his twin directly in the hope that Drax would come to him and speak openly, and it saddened and hurt him that Drax hadn’t done so.
Drax frowned as he watched Vere and Sadie. He could feel the now-familiar sensation of unbearable emotional agony ripping into him. He wanted to go to them and physically push his twin aside, then take hold of Sadie so that Vere couldn’t touch her. He knew that Sadie herself didn’t understand what was happening. He could see it in her eyes. But how could he explain to her that Vere was claiming her?
Vere had just left her when some instinct made Sadie turn her head just in time to see Drax disappearing inside his pavilion. Her heart felt as though it was being torn apart. She couldn’t endure any more of this torture. She had to know the truth; she had to know if Drax had ever loved her or if he had simply been cold-bloodedly lying to her. And if so, why? Not because he had hoped to trick her into his bed, obviously! She would go and have it out with him now, before she lost her courage, she decided. And she would demand that he return her passport to her so that she could leave Dhurahn. Her mind made up, Sadie made her way back through the busy bustle of men working to break up the camp and prepare for their return journey.
Already the hot bright glare of the sun had become slightly dimmed, the sky taking on an ominous, sulphurous tinge. But it was the storm inside herself that concerned Sadie more than the sandstorm threatening the oasis as she headed for the black tent she knew to be Drax’s.
The tents had already been erected when they’d arrived, and Sadie had been bemused to discover just how luxurious the drab black structures crouched on the sand were on the inside. Her own was carpeted with beautiful Persian rugs and divided into a bedroom and a sitting area, both of which were furnished with luxurious fabrics, rich silks and velvets strewn over low divans, and a wide, lonely bed in which she had been unable to sleep because of her longing for Drax. She had tortured herself with imagining Drax in his own bed. How she had longed to be sharing the scented darkness of his pavilion and its privacy with Drax. In her mind’s eye she had seen herself going to him, as secretly as though she were a favoured slave girl summoned to her master, crouching at the foot of his bed, waiting his permission to slowly caress and kiss her way up his naked body. But Drax did not want her kisses. He did not want her. He had made that plain enough.
A group of men were working outside Drax’s pavilion, causing Sadie to hesitate, wary of just walking inside in full view of them, knowing the strict moral conventions Vere and Drax’s subjects followed. There was another, smaller side entrance, though, just as there was in her own tent, and she headed for that
Drax was working on his computer when Vere walked into his tent. He frowned, pushing back his chair and standing up.
‘The storm is getting worse,’ Vere told him.
Drax watched him grimly. Vere hadn’t come here to tell him that.
‘I want to talk to you about Sadie,’ Vere said quietly. ‘You’re in love with her, aren’t you?’
Drax couldn’t make himself deny it. ‘What if I am? It doesn’t affect you.’
‘Of course it does. We’ve always shared everything, Drax.’
Sadie had managed to slip unnoticed into Drax’s tent, but now, as she heard the two brothers’ voices, she panicked and turned to leave. When she tried she discovered that the exit had been blocked by the men working outside, their four-wheel drive now parked close by. What on earth was she to do? She couldn’t leave, but she certainly couldn’t brazenly walk in on the two brothers either. She would just have to stay here until either Vere or both of them left.
She heard Vere saying something, but as always it was Drax’s voice her senses registered more clearly, clinging to it with all the desperation of the lover who was unloved. She was pathetic, she derided herself. But the sound of her own name had Sadie stiffening and creeping closer to the fabric wall separating her from the brothers.
‘So we share her, do we? How? In bed?’ Drax could hear the emotion he couldn’t control cracking his voice. ‘Turn and turn about? Until she’s so dizzy she can’t tell the difference between us?’
Sadie went icy cold with shock, and then hot with fear. Nausea cramped her stomach and rose sourly in her throat.
In the semi-light of the richly furnished tent, Vere waited to let the bitterness and anger spew out of his twin before he spoke. But Sadie could not wait. Driven by revulsion and horror, she stumbled back towards the narrow exit she had used to enter the tent and pushed her way through the workmen, no longer caring how it would look.
She was out of hearing range when Vere stepped towards Drax and placed his hands on his shoulders, ignoring Drax’s attempts to push him off. ‘Why are you saying these things?’ he asked him. ‘I like Sadie, yes. But I do not desire her. When I
think of her, I think of her as the woman you love.’
Outside, the wind had picked up dramatically, making Sadie stagger as she felt its full force. They would soon be returning to the city, but she couldn’t wait that long for her escape or for oblivion.
A Land Rover had pulled up almost in front of her, its driver getting out and leaving the engine running as he hurried to help two other men who were staggering under the weight of what they were carrying. Without giving herself time to rationalise what she was doing, Sadie ran to it, ignoring the grains of sand tearing at her exposed skin and burning her eyes and mouth as she climbed into the vehicle and pulled the door closed after her. In front of her was a barely discernible track. She released the brake and put her foot on the accelerator.
Immediately the powerful off-roader surged forward into the seething storm. Sadie didn’t care that she might be putting herself in danger. What was physical danger to her now, after what she had just heard? Her heart lurched against her ribs. She had thought that the worst pain she would ever have to bear was knowing that Drax didn’t love her. But she had been wrong and naïve. So stupidly naïve. How many other women had been used by Drax and his brother as they had planned to use her? She knew there were those who might boast that they would enjoy such an experience, but she was not one of them. The thought of the two men touching her intimately, using her body for their pleasure, excited by the knowledge that they were sharing her, filled her with disgust and loathing.
Vere held Drax’s bitter gaze as he waited for his twin to respond. The silence seemed to go on for ever, but finally Drax exhaled and said thickly, ‘Vere, you are just saying that for my sake, because you know that I love her too. But you forget that you have already told me that she will make a perfect wife.’
‘Yes,’ Vere agreed. ‘But for you, not for me. I had hoped my words would encourage you to confide in me and confirm what I had already guessed—that despite the fact that you had insisted you were bringing Sadie to Dhurahn for me you had fallen in love with her yourself. Do you really think I am so blind, so insensitive to your feelings, that I wouldn’t know immediately how you felt about her? Although I have to say, after the way you have been treating her these last few days, I wouldn’t blame Sadie for doubting how you feel about her. You’ve practically ignored her, and—’
‘I did that for your sake! Because I thought that you too had fallen in love with her.’
‘And it was for your sake that I didn’t ask what was going on.’ There was a hint of self-reproach as well as compassion in Vere’s voice. ‘I should have spoken more openly to you. But you know that I am not as comfortable in my emotional skin as you are in yours. I told myself that were I in your shoes I would want to choose the moment to tell you of my feelings rather than have you confront me with them. I knew something was wrong, but I had no idea what you were thinking. I should have guessed.’
‘How could you?’ Drax told him, sensing that this twin was blaming himself for what that happened. ‘It is a well-known fact that when a man falls passionately and deeply in love he is lost to all reason. I assumed that because I love Sadie you must do the same. I was jealous, bitterly so, but I felt I had to stick to my statement to you that I was bringing Sadie back to Dhurahn for you.’
‘Have you told Sadie any of this?’
‘No. I couldn’t bring myself to do so.’
‘She is very distressed by your behaviour towards her,’ Vere told him gently.
‘She told you that?’
Now Vere could smile, as he heard and recognised the reason for the hostility in his twin’s voice. ‘Not as such. But it is plain to me that she is unhappy.’
While they had been speaking the noise of the wind had been increasing, to the point where now they had to talk loudly to make themselves heard above it.
‘We need to return to the city,’ Vere said. ‘We don’t want to be caught out here in the storm.’
‘I’ll drive Sadie back myself,’ Drax said. ‘And the first thing I shall want to do when we get back is set in hand the arrangements for my marriage—after I have apologised to her.’
Suddenly they were both laughing, embracing one another with genuine understanding and mutual happiness.
As they stepped back, one of the workmen suddenly burst into the tent, exclaiming, ‘Highness! The English girl has just driven out of the camp in one of the Land Rovers.’
Drax released Vere and turned to look at the anxious man who had come hurrying into the tent.
‘What?’
It couldn’t be possible that Sadie had done something so dangerous. But the look on the workman’s face confirmed that it was.
The two brothers ran for the exit.
Outside, men were battling against the strong winds to pack everything up, some of them bent almost double against the force. A thick veil of storm-driven sand was turning the landscape into a yellow fog.
‘Which way did she go?’ Drax yelled at the workman above the keening howl of the wind.
The man pointed in the direction of the eye of the storm. Drax and Vere exchanged grim looks.
‘I’m going after her,’ Drax said.
‘You can’t—you won’t—’ Vere began, and then stopped when he saw the expression in his twin’s eyes. ‘I’m coming with you,’ he said instead.
Drax shook his head, but the look he gave his twin was filled with love and gratitude.
‘No, Vere,’ he told him gruffly. ‘We both know that I have to go after her, even though we also know the danger. My life is nothing without her.’
‘As is mine without you, my brother,’ Vere said simply.
Tears burned the backs of Drax’s eyes. ‘You will go on because you must—because our people and our country need you. But I cannot go on without Sadie. Before I met her I would have sworn that there could be no bond, no love that could ever be as strong as what I share with you. But Sadie has shown me that I was wrong. I have to find her.’
‘And if you don’t?’
‘I won’t rest until I do. I won’t come back until I find her. And I will find her. Even if I have to search the desert through this life and eternity for her.’
Vere gave a small nod of his head.
‘Go, then, my brother,’ he said softly. ‘And my prayers go with you. We will leave the generator and one of the tents, just in case you should need it.’
Drax nodded his own head. They embraced again, and Vere stood and watched as Drax ducked under the ferocity of the wind and climbed into his four-wheel drive.
‘Excellency, we must leave soon,’ one of the workmen begged Vere urgently.
Vere nodded, but didn’t move until the whirling sand had swallowed up Drax’s vehicle and he could see him no longer.
Outside the windows the sand whirled and the wind howled, battering the vehicle from all directions. Sadie had long ago lost sight of the track she had been following, but she didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything. She only wanted oblivion.
A sob tore at her throat, her emotions shaking her body in much the same way as the storm shook the vehicle. Both she and the vehicle were in the grip of a force so powerful that they could not escape from it. The storm was threatening to pluck up the heavy car and mercilessly destroy it, but it wasn’t that that was making the dry sobs tear at Sadie’s throat. Drax! How could he have planned to subject her to such degradation? She couldn’t bear to think of the fate he had been willing to inflict on her, and she couldn’t bear to know that she had loved him. She wanted to tear his memory from her heart and her mind.
The vehicle’s engine started to race as it struggled to climb a steep, invisible incline—so steep that it must almost be perpendicular, Sadie realised, as the wheels spun and the vehicle rocked. Without warning it suddenly started to plunge downwards at great speed.
Sadie tried to brake, but it was no use. The vehicle was out of control. She cried out in the seconds before the vehicle lurched to an abrupt halt, causing her to bang her head on the wi
ndow, and through the pain she was aware that she had cried out Drax’s name. And the pain of knowing that was far greater than the injury to her throbbing head. Her forehead felt wet and sticky. She lifted her hand to it and saw that she was bleeding. Already she could barely see through the windscreen because of the sand. She knew she ought to be afraid, but somehow she wasn’t. What was the point? Right now dying felt easier than living with the knowledge of Drax’s cruelty.
Sadie couldn’t have got very far, Drax tried to reassure himself. She had driven off down a well-used track, according to the driver of the off-roader she had taken. But she had also driven right into the path of the oncoming storm—which was why he had refused Vere’s offer to come with him.
That he would find Sadie was not in doubt. Whether they would survive the fury of the storm was a different matter. Like all modern vehicles in use in Dhurahn for desert travel, both were fitted with a special tracking system that ensured a driver could not become lost in the desert. His mobile phone might not work in the ferocity of the storm, but the tracking device would. Which was just as well, Drax thought, well aware of how easily a sandstorm could change the landscape, wiping out its existing features and creating new ones. It was impossible for him to see very much through his windscreen, but unlike Sadie he knew exactly what to do when he suddenly started to climb a steep sandhill.
Even though he knew approximately where the other vehicle was, it still took Drax several precious minutes to locate it, half buried beneath the sand. When he wrenched open the door and saw Sadie slumped over the driving wheel he felt as though his heart was being forcibly ripped out of his chest. But the moment he touched her she jerked upward, her eyes opening and darkening with horror as she saw him.
‘No! Not you…No…’ She was crying and half hysterical as she tried to push him away, to stop him from lifting her out of the car, but Drax persevered, dragging her free as she collapsed against him. Bent almost double under her weight, he struggled back to his own vehicle. Already sand was drifting against it, driven there by the unrelenting wind. Drax knew there was no chance of them making it back to Dhurahn ahead of the storm, but if they stayed here it would overwhelm them. The oasis was their best chance of survival—if they could get there.
