Her captivity didn’t matter.
It sure as hell mattered when he saw her hovering around Asad’s tent all evening. Waiting for the man to finish up his business? Asad had only moved her out of his tent a few days ago. Maybe they were starting to miss each other. Zach had been doing without sleep to make sure something clandestine wasn’t going on.
How would he feel if Asad’s arms was where she chose to spend tonight? It was the same question he’d asked himself every night for the past three nights. He ran a hand through his hair. He knew he wouldn’t be able to stand by and watch it happen.
Then he’d been lying to Asad when he’d said he only wanted to make Michelle happy.
Thank God they were leaving tomorrow.
But what if he wasn’t the man who could make her happy? Then he’d have a hard time explaining to McKenna how he started a war over one woman. Because he wasn’t just going to let Asad take her.
His wingman. His woman.
She wasn’t dead, but was she still his?
Zach watched as Michelle made her way from the noisy crowds near Asad’s tent to the deserted end of the camp near her own quarters. She stopped to exchange a few words with Raja. The women hugged.
Funny, he’d never thought of her as the kind of woman who had much use for girlfriends. He’d never seen her hug Skeeter. Nor had he ever overheard them talking about anything except jets.
And that was the real kicker. He could understand her forgetting him. But jets? Somebody must have really done a number on her head. It was up to him to bring her back.
Michelle ducked into her tent. He let out the breath he’d been holding. Maybe he wouldn’t get any sleep tonight. But he could feel the tension slipping away just knowing that Asad wouldn’t be getting anything else.
But then she reappeared a few minutes later with her flight suit on. He straightened, on full alert. He didn’t like seeing her in the bloodstained clothes. But he suspected she’d put them on over the other outfit to ward off the chill.
He held his breath, waiting for her next move, but she clung to the shadows by her tent.
Zach made his way back to camp, back to Michelle, guided by the light of the full moon, but sticking to the shadows whenever possible. Well after 0200 hours, and the party showed no signs of breaking up.
He reached her tent. Watched her watching Asad. Longing evident in her beautiful moonlit face.
Zach felt the dagger plunge straight to his heart.
Across the campfire Raja whispered in Asad’s ear, then danced away toward the Bedouin sheik’s tent. Asad got up and followed her.
Zach didn’t know whether to feel sorry for Michelle. Or a little smug satisfaction for himself.
He stepped up behind her.
“Maybe it’ll be your turn tomorrow night. Oops, I forgot we’ll be gone.” He could have bitten off his tongue as soon as he said it.
“Oh, grow up, Zach,” she said without turning around. “Remind me again why we got engaged when you can be such a jerk.”
“What you see is what you get. Why don’t you tell me?”
She turned to face him, folding her arms. “There must be an awful lot of pain behind those smart-ass comments of yours. I don’t remember a thing about you, yet I have a feeling I’m seeing you clearly for the very first time.”
“You’re the one who walks around with a chip on her shoulder.”
“Ah, so now the gloves come off. We’re going home tomorrow and you don’t feel you have to try so hard around me anymore. I have a chip? I have news for you—all my problems have been wiped away. It’s a clean slate.”
“News flash. Your problems still exist whether you remember them or not!”
“Are you one of my problems? I wasn’t wearing this ring three days ago. Maybe we’d already broken if off. Do you think you’re doing me some big favor by not telling me we hate each other? Because I would really like to know. You know what. Let’s not even wait for tomorrow. I’m ready to leave right now.” She stormed into her tent.
“And for your information, hotshot—” she turned, holding back the flap “—I wasn’t standing here daydreaming about Asad. Romantic fool that I apparently am, I was wishing I could remember what falling in love was like. If I could get one memory back, the day you proposed is the one I want.” She let the flap drop, silent, but as effective as any slamming door.
But not as secure.
He didn’t even let her start tying down the flaps before he pushed his way in.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
He cleared his throat. “We’re not engaged. The day you were shot down, you carried that ring with you in the cargo pocket of your flight suit, but you never knew it. And I never got an answer.”
She stared at her ring finger.
“What do you think my answer would have been?”
“I think we were better friends than lovers. And I think you would have told me to go straight to hell. So don’t rack your brain trying to remember falling in love with me ’cause maybe that one just ain’t there.”
Tears started welling in her eyes.
“How did you propose?”
“I put the ring in a piece of gum, wrapped it back up and gave it to you.” His voice turned from matter-of-fact to serious. “I had erased the comic and penciled ‘Marry me’ in the balloon. But I thought maybe if your answer was no, you’d play it off as a joke…”
“That sounds sweet.” She sniffled. “Except the part about the joke. What if I thought you were the one who wasn’t serious?”
He shrugged. “I’d asked once before. You said no.” He looked uncomfortable. “You need help packing your things?”
“Were we really lousy lovers?”
“Just inexperienced. It was a long time ago.”
“Were you my first?”
“Yeah.”
“Was I your first?”
“Yeah.”
“What if I wanted you to make love to me now?”
He opened his mouth. Only air came out.
“I take it that’s not something the Michelle you know would say. Then maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do, ’cause I’m the one saying it. And I think I would have said yes to that proposal.”
“You’re not acting like yourself. I’m not going to take advantage of you when you’re like this.”
She reached for his belt and pulled him closer. “Don’t you know it’s every woman’s fantasy to make love to a stranger?”
“No. At least, I didn’t know it was yours.”
“If you have a problem with your Michelle acting this way, you can call me sweetheart or darling.” She unclasped his belt. “Or Kalilah.”
With one pull, she yanked his belt free from the loops.
“You’re two fantasies for the price of one. It’s not every day a girl gets a second first time with the stranger she’s known all her life.” She brought his face down to hers. “I reserve the right to give you my answer to your proposal when I know what it is. And when I remember falling in love with you, I’ll tell you. Now you’d better kiss me or I’m going to feel really stupid.”
Zach lowered his mouth to hers.
“Say my name,” she murmured.
“Kalilah,” he managed through parched lips.
“Every year on our anniversary you can be the tall dark stranger who came to the Bedouin camp and I’ll be your Arab slave girl. My answer is yes.”
“Michelle.” In his hunger to have her, he devoured her mouth. In his thirst to quench her every desire, he rained kisses on her face. “I want you so bad.”
She undid the buttons of his shirt, pushed it off his shoulders, trapping his arms so that she could be the aggressor once again.
She ran her hands over the hard planes of his chest. Across his nipples. He moaned. She pushed him back onto the sheepskins. Fell on top of him.
“Do I like it on top?” she asked.
“Oh, yes,” he groaned.
Then he
caught a glimpse of the scared little slave girl in her eyes. Knew she desperately wanted to make a connection. Feel something real and maybe out of reach.
He slowed them down to a leisurely stroll through the garden of pleasure. Kissed her slowly. Gently. Tenderly.
Ever mindful that at any moment this all might come to a screeching halt. Lord help him. He didn’t want it to stop.
His shirt fell by the wayside. And he rolled her beneath him. Hand poised at the zipper of her flight suit, he asked, “What’s my name?”
“Zach,” she said on a sigh.
He trailed the zipper past her navel.
“When did we first meet?”
“In the nursery… By the bell,” she answered between breathless kisses. “Today… Yesterday…”
“Close enough.” He freed the buttons of her shirt. She wasn’t wearing a bra and he cupped her bare breast.
“Oh,” she breathed.
“When did we first make love?” He teased her nipple to a hardened peak.
“Now.” She writhed beneath him. “When we were virgins.” She let out a groan.
He lowered his head and closed his mouth over her flesh. He raised his head to look into her eyes. “When did we fall in love?” He touched her wet nipple. Trailed his hand along the same path as the zipper, past her flat belly. He slipped his hand between her thighs.
She was slick. And hot. And ready for him.
He touched her as if she were the most delicate desert blossom.
“Ah,” she moaned, closing her eyes.
“When did we fall in love?” he repeated, desperately needing to hear that she loved him.
“I’m…still…falling,” she panted.
He smiled at her answer. “Open your eyes, Michelle. Say my name.”
“Zach,” she panted out his name over and over again. He took her to new heights, using the stars in her eyes to guide him.
“I’m still falling, too. And we’re just getting started.”
He stripped the oversize flight suit from her. Struggled with the clothes underneath until she lay bare before his hungry eyes.
Then he trailed his lips down her body, culminating in a most intimate kiss.
Michelle’s world exploded, and she couldn’t deny she was his. She pulled him up from between her thighs by gripping fistfuls of his short jet-black hair. And she seared his mouth in a kiss so hot he’d never doubt he was hers.
“Zach, I want you inside me,” she demanded.
“Sweetheart, we don’t have a condom.”
“In your first-aid kit we do.” She smiled up at him, reaching for the blue canvas bag.
“Are you sure? Maybe this isn’t such a good idea.” She handed the condom to him. “But then again, who am I to argue?” he said, taking the package. “Wrap your legs around me, sweetheart. We’re going for a ride.”
She gave him a playful smack upside the head.
And he got serious. “I thought I lost you on the way to heaven.” He leaned in and kissed her so thoroughly he could have deprived her brain of oxygen and she’d have kept on kissing him until she passed out or died happy. They made love slowly, then made love again in the fevered pitch of two hot sweaty bodies deprived too long of sustenance.
Near dawn they began to make love for a third time, and he reached for another condom package.
She snagged his wrist. “I want to make a baby with you.” She barely held her desperation in check. “Now, tonight.”
He went completely still. “You can’t get pregnant. You’re on birth control. The five-year plan.”
He moved from their bed so fast the chill night replaced his body heat before she even realized the consequences of what she’d said. Of course, she’d forgotten. She touched the underside of her arm. Norplant.
They were using condoms for another reason. She had no memory of the past month, which meant she didn’t remember who she’d been with.
She felt dirty and ashamed.
“I’m sorry,” she said stiffly. “I shouldn’t have even suggested—”
“No need to apologize, Michelle.” His voice cracked.
“I’d probably wind up giving you some kind of horrible disease.”
“I wasn’t even thinking about that.” He stood facing the tent. “We already made a baby once. We were seventeen.”
“What do you mean?”
“You wanted to go to the naval academy. You wanted to be a fighter pilot. You couldn’t do that married or pregnant.”
“I did not do what you are suggesting!” She knelt on the bed and pressed a hand to her stomach.
“I don’t know what you did.” He took a deep breath. “I wasn’t part of the decision. But I can’t blame you for not wanting to marry a guy you thought would be flipping burgers the rest of his life to support you. I tried to convince you it wouldn’t be that bad. But you were probably right. You’re pretty much always right.” He sniffed. And kept his back to her. “God, I haven’t thought about that in a long time. I guess something you don’t want to contemplate is easy to push from your mind.”
“You’re a liar! Get out!” She threw his pants at him. “I never want to see you again as long as I live. I would never do that!”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t man enough for you, Michelle,” he said, stepping into his pants.
Firecrackers popped somewhere outside the tent.
Horses nickered and whinnied. More firecrackers.
And screams.
“Stay down,” he ordered. Grabbing her weapons, he went outside to investigate.
Michelle scrambled into Zach’s discarded shirt and followed.
Dawn streaked the sky. The ground vibrated under pounding hooves. Raiders mounted on horseback rode through the camp, setting tents on fire.
Clouds of billowing smoke choked out visibility.
Shots awaited the unwary running from the flames and into the sights of the raiders’ poised weapons. If they were lucky enough to escape being trampled beneath the powerful horses.
Women and children screamed.
Asad shouted orders. Men took up arms and fired back. Blood flowed.
Much as it did the day she’d arrived.
Michelle stood at the entrance of her tent, shaking.
“Get down!” Zach slammed her body to the ground. Rolled them out of the way of a rider.
He poised to fire on the retreating back of the cowards who’d left a path of destruction in their wake. Until he realized most or all of them carried off women.
Then all went quiet. Eerily quite.
“RAJA! RAJA!” Michelle screamed, leaping to her feet. She raced toward the fallen woman.
Zach followed and caught her. Surveying the destruction, he pulled her closer.
“She’s dead,” he said. He’d seen her shot, then trampled. Blood pooled around her head. He tucked Michelle into the safety of his arms and tried to shield her from the sight.
But Michelle broke free and covered the remaining few feet to her friend’s body. She dropped to the ground and cradled the dead woman in her arms. “Raja. Oh, Raja.” Michelle rocked back and forth. “Don’t die on me now, Sara! Oh, Sara!”
“Michelle?” Zach queried softly. His Michelle.
She looked up at him with tears streaking her beautiful face. “Skeeter’s dead.”
“I know.”
“I tried to stop her. But she killed herself. She was hurt during ejection. She knew I wouldn’t leave her. And she killed herself to save me.” She looked down at Raja’s body, then back up at Zach. “They were after me, weren’t they.”
He didn’t answer, just reached down and pulled Michelle to her feet.
Asad stumbled toward them, coughing from smoke inhalation. “We ride on the al Mukhtar tonight.”
“I’m going with you,” Zach said.
“You can’t leave me!” Michelle cried.
He looked into her eyes. “You’re right. I can’t.” And she was right about the raiders’ purpose. “They killed Raja as
she was coming out of your tent,” he said to Asad, hoping the man would understand what he was trying to say without his having to spell it out. “And they rode off with a half dozen women.”
The riders had been after only one woman.
CHAPTER NINE
0610 Tuesday
ESCAPE
THEY DROVE in silence. Fire had destroyed the al Ra’id camp and with it, their few possessions. They’d managed to save a couple of items from Michelle’s tent, but the loss of Zach’s cell phone and lap top computer, as well as Asad’s, meant they were well and truly cut off from the outside world.
Their only chance was to reach the Cessna.
Michelle shivered. She kept thinking about the injured Asad and their abrupt departure. She would have liked the chance to…what?…say goodbye, thank him, make amends? But Zach had spirited her away.
Someone wanted her dead.
Both Zach and Asad knew it, too, but they weren’t giving her the full story. Asad’s people were better off without her around.
Is your father a great man? Raja’s question came back to haunt her. Her father was a very great man with five thousand Navy SEALs at his disposal. Was someone using her as a pawn? For what purpose?
As the sun rose higher in the sky she got her first chance to really study Zach’s profile. She couldn’t decipher the stern expression.
Did he blame her for the destruction? For ending a pregnancy that never existed? Oh, yes, she’d gotten all her memories back. Even the bittersweet ones.
Still as they raced toward the Cessna, she knew Zach was the one person in this godforsaken desert she could trust with her life. And that trust was tested before they could reach the plane. They were five hundred yards away when it exploded into a ball of flames.
From the west, a horse and rider wearing the robes of the al Makhtar thundered toward them at full speed. As he neared, he fired.
“Head down.” Zach ordered, pushing her head toward his lap. He zigged and zagged to dodge the flying bullets, but the rider pulled even. Aimed his gun at her. Zach steered hard left and the dune buggy pitched and rolled down a dune.
Sign, SEAL, Deliver Page 13
