who said this was even a sandstorm? There had been no reports of any adverse weather, because she’d checked both the local and the satellite reports before she’d left the palace. She might be reckless, but she was not an idiot.
She repeated the reassuring words, but her gaze remained superglued to the horizon.
The dark, impenetrable cloud grew, blocking out the sun. It had to be at least thirty or forty miles wide, and although it was still a mile away it was advancing fast. The noise cut through the desert silence. Tiny creatures—a lizard, a snake, a rodent—scurried and slithered past her boots, rushing to burrow into the ground. The bright, cloudless sky darkened.
Fear clawed at her throat as her mind tried to engage. Should she get into the SUV? Should she get under it?
Then she saw something—a blot on the horizon—emerge from the cloud like a bullet. It took a while for the shimmering blot to solidify into a silhouette. It was a person, on a horse, galloping fast.
Panic and anxiety tightened around her throat.
Black flowing robes lifted in the wind behind the charging figure, like the wings of a giant predatory bird, as the horse’s hooves became audible over the roar of the sand.
The rider was a man. A very big man. His outline broad and strong, the fluid graceful movements powerful and overwhelming as he seemed to become one with the stallion as it galloped at full speed. He wore a headdress, masking most of his face.
The panic wrapped around her heart, the thundering beat matching the clump-clump-clump of the approaching hooves—as she saw the horse and rider change course and veer straight towards her.
Then she noticed the rifle strap crossing his broad chest.
A bandit. What else could he be, miles from civilisation?
Run, Kasia, run.
The silent scream echoed inside her head. The howling winds lifted the sand around her. Then in her grandmother’s voice—a voice she had always associated with salvation—Stay calm. Don’t panic. He’s just a man.
But even as she tried to rationalise the fear, liberate herself from the panic—reminding her of the sight of her mother walking away for the last time—a strange melting sensation at her core plunged into her abdomen.
A shout rang out, muffled by his scarf, in a dialect she didn’t recognise.
He was almost upon her.
For goodness’ sake, Kasia, stop standing there like a ninny and move.
The call to action helped drown out the fear of being alone and defenceless, a fear she had spent years conquering in childhood.
You’re not that little girl who wasn’t good enough. You’re brave and smart and accomplished.
She scrambled round the Jeep, wrenched open the passenger door, and dived into the stuffy interior. The sand peppering the windows sounded like rifle shots as her hand landed on the pistol in the passenger seat.
Zane had insisted she learn to shoot before he would allow her to go into the desert alone. But as her fingers closed over the metal, her heart butted her tonsils.
She knew how to shoot at a target with some degree of accuracy, but she had never shot a living thing.
The charging horse came to an abrupt stop only inches from the SUV’s bumper. Scrambling out, the sand slicing her cheeks like a whip, Kasia lifted the pistol in both hands and pressed a trembling finger to the trigger.
‘Stop there or I’ll shoot,’ she shouted in English, because it had become her first language after five years in the UK.
Chocolate eyes narrowed above the mask—glittering with intent and fury. The warmth in her abdomen became hot and heavy. And all the more terrifying.
The bandit swung a leg over the horse’s neck and jumped down in one fluid movement without speaking, those dark eyes burning into her soul.
She jerked back a step and the pistol went off. The pop was barely audible in the storm, but the recoil threw her down hard on her backside and she saw the man jerk back.
Had she hit him?
Before the thought had a chance to register, the stallion reared, its hooves pawing the air above her head. The bandit caught the horse’s reins before the animal could trample her into the desert floor, and she felt a rush of relief. Within seconds, though, he loomed over her again and the relief that she hadn’t killed him turned to panic. She scrambled back on her bottom, kicked out with her feet.
‘Get away from me.’
Where was the gun?
She searched for it frantically, but her vision was all but obscured by the swirling sands. He had become the only focus, the ominous outline bearing down on her.
Long fingers shot from the storm and gripped her arm. He hauled her up, bent down and hefted her onto his shoulder with such speed and strength she could barely grasp what was happening before she found herself straddling the huge black horse’s sweat-soaked back.
She lifted her leg, trying to dismount, but before she could get her knee over the pommel, he had mounted behind her.
He grasped the reins with one hand and banded his other arm around her midriff, pulling her into the unyielding strength of his body.
She let out an ‘Oomph…’ as the air was expelled from her lungs. The iron band of his forearm pressed into her breasts. Then suddenly they were flying, her bottom bouncing on the saddle—abandoning the Jeep, which was already half-buried in sand. Her body was forced to succumb to the will of his much bigger, much stronger one as he bent forward, his robes shielding her from the sand stinging her eyes. She tried to cry out, to fight the lethargy wrought by terror, the visceral heat coursing through her body making her too aware of every place their bodies touched.
He’s kidnapping you. You must fight. You must survive.
The words screamed in her head, but her breathing was so rapid now it was painful, her whole body confined, subdued, overwhelmed by his and the storm of sand and dust and darkness raging around them.
They seemed to ride for ever through the swirl of sand—until eventually her fear and panic stopped crushing her ribs and her body melted into exhaustion. The rhythm of the horse’s movements seeped into her bones, the man’s unyielding strength cocooning her against the elements.
Was this Stockholm syndrome? she wondered vaguely, her tired mind no longer capable of engaging with the terror as her body succumbed to the impenetrable darkness, the controlled purpose of her captor’s movements and the stultifying heat coursing through her.
As her eyes drifted shut and her bones turned to water, she dropped down through the years, until she became that little girl again. But this time she was no longer alone and defenceless, her mother gone without a backward glance, but sheltered in strong arms against the storm.
