Shadow of the Sheikh (11 page)

“I haven't decided,” he growled. “I should just kill you and save myself dealing with your treachery. If Kilpatrick had done that with your sister, Khepesh would not now be facing annihilation, and I would not have failed in my duty to the god!”

Her eyes rounded and she swallowed. “You can't mean that. You wouldn't kill a woman you made love to all night. You couldn't.”

“Made
love?
” He gave a snort of derision to show what he thought of that concept. “I used your body, nothing more.”

He ignored the spike of remorse he felt when her lips parted a fraction and her face went carefully neutral. But he could see in her eyes he'd hurt her, which was complete insanity, because to be hurt, she had to feel something for him.

Or think she did. Was that infernal spell
still
working?

“I see,” she murmured, casting her wounded eyes downward.

“Lest you carry any illusions, you are here to share my bed for a short while, nothing more. Do not deceive yourself that this fantasy of yours involves any deeper feelings from either of us. Or that I am interested in any kind of permanence.”

“I see,” she repeated.

“I am easily bored.”

She just looked at the floor.

He paced away from her, refusing to feel an iota of guilt. This was all
her
doing. Even so, the earthquakes stilled.

He turned. “Now, tell me where Josslyn has gone,” he commanded her.

“I don't know,” she said. Her chin lifted stubbornly and her gaze met his. “And guess what? I wouldn't tell you even if I
did
know.”

He regarded her, suddenly feeling absolutely calm. “Oh, you would tell me,” he assured. He took a step toward her. “You
will
tell me.”

Her chin went higher. “What are you going to do, torture me?”

“Have a care,” he quietly cautioned. Though it wouldn't be the kind of torture she expected. Not by any measure. “You forget who I am.
What
I am.”

“You are Sheikh Shahin, legendary leader of the death warriors.” She leaned toward him and pressed a finger into his chest. “Well, Sheikh Shahin, do your worst. You may have me in your power, but I'll be
damned
if I let you have my sister, too.”

His lips curved sinisterly. She had no idea what she was toying with here. He could break her without lifting a finger. Have anything he wanted from her with a mere thought.

In minutes.

Seconds.

But no, he decided. It would be much more amusing to take his time teaching her a lesson.

In the end, he would get what he wanted. Along with the greater gratification of her obedience.

G
emma did her best not to be terrified out of her wits. She'd never seen Shahin this angry before. He'd leashed the earthquakes, but his otherworldly energy swirled in the air around him, so thick and heavy you could almost touch it.

But she knew he wouldn't hurt her. He
wouldn't
. After the night they'd had together, she refused to believe it of him.

Even though her mind screamed at her
Shrink back! Escape!
she stepped closer to him. And closer still. Until she stood right in front of him, her body brushing against his.

He might deny he had feelings for her, but she
knew better. She knew exactly what kind of feelings he had for her.

His eyes narrowed to black slits. But trust was not among those sentiments.

Why?

He was like a different person from last night. One who didn't even see her. She wondered what had happened in his past to make the man so hard and cold on the outside. She knew very well he wasn't that way on the inside. She'd had ample proof of it last night.

“Shahin,” she said, striving to sound far calmer than she felt. “You don't want to do this.”

“But I do,” he refuted, and reached for her.

At the touch of his hands, his magical energy crept up her arms like a bath of warm fur. It melted over her, higher and lower, enveloping her whole body, taking control of her, robbing her of her strength. She shivered. Loving how it felt…knowing she shouldn't let herself succumb to it. Such a show of domination, of supernatural “otherness” should frighten her. But it just felt…good.

She couldn't help herself, she put her arms around him. He stiffened. “Just how will you torture me?” she asked seductively.

He was silent for several heartbeats. At length, he said, “You are either a very brave or a very foolish woman, Gemma Haliday.”

He wasn't the first person to tell her that. Mostly it had been a comment on her returning again and again to Egypt to do her ethnographical fieldwork. But just as her love for this country was too complicated to explain, so were her feelings for this man. He'd hurt her just now, denying their connection so brutally. But she didn't believe him. Perhaps bravely, perhaps foolishly, she trusted Egypt to keep her safe. And she trusted Shahin as well.

She looked up at him and felt herself drowning in the press of his overwhelming power. It was like sinking underwater, except she could breathe. Sort of.

He mirrored her gaze evenly. “I could bespell you,” he said, “and you would tell me everything you know.”

“Which is nothing,” she returned. “How could I? I've been here with you for two days.”

“But you know your sister,” he pointed out. “I could shower you with pain, and you would beg to tell me where she is so that it would stop.”

“You wouldn't do that,” she said without hesitation. “You're not that cruel.”

He stared at her for a long moment. “I could touch you,” he said, his voice going low and suggestive, “and you would beg to tell me where she is to make me continue.”

“You'll do that anyway,” she murmured, and
brushed her lips over his. “And believe me, it's not torture.”

He closed his eyes for a split second, then opened them again fiercely. “You are a witch,” he gritted out, stepped into her and covered her lips with his. Erotic energy spilled through her, like he was feeding it to her with his tongue.

“And you are a demon,” she returned. For that was exactly what he was, an ancient warrior come from the realm of the underworld to claim her soul for his own purposes. And with growing desperation she realized a terrible truth. She would give it to him, gladly, if only he wanted to claim her heart as well. She shuddered with need and kissed him back, swallowing the magical essence of him, eating at his mouth and his lips, wanting more of it. Of him.

He kissed her until they were both shaking and panting with want. And then he pulled away with a low growl. He held her body apart from his with fingers like steel talons in the flesh of her arms. He glared down at her as if what he really wanted to do was cast her away from himself forever.

“Please, Shahin,” she whispered. Not really knowing what she expected of him, not as a leader of the
per netjer
, nor as her lover, but having the sinking feeling she would never get what she needed to feel okay with any of this, on any level. “I honestly don't know where Josslyn has gone.”

Whether he believed her, there was no way of telling. Within the storm cloud of his face, his eyes were like black voids, the gold rings around his pupils flashing like lightning. “I'll make a bargain with you,” he said, his deep voice vibrating with something she dared not guess.

Speak of the devil…
“What kind of bargain?” she asked, licking her lips, gathering a taste of him on her tongue. Weakening further.

“Come with me to Khepesh. Meet the man intended for your sister. See for yourself that he is a worthy match for her.”

Whatever bargain she'd expected, this wasn't it. She gaped at him. “You want to take me to your temple-palace?” She didn't know whether to be thrilled or scared stiff. “The
per netjer
, yes. Meet Seth-Aziz. See how we live. Make up your own mind if your sister could be happy with him.”

“That's not for me to decide,” she argued. She tried to pull away, but he wouldn't let her go. “And what if I don't like him? What happens then?”

“Even the Lady Gillian found Seth-Aziz to be a good man,” he reasoned. “She liked and respected him.”

“And yet she ran away with another. Betrayed him, rather than marry him.”

The lightning in Shahin's eyes flashed brighter.
“Because of Lord Kilpatrick, not Seth-Aziz, or what he is.”

A shiver went down her spine at the thought of being married to a vampire…feeding a vampire with blood from your own veins…having sex with a vampire. This wasn't some silly teen movie where everything was Hollywood-perfect, where no one got hurt and it never got ugly. This was the real thing, bloody and messy.

“Are you sure about that?” she asked, totally unconvinced.

He leveled her a scorching gaze and let her go. He turned and strode toward the door. “I won't force you, Gemma. You must enter Khepesh of your own free will.”

His power still roiled like a living thing around her. She knew he could compel her to do anything he wanted easily enough. So why didn't he?

He lifted the curtained door and held it open for her, silently commanding her to go with him.

Did she really have a choice? Besides, maybe she'd feel better about all this if she met the man ultimately responsible for drawing her and her sisters onto this fateful, otherworldly path.

Or maybe she wouldn't. In which case, she'd decide then what to do about it.

She followed Shahin outside and watched nervously as he sent Hasim to fetch his men, then
he sketched a small design in the air with his fingers and murmured an incantation.

Several large shapes began to materialize from a swirling mist in front of them.
The ghost camels.
One of the apparitions trotted over to Shahin and lowered itself onto its belly for him. He beckoned to her to come.

Warily, she went to him. He gathered her body in his arms and seemingly effortlessly mounted the huge beast and settled her on the soft saddle in front of him. With a chorus of masculine shouts and animal hisses, his men also mounted and joined them. As one, the troop of warriors took off, loping up the dunes and galloping forth across the desert sands. Toward what…only God knew.

Shahin held her tight against his chest and wrapped his
bisht
around them both as a shield against the hot wind and blazing sun.

It was only then she had a chance to really think about what she was doing. And that's when the fear began to climb within her.

Sheikh Shahin, the legendary harbinger of death, was taking her to Khepesh,
per netjer
of Set-Sutekh, the God of Darkness and Chaos, dwelling place of his immortal followers. To meet the vampire demigod Seth-Aziz.

But Shahin had never said anything about leaving
again. What if the cult had other plans for her? What if once inside their lair, they wouldn't let her go?

He had just told her she would only share his bed for a short while. What would happen to her after he tired of her?

What if that pomegranate martini really
had
been the updated version of the old myth and she had eaten the six seeds that doomed her to live in Set-Sutekh's underworld palace forever, once Shahin ceased to be amused by her?

She turned in his arms, striving to mask the rush of panic that crept through her bones. She caught his gaze with hers. “You aren't going to leave me there without you, are you?” she asked. “At Khepesh?”

He didn't look away, but he didn't answer either.

Suddenly a bolt of raw terror stabbed through her.
“Shahin?”
Her heart stalled completely. Yes, she'd angered him by defying his wishes, but…” You wouldn't do that, would you?”

His mouth thinned and he regarded her for a long, tense moment. “I haven't decided,” was all he said.

 

Shahin knew he was losing his mind.

He must be. Because most definitely the organ he was thinking with at the moment did
not
reside in his head.

He watched Gemma's face drain of color and
actually felt a stab of guilt over his unfeeling words, both now and earlier.

By the rod of Osiris!

He turned aside and ignored her. Or tried to. Even though it wasn't easy with the warmth of her body pressed intimately against his, and the weight of her uncertain gaze upon him.

He'd promised Seth to use all his powers to find Josslyn Haliday. A simple spell of veracity would make Gemma spill her secrets, including where her sister had fled, if she knew. But Shahin had not cast the spell. Why? Because he couldn't bear the thought of seeing that trusting, adoring look in her eyes turn to suspicion, or worse, hatred, when she realized what he had done.

Gemma was like no other woman he'd ever met. She wasn't afraid of him. She didn't want anything from him. Not money or gifts. Not magic. Not eternal life. She hadn't asked him for a single thing. Well, all right she had, in bed. But those things he'd been more than happy to grant her. What he
wasn't
happy to gift her with was any part of his heart, or any of his emotions at all. And yet, inexplicably, he found himself doing just that.

He yearned to let go and allow himself to feel something for this woman who was so unique, as his reckless heart was urging him to do.

Had he not learned his lesson the first time a
woman had used her wiles on him? Had he and his family not suffered enough for that misplaced trust?

Nephtys had tried to convince him not all women were like the lover who'd betrayed him so long ago. But in his position, how could he take that chance? As captain of the guard, he could not afford a mistake that might jeopardize the lives of all those who depended upon him for their safety. If his emotions were compromised, he could not trust his decisions.

And he'd be an utter fool to trust Gemma Haliday.

He really
should
leave her at Khepesh. Remove the temptation of her from his life altogether. That was where she was destined to end up anyway. What was wrong with hastening along the inevitable?

Unfortunately, he knew exactly what was wrong with it.

He wanted her right where she was.

In his arms. Warm. Pliable. Giving. Loving.

Even if it was just a fantasy illusion.

They reached the
gebel
entrance to the palace, and he waved it open. Without breaking stride, the camels plunged down into the Realm of Darkness.

Gemma clung to him. He held her as they rode deeper and deeper, down into the very heart of the underworld. Until a faint light pierced the
dark, growing into the brilliant glow of a hundred torches.

They'd reached their destination.

The Great Western Gate of Khepesh.

 

The camels snorted and brayed, turning sideways and shying from the burning torches as the men reined them in.

Gemma sat awestruck, unable to move as she gazed up at the monumental silver gate before her.

Soaring at least three stories above them, the portal was really a huge double door. It seemed to be made of solid, glittering silver and was flanked by tall, lotus-shaped, fire-burning torches. Both wings of the door were engraved with row upon row of intricately wrought hieroglyphics. The cartouche of Set-Sutekh graced the center of each, along with a reverse
wedget
, the left eye of Horus—the symbol of Set-Sutekh's victory over the Sun God.

She still hadn't quite believed that Shahin was bringing her to the mythical dwelling place of the God of the Moon. But she was starting to be convinced.

“My God,” Gemma whispered threadily, clutching Shahin's hand with trembling fingers. “It's magnificent.”

“Just wait,” he said. He lifted her off the camel and they approached the gate.

It made a long, deep clang and slowly started
to open. The air around them vibrated, conveying something far deeper than sound. It was as though the power and magic of the tomb-palace could not be contained by mere walls. She felt the energy rise around her, electric and potent, more and more with every inch the gate opened. A shiver sifted down her arms, raising a rash of goose flesh.

She eased behind Shahin's body, totally spooked.

He urged her forward again. “Don't be afraid. No one's going to hurt you.”

This coming from the man who had just threatened to torture her.

Inside the gate, a crowd of people was gathering. They looked…interesting. Some were dressed in modern clothes, some in the ancient Egyptian style and others in every imaginable fashion in between.