The Mills & Boon Ultimate Christmas Collection. Kate Hardy

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СКАЧАТЬ do you know your way around?’ she questioned. ‘Aren’t you afraid of getting lost?’

      He gave a brief smile. ‘I grew up in this land,’ he said. ‘And it is as familiar to me as my own skin.’

      ‘Really?’ She thought using his skin as a comparison probably wasn’t the best idea, under the circumstances—but she kept her expression neutral. ‘In what way?’

      He shrugged as he slowed his horse down. ‘You see nothing but sand, but I see ridges and undulations on the surface where the winds have blown—and I can read the wind by sight and sound as others can read music. I know where there are underground rivers and lakes, where vegetation can thrive and provide shelter. And I always make sure I’m carrying adequate supplies of water and a compass—as well as a cell phone.’ He flicked her another brief smile. ‘Would you like me to take you to an oasis?’

      She thought at first that he must be joking, because it sounded so corny. She half remembered some pop song her mother used to love. Something about midnight at an oasis. Livvy gripped the reins a little tighter as she met the gleaming question in his black eyes and suddenly she wondered what the hell was making her hesitate. When else in her life was she ever going to get the opportunity to see an oasis?

      ‘I’d love to,’ she said.

      ‘Then, come,’ he urged, and when he saw the look of hesitation on her face he gave a quick smile. ‘Come.’ Pressing his knees into his horse’s flanks, he set off at a gallop and after a moment’s hesitation Livvy started after him.

      It came back within seconds—that raw exhilaration and sheer joy. She’d forgotten the speed and sense of power you got when you were riding a horse at full pelt, and any lingering reservations were melted away as she galloped after the sheikh.

      Over hard and undulating sands they rode—with nothing but the heavy sound of hooves pounding. They rode until Saladin slowed down the pace so that they could mount a steep incline, and Livvy’s breath died in her throat when she saw what was on the other side. For there was an unexpectedly wide gleam of water surrounded by grasses and a line of lush palm trees that provided acres of shade.

      ‘Oh, wow,’ she said softly. ‘A real oasis.’

      ‘Did you think it was a mirage?’ he questioned drily.

      The truthful answer would have been yes, because nothing felt quite real as Livvy’s horse followed Saladin’s down to the desert lake, and she jumped down to lead her mount towards the water. She could hear the strange squawking of a bird in one of the palm trees and the glugging splash as the two thirsty animals drank. Saladin gestured for her to tether her horse in the shade next to his, while he drew out a canister of water and offered it to her.

      Rarely had any drink ever tasted as delicious as this, and Livvy gulped it down with gratitude and a strange sense of being at peace with herself. She was standing beneath the shade of a palm tree and Saladin was taking the container from her suddenly boneless fingers and drinking from it himself. And she wondered how sharing water with a man could seem so ridiculously intimate. Because they had shared so much more than this? She watched the swallowing movement of his neck and suddenly her mouth felt dry again—even though she’d just drunk about half a litre.

      He didn’t say a word as he put the empty container back and then took her by the hand, leading her towards the cool canopy provided by the palm trees—and she didn’t ask him where he was taking her or what he was about to do when he got there, because she knew.

      It was obvious from the sudden tension in the fingers that were firmly laced around her own. The way in which her heart had suddenly started to race in response. He came to a halt when their faces were shadowed by the cool fronds above their heads, and her face was grave as he removed the wide-brimmed hat from her head and placed it on the ground.

      ‘Saladin,’ she said breathlessly as he framed her face in the palms of his hands.

      His voice was quiet, but insistent. ‘I’m going to kiss you.’

      ‘But you said—’

      ‘I said that we couldn’t have sex in the palace, but we aren’t in the palace now. Are we?’

      She shook her head, wishing he’d made it sound a little less anatomical, wishing he’d responded with a few romantic words in what was a very romantic setting. But maybe she would have to make do with this—along with the realisation that at least he wasn’t making mirages of his own. He wasn’t wooing her with empty promises—he was telling it the way it was. And anyway by then he was kissing her and all her objections were forgotten as she opened her lips beneath his, because hadn’t she been missing this, more than she would have ever thought possible?

      His hands were hot and urgent as they raked through her hair and over her body, and her own were equally hungry as they explored the hardness of his magnificent physique. Impatiently, he slithered off her jodhpurs and shirt before peeling off his own silken robes, and Livvy gasped to discover that he was completely naked beneath.

      ‘It is another characteristic we share with the Scots,’ he murmured as he spread the robes onto the sand to make a silky bed for them. ‘Who I believe wear nothing beneath their kilts?’

      But Livvy didn’t answer because by then she felt as if she were in the middle of a dream—the most amazing dream of her life—as he laid her down. His eyes were unreadable as he moved over her and made his first thrust, and she gasped out his name as he entered her.

      ‘It’s good?’

      She bit her lip and moaned. ‘It’s terrible.’

      He laughed, but then his voice changed to a note she’d never heard before as he began to move inside her. ‘Oh, Livvy.’

      She didn’t answer. There were things she’d like to have known and questions that maybe she should have asked. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. She was powerless to do anything other than respond to the feel of Saladin deep inside her. Because by then she had started to come, and there wasn’t a thing she could do to stop it.

      * * *

      They rode back after night had fallen, even though Livvy had initially been fearful of crossing the dark desert on horseback. But Saladin had run the tip of his tongue along the edge of her lips, and she had felt him smile as he answered her question.

      ‘I told you that I know this desert as well as my own body,’ he said softly. ‘Don’t you realise that there’s a great big celestial map overhead?’

      That had been the point when she’d looked up at the stars that she’d been too distracted to notice before. The brightest stars she’d ever seen—silver bright against the indigo backdrop of the sky. And there was the moon rising in splendour—a bright, gleaming curve above the palm trees where they’d spent the past two hours making love. Livvy felt a lump rise in her throat. It was like a fairy tale, she thought.

      Except that it wasn’t a fairy tale. It was nothing but a brief interlude, and Saladin had already warned her that real life would soon intrude.

      He had pulled her against him after they’d dressed and brushed away stray grains of sand from their clothing. He had tilted up her chin so that she was caught in the dark gleam of his eyes and, in that moment, she’d felt very close to falling in love with him.

      But his СКАЧАТЬ