Wade (21 page)

A poisonous mix of rage, fear and déjà vu flooded Wade's mind at the sight of Ahmad's knifepoint denting Chloe's skin. He'd been here before, twice, and each time it ended in death. This time had to be different.

Ahmad swung Chloe around as Wade skidded to a halt. “Drop your weapon,” he barked, “or I cut her throat like a pullet.”

Zach belonged to a generation that had been brought up on cowboy movies and had a tendency to fall back on their jargon in tight situations. “Can't
tell what he's saying, Wade,” he drawled. “But I don't much like the looks of this hombre, and sure as hell don't like his attitude.”

“No shit,” Nat said in heartfelt agreement as he edged through the door from the back.

“Dead right.” Wade met Ahmad's hot eyes as he answered him in his best Pashtu. “Spill even a drop of her blood and I'll personally send you to hell.”

“You think I care?” Ahmad demanded. “She has dishonored herself and defiled my family name.”

“Yeah, yeah, but she isn't your family, never was, never will be. What she does has nothing to do with you.”

“My father accepted her. I accepted her. She is ours.”

The claim raised hackles Wade didn't even know he had. Also a fierce possessive instinct he'd never felt before and had no right to express now. “Not on your life,” he answered in tones of steel. “She belongs to herself and to this country. She's an American.”

“Looks like we got ourselves a Mexican standoff,” Zach said.

Sunlight angled through the store's glass door to make a patch of yellow on the floor. Dust motes, glinting in the brightness, spun in lazy eddies around them. The smells of cottonseed meal, dog food, deer corn and pesticides were familiar beyond words, since Wade and his dad had visited the feed store a thou
sand times. Still, it wasn't where he wanted to make a life or death decision.

Chloe spoke then, her voice a little breathless but more reasonable than it had any right to be. “Wait. There's no need for this. I'll…I'll go away with you, Ahmad. You can have the money from my father if you will relinquish your jihad against this man.”

“No!” That instant rejection seemed to have jagged edges as it tore from Wade's throat. He'd guessed she had something like this on her mind, but hearing it was something else again.

“My righteous jihad?” Ahmad pressed his knife tip deeper so a trace of red stained the tip.

Chloe winced, shifting a little to keep her balance as she strained away. “Yes, you are right, my brother, to be angry at the…the interference. But Wade was forced to come for me. It was a vow made to my father as he lay dying. You must understand that.”

“He does not agree.” Ahmad was listening, though belligerence was still strong in his voice.

“He will accept my decision for the sake of his family. But if you attack them, it will be too late.”

She was speaking to Ahmad, but Wade knew that her message was also for him. He was to back off, let Ahmad go and her with him. He appreciated her need to avoid endangering those he held dear, but there was no way it was going to happen. If worse came to worst, he had the perfect way to prevent it, one she had given him herself.

“We may have this money now, today?” Ahmad
asked. “You can take it from a bank and give it to me in American dollars?”

She swallowed with a hard movement that was perfectly visible in the craned angle of her throat. Holding Wade's gaze, she answered, “Not today, maybe, but soon.”

Wade, his voice softly lethal, said, “It can be done. But what of afterward?”

She knew what he was asking for her eyes turned dark blue before they flickered away from his. The blankness that smoothed over her features told him that she had already considered and accepted the fact that she would die and refused to let it matter.

It mattered to Wade. The pain in his chest was so great that he could barely draw breath, the rage to destroy so savage that he understood without question every crime of passion ever committed. If Ahmad harmed a hair on Chloe's head, someone was going to have to pick up what was left of the jihadi with a shovel.

But before Wade would let her risk being alone and unprotected when Ahmad found out that she was no longer untouched, he'd tell him, here, now. He'd make damn sure it didn't happen when he wasn't there, when there was not a prayer in hell of being able to save her.

At that moment, the three missing Hazaris slid into the store from the front door. Dividing their gazes between Zach's shotgun and the weapons he and Nat
still held, they silently ranged themselves on either side of Ahmad.

Chloe glanced at the one to her right, then her gaze widened. “Ismael!”

“Even so.”

Wade eased forward a step. Something in the face of the man who had been married to Ahmad's sister ratcheted his nerves a shade tighter. Or maybe it was something that was missing. The Hazari's eyes were dark and fixed, as if he was drugged or else looked inward on some desperate mission.

“But why?” Chloe cried.

“Because I care,” Ismael said with echoing desolation in the gentle cadences of his voice. “Because of my wife whom I loved as I loved my life. And because I have my own personal jihad.”

Wade felt the hair rise on the back of his neck. His muscles tensed as he got ready to make a move. A quick glance at Zach showed him squinting along the barrel of his shotgun, though the weapon would make a hole the size of a basketball in any target he hit at that range.

“You blame me?”

The twist of anguish was in Ismael's smile. “You were the instrument, as I am now. It is enough.”

Wade didn't know what the guy was getting at, but it seemed that Chloe might. Or maybe she'd figured out that if Ismael could blame her for what had happened, it was useless to hope that an extremist like Ahmad would ever relent. Regardless of the cause,
her features hardened and she took a deep breath, as if some decision had been made, or possibly made for her.

Then beyond the glass entrance door, a shadow appeared on the sidewalk. It eased forward, the image of a man wearing a Stetson. The missing deputy, Wade thought. He must have seen the Hazaris enter the store, and it looked as if he was getting ready to rush the place.

Wade glanced at Ahmad to see if he'd noticed. Ahmad was scowling at Ismael. Chloe had caught that stealthy movement, however. She looked away almost immediately, as though afraid of directing attention toward it.

The shadow slid forward an inch, and then another. Wade thought he could make out the silhouette of a weapon held in the man's fist.

The door slammed inward, and the deputy catapulted inside. Chloe lifted her knee and stamped her heel down hard on Ahmad's instep. He stumbled back with disbelief stamped on his features at the attack from a female. In the same instant, Wade sprang to grab his knife hand.

The next seconds were mass confusion. Nat jumped Ismael. One of the other jihadis lifted a weapon but couldn't get a clear shot in the melee. Zach cursed and danced from side to side with the same problem.

Abruptly Ismael rammed his shoulder into Chloe, knocking her off her feet. Wade grunted as she fell against him with her elbow digging into his side. Pain
rose in a red haze in front of his eyes. His grip began to loosen and he felt Ahmad jerk free. With desperate effort, he caught Chloe, twisting, dragging her with him and away from the flash of the knife as he went down. As they hit the floor, he rolled, covering her with his body.

Zach's shotgun boomed out. Nat yelled. The deputy shouted an order that was lost in the uproar of another shot. Footsteps thudded, vibrating the floor under Wade, and the glass door was flung open to crash against the wall. Then everything was quiet.

“You okay?” Nat demanded as he knelt beside him.

Blood was creeping in a warm path along Wade's waistline and his side felt on fire, but he didn't bother to answer. Levering his weight off Chloe, he turned her to him. Her face was pale, but her throat was barely scratched. As he hovered over her, she opened her eyes and gave him a watery smile. Suddenly he could breathe again.

“Casualty report?” he said.

It was the deputy who answered, coming toward him as he holstered his weapon. “Zach's hit. He got one of the bastards, though.”

It was easy to tell that the feed storeowner's wound was nonfatal, since his curses turned the air a royal shade of blue. “Damn idiot stepped in front of that Ahmad,” he said on a grunt, “or I'd a had the sum-abitch.”

Wade climbed to his feet, wincing a little as he
reached down to help Chloe to stand. With a glance at the deputy, he asked, “You all right? You can get an ambulance here pronto for Zach?”

“I got it.”

Nat looked him over critically, his gaze resting on the red stain blooming on his shirt. “What about you?”

“I'll live. Let's just get the hell out of here and back to Grand Point. Before they beat us home.”

C
hloe felt like a prisoner as Wade marched her into the house at Grand Point. The clasp of his hand on her upper arm wasn't hurtful, but neither was it gentle. He didn't stop for the many queries about where he'd gone so fast or what he'd been doing, appeared not to hear the exclamations over the blood on his shirt. Face grim, he led her up the stairs and down the hall to his room. When they were inside, he shut the door and turned to face her.

“Talk,” he said. “I want to know exactly what you were doing by sneaking off without a word?”

“I had to see Ahmad…” she began.

“You thought you could give him what he wanted from you, and in return he'd decide to play nice and leave us alone? How could you even imagine that he'd agree? And if he had, how was that supposed to make us feel, knowing you preferred whatever punishment he might inflict to being safe here with us?”

“I didn't,” she said with a helpless gesture. “But there are women and children here. They don't deserve to die because of me.”

“You think we're like sitting ducks, is that it? No
match whatever for battle-hardened veterans like Ahmad and his men?”

That was cutting perilously close to her true views. “You and the others have no idea how cruel and vicious they can be.” She moved away from him, into the connecting bath where she found the first-aid supplies.

“We don't have to be either one in order to know how to fight,” he answered as he followed her to the door. “This is our turf. We know every creek, every hill and low spot, fence line or crossroad. It's terrain that we've walked over, hunted over and camped on for generations. It's a part of us, something we can use for cover or for ambush that the creeps out to get us can never understand, much less duplicate. We can't be cornered here, and we won't be defeated.”

“All right, I was wrong,” she said, bowing her head as she moved toward him with the things in her hands. “I didn't mean to cause so much trouble.”

He was silent for long seconds. When he spoke, his voice was tight with scorn. “Don't give me that drooping, lowly female stuff. Ahmad may be stupid enough to be taken in by it, but I know better. You aren't servile at all. You're proud and you're cagey, and you've learned to pretend in order to fit in, but that's all. You have a brain in your head, and you know how to use it. What I want is for you to do just that. Think, before you go doing things that can get you killed.”

“I did!”

“Oh, right. You thought you'd give yourself up and that would make everything just fine? Female sacrifice may be a big deal where you've been the last few years, but we don't have much use for it around here.”

Anger surged along her veins at his summary dismissal of what she had thought was an unselfish gesture. She pushed past him, giving him a hard stare. “I was trying to save your family. If that bothers you, I'm sorry.”

“It bothers the hell out of me, lady. They don't need saving. Get that through your head once and for all. And stop saying you're sorry!”

She would not apologize to him ever again, not if it killed her. “You think posting a guard on the road and boarding up a few windows will take care of everything? You really believe that throwing a family party is the best way to prepare for the worst?”

“There's more to our defense system than lookouts and a few boards, thank you very much, and every adult on the place knows exactly when and how to yank the kids into a safe haven without traumatizing them for life by shutting them up in the dark for days. We could have sent them away, and the women with them, but we prefer to know every minute that they're safe. We could all have hightailed it for the hills, but Benedicts don't run. We could have shut ourselves up here and yelled for the police, but Benedicts don't expect others to do our dirty work. We take care of our own.”

It was possible that she had misjudged the situation, and things weren't quite as they appeared on the surface. That didn't change her part in it. “While you're busy taking care of things, you want me to do nothing? I'm supposed to let you and your family risk everything while I have a nice little vacation?” She tossed the items she held onto the foot of the bed, then walked up to him and caught the edges of his shirt placket in her hands. The rage that burned inside her supercharged her strength, so she nearly tore the buttons from their holes as she yanked it open.

He blinked at her violence, but made no effort to stop it. “You were tired, you'd been through a lot and needed the rest. But no, this is a mutual effort. You're supposed to help when the time comes.”

“Your family doesn't want me here.” She lifted one end of the tape that held the blood-soaked compresses and ripped it free.

“Damn, woman,” he said with a growl in his voice as he grabbed her arm.

“Let me go.”

He hesitated a moment, watching her face, then he complied. “Anyway, you don't know what my family wants. You've had no time to find out.”

“I saw how they looked at me.”

“You're a stranger. What did you expect?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all.” She kept her gaze on what she was doing. His gash had stopped bleeding, but looked bruised and painful again. Tossing the old bandage to one side, she applied antibiotic ointment
to a long rectangle of gauze, then pressed it to the semihealed line of stitches and began to tape them in place.

“You have to make an effort. They can't do it all.”

“I'm not needed here,” she said without looking at him. “Nor am I wanted.”

“I want you.”

The words, steely in their precision, echoed with truth in the enclosed room. She looked up, her eyes wide. The planes of his face were still flat and tight with anger and his mouth was set in grim lines, but in his eyes was a hot and consuming need. Something inside her rose to meet it, moving through her in urgent flood. They stood immobile for long seconds while their chests rose and fell with their hard breathing. Then his face changed and he reached for her.

She flung herself against him in that same instant. She wanted, needed to feel his hard chest against her breasts, the strength of his arms around her. His mouth came down on hers, devouring, demanding. She opened to him, clashing her tongue with his, desperate for the taste and feel and thrust that let her know that he was alive, and so was she.

He shoved his hand under the T-shirt she wore, cupping her bare breast, kneading the nipple between thumb and forefinger like a tender grape. She felt his fingers slip under her waistband at the small of her back as well, gliding lower until he cupped the firm curves he found there. Feverish with internal heat, yet
shivering with the mix of anger and excitement in her veins, she rubbed her palms over the muscles of his back, reveling in their ripple and slide and the power they promised even as she pushed his shirt from him.

They shed the rest of their clothes on the way down to the floor. The prickly wool of the floral carpet scratched her back, but she didn't care. She didn't mind the crisp hair on his thighs that abraded the insides of her legs, welcomed his weight upon her. She was on fire. Moist, hot and welcoming, she rose against him. He opened her, dipped inside, eased into her tightness. Then with a hard twist of his hips, he plunged deep.

Her very being coalesced around him. She arched toward him, burying her face in his shoulder, tasting, nipping his skin. She could feel his hot breath against her hair, feel him stretching her, filling her, throbbing hot and hard so deep inside her that he seemed a part of her. And she wanted him there, wanted him deeper, wanted to take him and hold him in raging, half-mad possession, making him hers inescapably.

Wade seemed to sense her need. Holding her close against him, he rolled with her so she was on top with her hair tangling around them, binding them together. Free of his confinement, she could control the depth of penetration, the speed and fervor of it.

She did, too, riding, striving in mind-bending exultation, until her body was covered in fine perspiration, the air rasped in her lungs and her muscles felt on fire. And still the final triumph escaped her.

A touch, a whisper, and he turned with her again, and this time he was so deep that they were one being, the completion so infinite that tears rimmed her lashes in wet heat and spilled into her hair.

But with them came a hot deluge of purest and most transcendent pleasure. She moved with him then, with sobbing breaths and shuddering effort, with mindless acceptance that banished anger, soothed tension. And somewhere in the dim corners of her mind was an infinite gratitude that he could not see, did not know that with her every answering surge she abandoned pretense and gave to him her love.

Seconds later, he stiffened with a low, guttural cry. Muscles rigid, he held her while brushing the tender skin of her neck with his lips, burying his face in the waves of hair that trailed across her neck.

For long moments, they were still. Then he sighed, and eased to one side, resting his weight on his elbow though keeping their lower bodies entwined. He brushed the fine strands of hair away from her face, letting his thumb trail over her lips. “You're okay? I didn't hurt you?”

“I'm fine. Though I'm not so sure about you.” There was a smear of blood across her rib cage, and she couldn't tell whether it was from before or if he'd opened the wound yet again.

“I'll live.”

The humor in his voice, and lack of anger, were like a balm. She let it wash over her while her heart
beat slowed and the rise and fall of her chest returned to normal.

A niggling thought touched her, then remained long enough to become a worry. Lifting a fingertip to trail it through his chest hair, she said, “I wonder what your family thinks is going on up here.”

“I expect they can guess.” A wry grin curved his mouth.

The word that slipped from her in Pashtu was expressive if inelegant.

“Not to worry. The guys will think it's perfectly natural, what they'd be doing in my place, and their women will probably wonder if it's anything like what goes on between them and their men.”

“No.”

“No?” He tipped his head as he considered her.

“It isn't. Clay hugged me, remember, and it was nothing at all like…that is, well, you know.”

He gathered her close, so their bodies were intimately connected once more. “Nothing like this?”

“Not in any way.” She wished fervently that she'd kept her mouth shut.

A smile twitched his lips. He pressed them together, but it did no good. The amusement spread until laugh lines cut deep into his cheeks. “Well,” he drawled, “that's nice to know.”

Heat rose to her cheekbones. She suddenly felt exposed, both physically and mentally. Putting her fingertips to his shoulder, she applied pressure. It was enough. He shifted, giving her the room to slide from
under him, though his gaze was watchful. Refusing to meet it, she gathered up her clothes and padded into the bathroom.

She turned on the tap, letting the cool water run over her hands and wrists for several seconds before splashing her hot face. Then she stood with her hands braced on the basin's edge and her eyes closed, letting the water drip down her chin and neck onto her breasts.

She was a fool.

What she had just done could trap her, prevent her from doing the one thing that could give her life meaning. If unprotected sex left her pregnant, that baby would become a hostage binding her to this place and these people. She would have all the duties and obligations that left no time for other things. She could not work to save the women she'd left behind in the ignorance and near slavery of life behind the veil.

She was also foolish because she'd come so close to forgetting that she had that mission. She had allowed herself to be seduced by the ancient and visceral appreciation of women for masculine strength. She had seen in Wade the opposite side of male power from that shown by the Islamic fundamentalists of the country from which she had come, the use of it to protect rather than to subjugate.

Listening to him just now, as he spoke of himself and his family, she had heard his deep commitment to taking care of his own. She had seen the closeness
between the men of his family and their women, the care and concern and easy, unrestrained affection between them. She had heard and she had seen, and the yearning to be a part of it, to belong naturally and completely to something or someone had crept in upon her so quietly that she'd not known it was there until she'd seen, abruptly, that she could never have it.

The Benedicts didn't want her here. She'd brought trouble and fear into their safe, easy lives, and for that she could never be forgiven. If a single man or woman was lost, a hair hurt on the head of even one child, then she would be hated forever.

“You sure you're all right?”

She lifted her head. She could see him in the mirror as he stood behind her, leaning with one shoulder on the door facing. His hair was tousled and the sleepy look of spent passion lingered in his eyes. He'd stepped into his jeans, but that was all. As she said nothing, he lifted a brow and tipped his toward the water tap that was still running.

“Sorry,” she said, forcing a smile as she reached to turn it off. “I'm fine. Really.”

“Good. Marry me?”

“What?”

He moved away from the door and sauntered up behind her, wrapping his arms around her and spreading his fingers across her bare abdomen. “You heard me.”

“I can't.”

“Sure you can.”

“We hardly know each other.” The lazy circle he was making with his hand, barely brushing the small triangle of hair at the base of her belly, made it hard to think.

“I know enough. And it would give me the right to take care of you, always.”

His words said one thing, but his caress another. It didn't matter. Wade had made no secret of the fact that he wanted her. What he meant, she thought, was that he desired her. It was only a physical craving, sex without permanence or meaning beyond the pleasure of the moment, Mother Nature's great trick on humanity. That was all right. She didn't want more from him, didn't want love or promises or all the other things that made a prisoner of a woman.