Captive (14 page)

“It’s not really a lie.”

“You’ve lied to me before. Telling me that rubbish about traveling to meet your dead husband, the British diplomat in Gibraltar, and being seized en route by corsairs.”

Alex was stiff. “You wouldn’t believe me,” she said softly.

“You don’t trust me,” he said.

“I do. I trust you with my life,” Alex said, and it was the truth. “But one day, the truth could put you in danger, Murad.”

“I don’t like this,” Murad said. “What is going on?”

Alex shook her head. “You have to help me, Murad. I must meet Blackwell.”

He sat beside her and took her hands in his, gripping them tightly. “There is no possible way that you can meet with him. Not privately and not publicly. You have lived here long enough to understand that. It is forbidden.”

“I am not a Moslem woman. I will not obey your laws. I have to meet with him.”

Murad inhaled. “You swore to uphold the Islamic faith, to obey the Koran—and Jebal.”

Alex was on her feet, her eyes flashing. “I lied!”

Murad also stood. “I am well aware of that. But that is something you had better keep to yourself, Alex.”

She paced.

He sighed. “Right now he is under a heavy guard, either at Jovar’s home or in a special chamber here in the palace. Meeting
with him under these circumstances is an impossibility, Alex.”

Alex frowned. Meeting Xavier Blackwell was going to be far more difficult than she had ever assumed. And if meeting him, even once, was so difficult, how would they ever have a love affair? The logistics alone were suddenly overwhelming.

“Nothing is impossible,” Alex finally said.

“What, exactly, do you want from this man?” Murad asked. “If you really love him, then seeing him once, if you could somehow manage it, will be far more painful than forgetting his very existence. And that is what you should do.”

Alex was not going to reveal her agenda to Murad—that she would become Blackwell’s lover and that they would escape Tripoli together. No matter how loyal he was, he would never help her if he knew her plans. Indeed, he would be horrified. She ignored what he had said. “What will happen to him now?” Alex asked.

“I do not know. He is an important captive. Perhaps he will be ransomed. Perhaps he will be sold. Perhaps he will turn Turk.”

“He will never betray his country,” Alex said firmly.

“Never is a very long time,” Murad remarked.

Alex did not hear him. “Murad, go and find out everything you can. I want to know where he is, what they are going to do with him, and if he is under guard, who guards him.”

Murad looked at her with dismay. “I am very unhappy about this.”

“I also want you to help me think of a way to meet him secretly.”

Alex paced her chamber restlessly. Where was Blackwell now? The
Maja
must have docked close to an hour ago. At this exact moment, Blackwell might be somewhere inside the palace, so close to her—yet so very far away.

Yet Alex was perplexed. This was not the way it was supposed to happen. What did the
Pearl’s
not being destroyed before being brought back to Tripoli signify? The text she had read had been very clear. The
Pearl
had been ambushed in an inlet while putting up for water supplies. And she had been destroyed at sea before the corsairs could sail her back to Tripoli.

Suddenly Alex was excited. Were she and Blackwell already changing the course of history?

A knock sounded on her door, interrupting her thoughts. Alex hesitated, because Murad would not knock. She hoped it was not Jebal.

“Please come in.”

Zoe walked into the room.

Alex started. Zoe had never been inside her apartment before. The two women eyed each other, Alex openly surprised, Zoe smiling. Alex had never seen a more beautiful, sultry woman. Nor had she ever met a meaner, more spiteful and malicious one.

Jebal’s first wife was clad as she should be, in layers of silk and velvet, each robe, vest, and gilet heavily embroidered with gold and silver and precious gems. She wore numerous gold necklaces, bracelets, and bangles. She had a perfect oval face, hip-length black hair, which she refused to braid, and stunning features. Had she not been plump—and she was, unfortunately, not fat—she could have graced the cover of any major twentieth-century fashion magazine.

Zoe’s brown eyes widened just as Alex realized that she was still clad in bedouin clothes. Alex found her tongue. “Hello, Zoe. How nice of you to drop by.”

Zoe squinted. “You do speak strangely. I haven’t dropped anything. My. You dress even more strangely than you speak, Zohara. What are you doing, dressed up as a man?”

Panic rose up in Alex. One thought seized her,
she knows.
All of Murad’s warnings abruptly returned to her. He swore Zoe was out to get her. Alex believed it, too.

Zoe eyed her. “Do you want to be a man? Is that it? You certainly act like a man. I have never met a woman before as manly as you.”

The words were intended to hurt, but they did not. Alex wet her lips. “I hate being swathed in hundreds of robes and all those jackets and vests. I don’t know how you bear it. I much prefer this manner of dress. It is simple and convenient.”

Zoe laughed mockingly. “I wish Jebal could see you now. He would not find you so pretty then.”

Alex could not relax. “What do you want, Zoe?”

“I heard you are not feeling well. That you have been
gripped by melancholia. I brought you some herbal medicine. It will make you much better, Alex.” Zoe smiled, far too nicely. The smile never reached her smoldering brown eyes.

Alex looked at the vial Zoe was holding out to her. “That is so very thoughtful,” she lied. She would give the vial to Murad immediately—to find out what Zoe really intended. Was the vial filled with poison? Murad claimed that within the harem rivals poisoned one another frequently. Alex found that very hard to believe.

Zoe handed her the vial, its liquid contents blue. “I do hope you recover from your melancholia soon,” she said, very sweetly. But she did not leave. She continued to smile.

Alex tapped her toe impatiently. “Is there something else?”

Zoe laughed. “Yes, there is. I wanted to invite you to a special celebration later tonight in ray apartments.”

“A celebration?”

“Yes. Isn’t it wonderful? That Rais Jovar has finally brought the American dog to his feet?” Zoe laughed, the sound a trill, but her dark eyes were sharp.

Alex could not smile. She could not even think of a response. But Zoe could not know how she felt about Blackwell, could she? Or had she overheard one of the many discussions she had had with Murad about the Dali Capitan? Or perhaps she knew that Murad had been making inquiries about Blackwell and the
Pearl?.
Alex suddenly realized that she had to exercise far more caution than she so far had.

“You are speechless,” Zoe said.

Alex forced herself to think. “I am not speechless, I am surprised. Perhaps you are forgetting, Zoe, that I am an American?”

“I thought you were a Moslem now, and one of us,” Zoe said.

Their gazes locked. Alex wet her lips. “Old habits die hard.”

“What?!”

“Nothing. I am a human being and I happen to have compassion for a man who was once my countryman,” Alex said.

“I see.”

“What will they do with him? Will they ransom him?”

“Oh, no!” Zoe said fervently, her eyes gleaming. “Rais Jovar will not even consider ransom. Not after all he has done.
Rais Jovar wishes to punish him, to make him suffer—to humiliate him the way the bashaw humiliated Jovar for the destruction of the
Mirabouka.”

“What does he intend to do?” Alex whispered.

“He will follow custom.” Zoe smirked.

Alex was afraid her every emotion showed very clearly on her face, but she gripped her hands, pacing forward. “Custom? What custom?”

“You have been here a year and you do not know the custom for our captives?”

Alex shook her head, trying to think.

Zoe’s bitchy smile faded. Her eyes narrowed. “He will treat the American dog the way he would treat any other male captive. Dali Capitan will be publicly viewed tomorrow in the
bedestan.”

“Publically viewed?”

“And then he will be sold to the highest bidder.”

The
bedestan
was thronged.

The capture of the Dali Capitan, who had wreaked such havoc upon four of the bashaw’s ships in such a short span of time, was a momentuous victory for all of Tripoli. Unhappily, Murad followed Alex as she pushed and weaved her way through the crowds filling up the slave market. Alex was in her disguise as a simple bedouin man.

The auction of the entire crew of the
Pearl
would be held three days hence. Including the sale of Blackwell.

Murad jerked on Alex’s sleeve.
“Hasib!
Keep your eyes down, Alex!”

Alex could not bear the suspense and she did not answer Murad. She was out of breath. It was midsummer, but she was thoroughly chilled. She would finally meet Blackwell, finally lay her eyes upon him, but the circumstances were horrifying.

She had reached the edge of the crowd. The center of the
bedestan
was a cobbled courtyard; at the far end was an auction block. Its perimeter consisted of converging streets of sand. White stone houses were jumbled behind the slave market, in every direction, except to the east, where a mosque framed by date trees stood. Usually other captives were on parade in the human marketplace, but not today. Today the
bedestan
was spectacularly—peculiarly—empty.

“The bashaw wishes to insult and humiliate Dali Capitan, too,” Murad whispered in her ear. “For he has ordered no other captives to be viewed today.”

Alex’s heart flipped hard. Anger surged in her veins. “What will the bashaw do. Murad? Will he buy Blackwell? Hurt him?”

“I do not know.”

The crowd suddenly murmured, shifting restlessly. Alex tensed. Suddenly the bashaw appeared on a black stallion, flanked by his son. Alex quickly looked away from Jebal, but the two men, surrounded by Turkish soldiers in full military dress, were interested only in the parade soon to take place.

“He’s coming,” Murad whispered harshly.

Alex’s heart plummeted. She saw a group of men approaching from the street that ran behind the auction block. Rais Jovar was in their forefront and he was smiling coldly.

The other men in the group were soldiers, too. Janissaries. Then Alex gasped.

The man in their midst was not just in chains—he was stark naked.

Blackwell walked forward, surrounded by the soldiers, into the center of the slave market. He held his head erect. He was taller than Alex had thought, perhaps six foot four, and he towered over the others. He had an incredible body—the build of a soccer player—broad shouldered and narrow-hipped, his long legs corded with muscle. A huge iron shackle was on his left ankle, and a chain was attached from that to both of his manacled wrists.

Alex stared, drinking in the sight of him. At the same time, her heart wept for him.

But he hadn’t been beaten yet. His face was starkly proud. Determination and an iron will were etched there. He was impossibly arresting—far more so than his mesmerizing portrait. Even across the few dozen feet separating them, Alex felt his power, his charisma, his authority, and his sexuality. She was shaken to the quick.

Seeing him was so overwhelming that for an instant Alex had to close her eyes. It was so very hard to breathe. She was shaking.

Alex’s fingernails dug into her palms. She could not stop
herself from looking at him again.
Look at me,
she whispered silently.
Oh, please, look at me. I’m here!

But he stared straight ahead. Alex knew he had put himself in a trancelike state of being impervious to the jeering crowd of spectators.

And seeing him in chains was killing her. Being so close to him yet unable to go to him, touch him, smile, talk, was impossible. They would escape. Together. Soon. Dear God, they had to.

And as Alex stood there staring at him, the entire world apart from herself and Xavier Blackwell began to fade away, and all of Tripoli, the entire crowd, the Rais Jovar, the bashaw, the soldiers, the horses and dogs, Jebal, everything, the sights and sounds dimmed, blurred, fading into nothingness. Ceasing to exist.

It was just him and her now, two captives in nineteenth-century Tripoli.

And Blackwell jerked, his eyes lifting—finding her immediately. Their gazes locked hard. Alex was riveted.

And so was he.

His dark eyes were wide, stunned.

X
AVIER LAY ON
his back on the hard, cold stone floor of the cubicle where he had been imprisoned. He was alone. He was worried about his men and his ship, yet he found it hard to concentrate and plan. A pair of almond-shaped eyes haunted him.

His gut constricted. He was oddly breathless. He could not get those haunting eyes out of his mind. Xavier sat up.

Who was she?

He wanted to know.

She hadn’t fooled him for a moment. She had been disguised as a man, but when he had met her gaze he had felt the instant, eternal pull of male and female, more so than he had ever felt it before. Worse, she somehow seemed familiar to him. There had been an odd shock of recognition the moment their eyes had met.

But he was certain that he did not know her. He was certain that they had never met. He would never forget a pair of eyes like that, not ever.

Xavier stood up. There were no windows in his cell, there was nowhere to go. But he remained standing, staring at the rough stone wall. In the Moslem world of Tripoli, it was incredibly daring for a woman to disguise herself as a man. Clearly she belonged to some male Moslem of importance. Clearly she herself was Moslem. He might learn her identity
if his stay in Tripoli was protracted, but he was a realist and he understood that he would probably never see her again.

The thought was distinctly disturbing. It made him strangely uneasy.

He wanted to see her again.

Xavier paced. His cell was four steps by six. He was no longer naked. He had been given a pair of short, loose trousers, a wide, collarless shirt, and a small cap, which he did not use. The four-pound iron fetter was still on his left ankle, attached by a thick chain to the manacles on his wrists. Both his leg and arms were chafed raw and bleeding. He ignored the pain, which he had become accustomed to and now thought of as a mere discomfort.