The Tiger's Lady (27 page)

She shook her head blindly, fighting down a rush of despair.

“They must have brought you by boat, then. If you’d come down from Negoro or up from Colombo along the coast, someone would have noticed you. But I’ve sent my men looking twenty miles in each direction, and all of them have returned with the same results: nothing. Not a single bloody clue.” Then, as he saw the ragged edges of despair darken her eyes, “Pluck up, Cinnamon. We’ll find something.”

“Does that mean you believe me?”

Abruptly a curtain seemed to drop over Pagan’s face. “Yes,” he said after what seemed an infinity of silence. “Yes, I do believe you, Cinnamon. Not necessarily that your story is true, but that
you
believe it to be true.”

“Of all the arrogant, nonsensical—”

Pagan continued calmly, as if she hadn’t spoken. “Ruxley, of course, would not have planned on your injury robbing you of memory, but it does add a certain ring of authenticity to your protests. No doubt right now he is applauding himself for his cleverness.”

“You have an answer for everything, don’t you?”

“It is my sincerest hope,” Pagan answered silkily, making her a little bow.

“But you make one grave mistake, Mr. Pagan,” she snapped, pulling the belt tight about her slim waist. “I am
nobody’
s pawn. You’d best realize that right now.”

“Indeed?” Pagan’s unpatched eye took on a dangerous glint. “But there is something
you
fail to see,
Angrezi.
You
are
a pawn, whether you choose to be or not. Right now the only question is whether you will be Ruxley’s pawn…” His voice dropped as he studied the crimson swell of her lips. “Or whether you will be
mine.”

The woman before Pagan did not move, mesmerized by the dark fires burning in that hard, unblinking eye. For a moment she almost thought she read regret there.

Then that, too, was gone, replaced by a lazy ease. “Did you enjoy your rest?”

“Th-that was
alcohol
you forced upon me this morning!” she sputtered abruptly. “How
dare
you try to—-”

“Try to what—seduce you? Had I
tried
, believe me, I would have succeeded.” Pagan’s voice darkened, the texture of rough silk. “And you may be sure that we wouldn’t be standing here fully dressed, arguing right now.” His callused fingers stilled on Magic’s head, and the monkey squirmed in protest. Frowning, Pagan looked down and resumed his slow stroking. “By heaven, woman, you’re as contentious as Magic. I gave you no more than a mere thimbleful of alcohol this morning. Not enough to loosen your tongue—certainly not enough to pierce that prickly armor of yours.”

“Cursed mosquitoes,” she muttered, scratching furiously at the back of her neck.

“Damnable, aren’t they?” Magic still in hand, Pagan settled his big frame fluidly into the bamboo chair near the window. “Not used to the tropics, are you? But I’ve an answer for that.”

“I’m very
certain
that you do.” She continued scratching her neck.

“How does cool sound?”

Her digging slowed infinitesimally.

“Cool and smooth.” Pagan administered the
coup de grace.
“Cool and smooth and very wet?”

“No, thank you. I don’t care to have any more alcohol foisted upon me,” she said stiffly.

Pagan threw back his head and laughed, while Magic cocked her head with curiosity. “No, something far better than alcohol, my dear. Water—water for a bath. Water to swim in, stretching cool and sweet as far as the eye can see.”

His captive’s scratching abruptly ceased. “Water—truly? Where?”

“Not far from here.” Pagan concealed a smile of triumph. Sliding Magic down onto the arm of the chair, he came lazily to his feet. “Let me check those bandages and then we’ll go.”

“We’ll go?
Now I begin to understand. And if that’s your plan, you can count me out! And you can forget about using my wounds as an excuse to ogle any more of my body, either.”

One sable brow climbed to a wicked point. “Oh, I’ve seen everything there is to see already, Cinnamon. You have no secrets left, I assure you.”

Her cheeks blazed peach-red.

“Scared,
Angrezi?”
It was a low, dark challenge.

“You think you’re so bloody clever, don’t you? Well, it won’t work. I know exactly what game you’re playing at.”

Pagan waited in silence, watching her fingers pleat and unpleat the web-soft silk of his robe. He tried not to imagine the velvet curves just beneath. “Not clever,” he said slowly. “Not where you’re concerned, Cinnamon.” Something flickered in the shaded depths of his eyes. “Just determined.”

The woman before him frowned. Determined to do what? she wondered. But she did not ask.

Something told her it would be better not to know.

And right now the thought of stripping off her itching bandages and slipping into cool, silken water was a temptation she couldn’t resist.

“Very well, Mr. Pagan. I believe I
shall
accompany you after all.”

“Good. I begin to think there might be hope for you yet,
Angrezi.”

“Stop calling me
Angrezi.
You act as if you were not as English as I. That
is
what the word means, is it not?”

Pagan didn’t answer, his eyes hard upon her face.

“Well?” she demanded, impatient to be off.

“So it does. But I find I like the word, and I don’t believe I’ll give it up. Not even for you, my dear.”

“You are without a doubt the most arrogant, irritating—”

She was growing hotter—and angrier—by the second. “Bast—”

He was at her side in a second, his hand biting into her wrist. “Don’t even think of saying it,” he growled.

She jerked away, horrified at the crude term that had sprung to her lips. Horrified, too, by the fury that had darkened Pagan’s face before he’d regained control.

Twisting, she fought his iron grip, but her struggles only sent the silken edges of her robe flying. Ivory skin flashed beneath navy and crimson paisley before she managed to clutch the garment closed with her free hand.

She felt him stiffen. She felt the deep pounding of his heart where she was crushed to his chest. She felt the heat that radiated from his taut thighs.

Suddenly the humor and mockery fled and it was deadly serious between them, all heat and hunger.

All madness and desire.

Her breath caught at the darkness in his face, the tension in his body.

“Take off the robe, Cinnamon.”

She swallowed. “No-no.”

“Now,
woman,” he growled. “We’re going nowhere until I check those bandages.”

She glared back at him.

“Do you really think I’ll hurt you?”

There was something unexpected in his voice. Something that might almost have been … hesitation.

Impatiently she shrugged the thought aside. One glance at his face was enough to tell her this man didn’t know the meaning of the word.

Across her back she felt the pricking of the old bandages, already stiff with dry, caked blood. She tried not to think about how good the cool water would feel.

Their gazes locked, teal plumbing cool onyx, and the aftershock rocked her all the way to her toes.

Just ask me and I’ll help you, Cinnamon.

I’ll never ask for a single, bloody thing,
she countered mutely.
Not of you or anyone else.

His gaze fell to her lips, smoldering and sensual. Her fingers began to tremble. She closed her eyes, afraid of the dark pull of his gaze.

And opened them to feel strong bronze fingers sliding inexorably up her arms.

“D-don’t—” she protested, but the words died on her lips.

Spellbound, she watched those big hands glide higher. Strikingly gentle, they curved over her shoulders.

Her heart began to slam against her ribs. What was
wrong
with her?

With a choked cry she wrenched free, one hand caught to her lips as if to scrub away the heat that still lingered from his gaze.

It did no good.

How had he succeeded in goading her to sputtering incomprehension, to white-hot fury, and now
this?

This what?
a cool voice asked.
Recklessness? Hunger?

Need.
That was the only word for it. A hot, shameless need that grew with each heartbeat until she could see nothing but that wide, hard mouth. Those strong, callused fingers.

Until all she could think of was what they would feel like on her skin. Anywhere and everywhere. With neither linen nor damask to impede their hot, sweet flow.

Heat and dizziness swept over her.

At the same moment Pagan turned her with a rich rustle of silk and slid the dressing gown from her shoulders until her back was bared to him.

She stood stiffly, her legs leaden, her blood aflame, with every breath assailed by a thousand sensations. She felt the heat and power of his taut thighs in sharp contrast to the gentleness of his fingers. She gasped as he slid the top bandage free.

His fingers dropped. The lower bandage resisted, adhered with dried blood to her skin. Gently he worked his hands around the edge of the wound until the fabric pulled free.

Her breath hissed out in a jerky sigh.

“Steady, Cinnamon.”

She shuddered, desperate to break free of the sweet, potent lethargy inching up her legs, creeping over her heated skin where the soft borders of the dressing gown flapped free. “Just
finish
it, can’t you?”

Her hands balled into fists. She spun about to face him, a wild sob rising in her throat. “L-let me go. You’re
hurting
me!”

“Liar,” Pagan whispered, his eyes dark with desire. “Pain isn’t what you’re feeling now, but hunger and need and a thousand other things.” His gaze fell to the silken expanse of her chest, stained by a faint flush. “I should know, because I’m feeling all that too,” he added harshly.

The next second she was crushed to his chest. “Can you deny it?”

She went utterly still, trying to ignore the hot brand of his manhood against the curve of her belly. “It—it hurts, Pagan.”

She was not thinking about the pain at her back, however. It was the other pain, the strange gnawing restlessness, that plagued her. The sweet, mindless wanting…

Pagan watched the hypnotic rise and fall of her chest, the jerky pulse at her neck.

“Turn around,” he growled.

He jerked a fresh length of linen over the rapidly healing wounds, working in tense silence. The only sound in the room came from the rustle of bandages unrolled over warm bare skin.

And the wild thunder of his heart in his own ears.

Damn it, man.

Keep your control.

He started to speak. To his utter disgust he had to clear his throat before continuing. “Better.”

“B-better?” his patient repeated dumbly, no more coherent than he.

“Your back. Bleeding seems to have stopped. Smaller wounds—beginning to bind. Good sign.” Pagan scowled. He could barely string two words together!

What about when her wounds heal?
a mocking voice asked.
Will you be able to let her go?

“No!”
The word burst from his lips.

“No what?”

“No—no sign of infection.” How had the tawny-haired creature manage to strip him of thirty years of logic and hard-won skepticism in less than forty-eight hours?

Get your wits about you, man. This one may be well more dangerous than any tiger.

And then he was done. He tugged her dressing gown back in place. Barely was he finished when his patient spun about, her face ashen. “You
hurt
me, damn you!” Her eyes were dark with pain and accusation.

Suddenly Pagan recalled how still she had stood while he worked feverishly at his task. And he had been congratulating himself on his skill…

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Would it have made any difference if I had?”

His jaw locked. Perhaps she was right. Perhaps it wouldn’t have mattered, considering the raw state he’d been in.

Hell, the state he was
still
in.

“I’m … sorry, Cinnamon.”

She tried to turn away, but he cupped her cheeks and forced her head up to his gaze, cursing when he saw two bright tears trembling on her skin.

Mesmerized, he slipped the liquid diamonds onto his forefinger and drew them gently to his mouth.

He shuddered as he tasted the salt of her body. It made him wonder how the rest of her would taste.

Abruptly he spun her about and pushed her toward the bed, where her dress lay flung in a silken pool. “Get dressed. The cove won’t be safe after dark.”

He saw a string of emotions play across her face, fury, surprise, and uncertainty. What he had not expected to see was the disappointment that skittered briefly through her lovely, haunted eyes.

The sight made his blood burn with raw triumph.

Her slim fingers pleated and unpleated the silk dressing gown at her chest. “S-safe? What do you mean?”

She was as wary as a sambhur doe at twilight, Pagan thought. And just as beautiful.

“At last light the great cats go down to clean themselves in the tides. And, of course, to eat. Now that the drought has come you can hear the cry of the leopards all along the coast, since their usual water holes have dried up.”

And what about the tiger? Pagan asked himself. Or was that simply another one of his nightmares?

“H-how do I—That is, what shall I—”

“Wear?” His voice was low and deep. “Steamy, scented air,
Angrezi.
And not a bloody thing else.”

If he couldn’t touch her, Pagan decided grimly, then at least he could damned well
look
at her.