Taming the Prince (5 page)

The biggest of the Black Knights pushed him toward Sara, and Shane stumbled a bit before regaining his equilibrium and righting himself once more. Somehow he seemed even larger as he completed the action, as if he were flexing every one of his—not unimpressive—muscles as he straightened. His expression was murderous when he stood upright again, and it occurred to Sara that, between the two of them, if no others joined the dissidents, they might stand a chance of escape. All she had to do was plan well. And wait for the proper moment. And hope that Shane Cordello was as good as he looked.

Ah, for escape plans, she meant.

“You okay?” he asked softly when the Black Knight who had shoved him toward Sara returned to his compatriots and began to confer with them in low tones.

She nodded, thinking his concern was sweet…before halting herself from thinking about him at all. No need to get lost down that route again. She’d already caused enough trouble that way. “I’m fine,” she told him quietly. “Just feeling very stupid at the moment.”

He looked puzzled. “Why should you feel stupid?”

“Because I should have been prepared for something like this,” she told him. “I never should have allowed it to happen.”

His expression grew even more confused. “How could you possibly have been prepared for something like this?
And why should the responsibility for it happening be yours anyway?”

In response, Sara only shook her head. Things were much too complicated to try and explain it all to him at present.

“What’s going to happen to us now?” he asked. But he didn’t sound fearful or anxious when he voiced the question. No, there was only hostility and contempt in his tone.

“I imagine they’ll hold us hostage while they make their demands,” she told him.

“What kind of demands?”

“Judging by their comments on the jet, they’ll threaten to harm you if Penwyck doesn’t cancel its alliances with Majorco and America.”

“You mean it’s my fault that we’re in this situation.”

She looked at him, surprised. “I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“Shane, I’m not blaming you for this.”

“I know. You’re blaming yourself.”

“I’m blaming those bastards who hijacked the plane and took us hostage. No one else.”

“But if I hadn’t come…”

He left the sentence unfinished. Not that it needed finishing. In spite of that, Sara wanted to finish it for him, wanted to point out that if he hadn’t come, then she never would have met him, never would have seen his beautiful blue eyes or his bewitching smile that made her heart turn over, or—

Drat. She truly must put an end to all this fantasizing, or else the two of them really would be dead by dawn.

“Neither of us could have known something like this would happen,” she said.

He inhaled a deep breath, as if he were going to argue with her again. Instead, though, he only asked, “So what happens after they make their demands?”

Sara tried to smile reassuringly, but she had a feeling the gesture fell well short of its mark. “I wish I could tell you
that we’ll be safe until those demands are met or refused, but I can’t be certain about our safety at all. Nothing is certain with this group. They’re a ghastly bunch. And I
can
tell you that their demands, regardless of what they are, will almost certainly be refused, because the royal family has a zero tolerance when it comes to dealing with the Black Knights.” She hardened her expression, so that he would understand she was perfectly serious when she told him, “They’re capable of anything. Even murder.”

“You talk like you know a lot about them,” Shane said.

Oh, she knew more than he realized, Sara thought. She’d made it her life’s work to know about the Black Knights and other factions like them. She intended to make a career out of disbanding and punishing such groups. That small, private college near Santa Barbara that she attended was a world-renowned facility for counterterrorist training. But, of course, there was no reason why Shane needed to know that. In fact, the less he knew about her, the better off they’d both be.

“I’m from Penwyck,” she said by way of an explanation. “Everyone in Penwyck knows about the Black Knights. They’ve gone out of their way over the years to make their presence there known.” Which was certainly true, Sara reminded herself. So she wasn’t voicing a deception to Shane when she said it. Not really.

He had opened his mouth to say something more, but he closed it again suddenly, staring at something in the distance behind Sara. When she turned to follow his gaze, she saw two automobile headlights bearing down on them from a few hundred feet down the tarmac. They ended up being attached to a big, black Mercedes sedan that seemed not to emerge from the dark night so much as it did become a part of it. The windows, too, were darkened by tinting, so she couldn’t see who was driving. One of the Black Knights approached the car as it rolled to a stop, but the window went down just a few centimeters—enough to allow con
versation between driver and terrorist that was too quiet for Sara to hear.

After a few moments—and what appeared to be a rather heated exchange, she couldn’t help noticing—the Black Knight turned to his companions and signaled them to escort Sara and Shane into the back seat of the car. Of course, they didn’t so much escort the two of them as they did manhandle and dump them, but the end result was the same. Sara and Shane were forced into the back of the car between two of the Black Knights, behind a smoked glass screen that prohibited them from seeing the occupants of the front seat, a point which soon became moot anyway, as she and Shane were promptly blindfolded.

The group rode in silence for a good half hour, Sara deduced, all of it uphill, she also noticed, until the car finally came to a stop. Still blindfolded, she and Shane were shepherded out of the car and across what felt like a grassy yard, to an unevenly cobbled walkway. Then she was nudged up three steps—wooden steps, because they creaked and felt warped—and through a door that was then closed, and ominously locked, behind her. She felt Shane’s presence through all of this, even though no one spoke a word. She thought the Black Knights would separate the two of them, but they were both shoved into a room together. Then she heard another door closed, and locked, behind them, followed by the sound of receding footsteps and muffled voices. And then she realized that she and Shane were alone for the first time in hours. Well, alone in a room, at any rate. She was certain they were still under guard stationed elsewhere in the building.

The room where they found themselves smelled dusty and faintly of cinnamon, and Sara sensed that the dimensions were quite small. Her suspicion was confirmed when, in just two small steps, she bumped into what seemed to be shelves. Empty shelves. Four steps in the opposite direction had her bumping into more.

“Shane,” she said softly. Only after voicing the word
aloud did she realize it was the first time she had called him by his given name, and she couldn’t help grinning a little wryly. She supposed there was nothing like being taken hostage with someone to breed immediate intimacy with him.

“What?” he whispered back.

“Are you all right?”

“Gee, except for being tied up, blindfolded and taken hostage by dissident traitors, not to mention exhausted, thirsty and starving to death, yeah. I’m just peachy keen.”

Well, at least he hadn’t lost his sense of humor, Sara thought. Sort of. “I’m going to move toward you,” she said. “When I’m standing in front of you, use your teeth to remove my blindfold. Then I’ll turn around and you must untie my hands.”

He said nothing in response to that, something Sara found curious. She would have thought he’d want to be free of his bonds, and he couldn’t be free of them until she was free of hers. Perhaps he’d received a blow to the head at some point in the evening, she thought, and now his wits were addled.

“Shane?” she said again.

“What?” he grumbled.

“Can you do as I’ve asked?”

He hesitated a moment, then snapped, “You haven’t
asked
me to do anything. You’re issuing orders like a drill sergeant.”

Strangely, she felt a giggle bubble up at that. Oh, dear. All the exhaustion and tension and upheaval of the last two days were definitely catching up with her. She was getting hysterical.
Now, now, Sara, none of that,
she cautioned herself. Still, she couldn’t quite keep the—albeit erratic—laughter from her voice when she replied, “Well, my goodness, aren’t we just behaving like the slighted debutante?”

“Debutante, hell,” Shane retorted. “I just don’t see who died and made you general.”

“Well, the family name
is
Wallington,” she reminded him. “It’s not such a far cry from Wellington.”

There was another curious silence from him, then, “Oh. Well. Yeah. Okay. But I still don’t see why you’re suddenly the one in charge.”

Sara bit back an exasperated sound. Men. Honestly. They were such delicate creatures. Trying again, she said—in a sweeter tone this time—“Please, Mr. Cordello, if you could be so kind, I’d very much appreciate your liberating me from my bonds. If it pleases you, I’ll move in your general direction, and if you have a moment to spare, perhaps you could orally remove my blindfold, hmm? Would that be doable, do you think? It makes more sense, after all, since you’re the taller of us. I might have a bit of a problem using my mouth on you.”

And oh, how she wished she hadn’t said those last words, Sara thought immediately after voicing them. Because even though she had
not
meant them the way they sounded, and even in their current situation, when she should have her mind on a million other things, the thought of using her mouth on Shane was just too, too tempting not to consider it. As if she even had a choice in the matter. Because try as she might since meeting him, Sara had been unable to think of little other than Shane Cordello. Now, bringing her mouth into it…

Oh, dear.

He seemed to be thinking about her using her mouth on him, too, because yet another silence ensued, and it was infinitely more awkward than any of the others had been. She was actually grateful to hear him eject another impatient sound when he finally did, because it told her that he, at least, was able to move his mind on to other matters. At least she hoped that was what it meant. She’d hate to think that he was thinking about her using her mouth on him as she was thinking about using her mouth on him and feeling impatient as a result. Unless of course, that impatience re
sulted from the fact that he was so anxious for the two of them to get down to—

Drat. She was doing it
again.
Thinking errant, erotic thoughts about Shane Cordello. While being held hostage, no less. What on earth was
wrong
with her?

“You don’t have to pour it on so thick, Miss Wallington,” he finally said, and with the mention of pouring thickness, her thoughts once again turned to the, ah, unacceptable. Then she realized he was talking about flattery and not—Ah…he was talking about something other than what she was thinking about. “I’m not a child,” he added petulantly.

Oh, she was frightfully aware of that. But all she offered in response to his assurance was a noncommittal “Mmm.”

“Come over here,” he said.

And there was something in his voice, something velvety and seductive and rough, that sliced through the darkness and made her skin fairly prickle with anticipation. What an odd reaction, Sara thought. Odder still was the way she so automatically and immediately moved toward him. Because she realized she was responding to his command
not
because it was one she had initially proposed herself, but because this time he was the one uttering it. And somehow, with that one simple utterance, everything between them changed.

Sara moved forward uncertainly, sensing where he was without seeing him. And blindfolded as she was, she realized she was acutely aware of him in ways she hadn’t been initially. She could smell him now, a musky mix of manly scents that combined to put her senses on red alert. And she registered his breathing, deep and low and a little ragged. As she drew nearer still, she felt the heat of his body mingling with her own, and the very air surrounding them seemed to grow damp and heavy with it. And she quickly recognized the fact that she’d misjudged his distance when she bumped softly into him, her front to his.

Somehow, though, she couldn’t quite make herself take
even a tiny step backward. She told herself it was because she needed to be this close to him in order for him to perform the action she had requested—oh, all right, commanded—that he perform. Then she had to force herself to admit that although she did indeed
need
to be this close to him, that need hadn’t necessarily come about because she wanted him to free her bonds. No, her need in that moment stemmed from something else entirely, something Sara told herself she’d be better off not pondering.

He was taller than she remembered, perhaps because she no longer wore the low heels she had initially been wearing, and his chin grazed the crown of her head when they made their first contact. It occurred to her then that this was the first time the two of them had actually physically touched each other, and somehow that made the gesture seem almost poignant.

Before Sara had a chance to consider anything else, she felt his lips brushing over her forehead, and she realized he was doing just as she had asked—or, rather, commanded—he do, trying to remove her blindfold with his mouth. But he had trouble finding it at first. His coarse, unshaven jaw grazed her forehead and temple, and she remembered then how she had wondered what such a touch would feel like. Now, suddenly, she knew. It felt exquisite. Seductive. Arousing. His mouth began brushing against her sensitive flesh then, again over her forehead and temple, a good half-dozen times before he finally gripped the scrap of cloth with his teeth. And with every soft brush of his lips against her skin, with every faint breath that warmed her flesh, her heart gathered speed and beat more frantically against her ribs.

Good heavens, she thought. How could he possibly be making her feel aroused at a time like this? Before she had time to consider that question, he had tugged her blindfold down from her eyes, then lower still, over her nose and mouth, until he could bend over enough that the fabric hung loosely around her neck. She couldn’t be sure in the dark,
but he seemed not to straighten right away, but lingered a bit, inhaling deeply. She felt his warm breath dampen her sensitive flesh, and if she hadn’t known better, she would have sworn he dragged his open mouth lightly along the slender column of her throat before he rose to his full height again. Surely, though, that had only been a product of her overly heated imagination. Hadn’t it?