Free Sheik Protector by Dana Marton Page B

unconscious from blood loss.
    She wet the towel and began washing him with it. A bullet wound and a couple of grazes. She did her best to scrub away the dried blood, leaving only the area of the bullet hole untouched. That was a deep wound that thankfully stopped bleeding. She didn’t want to chance opening it up. He didn’t need to lose any more blood. She wished she could find a phone book and figure out the number for an ambulance.
    “I hope you won’t get an infection this quickly. When you wake up you can call that doctor. You’ll be fine.”
    She bandaged his wounds and left them alone.
    She needed more cloth and more clean water to wash him completely clean. There was dried blood on most of his torso. When she was done with the front, she leaned him forward carefully to look at his back. And gasped at the angry scars that marred his skin, a horrific testament to his past.
    She couldn’t image what could have happened to him. Whatever it was, it seemed a miracle that he had survived. She cleaned off the blood, not so much of it here. Then tentatively dragged a finger over the largest scar, feeling the rough edge that ran down his skin.
    She might have been overwhelmed by the dangers of the last two days, but it was clear that Karim Abdullah was no stranger to violence.
    She pulled away, resolving again to get away from him at the earliest possibility. But first, she might as well make him a little more comfortable.
     
    K ARIM LET HIMSELF sink into the most pleasant dream he’d had in a long time. A woman’s soft fingers were caressing his skin. Her touch was as smooth as the finest Arabian coffee and took away the pain that burned his arm.
    Her voice was warm and sweet like a honeyed treat he was particularly fond of. Her scent of jasmine and vanilla invaded his senses. Her fingers ran down his chest. The dream disappeared for a while then came back again. She was touching his back now, very gently. He was aware it was a dream, even as he dreamt it. No woman would want to touch his scars, no woman would willingly look at them. But he pushed reality away and pulled the dream closer, not wanting to let go the sweet comfort of it.
    The dream faded again and other images came. Pain. People dragged him over cold, hard ground. He was a child now, kidnapped and beaten when he had tried to run. The men who dragged him talked openly of killing him, of dividing the price his own stepbrother put on his head. But they decided to beat him first to pass the time and to teach him a lesson for having tried to escape. They used a camel whip to peel the skin from his back.
    But that light, feminine touch brought his dreams back from the dark past. Slim fingers placed a cold cloth on his forehead and washed his face. A soft torso pressed against his midriff as the woman leaned over him.
    And as sleep wore off, his body awakened. Instincts warred. A part of him warned of danger. Another part wanted to forget about everything else and take all that softness that moved around him. Jasmine and vanilla. Arousal washed over him as he woke, and a sudden awareness. On reflex, he caught the slim wrist that had been the first thing he saw, a hand rising above him. Then he rolled, pinning the woman under him.
    In the next second two things registered: the pulsing pain in his arms, and that the person looking at him wide-eyed was Julia Gardner, the woman who possibly carried his brother’s child. Off-limits .
    But just now, his brain still slow from drugs and sleep, he couldn’t deny that he wanted her, wanted her with a fierce need he hadn’t experienced in a long time.
    The room was shrouded in semidarkness. Dusk was settling outside. She hadn’t turned on the light. Smart. Her intelligence had never been in question. Her stubbornness was the thing that had gotten her in trouble.
    He pulled away and sat up, his mouth as dry as the Rub Alkali, the Empty Quarter, the deadest part of the desert. His limbs were still weaker than he would