“Not” Automatically Alex started toward him, her arms outstretched.
Murad rushed to her, jerked her hard backward, against his side. She had thought that she had already experienced the most crushing anguish possible, but she had not. “No!” Alex cried.
Blackwell glanced at her, their eyes locking. “Don’t worry about me, Alexandra,” he said. “Take care of yourself.”
“I love you,” Alex heard herself cry in a raw, soblike whisper.
“Take him away,” Jovar said.
35
THEY HAD TAKENhim away. What if she never saw him again?
Alex hardly had time to assimilate this horrible thought The soldiers had left, with Blackwell in chains, Jovar following, and now Jebal stormed into the room. Zoe was on his heels.
Discovery.That single-word refrain drummed in Alex’s numbed brain. She stood unmoving, facing her husband, who approached her rapidly, his countenance set in lines of fury. Before Alex knew what was happening, he had struck her across the face, so hard that her head snapped backward and she stumbled, almost falling. Tears of pain stung her eyes. His blow had been vicious and cruel.
“Come here,” Jebal shouted.
Alex cringed. Murad stood behind Jebal, as frightened as she, as agonized.
“Come here, whore!” he shouted again.
Alex slowly approached. Jebal’s hand cracked across her face again, and this time Alex landed on her buttocks and back on the hard floor. The air was knocked out of her lungs. For one instant she lay unmoving and afraid. It was the third time she had been struck by him that evening.
“Please, my lord, have mercy on her, she has done nothing wrong,” Murad cried, kneeling beside Alex and reaching for her.
Alex knew she had to think and she forced herself to sit upright, the left side of her face throbbing badly. “Murad, leave me and my husband,” she gasped. She did not want Murad to suffer her fate. She wanted to remove him from the scene.
His eyes were agonized. She read his thoughts as clearly as if he had spoken them aloud:I cannot.
“Murad.” She spoke more firmly, her chest heaving, her lungs still seeking air. “Leave us, now.”
Murad turned reluctantly. Jebal did not even look at him as he left. His gold-flecked eyes were focused solely on Alex, and they continued to burn.
Alex knew that her life was at stake. “There has been a mistake,” she said.
“You have betrayed me,” Jebal spat.
“I have not betrayed you,” Alex lied, and she knew she did not blush. The desire to live gave her words the ringing tone of utter conviction, of absolute truth. “When I saw Blackwell in thebedestanhe was near death. Yes, I knew it was he. I was sickened, Jebal, sickened, by the cruelty of your countrymen!”
“Do not dare cast aspersions on me or mine.”
“I saved his life,” Alex almost shouted. She wiped her running nose with her hand and realized that it was bleeding. “You hit me, curse me, for saving a man’s life?”
“He is your lover,” Jebal cried. His entire body shook. Alex did not know how she could not have recognized long ago that he could be, if provoked, every bit as cruel as the bashaw. “Together the two of you have been spying on me and my family!”
“No!” Alex shook her head. “We are not spies. And he is not my lover,” she said firmly. “I saved his life, nothing more.”
Zoe stepped forward. “She is lying, Jebal. Even Jovar thinks she is a spy. And Jovar says Blackwell rendezvoused with a bedouin in the bagnio last year—a lover. I myself have seen her in bedouin robes but stupidly believed her excuses. Bring her before Farouk and your father. They are intelligent men. They will be able to determine the truth.Allof the truth.”
“I am not a spy,” Alex repeated, growing frantic. She did not want to be interrogated by the bashaw, Jovar, and Farouk. Those men would break her, destroy her—she was certain of it. “I am not Blackwell’s lover.”
“There is one thing I like about my wife—her utter loyalty,” Jebal said harshly, and they all knew he referred to Zoe. “She is also clever—as you are, Zohara.” Jebal began to shake. “I seem to recall that last year, the night thePearlwas destroyed by Blackwell, there was a bedouin involved, a bedouin who disappeared and could not be found.”
Alex felt faint. “I know nothing of that,” she whispered.
“Bedouin robes are a wonderful disguise,” Zoe remarked.
