Strangers in the Desert. Lynn Harris Raye

of her dress. She smiled into the microphone, thinking of his reaction. A man in the front smiled back, mistaking the gesture. She didn’t mind; it was part of the act, part of the personality of Bella Tyler.

      Except that Bella wouldn’t go home with this man. Or any man. It didn’t feel right somehow. Had never felt right since the moment she’d come to the States. She was free now, free from the expectations and duty her father had raised her with, and yet she couldn’t shake the idea she had to save herself for someone.

      “Bella Tyler, ladies and gentlemen,” the guitarist announced when she finished the last song. The bar erupted in applause.

      “Mahalo,” Isabella said as she shoved a strand of damp hair behind her ear. “And now we’re going to take a little break. We’ll be back in fifteen.”

      As she left the stage, she grabbed the glass of water that Grant, the club manager, held out for her, and headed into the back for a few minutes’ rest. The room she went to could hardly be called a dressing room, and yet it was where she stowed her stuff and applied her makeup for the evening. She flopped onto a chair and propped her bare feet on a bamboo trunk that served as a coffee table.

      Laughter and disembodied voices from the beach came to her through the thin walls. The rest of the band would work their way back here eventually, if they didn’t grab a cigarette and head outside to smoke instead. Isabella tilted her head back and touched the icy glass to her collarbone. The coldness of it was a pleasant shock as moisture dripped between her breasts.

      A few moments later, she heard movement in the hall. She could sense the moment when someone stopped in the doorway. The room was small, and she could feel that she was no longer alone. But people were always coming and going in Ka Nui’s, so she didn’t open her eyes to see who it was.

      But it wasn’t a waitress grabbing something, or one of the band members come to join her, because the person hadn’t moved since she’d first sensed a presence.

      But was the visitor still there—or was she imagining things?

      Isabella’s eyes snapped open. A man stood in the entry, his presence dark and overwhelming. Raw panic seized her throat tight so that she couldn’t speak or cry out. At first, all she saw was his size—he was tall and broad and filled the door—but then she began to pick out individual features.

      A shiver slid down her backbone as she realized with a jolt that he was Jahfaran. Dark hair, piercing dark eyes and skin that had been burnished by the powerful desert sun. Though he was dressed in a navy blue shirt and khaki pants instead of a dishdasha, he had the look of the desert, that hawklike intensity of a man who lived life on the edge of civilization. She didn’t know why, but fear flooded her in waves, liquefying her bones until she couldn’t move.

      “You will tell me,” he said tightly, “why.”

      Isabella blinked. “Why?” she repeated. Somehow, she managed to scramble to her feet. He was so tall that she still had to tilt her head back to look up at him. Her heart thundered in her breast as she realized he was terribly, frighteningly angry.

      With her.

      His gaze skimmed down her body. When his eyes met hers again, they burned with disgust. “Look at you,” he said. “You look like a prostitute.”

      The cold fear that had pooled in her stomach began to boil as anger stirred within. How typical of a Jahfaran male. How absolutely typical to think he had a right to criticize her simply because she was female, and because he did not understand her choices.

      Isabella drew herself up. She thrust her chin out, propped her hands on her hips and gave him the same thorough once-over he’d given her. It was bold, but she didn’t care. She owed this man nothing.

      “I don’t know who you think you are, but you’re welcome to get the hell out of my dressing room and keep your opinions to yourself.”

      His expression grew lethally cold. “Don’t play games with me, Isabella.”

      She took a step back, her pulse thrumming in her throat at breakneck speed. He’d used her name—her given name—and it stunned her, though perhaps it should not have. Clearly, he knew her father, and he’d recognized her somehow. Perhaps they’d met in the course of her father’s business dealings. A party, a dinner.

      But no. She didn’t recognize him. And she was sure that she’d never have forgotten a man like this if she’d met him. He was too big, too magnificent—and much too full of himself. He would have been impossible to ignore.

      “Why would I play games with you? I don’t even know you!”

      His eyes narrowed. “I will know how you came to be here, and I will know it now.”

      Isabella drew herself up. How dare he question her as if he had a right? “You’re bright. Figure it out.”

      He took a step into the room, and the room shrank. He overwhelmed the space. He overwhelmed her.

      Isabella wanted to back away from him, but there was nowhere to go. And she would not cower before this man. It seemed vitally important somehow that she did not.

      “You did not do this alone,” he said. “Who helped you?”

      Isabella swallowed. “I—”

      “Is everything okay here, Bella?”

      Her eyes darted past the stranger to Grant, who stood in the door, his fists clenched at his sides. The stranger had turned at his entrance. Grant’s expression was grave, his blue eyes deadly serious as he tried to stare the man down.

      She could have told him it wouldn’t work. The man stared back at Grant, his expression not softening in the least. The last thing she wanted was a fight, because she did not doubt that Grant would try to defend her. She also didn’t doubt that he would lose. There was something hard and cold about this man. Something fierce and untamed.

      “I’m fine, Grant,” she said. “Mr … um, the gentleman was just leaving.”

      “I was not, in fact,” he said, his English oh-so-perfect. The cultured tone of his voice proclaimed him to be from an elite family, the ones who usually sent their sons to be schooled in the United Kingdom.

      “I think you should go,” Grant said. “Bella needs to rest before she goes back on.”

      “Indeed.” The stranger turned back to her then, and she felt the full force of his laserlike attention. “Sadly, she will not be returning to the stage. Isabella is coming with me.”

      Fury pounded through her. “I am not—“

      He reached out and grasped her arm with an iron fist.

      His fingers didn’t bite into her, but they were firm and in control. Commanding.

      Shock forced Isabella to go completely still as her body reacted with a shudder at the touch of his skin on hers.

      But it wasn’t revulsion she felt. It wasn’t terror.

      It was familiarity. It was heat and want and, underlying that, a current of sadness so deep and strong she wanted to sob.

      It stunned her into immobility as she tried to process it.

       Why?

      “Hey,” Grant protested. “Let her go!”

      At the same time, Isabella looked up in confusion. “Who are you?”

      A shadow passed over his face before it hardened again. “Do you really expect me to believe you do not know?”

      Anger and despair slashed through her in waves. It made no sense. And yet he hated her. This man hated her, and she had no idea why. Somehow, she found the strength to act, wrenching herself free from his grip.

      Isabella hugged her arms around her torso as if to shield herself. She couldn’t bear to feel the anger and sadness ripping through her a moment