Duel In The Sun

Catriona nodded and walked up the stairs to go to her room. Rafiq stood in the hall watching her go, his thick white robe hanging open.

Suddenly there was a commotion outside and then the front door was pushed open, so violently that it went crashing back on its hinges. A man strode into the hall. A fair-haired European. Tall, broad-shouldered and with arrogant self-assurance. Seeing Rafiq, he came to a stop and put his fists on his hips. A sardonic smile came to the man’s lips and he said, ‘Hello, Omar. I hear you’ve kidnapped my new textile expert!’

CHAPTER TWO

CATRIONA stood on the stairs, frozen with astonishment. Then a great feeling of relief filled her and she went to run down to the hall, but then stopped; Rafiq hadn’t been so taken aback and had moved forward to face the intruder.

‘Good evening, Dr Kane,’ Rafiq said smoothly, apparently in no way put out. ‘What a pleasant surprise.’

So this was Lucas Kane. Catriona stood still, hidden from Kane’s sight by a bend in the stairs, but able to watch the two men as they confronted each other. Rafiq had an inborn hauteur that had probably grown through a hundred generations, but Kane had the self-confidence of a man who had carved out his own success in life. Physically Kane was much the taller of the two, a couple of inches over six feet, Catriona guessed, and where Rafiq was dark-haired and -skinned, he was fair, although he had a deep-golden tan that could only have come from long hours spent in the sun. Both men could have been called good-looking, but in entirely different ways; Rafiq’s features were soft and would one day be full, but Kane’s face would never be anything but lean, almost hawk-like. The Egyptian’s eyes were dark and long-lashed, those of Kane an intense slate grey.

‘A surprise, Omar?’ Kane answered, his eyebrows rising. ‘But surely you knew I wouldn’t let you get away with it?’

To Catriona’s surprise, Rafiq laughed. ‘It was purely a mistake, my dear Dr Kane. And entirely your own fault. You really should make sure that you’re on time, you know. The lady waited so long for you that when my car arrived to collect someone else she thought it was for her and was brought here. Naturally she was made most welcome.’

‘And why didn’t you phone to tell me of the—er—mistake?’

‘I didn’t find it out myself until I met the lady—this morning.’ His deliberate pause emphasised that it was now evening.

‘And since then?’ Kane queried.

Rafiq gave a small smile, knowing that Catriona was listening. ‘Why, the lady has been having a very pleasant time, enjoying my house, my hospitality. In fact I’ve been trying to persuade her to stay here—’ again he paused as Dr Kane’s head came sharply up ‘—as an English teacher for my children, of course.’

‘And has the lady yielded to your persuasion?’ Kane asked sardonically.

‘Oh, come now, Dr Kane, you do not really expect me to tell you that, do you?’ Catriona made an angry movement and Rafiq turned quickly in her direction. ‘But why don’t you ask her for yourself? Please, Catriona, come down.’ And he added, ‘There is no need to be afraid of Dr Kane; he will not harm you—in my house.’ This last on a definitely mocking note.

Slowly Catriona came further down the stairs until Kane could see her. Her hair had got wet while she was swimming and she had undone the plait, shaking her hair loose so it could dry. The dampness had made it curl so that it framed her face and hung in twisting, golden tendrils that caressed her bare shoulders. Kane’s eyes widened and he stared at her face in arrested surprise, but then he glanced down and saw how little she was wearing and his expression changed. His eyes swept over her and then, noticing Rafiq’s partly open robe, hardened and became contemptuous. Catriona pulled the towel tighter around her, feeling strangely indecent under his scornful gaze.

‘Well?’ Kane said harshly. ‘Has he persuaded you to stay?’

Her chin came up. ‘No. Of course not.’

Kane’s left eyebrow rose in surprise at her forcefulness and his gaze lingered for a moment on her face, on the tilt of her chin. Turning to Rafiq, he said jeeringly, ‘It seems as if you’re losing your touch, Omar.’

Rafiq shrugged eloquently. ‘Catriona has been here only one day; perhaps when she has seen your house she will change her mind.’

‘Not if she has any sense.’

‘But she is so fragile, so delicate.’ Rafiq used his hands eloquently and this time both men’s eyes turned to look her over. ‘I’m afraid she will find life in your primitive house far too hard, and then she will—’

Tired of being talked about as if she wasn’t there, Catriona cut in, ‘I’ve already said that I don’t want to stay here. I want to go to the dig.’

‘So instead of just standing there, why don’t you go and put some clothes on?’ Kane demanded scathingly.

Catriona shot him an angry look, beginning to realise why he had such a tyrannical reputation. ‘My cases are already packed; I’ll be down in just a few minutes,’ she said shortly, and turned to run back up the stairs to her room. Hastily she towelled herself dry and dressed, found a bag for her wet swimsuit and shoved it in her case. She couldn’t manage all her luggage alone; going through on to the galleried landing, she looked over. The two men were standing close together and seemed to be in the middle of a heated but low-voiced argument. Catriona called, ‘Would one of you help me with my cases, please?’ and they moved apart.

Rafiq gestured to one of his servants who was waiting near the open door and the man came to help her. When she followed him down she found that Dr Kane had gone outside to wait. Rafiq, too, was waiting. Taking her hand, he didn’t shake it, but bowed over it. ‘You have graced my house, Catriona. And I am sure that you will again.’

‘I doubt it,’ she returned shortly.

He smiled. ‘Wait until you have seen the house at the excavation site. My offer is still open and you will soon be back, Catriona.’

Realising that he couldn’t be argued with, she merely said, ‘I didn’t say you could call me that.’

‘But I am going to. And I want you to call me Omar.’

‘As I won’t be seeing you again, there won’t be any need, will there? Goodbye.’

She turned to leave and saw that Dr Kane had stepped back into the doorway and had heard. He laughed, but waited until Catriona had got into the passenger seat of the waiting Land Rover and he had climbed in beside her before he leaned out of the window and called jeeringly, ‘It seems the lady wasn’t tempted, Omar. You’ll just have to make your bribes bigger in future!’ Laughing again, he gunned the car down the driveway and through the heavy wooden gates of the Garden of the Nile.

The Land Rover bumped along the worn-surfaced road, making Catriona grab for the dashboard to brace herself. The car was old and noisy, and the seat had long ago lost its stuffing. It was so exactly what she had originally expected that she laughed aloud.

Dr Kane glanced across at her. ‘What’s so funny?’

She shook her head. ‘It’s nothing.’

He thumped an angry fist on the steering-wheel. ‘Why the hell do women always say that when you ask them a question?’ he demanded. ‘Is it because you think I won’t understand the subtleties of the female mind—or is it just that your mind is a complete blank? “It’s nothing”,’ he mimicked, falsetto. ‘When I ask you a question, woman, you damn well answer it! Is that understood?’

His manner would have intimidated most women, but not Catriona. She was still overpoweringly grateful that he had rescued her from Omar. And had done it in such a satisfyingly high-handed way, too; leaving Omar discomfited on his own doorstep. She was still on a high from that, full of a crazy kind of excitement that shone in her eyes. But she managed to say calmly enough, ‘I was laughing at the age and discomfort of this car; it was exactly what I originally expected to be met by.’

‘So why on earth were you stupid enough to go off in Omar’s limo?’ Dr Kane asked scornfully.

‘Why didn’t you send someone to collect me?’ she countered, determined not to grovel.

‘I did. You’d gone.’

‘I waited for ages,’ she said accusingly.

Her words were almost drowned under the noise of the hooter as a truck, loaded with live camels, of all things, got in the way. She thought he hadn’t heard, but when they’d passed the truck, he said, as if it was her fault, ‘You were early. The planes are late so regularly that no one bothers to get there until half an hour after one’s due in.’

‘I suppose nobody bothered to phone and check?’

A warning glint came into Kane’s eyes. ‘Don’t push it; I had a devil of a job tracking you down.’

‘How did you find me?’

‘By making enquiries at the airport. But I had to wait till the night shift came back on before I heard you’d gone in Omar’s car. Of all the damn stupid things to do!’

Stiffly, Catriona said, ‘I’m sorry if I caused any inconvenience, Dr Kane, but it was—’

‘Lucas,’ he interrupted. ‘My name’s Lucas Kane. There’s no formality at the dig. And, yes, you were a damn nuisance. An official at the airport confirmed that you’d arrived but I had to bribe a taxi-driver before I found out where you’d gone.’

‘Bribe him?’ Catriona was shocked. ‘I hope you didn’t have to pay him too much?’

‘Enough—and I’m taking it out of your wages.’

She should have expected that. Catriona grinned inwardly, and sat back in her seat. The Land Rover had slowed, caught up in a snarl of traffic on the outskirts of a town. Luxor, she supposed. It was almost dark but the streets were still full of cars, taxis, tourist buses, as well as bicycles, rickety old trucks, horse-drawn buggies, and people who just stepped out into the street to cross whenever they felt like it. Everyone seemed to drive on their horns; it was hot, dusty, noisy and intensely foreign. Magic!