Dark Sins and Desert Sands by Stephanie Draven Page A

might help.”
    It was surreal to watch her return from the bathroom, carrying a drink for him, like she was Florence Fucking Nightingale. I heal people now, she’d told him in the shifting sands of her mindscape. Right .
    He took the water and drank it down, then sat down on the bed, hard.
     
    Layla was relieved to see that the stranger seemed to be coming back to himself now, getting it under control. But his eyes were still on her, pinning her in place like a red butterfly against a mat. “So now what? Are you going to shoot me?”
    He snorted. “Is that why you think I brought you up here? To shoot you? Seriously?”
    “The only thing I know is that you’ve taken me hostage.”
    “Lady, I just rescued you,” Ray said.
    “Is that why you have a gun?”
    “I have a gun because people are after me. Let’s both hope I won’t have to use it.”
    “Why would you need to use it?” she asked, her voice rising an octave. “People seem to do whatever you say….”
    “It’s my animal charm,” he said, but his acid tone was anything but charming. He slammed the empty glass down on the bedside table. “So let’s see if I have this straight. You don’t know who I am. You also don’t know who is following you. What the hell do you know, Doc?”
    Layla had held the secret inside her for so long, it seemed impossible that she was going to admit it to a complete stranger. But when the words left her lips, they came out in an exhilarating rush. “I don’t know anything! I don’t remember anything but the past two years of my life. I woke up in the desert, in my car, holding an old sixpence coin in my hand—this sixpence,” she said, pulling the necklace out of her neckline so he could see it. “I thought maybe I was from England, but my wallet was filled with dollars and I had an American driver’s license.”
    “And that didn’t jog your memory?” he asked, examining the coin.
    “No. I didn’t recognize myself and I don’t recognize you either. When was the last time we saw one another?”
    “Twenty-four months, thirteen days and six hours ago… I got in the habit of counting when I was locked in a box.”
    Twenty-four months, Layla thought. Two years ago. Before she lost her memory. “And how did we know each other? Were we…” In spite of herself, her eyes drifted to the bed.
    “Screwing?”
    Her cheeks suddenly burned, both because of his crass word choice and because of the way her insides flip-flopped at the mere suggestion. Were they lovers? It was the only way she could explain her physical reaction to him. Or why he was stalking her and leaving threatening notes in her office.
    “We never went to bed together, no,” Ray finally said, but not before letting his gaze travel up and down her body. It made her go hot all over. “I was arrested because some anonymous informant accused me of colluding with the enemy in Afghanistan. You were my interrogator. I was innocent. I am innocent. But you let them torture me anyway.”
    The heat in Layla’s body went to sudden chill. She had to sit down on the hotel room wing chair to keep her knees from buckling. “You must be mistaken.”
    Ray took off his coat and threw it at her. Now that his arms were exposed, she saw the crisscrossing lines of scars near his wrists. “Does this look like a mistake?”
    “You could’ve made those marks yourself,” she said, slowly.
    He yanked off his holster—gun and all—throwing it onto the bed. Then off came his T-shirt. She watched the pure artistry of his torso in motion, hisbare stomach coming into sharp focus. He was beautiful. Like some bronzed statue of an ancient athlete. But she wasn’t the type of woman to wilt at the sight of a man’s rippling muscles. She wasn’t like Isabel, all open and sensual, so the feelings that rose in her weren’t because of his raw physicality. It was the way he was staring at her, predatory and intense, compelling her to look at him. Really look at him.
    As she