Sheikh Defence
He's the one she can't remember, she's the one he can't forget…Tossed overboard, Ava Adams had been left for dead, drifting at sea. But security specialist Faisal Al-Nassar was determined to find her. He owed her father a great debt and had never forgotten the connection he and Ava had once shared. Yet after rescuing Ava he discovered she barely remembered him.Amnesia had left Ava uncertain of who had tried to kill her. She did know, however, that Faisal was a man she could trust. The sheik's embrace was familiar and enticing…and possibly even more dangerous. How could she succumb to feelings for her protector when what she didn't know could get them both killed?
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Heâs the one she canât remember, sheâs the one he canât forget...
Tossed overboard, Ava Adams had been left for dead, drifting at sea. But security specialist Faisal Al-Nassar was determined to find her. He owed her father a great debt and had never forgotten the connection he and Ava had once shared. Yet after rescuing Ava he discovered she barely remembered him.
Amnesia had left Ava uncertain of who had tried to kill her. She did know, however, that Faisal was a man she could trust. The sheikâs embrace was familiar and enticing...and possibly even more dangerous. How could she succumb to feelings for her protector when what she didnât know could get them both killed?
âAva, itâs me, Faisal.â
She hadnât heard right and yet she had. The voice, the words, even the shoes. It all came together. All of it was familiar. The fear fell away. She relaxed in his arms, her heart pounding a zillion times an hour.
âIf I let you go, promise me you wonât run,â he said.
âItâs a mistake to be here with me.â
His arm eased and she slid down, landing on her feet and turning to face him.
The look he gave her was both intimidating and full of concern. âYou could have died, running the way you did.â
âBut I didnât,â she said obstinately as if her earlier fears had been based on nothing but her imagination. âIt was a mistake to follow me,â she repeated, for he hadnât responded the first time sheâd said it. âFai,â she whispered. âYou need to get out of here. Trust me.â
âWeâll get out of here together. Itâs what I do, protect.â
RYSHIA KENNIE has received a writing award from the City of Regina, Saskatchewan, and was also a semifinalist for the Kindle Book Awards. She finds that thereâs never a lack of places to set an edge-of-the-seat suspense, as prairie winters find her dreaming of warmer places for heart-stopping stories. They are places where deadly villains threaten intrepid heroes and heroines who battle for their right to live or even to love. For more, visit www.ryshiakennie.com.
If you are reading this dedication, this one is for you.
You are the reason this book was published. Thank you and enjoy.
Contents
Friday, June 10â11:00 p.m.
âSon of a...â
The broken expletive was followed by a bang that seemed to echo through the bowels of the yacht.
Ava Adamsâs eyelids fluttered. Fitfully, she turned once, then twice. The yacht shifted and rocked in the waves. It had been a late night yesterday and the day before, not to mention the fact that this trip had been completely unexpected. She was dreamingâthere was no reason to get up, not yet...not for hours yet.
Still, she shivered. Her sleep was skating on the edge of consciousnessâwhat was reality and what was not were no longer clear. In her dream, she only knew that she needed to escape. She flung one arm out grazing the wall, causing her to turn to her other side.
She opened her eyes. She wasnât fully awake. She didnât even take in her surroundings before immediately closing her eyes again. But she couldnât shift as deep into sleep as sheâd been. In fact, now with her eyes closed, her consciousness was heating up. She could see through the curtain of lashes. The moonlight drifted in a faint stream of light across the sheet that twisted around her waist. Her breathing leveled out and she fell asleep again. This time the sleep was even lighter than it had been beforeâmore troubled. She didnât know how long she slept. She only knew that it wasnât long before she was again awakened. This time by sounds that she couldnât ignore. They were loud against the background of the once calm rocking of the boat. Her senses came awake, first noting the change in smell. She inhaled, long and slow. Sheâd done that often in the two days that theyâd been anchored in this cove. She loved the hint of vanilla that was so pervasive and wove through the salty scent of ocean, of seawater. Oddly, the vanilla scent was gone.
âTo hellââ a manâs voice rose in a shout. It was a shout that seemed to be cut off as if forcibly stopped. He might have said something else. Words that jumbled in the scuffle and chaos of noise that preceded a crash, followed by another.
It was only a nightmare. It was a figment of her imagination. A result of the stress of stepping from one world into another; from academia into the world of a self-sufficient adult. Two weeks from today she was moving to Casper, Wyoming. At twenty-five and with a doctorate in psychology under her belt, it was about time. At least that was what sheâd told herself. Her father had encouraged her to take all the time she needed. She knew that was a way of keeping her close, of keeping her dependent on him. Even though she had lived her own life, in her own apartment, paying as many of her college bills herself as she could with money she had made by occasionally tutoring other students, still she had relied on him. It gave him a chance to be the father he hadnât gotten to be when she truly had been a child. Sheâd allowed him that. For heâd become her parent in her latter childhood. It had been through marriage, but stepparent or not, she couldnât ask for a better father. Now they were making up for lost time. Thus, this trip. They both needed itâthe time to be together. Life had gotten busy.
