by Alam, Donna
‘Sit down.’ My words are still soft but heavy with the weight of my command. Wonder if it’s okay to admit to being turned on as he does?
‘The kitten has claws,’ Kai murmurs, settling himself, no doubt uncomfortable due to his arms, and possibly the bulge in his pants. Suddenly, he stills and sits taller, his head tilting as though listening hard.
‘You’re such a tease,’ he growls.
‘Am I?’ From a few steps away, I throw my bra over him. His chuckling stops at my next question, his face folding into a more serious line.
‘Tell me why you’re here.’
‘I told you. This was the place I thought you wouldn’t come.’
‘No, Kai,’ I say in a deliberate purr. ‘I know. The photograph, it had to hurt. Seeing it, knowing Essam—’
‘Don’t,’ he rasps. ‘Leave it, Kate.’
‘You said you couldn’t stand to look at me. Good job you’re wearing a blindfold now, huh?’
‘Come closer, kitten. I don’t need to see you to want you.’
My heart lifts; confirmation of a thought I’d fought not to recognise. ‘You do still want me?’
‘All. The. Fucking. Time.’
‘The feeling’s mutual.’ I’m naked now, but for my heels. ‘But mutual is overrated, according to you. Do you know,’ I continue, drawing closer to the object of my desire and the bed. ‘You’re my waking thoughts, and my daydreams? My night-time obsession, as well.’
‘Come closer,’ he whispers, his tone low and raspy. Kai’s chest rises and falls steadily, the muscles in his shoulders defined and pronounced. I’m no fool—I’m sure he could pull his arms free if he wanted, but there’s something keeping him from me.
‘My . . .’ I whisper, climbing onto the bed and at his side. ‘What big . . . muscles you have.’ My fingertips trail his bicep, eliciting a whole-body shiver.
‘All the better to hold you with,’ he says with a teasing smile, one sharp bicuspid peeking from behind his curved lips.
‘And my, what beautiful teeth you have.’ I draw my thumb against his bottom lip, his smile widening a touch as I do.
‘All the better to eat—’
‘Not just now, Romeo,’ I whisper. ‘Because I need you to tell me why you couldn’t—why you can barely look at me.’
His mouth clamps closed, his lips now just a line across his face. A muscle in his jaw begins to tick as he makes to turn his head from me, but not before I catch it in both my hands.
‘Tell me,’ I hiss, licking the jumping muscle. He shivers as my hair trails his chest. ‘Your cousin sent you naked photographs of me, and you know he didn’t take them.’
‘Of course I fucking know,’ he grates out, looking like he’s about to explode.
‘Then tell me.’
‘I don’t fucking know!’
‘Liar,’ I whisper in his ear, my tongue flicking out to caress the shell.
‘Stop it.’ A growl.
‘You can’t stop me. You can’t stop me from doing anything. You can’t—’
‘Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I don’t feel impotent enough? He fucking attacked you, Kate, and I left you alone! All that’s happened . . . it’s my fault. If I’d been here—’
Sliding my legs wide, I slip over his lap. ‘If you’d been here, it would have happened some other way. You need to stop punishing yourself.’ My hands glide to his neck, my fingers grasping the ends of the ties. ‘I want you to punish me instead.’
He blinks heavily—once, twice—as the silk falls between us, his pupils reacting to the light.
‘Don’t, Kate. This isn’t your fault—’
‘It is. It’s my fault. There are more photos.’ He nods and sweet relief spreads through my insides. ‘I’m sorry I lied, but I didn’t want to disappoint you. I didn’t want you to—but I did lie. To you. Even though I didn’t mean to.’ Foot, meet idiot, rambling mouth. ‘And I want you to. Please, anything. ’
‘Don’t promise me things you can’t mean.’
My hands retract from his hair, slipping around to cup his face. ‘Why can’t I?’
‘Leave it, Kate. I’m too angry—’
‘You told me once that passion and anger are often two sides of the same coin. Kai, come on, make me atone.’
Proving my theory that I’ll never make a bondage expert, Kai pulls his wrists free from his shirt. In an instant, his mouth is hard against mine, his tongue thrusting and demanding a return. His hands knead and touch my back and arse as though to make me aware of his possession—his need. Then, suddenly, I’m in the air, his arms banding my butt and he lifts me as he stands. The hard press of his body against mine spikes desire deep in my veins, rushing through the limbs I try to wrap him in. I’d expected him to throw me to the bed, when instead, he moves us to the chair that I’ve both loved and then loathed.
As my feet touch the floor, Kai stops kissing me before turning me to face the mirror with both hands against my waist.
‘This is your last chance to say no.’ Our eyes connected through our reflections, he lifts the weight of my hair in his hands. My head falls to the side and he bends to kiss my neck, my eyes rolling closed. ‘Don’t make me do this,’ he whispers against the sensitive space. ‘Not today.’
His words and tongue echo in between my legs and I push back against the weight of his body, curling my fingers into the back of the chair, desperate to make this right, desperate for him.
‘Please,’ I whisper, not sure what I’m pleading for, not sure how he can be so hard yet so reluctant.
Kai flexes into me again and I whimper—one small sound lengthening into a libidinous moan as he pushes his knee between my legs.
‘You don’t want this. You don’t need to feel my anger.’ His words are low, throaty and heartfelt—almost a plea—even as he lifts my knee onto the seat of the chair. ‘How I feel—I don’t think I’ll be able to stop. Please tell me you don’t want that.’
‘I don’t want you to stop. I want you to be free.’
A pounding pulse hammers between my legs as Kai’s golden eyes stare back, his expression pained as he curves his body over mine. He rests his head against my shoulder, and with one heavily expelled breath, says something that resonates inside me almost viscerally.
‘Don’t let go.’
The same words he’d whispered our very first time in this room, both hands curled over mine against the back of the chair. Three small words caressing and commanding in their delivery, a promise, almost, of what’s to come.
Me! Me! Make it me!
Chapter Eighty-Seven
Air kisses my skin as he unfurls his body, the phantom of his touch shimmering along my spine. I’m so caught up in the promise of this moment, it takes me a beat to realise he’s stepped away, the mirror reflecting every knot of muscle in his naked back.
Opening the armoire, he takes something out as he asks, ‘Do you remember you’re safe word, kitten?’
My safe—‘What?’
Closing the door, he speaks again. ‘Khallas. Remember that and—and I’ll stop. I promise.’
I’m not sure which of us he’s trying harder to convince. And I know khallas is Arabic for stop, but a safe word? I’m familiar with the concept—I’ve read plenty of those kinds of books. Books where the heroine may or may not need protecting from her counterpart and, sometimes, from herself. What exactly does he have planned that I might need him to stop? What have I started here?
My heartrate increases as he stills by the bed, gathering the scarf he’d worn moments earlier. Moving to stand behind me once more, his jaw is resolute. He places something on the seat of the chair between my legs, his skin hot against mine as he leans over, looping the silk through the crown of the chair.
‘Does this chair belong to the hotel?’ I’ll be asking questions about the wallpaper next—anything to drown the pounding in my chest.
Kai’s laugh is filled with a lazy kind of mocking as he lifts my hands closer together before thread
ing the silk between them. ‘Want to get one for home, habibti? I know how much you like to be strapped down.’
Such a beautiful, detestable man.
‘W—what was that you put on the chair?’ I tilt my head over my shoulder, unable to see from this angle.
‘Eyes front.’ His gaze flicks to the mirror, shining dark gold. ‘Nervous?’
‘No.’ My answer is immediate and thick sounding, the hedonistic mixture of excitement and alarm dampening my skin. ‘Should I be?’ He shrugs lightly; a non-answer. ‘What are you going to do to me?’ From thick to a breathless encouragement; Kai straightens behind me with a languid sort of grace.
‘Anything I want, wasn’t that it?’
My heart flutters wildly; the look on his face one of absolute seriousness. As he unzips his pants, he spreads my knees wider with his own, before lifting the point of my heel from the ground and encouraging me to place my knee on the seat. Tied to the crown, with my knees spread wide and my arse sticking out, I feel exposed. Vulnerable. Alive.
The atmosphere between us feels all at once heavy and suspended; a charge of an electrical-like current snapping between us, ready to burn.
‘So you lied about the photographs.’
My heart beats twice in rapid succession, immediately righting itself as I nod, not trusting myself to speak.
‘And you didn’t tell me you saw him.’ Essam; neither of us are willing to bring his name into this.
I nod again.
As fast as lightening, his hand reaches out, slapping my right butt cheek, the sound ricocheting around the room.
‘Answer me,’ Kai demands
I realise I’ve bitten my lip—whether from surprise or a reluctance to cry out I’m not sure. I push them together as I swallow, trying to control my emotions, the urge to cry.
‘I did. Out—outside the house. Twice. I saw Sofia, too.’
‘Together?’
‘No. With your mother. She—I didn’t speak to her.’
He nods once, the motion suggesting our almost meeting as inconsequential.
‘What did he say? What did my cousin want?’
‘To hurt you,’ I answer softly. ‘Through me.’
‘He tried to blackmail you? He wanted to fuck you in exchange for keeping the pictures quiet.’
I nod, and as his reflection frowns, I add a quick, ‘Yes.’
‘And still you didn’t say? You kept it all to yourself. Tell me, kitten, what would you have done if I hadn’t come home?’
‘I don’t know. I-I thought—’
‘That you’d fuck him? Keep it all quiet? Continue to lie?’
‘No! You know that’s not true.’
‘Then tell me.’
‘I didn’t know what to do!’ My body slumps forward, my head against my bound hands. ‘I was trying to come up with some way to deal with it on my own. I’d lied to you, and no matter how pathetic it makes me, I didn’t want you to have to sort this out for me. I’ve felt so wretched. So ashamed.’
‘Tell me.’
‘Those pictures—I told you I’d never—and I hadn’t. Not really. Not like with you.’ Through a riot of tangled thoughts, I try to make him see that this felt like a betrayal. I lied, yes. A stupid reflex, but the way I’ve tortured myself hasn’t truly been about that. ‘That afternoon with Shane, it wasn’t the same. There was no intimacy, no real desire. No thought. It was, and it wasn’t, really a lie.’ It all sounds so pathetic, even to me.
‘So tell me.’
I raise my gaze to our reflections; mine confused, his burning hot.
‘Tell me about this afternoon . . . these photographs.’ His hands find my hips as he flexes his body into mine just once. ‘I want to hear how it happened.’
Slowly, it all begins to make sense. I’ve been here myself; that stage of imagining the images from which you can torture yourself. Images of the one you desire with the one you despise. Kai and Sofia wrapped in each other’s arms; Sofia on her knees.
‘W-we’d been at the beach with friends.’
‘Topless sunbathing,’ he suggests, his tone gravelly.
‘Yes—it was hot. Really hot. The weather I mean, and we’d all been drinking. Doesn’t make for good decision making.’
‘I don’t know,’ Kai purrs from behind me, his fingers stroking my sides. ‘If not for Dutch courage, where would you and I be today? If not for wine,’ he continues in that delectable honeyed tone. ‘Would you have followed me to this room?’
I dip my head, my hair falling forward to hide the thoughts he’s planted there. This chair. A night of firsts. I note abstractly that he doesn’t seem conflicted. More turned on.
‘Where were you?’ he asks softly, his light fingered touch making my skin tingle and my nerve endings sing. ‘Ah, yes. Drinking . . . with friends.’
‘No,’ I answer quickly, thinking back to Essam’s insinuation. One photographer or more? ‘That’s not how it happened. There were just the two of us. We—we went back to the roo-mmh . . .’ The word draws off, my body bowing as his fingers find me wet and ready as he strokes between my legs.
‘Did he touch you like this?’ Unable to answer, I shake my head as he slides his fingers inside me, my body pushing back onto his hand. ‘Like this?’ With a twist of his wrist, those long elegant fingers begin stroking my insides.
I bite my lip even though I can’t answer; his words a heat rushing through my bloodstream, trailing fire under my skin. I keep my eyes down, knowing I shouldn’t look at him, because when I do I won’t stand a chance.
‘Want to know something?’ he asks, his teeth grazing the skin of my neck. I cry out, my head rising as he bites. His golden-eyed reflection looks like he’d burn to the touch. ‘You looked like a girl who didn’t know what a good fucking was.’
‘Yes. Please,’ I pant out.
Kai’s laugh sounds like a groan, and my body sags to hide my distress as he pulls his fingers out. Leaning over me, he drags two wet, glistening fingers against my lips, trailing the scent of my arousal. Without conscious thought, my tongue darts out.
‘Not so uptight now,’ he reprimands, plunging his fingers back inside me again. ‘It’s one thing to know you’ve had other men—’
‘Man,’ I correct as a familiar sensation begins to build.
‘It’s another,’ he continues regardless, ‘to be faced with the evidence with your own eyes. Your lies.’
‘We weren’t—’ Fucking. Not like the photographs we took before he left for his business trip.
His free hand grasps a handful of hair, bringing my head up fast. ‘You were naked and spread out on a bed. Please don’t insult my intelligence.’ Soft lips and harsh words. Why does this tone cause my insides to quicken?
His hands retract, making quick work of his pants and the remainder of his clothes. My body stiffens as I hear the familiar tear of foil—a condom; something we haven’t used in a while. Does he not trust that I’m telling the truth?
‘Here’s what I think, kitten.’ His hands move to the seat of the chair between my legs, the fingers of one hand sliding down the crease between my butt cheeks. ‘Intellectually, I can appreciate everything you’ve said, but the animal in me is unmoved. You really should’ve given me time to cool down.’
The head of his cock touches the round of my arse as he slides on the condom, his thumbs then between my cheeks. As though to break open a peach. It all happens so fast, I can’t process his actions. Can’t tie them in with his words, but as something cold and wet coats the cleft of my arse, my body stiffens, and I try to scoot away.
Some knowledge is instinctual rather than cerebral.
‘Remember khallas?’ His voice is strained, control cracking in delivery.
‘Yes, but—’
‘The animal in me is unmoved. The husband in me feels cheated. And as your husband, I want the only bit of virginity you have left.’
What? Though I’d lead a pretty sheltered sexual existence until I’d met this man, that boat sailed
a long time ag—ooh.
‘N-fuck—get off, Kai!’ I begin to pull against my silk bonds, his words beginning to make sickening sense, as at the same time, from the deep recesses of my mind, Niamh’s words float free.
Messy sex is sometimes wonderful, sometimes a pain in the arse, quite literally.
‘No?’ he grates out in response. ‘Then you know the word.’ His expression is seven kinds of sinful smiling back at me through the glass. ‘You wanted to atone, and sweetheart, I want this.’ His knees dip, hips rolling into my rigid body. ‘Mihajik. I need you. Need this.’
I’m not sure I’m up for this; despite reluctantly enjoying the small suggestion of play Kai introduced me to in Brisbane. I try to move forward, not getting very far, distance-wise, before Kai slides himself between my legs, the head of his cock suddenly gliding through my folds and nudging my clit. I whimper—libidinously—it sounds like encouragement, delicious sparking sensations coursing through my limbs.
My hands scrabble for purchase against the chair as he fills me in one long stroke. One hand curled around my hip, Kai brings his other to my clit, the heel of his palm pushed against me. His thrusts are slow at first, before gathering momentum, but never quite giving me what I need. Short strokes—short of where I need him to be, my clit alternately rubbed by his palm and pinched between slippery fingers.
‘You. Want. This.’ Three words and three sharp thrusts. I call out as he hits the spot that ensures I’m tumbling over that precipice of no return. Unravelling further as what I guess is his thumb presses at my other opening—the exit only ramp.
‘Kai, don’t. I—’ My voice is quiet, more air than words and I can feel my whole body tightening. Tightening against the pressure of his thumb, yes, but I’m also very close to coming, too far past the point of no return.
‘You know the word.’ His voice is low and controlled as he drives deeply inside, holding me there—holding me against that unseen edge. My legs turn almost liquid beneath him as he takes the opportunity of my contracting muscles to slide his thumb inside.