Innocent In The Sheikh's Palace (Mills & Boon Modern)

by Dani Collins

  The Queen frowned at her as she rose to take him out. “Why is the nanny dressed like that?” she asked Tadita.

  “This is Prince Akin’s wife, Your Majesty. Remember? Princess Hannah.” Tadita’s smile at Hannah begged for understanding. “She is Qaswar’s mother.”

  “Who is Qaswar?” The Queen frowned in confusion, looking between Hannah and the buggy. “And she is married to Akin? No. I hate Akin. I love Eijaz. Why is she taking him?”

  Tadita glanced helplessly at Hannah, mortified by her mistress’s words.

  “Qaswar is Eijaz’s son, Your Majesty,” Hannah said in the most gentle and reassuring tone she could muster. “Akin married me so I could bring Eijaz’s son to be here with you. He will rule one day, as your husband does.”

  “But where is Eijaz... Oh.” The Queen remembered and her eyes filled with sorrow. “Akin should have been the one to die. I never wanted him. I loved Eijaz so much.”

  Hannah was appalled, but she didn’t let it show on her face. She might even have dismissed the Queen’s sentiment as the ramblings of dementia, but the guilty horror on Tadita’s face left a lump of icy understanding sitting heavily in her belly.

  Tadita was making noises of comfort as if she’d witnessed this kind of resentment many times.

  Hannah slipped away, but she could hardly breathe. Little things clicked in her mind—the way Akin always seemed to be recognized as being ancillary to the rest of his family. Eijaz was clearly the favorite who had been allowed to do anything he liked, while Akin was the one to do the real work of running the country. She remembered what he had once said about his mother. Do not take her cold shoulder to heart. That way lies madness, trust me.

  “Are you feeling unwell, Princess? May I get you something that appeals more?”

  Nura’s voice snapped Hannah out of her reverie to an awareness of birdsong and the tinkle of the pool fountain. She was eating her midday meal in the courtyard as was her habit, but she hadn’t touched her lamb and rice.

  “I’m thinking about my visit with the Queen today,” Hannah admitted. “She said something that left me wondering.”

  “My mother feels very fortunate to see the young Prince each day when you visit Her Majesty. I tease my mother and say, ‘Yes, but I see him much more.’” Nura topped up the water in the glass that Hannah had barely touched. It was the sort of banter they often enjoyed, but Hannah had the strangest feeling Nura was trying to distract her.

  “Nura, I know you and your mother are very loyal. You would never gossip about me or the Queen, not even with each other.”

  “Never, Your Highness!” Nura seemed to blanch beneath her light brown skin at the mere idea.

  “But can you tell me, when you trained to become an attendant, did you work with your mother directly in Her Majesty’s presence?”

  “Oh, yes.” Nura was shifting her weight, clearly wary of saying too much but wanting to impress on her how well qualified she was. “The Queen has retired from many of her duties, but when she was active, she required many hours of preparation and clothing changes. I assisted my mother as soon as I could fetch and mend. Later I arranged much of the incidental shopping. I cleaned shoes and jewelry and tended the Queen’s birds in her courtyard. I was the lead maid of four who kept the royal chambers under my mother. Is there some particular task I’ve neglected that you need me to do? Please tell me.”

  Hannah started to say no, but turned it into, “I think there is some information you might be able to give me, something that will help me as I learn to make my home here. I need to know more about the Queen’s regard for my husband.”

  If Hannah had ever seen someone confronted with the barrel of a gun, the expression on Nura’s face was it. Hannah’s niggling intuition turned into a heavier dread.

  “I understand that Her Majesty has not been herself since losing Qaswar’s father,” Hannah said gently.

  “No mother should have to face losing a child,” Nura said with anxious sympathy. “And she lost a daughter many years ago. You may not know that.”

  “No, I didn’t. That’s tragic.” It was. From the outside, Akin looked as though he had everything, but she was getting the sense he’d had very little of the things that counted. “It sounds as though she loved Prince Eijaz very much.”

  It sent her into agony, thinking of Akin risking his life for his country—for the very brother who had been favored over him. What if he had died in battle? Would his mother have mourned for him the way she did for Eijaz? She wanted to believe the Queen would have but had to wonder.

  “Everyone thought very highly of the Crown Prince,” Nura said, her voice barely above a whisper. She knew what was coming and so did Hannah.

  “But how did the Queen feel about Prince Akin?” Hannah prompted, bracing herself.

  “I—” Nura was wringing her hands, gaze casting about as if she were hoping a dropping piano would save her from continuing. “My mother once said that every mother loves her children, but some mothers love one child a little more.”

  “And some love certain children less?”

  “Not through any fault in the child,” Nura said hastily. She looked miserable as she gazed toward the aviary. “But I think that can happen sometimes, yes.”

  Hannah’s heart grew thin as it stretched toward the doors to Akin’s empty chambers and further afield to wherever he was. She drew a pained breath and nodded understanding.

  “Thank you, Nura. When I visit the Queen, I see how much your mother cares for her. It must be a great comfort to Her Majesty to have someone she knows so well at her side when she is not feeling as well as she could. I know I’m very fortunate to have you. Like you, I only want good things for Baaqi. Thank you for helping me understand the things that affect my son and my husband.”

  “Of course.” Nura looked relieved to escape as Hannah let her take her plate. They didn’t talk about it again.

  Akin was exhausted. He took his scotch—a vice he’d picked up from a friend at Oxford—to his lounger beside the pool. His butler had taken to leaving a towel out here so Akin wouldn’t affront Hannah’s maid if she happened to glimpse him entering or leaving the pool, since he never wore a bathing suit. He stuffed the roll behind his neck and sighed at the stars.

  He should have gone straight to bed, but he had come outside to feel closer to Hannah, as if coming home wasn’t enough.

  He had missed her while he was gone, much to his chagrin. And the baby, which was even more baffling. The most notice the boy had taken of him had been to curl a surprisingly firm grip around Akin’s finger while half asleep. From what he’d observed, the infant did that with anyone who held him, so it was no great sign of affection, but Akin was looking forward to those tiny fingers holding him so trustingly again.

  Pathetic.

  He heard a soft noise and opened his eyes. There was flickering movement across the pool. Hannah’s white wrap fluttered like an apparition as she slipped it on while weaving in and out of the moonlight and latticed shadows, making her way around the pool toward him.

  He didn’t move, wondering if he’d fallen asleep and was dreaming, because why would she come to him this way? She tied the light silk at her waist as she came around his end of the pool, but it did nothing to quell the free movement of her ample breasts or disguise their beautiful shape.

  The banked fire in his blood flared and he dragged his gaze up to her faltering expression.

  “Is the baby all right?” he asked.

  “Sleeping. I just fed him and sent him back to his room, but I noticed you’re back, so I came out to say hello.” She crossed her arms as though regretting the impulse.

  He cocked his head. “Am I wrong or does the dentist remain at the top of your Christmas list?”

  Her white smile flashed briefly before she said, “The very tippy top.”

  “Let me see.” He shifted his
legs to the side a few inches and patted the space on the lounger beside his thigh.

  She nervously lowered to the edge, tongue sliding across her teeth behind her lips, silk wrap tinted blue by the lights beneath the water.

  “I thought you would be smiling nonstop.”

  “Like a crocodile, all day.” She bared her teeth, then chuckled and ducked her chin. “But I’ve been trying to hide my teeth most of my life. Strangely enough, the braces felt like armor. I wasn’t as self-conscious when I wore them, but now they’re gone I’m back to thinking I can’t let anyone see me smile.”

  “That would be a shame.” He touched her wrist, enjoying her soft skin with a light caress, a strange tenderness rising in him as he regarded her. “It should be on your list. If you feel an urge to smile, smile.”

  A small one struggled to stick on her lips while her gaze flickered to where he was touching her. She swallowed and he noted her nipples were jutting against the silk she wore.

  Was making love on her list? He would add it to his own, he thought, as he brought her hand to his mouth. Lying with her would make him incredibly happy. He kissed the back of her knuckles then turned her hand so he could taste the thin skin inside her wrist, where her pulse was tripping so hard he felt it against his lips.

  “I feel like I should tell you—” she blurted while her fingers flexed in reaction. “While you were gone, your mother said something that made think...”

  Was there a more effective death knell for amorous thoughts than invoking a man’s mother? He lowered her hand to the middle of his chest and waited.

  She looked deeply uncomfortable. “It seemed very personal and I thought you would want to know that I...have an inkling your childhood might have been difficult.”

  His inner guardedness had relaxed at the sight of her, but it now clanked to attention, standing tall and ready to go on the offensive. He released her hand. “I don’t want to talk about my childhood, Hannah.”

  “I don’t expect you to.” She tucked her hands between her knees, but the straight-up compassion in her tone landed on him like a lead blanket. She knew without him saying a damned thing. He could see it in her face, all soft with gentle concern.

  It was the most exposed sensation he’d ever experienced. Like his throat was bared for a sword and his chest bared to a cannon. He rarely even acknowledged that old pain anymore, but she stood staring at it. Seeing it.

  He held his breath, waiting to learn what she would do with her knowledge. With that weakness of his. That flaw.

  “I hate talking about my childhood, too,” she murmured, shifting her gaze to the pool so the lights threw ghostly shadows onto her face. “My mother died of a drug overdose and I didn’t know anything about my father. My grandmother had a house, but only a tiny pension. I wore secondhand clothes and ate plain sandwiches in my lunch. I made them myself and did my own hair because of her arthritis. I didn’t want to be a burden on her, but I was. All of that made me withdrawn. Libraries became my second home. I like learning, but libraries are a safe space too, where people have to behave. Other kids couldn’t tease me or play jokes on me there.”

  He was going to build her a library, he decided.

  “Grammy would tell me to just ignore them but pretending something doesn’t affect you isn’t the same as not being affected. She would also say things like, ‘Bloom where you’re planted.’ You’ve done a good job of that.” She tilted a shy smile at him. “I know you don’t need to hear that. You know who you are. I admire that about you. It’s something I want to become better at.”

  “Come here.” He gathered her into his lap, not knowing how else to express himself. He didn’t open himself the way she did. He only had this—action.

  Her gaze flashed to his with surprise. “Don’t feel sorry for me.”

  “I don’t. I admire you, too.” It was such a strong, sincere sentiment coming straight from his gut that it shook his heart on its way by.

  Then he kissed her. Because this was the only way he knew how to let tenderness out of himself. She was lovely and pure and shockingly earnest, and she terrified him because she could be hurt so easily. How could he possibly protect her from the inevitable scrapes of existence? How could he protect her against himself?

  Hannah didn’t know how to kiss him back, not in a way that could compete with the way his mouth slayed her so completely. She felt utterly weak when his lips claimed hers so commandingly. Somehow he made her feel taken while giving so much, and she trembled under the intense feelings he provoked. The entire world stopped to hold them in a timeless place yet whirled so fast beyond them that she was dizzy.

  In the back of her mind, she knew much of her reaction was infatuation. She couldn’t help falling for a man who ticked all the alpha male boxes like great looks, money and power, but also had inner strength and a deep sense of loyalty that wasn’t impacted by the injustices done to him.

  The more she learned of him, the more she was humbled to be in his sphere. And she was married to him. Touching him. Kissing him. She would never measure up to all that he was, but she wanted to. She wanted to give him this same sense of being wanted that he invoked in her.

  He couldn’t know how deeply the heat of his hands moving on her back and the hardness of him against her hip thrilled her, but they did. She’d only been mocked for wanting love. For thinking compliments and caresses had been offered as heartfelt sentiments instead of a manipulation into the bedroom. This didn’t feel like mockery, though. She cautioned herself against reading more than proximity into his desire, but it felt like genuine desire, which was enough.

  He shifted her, deepening their kiss so his tongue pierced into her mouth, shooting a jolt of pleasure straight to her loins. She blatantly sucked on his tongue and he groaned. His big hand gathered her breast and he opened his thighs so her hip sank more firmly against the hard shape of him.

  “I want to touch you everywhere, but I don’t want to hurt you,” he said against her mouth, then kissed her again with more head-spinning greed. “What can I do? Tell me.”

  “I want to touch you,” she said, overwhelmed as it was. Letting him have his way with her would be too much—and maybe not enough. The little sex she’d experienced hadn’t been as earth-shattering as she’d been led to believe. She didn’t want that sort of disappointment between them, not when they were in such perfect accord right now. “Can I?”

  “Touch me anywhere you like. I’m yours.”

  He wasn’t. She knew better than to believe that, but she wanted to. She wanted to claim him in ways she barely understood, but as he trailed his mouth into her neck, she pushed aside the edges of his robe and ran her hands across his pecs to find the sharp poke of his nipples.

  She liked the way his chest swelled as he drew in a deep breath of reaction. It made her feel mighty and equal. She tilted so she could run her mouth to his nipples and lick around and across one then the other.

  He hissed out a curse and his hand curled into her hair. “Let me do that to you.”

  She smiled against his skin and dabbed kisses down the trail of hair leading to his navel, opening his robe further as she went.

  For all she’d lost in coming here, there were incredible things she’d gained and one of them was this. Him. He stunned her, this man who carried the weight of the world and was straining with arousal as she revealed him, but said, “You don’t have to do that.”

  “I want to.” She started to kneel and a rolled towel arrived to cushion her knees.

  She barely noticed, too fascinated by the shape of him. With a tentative touch, she explored him. Kissed with parted lips, taking light tastes as she worked from the base of his shaft toward the tip.

  His breath grew jagged. His stomach contracted. His foot fell off the far side of the lounger, opening his thighs so she had more room to caress him. She’d read about this more than she’d done it, but
enthusiasm had to count for something? She closed her fist around the thickness of him and drew the velvety tip of him into her mouth.

  “Hannah.” His hand was on the back of her neck, not forcing her to take more. It was a reverent touch that moved into her hair, playing softly as she moved her mouth and tongue on him, discovering all the ways to make him twitch and stiffen and stop breathing altogether.

  It was a magnificent experience. She loved how much he loved it. He was shaking, and when she lifted her lashes, she saw his eyes were on her, not closed and blocking her out as he drowned in what she was doing. His stare was alight with something fierce and hot as he watched her pleasure him. She could taste his growing excitement. Felt him swell to impossible hardness in her mouth.

  “Stop,” he said in a guttural voice.

  No, she thought, but consent went both ways. She drew back, hurt, worried she’d done something wrong, but he closed his hand over hers and guided her fist to stroke. Once, twice—

  Now his eyes closed and his head went back as he released a groan to the starry sky. He pulsed strongly against her palm as he crushed her hand on himself in a way that ought to be painful, but...

  But his gratification was so tangible she couldn’t help her secretive smile. She had given him that and it had been a lot better than the blunt orgasm he’d given himself. She could tell.

  He swiped the edge of his robe across his stomach, then gathered her into his lap. “Let me touch you. Give you that,” he murmured as he nuzzled her cheek and the corner of her mouth.

  “Can it just be this for now?”

  “If that’s what you want.” He sounded drugged and slid a tickling caress across her shoulder and up to her nape. He tilted her head so he could kiss her, long and thorough. “Thank you.”

  She tucked her nose into his neck where he smelled divine and his pulse was still strong but slowing. His arms around her grew heavy and she knew he was falling asleep.