by Leslie North
Mackenzie bit his bottom lip, and the aching pleasure nearly undid him.
They broke the kiss, Mackenzie still standing between his legs, still twining her arms around his neck, and he saw in her eyes that she had needed this release as much as he had. He saw that the door was open. They could take this farther. They could, right now. Nobody was watching.
Slowly, she pulled her hands from his neck and stepped back, breathing in deeply. She touched her lips, swollen from his kiss, and her eyes fluttered shut for a brief moment as she collected herself. Issam badly wanted to see what she was like when she lost control. He wanted to make her lose control. But Mackenzie—she had a power all her own. And when she opened her eyes again, he could see that she had wrapped her fists around her impulses.
When she met his gaze, her brown eyes held a challenge.
Oh, Issam thought. This won’t be as simple as I imagined. He had a fleeting realization that Kyril hadn’t been bluffing after all. He could even see, for a brief moment, how the aforementioned “compromises” would play out.
In the bedroom.
Under the sheets.
Mackenzie’s lithe body underneath his own. She might be the kind of woman who liked to be coaxed a little in bed, a playful submission.
She grinned at him, then arranged her expression into something more serious. “See? My standards are very high.” Mackenzie turned and flounced toward the windows overlooking the city, stretching her arms above her head. “And if you’re lucky, you’ll get to see the true extent of my skills.”
7
She had cheated death, and the new day dawned bright and clean and fresh.
Mackenzie had slept with the curtains open, and the moment the sun rose above the city, she leapt out of bed.
It was too bad Issam wasn’t there with her.
After that kiss, he’d wished her a good night and retreated to his own rooms. He was so honorable. Or perhaps he wasn’t, and the kiss hadn’t interested him.
No. She had felt the way he responded, when she was standing between his legs. He was very interested.
He was so interested that Mackenzie was terribly intrigued by certain aspects of Issam’s body. Had things gone much further, she would have unzipped his pants for him. One thing was for certain—he was very large.
Her pussy heated at the thought of it. She’d spent an hour last night with her hand between her legs, stealing orgasm after orgasm. It was a combination of everything that had made her feel that way. Issam. His muscular body. The way he held her in his arms. The way he’d saved her life. The way she was still alive, still alive, still alive.
It had been a narrow escape, no matter how brave a face Mackenzie had put on it, and when she was alone in the dark, the full magnitude of her survival had hit her full force. She wanted every sensation possible, all of them, and even if Issam wasn’t going to give them to her yet, she couldn’t wait.
She took a deep breath and looked out over the city. It was gorgeous, truly, the ancient stone warming in the sunrise. And here she was, engaged to be married to one of its rulers. Mackenzie lifted her hands, pretending to hold the city in her palms.
It would be hers soon, too.
But now it was time for business.
She showered in the bathroom, which was a luxury all its own. The floor was tiled in a delicate pattern, red flowers against white, a gleaming walled-in shower lit by the morning sun. It was fully stocked with brand-new shampoos and soaps. It seemed like a long time since her last shower, though it had only been yesterday, and she lingered under the hot water as long as her excitement would allow. She dried and styled her hair, putting it in a twist at the back of her head, then went into the walk-in closet.
She had no expectations of what she’d find there but was pleasantly surprised to discover a selection of new clothes in her size. Mackenzie also found what she was looking for specifically—her lucky suit. Someone had arranged for her suitcase to be brought from her hotel, and everything in it had been cleaned, pressed, and hung.
She put on the navy-blue suit and a cream blouse underneath. Matching heels. A smart necklace. She took the folder with her research and negotiating points from the outside pocket of her bag.
There. She was ready.
Mackenzie headed out into the hallway, which was busier this morning. Servants went quickly from one end to the other, and she flagged down one of the women. “I’m looking for my fiancé’s offices. Do you know where they are?”
The woman grinned at her, then gave her directions to another wing of the palace.
It was easy to find—an even busier hallway in a different wing. With every step, Mackenzie felt more and more confident. This would be the day she could finally get something done.
A door opened midway down the hall, and she heard Issam’s voice filter out. “That’s not acceptable,” he was saying. “It’ll have to be tighter than that to—” A man in a dark suit came out and shut the door behind him, then took up a position outside the door.
She approached him with a big, friendly smile, then reached for the handle.
He stopped her with a firm hand on her wrist. “You can’t go in there.”
Mackenzie looked up at the stoic bodyguard. “There’s been some confusion,” she said in a soothing tone. “I’m Mackenzie Peters, Sheikh Issam’s fiancée, and—”
“And you don’t have security clearance,” the bodyguard said firmly. Then he called for another man who was down the hall. He jogged over. “Akim,” ordered the bodyguard. “Take Ms. Peters downstairs.”
Her stomach lurched, and she must have gone pale, because the bodyguard spoke again. “For breakfast,” he said. “We must abide by the government’s systems when it comes to processing clearance applications.”
She lifted her chin. “Could I talk to my fiancé, please?” From inside the room, Issam’s voice rose. “I’m sure he could…expedite this process.” Her frustration battled with her fear. They could mean breakfast in a holding cell, and if Issam were here—
“Akim will escort you to where you need to go.” The guard’s expression softened. “I will tell Sheikh Issam you wish to see him.”
Mackenzie followed Akim to the floor below—to a dining room, not a holding cell. It was an intimate room, filled with light. She’d hardly sat down in one of the plush seats, arranging her folder on the table before her, when someone called her name.
“Mackenzie.”
It was Issam.
She stood up to greet him, and he closed the space between them. Her confidence grew until his very last step. Mackenzie automatically tilted her face up to kiss him, full on the mouth, and Issam did the same as if drawn to her by an invisible bond. Just before they made contact he switched directions and pressed a rather chaste kiss to her cheek.
That was disappointing.
But he straightened up and gestured for her to sit. “I wanted to go over some projections with you.”
She let out the breath she’d been holding. “That’s perfect. I have a lot to say about the land dispute, and if we could just—”
“Not about the no-man’s land,” Issam said as a waiter in a dark outfit appeared next to the table with a gleaming silver coffee pot. “Projections for the wedding.”
So he had been serious about her role in the planning. Well, she’d plan a wedding if that was what he wanted, but she was going to be heard about the land. And the fort. And the people inside it.
“Issam,” she said as the waiter poured her coffee. “I came here to join the team about the land negotiations. I dressed for that, not…not wedding planning. I thought we would need to get started as soon as possible, in light of—”
His gaze raked over her body in the blue suit. “You’re dressed appropriately for many things.”
Her cheeks heated. “Yes, but—”
“Among those things are several wedding planning meetings. They’ve already been scheduled. You’ll have one beginning shortly, right here in the dining room.”
“Here?” Mackenzie needed another breath to process this development. She wanted to do her job as a lawyer, advocating for the people hiding in the fort in the middle of Issam’s no-man’s land. And it was clear, from the way Issam never mentioned them, that he didn’t know anything about them.
“At this very table, if you’d like.” He smiled at her, though she couldn’t see why this was a joke. She was not prepared to begin planning a royal wedding alone.
She stood up. “I should go. I need a few minutes to research traditions before I get into the planning phase.” Mackenzie tucked her folder under her arm. “We can talk about the land dispute later.”
She was only able to take one step before Issam caught her by the elbow.
“It’s not what you think,” he said, his voice so smooth she wanted to lose herself in it. She wanted to lose herself in his hands. Last night—that kiss—it hadn’t been enough. She needed more of him.
And she needed to do her job.
“I need to research,” she insisted.
“The people you’re meeting are more than willing to help you. Sit down, Mackenzie. Have some breakfast.”
Her heart raced. She hated the feeling of being unprepared, but Issam’s eyes beckoned her. His voice was hard to resist.
She sat.
The first meeting, as it turned out, was with Adira and Daya, who swept into the dining room after Mackenzie and Issam had been eating for twenty minutes, filling the space with laughter and enthusiasm.
“Another wedding,” joked Adira. “When will we ever be able to stop planning?”
Her mother nudged her with an elbow. “When you find a suitable partner.”
“I’m not in any rush,” Adira answered primly.
“Mackenzie.” Daya greeted her warmly, kissing her on both cheeks and taking the seat next to her. Issam pressed his lips to Mackenzie’s temple and disappeared into the hallway. “We’ll do our best not to overwhelm you.”
“Oh, please don’t. I’d love to be overwhelmed by this,” said Mackenzie, and both the other women laughed. It was true. If she couldn’t be at the negotiating table, she’d rather be consumed by another project, like the wedding. She had switched naturally to the local dialect, and it immediately made the conversation more comfortable.
“Then we’ll begin with the venue.” Daya launched into a long and complicated list of decisions about the wedding, each affecting the other. “So,” she said at last. “Would you prefer the ceremony to be indoors or in the rose garden?”
Mackenzie thought for a moment. “Wherever my mother-in-law loves best.”
Daya laughed heartily. “Oh, I like you,” she said. “You’re my kind of woman.”
8
Issam had thought the day before that nothing could possibly top Mackenzie’s navy-blue suit. The way she moved in it was intoxicating, as if she was ready to throw open any door that dared close itself against her. He had been surprised that she didn’t fight her way into his meeting rooms, security clearance or not. That would have been quite disastrous—she couldn’t be privy to those meetings, as much as he wanted her energy in the rooms. The longer his team delayed processing her application and completing her background check the better.
He had been wrong, however, about the suit.
In an effort to distract her from her obsession with the negotiations, Issam had invited Mackenzie to accompany him to a morning workout in his private training center. It was across the palace compound, and he spent time every morning there with his top brass. Today, he’d sent his men on a cross-country run so he could have the gym—and Mackenzie—to himself. Staying in shape was essential, and so were the bonds he formed with his men. But they could survive a day apart.
That had all fallen by the wayside when Mackenzie stepped through the door, her curious gaze flitting back and forth across the state-of-the-art gym and training center.
Her workout gear was on another level.
He had ordered it purchased himself but had left the details up to one of his assistants. He’d have to give her a raise, because though she’d chosen classic gear—black capris and a pink tank—they both looked as if they’d been made for Mackenzie. Her breasts peeked out from the tank just enough to make his mouth water.
She surveyed all the equipment and the room’s setup. On one end of the massive room, there were three rows of cardio machines. In the center was a large open area with jump boxes, ropes, and tires, and more equipment lined the walls. Issam relished the thought of explaining it all to her. Of course, in teaching her how to use the equipment, he’d get to touch her...
“The way we’ve set things up,” he began, going to stand next to her, “is something you might recognize from America and Europe. The style is—”
“CrossFit,” Mackenzie said. “This is how I prefer to work out at home. Have you looked up the workout of the day?”
“I—” Issam was taken aback. The men he worked with loved the military style workouts and the adrenaline rush they provided. His sister Adira, on the other hand, had never expressed the slightest interest in it. “I’m surprised.”
“At the workout of the day?” Mackenzie shrugged. “It doesn’t seem so bad. Maybe a little challenging. Push-ups aren’t my forte, but it’s not like I can’t do them. How do you like to warm up? I usually run outside first, but those treadmills are calling my name.”
She jogged over to them, leaving Issam behind.
He watched her firm ass in those snug capri pants and instantly had to adjust himself beneath his shorts. Mackenzie doing CrossFit? They hadn’t even started the workout and he was turned on by the idea.
So turned on.
He took the treadmill next to hers and settled into an easy jog. “So,” he said, and for the first time it felt like they might actually be...dating. And not deeply into a diplomatic arrangement. “What do you like about CrossFit?”
Mackenzie glanced over at him, her ponytail bouncing at the back of her head. “What do you like about it?”
He thought about the way it felt to lift an impossible amount of weight, do an impossible number of reps. “The challenge. The harder the workout is, the more I like it.”
She grinned at him. “I feel that way about lots of things.” She let that comment hang in the air between them, and Issam had to resist the urge to readjust. “But I definitely feel that way about this workout.”
Would it be so bad, Issam thought, if they mixed a little business with pleasure?
After a couple of minutes, Mackenzie turned up the speed on her treadmill. Issam followed suit. It wasn’t long before they were both running full speed. Mackenzie’s breaths came short and sharp, and he loved the sound of it. He wanted to be the cause of those short little breaths, but for that they needed a bedroom, not a gym.
Before he could get lost in the fantasy, Mackenzie hit the STOP button on the treadmill and jumped off. “I’m ready,” she told him, jogging back toward the center of the gym as if it had taken no effort to run that fast at all. “Do you have the workout pulled up somewhere?”
Issam pointed to a TV screen on one of the side walls. There, in large letters, the workout of the day was laid out.
“Nice.” Mackenzie approved. Issam had never been so proud of a television in his life before that moment.
They launched into the workout. Thirty walking lunges with weights. Thirty kettlebell swings. Thirty pushups. Thirty weighted squats. Thirty bench presses. More weight. Another round.
Mackenzie was beating him.
Sweat glistened on her forehead, and her face was a mask of concentration. She approached every rep like it was the most important thing in the world and moved through them quickly, with precision.
What would she be like in bed?
Issam missed a rep imagining it, and Mackenzie caught him. “Keep your head in the game, Issam,” she said, taunting him. “Otherwise—”
He stepped closer in. “Otherwise what?”
Mackenzie’s face w
as already red, but her cheeks got pinker. “Otherwise you’ll pay for it—”
“I doubt that,” he said, then moved through another series of exercises. “You’ll be the one paying.”
“Oh, is that what you think?”
They moved on to the last set of weights, and Mackenzie dropped hers to the ground seconds before Issam. “I win.” She crossed her arms and jutted a hip out.
“I was lifting heavier weights.”
“Fine.” Mackenzie’s eyes sparkled. “You choose the final round, then.”
“A race,” he said instantly. Issam could run fast. He’d proven that time and again. “Around the building. The first one back to the door wins.”
“Ready, set, go.” Mackenzie bolted for the door.
His heart was still pounding from the workout, but he put on a burst of speed, hitching his hand on the doorframe and spinning after her. Issam was fast—but Mackenzie was faster, lighter on her feet, and hungry for victory.
She took every turn with the same precision as with her weightlifting, and her tight body moved more easily in the space. He’d never been so torn. He was half proud of her and half irritated that she was beating him.
Mackenzie wheeled around the last turn, her breath harsh in the air, and sprinted for the door.
Issam gave it everything he had, his legs burning, his lungs about to burst. He nearly had her—he was almost there—
Mackenzie slapped the door with a triumphant yell. “First!” she cried, then spun back toward Issam. “See? My standards are so high that you’re the one who’ll be struggling to meet them!”
She was absolutely irresistible.
He went for her.
Their lips crashed together, and Mackenzie gasped as Issam backed her up against the wall. “You think you’ve won?” he growled into her ear. “You think you’re the one who’s come out on top?”