The puzzled look on her face made him smile. “For me?” she asked, putting her hand to her chest.
“Hmm-hm.” He nodded. “Well, for both of us really. Go on and open it.”
She grabbed the bag and excitedly and ripped open the packaging. “Wow, headphones!” she exclaimed as he watched her check them out. “Really good headphones,” she added, looking up at him.
“Yeah,” he said, walking over to the fridge for a bottle of water. “The guy in the shop said that they were the best, something about brilliant noise reduction…or something.” He shrugged his shoulders and noted that the pain wasn’t quite as bad as usual. “I just asked for the best they had,” he said, walking back to the counter and trying to open the bottle unsuccessfully with one hand. She grabbed it and did the job for him before returning to admire her present.
“Thanks, Jumal,” she said quietly. “That’s really thoughtful.”
“No problem,” he said dismissively, taking a swig from the bottle, feeling strangely nervous all of a sudden. “Well you said you left yours at home and we both know how much you love listening to your music. Now we won’t have to have a battle over the volume.” A battle she’d been winning for the last week since she’d arrived.
She popped off her stool and came over to him, surprising him when she reached up and placed a chaste kiss on his cheek.
He rubbed at the spot her lips had touched. “Oh sorry, I forgot I had that on my face, here,” she said, taking hold of his chin and turning it to the side to wipe at it with the belt of her robe.
“So why do women insist on slapping that stuff all over their faces?”
She cocked her head to the side for a moment before stepping back and pursing her lips. “Hmm, well it’s great for the skincare routine and helps relaxation.”
He gave her a look that conveyed his doubt.
“Not that you would have a clue what relaxation was; you’re a workaholic. You can see it in those little lines starting to form around your eyes,” she baited and raised a finger to the edge of his eye as she continued, “I’ll make a deal with you: let me give you a facial and if you don’t find it relaxing I’ll offer you something even you can’t say no to…” He raised an interested brow as she crossed her arms over her chest. “I’ll stop teasing you at work.”
Hmm, not what he was hoping she was about to offer but still…
“And how will we prove that I find it relaxing?”
She shrugged a shoulder. “I’m willing to take it on trust. That’s how confident I am.”
After a few moments he nodded. “Okay, you have a deal.”
She stepped forward towards his body and reached up to run her fingers over his jawline, and Jumal was momentarily surprised by the contact.
“Good,” she said, dropping her hand and reaching for his left hand before pulling him off towards the bathroom. “Come on,” she encouraged, dragging him behind her. “I’ll need to give you a shave first.”
He pulled her to a stop and said, “I can shave myself, Pippa.”
She spun around to face him. “Oh no, mister,” she dismissed, waving her index finger at him. “Last time you attempted to shave your face with your left hand we ended up spending half an hour covering each nick with tissue and it will hurt when I put the oil on your face, so suck it up and just let me do it.” She widened her eyes in a challenge. “Okay?”
“This is ridiculous,” he mumbled as she marched to the bathroom, although a very small part of him wondered whether he protested just to get her riled up; he was actually quite looking forward to a little Pippa pampering.
Having made him change into his own bathrobe, she deposited him on a chair she’d brought along into the bathroom and positioned next to the marble counter as she began her preparations: first placing a hot face towel over his face. He’d started to ask questions but she had quickly cut him off, telling him that if he was going to question her every move then it was going to take all night…which meant less time for him to work. He shut up.
After a few minutes she discarded the towel saying, “Hmm, this smells nice, menthol or something.” She held a blob of the foam to her nose and inhaled deeply, pushing out her chest.
He dropped his eyes. “Spearmint,” he corrected, clearing his throat and reaching up to wipe off the blob she’d gotten on her nose as she began to slowly cover his face and throat.
“Thanks,” she offered.
He swallowed hard. “No problem.” He closed his eyes briefly as she turned her back to him to refill the sink. Being in such close proximity to Pippa was like locking a diabetic in a chocolate shop. He forced his good arm to drop and take a firm grip on the chair. Just to make sure his hand didn’t get him in trouble. At least the other was securely bound!
This predicament was far too tempting and he needed a distraction.
“So er, why do you insist on joking around and acting like a kid so much?”
She spun around, her brows jumping high to disappear beneath her fringe.
“I wouldn’t have thought this was the best time to upset me, Jumal,” she said, holding the razor menacingly.
He swallowed again and he saw her eyes dart to his bobbing Adam’s apple. “Perhaps not, but I still want to know.”
She stalked over to him and narrowed her eyes before taking a grip of his hair with one hand and tilting his head to the side and bringing the razor into contact with his skin.
He watched her face, which was etched with concentration, as the tip of her tongue darted out to the side of her mouth before she turned to the sink to rinse off the blade.
“Pippa,” he encouraged, as she finally took a deep breath and turned back to him.
“I was bullied at school and even though I’ve never been to see a shrink or anything, I’m pretty sure it’s some kind of defensive reaction to that. A need to cover up my feelings to make sure the people I cared about didn’t see what was really going on. Okay,” she confessed, exasperated.
Jumal was stunned and he took hold of her wrist to still her as she moved the razor back to his cheek.
“You were bulled at school?” he repeated in surprise. “I’m sorry.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, nonchalantly, but he wasn’t fooled and he needed to know more. Not to push to make her tell him about what was no doubt something she wanted to forget, but because he needed to know everything about her.
“How old were you? When did it happen?”
“High school. So I was about twelve or thirteen when it first started. About the same time I got braces.”
He narrowed his brows. “It was about your braces? But don’t most kids have braces that age?” he asked, confused.
“No. It wasn’t just about my braces. There’s nothing more vicious than bullies. It can be anything. I was teased for wearing glasses, having braces, having parents who were deemed old—” She continued to talk as she shaved him and he was pleased that she carried on talking to him. “You know my parents thought they couldn’t have any more children after Matt. Mum was in her late thirties when she had him, so when I came along thirteen years later—” She gave a tight-lipped smile and shrugged. “Then of course the bastards discovered my fear of small, enclosed places and locked me in the storage cupboard in the gym.”
“Jesus how’d they find that out?”
He saw sadness spread over her face and reach her eyes. “My best friend. She was a redhead with freckles. Need I say any more? They called her the usual nasty names and teased her incessantly until they broke her and she told them a secret about me, which was all they wanted.”
“Didn’t you tell anyone?”
“No. Matt was still away from home at the time and I didn’t want to tell my parents. I was ashamed that I couldn’t deal with it myself and I didn’t want them to know that I was being teased because they were older than most parents, that I was being constantly told that they were going to die soon. Like I said, nothing as nasty as a bull
y.”
She moved to the other side of his body and again took hold of his head and tilted it to the side.
“So anyway, I tried to remain positive and happy like normal and managed to carry it off until the bullying finally stopped. I think they got bored that they couldn’t get the reaction out of me that they wanted.” She tapped out the razor again before moving lower on his face towards his throat.
“So, I’m sorry if I act out sometimes at work. I just have a need to please people and make them like me. I know it’s stupid.” She shook her head.
He took hold of her wrist again. “I don’t think it’s stupid. I think you’re brave to have gone through that on your own and if Matt had known—”
Her eyes widened with alarm. “You can’t tell Matt, Jumal. Ever. He’d hate it that he didn’t know what was going on. Please,” she begged.
“Okay, Okay,” he reassured. “I won’t say anything, but like I was saying, I think you’re very brave to have stood up to bullies at that age.” He dropped her wrist and lowered his gaze as he continued, “I wish I’d have had the guts to stand up to a bully.”
“You were bullied too?” she asked, shocked.
“Not in the sense that you were bullied. My bully was far closer to home. My father.”
“Your father?”
“Yeah, his preferred form of bullying was more emotional over physical though. He basically dictated every move I ever made in my life until I was twenty-one: my education, my hobbies, my friends, even chose Faridah as my fiancée. Whenever I would stand up against his authority he would throw my heritage and title back at me and what a disappointment I’d been to him.” He gave a short, humourless laugh.
“The best thing he ever did though was send me off to Oxford to study—not that I thought so at the time. I met Matt there and he changed my life, showed me what freedom really was. I remember coming back to Melville for one summer.” He paused at the memory of Pippa. “You’d have been only about six or so at the time, all cute with hair in pigtails but covered in mud if I recall and stuffing your face with one of Mrs Henderson’s cookies. You looked like a little street urchin,” he teased as she batted at his shoulder.
“Hey,” she challenged with a smile on her face. “I resemble that remark!”
Jumal chuckled at her joke but pressed on. “Well, anyway, I saw what a close family you all were. How much your parents loved you both and each other, and God the whole village seemed to revolve around your family, Melville House and the Horse Stud Farm. I loved spending time just watching your father work with the horses. He would let me indulge my love of horses, which I’d had to hide from my own father like it was some dirty little secret. He never understood and I ended up being exactly what he wanted me to become. A successful businessman in Dubain, taking on the role of sheik.” He closed his eyes. “Of course he was never happy with how I did things—thought I was too liberal and allowing Western culture to influence my decisions and planning, particularly the religious freedom we’ve worked hard to secure for minorities. What the hell he thought was going to happen by sending me off for a Western university education I have no idea.”
“So what did he say when you told him that you and Faridah were no longer engaged?”
“I haven’t told him. He’ll find out through the normal gossip channels and I’m not bothered. I’ve decided to take your advice and just ignore bullies.”
She pursed her lips. “Hmm, well I’m not sure that’s the right way to deal with your dad. Maybe you just need to tell him. Now stop talking whilst I do this bit,” she lectured, her tongue darting out once again as she concentrated while running the blade over his throat.
She stood back with her hands on her hips and she scrutinised his face and appraised her work.
“All done. Here,” she said, handing him her hand mirror.
He ran a hand over his face. “Not bad. Not bad at all, Miss Darling,” he said, moving his reflection from side to side, genuinely impressed.
***
“Now close your eyes.” At his quizzical look she added, “Trust me.” He nodded, following her instruction.
“I’m going to ask you to smell three different oils in a minute. Just tell me which you prefer.” At his nod, she continued. “Okay,” she said, taking hold of his hand and rubbing the first oil onto the back of it. “Here’s the first…”
Having chosen the last oil she manoeuvred him back into the lounge, carefully placing a plethora of oils and potion bottles on the low table and taking up position on the sofa with her back against one end, cushions plumped between her legs. She patted the cushion. “Right, come on. Make yourself comfortable.”
He took a deep breath. Every instinct and warning in his thirty-four-year-old brain was yelling at him that this was a bad idea—a very bad idea. Hell, he’d have his head right between her legs… Yet he found his feet slowly walking over to the sofa and taking up position, ensuring his robe remained tightly closed.
“Comfortable?” she checked, looking down over him.
“Not in the least—”
“Excellent,” she interrupted, choosing to ignore him as she reached over for the first bottle. “Now close your eyes and keep them closed and give yourself permission to enjoy this and relax.”
Easier said than done with my head right where I’ve wanted it to be for the last twelve months or so…but I’ll give it a go…
“Okay, take three deep breaths through your nose for me,” she instructed, covering his nose gently with her cupped hands. He inhaled the soothing oil he’d picked. She’d said something about the body choosing which oil it needed. Perhaps, unsurprisingly, he’d ended up choosing the one for relaxation…
Her hand now moved to his shoulders and she tugged slightly at the collar of his robe so that her oil-covered hands rested on his exposed shoulders. He tensed automatically. She applied more pressure and told him to take three more deep breaths, and she increased the pressure further until he felt his shoulders finally drop.
“You carry a lot of tension in your neck and shoulders, Jumal. You probably aren’t even aware of it. You really do need to learn to relax more,” she lectured, but her voice was soft and melodic.
Jumal was beyond speech and merely grunted his agreement as she applied a colder substance to his face. His eyes were still closed as she gently worked her fingers over his face in a repetitive, slow motion until she finally applied an even cooler potion with cotton wool, which made his skin tingle in response. But she saved the best for last when she once again covered her small hands with that oil he’d picked and she performed a massage on his face, her fingers slowly manipulating along his jawline—back and forth several times.
He felt his head sink further back into the cushion to soak up her touch as she moved up and along the bridge of his nose to his brow and repeated the massage along his brow, her fingers then slowly tracing his eyebrows, tracing around under the sensitive part of his eye sockets and back up his nose. She did it over and over rhythmically until finally dropping her fingers to his ears and massaging his sensitive lobes and around the shell of his ear.
Jumal felt his calf muscles tighten as he fought the urge to squirm but he couldn’t stop his toes from curling at her ministrations, and he thought he might have let out a low moan of pleasure. He bent his knees slightly to hide his feet. When her oiled fingers traced over his lips gently, he fought his primitive instinct to open his mouth and allow his lips to capture those wicked fingers, run his tongue over them—maybe bite teasingly on their pads…
She stopped her massage for a moment and he was just about to complain and beg for her to go on when her hands were once again covering his face with another product, but this one didn’t smell like the oil. It was a thicker, gloopier substance.
He didn’t try to hide his smug smile when once again her magic, oil-covered hands returned to his body and moved across his collarbone, being extra careful around the hairline fracture, and upwards to massage at his shoulders wi
th more of the miracle oil. Her hands moved around to the back of his head and she took hold of his head in one of her hands as she began to run her fingers through his hair and massage his scalp. This was better than sex, Jumal thought for a moment, but then corrected himself. It wouldn’t be better than sex with Pippa—and with that, the naughty side of his brain went off with thoughts of Miss Darling and that magic oil…
***
“And he finally sleeps,” Pip murmured as she felt the full weight of Jumal’s head in her hands. He gave up the useless fight, surrendered and let his body float away in sleep. His head turned to the side and she slowly manoeuvred her body out from under his and over the end of the sofa, placing another cushion at the side of his head. Pleased that he was going to remain asleep, she bent over to rub at her own legs, which had gone dead about an hour or so ago. She spotted the clock over the mantel. They’d been lying for over two hours, she mused, as her tummy rumbled as a reminder.
As she stretched, she admired the length of his body, allowing her eyes to linger over his exposed thigh. He hadn’t opened his eyes the whole time and she assumed he’d been unaware that his robe had fallen to the side when she shifted his position about halfway through her facial. Her eyes had focused in on his thigh like it was prey, but she’d dragged her eyes away and back to his face for fear that those dark green eyes would suddenly dart open and catch her ogling. She definitely remembered licking her lips at the sight. As her own mind had begun to relax at the repetitive motion of her massage, her thoughts had drifted back to that deliciously naughty wet dream she’d been having about Jumal, her legs tightening slightly around his restful body.
Eventually, once the blood was once again flowing through all parts of her legs, she looked down and admired her sleeping client, pleased with her results and allowing herself a soft giggle at Jumal sleeping with his legs now crossed at the ankles, arms tucked together at his chest, his face covered with her green face mask and his hair messed with her oil.
She grabbed her phone from the table and took a picture. She typed out a message to go out with the picture on her social media… After all, she’d won the bet, right? But as her fingers hovered over the “send” button, she glanced over again at Jumal, lying sound asleep, having trusted her to relax his body—and now, she felt like she was about to betray him with another prank. She had trusted him enough to tell him the very darkest parts of her childhood and he hadn’t judged her but, instead, had told her about his own difficult childhood—something that the Great Jumal would not have done lightly or to just anyone.
His Irresistible Darling Page 13