The community of unmarried women is now one less.”
The music whirled, and the congregation all spun around the dance floor in a happy blur of smiles and laughter. Coral took it in turns to dance with Rafe, Uncle Edward, and Frank, and watched happily as her dazzling new husband danced with his mother-in-law and Lady Langley.
While they were dancing, Coral, who had removed her cumbersome veil for the reception, suggested that she would change into something more casual before leaving the house. Rafe’s mouth twisted into a mischievous smile, “No one’s going to have the privilege of lifting you out of this dress except your loving husband,” he said huskily, drawing her closer into his embrace.
“Those buttons are a nightmare to deal with.” Coral smiled as she remembered Aluna’s words earlier that afternoon while she was dressing.
“Then it will be my pleasure to slowly turn the nightmare into a wondrous dream,” he parried, his golden eyes creasing into a wicked smile.
It was close to midnight when they were able to tear themselves away from the celebrations under a luminous shower of petals. As they left, fireworks split the sky with dazzling colors. Kaleidoscopic bursts and sparks darted sideways and across the grounds as well as into the air.
Finally they made it to the awaiting car. Rafe’s Alpha Romeo, decorated with white ribbon and flowers, slid smoothly on the road in darkness, the brilliant beam of its headlights a unique glow in the pitch black night. “Where are we going?” Coral asked for the umpteenth time since they had left Mpingo.
Rafe gave her one of his slow smiles and lightly squeezed her hand. “Patience, woman! ‘Let your thoughts travel to a faraway land,’” he whispered. “‘A place of your dreams where you long to be. Relax, let your soul fly away and climb to the clouds and you’ll live as never before.’”
“That’s beautiful. Is that your own?”
“I wish. It’s a quote from a little-known philosopher, Gilbert de Villier.”
The car turned onto a mud road and bumped its way down the soft ground. Through the open window, Coral could hear and smell the sea. There was no sign of habitation; the landscape was surrounded by arid loneliness. Suddenly the road curled between high cliffs. There, on the white sandy beach, nestled in splendid isolation among dunes and serenely facing the Indian Ocean, lay the white-washed cabin, glistening like a solid mass of pearl under the silver light of a full moon. Coral sucked in her breath. “Oh, Rafe, how did you discover such a jewel?” she whispered as he brought the vehicle to a smooth stop.
“It’s Frank’s hideaway. He’s kept it very dark all these years,” he said with a chuckle. “Even I didn’t know about its existence until recently. This is where he goes to escape when work gets on top of him.” He slipped out of the car and came round to help her out. Then, lifting her up into his powerful arms, he carried her all the way to the front door.
The cabin was made up of two charming rooms, large and whitewashed, along with a bathroom and small kitchen. A wide veranda along the entire front of the house jutted over the beach with a miraculous view of the ocean, which tonight was profoundly dark, gleaming almost surreally in the moonlight. The power and magic of the landscape created an extraordinary sense of stillness and peace that enwrapped the lovers like an enchantment. Husband and wife, they were finally alone. A cold dinner of lobster salad and champagne was waiting for them, but they had no need for food, only hungry for each other.
“You can’t imagine how many times I’ve dreamt of this moment,” Rafe said huskily, cupping Coral’s face in his hands. “I’ve yearned for you for so long. I never thought you could be mine one day. I still feel a bit of a seducer. You’re so beautiful and so innocent, my love.”
“Maybe not so innocent.” Coral smiled as she pressed herself against him, every inch of her body telling him what he wanted to know.
“Oh, my darling…” Rafe scooped her up and carried her across into the bedroom. He set her down gently next to the king-size bed. “Stay where you are. Don’t move,” he said as he did away with his clothes in double quick time. “I want to make love to you.”
Coral removed her jewelry, her gaze fixed on her husband’s muscular body: a beautiful bronze statue of an archaic god. It was her wedding night, and she was a virgin. She should have been shocked by his blatant virility, a little afraid of his promising possession; instead she felt flames of desire licking up her body. She wanted to touch him, to feel his skin brush against hers. As she lifted her arms to start unbuttoning her dress, he anticipated her gesture and was beside her, drawing her back into the warmth of his embrace. “Patience is a virtue,” he whispered, gently nibbling her ear.
Rafe moved behind her and set about undoing the first button in the long track down her dress. With each disconnected button he paused to kiss her, flooding her with the exquisite torment of anticipation. Rafe’s expert lips and practiced hands moved knowingly, erotically over her cheek, her neck, and through her hair. Now as he reached her waist, he freed her shoulders and her back from her dress. Coral could feel his warm breath, his burning mouth, and the cool tip of his tongue on her skin as his kisses moved from the nape of her neck to her shoulder blades, down every bump on the length of her spine, making her quiver and moan helplessly.
Soon the dress slid to the ground. He unfastened her bra with a flick of his finger and peeled off her skimpy panties. Then, lifting her up again, he cradled her in his arms and set her down gently onto the bed. She lay on the white sheet, her hair fanned out on the pillow, shafts of moonlight bathing her trembling body. She gazed up at him, ignited by the fiery expression in his eyes and his obvious desire. Breathless, she pleaded for release as she felt her pulse leaping against her skin and the ache building up more and more within her. She lifted her arms toward him. “Now. Love me now, Rafe…”
Rafe knelt on the bed and stretched himself out to his full length next to her. Coral turned a little and brushed against his muscled thigh. She felt him shudder as her hand found the satiny tip of his arousal. He groaned as her fingers encircled it.
As if about to lose control of himself, Rafe carefully moved her hand away. When she resisted, he buried his face in the warmth of her neck as he fought the passion that seemed ready to explode. “Not yet, my darling, not yet,” he breathed. “This is our wedding night. First let me pleasure you slowly; otherwise I won’t be able to stop myself, the way you’re stirring me up right now.”
She heard the urgent tremor in his voice, and recognized the willpower he was using to hold back. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to him without restraint.
Rafe’s mouth claimed her hungry lips, and his hand slid over her smooth skin, stroking and teasing her breasts, her tummy, then her thighs. His touch was altogether wild, yet gentle and possessive, making her gasp and shudder and cry out his name. Coral let herself go, enthralled by the magic of his hands on her, moaning her pleasure. She writhed insatiably, and the more she yielded, the more he gratified her, seeming to revel in her desire for him. Several times he carried her to the brink of pleasure, only to bring her back and raise her up again to new heights. There was not an inch of her body that his fingers, his mouth, his tongue had not intimately explored with loving art and skill.
Finally, when all the muscles in their bodies tightened, when the ache of her need was overwhelming, he moved onto her, keeping his weight slightly off her body. Instinctively she parted her thighs for him, inviting him into her warmth, knowing that the moment she had been longing for all these months had come. His palm under her bottom lifted her up, she arched her back to meet him, and with one smooth, slow stroke, he slid inside her.
Coral’s muscles tensed as he entered her, and she smothered a small cry as a burning sensation darted through the length of her body. And then she opened up her body to take him in deeper and deeper, moving with him, crying out his name again and again as they took the final plunge together into space, swept away by the violent storm of their passion, to a world of ecstasy. There they remained clasped, a p
erfect fusion into one body, locked up in their voluptuous dream, where emotion and sensation merged into one and transgressed the bounds of their senses.
Completely spent, drunk with love, and satiated passion, they finally fell asleep in the hammock on the veranda under the stars, lulled by a warm summer breeze and the sound of the sea. It was dawn when they woke up. Just as it had attended the birth of their love months ago aboard the deck of a ship, today it was the dawn again that was witnessing the prelude to their life together, this time in a wooden cabin on an isolated beach.
“I love you,” he whispered.
“I love you more,” she said.
They lay there, huddled against each other, their heads touching, their arms intertwined, the burning embers of their love glowing as they watched the long, spindly streaks of morning light seeping glorious colors into the sky, heralding the onset of a fresh new day. And mutually, silently, they vowed never to let go.
THE END
A LETTER FROM HANNAH
Dear Reader,
Thank you for reading Burning Embers. I hope that you found Coral and Rafe's passionate love story as exciting to read as I did to write it.
If you did enjoy the story, I'd be eternally grateful if you would write a review. Getting feedback from readers is incredibly rewarding and also helps to persuade other readers to pick up one of my books for the first time.
For news of my next releases, please come and visit me at my website - www.hannahfielding.net or join me on Facebook or Twitter.
Best wishes,
Hannah.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
HANNAH FIELDING was born and grew up in Alexandria, Egypt, the granddaughter of Esther Fanous, a revolutionary feminist and writer in Egypt during the early 1900s. Upon graduating with a BA in French literature from Alexandria University she travelled extensively throughout Europe and lived in Switzerland, France and England. After marrying her English husband, she settled in Kent and subsequently had little time for writing while bringing up two children, looking after dogs and horses, and running her own business renovating rundown cottages. Hannah now divides her time between her homes in Kent and the South of France. She has written two other novels, Indiscretion and The Echoes of Love, which won the Gold Medal for Romance at the 2014 Independent Publisher Book Awards.
Q AND A WITH HANNAH FIELDING
African Adventure
What is it about Africa that inspired you to write Burning Embers?
Burning Embers began not as a story, but as a vivid landscape in my mind. The seed of the ideas was sown many years ago when, as a schoolgirl, I studied the works of Leconte de Lisle, a French Romantic poet of the nineteenth century. His poems are wonderfully descriptive and vivid — about wild animals, magnificent dawns and sunsets, exotic settings and colourful vistas. Then later on, I went on holiday to Kenya with my parents and I met our family friend, Mr Chiumbo Wangai, who often used to visit us. He was a great raconteur and told me extensively about his beautiful country, its tribes, its traditions and its customs. I was enthralled. What a beautiful, wild, colourful, passionate country in which to set a love story!
The specific idea for Burning Embers came to me one night at my home in France. I couldn’t sleep and I was sitting up in my bed gazing out at the Mediterranean, watching the silver full moon shimmering on the sea. Then an ocean liner, all lit up, glided past. It was such a romantic sight that I found myself wondering about the lives of the people on board that ship. Who were they? Where were they going? And into my head walked the heroine of Burning Embers — Coral, a beautiful, naïve young woman returning home to the land of her birth. I grabbed the notebook beside my bed and began to write, and the skeleton outline of the first chapter took shape… Coral, alone on the deck of a ship grieving for her father and a love that was destroyed, and the appearance of an enigmatic man, the alluring Rafe, who offers her the classic comfort of strangers.
What did you most want to convey in Coral and Rafe’s characters?
Coral is interesting in that at twenty-five, she is still emotionally immature, despite the sexual social revolution that took place while she was growing up. I deliberately wanted to write a rites-of-passage love story with a naïve heroine who was nevertheless a product of her time in terms of her independence and ambition; and it’s essentially this combination of innocence and sophistication that attracts Rafe to her and holds his attention. She’s intelligent and sensitive enough to realise when it is time for her to grow up and put aside her childish ways. Her love for Rafe teaches her to control her fiery impulsive nature, to start giving, and to trust.
I wanted Rafe’s vulnerability and compassion to be instinctively perceived by Coral, despite his notorious reputation, making their chemistry all the more powerful. He’s a passionate man with a strong sense of right and wrong. Although he is very much in love with Coral and desires her more than anything, he nevertheless fights to keep his feelings in check; and when she offers herself to him, he finds a way of giving her pleasure without totally robbing her of her innocence. It’s just this combination of strength and vulnerability that is irresistible and goes straight to a woman’s heart.
Who is your favourite character in Burning Embers?
It would be too easy for me to choose Rafe, my Alpha man hero, who in my eyes represents the perfect man par excellence. But I also feel a strong pull to a secondary character, Morgana, the dusky Middle-Eastern dancer and Rafe’s former mistress. A beautiful and passionate woman, she guards her love for Rafe with the fire of a lioness defending her cubs. As long as she thinks there is hope, and a chance to keep her man, she will fight for her love, all claws out. Morgana is sensitive and proud, and as soon as she realises that Rafe’s happiness lies with another woman, she discreetly relinquishes her place and melts away into the background. That’s what I call selfless love!
Do you believe in magic?
When I was a child, my governess told me fairy stories. These tales, full of wonderful and dreamy magic, were my first induction into ‘the other’. I knew them for what they were — legends imparting moral meanings — but I enjoyed fantasising that such enchantment was real. Then when our family friend, Mr Chiumbo Wangai, visited, he opened my eyes to the darker side of magic with his stories of the witch doctors and voodoo ceremonies of his native Kenya. Did I believe in those stories? I tried not to, because doing so would give me nightmares!
Years later, when I started writing my own romantic stories, I found that I needed to revisit those magical stories of my childhood, deciding not only what I believed now, as an adult, but also what views I would put forward in my books. I realised that neither glowing angels nor wicked evil spells resonates with me; but instead I find it interesting that somewhere just on the edge of ‘the other’ is a realm of light and darkness. Like Hamlet, I believe there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy. Exactly what, though, I’ll never know! In that sense, Coral in Burning Embers is like me — bewitched, bothered and bewildered by black magic. But, ultimately, she has faith. Because if you don’t believe in just a little magic — light and dark — how can you ever fall in love?
Wanderlust
Where does your love of travel come from?
When I was a little girl my parents took my sister and me on trips to Europe, which were magical and inspirational for a romantic like me. But after the 1956 war in Egypt, almost everyone was stopped from travelling. Throughout my teens, the desire to travel boiled up in me and I don’t think I ever recovered. Two or three times a year I reach for my passport and set off. As St Augustine said: ‘The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.’
Do you have a special place you like to stay?
The Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan. It’s an opulent belle époque style villa built on the banks of the Nile, and many famous people have stayed there, including Sir Winston Churchill, King Farouk, the Aga Khan and Czar Nicholas II. The views from the luxurious bedrooms are mind-blowing
: the sweeping vistas of the Nile, the picturesque surrounding countryside and the lush garden of Elephantine Island. In this captivating and mystery-laden atmosphere dwells much of the romance of a past, exotic age, yet with all the comforts of modern times.
What’s your most impressive phrase in a foreign language?
When my English husband and I visit Egyptian markets, the local people talk freely about us because they assume that I’m a foreigner and that I don’t understand what they’re saying! I love to see their expressions change when I tell them, ‘Ana masriya zayak wa batklam araby zayak’: ‘I’m Egyptian like you and I speak Arabic as you do.’
Writer’s Notes
When you’re writing, who’s in control, you or the characters?
Definitely me. I am extremely disciplined in the planning of my plot. I have a rigid routine which has served me well. Having researched my facts thoroughly, I plan my novel down to the smallest detail. Each character is set and will react according to the plot and the plan I have decided upon. I have found that planning ahead makes the writing so much easier and therefore so much more enjoyable. I use my plan as a map. I never set out on a long journey by car without a map, and the same applies to my writing.
Do you need silence or do you play music?
All through my research and planning I listen to music, usually in the language of the country in which the plot is set. While writing Burning Embers, I often listened to a wonderful African Sixties pop song called ‘Pata Pata’, made famous by the South African artist Miriam Makeba, otherwise known as the ‘Empress of African Song’. It has joyfully infectious African rhythms mixed with a Sixties sound. Apart from that, I loved listening to old classics, in particlar by Nat King Cole, the Beach Boys, Abba and Boney M.
Do you have any writing rituals?
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