More Precious than a Crown

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘Still here?’ Zahid smiled and took the towel from his shoulders and started to dry his chest and under his arms.

  ‘Looks like it.’

  ‘I’ll get the place sorted.’

  ‘I’ll have my bath.’

  She climbed out of bed and walked to the bathroom but turned at the last moment, in time to see Zahid take off the towel from his hips. And Trinity got more of a glimpse of what she was letting herself in for. It was darker than he, thick and tumescent, and so incredibly beautiful that rather than wanting to grab her dress and run or head for the other side of the bathroom door, she actually wanted to go back to bed.

  ‘You should call your family,’ Zahid said, as if it were completely normal to be chatting to her while naked, as if it was completely normal to want the plates cleared and the place tidied and all distractions put on hold before settling in for a lovely long session.

  ‘Er, after my bath,’ Trinity croaked, for she wanted nothing to burst the fragile bubble that she carried into the bathroom with her and only released once she had closed the door. The most fragile bubble she had ever carried, for she actually wanted sex, rather than wanted to want sex.

  The lighting had been turned down and the huge sunken bath was filled with warm milky-looking water.

  She felt all giddy and disorientated but in the nicest way. She looked in the mirror. Her hair was a disaster, her eyes on fire and her body felt as if it was filled with helium, so floaty and high was she from pancake-laden kisses and the promise of more to come.

  There was a little card telling her the infusions that her bath contained—frankincense, neroli and argan oils—and that she was to add the bomb at her leisure.

  It was the bomb of bath bombs, Trinity thought as she watched it spinning in the water, tossing out petals and the most heavenly fragrances that lured her to climb in.

  She lay there in the just right temperature water, with her stomach pleasantly full and her thirst more than quenched, yet for the first time, the very first time since her very first kiss with Zahid, there was a stir of want for a very different pleasure.

  Zahid thought her a party girl—that a morning sex marathon was surely commonplace for her.

  He’d fall off his mummy-bird perch if he knew just how limited her experience was.

  Yet as she lay there, recalling his kisses and her body’s response to them, it dawned on Trinity that after all those years of therapy and Californian healing, which hadn’t worked a jot, the answer could well be on the other side of the door.

  If Zahid had so much as a clue how messed up she was sexually then everything they had now would disappear. He’d either do the honourable thing and decline because nothing could ever come of them or, worse, she’d get pity sex, with Zahid being all careful and tender and asking if she was okay every five minutes.

  Zahid wanted straightforward sex but there was nothing straightforward about sex for Trinity.

  Yet she wanted Zahid to look at her the way he had this morning, she wanted the absence of fear that he brought, not just to her mind but her body too.

  Still, if she was going to carry this off, then a confident, assured woman must walk out of this bathroom. Somehow she must present herself as the sexually experienced woman that he assumed she was.

  ‘The maid has been.’ Zahid knocked at the door. ‘And your phone keeps buzzing. Do you want me to bring it in to you?’

  ‘I’ll be out in a minute, Zahid!’ Trinity called to the closed bathroom door. ‘About what you said last night...well, it would seem that I forgot to say please...’ She could almost feel his smile behind the door as he answered her.

  ‘Just remember to say thank you.’

  Trinity ducked her head under the water but it didn’t wipe the smile from her face. It should worry her really that the rather staid Zahid seemed to be the only person in the world who got her sense of humour. Most people frowned, or she had to explain and by then it wasn’t so funny.

  She didn’t have to explain herself to Zahid.

  Trinity looked down and saw her nipples peeking up out of the milky bathwater and she didn’t understand why she was terrified but not scared.

  This was all so...planned, so clinical.

  No, not clinical...

  Trinity blinked as she realised she had found the word she was searching for—Zahid put the sensual into consensual.

  It was a very nice word to ponder as she climbed out of the bath. There were petals from the bath bomb in her hair and sticking to her skin but Trinity just wrapped herself in a robe and ran his comb through her hair.

  What if she couldn’t carry it off? Trinity thought. What if she started crying or broke down, or her complete inexperience told him that she hadn’t a clue?

  You’ll never get a chance like this again, Trinity warned her reflection.

  Kill or cure.

  She opened the bathroom door, half expecting the slight chaos of this morning.

  Instead, the room was in darkness, broken only by the candles dotted everywhere.

  The breakfast things had been taken away, all clothes and things tidied, even the bed had that smooth freshly made look, except for the naked sheikh in it!

  Trinity was terrified, of course, but nicely so, as she walked over to the bed.

  ‘Nice bath?’

  ‘Lovely.’ She sat on the edge of the bed and wondered if the right thing to do would be to tell him but, no, as he welcomed her to his bed with a kiss, she wanted it just as it was.

  His kiss made her shiver, the skill of his mouth told her to leave things to him but, just as she almost forgot to be frightened, the bleeping of her phone made her jump.

  ‘Has anyone seen Trinity?’ Zahid said, and actually made her laugh as she rose from his bed and raked her hands in frustration through wet hair. ‘I’ll just let them know that I won’t be joining them.’

  She was far from grateful for the reprieve—now she and Zahid would have to start all over again, Trinity thought as she picked up the phone from the bedside and read her mother’s text.

  ‘They’re about to start breakfast and she wants to know where I am.’ Her voice gave a little squeak at the end, because he had rolled to the side of the bed and was fiddling with the belt of her robe,

  ‘Text and say Zahid has taken you riding.’

  ‘Horseriding?’

  ‘Don’t lie,’ Zahid said, and pulled her hips so she was standing, trying to text, as he stayed very much on his side, leaning on one elbow, one hand on her bottom, guiding her hips to his face.

  It was terribly hard to text with a mouth nuzzling your stomach. She could see his glossy black hair and feel his hot mouth and tongue as she tried to work out what to write.

  Oh, my, Trinity thought as he continued to kiss her stomach, because she actually wanted to drop the phone and hold his head.

  Dry from her bath, she was wet from his mouth.

  She wanted him lower, yet she didn’t.

  She wanted fear, yet it steadfastly refused to arrive.

  She wanted to run, yet she wanted to remain.

  Somehow she hit ‘Send’ on her text.

  ‘Now turn it off.’ Zahid didn’t lift his mouth from her skin as he delivered far from his final instruction. ‘I want no distractions.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  TRINITY TURNED OFF her phone but it did not make it to the bedside table because his mouth was really working her stomach now and instead she just dropped the phone to the floor.

  All phones were off, there was a ‘Do not disturb’ sign on the door, day had become night and all Zahid wanted to do was enjoy.

  The soft skin of her stomach tasted better than even he had imagined. Still warm from the bath, it responded so readily to him. Zahid felt the tension in her stomach shifting, he felt the taut muscles relax and then tighten again, but in pleasure as his mouth moved steadily down.

  Zahid was working her quickly but for one reason only—he wanted her to come.

  Zahid had conside
red taking care of things in the shower so that he might take more time, but he had chosen to wait.

  He was ruing that decision now as he deep-kissed her stomach and his hands slid up her thighs, for he had wanted Trinity for a lot longer than perhaps he cared to admit.

  What to do? Trinity pondered. What should she be doing about now? Her hands moved to his hair, more to steady herself, but Zahid moved his mouth lower, nibbling at golden curls then nudging her clitoris out with his tongue as his fingers slid inside a place that no fingers had ever touched.

  It was just her mind that was scared, Trinity realised, not her body, for it responded so readily to him.

  She could feel a tremble in her thighs as his fingers and tongue stroked her intimately, a tremble that had her wondering if she could remain standing, but his hands soon answered that though, for he released her sex for a moment and guided her to the bed.

  She thought he would kiss her, but Zahid had kissed her mouth last night and again this morning, and the first more intimate taste of her had him yearning for more and so he slid down the bed.

  ‘Zahid...’ Trinity attempted to halt him, could barely cope with her inhibition, but then came his voice.

  ‘Do you know how many times I have thought of this?’ Zahid revealed.

  Why was she smiling when she should be in tears?

  She could only do this with him, Trinity thought. It could only be this way, Trinity realised, for if he had seen the look of brief horror on her face at such intimate exposure, Zahid would have surely stopped.

  He could not see it, though, he was too focused on her sex and guided her hips so she was kneeling over his face.

  As she hovered over him his mouth kissed up her inner thigh till it met its shy mark.

  ‘Za—’ His name did role from her tongue, it halted in Trinity’s throat as his tongue rolled her somewhere deep. She had meant to tell him to stop, but by the time she got to ‘hid’ the world as she knew it was different.

  Trinity’s expression had changed from horror to a smile and then to a shocked state of bliss as all those years of frustration were swept aside by the masterful strokes of his tongue.

  To him she unfolded and, though together, somehow the moment was private, the awakening exclusive to Trinity, which was how she wanted it to be, how it had to be if she wanted him to be this bold.

  ‘I have a rose petal in my teeth,’ Zahid said, though his mouth did not move away.

  ‘They’re everywhere,’ Trinity breathed.

  ‘Good,’ Zahid said, returning to his heated mission. ‘I find each one.’

  She didn’t actually have to do anything, Trinity realised, all she had to do was hold onto the bedhead and try not to moan as she followed instructions.

  ‘Kneel lower...’ Zahid breathed. ‘Lower.’ And she gasped as his face took more of her weight and, once it did, there was no chance of not moaning.

  Unshaven, rough, wet and warm, he was everywhere that was needed, inside and out, as he devoured her with relish and his lack of inhibition gained hers.

  Thank you, Trinity wanted to whimper, only not because of their earlier game—she had never been more grateful as he stirred her body beyond a simmer. She had to bite on her lip not to say it as he sucked and licked, and ran his stubbly jaw over her. His focus was so concentrated on her that Trinity didn’t have to do anything other than rock to her body’s tune and let out words that she would rather have kept in because they sounded so lame.

  ‘That’s lovely...’ she managed. ‘Lovely...’ Because it was. It was as it should be and no less than that, just so nice to be lifted a little higher by his hands and his tongue kissed her more lightly, swirling her and then probing her, only pausing to tell her she was something, Trinity had no idea what, in Arabic.

  ‘Fantastic,’ Zahid translated between licks.

  She felt it.

  Those sirens were back and moving closer, but there was no sense of danger. She had never had an orgasm, but twice had glimpsed it with Zahid, yet she was on the very edge of one now.

  ‘Zahid.’ She said it in one word this time, for now she did want him to slow down.

  ‘Why do you fight it?’

  Because she didn’t know what it was, till suddenly it was there and she rose to boiling. The zap of tension that raced up her spine, the shaking of her thighs almost shot Trinity from the bed. Zahid held her hips hard down and his mouth absorbed the energy that pulsed to his lips and tongue as Trinity sobbed out her pleasure. She released a few long-held fears as Zahid fought his—he wanted more, more of the same, more of everything with her. As he lifted her pink and warm from his lips, his mouth suddenly returned again, softly kissing, for he might never be there again.

  Trinity wanted to collapse forward but she was already leaning on her arms as Zahid slid up the bed and let her down so she rested at the top of his thighs.

  She looked down where he rose between her legs and just explored him a moment with her fingers. Zahid watched, incredibly turned on by her gentle ministrations, very close to coming for the feel of her on his lips had been incredible and the feel of her hands was sublime.

  Trinity stroked what would soon be inside her; she felt the soft drizzle of him moisten her fingers and she was actually excited for the moment ahead. Still breathless from her first orgasm, she wanted to get back on the merry-go-round, loved it that the more she stroked, somehow he became even harder, and bigger too.

  ‘You know...’ Trinity said, and then stopped.

  ‘Not unless you tell me.’

  ‘I could get to liking this.’ She smiled.

  It was the most honest she had been.

  ‘I could get to liking this too,’ Zahid said, his face tense from withholding pleasure.

  His words were more honest than he should dare to be, for a morning together was becoming far less than enough.

  He could not think of that now. His mind was struggling just to remember what had once been routine—he reached to the bedside for a condom. Trinity halted him, for she wanted the softness of his skin to meet hers and she mumbled something about an IUD.

  ‘A coil,’ she explained, when he frowned.

  She’d had one put in when she’d lost the baby, and had had it changed a couple of years ago, the fear of a random attack almost as petrifying as the fear of getting pregnant again.

  ‘You’re sure,’ Zahid said, trying to cling onto the last shreds of common sense, for he never went without. ‘Because if you get pregnant...’ he made a slitting gesture to his throat ‘...it will be off with mine.’ And Trinity actually laughed.

  ‘Very sure.’

  He held the base of his thick cock and Trinity lifted herself and lowered herself, loving the feeling of being on top, the control he gave an unwitting gift perhaps, but it set her free.

  He filled her completely, she was sure, but then he pulled her hips right down and she shuddered a sob as she struggled to accommodate the full length of him and rose of her own accord to escape, but nature brought her down again. With Zahid her body did not need instruction, it just followed its own lead, until it was Zahid who slowed her down, but for reasons of his own.

  He tried to keep things smooth, and although Trinity did her best to move slowly, all she wanted to do was grind against him. Zahid too gave up fighting it and simply let her be.

  Was this what she’d been so scared of? Trinity thought as she looked down at Zahid, yet she knew there was no other she could be more herself with. Whatever colour she wore on the day, Zahid saw the person beneath, whatever lie her lips produced, Zahid seemed to extract her truth.

  ‘I think I’m about to come...’ Trinity said, and started to chase the feeling, but to no avail. Just as she thought she might not repeat the magic his mouth had given her, Zahid took over, bucking his hips into her, grinding her down to him, and there was nothing to chase, she was already here. The final swell of him inside and the lift of his hips tipped her over the edge and she came to the delicious sight of a very cont
rolled Zahid momentarily out of it, pulling her down to her side and bucking into her for those last delicious strokes, where they met in a place where logic was left far behind.

  It was sex, Zahid said to himself as he kissed her down from her climax. Good-morning sex that had been a long time coming.

  It must remain as simple as that.

  CHAPTER SIX

  IT WAS FAR more complicated, though.

  Zahid knew it.

  It wasn’t just that his people would never accept her as his bride. Or that she might not want to be one.

  It went a lot deeper than that.

  Zahid rolled away as he did after sex, but then thought twice and rolled back to face her again.

  ‘Penny for them,’ Trinity said, and it took a moment for him to register that she was asking his thoughts.

  ‘Oh, it would cost a lot more than that,’ Zahid said.

  It might cost him his kingdom or, worse, he might lose his head, though not in the way he had joked about before. How could he run a country with Trinity waiting in his bed? How could he focus on his people when his mind would be so consumed by her?

  It was no surprise when Trinity turned from his silence and picked up her phone.

  Whatever he thought of them, they were her family.

  ‘Eight missed calls,’ Trinity said.

  ‘You need to go down?’

  ‘I don’t want to,’ Trinity admitted, ‘but, given that I fly out this afternoon, it would be wrong not to put in an appearance.’

  ‘I know.’

  Zahid then made a huge concession. Yes, he had decided to sever ties but for her he would do the right thing. ‘Do you want me to come down with you?’

  Trinity shook her head and climbed out of bed and started to gather her things.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Zahid asked.

  ‘I have to get ready. I need to go to my room.’

  ‘You can get ready here.’

  ‘It’s going to be bad enough wearing last night’s clothes in the elevator, I’m certainly not going down to face everyone in my bridesmaid’s dress.’