by Tee, Marian
“You’re so damn easy to please,” the sheikh gritted out, but the way he couldn’t seem to take his eyes off my face told me his words were more a compliment than anything else.
The sheikh bent his head and, biting my earlobe, he whispered, “But that’s good. That’s exactly how I like it. Exactly how I need you to be because I’ll do this—-”
And before I could understand what he was talking about, the sheikh was pushing my thighs wide open again.
His cock slid inside my pussy, my come easing his passage. I sucked my breath when I felt the tip brushing against the barrier of my virginity.
“Khal.” I was afraid and excited at the same time.
The sheikh withdrew a little, making me feel empty, and then he was sliding back into me, his cock driving down hard—-
“AAAAAH!”
His cock tore through the barrier in one thrust, and he slid all the way in, my well-lubricated and practiced pussy able to take the entire length of his member.
Oh God, oh God. I had never felt this full. Never thought I could feel this full actually.
“Ella.” The sheikh was looking down on me, his jaw clenched hard, his muscles bunched as he fought to remain still. When I looked up, he asked tightly, “Did it hurt a lot?”
I shook my head.
“Does it still hurt now?”
“Just...a bit.”
He nodded. “It will pass.” A savage kind of possessiveness gleamed in his eyes as he said roughly, “You are mine now.”
“I’m yours,” I agreed shakily, my fingers digging deeper into his back.
“I took your virginity.”
“I wanted you to.”
“I’m never going to let you go.”
“I don’t want you to.”
Our gazes meeting, he started to move, and I held my breath, expecting my pussy to ache the way it did when he tore my hymen.
But it didn’t.
My eyes widened as the sheikh was able to pull out completely and then slide back in and I didn’t even experience a bit of discomfort. Instead, I felt something to stir inside of me.
“Ella...” The sheikh demanded my attention with a hiss. When I looked up at him again, he sucked my breath, and I knew he had seen it on my face – wonder at how it felt so good—-
“Ella.” This time he groaned my name as he pulled out the second time and slid back in. This time I moaned with him.
My eyes drifted closed, my fingers digging crescent marks on his smooth hard back as my legs snaked around his waist.
“Khal.”
His name acted like a cue, and the sheikh started thrusting in and out of my pussy, his thrusts deep and steady. I clung to him harder, rocking my body against him, rubbing my pussy against hardness, silently begging him not to be gentle.
“Temptress.” An accusation, but he uttered the word with savage tenderness. Our bodies began to rock against each other, his thrusts turning wilder as his cock reached all the way to my womb.
When I felt it again, that familiar, exciting, terrifying sensation of having your orgasm build inside your body, rising and rising—-
My breath caught and then I sobbed out, “Khal.”
The sheikh shuddered over me. “Say it again.” He dug his hands under my body and squeezing my bottom, he said harshly, “Say my name, milady.”
“Khal.”
Cupping my bottom, he began pumping into me relentlessly.
“Khal, Khal, Khal.” I cried his name over and over as I could feel my orgasm rising higher and higher, closer and closer to the peak—-
The sheikh bent down and latched his mouth to my breast, biting my nipple as he thrust deep into me.
I screamed.
“KHAL!”
Pleasure of immeasurable proportions electrified my body, and I ground my hips against him as I came. I started sobbing, my orgasm so powerful that the world started to dance around me. “Oh God, Khal. Khal. Khal.”
“ELLA.” The sheikh roared my name as he, too, came, his back arching as his cock pumped out its first load of come into my pussy.
I sobbed harder.
Oh God.
The sheikh's cum.
The sheikh was filling me with his cum.
My thoughts disintegrated, and I could only sob his name and cling to him while the sheikh fucked me through his own orgasm, his cock pumping out an impossible amount of seed into me with every thrust.
“Ella...”
The sheikh's voice was unusually ragged when he spoke my name in the aftermath of our first joining. He was on his back, having rolled me on top of him while our bodies remained connected, his cock still semi-erect inside my pussy.
The strange sound of his voice made me lift my head, and I gazed down at him warily. “Yes, Your Highness?” Just looking at him made me feel all sorts of delicious things. I wanted him again, wanted to feel his cock filling me, wanted to feel him ripping me apart with the monstrous size of his cock.
But more than that, looking at him made me feel...right.
Like I had found my place, finally.
The sheikh's blue eyes were sober. “I have something to tell you.”
I stiffened.
“Tomorrow, the king and queen will be back, and they will be holding a ball for me.”
“A ball?” I repeated dumbly. “Is it your birthday?”
He shook his head.
“Then – what for?”
“A bride hunt."
My eyes widened.
Holding my gaze captive, the sheikh said grimly, “One of the women invited will be my bride.” He paused. “And I don’t want you to come.”
The Invitation
The whole palace was in an uproar. Not only was the entire royal family in residence, but there was also a mad rush to prepare for the ball. Servants rushed to and fro as they hastened to decorate the palace in time. Fresh flowers were needed, marbled floors to be scrubbed clean, and curtains of gold silk to be hung on every window.
Everyone was excited – or at least everyone but me.
“I wonder who the sheikh would choose as his bride,” I heard someone say from below stairs.
The words made me pause, and instead of continuing to my room I bent over the balustrade and peeked from the second flight of stairs. Two servants were chatting, their arms full of fresh linen, and I heard the other girl answer with a sigh, “I’m only sure of one thing. The sheikh is the king's heir. I don't think he'd marry anyone without a crown on her head.”
“What about heiresses or First Daughters?”
Her companion snorted. “Perhaps that would work for English royalty but not our sheikh. He’s always done the right thing from the start, and his only choice is to marry another princess.”
I didn’t bother to hear the rest of what they had to say.
Picking up my skirts, I simply raced up the stairs, trying all the while to fool myself into thinking I could outrun my misery.
The soldiers stationed outside my room bowed the moment I appeared – but not before exchanging glances between them.
My smile almost slipped. They knew, I thought dully. I could see it in their eyes. They had heard me sobbing myself to sleep – every night, actually, since I had given myself to the sheikh, and he had broken my heart in return.
“Good evening.” I could barely meet their gazes as I greeted them. Hurrying inside, I closed the door and squeezed my eyes shut when I found myself alone in the darkness of my room.
How was I going to withstand this, I wondered miserably.
It had only been five days, and yet it already felt like eternity.
Forcing myself to move, I trudged to my bed and threw myself on it. The bed dipped under my weight—-
And then it dipped a second time, indicating that I wasn’t alone.
“Ssssh.” A hand covered my mouth, silencing my scream.
The lights switched on, and I stiffened in shock when I found myself staring straight into the sheikh's blazing blue eyes.
>
“Promise you won’t scream?” His voice was soft but mocking, as if he already knew what my answer would be.
I glared at him, snarling my answer against his palm, but even as I did it, deep inside I knew the truth. It was all for show, and by the way the sheikh's eyes gleamed he knew it, too.
For a long time we only stared at each other, his strong, powerful body relaxed while all the tension in the room seeped into my skin.
His thin, cruelly beautiful lips curved all of a sudden, catching me unawares. With my guard lowered, his smile enslaved me, and that was it.
The sheikh lifted his hand off my mouth as we both moved towards each other. I wasn’t sure who reached whom first, but suddenly every part of our bodies was touching. Plunging his fingers into my hair as his mouth covered mine, the sheikh pushed me down on the bed. We undressed each other without breaking the kiss, our movements more frenzied than proficient. In moments, we were completely naked—-
Aaaaaaaaah.
The sheikh had entered me without warning, but it didn’t hurt at all, not with my pussy already wet and aching for his possession.
Moaning, I arched against him, my legs snaking up to curl around his waist. The sheikh groaned, and as I strained up against him, he deepened his penetration. Faster and harder, he shoved his cock into me until all I could do was clutch his shoulders, gasping with every thrust.
Soon, we were rocking against each other, the sheikh swallowing my every scream and whimper into his kiss. I dug my fingers into his back, a silent, desperate plea for it to go on forever.
But it wasn’t to be.
I could already feel the orgasm building, making my body shake hard against him. I tried my best to control it, wanting to prolong our union, but it was impossible.
My climax exploded in the next second, and I cried out against his mouth. The sheikh kissed me hard as I came, and I cried out again as he sucked hard on my tongue. I cried with each wave of ecstasy, and when I felt the sheikh shudder over me, it started again, my body buckling as I came another time. This time, we came together, wildly, his hips slamming down on me as his cock turned into a beast, devouring my pussy over and over.
He didn’t let me go throughout it, and I held him to me just as tightly. When it was over for both of us, our bodies humming with sated pleasure, I expected him to roll away, but instead, I felt the sheikh press his lips to my forehead.
Oh.
I squeezed my eyes shut as my heart slammed against my chest. I tried to deny it, but the molten heat spreading all over my body couldn’t be denied.
I was still irrevocably in love with the sheikh.
“Did I hurt you?”
I shook my head at the gruffly voiced question. If only he had, I thought. If he had hurt me, I might have a better shot at forgetting. But instead making love to him was never painful, never terrible or ugly. Twice we had made love now, and each instance seemed to be more heartbreakingly beautiful than the last.
“I missed you.”
Oh. I bit my lip hard. Dear God, but how could he say that so easily? I truly wanted to know. I wanted this to be over, wanted to stop the yearning and start moving on.
When I still didn’t answer, the sheikh's voice turned brooding. “Where have you been? It’s almost midnight, and I’ve been waiting for you for hours.”
The words broke the spell between us, the answer to his question reminding me of the painful truth between us.
The sheikh was going to a ball to look for a bride, and he didn’t want me to come. Humiliation washing over me, I tried pulling away from him, but the sheikh was too swift, his arms turning into immovable chains as he hauled me back to him.
“Let me go.” My voice was muffled against his chest, and I was torn between screaming and crying. God, how could I have let this happen? Why did I still find him irresistible after what he had done to me?
I tried getting away again, but it was no use. Over my head, the sheikh spoke again, his voice calm. “Tell me where you’ve been first.”
Resentment hit me, and I lifted my head to gaze at him wrathfully. “You really want to know?”
His gaze narrowing at my raised tone, the sheikh grated out, “Will you keep it down—-”
Even knowing he was right, I was too mad, too hurt to listen to reason and I found myself bursting out even more shrilly, “I was with Mik'hail."
Silence detonated between us.
Something flickered in his eyes – something like pain – but it was gone in a flash, and I told myself I had just imagined it.
“I see.” The sheikh released me as he spoke, and the abrupt absence of his touch left me feeling inexplicably and mortifyingly empty.
God, I was so helpless.
In a fit of hurt anger, I grabbed the covers and, wrapping it around me, I climbed out of my bed and stalked to where my dress laid discarded on the floor. Bending down, I picked it up and, dipping into its pocket, I pulled out a still-sealed letter.
Whirling around to face the sheikh, I threw the letter at him.
Raising himself up to a sitting position and looking entirely unconcerned of his nudity, the sheikh caught the letter handily. His lips tightening at the sight of the royal seal of Layla, he demanded, “What is this?”
“My invitation,” I said coldly.
In response, the sheikh locked his gaze with mine just before ripping the letter into half with slow deliberation.
I gasped. “What are you doing?” I lunged towards him, trying to get the letter out of his hand, but the sheikh moved too fast for me.
He was gone from the bed in a flash and managed to rip the letter into smaller pieces. “You’re not going.”
Seeing him release the pieces of paper into the air was like watching my own heart crumble anew, pieces of me that I wasn’t sure I’d ever get back because only the sheikh could stitch them together again.
“How?” I whispered. I had lost all sense of pride and shame. “How can you be so cruel to let us get this far only to throw me away?”
“I didn’t throw you away.” The sheikh's handsome face became shuttered. “I only said you are not to go to the ball—-”
“But it’s a ball for you to find a bride,” I cried out. “A bride, Your Highness! Not anyone’s bride but yours! How can I not want to come?” I nearly wept when the sheikh only looked at me, a stoic, noble figure that almost made me feel like I was talking to a cold and unfeeling statue. “Is it because I’m not a p-princess?” I stumbled over the last word but I forced myself to say it, needing to know the truth, if only to find a way to move on. “Is that why you don’t think I c-could be your bride?” I fought hard not to cry, but tears had clogged my voice in the end.
And yet, instead of being moved to pity, the sound seemed to enrage the sheikh. “Stop crying.” His savage voice was like a lash against my heart, and my body shook at the greater effort it took not to cry.
How can this be the same man who had loved me so tenderly a while ago, I wondered despairingly. How can be so tender one moment then so nasty the next?
Telling myself it was a waste of tears to cry over him, I wiped my eyes dry and, lifting my chin, I said flatly, “You won’t stop me from coming to the ball.” I shook my head when he tried to speak. “But don’t worry, it’s not to be your bride.” Tightening my hold on the covers around me, I said in a brittle voice, “You can tear all of Mik'hail's letters, but it won’t change a thing. I’m going to accept his proposal of marriage.” I smiled as my heart broke and I kept smiling even as I sealed my unwanted fate, saying, “And who knows? The king may even ask you to give me away on my wedding day.”
THE SHEIKH WAS IN A cold rage.
Even now, with dawn breaking outside his windows, he was unable to sleep, his mind tormented by recurring memories of Ella’s last words.
I’ve decided to accept his proposal of marriage.
Snarling out a curse, the sheikh threw his glass against the wall. It shattered into pieces, the small amount of wine in it
leaving behind a purplish stain.
Damn Dezza and her machinations, he thought furiously. Because they shared the same blood, the sheikh had always turned a blind eye to his half-sister’s greedy ways.
But this – this goddamn mess she had created by bringing his Ella and the Sheikh of Layla together – was the last straw. She had forced him to show his hand too early, forced him to hurt his beloved out of necessity, and for that he would make her pay endlessly.
Once all this was done, her misguided ambitions about the throne of Kivr would be put to a definite end, and she would be made to learn her place.
His decision made, the sheikh called for Luke. "Has the traitor confessed?” They had found the culprit behind the stolen letters, a low-ranking palace servant that his half-sister had bribed into doing her bidding.
“No, Your Highness.”
“That’s a pity then.”
And yet, Luke thought with a shiver, the sheikh's murmured words were the opposite of his merciless tone. It was a frightening reminder that the sheikh had not always led a charmed life, and there had been a time the perils of war had turned him into the fiercest killer.
The sheikh's next words seemed design to affirm this as Luke’s master informed him, “My former sergeant will take over later today. It should take him only three days at most to break the man down.”
“I understand, Your Highness.”
“Once the traitor’s returned to your care, you can be sure he’ll be most cooperative.” The sheikh paused. “However, you may notice a few changes about him.”
“Changes?” Luke echoed, puzzled.
“A missing finger or two,” the sheikh answered casually. “Nothing that worrying, but I thought I should warn you beforehand.”
Luke swallowed. “I a-appreciate the warning, Your Highness.”
“It is nothing.” The sheikh's voice turned hard. “Just be sure everything is ready come the day of the ball. I want it to be clear in everyone’s minds the lengths she had taken to prove her love to me.”
The Plan
“The first course shall be served,” the butler announced as attendants filed past him, each one tasked to serve a member of the royal family. The king was seated at the head of the table, the queen and the king’s daughter on his right and Khal and Ella on his left.