The Sheikh's Million Dollar Bride

by Clare Connelly

  “Was it always like that?” She said quietly, a soft question into the darkness of her thoughts.

  His laugh made his arousal flinch and her overly sensitive muscles rejoiced at the contact. She startled against him and he pulled back a little, just enough to look her in the eye. “No.”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t think so.”

  He lifted a thumb and stroked her cheek. “You were unforgettable then.”

  “And now?” She murmured, angling her head and catching the ball of his thumb between her teeth.

  “Now?” He shook his head. “I cannot say.”

  She frowned, analysing the statement even as he began to move. But it was a simple, quick thrust, and then he pulled her away from the wall, holding her around his waist. He carried her easily, as though it were the most natural thing in the world. He strode confidently to the wall of glass overlooking the city.

  He eased her to the ground in front of the window and she groaned as his body separated from hers.

  “Turn around.” A gravelled request that nonetheless carried the weight and authority of a man used to commanding.

  She did, immediately. Not because she feared him or saw him as her ruler, but because she trusted him when it came to matters of pleasure. She had begun a journey with him five years ago. He had been her only instructor, the master to whom her body responded, and she was his ever-willing pupil.

  Her back to him, he reached for her hands and lifted them, bracing them against the glass before running his fingers slowly down her arms, teasing her beside her breasts, before dragging slowly lower, to her hips. When he reached the subtle curves, he pulled on them sharply, jerking her backwards so that she was bent over, her body at a right angle, her arms braced against the glass.

  “You’re sure this window isn’t see through?” She murmured, amazed at the view of Manhattan as the sun settled over it.

  “It is private,” he assured her, his fingers running over the bare curves of her rear, marvelling at the soft roundness, touching her intimately, brushing against her most private flesh.

  “And secure?” She shivered as his thumb glanced forward, towards her feminine core.

  “Perfectly. You will not tumble to your death.”

  “Not without taking you along for the ride,” she agreed.

  His laugh was a different kind of pleasure, because it brought a reminder of another kind of intimacy. The way they had talked and laughed and shared everything.

  His finger dipped inside her wet heart, rolling around the nerve-endings that were already screaming from pleasures enjoyed.

  “I will wipe him from your mind,” Syed said with heat and passion.

  “Who?”

  “The father.” He pushed another finger inside of her and she bucked, grinding her hips lower. But when her arms pushed off the glass and she attempted to straighten, he used his other hand to hold her in place, keeping her bent over Manhattan. For his pleasure? Or hers?

  She stared at the city as he twisted his fingers against her most sensitive flesh, finding the spot that was at the centre of her pleasures, and tormenting it with insistent, quick taps. She writhed against the window, but moving was not an option. He held her fast and she surrendered to the pleasure he provided. It was new and it was intense and she was his, as he’d said he wanted.

  She always would be.

  He slid his fingers from her and she groaned at the removal of contact, but not for long. He crouched behind her; his tongue found its mark, running along her seam and pleasuring her anew, in a thousand different ways. She screamed out, and now when she went to stand, he pulled away, punishing her and ensuring her submission in a new way. A way that was torture. She could not let him stop. Her world would crumble without the pleasure he promised.

  It was a climax that overtook her for its speed and intensity. He kept his mouth against her as she came, his tongue unrelenting until the last wave had passed and then he stood, easily, and his cock, so hard and big, drove into her, even as her body was still processing the last assault of sensation.

  She cried out, but it was a hoarse cry, muted by so many cries before it. His hands curled around her body, seeking her breasts, and he played them. Roughly, not gently, pulling at her nipples almost as though they had angered him. And the pleasure from that touch sent sharp arrows of need through her, sharp against her flesh, overpowering her nerves, boiling her blood.

  It had never been like this before. In the past, he had been gentle. Still seductive and powerful, but not demonstrating this all-consuming need to control.

  It was new. And she loved it. He thrust into her and now his hands moved to her shoulders, digging into the flesh, holding her tight, so that each jab of his arousal moved deep within her. “Keep your eyes open,” he barked, and she complied, such was his power over her.

  The city beneath her was like another form of stimulus; she was dizzied by its heights and its pace and she suspected he knew it.

  “I am going to drive you crazy tonight,” he said. “You will not sleep. You will simply be pleasured. Again and again until you beg me to let you sleep and still I will pleasure you. So that no man, ever, can give you what I have. Do you understand, najin? Tonight, you are mine. All mine.”

  She groaned but didn’t answer, and as he thrust into her he dropped a hand to her opening and his fingers began to tease her in time with his movements until she was incandescent with the build up of her desire. She fell apart against the window, the streets of Manhattan manic below her, but not a patch on the mania that was rampant in her blood.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  He had possessed her, again and again, but it was clear Syed was the one who was possessed. A darkness moved within him. A pain. The water of the spa swirled around them. Warm, bubbling and scented with rosewater and cinnamon. Sarah sat between his legs, her eyes heavy, her body drifting far above them, resplendent on cloud nine.

  “What happened after you left?” She asked, the words drowsy. Beyond the windows that surrounded them, Manhattan sparkled with lights. There were no stars, but that didn’t matter. Not when there was such man-made beauty to feast upon.

  Syed’s mind travelled back to that time. His anger at having been recalled; his frustration at the realisation that what he had with Sarah was a fantasy. It couldn’t exist in real space and time – it was a bubble of pleasure that wouldn’t translate to his real life.

  He remembered his father’s insistence that he forget ‘The American’. An edict he would never have obeyed, had it not been for the death of his mother. A death that had left them all splintered into pieces. Syed would have done almost anything for Sarah, but not inflict more pain on his already-bereft father.

  “I returned to my role in Kalastan,” he said quietly.

  Sarah nodded, and in the reflection of the glass, she saw him brush her hair away from his chin, as though it had tickled him. It brought back memories of the way she had liked to sleep, her head on his chest, and the jokes he had always made that it had been like sleeping with a feather duster against his face.

  She swallowed. “Have you … have you been back here? Since?”

  He was still. And he was angry. Not at her. At the turns his life had taken. “Yes.”

  Grief slashed her anew. “Did you ever think about … or try to… see me?”

  He reached for the sponge. In the window, she watched him apply body wash to it, his jaw chiselled with determination. He held it in his hand a moment, and then brought it to her shoulder, running it over her flesh slowly, leaving a trail of bubbles. “No.”

  Such an unsatisfying answer, given the deliberation she had seen him put into it.

  “It would have been a betrayal to what I had promised my family.”

  Her heart turned over in her chest. Curiosity and mortification swirled through her. “They knew about me?”

  His lip lifted in sardonic acknowledgement. “Yes.”

  “And they didn’t approve?”

  He st
illed, holding the sponge at the top of her arm. “No. Remember, I was engaged to be married. Anyone who jeopardised that would have garnered the same reaction.”

  She bit down on her lip and nodded. “How could you do that?”

  “Ours was not a normal engagement,” he said softly. “I felt I owed my betrothed my faithfulness only once we pledged our marital vows.”

  “I don’t mean to her.” Sarah swallowed. “How could you be with me and not tell me who you were? Or tell me about this woman – what is her name?”

  “Charlotte,” he said quietly. “At first I presumed you knew. In my country, and certainly in more cosmopolitan cities, I am recognisable. By the time I realised you didn’t know me, I had become addicted to you. I thought the truth would ruin it.”

  The smile that brushed across her lips was pained. “I wish you weren’t royal,” she said, the words half-swallowed by the water, so that he had to ask her to repeat them.

  “I wish you weren’t royal,” she said again, with more intention. “I wish you had been free to stay. To be with me.”

  He ran the sponge over her arm and then brought it around her front, to wash the flesh beneath her breasts slowly. “I did too, at the time.”

  It was something. A small admittance that hinted at a reticence to end what they’d been.

  “My mother’s death splintered our family. I could not do so further.”

  She nodded. But the pain was still there. Pain at having loved him and found him gone one day. Pain at the discovery that he was a Prince, and that she’d never really known the man she thought she’d loved. Pain at knowing how impossible their relationship was, even when it was all she wanted.

  Sarah remembered his pain, though. The way he had been so broken, despite the fact it had been a long illness and she had felt much pain at the end. I was her favourite, he’d said one night, smiling fondly. I look like my father, you see, and she told me once that she’d fallen in love at first sight only twice. Once with him, and again with me.

  “I wish you’d come back sooner,” she said with a small shrug of her shoulders. “Or that you were back for longer.” It was a tired admission. One she wouldn’t have made if she hadn’t spent an evening and night being ravaged by this man.

  He studied her in the reflection and shifted a little in the bath. She was exhausted. Despite his earlier promise, a desire to see her sleep – to take care of her – filled him. He reached for the tap and pressed the dial to turn it off, then held her against his chest. Her eyes were heavy. Though she was trying, valiantly, to keep them open, he saw the moment they dropped and did not lift.

  He held her sleeping form against his body, watching her in the window and feeling her breaths on his chest. He couldn’t have said how long he watched her for, only that the water began to cool and her flesh did likewise, so that he stood and lifted her in one movement, stepping carefully from the enormous tub and holding her tight to his chest. She shifted a little against him, murmuring something he didn’t quite catch.

  Covered in droplets of water, he laid her down on his bed before retrieving a towel. “I’m okay,” she murmured, pushing up to sitting. But her eyes were so heavy, he made a noise low in his throat and continued to dry her, rubbing gently, all over. Then, he lifted her once more, carrying her to a guest room and placing her in an enormous bed. He stared at her long and hard then walked from the room.

  *

  The morning broke in a dazzling array of gold and peach, but Sarah couldn’t appreciate it. Her body felt different. Sore, but in the best possible way. She stretched her toes, pointing them downwards, and froze as they connected with a warm, hair-roughened calf. Her stomach swirled and she jerked her head to face Syed.

  He was still asleep, his handsome face in a repose.

  What the hell had she done?

  A small moan of anguish escaped her lips as she remembered all of the ways they’d made love the night before. The way he’d kissed her all over. Washed her as though he loved her, dried her gently.

  Would it take her another five years to get over him?

  God, she was an idiot. Why had she come?

  Not for money. Never for money.

  She’d come because she hadn’t been able to refuse. She’d been weak, and the pain of never having him again was going to wound her more than she could have imagined.

  She had to leave, and she had to do it before they made love again. Slowly, carefully, she pushed her feet out of the bed, placing them on the thick carpet just as his hand reached out and snaked around her wrist.

  “Good morning.”

  His voice was so sexy first thing in the day, still roughened by sleep. She forced a tight smile to her face. “Hi.”

  He sat up, the sheet falling low across his hips, his torso tanned and sculpted by muscles and ridges. Her eyes dipped to his narrow waist and then she looked away quickly.

  “How did you sleep?” He ran his hand up her arm, his fingertips dancing over her skin leaving a trail of electricity in their wake.

  “Fine,” she lied tersely, standing up quickly and scanning the room for her underclothes. They weren’t there. Fragments of the night before came back to her. The way they’d made love in the lounge room, then bathed together. She swept her eyes shut on the sensual imagery that was tormenting her anew. Nausea filtered through her, biting her mouth.

  “Sarah?” The single word made her cheeks flush with misplaced guilt.

  “Yes?”

  “Is something the matter?”

  She shook her head. “Not at all.” She was a bad liar. “But I have to get back to Lexi.”

  “It’s still early,” he said, but the words were laced with the hardness that should have signalled to her, years earlier, that he was a powerful ruler. “Surely you do not have to rush off yet?”

  “It was hard enough for me to get away for the night,” she said with an attempt at a smile. “By the time my flight lands it’ll be midday…”

  His eyes narrowed speculatively. “Your flight is booked for this afternoon.”

  “I changed it,” she murmured.

  “You didn’t say anything about this last night.”

  “Didn’t I?”

  “You know you didn’t. You’re running away.”

  “I’m running away?” She repeated angrily, her eyes flashing to his with barely-concealed resentment. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

  He compressed his lips at her justified quip. “What’s happened?”

  “What do you mean? Nothing’s happened.”

  “Last night, we made progress. And yet this morning, you are mad at me once more…”

  Her face paled. “Progress? Progress? My God, Syed. What do you think we’re progressing to? You came back after half a decade and propositioned me. Sex for money. There’s no progress from that.”

  A muscle jerked in his cheek.

  “This is crazy. I shouldn’t have come.” She stalked through the room, yanking the door inwards angrily. It took her a moment to get her bearings. The bedroom was further down the hallway, and she looked left then right before moving quickly into the enormous living space.

  The dress had been draped over a chair, her shoes put neatly beneath it.

  Servants must have come in at some point and tidied up after them. She would have been embarrassed if she wasn’t so damned angry. And the worst of it was that she couldn’t even direct that anger at Syed.

  It had all been Sarah’s fault.

  She should never have come.

  Eventually he would have got the message and left her alone.

  “I don’t want you to go.” The words were quietly spoken, and when she spun around, his brow was crinkled, his face wearing a mask of complete confusion. “I need you to stay.”

  “Stay?” She repeated, fishing her underpants off the chair and pulling them on. “Why? For more closure?”

  He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s not true.”

  “Why am I not s
urprised,” she snapped. “Another lie.”

  “Not a lie. I think, at the time, I don’t know. But Sarah? After last night, don’t you see? Everything’s changed for us. Everything.”

  Her heart trembled in her chest. She stared across the room at him, and then she shook her head. “Nothing’s changed. You’re still the man who left me. Who deserted me…”

  “And you’re still the woman who got pregnant to another man three seconds later,” he said darkly.

  Tears swam on Sarah’s eyes. Lexi isn’t mine. The words were right there; how easy it would have been to tell him the truth. But why? Why give this man her confidence when he was so undeserving of it?

  She jutted her chin defiantly. “Right. So we both have reasons to walk away this time.” She grabbed the dress up, and was midway through stepping into it when he stalked across the room and brought his mouth down on hers.

  “No. Don’t go.”

  She pulled away, a sob ripping out of her.

  “I’m not ready for you to leave. Please.”

  “So when you are ready, it’ll be time for you to go back to Kalastan? Leaving me here, again?”

  He compressed his lips into a flat line of disapproval.

  “This isn’t a relationship, Syed,” she said with stoic determination. “And we’re not a couple. There is no hope for us. No future. Why prolong the inevitable?”

  He stared at her as though she’d started speaking Swahili. If she hadn’t known what he wanted from her, she would have actually believed he’d been blind-sided by her statements. But he’d been brutally honest with her, this time around.

  He wanted sex.

  One night of it.

  And he’d got that.

  “I’m glad we had last night,” she said honestly. “I don’t have to wonder any more.” And she walked around him, skirting the lounge and scooping up her bag with one hand.

  “To wonder what?” He demanded, moving towards her.

  “I don’t know.” She felt a sob in her throat and dug her nails into her palms. She wasn’t going to cry. “I wondered if you were really as great as I’d thought. I wondered if I’d fallen in love with a man or a lie. Now I know.”