“Being able to drop me whenever you want?” Crap. Why had she let that come out of her mouth? Why remind Amin that he held all the power in their agreement? That she could only rely on his mercy.
“The sensation of my hands on you,” he answered. “And sharing something I love with you. I intend to build a swimming pool in the palace where we may continue your lessons, if you wish. I was a fairly decent swimmer in college, and participated in certain competitions.”
By that she assumed he was talking about the World University Games, where he’d come in second in the long-course event. Mrs. Khan had kept her informed of all his championships. “I’d like that. Very much.”
“As would I. But for now, allow yourself to float. Feel my hands on you.”
“I feel them.”
“You may trust me, Rania. I am not Ghassan.”
“I know. Believe me.”
She simply floated for a while, enjoying the weightlessness, a brand-new sensation for her. Amin seemed content to let her, and to provide the support she needed. Every once in a while, the panic returned, but then she pressed against his hands and she knew she was safe.
Maybe knowing she was safe made her feel open enough to talk about things she shouldn’t.
“Amin?”
“Yes.”
“Ghassan was all I ever knew,” she told him, then laughed a little at herself. “How is that for emotional honesty?”
“This is enough for today,” he said, lowering her legs. With that, her lesson ended.
An hour later, she sat on a blanket on the beach, watching Amin move through the water like he had been born there and not the desert. He’d swum out so far that her panic nearly returned. She’d had to grip the cell phone he’d left her for security, watching for any signs of distress from him. Not that she’d see anything, with him only a black speck moving through the blue.
Oh, but she did see him emerging from the water like Neptune himself, only missing the trident and full beard. As he did, he raised his arms to slick back his hair, pressing the water out. This lovely maneuver displayed the swimmer’s muscles in his chest like a statue’s pose.
She inhaled a deep breath, feeling all kinds of blood rush to the female parts of her.
Why this guy thought he needed to blackmail-slash-pay someone—especially a woman ten years older than him—to be his mistress was beyond anything she could comprehend. Not a question she was going to ask. Not ever. If she did, he might realize his actions made no sense and kick her to the curb.
Then again, he seemed to want a lot of emotional honesty, as he put it, without wanting to give any back. Without that, he might be the perfect husband for some kind, open woman.
Of course, there was also the little matter of him keeping a mistress.
As he approached her, she lifted one of the towels that had been provided for them, and met him halfway to the blanket.
“Good swim?” she asked, the last of her apprehension for his safety slipping away. He was back, and safe, thank Jupiter, or any deity who cared to listen.
He nodded. “I hope the basket is full. Swimming always increases my appetite. For food.” He looked her over in her bikini.
And other things. The words hung in the air, unsaid.
In the basket that the Miizaan staff had left for them, they found a feast. Amin did not even wait to unpack everything before he tucked in to the first wax-paper-wrapped sandwich he pulled from the stash.
While he ate with one hand and managed to twist the cap off a bottle of water with the other, she brought out the rest of the surprises. The champagne, when she zipped it out of a bottle-shaped wetsuit thing, was surprisingly cold. In addition to a variety of sandwiches, she found cold meats and cheeses, with slices of baguette to put them on. The eggplant dip she placed close to Amin. While she loved the stuff, she couldn’t afford to have her breath smell like garlic.
She set out mango cut into perfect cubes, another favorite, and kiwi-strawberry-pineapple fruit skewers that had been drizzled with chocolate. Perfect miniature pastries, dripping with honey and wafting the smell of cinnamon, completed the meal.
Only when all that was done did she let herself put a slice of Brie on a baguette and add some of that mango.
Amin was right. Swimming made you starving. She’d never eaten anything so delicious. She closed her eyes and chewed the sweet and salty mix, trying not to groan with pleasure. All she wanted to do was stuff more food into herself, fast as possible.
Except she couldn’t afford to. Couldn’t afford to let Amin see any greediness in her. Couldn’t afford to get fat on rich food. Couldn’t afford to not be attractive as humanly possible to her much younger patron.
She reached for the green salad, dressed with a squeeze of lemon juice, that the boat staff knew to always include for her.
“Is that what you intend to eat?” Amin asked, around a mouthful of food.
“Salad. My favorite.” Her words didn’t even sound convincing to her. Her stomach didn’t help, choosing that moment to give out a long, low growl that seemed to last forever.
He raised an eyebrow and passed her a sandwich. Then, staring out at the sea, he said, “You are too skinny, in any case.”
Well, maybe she could eat half. She unwrapped it and took a delicious bite.
“Who is MacIntyre to you?” she asked, after several minutes of amicable silence.
The question seemed to startle him. “Our association has been mutually beneficial. We attended school together in England. There were those who did not appreciate people who did not look like they did. Until I arrived at the academy, there was no one who looked like MacIntyre. I believe he felt I should not be subjected to what he experienced. He has been my bodyguard ever since.”
Now she liked the big man even more.
“Why isn’t he here?”
“He does not like the water.”
She shoved her sandwich in her mouth to keep her snarky response from coming out.
“He’s Scottish?” she asked, when she could trust herself again.
“His mother was. He bears her name.” Amin tossed a grape in the air and caught it in his mouth. Was this really the same man who had decided to blackmail her? He seemed so calm and relaxed.
Then again, he’d seemed calm and relaxed when he informed her she would have to sleep with him for money, too.
“You find him an interesting person.” A challenge tinged Amin’s voice.
“Not as interesting as you.” She didn’t have to fake that flattery. But maybe she would leave off the subject of MacIntyre for now. “I’m sorry I negotiated with Shafa. I won’t do it again.”
“Why not? It was poetry. Your friend and I would have wasted months and ended up with the same bargain.”
“I overstepped. I should have asked you first. Also, those months would have let you build a close relationship that would work well for you in the future. It’s the way of Qena.”
“But you forged the deal in a few minutes without having to drink interminable cups of tea and dance around issues.”
She shrugged. “I’m allowed to step outside the lines sometimes because I’m a woman and a foreigner.”
Amin lay down on his side, stretching long legs almost off the blanket, and hunted through the spread for some treat he wanted. “You were born in Qena. Between the two of us, I am more the foreigner.”
She shook her head. “Your father was king. You will never be an outsider in Qena. Some people still think of you as a prince. Which you can definitely use to break down red tape and cultural inconveniences.”
“But you are an outsider?”
“No one will ever forget that my mother was Italian-American. But I find it useful sometimes.”
“I found it useful yesterday. I can see why you lasted so long as my guardian’s mistress. You make it easy to pretend.”
“Pretend?”
“That we are in a relationship.”
Thank God that she didn’t have anyth
ing in her mouth. She put the second half of her sandwich aside, suddenly feeing nauseated.
“Then I’m failing. You’re not supposed to think about having a relationship with me.”
He rolled a grape between his fingers. “Is that not the fantasy?”
“You’re not—” She gulped. There was no other way to say this.
Okay, if they were going to have this talk, she had to make the conversation less like a transaction.
She stood and walked around the huge spread of food. Summoning all the swagger she had, she straddled him and lowered herself to her knees. An intense light went on behind his eyes.
“You’re not buying a fantasy,” she told him, when she was settled, half sitting on his hips. “You’re buying reality. You don’t have to imagine or pretend anything. I am here to fulfill your desires, anticipating what you need before you realize you want it. But I’m having a steep learning curve here.”
He slid questing hands up her sides. “I am fond of your curves. Is there no learning for me?”
She couldn’t hold back her smile. “No. What would you need to learn?”
Heat and hardness seeped through his swimsuit. “To please you.”
Her breath caught. Please her? No man had ever cared about that.
“Oh,” she said, trying to purr like a sex kitten. “I’m already pleased.”
“I can tell the difference when a woman is pleased and when she is not.”
She froze. Impossible to answer. Impossible to breathe.
“Rania.” His tone softened.
Hearing her name snapped her out of the micro trance. He’d been a great lover. He’d done everything right, but she hadn’t climaxed. It wasn’t him—now to convince him of that… She hadn’t often had that experience with Ghassan, either. But somehow she thought that comparing his performance with a guy forty years his senior would be the wrong thing to say.
“I apologize. This will resolve itself.” She’d never talked about this kind of thing with Ghassan. With anyone. “I told you it’s been a long time for me.”
He raised a hand. “I do not require an apology. I doubt my guardian noticed, though you probably felt the need to act for him as well. You are blushing.”
Blushing? The flames of hell were licking her cheeks. Maybe she had him on his back, between her thighs, but it was the discussion that was intimate. “This is pretty personal.”
“Perhaps that is why I am enjoying the conversation so much.” He was on his back, but she was the one feeling vulnerable and exposed. “You are not what I imagined you to be. Perhaps there is much of the fresh-faced virgin, as you put it, in you yet.”
After all this time, she doubted it. But let him believe whatever he wanted. “I hope you’re okay with that.”
“You are a beautiful woman. I still cannot believe you had no lovers. Other than Ghassan. Did you never fall in love?”
Okay, now this, she could handle. “Of course. And with a younger man.”
Something in Amin darkened. He grasped her hips almost to the point of pain. “Go on.”
She gave an elaborate shrug. “But Thor seems to be pretty set on this Dr. Jane person, so I can only watch from afar. And how many British women fell for your dark, exotic charms?”
His death grip on her bikini bottoms eased. “I cannot say.”
“So, all of them, then,” she teased, planting her hands on the sun-heated skin of his abs.
He cocked his head at her. “You are not the jealous type, then?”
Oh, crap. Back to the serious stuff. “The truth?”
“Always.”
He just didn’t seem to be getting the hang of their relationship. It almost seemed like he thought she had some say in… well, anything. He needed the rules spelled out for him. “I am your mistress. I don’t get to be jealous. You get to do what you want. I’m yours. You’re not mine.”
Just please, please don’t get married. Don’t torture your wife, the mother of your children, by running off to be with the woman who is paid to never say no. Be an honorable man. Don’t waste what I had to do to get you away from Ghassan.
He glanced up and down her body. “I am yours at this moment. You could make me do whatever you wanted.”
Then let me go. She bit back the words. Instead, she said what she was supposed to say. What he wanted her to say.
She lowered her eyelids and put a sultry tone in her voice. “I want you.”
Before she had finished her sentence, she was on her back on the blanket. And he was kissing her, full and wet and deep. His weight on top of her seemed like nothing. The pleasure flooding her body made her as weightless as floating in the water had.
“I know—” He punctuated his words with a kiss between her breasts, just above the string of her bikini.
“—that when you say—” Another, on the skin of her ribcage.
“—you want me—” The next kiss was even lower, a wet lick near her belly button.
“—that you do it to fulfill my own wishes—” He pressed his lips right where her skin met her now-dry bikini bottoms.
“—but I will—” He rested here, his shoulders between her knees, his chin on her mound, and pulled at the knot at her right hip. The knot that kept her bottoms on.
He pulled the other, exposing her sex to him. “—make you want me.”
Her brain had stopped processing around the time he kissed her belly button, and now little explosions started going off behind her eyes. She’d joked that all women were in love with him? If they only knew what they were missing.
Her back arched with the sheer pleasure of what he was doing. He opened all her secret places, found them, and teased them into sending snaps of sheer joy up her spine. She sucked in gasps of sea-scented air as every wave rose up and hit her. Little shudders racked her body as she reached a new pinnacle with each movement of his mouth.
She closed her eyes, and concentrated on feeling. The gentle lap of waves. The sensual taste of salt on her lips. The sand beneath the blanket shifting beneath her back as she squirmed with sensation. The sun’s heat on her face.
And most of all—over everything else—Amin between her legs, focusing all his attention on making her happy.
All of these things made it so easy to forget him. To forget Ghassan.
Ghassan, who had never felt the need to do this to her. And she’d never asked. Because the first time she’d felt it had been with one of the men Ghassan had given her to.
If she’d asked Ghassan to do this to her, he would have been reminded that she’d been with another man. Even though sleeping with someone else had been all Ghassan’s doing, she’d sensed danger in reminding him that it had happened.
She’d lived on a knife’s edge with Ghassan.
With a snap, she came back into herself. The pleasure of Amin’s mouth slipped out of reach. Instead, she felt too hot, too close, too intimate. The feeling wasn’t thrilling anymore, just far too sensitive. Too near pain.
“Amin,” she gasped, in a way she thought he’d like. “Amin, I want you inside me. Please.”
There. She’d been honest. Just not for the reason he thought. She wanted him inside her so this could be over.
He quickly wiped his mouth on a linen napkin and rose above her. His still-covered groin touched hers, leaving her in no doubt of his readiness.
“Ra—”
Before he could finish her name, she dragged his face down to hers in what she hoped was a blistering kiss. She threw herself into it, pulling him close. She dug manicured fingernails into his spine as if she couldn’t stand that he wasn’t touching her everywhere.
She ripped at his swimsuit with all the eagerness in the world, drawing it down his muscled thighs. But her mind swam with ugly images of the men before him, the things she’d had to do.
All she wanted was this to be over with.
She wrapped her legs around him, growling with frustration when his cock didn’t slip inside her, but missed the mark.
> Amin didn’t seem to mind, but attacked her neck, licking and kissing and sucking. She tried, tried so hard to enjoy what he was doing. She squirmed beneath him, rubbing her hips against him, trying to seem like a woman deep in her passion. A couple of times, she even begin to lose herself, only for memories to come rushing back.
She did her best to respond to what he was doing, with no luck. He was in no hurry, paying close attention to every part of her. And nothing was working.
Time to end it.
She moved her hips, aligning them with his. Hard and thick, he slid inside her. She arched her back and gasped. He was big, filling and stretching her, in a way she liked. In a way she would have loved if she could get out of her head.
She refrained from the dirty talk that Ghassan liked. The lies about his sexual prowess, how big he was, how good he felt. What she wanted him to do to her.
Instead, as he began to rock in and out of her, she just produced the appropriate enthusiastic noises, dialed back so Amin wouldn’t think she was acting. As he increased his pace, so did she.
Raised on muscled arms above her, he was an amazing sight. The strain of pleasure on his face made him even more compelling. His dark hair was still damp from his swim. His deep brown eyes were closed in pleasure and concentration. Being this close to him should feel far too intimate for words.
More than anything, she wanted to be in the place he was, enjoying making love with this man who seemed to accept her past and want her anyway, even if it was only on his terms.
His pace increased; she matched it, timed her vocalizations, coming to a peak as soon as she thought realistic.
Finally, he plunged one last time, deep inside. She felt the hot dampness of his release. They froze together in that instant; the only part of them moving was his final pulses as he rode his climax for a long time.
After a while, he opened his eyes. Instead of the self-satisfied male glow she’d come to expect, she saw irritation. And disappointment.
But why? She’d done everything right. He’d gotten what he wanted…
He made no move to get off her. Arms that had held her, given her pleasure, now trapped her under him.
Older Woman, Younger Sheikh Page 8