by Trish Morey
Yet something about that rigid column pressing against her belly, something wild and wanton that was written on the pulsing insistence of her own body, made her yearn to try.
‘Please,’ she cried between frantic breaths, not knowing let alone understanding what she was asking for as he dipped his head to her breast and suckled her nipple in his hot, hot mouth, sending spears of sensation shooting down to where her blood pulsed loud and urgent between her thighs.
‘Aisha,’ he said, his breathing as wild as hers as he reclaimed her mouth, her lips already tender from the rub of his whiskered cheeks. She wondered why she was hesitating and not already in his bed.
It wasn’t as if she had a choice. She was already married to this man. She was expected to bear his children and provide the country with heirs, and the officials would already be counting the days.
Why should she wait when the night was so perfect and her own need so insistent?
Why wait, when she already hungered to discover more?
His mouth wove magic on her throat, his hands turned her flesh molten and made her shudder with delight, and through it all she sensed the greater pleasures that were yet to be discovered, yet to come.
And still a crack opened in the midst of her longing, a flaw in the building intensity of feeling, a space in which to give rein to her doubts and fears.
For this was not how she had planned her first time to be.
Even though her breasts were heavy with want, and her body pressed itself closer to this man of its own wicked accord, this was not how she had imagined giving away her most private, guarded possession.
She had wanted to give it up with love, not merely in the heated flames of lust.
She had wanted to give it to a man she loved because she wanted to. Because she had made that choice.
And through that widening crack came the mantra, the words she’d rehearsed and practised and that had seemed so important to cling to.
‘I won’t sleep with you,’ she breathed. Yet she faltered over the words even as she spoke them out loud, struggling to comprehend what they meant and why they had suddenly seemed so very necessary to say, why they now seemed so strangely hollow.
‘But that is good news,’ he said, his mouth at her throat, his hands scooping down the curve of her back to press her even closer to him, ‘because I don’t want you asleep. When I make love to you, I want you very much awake. I want to see the lights in your eyes spark and shatter when you come.’
She gasped, her heart thudding like a drum in her chest at the pictures so vividly thrown up into her mind’s eye. And once again she felt herself drowning under the waves of desire, lust and all things sensual. Unable to breathe or think or make sense of where she was.
Able only to feel.
And the fear welled up inside that soon she would have no choice; that maybe it was already too late.
‘I’m afraid,’ she admitted. ‘It’s too soon.’
‘You want me,’ he said, his mouth once again on hers, coaxing her into complicity, convincing her that this was the best way. The only way. ‘It’s not too soon to know that.’
He might be right, but still she wavered, because she had seen her sister give in to passion and take what she wanted of a man, had seen her left with his child and nothing else.
She did not want that for herself. She did not want a fleeting affair that might rapidly turn from lust to resentment or worse. She did not want a marriage that could turn so quickly empty, and from where she could not simply walk away.
She wanted the real deal. She didn’t know how that was possible now, but that didn’t stop her from wanting it. She had held on to that dream for too long to give up on it completely.
‘It’s not that easy,’ she whispered against his stubbled jaw. ‘I can’t just—’
‘Of course you can,’ he soothed, his hot mouth stealing her words and making magic to convince her it would be the easiest thing in the world. ‘I am a man, you are a woman and we want each other. What else matters?’
His hand scooped down her back, squeezing her behind, his fingers so perilously close to her heated core. She knew she must tell him or she would be on her back before he found out. She did not want him to find out that way. She could not bear it.
‘Then maybe there is one more thing you should know,’ she said, looking uncertainly up at him, feeling herself colour even as she spoke the words, ‘because I have never done this before.’
The side of his mouth turned up, and the eyes that had so recently been molten with heat turned flat and hard. ‘If you’re still trying to get out of this, Princess, you should know I am not as gullible as my half-brother.’
CHAPTER TEN
HE SAW her flinch and caught the hurt in her eyes before she shoved herself away from him. He let her go, watched her putting distance between them as disbelief bloomed and grew large in his gut. A virgin? There was no way it could be true. ‘You can’t be serious. You’re how old? And your sister …’
She spun around. ‘Oh, of course! Because I’m twenty-four, and because my sister has two illegitimate children, then I must have slept with any number of men and somehow got lucky and escaped the same fate? How many men did you think, Zoltan? A dozen? One hundred? How many men did you think had broken down the gates and paved the way for your irresistible advances?’
‘Princess,’ he said. ‘Aisha, I never thought—’
‘Of course you did. You didn’t believe me before when I told you why Mustafa had not touched me. You thought it was some kind of joke. Well, the joke’s well and truly on you. And if I had my way, even though we are married already, the gods would surely curse you as I now do.’ Then she turned and strode away down the beach.
He watched her go, adding his own curses and feeling the effect of hers already. What a fool! He’d had her in the palm of his hand, supple and willing, so close to exploding she was like unstable dynamite. If only he’d reacted to her confession by telling her he’d be gentle with her, or that he thought her all the more precious for it—as he would have, if he’d thought for a moment she was speaking the truth—then she would have been his.
And that should have been his reaction, given what she had told him earlier. But back then he’d heard her story and had seen in it only the chance to laugh at Mustafa’s stupidity. Because that was what he’d wanted to see.
He hadn’t considered her in any part of it.
But then, he had never considered her.
He’d only seen what he had to do to satisfy the terms of an arrangement he’d had no part in making. He’d only wanted to grind his half-brother down to the nothing that he was in the process.
He was a fool, on so many counts. He’d been the stupid one.
As for Aisha? She was indeed a goddess.
A virgin goddess.
He watched her walk towards the camp as long as he could along the dark stretch of beach, watched until her flapping abaya was swallowed up by the night. Only then did he look up at the silvery moon and stars and feel the weight of his obligations sit heavily on his shoulders, feel the watchful eyes of the gods looking down on him, no doubt laughing at this sad and pitiful mortal who threw away destiny when it was handed to him on a platter.
And what to do? For she must be his wife in all senses of the word in time for the coronation if he was to become king, and there was one more night for that to happen.
That should be his most pressing imperative. But right now he wondered, for right now he was faced with choices he’d never seen coming.
He could have the kingdom and a wife he lusted after but who might hate him for ever if he took her before she was ready. Or he could have a wife who wanted him but who might take her own sweet time falling into his bed, in which case the kingdom might well in the meantime fall into the hands of a man he hated more than anyone.
And, when his duty to his country had been his prime motivating force until now, why was that suddenly such a difficult choice?
He slept badly that night. But how could he not when he’d lain awake not ten feet away from her all night? He’d heard her toss and turn through the night, he’d heard her muffled, despairing sighs and pillow punches when it was clear sleep was evading her too despite the gentling sounds of the sea on the shore. He’d registered the exact moment her breath had steadied and calmed and then he’d listened to the sounds of her sleeping. And all the time he thought about the waste of night hours and what they could have been doing if only he hadn’t been such a damned fool.
When he rose early, he tried not to dwell too much on how good she looked asleep with her hair rippling over the pillow, or how easy it would be to climb into bed with her and finish this thing now. Except that she would truly hate him then, and somehow he didn’t want her to hate him any more. If she could like him, even just a little, it would make this whole thing so much easier.
But he took one look at the table under his palms waiting for him to resume his studies and baulked. He had a problem to contend with and there was no space in his head for study. Besides, there was still way too much tension in his body to sit there quietly and take anything in, tension he needed to work off to give himself the headspace to think. He looked out at the ocean, inviting and calm, but swimming would involve going back to the tent to change. Besides, the thought of swimming made him think about her, looking lush and edible in that citrus-coloured swimsuit, and he needed to untangle his thoughts if he was to work out what he was to do, not scramble them completely.
And she was more than capable of scrambling his mind.
Already he was half-tempted by the thought of giving her as much time as she needed to fall into his bed. But that would mean leaving the door open for Mustafa, and how could he do that to Al-Jirad? How could he so callously evade his duty?
But, for a prize like her, it would be almost worth giving up the throne.
He shook his head, though he knew it would take more than that to clear it. He heard the nicker of horses and swung his head around.
Perfect.
Zoltan was nowhere to be seen when she rose, her head feeling as if someone was pounding inside her skull trying to break their way out. She could not remember a worse night. But then, she had not had much experience of sharing a tent with a man who simultaneously drove her wild with passion one minute, and so foaming with fury the next. And somewhere in the midst of those extremes she felt a strange hurt, a sadness, that things had gone so very wrong. But she would not dwell on how cheated she felt that they had not made love last night, or how her body had refused to relax, remaining so achingly high-strung half the night. She would not dwell on that at all.
Rani bringing her tea was just the distraction she needed. If she was going to worry, it might as well be about something important, and someone must have heard from Marina by now. ‘Is there any news of my sister this morning?’ she asked as the steam from the fragrant, spiced liquid curled in the air.
‘No news, mistress.’
For the first time, Aisha felt a prickly discomfort about her sister’s failure to arrive. Sure, Marina might be headstrong and wayward, and abhor anything to do with the constraints of convention, but why would she not attend her sister’s marriage, and now the coronation? Surely she would attend for her sister’s sake, at least?
‘The master is riding, Princess,’ Rani continued, breaking into her thoughts. ‘Would you like a horse prepared for you?’
Aisha almost said no. Almost. But then she thought about riding along the beach, the wind in her hair, the closest she would ever get to being free again, and the idea held such appeal that she agreed. Maybe it might even blow away this growing concern in her gut that Marina hadn’t shown up. Maybe it might make her see that her sister was just making a statement that she disapproved of this marriage and its terms and she was staying away as a protest. Maybe.
‘Which way did Sheikh Zoltan go?’ she asked when her horse was brought to her a few minutes later. When the groom pointed one way down the beach, she pointed her mount the other way.
It had been worth visiting the rest of the tribes people, Zoltan thought as he neared the point, taking a circular route back to the camp. Talking with them had made his path clearer and shown him what was needed. Al-Jirad had progressed in many areas under the rule of King Hamra, but there were still advances to be made in education and healthcare delivery, especially for these wandering people.
It was clear he should thank Aisha for breaking the ice and putting him in contact with them. He would not have thought to visit them otherwise.
It was also clear that he could not entrust the future of anyone, let alone his people, to the likes of Mustafa. That man did not want the throne of Al-Jirad for any reason other than his own personal aggrandisement. He cared nothing for the people.
Strange, he mused as his mount nimbly negotiated the rocky shoreline, how quickly he had come to think of the people of Al-Jirad as his people. He had taken on this role begrudgingly out of a sense of duty, and because the alternative was too ugly a prospect to entertain. He had taken it on all the while resenting the changed direction it meant for his life, and the loss of a business he had created from the ground up, the biggest and best executive-jet leasing business in the world. He had been only months away from achieving that goal when he had taken the call and realised he could not do both. Where was his resentment now? Where was his anger? Instead he felt a kind of pride that he was able to follow in his beloved uncle’s footsteps. He would honour King Hamra’s memory by being a good king.
The coronation must proceed.
Which meant he could not wait for Aisha to make up her mind. They would have to consummate the marriage before the coronation, which meant he would have to go back to the camp and explain, once again, that she had no choice. But after the mess he had made last night, he just hoped he could word it in a way she would understand. She had to understand.
It was duty, pure and simple, after all.
Except, thinking about it, his groin already tightening, maybe this part was not so much duty.
He saw her as he rounded the point, probably one hundred metres down the beach. He stopped for a moment to watch her gallop along the shore, her long hair flying behind her, the hem of her abaya flapping in the wind, the rest of it plastered against her body as spray from the horse’s hooves scattered like jewels around her, and he realised the word ‘goddess’ came nowhere close to describing her.
Then she saw him, and he lifted one hand in greeting, but she pulled her horse up and turned before galloping in the other direction.
So she was still angry with him about last night, he thought as he set off in pursuit. Not entirely unexpected, but nevertheless not a good start when she was probably only going to get angrier with what he had to tell her.
His stallion powered down the shore. She was a good horsewoman and she had a decent head start, but her horse was nowhere near as big or as powerful as his and steadily his stallion narrowed the lead until they were galloping side by side across the sand.
She glanced across at him and dug her heels into her mount’s flank. It responded with a spurt of speed but it was no trouble for his powerful horse to catch her. ‘We need to talk,’ he shouted into the air between them.
‘I have nothing to talk to you about.’
‘It’s important.’
‘Go to hell!’
‘Listen to me.’
‘I hate you!’
And she wheeled her horse around and took off the other way. He pulled his mount to a halt, its mouth foaming, nostrils snorting as he watched her go.
‘You want a race, Princess,’ he muttered into the air as he geed the horse into pursuit. ‘You’ve got one.’
He was gaining on her again. She knew he would, she knew she couldn’t escape him for ever, but he wasn’t even supposed to have come this way. And she didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want to have to listen to him. She didn’t even want to see him. How dared he look so good
on a horse, with his white shirt flapping against his burnished skin, looking like some kind of bandit? How dared he?
She glanced over her shoulder, saw him just behind and urged her mount faster.
Barbarian!
All night he had lain there as if she didn’t exist, as if he didn’t care that she was hurt and upset and angry. All that time he had made not one attempt to try to make up for what he had done. Not even one. He had let her lie there waiting for him to do—something—and he had done precisely nothing. He had let her lie there aching and burning and he had made not one move to comfort her.
Bastard!
‘Aisha,’ he called, alongside her once again. ‘Stop!’
He reached across, snatched the reins out of her hands and pulled the two horses to a halt.
She shrieked and smacked at his hand and realised it was useless, so she slid off the saddle, swiping at the tears streaming down her face. She splashed through the shallows, her abaya wet and slapping against her legs, tiny fish panicking and darting every which way before her frantic splashing feet.
She did not even know why she was crying, only that now the tears had started she didn’t know how to turn them off.
‘Aisha!’
She felt his big hands clamp down on her shoulders, she felt the brake of his body and his raw, unsuppressed heat, and she sobbed, hating him all the more for reducing her to this. ‘Leave me alone!’
But he did not leave her alone. He turned her in his hands and she closed her eyes so she could not see his face. There was nothing but silence stretching taut and thin between them. And just when she could not stand it any more, just when she was sure he must be enjoying this moment so very, very much, he crushed her to his chest. ‘Oh, Aisha, what have I done? What have I done?’