You Can't Fight a Royal Attraction

by Ruchi Vasudeva

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Your Muse,’ he teased.

  Discovering. Was he right? Had it been something waiting below the surface for her? She remembered how she had used to stitch her mother-in-law’s and other relatives’ homewear when she had been married. Some of them had even worn them for their kitty get-togethers. Jokingly, they had complained that she turned the most traditional outfit into something fashionable. A skill that her ex-mother-in-law hadn’t liked, so jealous that she’d found fault in everything she made.

  Maybe this streak, this creativity that he called it, had just needed to be free of that criticism to be able to breathe.

  She knew the exact moment she had known freedom. When Rihaan had drenched her by streaming the coloured water all over her. Call her crazy, but something had changed in her psyche then. Deep inside her, she clung to that moment when she had felt most liberated ever in her life. Touched. Celebrated.

  Or maybe it was just him being in her life. Certainly she couldn’t credit what she felt like now, so full of buzz and energy, was anything like the Saira who had lain moping around in Vishakha’s beach house.

  ‘Maybe your crazy Muse infected me.’ She smiled. ‘It has to be your doing, Rihaan. I had no purpose in sight. I can’t tell you how hopeless I used to feel sometimes. This—’ she spread her hands over the carpet of sheets ‘—it isn’t much. I can’t say anything will come out of it, but it’s better than knowing there’s nothing you do that is worth doing.’ She held his gaze, her own misty as she smiled. ‘I know what I want to do now. I’m going to go back to learning. I’ll do whatever I have to. At least create one or two of these. If anyone wears a creation of mine with pleasure, I’ll be done.’ She sighed blissfully. ‘I’m so happy, Rihaan. So happy.’ Moved more than she could express, she flung her arms around him and kissed him. Kissed him to share the joy, the thrumming thrill of it all. And she poured everything she felt into it. The contact grew charged. Pleasure and electricity exploded around her as he accepted her joy and gave it back to her. Feeling blossomed and burgeoned from a sharing of excitement to shared desire. To much much more.

  She drew away, breathless; he drew away too, dishevelled from the fingers she had raked into his hair. Her heart was beating wild enough to jump out of her chest. ‘That felt… stupendous.’

  ‘Saira!’ The word was an acknowledgement and a warning combined. ‘Don’t get carried away by gratitude.’ Although whether he was warning her or himself, Rihaan couldn’t have said at the time. She was right. It felt like something else entirely. The exhilaration that radiated from her was fairly a zap of current that wouldn’t take much to flare to shocking electric pleasure.

  ‘Gratitude can only go so far and no further. It can’t generate this kind of desire. You want me, Rihaan,’ she said with typical frankness. ‘And I… I’m ready to let go of the barriers.’ How could she not when his mere touch sent want spiralling through her? She had held back too long. From life. From chance. Now it was time to go forward and meet it. The conviction that pulsed through her swept away all the doubts.

  ‘It’s not so easy.’ He got up, putting distance between them.

  She followed. ‘Then why did you come? It was just a text message. You could have ignored it.’

  ‘Maybe I thought you were in trouble.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Rescuing you seems to have become a habit.’

  ‘That wasn’t it and you know it.’

  He sighed. ‘Things are complicated. More than ever now, Saira. If I could offer you nothing but a temporary affair before, now I can’t offer you anything.’ He paced then turned back to her. ‘The Maharaja wants me to take over the kingdom. He plans to grant me accession by his own hands so no one can doubt he has accepted me back. But the condition that accompanies it is that I have to marry Nadira. If he does this for me, I can do no less than help him keep his word, now that the truth about the past is all out and he knows I was ready to marry Nadira before.’

  ‘So the past will be brought back to life,’ she stated, trying to absorb the shock.

  ‘This time round, I might have to marry her,’ he told her quietly.

  ‘But you haven’t yet, have you?’ Before she lost courage, she said quickly, ‘Maybe you can’t offer me anything. But then I don’t want more. We can still have this night.’ If she lost him after that, at least she would have no regrets. No regrets that she hadn’t taken what life had once offered her. The electric desire, the thrill of his touch. She wanted this with him. Her heart began to beat wildly.

  ‘Saira…’ She couldn’t get enough of the dark need flooding his eyes. Triumph was a heady feeling, a rush of intoxication.

  She moved to him. ‘Kiss me.’

  ‘I don’t think I should.’ Slowly he gave a negative headshake, gaze hooked to her.

  ‘Then I will.’

  ‘I can’t resist you any more than a junkie can resist a fix. Sweetheart, don’t try me. I’m losing the battle.’ The last was uttered on an exhalation as she pressed against him, raining kisses over the skin revealed by the open collar of his nightshirt.

  Rihaan groaned. In the soft cotton two-piece she wore for nightwear, she was infinitely more desirable than any starlet in a sexy negligee. All he could think of was the memory of the feel of her skin, her kiss, her body straining against his in the alcove that full moon night of Phalguna.

  Too much temptation for a mere mortal, surely? Her soft scent swirled around him and filled his senses.

  She’d already asked him to stay…

  Just a touch, he told himself and let his fingers caress the skin where the short top barely met the pyjamas. Smooth. Like the finest silk. Just a bit more. His hands slid up. His mouth was finding hers. Homing in on it like a hungry eagle swooping down to capture a succulent prey. Reason became lost as they clung to the reality of only touching, only feeling.

  Just one night… couldn’t he forget everything for just one night?

  She started to take off his shirt and Rihaan was only too glad to help her. She ran her hands over him, leaving trails of heated skin behind. Her hand slid between them, closing over his arousal and he went still. Power and desire surged through him till he thought he would explode.

  He disengaged the contact, breathing raggedly. Control. It was blown away. A thing belonging to the past. Lost in the raging wanting possessing his body.

  With shaky hands, he took off her top, gazing at her, letting her beauty fill his senses. Instinctively, moving to possess the globes waiting for his touch. She gasped and clung to him. The peaks pierced his palms like tight rosebuds. Hunger intensified in his body and he lifted her up to take her over to the bed. His heart filling his chest with its galloping beat, he slid off her pyjamas. Then he stopped abruptly, closing his eyes in regret. ‘Damn, I’m not carrying protection.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’m on the Pill,’ she said softly.

  ‘Better words were never spoken,’ he growled approvingly. He made short work of his clothes. ‘I’m clean. I’m no virgin but I always use a condom. And I have check-ups.’

  ‘I’m—’ Her gaze was fixed on his body, muscled and shapely, light and shadow playing on dark gold skin, the dark whorl of hair framing his manhood. The temperature between them went soaring as he caught her regard. She swallowed. He came on to the bed, letting their bodies touch.

  Somehow she found breath enough to continue. ‘There hasn’t been anyone since Munish.’

  The feel of her naked body beneath his was driving him mad but he could still see the brief glimpse of pain the name of her ex evoked.

  ‘Forget him,’ he said roughly. His mouth moved over silky skin. He felt the vow pound through him. He was going to make her forget everything. Think of just him. Make her forget every lover, every fantasy she’d ever had.

  Saira arched as his mouth traced sensuous patterns on her waist, his tongue circling her navel. His hands were everywhere and every spot they touched was throbbing with the need to know more. Even more.

  She t
raced the outline of hard muscles, delighting in the feel of them bunching beneath her hands. The scrape of his chest hair was deliciously inciting to touch, his abdomen ridged and hard and, below the flat plane, in the dark cloud the symbol of power and masculinity made her insides melt as she thought of his possession.

  There was intensity and beauty in each stroke of his touch, in the intoxicating snare of dark sherry eyes. In his kiss. The intensity that hadn’t been in Munish’s. He had been a considerate lover but the aim had been climax not this divinely exquisite exploration of each other that made pleasure a slow torture both to be delighted in and suffered for the next level of pleasure to envelop them.

  The shivering thrill he evoked, the sheer intensity of the need she felt, frightened her a bit. His hand stroked along her thigh, upward to the centre of her desire, and she stilled, afraid of giving in to the want before he hit his satisfaction.

  ‘Let go, sweetheart,’ he whispered. And she did. She let pleasure overtake her, crash over her, sweep her along in the flood.

  ‘Rihaan, don’t make me wait.’ She swallowed, suddenly hesitant. Had she come across too eager? But his harsh breathing told her he couldn’t wait either. She tensed slightly but fear had no place here, only pleasure, as he showed her, every nerve stretching out with the fulfilment of his possession.

  But this was just the beginning. She clung to him, her body accommodating his, eyes closed to better let the exquisite sensations flood her. How could so much make her only want still more? And she had it. Her fingers curled into supple skin as sensations climbed. Her mind hazed. He increased the tempo till she could only gasp. ‘Please, Rihaan,’ in repeated broken phrases as the urgency grew and coiled tight. And tighter.

  She felt heatwaves steal over her skin, red-hot and intense, then tremors took over and it all crashed together in a glimpse of heaven enclosed in the plummeting, buffeting waves of pleasure.

  He followed soon after, his triumphant growl making her feel more sated than any rich feast could ever have.

  ‘I have been had in a palace, by a prince. Surely it doesn’t get better than this!’ The windows showed the dark blue of a pre-dawn sky. She caught the sheet and leaned back against Rihaan, stretching limbs that felt languid and heavy, a body that felt… loved, stinging lightly at places he’d been too attentive to during the night.

  And what a night! They had slept sketchily, the need for each other too strong to be quieted easily.

  Rihaan drawled, ‘I was the one who was had.’ Lazy fingers slid in her hair and rubbed her scalp. ‘I was overpowered.’

  She leaned back further, winding her arms around his neck and nuzzling her cheek against a scratchy jaw. ‘The temptation was just too much.’

  ‘Can’t disagree with you there,’ he murmured, stopping to steal a brief kiss. ‘By the way, why are you on the Pill?’

  ‘I wasn’t taking a chance with you around.’ She giggled, then her teasing expression became serious. ‘I’ve had to be careful about not getting pregnant. Munish wanted children but things weren’t good between us even few months into the marriage and I felt it wasn’t a healthy environment to bring a child into. So I was always careful…’ She shrugged. ‘Then I knew I was attracted to you. Very attracted. I didn’t trust myself to that extent, not to forget the basic precautions.’

  His gaze was dark. ‘Shall I tell you how that makes me feel?’ He loved that about her, that honest confession of her feelings. ‘Not to mention the sexy surge of being told I’m so desired is enough to make my day… On second thoughts, it could be made better.’ He bent his head and kissed her.

  She sighed when he stopped. ‘Still can’t believe I did it with a prince.’

  A smile brought a familiar gleam to his eyes. ‘Are you sure that wasn’t half the charm?’

  ‘It could have been. Intriguing thought!’ She tilted her head to one side. ‘You know how they say royal people used to have a decadent imagination? I heard a nawab or someone had a bed with naked stone statues at all four posts of his bed. Do you have something outrageous like that? With music playing from a box?’

  ‘Maybe I have.’ He bit her earlobe. ‘Come tonight and find out.’

  ‘Tonight…’ She paused, suddenly zapped out of the moment. He went still too. Realising what he had said.

  The moment broken, she straightened away from him.

  ‘Oh God!’ Rihaan raked a hand through his hair. Reality dripped, cold and inexorable, into a consciousness still too reluctant to acknowledge it.

  ‘You should go,’ she said quietly for both of them. The fun and frolic was over. Time to face hard truth now.

  ‘Saira…’ He caught her to him. ‘Just remember, this was worth… a lot to me. This time was most special to me. You’re the best, that’s all, the best.’ He gave her a quick, hard kiss.

  Then he was gone and she was alone. With the memories.

  She hadn’t expected it to feel so… so shattering. It had been just sex, she reminded herself. Be cool about it and let it go. But she knew she couldn’t. She had underrated the havoc he could wreak on her peace, underrated the powerful sensation of his possession, had never thought that the surging abandon, the total surrender of the night would leave a want that became an emptiness in the soul…

  Madness. She was crazy to think of him. Crazy to want him, to even imagine he was attainable. She didn’t want involvement, remember? All she’d wanted was pleasure and he had more than given what he had promised all along. Now it was time to move on.

  The party was over.

  The Maharaja hadn’t kidded about his intention.

  The evidence was all over the palace. In the gallery the gilded frames were being taken down to be polished. Viren cancelled their Jaipur trip because a designer was coming for an apparel meeting. At noon, a representative was dispatched to deal with the dozens of reporters teeming the grounds.

  And Rihaan? Rihaan had become suddenly unapproachable.

  It was only natural that Maharaj should want him with him at all times. There must be tons of things to be discussed. But it was a shock to find the writer whose priority was his cave to disappear into should be suddenly the pivot of this buzz and whirlwind of activity. It was a shock because she had become used to laying a claim on his time.

  Reality check, Saira. You never had any claim on it. Or on him.

  The realisation shouldn’t leave her frozen inside. But it did. His being apart from her shouldn’t hurt this much. But it did.

  Saira crept downstairs. The palace was nearly settled for the night but she couldn’t sleep. Her room, however vast, felt claustrophobic. Maybe she could take a walk in the courtyard.

  That was, if she ever found her way out of this maze.

  Somehow in the dim light she had taken a wrong turn somewhere and she found herself facing a passage like the one which led to the Maharaja’s sitting room. A figure crossed the end of it to the other side. Her heart flew into her mouth for a second till she calmed it down. Then jumped again as the figure came backtracking to see her.

  He stepped forward. It was Viren. ‘Oh, it’s you, Saira,’ he said.

  He was dressed in street clothes; he must be going out. Seeing him, she was reminded she hadn’t even changed for the night.

  ‘Party tonight?’ she teased softly. ‘Or maybe a bar night,’ she judged from the casual dress.

  ‘Something like that. What are you doing? Not planning to rob our castle?’ he teased back.

  ‘No, I haven’t found anything worth taking.’ The joke fell flat as she felt the bite of it. She bit her lip. Suddenly the feeling of claustrophobia cloaked her again. She would ask Rihaan to make arrangements for her to leave tomorrow, she thought on impulse. With him and yet without him, this palace felt as if it would eat her alive.

  ‘Viren, can you tell me where Rihaan’s room is?’ she asked urgently, not caring that the man’s eyes widened slightly, a speculative light entering his eyes.

  ‘So that’s the way the wind is blowing.
I have suspected but… does Rihaan realise he is playing with fire?’

  She had no time for rhetorical questions. ‘Viren, please. I… I need to talk to him.’ She did. But about what? She had nothing to tell him. Yet so much.

  ‘Saira…’ he caught her arm to get her attention ‘…don’t go down that road. Please don’t.’ She stilled at his earnest words. Her gaze was snared by the ink on his forearm, an identical mark to the one Rihaan wore. He followed her look and said, ‘It’s the emblem of our house. It stands for loyalty and bravery. Loyalty,’ he reiterated, ‘do you know how much it means to us?’

  ‘Family feeling.’ She knew it. Hadn’t she seen the suffering Rihaan didn’t disclose to anyone, pain that had festered inside him when he had been away from his clan?

  ‘Yes,’ Viren agreed. ‘I can assure you, you have no future with Rihaan. You know marriages in the rajmahal are set through birth, not taking into account the person. Or their wishes.’ Brown eyes, dark with feeling, fixed on her. ‘Why do you think Nadira is so ideal as a wife for the future Maharaja of Prabhatgarh? Our family follows the rule of the male primogeniture, by the issue of Rajput mothers only. While the kingdom exists no longer, the rites are still closely adhered to. The people still honour their king and they want the family to be involved in administration. After Rihaan left, the people started distrusting the name. Now they are looking for the order to be restored.’ He gave her arm a slight shake for emphasis. ‘Do you follow? There’s no future for you with Rihaan. Don’t set yourself up for heartbreak.’

  ‘Will you just tell me the way, Viren? You’re misunderstanding things. Rihaan and I, we don’t have anything going.’ It was all gone, she thought hollowly. Oh God, why hadn’t she seen this coming?

  He gave her the directions and left. The reality of it surged through her. Rihaan was going to be out of her life for ever. She blinked away tears. Too late to wish for them, too late to wish last night had never happened.