by Lynne Graham
When she climbed into the limo with Saif she was, momentarily, tempted to pinch herself before accepting that the designer gown, the incredibly handsome man by her side and the opulent mode of travel could figure in her new lifestyle. It was even more ironic to know that her uncle and aunt would now be furious that she was the one benefiting from the marriage rather than their daughter. They had needed her to marry the Prince to gain access to that dowry, but it would still outrage them that their niece was now living in luxury. And for the first time, Tati acknowledged that she was grateful to have escaped her relatives’ demands, relieved to know that in many ways she was finally free and that her mother’s residence in her care home was secure. She would eventually be able to look towards her own future, unfettered by the limits imposed on her by others.
‘You’re very quiet this evening,’ Saif remarked as they crossed the pavement to the large illuminated mansion with its classic gardens that were equally well-lit to show off glimpses of women in elaborate dresses and men in dinner jackets, their necks craned as they watched the glorious fireworks shooting and sparkling across the night sky in a rainbow of colour and illumination.
‘Gosh, these people know how to party,’ Tati commented, hugely impressed by her surroundings as they stepped into a brilliantly lit hall and a crush of little groups of chattering people. And everybody, literally everybody, looked as though they might be a celebrity of some kind. In such company, neither her gown nor her magnificent diamonds could ever look like overkill. ‘Are the hosts close friends of yours?’
‘No. I owe this invitation to the relative whose house we are using,’ Saif admitted. ‘But I have no doubt that I will see familiar faces here.’
‘Yes. I suppose you get to meet a lot of people.’
‘Because the Emir doesn’t travel. I take care of Alharia’s diplomatic interests in his place. It entails attending formal receptions and dinners. You’ll be accompanying me to some of them,’ he declared, startling her.
‘Me?’ Tati stressed in a low mutter of disconcertion as he curved a guiding hand to her taut spine.
‘The joys of marrying a crown prince,’ Saif murmured teasingly, his breath fanning her cheekbone. ‘Some of that kind of socialising is boring but, equally, sometimes it’s fascinating.’
‘I should’ve realised that there would be...er...duties to carry out in this role.’ Tati sighed. ‘It all happened so fast, though... One minute Ana was running for the airport and the next we were married.’
In the midst of that speech, Saif was hailed by two men, who addressed him in another language. It wasn’t French and it wasn’t English, and she was introduced and served with a drink of champagne by a passing waiter before they moved on into a room. ‘Could we go out and see the fireworks?’ she pressed once they were alone again.
Saif glanced down at her in surprise, for in his experience women in their finery avoided the outdoors like the plague. The unhidden eagerness brimming in her upturned gaze, however, made him laugh and for a moment she seemed much younger than her years. ‘Why do you want to see them?’
‘Mum was so terrified of fireworks that I never got to see them properly as a child. When she was young she witnessed a dreadful accident, which injured a friend at a firework event, and it put her off them for life,’ she explained. ‘Every Bonfire Night, we sat indoors with the curtains closed and then, the next day, Ana would tell me how much fun she had had at whichever party she had been invited to and I would feel madly jealous.’
Saif’s expressive lips quirked. ‘Naturally.’
They stood on the paved terrace watching the display until a low murmur of a comment made Tati turn her head. A very tall brunette in a startlingly see-through dress was stalking towards them. For a split second, Tati was guilty of staring, taken aback by a woman revealing that much flesh in public, showing off her bare breasts and her nipple rings below the thin white chiffon gown. Truly, however, Tati was forced to admit, the woman had a superb body. In haste she turned her head away from the conspicuous beauty, only to stiffen in astonishment when the woman appeared in front of them and greeted Saif with the kind of familiarity that no woman wanted to see her male companion receive in her presence.
‘Saif!’ she carolled, followed by a voluble gush of French as she walked her long, manicured fingertips up over his chest in a very inviting gesture.
‘Juliette,’ Saif murmured with rather more restraint. ‘May I introduce you to my wife, Tatiana?’
‘Your wife?’ Juliette gasped in consternation while walking her fingers down over his flat muscular stomach in unmistakable invitation.
Tati couldn’t stop herself. In a knee-jerk reaction, she reached out and pushed the brunette’s hand away from Saif. ‘His wife, sorry,’ she said with a smile that she was sure was unconvincing.
A split second later, Juliette having languorously taken the hint and strolled away, Tati was shattered by her own possessive and wholly inappropriate reaction to another woman touching the man she had married. Saif didn’t belong to her in the usual sense of married people. They weren’t in love either. She had come up with the label of friends with benefits but even that wasn’t a fair tag for them, because people in that kind of relationship were generally those who had had a reasonably long and close friendship before intimacy developed and she and Saif didn’t fit into that category either. The intense colour of mortification swept her cheeks and she felt as though she were burning alive inside her own skin.
‘I’m sorry... She was annoying me,’ she said uncomfortably.
‘It was unseemly for her to touch me in that way,’ Saif murmured, appraising her with gleaming green eyes fringed by black lashes. ‘There is no need for an apology.’
But regardless of what he said, Tati felt very differently. She had shocked herself with that little show of possessive behaviour. After all, she wasn’t entitled to be that territorial with Saif. She should not be experiencing any prompting to react as though she were jealous of another woman touching him. Of course, she wasn’t jealous or possessive of him, she told herself fiercely.
‘And it was sexy,’ Saif murmured in a husky undertone, gazing down at her with potent green eyes of appreciation. ‘Very, very sexy.’
Stunned, Tati looked back at him in wonderment and then she couldn’t help herself—she laughed, and all her discomfiture was washed away as though it had never been. Evidently, Saif took a very different view of her attitude, but as the evening wore on she continued to marvel at the way she had behaved. Clearly, she was possessive of Saif. Was that simply because she had gone to bed with him?
Brow furrowing, she attempted, during all the chatter, the dancing and the eating that comprised the lively party atmosphere, to pin down what she was feeling about the man she had married. It was surprisingly difficult. She had travelled at speed from raging resentment and frustration over her powerlessness to grudging acceptance that Saif had had little more choice than she had in their marriage. And somewhere along the line she had begun lusting after him, liking him, appreciating his calm, measured approach to life. It certainly didn’t mean that she was developing any kind of mental attachment to him, she assured herself confidently.
She wasn’t so naïve that she would confuse lust and love, was she? Admittedly, she was enthralled by the fluid movement of his hips against hers on the dance floor, the pulsing ache building between her thighs and the provocative awareness that she was having the same physical effect on him. Unlike her, he couldn’t hide his response. She was insanely conscious of his arousal. And that sheer reciprocity thrilled Tati because it made her feel powerful and seductive for the first time in her life, no longer a weak pawn in someone else’s game, but an equal. She was finally making her own choices and doing what pleased her, rather than someone else.
‘So, you and Juliette?’ Tati whispered as she stretched up to Saif. ‘Do share...’
Saif tensed, won
dering why on earth she would ask such an awkward question before reminding himself that women were often morbidly curious about a man’s past. His three older sisters had taught him that, always prying where their interest was least welcome.
‘Was she your girlfriend?’ Tati prompted.
‘No. It was a casual connection.’ Saif shrugged in emphasis, hoping that her curiosity concluded there, long brown fingers skimming soothingly down the side of her face. ‘I can’t keep my hands off you,’ he breathed with a sudden raw edge to his dark, deep drawl that sent a responsive shiver of delight down her taut spine.
‘It’s mutual,’ she whispered.
Even so, she was still assailed by a sudden perverse attack of guilt and discomfiture because, try as she might to be a bolder version of her old self, being bold still felt sinful and brazen. She would have to work harder on that outlook, she told herself firmly, because being quiet, accepting and the person others preferred her to be had only served to deprive her of her freedom and her choices in life. Wanting Saif, allowing herself to succumb to that sizzling chemistry that went way beyond anything she had ever experienced, was probably the most daring thing she had ever done. And one of the best things about Saif, Tati reflected happily, was that he hadn’t known her as she used to be and, with him, she could be entirely her true self.
He curved an arm round her in the limousine on the drive back to the house. She was gloriously aware of the strength of his lean, powerful frame up against her and the subtle musky, fragrant scent of him that close. Her heart was pounding in her chest when he stopped on the landing halfway up the fabulous staircase of the town house and hauled her up against him to kiss her with all the fierce hunger she craved. The lancing touch of his tongue inside her mouth set her on fire and a choked moan escaped low in her throat.
Her whole body was surging with wild anticipation and, lifting her, he cannoned into the bedroom, pushing her back against the wall and pinning her there afresh to crush her lips hungrily beneath his again. Her heart was thumping, her pulses thrumming because that rocketing passion of his took her over and thrilled her to death. It was the exact match of her own, a wild, seething need that drove out every other logical thought, leaving only the wanting behind.
Saif turned her round to run down the zip on her dress, pushing it off her shoulders, stroking it down her arms until it dropped round her feet. Kicking off her shoes, heartbeat accelerating, she stepped out of the dress. His lips traced the line of her shoulder and every nerve ending in her body leapt to attention as she pressed back into the heat of him, breathless and boneless with need.
‘I like the lingerie,’ Saif husked with appreciation as he carefully lifted her and lowered her down onto the well-sprung bed. ‘But I think I’ll like you even better out of it.’
Flushed and wide-eyed, her eyes very blue in her face, Tati watched Saif shed his tailored dinner jacket and bow tie, standing over her while he unbuttoned his dress shirt, smouldering emerald-green eyes locked to the silvery-grey cobweb-fine bra and panties she sported and the firm, soft curves they enhanced. ‘Your eyes are so unusual,’ she whispered, and then wanted to cringe at herself for saying it just at that moment.
‘As I said, my only inheritance from my mother,’ Saif muttered, his shirt fluttering to the floor, exposing an impressive bronzed torso composed of chiselled abs and a flat, taut stomach and the intriguing little furrow of black hair that ran down below his waistband. ‘But I didn’t like being different as a child when everyone else’s eyes were dark. You occasionally see blue eyes in the desert tribes but never this shade.’
Something clenched almost painfully in Tati’s stomach as she looked up at him. He came down on the bed beside her, naked and aroused and, oh, so sexy to her riveted gaze. ‘I like your eyes,’ she framed unevenly, her chest lifting as she dragged in a sustaining breath.
His expert mouth toyed with hers while he released her bra and explored the pouting swells and hard tips eager for his attention. He trailed his lips down to tease those rosy, sensitive crowns and her hips rose and she gasped, her entire body shimmying on an edge of gathering anticipation, desire twisting sharp as a knife inside her, tensing every muscle. He skimmed away the panties, parted her thighs and she trembled, feeling shy, tempted to say no but too aroused to have that discipline.
And then he employed his tongue on her and exquisite sensation flooded her. He dipped a finger into her tight channel and her spine arched, the craving climbing again. Melting heat liquefied her pelvis, excitement gripping her taut, and before she could even work out what was happening to her, she became a creature only capable of response, so worked up to a peak that she could only moan and gasp while her body moved in a compulsive rhythm. When she reached a climax it was fast and furious, ripping through her quivering length in an explosion of raw heat and ecstasy, leaving her flopping back against the pillows, limp as a noodle.
Saif dug into the cabinet beside the bed and donned protection. ‘We will take no further risks,’ he murmured with a slanting, charismatic smile.
Relief filled Tati because she had been thinking that perhaps she ought to go out and look for an English-speaking doctor and ask for replacement pills. But wouldn’t Saif’s precautions be sufficient until she went back to England to see her mother and reclaimed her possessions from her uncle’s home? Convinced that she no longer needed to worry on that score, Tati wrapped her arms round him as he came down to her again. Her body was still pulsing with the aftermath of satiation and highly sensitive.
‘I’ve been thinking about this moment all day and all evening,’ Saif groaned, startling green eyes alight with desire.
‘All day?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then why did we wait this long?’ she whispered as he shifted against her tender core, sliding into her in a sure rocking motion that sent her heart rate flying.
‘You tell me,’ Saif urged thickly, awash with surprise at the sheer mutuality of sex with Tatiana.
With a twist of his lean hips he pushed deep and fast into the tight, damp welcome awaiting him and he listened with satisfaction to his bride moan with a pleasure that only echoed his own.
His hard, insistent rhythm enthralled her in the wild ride that followed. Excitement roared higher for her with his every thrust. She moved against him, lost in the experience as her excitement rose higher and higher, the need tugging at her every sense pushing her to a frenzied peak where only mindless sensation controlled her. When the glorious wave of excitement tipped her over the edge, she cried out in writhing delight before the last of her energy drained away, leaving her limp and winded.
Saif thrust away the bedding and fell back from her. ‘I’m hot...’
Tati grinned and rolled closer, a possessive hand smoothing down over his heaving chest. ‘Yes, very hot.’
Saif sat up and pulled her to him. ‘And you’re joining me in the shower.’
‘Why? I’m not fit for anything else right now,’ she protested, shy about getting out of bed naked in front of him and knowing how silly that was after what they had shared.
‘I’m not ready to let go of you yet,’ Saif told her truthfully, his fertile imagination already arranging her in erotic positions round the marble bathroom and seeing possibilities everywhere. Cool off, his brain told him, step back, regain control, because he suddenly felt as though he were in dangerous territory, a territory without rules or boundaries and not his style at all.
That uneasy feeling, that sense of wrong, stabbed at him because Saif liked everything laid out neat and tidy, nothing left to chance. And yet here he was with a wife who wasn’t a genuine wife, a lover who wasn’t a simple lover and a friend who wasn’t a real friend. Where was he supposed to go next? What was his end goal?
And even though Tati knew in her heart of hearts that she shouldn’t go there, she was too curious to silence the question brimming on her lips. ‘And when will you b
e ready?’
Having switched on the shower, Saif swung back to her, startlingly handsome with his black hair tousled, his green eyes very shrewd, sharp and bright, his strong jawline defined by black stubble. ‘Ready for what?’ he queried.
‘Ready to let me go?’ she almost whispered in daring clarification, sliding past him to take refuge behind the tiled shower wall where he could no longer see her.
Saif froze. ‘You’re asking how soon we can decently go for a divorce without unduly surprising anyone?’ he murmured flatly, unprepared for that sudden far-reaching question and wishing she hadn’t asked before he had even had the time to decide on the wisest approach to their predicament. ‘Possibly six months...a year? I don’t really know yet. We should make it look as though we’ve given the marriage a fair chance before throwing in the cards.’
Six months to a year, Tati mused, thinking what a very short space of time that was. A mere blink and their relationship would be over, done and dusted, ready for the archives. Her tummy hollowed out and sank while she busied herself washing her hair, her movements slowing as she became aware of the little muscles she had strained and the ache between her thighs, the inescapable reminders of their intimacy. Friends with benefits, she reminded herself doggedly, but that tag no longer enjoyed the same exhilarating ring of daring that it had first seemed to have. Indeed, all of a sudden that style of thinking seemed a little sad and immature, she acknowledged ruefully. Saif was making it very clear that what they currently had was a casual fling with an ending scripted in advance.
An ending written and decided at the same instant they had married, she reminded herself. There was nothing personal about his decision, she reasoned, determined not to take umbrage. Saif could never have planned to stay married long-term to the bride his father had picked for him and she could hardly blame him for that, could she? Saif was way too sophisticated to settle for an arranged marriage with a stranger. And when the stranger was also an unsuitable foreigner, a divorce was a fairly predictable conclusion.