Bartered to the Sheikh: Honour, duty, marriage ... and passionate desert nights Read online

  “Leave us.”

  It was a command that even Abigail dared not disobey. Though she took a moment to send him a stern frown. Her meaning was abundantly clear. Fix this.

  He intended to.

  He waited until the door had clicked shut, and then he focussed the full strength of his frustration on the woman who would be his wife.

  “The Haranathi-al will not take place.”

  Her eyes glittered as she stared up at him. “I’m sorry if you won’t be joining me, but I intend to go down there before night fall.”

  He walked with his panther-like gait, silent and stealthily across the tiled floor, until he was almost touching her. “You don’t fear your fate?”

  Her eyes were awash with sensation. “What is my fate?” She pushed, her expression nuanced.

  “You invite danger.”

  “I am not going to be cowered by what happened to Tashana. We are marrying so that our people can come to see our unity. So let’s be unified. Let’s be strong. Let’s send a clear message that I am not afraid.”

  He couldn’t help it. When he was around her, her body seemed to call to him. He needed to touch her for no reason other than biological instinct. He lifted his hand and tangled his fingers with hers. “I am afraid.”

  Her mouth formed a perfect circle of surprise. The idea of this hulking warrior-like beast fearing anything was truly impossible to believe.

  “I am not heartless, Sally.” The use of her preferred name brought pleasure to her heart. “I did not love your cousin. And yes, I saw her as a means to an end. But her death was my fault.” His black eyes glittered. “I will not make those mistakes again.”

  “What mistakes?” Sally pushed. She ignored the questions that were burning inside of her. Was she a means to an end? Of course she was! Desire did not change that. It was a convenient silver lining to his need for a Medouzan bride. Any of the Ibarra family would have done; she was not special.

  “I ignored her. I trusted that my palace was impenetrable and that she would be safe here. I trusted those in my employ, and I did not interest myself in her movements.” He shook his head slowly. “I will not make this mistake with you. I want you where I can see you. Under my personal protection. I swear to you, Saaliyah, no one will hurt a hair on your head.”

  Her stomach squeezed. Emotional awareness was coursing through her. “You could not have been with her every moment of the day. And nor will you be with me. You are too busy for that. You have to trust, at some point, that I can take care of myself. You have to trust again.”

  His black eyes glittered. “Perhaps. But not yet. Not now.”

  “But …”

  “Saaliyah,” he groaned her name as he ripped his fingers through his long hair, dislodging it from the bun. She sucked in a breath at the way it fell in disarray around his handsome face. His hyper-masculinity was truly unfair. “There is still so much we do not understand about Tashana’s death. Until I know who’s responsible, I do not want to risk that you will be in danger. Surely you understand that.”

  He was pushing his hair back from his face, and it drew attention to his broad chest and strong, tanned arm. She forced herself to look away. The crowd at the gate was swelling in numbers. “Who do you think is responsible?”

  He studied her thoughtfully. It was her cousin. She had a right to know.

  “The driver’s wife and family have gone into hiding. I suspect they flew even before the accident. Their passports were traced into Russia, but not beyond. They’re our best clue.”

  “So you think the driver…”

  “Yes.” He nodded. “He took money to assassinate her. And more than likely died with her. It was an enormous sum of money. More than he could have earned in ten lifetimes.”

  Sally shivered. “Someone really wanted her dead.”

  He put his hands on her shoulders, surprised by how frail she felt in his grasp. “And there is every reason to believe that the same person wants you dead.”

  Sally felt grief sag her forward. She dipped her head and squeezed her eyes shut, but the tears escaped. She couldn’t have said if he spun her in his arms, or if she turned first, but suddenly they were embracing, her head against his chest. He was stroking her hair, running his hands down her back, whispering words in his native language.

  Sally had known everything he was saying. None of it was new information. And yet she felt completely shaken. Bit by bit, her grief lifted. It was always there, cloaking her heart, but other emotions were jostling for principal place. The spring of desire he seemed effortlessly able to invoke was stirring within her.

  She wrapped her hands around his back, moving them quietly along his spine. His muscles bunched beneath her touch, and his skin was warm through the linen of his clothes.

  “Saaliyah,” he said against her hair, his own body stopping its gentle exploration of her. “I came to urge you to be reasonable this afternoon.”

  She darted her tongue out and licked her dry lips. “And if I won’t heed your suggestion?”

  Did a day really make a difference? He padded his finger over her mouth, tracing the path her tongue had taken. Her eyes were wide as they searched for his. Her body was being supported by his frame, now.

  “You are being deliberately provocative.”

  Sally blinked up at him, a perfect study of innocence. “Am I?”

  Khalid’s laugh was unsteady. “You are aware of the fact.”

  Innocent or not, an ancient feminine strength and wisdom was moving inside Sally. She pressed her body closer to his, moving her hips gently against him. His eyes darkened at the unmistakable invitation. “And is it working?”

  He laughed softly. Fear that he might not stay there with her, close and intimate, flooded her system. She couldn’t let him leave. The fires from the first time they’d kissed were still burning out of control.

  “You know, the first time I saw you, I thought you were the sexiest man I’d ever seen.”

  He shook his head with amusement. But her words were weaving magic around him. “No. You wanted to kill me with your bare hands.”

  She fluttered her lashes at him. “Well, you were very rude. You were everything I’d feared my husband-to-be might be…”

  “Which was?”

  “Domineering, arrogant, and impossibly handsome.” She sighed with mock disappointment.

  “And you were supposed to be a convenient replacement bride.” He made a noise of frustration as he scooped her up around the waist and held her cradled against his chest. Her eyes were glued to his mouth, while her mind was trying to put his words into some kind of sensible order.

  “And I’m not?” She said finally, stroking his shoulder as he carried her through her suite of rooms. He reached her bedroom and tossed her unceremoniously onto the bed.

  “No.” He stared down at her, his chest heaving with the exertion of controlling himself.

  Sally watched, fascinated. “Why not?” She pushed up onto her elbows but he shook his head, bringing his body weight to her, so that she fell into the soft mattress.

  “Because you torment my thoughts,” he kissed the words into her mouth. “You are everywhere in my head. When I blink, I see your face. You are a drug I need a dose of, only I keep telling myself to wait; to be patient. Not to scare you. Not to hurt you. Not to want you.” His voice was torn from him as though the confession was a physical pain.

  His kiss was an overload of passion, and her body was electrified. She lifted her legs, wrapping them around his waist, uncaring that the fabric of her clothes rumpled around her thighs. She was hot one second, cold the next, shaking with sensations she’d never known but instinctively understood. His arousal was a heady promise between her legs.

  “Why would you tell yourself not to want me?” Every word was enunciated by a gasp of air.

  He was pushing at her robe, separating it to reveal her splendid, naked body. She was not wearing a bra, and her underpants were a small scrap of lace. He ran broad hands ov
er her, his fingers unsteady as he cupped her breasts. She arched her back, her head tilted away from him as unfamiliar sensations sent her pulse rocketing.

  “I do not need a wife who drives me crazy.” His mouth dragged down her chest, so that he could take a nipple into his mouth. He traced his tongue around the dusky pink aureole, smiling as she quivered against his lips. “I do not need a wife I desire as I do you.”

  She was listening, and responding, but almost the entirety of her mind was missing in action. Completely absorbed by what he was doing to her.

  Her fingers teased through his hair, holding his head, while her legs wrapped tighter around his middle.

  “Why not?” She groaned, writhing as the arrows of pleasure threatened to burst through her skin. Her flesh was pink from the heat of her blood.

  He pushed up, propping his weight on one elbow, and locking his eyes with her. She grabbed hold of his shirt, terrified now that he was going to leave. Her expression must have betrayed her feelings, because he laughed softly. He traced one hand down her body, pausing to flick her nipple before running lower still. Over the flatness of her navel, and to the scrap of fabric she wore.

  Her intake of breath, when his fingers made contact with her most sacred flesh, was a soft sound of wonderment.

  “Because this is not a real marriage, habibi.” He slipped a finger into her core, and the invasion was such a surprise that she jerked her body. Her eyes flew to his, fear and uncertainty in them. He whispered words of reassurance in his native tongue, until she relaxed beneath him. And then he moved, teasing her and stoking her flames of passion, until she was making whimpering noises of delight. He doubted she knew she was moaning, over and over. She was somewhere else.

  On the precipice of her first orgasm.

  He had been her first kiss. He would be her first everything. The knowledge burst into his chest.

  Her words were ripped from her body, as pleasure made speech almost impossible. “You said … you wanted … a wife … you were sexually … attracted to.”

  He lowered his mouth to her breast, tormenting it with his light kiss while his hand worked to set her free.

  “Sexually attracted to, yes,” he spoke soft and low. “But this is not attraction. This is distraction. This is the definition of agony.”

  “Khalid,” she dug her nails into his arms as waves of pleasure began to pound through her. The ultimate release was imminent. It had been since their first kiss. He had known he would enjoy doing this to her. Playing her like a musical instrument that only he had the songbook for.

  Her eyes flicked back in her face as she pushed up on her heels. Her whole body shook with the intensity of what she was feeling.

  And he watched, his own need bursting through him almost painfully.

  He might not want a wife he desired in this way, but he was going to get one anyway.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The stars were breaking apart. Each and every one of them had sparkling dust at their heart, and they were breathing it over her now. Her skin seemed to tingle with their magic. Her body was warmed by the glow.

  She lifted her eyes to his face, and ridiculously, tears shone in her eyes. Her mouth worked, evidently trying to form words, but Sally’s brain wouldn’t oblige.

  “Do you feel better, little one?”

  She blinked. Nothing made sense. It was the same room she’d been sleeping in since arriving in Tari’ell, but none of it felt the same. It was bursting with colour and textures. It was made vibrant by their pleasure.

  Her pleasure, she realised with a tingling sense of regret. For though he had used his skills and experience to drive her wild, she had given him nothing. He had experienced nothing. It made her stomach roll and she sat up abruptly, bumping her head into his.

  She swore under her breath, lifting her hand to her forehead as pain seared through her.

  “Hey,” he leaned over and ran his fingers across the darkening patch of skin. “What is it?”

  Too many things.

  This is not a real marriage, habibi. I thought you would be a convenient replacement wife. You will always be a consolation prize. Every statement, no matter how he’d downplayed it since, was a knife in her gut.

  And now he’d pleasured her, simply because she’d begged him to. She hadn’t been able to keep her perspective. While she was having flights of fancy about falling in love with this perfect specimen of masculinity, he was what?

  He had said he desired her, and yet he had not wanted to be with her. Not really. Or he wouldn’t have stopped with her pleasure alone. Doubts and uncertainties were a thick fog in her mind.

  “Saaliyah,” he murmured, putting an arm around her naked shoulders and holding her to his chest. “Tell me what it is?”

  She was hurting so very badly, and he was acting as though everything was fine; she could have screamed. But she didn’t. Instead, she fixed him with a cool gaze, forcing her emotions deep, deep inside her chest. “Are you going to join me for the haranathi-al?”

  “Saaliyah,” he groaned, putting some space between them. “It is madness.”

  “This was madness,” she responded, her eyes not able to meet his. And, as though realising for the first time that she was naked, she reached for her sheets and pulled them around her. “I’m sorry I …”

  “What are you sorry for?” He scanned her face, at a loss as to what had happened to the vibrant, sexual being he’d just been with.

  She ground her teeth together, then pushed off the bed with a noise of impatience. “I must seem incredibly inexperienced to you.”

  “Yes.”

  Two pink spots appeared on her cheeks. “Don’t beat about the bush, will you?”

  “Beat about the …?”

  “It’s an expression,” she muttered with exasperation. “It means, you know, be honest. Don’t worry about my feelings.”

  He shook his head slowly. “Your feelings should not enter the equation, habibi.”

  More pain! She wrapped the sheet tighter.

  “I like your inexperience,” he clarified, standing. His superb form was an insult to how she felt. “I like that my possession of you is, and will be, unique.”

  She glared at him, her whole body cold all over now. “That’s a stupid, out-dated attitude.”

  “Perhaps,” he acceded with a tilt of his head. “Yet it is how I am.”

  “I don’t like that you can make me feel like that,” she said with absolutely honesty.

  “You seemed to like it very much.”

  Her fingers itched to slap the amusement from his face. “Khalid,” she snapped instead, her word a verbal pronouncement of her mood.

  “I see your doubt and I do not know how to answer it,” he said finally, putting his hands around her waist. He was still hard against her; his own desire had not diminished.

  She wanted more. She wanted to know he felt as she did. She wanted the real marriage he had told her could never be.

  “It’s stupid. Forget about it.”

  “Now it is you who is beating about the bush, yes?”

  She rolled her eyes. “I’m sorry! There’s no manual for how to do this. You talk about sexual desire and attraction … I never expected to feel any of those things. Do you know what I felt, when I saw Kaman, pretending to be you?”

  His eyes narrowed. She was so beautiful when she was enraged. He forced himself to focus on what she was saying. “No. Why do you not tell me?”

  “I was relieved. I was thrilled. I thought he looked nice, and kind. Definitely not sexy. Definitely not threatening. Definitely not someone who would make me feel … make me feel …”

  “Yes?” He prompted, his lips twisting upwards.

  She pushed a fist into his chest, but he caught her hand at the wrist and held it by her side.

  She dropped her gaze, contrite. “I knew we would have a sexual relationship. Because of the need for an heir, and to truly cement the alliance. But Khalid, this?” She gestured to the bed, her cheeks
flushed. “This is out of hand. I can’t be in the same room as you without wanting to …”

  He nodded, not needing her to finish her sentence. “It is like this for me, too.”

  “But you don’t want me! Not like I want you!”

  “No?” He lifted his brows in a gesture of curiosity. “Why do you say this?”

  The uncertainties were stronger now. She was close to understanding why her heart was racing and her heart was hurting. “Because we just did that and you didn’t … you know …” At his continued silence, she stomped her foot. “You stopped it. You didn’t … enjoy yourself.”

  His laugh was a soft caress over her skin, but she was so mortified that she tried to shake away from him.

  “No, I didn’t take you as I wanted to. I didn’t move hard inside of you and watch your body shake with recognition of its new master.”

  “Don’t,” her word was shuddered and her insides immediately clenched with undeniable need.

  “Not because I did not wish to with all that is in my soul,” he said firmly, lifting her chin so that she had to face him. “Because I want to wait until tomorrow. I have waited to feel this for a woman all my life. It is new for me too. Another day will not kill us, habibi.”

  “You think?” She muttered, shaking her head.

  He laughed. A proper sound of mirth, as he took in her sullen expression. “I deserve more than a medal.” He rubbed a hand across his stubbled chin, his eyes still crinkled at the corners. “I had no idea you were going to be such a temptress.” His expression turned sombre. “You talk about how you felt, when you first saw me? For my part, I can’t believe it, but I thought you seemed demure. Quiet. Unremarkable.”

  “Gee, thanks,” she said, the droll inflection hiding pain.

  “I was very wrong. I realised it when we were walking, and you saw the mountains of Allani. You looked at them as though they were pirate ships loaded with treasure. Your face seemed to shimmer with wonder. Yes, my first appraisal was wrong. For you are full of spirit and fire, and your choice to come here and marry me was brave, and it was beautiful.”

  She turned away from him. Her breath was burning in her lungs. What sweet delight his admission was! Sally was plunging from pleasure to pain and back again every few moments. Her emotions were a roller coaster, completely out of control and just as exhilarating.