Desert Jewels: The Sheikh's Undoing / The Sultan's Choice / Girl in the Bedouin Tent. Annie West
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‘Izzy,’ he growled, as every fantasy he’d been concocting over the last few days burst into rampant life.
Izzy with her hair loose and cascading around her shoulders. Izzy wearing some ridiculously oldfash-ioned pair of pyjamas. Izzy warm and soft and smelling of toothpaste, just begging to be kissed. Reaching up, he tangled his fingers in the rich spill of her curls and brought her mouth down on his.
‘Oh!’ Her startled exclamation was muffled by his kiss, and it only partially blotted out the urgent clamour of her thoughts. She ought to stop him. She knew that. A whole lifetime of conditioning told her so.
But Isobel didn’t stop him, and the words which her mother had once drummed into her floated straight out of her mind. It no longer mattered that Tariq was the worst possible person to let make love to her. Because her body was on fire—a fire created by the blazing heat of his. She wanted him, and she wanted his kiss. She wanted it enough to turn her back on all her so-called principles, and now she gave in to it with greedy fervour, her mouth opening hungrily beneath his.
She could hear the small moan he made as the kiss deepened. He crushed his lips against hers and a fierce heat began to flood through her body, from breast to belly and beyond.
Frantically, her fingers slithered over his chest and began to knead at the silken flesh, feeling the mad hammer of his heart against her palm. She moaned into his mouth as his hand skimmed down from the base of her throat to her breast, slipping his fingers inside her pyjama jacket and capturing the aching mound with proprietorial skill. She could feel him stroking one pinpoint nipple between finger and thumb until she gasped aloud, wriggling uselessly as she felt the flagrant ridge at his groin pressing against her belly.
Tariq groaned. She tasted of mint, and her hair tickled him as the thick curls cascaded down the side of her face. She felt amazing. Was that because this had come at him out of the blue? Or was it novelty value because she was the last person in the world he could imagine responding with such easy passion? My God, she was hot.
He kissed her until he had barely any breath left in his lungs, and it became apparent that her narrow sofa was hopelessly inadequate for two people who were exploring each other’s bodies for the first time.
‘This is getting a little crowded,’ he managed, pulling his lips away from hers with an effort.
He slid them both to the ground, barely noticing the hard flagstones beneath the thin rug. All that concerned him was the gasping beauty in his arms, her hair spilling out all over the floor like tendrils of pale fire and her eyes as tawny as a tiger’s.
‘Comfortable?’ he questioned, as he smoothed some of the wiry corkscrews away from the pink flush of her cheeks.
Heart thundering, Isobel gazed up at him, wondering why she didn’t feel shyer than she did. Was it because Tariq was staring down at her with such gleaming hunger in his eyes that in that moment she felt utterly desirable? As if almost anything was possible? ‘Oddly enough, yes, I am.’
‘Me too. Deliciously comfortable. Perhaps I can help make you more comfortable still, anisah bahiya.’ Pulling open her dressing gown, he began to unbutton her pyjamas—until two rosy-peaked breasts were thrusting towards him. Unable to resist their silent plea, he bent his head to suckle one. Slicking his tongue against the tight bud, he felt the responsive jerk of her hips and heard her gasp his name. ‘I’ve never seduced a woman in pyjamas before,’ he whispered against the puckered flesh.
‘Are you…are you going to seduce me, then?’
‘What do you think? That I’ve got you down here because I want to discuss my diary for next week?’
Thinking was the last thing Isobel wanted to do—because if she did that then surely she would realise that what they were doing was crazy. Wouldn’t thinking remind her that Tariq was a cavalier playboy, and that there was a reason why men like him should be avoided like the plague? Wouldn’t it prompt her into doing the only sensible thing—which was to tear herself away from him and rush upstairs to her room, away from temptation?
She felt the graze of his teeth against her nipple and shut her eyes. Far better to feel. To allow these amazing sensations to skate over her skin and fill her with an urgent longing which was fast spiralling out of control.
‘Oh!’ she breathed, eagerly squirming her hips beneath him and feeling a warm, wild heat building up inside her. And he answered her voiceless plea by slipping his hand inside the elasticated waistband of her pyjamas.
She held her breath as his warm palm navigated its way down her belly, tiptoeing tantalisingly to the fuzz of hair which lay beyond. Still she held her breath as he stroked at the sensitive skin of her inner thigh, and then gasped as his fingertips seared over her moist heat.
‘Oh!’ she said again.
‘You’re very wet.’
‘A-am I?’
‘Mmm…’ Tariq’s mouth brushed over hers as his finger strayed to the tight bud at the very core of her desire. Her instant compliance didn’t surprise him—he was capable of reducing a woman to a boneless state of longing no matter what the circumstances. But the sheer and urgent spontaneity of what they were doing made him tense—just for a moment. And that moment was enough for him to remember one vital omission.
He froze, before snatching his hand away from her. Damn and damn and damn!
‘I don’t have any protection with me,’ he ground out.
For one stupid moment Isobel thought he was talking about the bodyguards he sometimes used, and then she saw the look of dark frustration on his face and realised what he meant. A wave of insecurity washed over her.
Should she tell him?
Of course she should tell him—they were on the brink of making love, and now was not the time for coyness.
‘Actually, I’m…’ Isobel swallowed, wanting his fingers back on her aching flesh. ‘I’m on the pill.’
Her admission dampened his ardour fractionally. He drew away from her, his black eyes slitted in a cool question. ‘The pill?’
Isobel heard the unmistakable disapproval in his voice. ‘Lots of women are.’
There was a pause. ‘Yes. I imagine that they are.’
Suddenly she shrank from the truth in his hard black eyes, indignant words tumbling from her lips before she could stop them. ‘I suppose you think that the kind of woman who happens to have contraception covered is easy?’
Tariq shrugged. ‘You must agree that it does imply a certain degree of accessibility.’
‘Well, you couldn’t be more wrong, Tariq,’ she declared hotly. ‘Because…because I’ve never had a lover before!’
He stared at her, genuinely confused. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘I was prescribed the pill because my periods are heavy, and that’s the only reason. I’ve…Well, I’ve never had any other reason to take it.’
This commonplace and unexpected disclosure highlighted the unusual degree of intimacy between them, and Tariq frowned. He brushed a corkscrew lock of hair away from her forehead, trying to make sense of her words. ‘You’re trying to tell me you’re—?’
‘Yes, I’m a virgin,’ she said, as if it didn’t matter.
Because surely it didn’t? What mattered was Tariq kissing her and transporting her back to that heavenly place he’d taken her to before. Just because she had waited a long time for a man to turn her on as much as this, it didn’t mean that she should be treated as some kind of leper, did it?
Sliding her arms around his neck, she lifted her face to his, hungry for him. ‘Now, kiss me again,’ she whispered.
How could he refuse her soft entreaty? Tariq