Darker Side of Desire & the Sheikh's Pregnant Prisoner(51)
Every time she thought she had a measure of him, he went and toppled her all over again. Made her need him on such a visceral level that she came undone by his words, his smile, his touch. Joy made her want that much hotter, bone-deep affection made her need that much deeper.
She had never felt such heights of dizzying joy or such a deep hollow ache as she did with this man.
Moaning in the back of her throat, she clasped his neck and clung to him by her mouth.
Until he pulled her hands off his neck, and whispered, “Only one more week, habeebti.” Fire gleamed in his hungry gaze, his breath a harsh rhythm in her ears. “And if you get upset again because you didn’t listen to me, I will put your mother in jail.”
She sputtered and he pressed another hard, hasty kiss to her stinging lips. And then he was gone.
* * *
“Marriage. Commitment. Forever.”
She had seen him only that once in the exhausting week and Lauren clutched those three words to her every time she felt as though she was sinking in the spotlight leading up to her fairy-tale, fantastic wedding that had Behraat and the rest of the world take notice of her.
She had never imagined her wedding day, having had only one disastrous relationship by twenty-six, much less on such a huge scale, and as the days blended into a flurry of activity, Lauren felt scared, isolated, inadequate and craving Zafir’s company once again.
The palace staff in an upheaval over the upcoming wedding, even Farrah had kept their daily appointments to a minimum.
Exotic flowers and exquisite silks, diamond jewelry and designer dresses, there was no end to the treasures Zafir bestowed upon her.
And in addition to the army of staff that catered to her every breath, she also now had a secretary whose job was to school her in everything social—mostly at what state ceremonies she could open her mouth and at what, which was 90 percent, she had to look poised and beautiful and ornamental for the sheikh.
“I will train you in our ways,” he had told her arrogantly. And through those two weeks, she would have even taken his arrogant, imperious behavior if it meant she got to see more of him.
Abdul, her newly appointed secretary, she realized within two days, was adept at manipulating the truth to suit Behraat best. He had coached her intensively for an interview, the only one required of her, with a female journalist of a huge media channel. But when Lauren had sat down to watch it, her jaw had fallen to her chest.
The bits and pieces of responses that Abdul had fed her had been manipulated into a cohesive whole that told how Zafir and she had fallen in love with each other while he had been in exile, waiting to serve his country, how she had come in search of him thinking him dead, and how having found her again, the sheikh hadn’t been able to wait to make her his sheikha.
It told of how a plain, hardworking nurse from Brooklyn, New York, had befriended their sheikh, fallen in love with him and now, had been transformed into the sheikha fit for him and his great country.
Lauren hadn’t known whether to laugh or cry or take offense at being described as some kind of mouse who had unwittingly befriended a lion, and subsequently, transformed into an elegant deer?
Because levelheaded as she’d always been, even having been exposed to her parents’ glittering, high-society life at an early age and turned her back on it, her wedding and all it ensued was on such a grand level that even her head could turn.
Could buy into the fantastical love story that the palace whispered it to be around her. Could delude herself that Zafir was marrying her because he couldn’t bear to part with her rather than because it was the best thing for the situation they found themselves in.
But it was a commitment they had made and she was determined to give everything she could.
The morning of the wedding, minutes before she was due in the lavishly decorated great hall, she had seen Farrah and Huma standing in the corridor waiting to greet her. She’d barely embraced them when she saw David and a couple of her friends who had worked with her in the inner-city clinics.
Zafir had contacted David and the rest of them personally, Alicia had said with awe in her voice. Of course they had to come to see Lauren become the sheikha of her own nation.
Her chest ached as their words sunk in.
He had not only comforted her when she had been upset but had contacted her friends on her behalf. Domineering he might be, but Lauren was afraid he was slowly stealing bits and pieces of her very soul.
Beyond her friends from the States, another small group of men and women stood in the last hall. With Salma and Bashir at the front, Lauren realized it was the Dahab. Ahmed, standing close as always, had grinned at her stunned face, told her they had traveled to the city to stand witness to her wedding to their sheikh, to wish her happiness in her marriage.
Between Farrah’s admonishments that they were getting late and Alicia’s wicked whispers about Ahmed and the ‘fine quality’ of Behraati men in general, Lauren felt anything but alone.
In this strange country and between people she had only met for a few weeks, Lauren felt loved, cherished, and thanks to the dark, breathtaking man whose gaze swept over her with a possessive desire as she reached the great hall, utterly wanted.
Once she had repeated the vows that she had practiced, Zafir had nodded at the small group that had stood to the side of the hall. “Fans of yours, sheikha?”
Warmth filling her from the inside out, Lauren resisted the urge to plaster herself all over him. It was a losing battle, she realized as she studied his rough-hewn features, that generous mouth and the long bridge of his arrogant nose. “My tribe,” she had finally said.
And he had smiled.
Before she knew it, they were joined together as man and wife in front of God and the people of Behraat and then she was whisked away to a feast unlike anything she had ever seen.
After two hours of raising sparkling water, picking at her food and thanking a host of dignitaries from around the world, her smile began to droop and her shoulders ached. The three-inch designer shoes that she had cooed over now felt like torture devices on her tired feet.
His hand around her, Zafir instantly held her as she toppled. Last she had looked, he had been walking around the room, greeting and meeting men she couldn’t even remember the names of. That he had appeared by her side so fast…her breath shook.
Long fingers held her right below her breast and she felt branded, feeling his touch through her dress all the way to her skin. “You’re ready to drop.”
She saw the hunger in his golden gaze, felt the tight tension in his body, heard the hiss of his exhale as her hip brushed his front. Legs wobbling, belly tight with need, she said, “I’m sorry, it’s just been a long day.”
His finger landed on her mouth, while he signaled to someone behind her. “Don’t apologize. I will see you tonight.” He bent his head and whispered, “Get some rest, yes? It might be late but I’ll be there.”
Sparks of heat spreading to every limb, Lauren nodded.
She followed the contingent that seemed to be her shadow now.
No matter, she decided, because all she wanted right then was to escape from her own self, much less face the man who was slowly but inexorably imprinting himself on her very soul.
CHAPTER TEN
BY THE TIME Zafir had dealt with the numerous council members and state delegates, and the tribal chiefs led by the Dahab’s chief, and arrived at the oasis, separately from Lauren, darkness had fallen like a thick cloak over the encampment.
He was glad he had sent her on earlier because his negotiations with the chiefs had gone on and on. And he had, eager to finalize the agreement he wanted to reach with them and loath to disturb the fragile peace, let half his wedding night pass by.
Not wanting to disturb her in case she was sleeping, he had the pilot land the chopper a mile or so from the camp.
The desert sky glittered with stars as he walked, the wild, crisp scent of the night driving his blood to pound faster in his veins.
Victory was his. For the first time in his life, he felt like he belonged to the Al Masoods, like the conquering warrior in those stories.
He had secured his rule of Behraat, had secured its return to a path of progress. Trade agreements could be renewed now that half its population wasn’t trying to rip the other half apart. Excavation for oil could begin again in lands that had been occupied by the tribes.
He had done everything an orphan who had been thrust into power could have done.
And his prize was in that huge tent set just a little apart from the rest of the encampment, the path to the entrance flanked by a row of lanterns.
Tonight, he belonged in that tent, truly, with his wife. Even his father’s wife, banished to the fortress in the old city could not contest his place here.
The wind whistling through the sands, the dark desert sky, and the harsh, unforgiving desert, he was a part of this land finally. And it filled every inch of him with a profound joy, an unquenchable fire.
* * *
He acknowledged Ahmed and another guard with a nod. She wouldn’t like that they were so close by, the errant thought dropped into his head. Not for what he had on his mind, he thought with a smile.
But he wouldn’t dismiss them. Not when her safety was paramount, not when he was hovering on the knife-edge of desire, his rationality and the civilized veneer like the slippery sand under his feet.
Before his next breath, he was standing inside the tent, at the foot of the vast bed. Numerous lanterns were lit all around the room and he wondered if she had been afraid of the pitch-darkness that was a desert night.