Never Seduce a Sheikh(36)
“Why shouldn’t I?” She stepped closer. “I know you’re afraid of hurting me. Afraid of repeating what Dan did to me. But I’m telling you that you won’t. Because I want you and that makes a difference—I understand that now.”
His breathing had become unsteady, a thin strip of color on his cheekbones. “You will have been observed coming here.”
“I didn’t see anyone around.”
“My security team will have noted your arrival.”
Oh. That wasn’t exactly what she wanted. And yet she found that fact it wasn’t enough to make her leave. “I don’t care who knows I’m here.” It was almost strange to find she really didn’t.
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Lily . . . you understand what I like? You know what I’ll take?”
“Yes.” She reached out and put a hand on his chest, feeling his heat. “And I want that too.” Her mouth had gone dry as the enormity of what she was asking came home to her, a tense, shivery excitement collecting in her stomach. It felt good. It felt like coming back to life after years of being frozen. “No holding back. No protecting me. Treat me as if I’d never told you about Dan.”
In his gaze a hot, blue spark ignited. “I will need your obedience.”
She stared back. “You won’t get it.”
Tension, thick and hot and exhilarating built in the air around them.
“Then, I will have to take it,” he said, very soft.
“You can try. In fact, I want you to try.” A shot of intense excitement went through her as something suddenly crystallized in her head. “And . . . I want to resist.”
Yes, resist him. Fight him. Do the things she’d never done when Dan had touched her all those years ago. A dark and dangerous desire.
“Lily . . . ” He stopped. “Do you know what you are asking for?”
She swallowed. “I didn’t stop Dan. I didn’t push him away. I just stood there and let him do whatever he wanted because I was too young and too afraid.” Her hand pressed against the hard wall of muscle. There was no give. Just heat and solid strength. “I’ve always been so ashamed of that. I always wished I’d at least put up some fight.”
“You were only sixteen.”
“But I’m not sixteen now.” She pushed at him and again he didn’t move. “I want to resist, Sheikh. I want to fight. Just so I know that I can. So I know what it feels like.”
He said nothing for a moment. “If you do not want me to hold back, Lily, I will win. I will take you.” It wasn’t a threat. It was a statement of fact. “You understand that?”
“It’s not the winning that matters. All that matters was that I fought. That I tried. That I resisted with all my strength. That I gave back as good as I got.” She curled her fingers, digging them into the taut muscle under her hand. “I’m so angry that he did that to me. I’m so angry I let him. And I’m so angry that all I feel is shame.”
Isma’il’s warm hand covered her own, the heat of it burning down her arm. Into her chest. Into her heart. “Then give me your anger, Lily Harkness. Give me your shame. Use me to reclaim your strength and your pride.”
Her throat closed. He understood. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
His mouth curved. “Do I look weak to you?”
“No.” She wanted to smile back, but the moment was too serious. Too intense. “But I’m very angry, Isma’il. And I’m stronger than I look.”
“Then try, Lily,” he said softly. “Hurt me if you can.”
That was all the warning she got.
He moved, pushing one hand into her hair, curling his fingers through it. Lily gasped, but he didn’t let go. Instead, he turned his wrist, wrapping her hair around it, pulling her head back hard. She looked up into his eyes, into the blue flame burning there. A blue flame with a dark heart.
“Isma’il.” A prayer. A plea.
His head bent and he took her mouth, letting her know exactly what she was dealing with. What she’d unleashed in him.
So much heat. So much intensity. He devoured her, the hot taste of him a shot of pure alcohol that went straight to her head. Like the kiss in the dunes, he didn’t hold back and he didn’t let up, kissing her with a raw carnality that made wild excitement break loose inside her.
She shoved her hands hard against his chest, resisting him as she’d promised, but it was like pushing against a brick wall. He didn’t move, didn’t release her. His hand in her hair tightened further, her head pulled back harder, giving him deeper access to her mouth, which he took without mercy.