A dazzling smile, edged with anticipation, thrill and even a flash of trepidation curved her mouth. “You came.”
He felt his mouth twist into a bitter curve. “Did you doubt it?”
Her eyes closed for a second, as if she wanted to shield something from him. And he realized that she was as conflicted about this as he was, just in a different way. She had asked for this night with that characteristic bluntness that he had begun to see, but it didn’t mean she wasn’t nervous about it.
“You’re trembling, Nikhat.”
“I imagined this moment for so many years and in so many ways, Azeez, that the reality of it now, it’s a little frightening.”
She wore a cream-colored sleeveless nightgown that almost blended with her skin, making him think she was naked for an aching instant.
Blood rushed out of his head, leaving him with a dizzying desire. But this time, that rush wasn’t followed by that clawing void. This time, she didn’t disappear, this time he wasn’t left with cold sheets and empty arousal. This time he wouldn’t feel the shame that he felt when he looked down at the wrong face.
He came to a stop at the bed. “After those months in Monaco, my father ordered me home. For the first time in my life, I was ashamed of myself, I couldn’t meet his eyes.
“I haven’t touched another woman since, Nikhat. And I have been given a clean bill of health by the doctors.”
He touched her chin, and tilted it up, his hand shaking. He felt her tremble, but the resolve didn’t falter in her eyes.
“I’m in good health, too,” she said with a small smile. “And I’m protected by the drugs I take, so…”
She placed her hands on his chest and moved them restlessly, the irises of her eyes bright like flames. She unbuttoned his shirt and pushed the edges apart. Her hands found his bare skin and he hissed out a sharp breath. Her fingers explored his chest with wanton thoroughness, curled into his chest hair, pressed into his abdomen, traced the seam of his low-slung pajamas.
Back and forth, dipping into the band now and then, until every nerve in his body was tuned into the movement of her fingers. Every muscle in him curled with anticipation.
She bent and kissed his chest, and a moan rumbled out of him. His fingers sank into her heavy tresses, the hold on his control wavering at her soft, feathery kisses. Her lips moved over his neck, his pulse, trailing wet heat all over his skin, setting a fire in its wake. The second he felt the stroke of her tongue at his nipple, he tugged at her.
She looked up, a wicked smile on her mouth, her fingers clutching his waist. Her beautiful, kohl-lined, brown eyes shimmered with desire and glittered with a raw hunger. He tightened his fingers in her hair, waited for a flash of doubt or something that would puncture the spiraling need between them.
Their hoarse little breaths whispered in the room.
Still holding his gaze, her own hazy with desire, she sank her teeth over his nipple and sucked it into her mouth.
The wet rasp of her tongue, the drag of her teeth, her soft curves rubbing up against his lower belly, right above his erection…Azeez lost the battle over his already frayed control.
He pushed her back on the bed.
Settling on his good hip, he ran his fingers over her cheek, over the pulse fluttering at her neck, to the neckline of her nightgown. Her skin was like raw silk, a sheen of pink dusting all over. The soft rise and fall of her lush breasts under the satin of her gown, her breath coming in fast little whispers, goaded him. He pressed his mouth to her neck, licked her skin, and her hands sunk into his hair.