“I wish you’d keep it on,” she said under her breath.
Mika studied her friend with undisguised interest. “What has got into you? You seem miserable?”
“I’m not,” she promised, watching as Mika dislodged the ring and slid it from her finger. She moved it over to Charlotte’s hand, and Charlotte stared down at it. She couldn’t help it. She looked towards Ashad and saw thunder on his face. He was watching; he’d seen. And though he knew that she would marry Syed, seeing her wearing his ring infuriated him.
She smiled at him and he slid his eyes away, turning back to Eloise and nodded at a comment she’d made.
Charlotte sighed.
What a mess.
The party continued and somehow, she managed to go through the motions. There were a great many people for her to speak to. But all the while her mind kept track of Ashad.
He spent most of his time being flanked by Yelana, and that couldn’t help but inspire envy in Charlotte.
Not because she doubted his desire for her, but because Yelana was free to talk and laugh with him as Charlotte wasn’t. Finally though, as the dancing began, he moved towards her.
“Your highness,” he asked with a crisp formality that would have fooled anyone. “May I have this dance?”
She nodded, trying to hide her enthusiasm. “I’d be honoured,” she responded in kind, as though they were barely acquainted. He held her left hand and his fingers moved to the diamond. He spun it on her finger, so the diamond faced downwards.
Once on the dance floor, he put a hand on her waist and held her other. His eyes met hers and there was so much need in them that Charlotte’s breath began to burn in her mouth.
“Are you having a good night?” She asked quietly, keeping a polite smile pinned on her face. How could they not be observed, in this environment? Sure enough, she saw Eloise and Rama watching from the edge. For his part, the King was smiling, relaxed. If Eloise suspected something, she hadn’t yet communicated it to her husband.
“No,” he responded. “But that is because I’m impatient for the night to be over.”
Anticipation hammered through her. “Yelana seems to be doing a good job of entertaining you,” she pointed out.
“You know I am thinking only of you,” he answered. And though she hadn’t been jealous, the assurance spread warmth through her.
“And I of you.”
The song stopped, and she went to drop her hand but he held it tight, waiting out the pause until a new song began. It did, soon enough, and he began to move once more. “You will come to my embassy,” he said darkly. “As soon as you can get away.”
“Sure, that’s going to be easy,” she joked sarcastically. “I’ll just slip out. No one will notice.”
His eyes bore into hers. “I can send a car,” he said.
“No, it’s fine.”
“Or you can come with me?”
She rolled her eyes. “Again, something that might arouse suspicion.”
“So?”
She laughed, but it wasn’t from amusement. “I’ll try,” she promised. “I can tell my mother I am going to spend the night at my place.”
His eyes narrowed. “I will wait for you.”
Anticipation thundered inside of her. “I’ll try not to be too late.”
At the conclusion of the song, he released her. She was lost, for a moment, unable to believe she had to wait hours yet before being able to touch him again.
“Thank you for the dance,” she responded formally, moving away from him for fear that she might indulge her inner urges and launch herself at his chest instead.
It was only a matter of time, she told herself. She simply had to be patient.
CHAPTER TEN
In the end, she was kept busy until the early hours of the morning. By the time most of the important guests had left, and Charlotte was able to absent herself, she had a slightly tipsy Mika to assist into bed.
Finally, though, the corridors of the palace were quiet. Charlotte, changed into a pair of black pants and a floating tunic, slipped through them without detection. All the worries she’d been grappling with – how to leave the palace without being noticed, what to say to her mother – resolved themselves easily. She left via a side entrance, a far enough distance from her parents and their friends. Palace vehicles had been ferrying guests to and from the city all evening. Charlotte simply wrapped a scarf around her head and kept her face averted, and switched to Kalastani as she instructed the driver to take her to the embassy.
As he slowed the car to a stop, she slipped out, reasonably confident that he hadn’t recognised her. She hovered on the doorstep, hesitating before lifting her finger to the door. As it happened, she didn’t need to press it.
Ashad, on the other side, pulled the door inward. His eyes met hers, his chest heaved with the force of his breath and he stepped backwards. There was urgency in his every movement.
“Come,” he said, the shortness of words a sign of how desperate he was to have her in his private apartment.
He led her up the stairs to the same suite of rooms they’d been in the second day they’d met. She remembered the balcony they’d sat at, and the way that even then she’d been fighting a losing battle.
Once inside, he watched her step deeper into the apartment and, as with the boat, he latched the door shut behind her.
“Well, Charlotte. Are you sure about this?”
She smiled at him; a smile that showed everything in her heart. “I have never been more sure of anything in my life,” she said honestly. “Make love to me, Ashad.”
His laugh was a soft caress. “This reminds me of the first time I met you. You flew into the embassy so sure of what you wanted; so certain that you wouldn’t let anyone organise your life for you.”
He reached for her hands, and frowned when he saw the engagement ring was still there. His eyes held hers as he slid it from her finger and placed it carelessly on the side table.
“I forgot I was wearing it,” she said truthfully.
He nodded, brushing away her explanation.
“It’s a beautiful ring.”
He nodded. “It’s an heirloom.”
“I gathered.” She smiled again. “I don’t really want to talk about my engagement ring.”
Syed doesn’t want to marry you. I do. Marry me. The words he should have said were alive in his mind but something held him back. Was he waiting for her to reach that conclusion on her own?
No, because sleeping with him would effectively shut down any chance of a marriage to Syed. He would not let it happen once they’d made love. Surely she understood that?
He walked with intent towards her. They were in the lobby of his apartment; he didn’t care. His hands sought her shirt and he lifted it, glad to see that she wore the bra, still.
He knelt before her, pulling at her pants, and then, when she was naked but for the jewelled lingerie he’d given her, he stood back to stare at her.
She was just as he’d fantasised; better, perhaps.
“Perfection,” he muttered. Except for the whole being engaged to another man thing.
She met his eyes, but she was self-conscious. “Did you know that this bra is … um …”
“That it’s designed to bring you to the point of arousal? Yes.”
She gasped. “Ashad,” but she laughed then. “Did you think a bra was needed for that? Looking at you all night and not being able to touch has been all the foreplay I’ve needed.”
His eyes flared at her frank admission. He’d felt the same.
“You know,” he closed the distance, and looped his fingers into the diamond string that wrapped around her waist. “There was a thong that accompanied the bra. A string of pearls went from here,” he pressed a finger to the heart of her femininity, then dragged used his other hand to caress the curve of her arse. “To here. Every step is supposed to bring a woman almost agonising pleasure.”
Her mouth dropped. “I think that sounds … weird.”
He laughed. “I did too. But perhaps I will buy it for you to … confirm this.”
Her cheeks flushed. She didn’t want to point out to him that it was difficult to imagine them having time to play with kinky lingerie.
He lifted his hand to the bra and ran his thumbs over her nipples. They were more sensitised than she’d known they could be, and the simplest touch made her gasp. Sensations were overpowering her. “Make love to me.”
He nodded. “I intend to.”
“No. I mean, now.”
His laugh was soft. “Oh, Charlotte. You have spent a decade fearing sex. I am going to make sure you enjoy yourself again, and again, and again.” He unhooked the bra and dropped it to the ground, apparently uncaring that it was an incredibly extravagant item of clothing. He lifted her easily, cradling her to his chest and carrying her through his home. His bedroom was on the other side of the house to the living area she’d been shown to before. She saw doors and artwork pass in a blur as he strode to the room and tossed her down onto the bed.
She laughed as her hair fell over her face.
A cool breeze ran over her body and she moaned. It was heaven. She looked around and saw curtains billowing. As they lifted, she saw a balcony, and beyond it the lights of the city.
That was the last impression she had; her mind became incapable of observation from the minute he came to lie on top of her. “Did you know, your highness, that I intend to make you orgasm just by doing this?” And he reached down and drew one of her nipples into his mouth, sucking it until she moaned and cried out. The pleasure was so intense it was almost painful, but she couldn’t imagine him stopping. He brushed his palm over her other breast and the nipple, already so raw from the fabric, answering immediately. She felt a swirl of desire and then, he brought his mouth to hers. He straddled her, so that his arousal was between her legs.