Desert Prince, Defiant Virgin

by Kim Lawrence

  But amazingly he was.

  ‘Dear, sweet…’ His powerful chest lifted as a deep shuddering sigh moved through his body.

  Molly felt the helpless response of her own sensitised flesh respond to his scrutiny. The tingling life that pulled the pink buds of her small trembling breasts to tight prominence was painful, but not in a bad way.

  ‘You’re so beautiful, so perfect…’

  Tair drank in the sight of her, the delicate bones of her shoulders, the shape of her narrow ribcage and the soft twin mounds of her high, deliciously plump breasts. To watch them visibly respond to the feel of his eyes made him think about how sensitive they would be to his touch.

  He closed a hand over one small firm mound of trembling flesh and then the next, his thumb moving across each tight nub, drawing a series of small throaty gasps from her parted lips.

  ‘Like sweet, ripe little apples.’

  His bent his head and ran his tongue across the tip of one quivering peak. Her back arched as she grabbed the back of his head to hold him there.

  ‘Oh, God, Tair, you…’

  With her eyes closed, her splayed fingers sank deep into the lush pelt of his hair, then tightened as his tongue began to explore and tease, evoking sensations inside her that she had not dreamt existed.

  It was just about the most erotic image she had ever imagined, but the feelings it produced went farther. Right now, though, Molly would make no attempt to unravel the complex tangle of emotions that erupted when she looked at his mouth against her body.

  When Tair lifted his head he was breathing hard and there were lines of dark colour etched along the contours of his high cheekbones.

  Without a word Molly reached out and began to unfasten the buttons on his shirt.

  He sat still, looking at the top of her bent head, fighting against the fire in his veins and the urge to rip apart the buttons of his shirt as her trembling fingers performed the task with what felt to him like agonising slowness.

  His control lasted until she reached the last two buttons and then he could bear it no longer. With a groan he tore the shirt open sending the buttons flying across the room.

  Molly sucked in a deep breath, her eyes darkening and her pupils expanding as she watched his muscles ripple beneath skin that gleamed like oiled satin.

  Things tightened and stirred deep inside her and the heavy ache low down in her body intensified as her greedy gaze slid down his bronzed torso.

  He had the perfect body. His shoulders were broad, his chest was covered in a light dusting of dark hair and his stomach was washboard-flat. There wasn’t an ounce of surplus flesh on his body to blur the perfect muscle definition on display.

  The stab of lustful heat that slid through her body made her gasp.

  Tair swallowed, the muscles in his brown throat visibly contracting as he reached for the buckle on his belt and slid it from his narrow hips. ‘Come, I need to feel your skin against mine.’

  Molly, her eyes locked on his, placed a hand on the headboard either side of his head as she leaned forward. Tair placed one hand in the small of her back and the other behind her head. As their lips met in a deep, drowning kiss he jerked her up hard against him.

  Molly’s breasts were crushed against his chest and she moaned into his mouth as Tair’s fingers tangled in her hair, and opened her mouth to deepen the kiss. She felt Tair’s hands moving over her back, drawing her even closer to him.

  But not close enough! Never close enough…to satisfy the knot of frustration inside her that tightened another painful notch. ‘I want…’

  When he pulled away the febrile glow in his eyes made her head spin. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Everything. All of you.’

  Without a word he slid down the bed and flipped her over onto her back. Molly’s heart skipped as she saw the look in his eyes, the heat, and his hunger. She could feel them in her bones.

  A moment later he pulled her beneath him and carried on kissing her with a frantic need that bruised her lips. She kissed him back, wanting it never to stop, loving the weight of his body on hers, loving the roughness of his jaw on her soft skin, loving the smell and taste of him.

  There was nothing about him that didn’t feel perfect and right.

  She hadn’t expected that feeling…The thought flitted through her brain and then his fingers were sliding under the waistband of her skirt, easing it down over her hips, and she couldn’t think anything beyond please…and yes!

  Tair levered himself off her, his intention to remove his boots and trousers distracted by the sight of her lying there so wanton and so willing, her tight nipples still wet from his ministrations.

  ‘You are totally and absolutely…’ He bent forward and kissed her stomach, letting his hands slide slowly down her slim hips. He marvelled at the texture of her skin and how the lightest touch made her tremble and shake.

  She moaned his name, her back arching as his mouth slid lower leaving a wet trail on the soft curve of her belly. With a cry he forced himself from her.

  ‘Remember where we were. I need to…’He pulled off one boot and flashed her a look that made things inside her twist.

  Even with his back to her Tair was aware of her big eyes watching his every move as he pulled off his second boot and then kicked aside his trousers and shorts. The knowledge that she was watching him increased the painful level of his arousal.

  The line of his back and narrow hips, the length of his leg, the tautness of his male buttocks looked to Molly like a classical statue come to life. Then he turned and as her eyes slid down his body she forgot about statues and his classical grace.

  The heat flooded her face as she struggled to lift her gaze, or, failing that, even blink or breathe.

  Sucking in air through her nostrils, she shook her head and closed her eyes as all her lust and hunger fused into one intense ache of primitive yearning to have him inside her.

  A deep, almost animal groan was ripped from his throat as he threw himself down beside her, rolling her onto her side until they lay face to face. Then he placed a hand in the small of her back and pulled her thigh across his hip.

  ‘Have you noticed we fit really well?’

  Molly, who on recent evidence was having doubts on this score, didn’t say anything—she wasn’t sure she could speak without crying…Was lust meant to feel this emotional? In all other ways it had outstripped her most optimistic expectations.

  Tair nuzzled her throat before parting her lips with his tongue. Still kissing her, he took her hand and fed it onto his body, curling her fingers around his shaft.

  He sucked in a deep breath as her fingers tightened and when he slid his own hand between her legs she gasped. Then a moment later she sighed and pressed against his hand.

  ‘This is for me?’ he asked, sliding his fingers over her wetness and drawing sighs and cries from her as she rolled on her back and parted her thighs for him in silent invitation.

  He kissed her and nuzzled her neck and watched as her back arched. A gasp deeper than any that had preceded it was wrenched from her parted lips as he slid a finger inside her.

  Molly could feel his heartbeat as he lowered himself onto her, his hands either side of her face. She grabbed his shoulders, her fingers spread across his sweat-slick skin.

  The nudge of the hot, silky-skinned tip of his erection against the apex of her parted thighs made Molly stiffen. Then Tair kissed and breathed words into her ear and she relaxed, though she was unable to stop tensing as he entered her.

  ‘I can’t!’

  Above her Tair had gone very still.

  ‘There is no I just we…we can, we will…just let it happen, ma belle, let me make it happen for you. Look at me, go with me…’

  Molly responded to the coaxing of the velvet voice and opened her eyes as he slid another inch inside her.

  ‘Oh, God, Tair, this is…’

  ‘It will be,’ he promised thickly. ‘It will be…’

  The breath left her lungs
in a long sibilant sigh as he began to move.

  Tair held her hips, murmuring her name thickly as he slid slowly deeper and deeper into her sweet slickness, then he repeated the process again and again, all the time conscious of the pressure he fought to control inside him building and burning.

  As he felt Molly tighten around his length Tair’s mind slipped into a dark primal gear where there was nothing in his world but the woman who cried his name as she moved beneath him and the need—the necessity—to reach a plateau where they could merge and be one.

  Molly’s entire being was focused on the incredible sensations she was experiencing, of Tair inside her, stretching and filling her. She felt things tighten in anticipation as the pleasure centres of her brain overloaded.

  Tair watched her face, saw the rosy flush wash over her skin and her eyes widen in shock as the first soft flutters of climax hit her. Then he felt the vibration of the feral groan that came from deep inside her as her muscles began to spasm.

  Tair let himself go, then allowed himself the final deep thrust into her as he was engulfed by a mind-shattering and spirit-lifting release.

  For several minutes he lay on top of her until his heartbeat slowly returned to within shouting distance of normality.

  When he rolled away she cuddled up to his side like a kitten and laid her head on his chest. It was one thing to take a conniving woman of experience to his bed, but it was, as they said, a whole different ball game to take a virgin!

  ‘You didn’t sleep with Tariq.’ A bemused frown creased Tair’s brow as he absently trailed his fingers down the curve of her spine. Molly arched her back under the pressure and almost purred.

  ‘Don’t be stupid!’

  ‘He went into your bedroom. I saw him.’

  His jaw clenched as he recalled how he had seen with his own eyes that Tariq was unable to take his eyes off her. The only way a man who wanted Molly could remain pure was if he removed himself to another continent!

  ‘Men and women can do other things besides have sex in a bedroom.’ Although not in Tair’s bedroom, she thought.

  ‘He was never your lover?’ Tair’s expression hardened to one of predatory possessiveness as he looked down at her silky head and thought how Tariq would now never be.

  He would do everything within his power to make sure that Tariq never got near Molly again in his life.

  ‘You’ve never slept with any man.’ The wheels in Tair’s mind seemed to be working tortuously slowly.

  ‘No, I told you—Tariq and Khalid, they’re my half-brothers.’

  ‘Be seri—’ She felt him stiffen. ‘My God, he is…they are…Susan Al Kamal, the woman who divorced…she remarried?’

  Molly nodded.

  ‘You’re Susan Al Kamal’s daughter?’

  Molly turned her face into his warm skin, breathing in the warm musky smell of him. ‘And a bit of an embarrassment to the Al Kamals, the skeleton in the closet.’

  He cursed softly in his own tongue and groaned.

  ‘I did try and tell you.’

  She heard him curse once more before he said, ‘What have I done?’

  ‘I thought you were the expert…’ Her teasing tone faded as she added, ‘Does it matter who my mother was?’

  He caught her chin in his hand and brought her face up to his. ‘Matter…you ask does it matter? I have taken your innocence.’

  She watched, her sense of bewilderment increasing as he groaned and rolled onto his back. As he lay there with his eyes closed the tendons in his neck were tense as he dragged in air through his flared nostrils.

  ‘I wasn’t innocent, just inexperienced,’ she said, allowing her eyes to roam over the sleek strong lines of his tautly muscled body before she turned on her side.

  A hissing noise of exasperation escaped his lips as he opened his eyes and fixed her with a bright blue incredulous stare.

  ‘You were a virgin.’

  ‘You did nothing I didn’t want you to, even if I didn’t know that’s what I wanted at the time.’ He had intuitively known exactly how to please her, how to send her to heaven.

  ‘Look at me.’

  ‘I am.’ It was possible she might never be able to stop!

  ‘You must realise that this changes everything…Tariq is your half-brother, you were living under the protection of the royal house and I abducted you.’

  ‘It doesn’t have to change anything. I’ll tell Tariq I came because I wanted to just the way you put it on the letter.’

  Tair loosed an odd laugh. ‘You think that would matter? You are not just any woman. If you were any woman I would take you as my mistress.’ Until thirty seconds ago that had been his intention. ‘But that of course is now out of the question.’

  ‘Would I have had any say in the matter?’ He acted as if she would have left her life at a word from him…a word he’d just made plain wasn’t going to come her way now.

  Tair, his face set into grim lines, did not even respond to her ironic comment. ‘We must marry, of course.’

  She searched his face, saw that he looked pale and his expression was darkly sombre. ‘You’re not serious…?’

  ‘I have never been more serious.’

  Molly shook her head, gathered the silk sheet around herself and swung her legs over the side of the bed. She was shaking. She had to break it to this man who was clearly living in a bygone century when family honour and a woman’s reputation required preserving at all costs that things no longer worked this way. She tried to speak calmly.

  ‘Don’t be stupid. I can’t marry you…You don’t know me or love me or—’

  His voice, terse and impatient, cut across her. ‘This is not a question of love.’

  Always a good thing to say when proposing.

  She slung an incredulous look over her shoulder. He was lying there, one arm curved above his head, looking more incredible than any man had a right to look.

  ‘It is,’ he told her plainly, ‘a question of honour.’

  ‘Your honour, not mine. I’m living in the twenty-first century.’

  Tariq shook his head and conceded, ‘I know it’s not something either of us planned to happen, but you’ll get used to the idea.’

  ‘Have you been listening to a word I’ve said?’

  ‘Some women would not be insulted by the proposal.’

  ‘I’m not some women.’ The heat flared in her cheeks.

  ‘My wife…’

  She stuck out her chin. ‘Don’t be ludicrous.’

  Her childish refusal to recognise the gravity of the situation frustrated him. ‘Grow up, Molly. This is not what either of us would want, but in life there are consequences for our actions. You think I wanted this to happen?’ he yelled, revealing suddenly that he wasn’t as composed about this as he appeared.

  ‘Thanks! Strange, but you didn’t seem to be a man who was doing something against his will a few minutes ago!’

  He looked irritated. ‘That isn’t what I meant! It has always been expected that I will marry to further the political and financial interest of our country…’

  ‘A family tradition—how sweet,’ she trilled. ‘I wouldn’t like to stand in the way of such romance,’ she choked.

  His lips tightened. ‘That is obviously no longer possible.’ His glance slid over her slim, stiff figure and a gleam ignited deep in his eyes. ‘Still, there are plus points…’ His hand suddenly shot out and curled around her arm.

  ‘You know what I think?’ She gave a grunt of anger as he pulled her back down onto the bed beside him.

  ‘What do you think, Molly James?’

  Tair watched her brush a gleaming strand of hair from her face as she glared up at him, breathing hard. He felt his recently satiated lust stir as he looked down into her angry golden eyes.

  ‘I think that you slept with me because you thought you could make me forget any other man I’d ever been with…including, you thought, Tariq. Abducting me wasn’t enough—you had to be doubly sure.’

 
; Actually what she said made a lot of sense, supposing he was as cold and calculating as she apparently thought. The irony was that where Molly James was concerned he was incapable of thinking beyond touching her—clinical objectivity did not even register on his radar!

  ‘You think I’m that good?’

  The colour flew to her cheeks at the throaty taunt. ‘Don’t give me that,’ she snapped. ‘You know you are!’ A woman who slept with Tair would forever be comparing future lovers with him and finding them sadly wanting.

  The mocking light left his deepset sapphire eyes as he studied her face. ‘It takes two…sometimes two people just mesh.’ He took her chin gently in his hand and shook his head. ‘It is rare, Molly.’

  ‘Don’t turn this into something it isn’t. We had sex…I’m not marrying you because of some warped idea you have of honour and stuff. Tariq won’t feel that way. He’s modern…he’s not a barbarian.’

  ‘You think I am barbarian? You are reluctant to marry me because I don’t have nice manners?’

  A beautiful barbarian. ‘I think this would have been a one-night stand if you hadn’t cottoned on to the fact I was telling the truth when I said Tariq was my half-brother.’

  ‘Is that what this is about? You think all I want is a one-night stand? You really think I’m going to leave in the morning? You think that in two days’ time I was going to wave goodbye to you for ever?’

  She swallowed. ‘Weren’t you?’

  He shook his head and the blaze in his eyes held her as surely as his arms. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ he promised, stroking the side of her face with his finger. ‘Do you think that one night would be enough for me? I can’t get enough of you, ma belle. Be honest, Molly—you don’t want me to leave you now, do you?’

  Molly told herself he was only saying these things because he wanted to make her agree to marrying him. ‘I’m not marrying you.’

  She sighed and turned her face into his palm. Just at the edge of her consciousness there lurked the knowledge that there was a limit to how honest she could allow herself to be!

  But there was one thing she couldn’t deny!

  ‘I don’t think I can get enough of you, Tair,’ she admitted quietly.