Slowly, slowly enough so he could feel the sweat gathering on his forehead, he watched her reach out.
Her fingers brushed his taut flesh.
He groaned.
She jerked back.
“I don’t—I don’t want to hurt you …”
Did a man laugh or cry at such a moment?
“You won’t hurt me,” he said, his voice gruff. He made a sound he hoped was a laugh. “You may kill me, habibi, but you won’t hurt me.”
Rachel slicked the tip of her tongue over her bottom lip. Karim bit back another groan—and then she closed her hand around him.
He shuddered.
“Yes,” he whispered, “yes, sweetheart. That’s it. Touch me like that. Like that …”
His hand closed over hers; he taught her how to make that soft groan rise in his throat again, but now she understood that it wasn’t a sound of pain.
It was pleasure.
Pleasure only she could bring him.
She saw it in his face, the way his golden skin seemed to tighten over the bones, the way his nostrils flared …
Until he caught her wrist again and stopped her.
“Wait,” he said thickly.
He took a long, deep breath. Expelled it. Another breath. Then he leaned toward her.
“My turn,” he whispered.
He eased her onto her back. Knelt between her thighs. Kissed her mouth. Her throat. Her breasts.
It was she who groaned this time, and moved restlessly under his caresses.
“I love watching you,” he said softly. “The rise of color in your face. The way your lashes veil your eyes. I love seeing what happens to you when I touch you. When I kiss you. When I do this …”
She gasped as he parted her with his fingers. Stroked her, then bent to her, licked her, sucked on her. She came on a dizzying wave of release.
But there was more.
First, another condom.
Then he brought the head of his erect penis against her silken folds.
“Look,” he said. “Watch me enter you, habibi.”
His words made her tremble with anticipation.
She raised her head, looked at the place where their bodies met in the most intimate of kisses.
“Watch,” he said again, his voice rough as gravel.
She watched. Cried out at the sweet, sweet torture of seeing him penetrate her, feeling him claim her.
“Rachel …”
He thrust hard, thrust deep, and she gave a long, wild sob of joy, fingers clenched around his biceps, her legs wrapped high around his hips.
Karim’s body glistened with sweat. His heart was racing. He wanted to follow her into oblivion …
Teeth gritted, he fought against it.
And took her to the brink again.
It was too much.
She could feel herself starting to come apart.
“Please,” she sobbed, “please, Karim, please …”
He drove deep one final time.
And as she screamed he let go, spent himself within her silken walls, then collapsed in her arms.
The moments slipped by.
Then Karim lifted his head, brushed his lips gently over hers and rolled to his side with Rachel safe in his arms.
She gave him a slow, sweet kiss. And she smiled.
It was the kind of smile a man dreamt of seeing on the face of the woman he’d just made love with, and he smiled back.
Hell, he grinned.
“I take it,” he said, trying to sound solemn but not succeeding, “that smile signifies satisfaction.”
“In triplicate,” she said softly.
He gave a soft, delighted laugh. She smiled again.
“No pretensions at modesty, Your Highness?”
“None whatsoever,” he said, “because you’re the reason this was so wonderful, habibi. So incredibly perfect.”
He brought his mouth to hers for a tender, lingering kiss, and when she sighed against his lips he felt his heart swell.
“Perfect,” he murmured.
Rachel closed her eyes, put her head on his shoulder, her hand over his heart.
“What does that mean? Habibi?”
“It means sweetheart,” he said, pressing a kiss into her hair.
“In Arabic, yes?”
He nodded. “Yes. It was my first language.”
She raised her head, moved her hand just enough so she could prop her chin on it.
God, she was beautiful!
Her hair was a tangle of soft waves around her face. Their lovemaking had turned her eyes bright and given her skin a pink glow.
He wanted to rise over her and make love to her again.
“Your first language? You mean, before English?”
“Before French. Then I learned English. And Spanish. And German. And … What?”
“Five languages?”
“Six. Well, almost six. I’m still having trouble with Japanese.”
She laughed.
“I’m still having trouble with Spanish,” she said, “which is pretty sad, considering that I took a year of it in high school. Of course that was a long time back.”
“I’ll bet it was,” Karim said as seriously as possible. “What was it? Twenty years ago? Twenty-five?”
Rachel balled her fist and punched him lightly in the belly.
“Oof! Okay, not twenty-five.”
“I was in high school seven years ago, Sir Sheikh,” she said, trying to sound indignant.
“Sir Sheikh, huh?” He smiled, brushed a strand of glossy hair back from her cheek. “I’ll bet you were an honors student.”
A cloud seemed to darken her eyes.
“I wasn’t.”
“Too busy being the homecoming queen to study?”
She stared at him for what seemed a long time. Then she rolled away, sat up, grabbed the comforter and wrapped it around herself like an oversized cloak.
“Rachel.” Karim moved fast, caught her hand before she could get to her feet. “Sweetheart, what did I say?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t do this. If I said something that hurt you, tell me.”
The tension in her damned near radiated through his hand.
“Remember what I told you? That there are lots of things you don’t know about me? Well, here’s one of them. I didn’t graduate from high school. I finally qualified for an equivalency diploma a couple of years ago and that’s how come I’m still struggling with Spanish—because I only began taking it again in night classes at college. So, no, I don’t speak six languages, and, no, I don’t have a university degree, and, no—”
Karim swung her toward him and stopped the flow of angry, pained words with a kiss.
“I couldn’t stay in school,” Rachel said in a low voice when he lifted his lips from hers. “I had to take care of my sister and me.”
“Your parents?” Karim said, trying to sound calm.
She shook her head. “My father died when Suki and I were little. My mother—my mother liked to have fun. She went away one day and we never saw her again.”
“You see?” he said, trying to conceal the rage he felt at a woman he had never laid eyes on. “We have something in common. My mother left Rami and me, too.”
“It’s hard—it’s hard to know how a mother could—could—”
Karim cursed, pulled her into his lap and kissed her.
“Habibi,” he whispered. “Habibi. Ana behibek—”
“What does that mean?”
He swallowed hard.
“It means—it means you are very brave, sweetheart. It means I love holding you in my arms.”
“I’m not brave at all,” she said in a wobbly voice, and Karim tumbled back on the bed with her because the only safe way to show her that she was everything he’d just said was to make love to her again.
There was nothing at all safe in telling her the truth—
That what he’d really said was that he loved her.
They sl
ept locked in each other’s arms.
Sunlight woke them.
Karim looked into Rachel’s eyes.
“Good morning,” he said softly.
Rachel smiled. “Good morning.”
“Did you sleep well?”
“Wonderfully well. In fact …” She rose on her elbow and looked past him to the iPod docked on the nightstand. “Oh! It’s past seven. Ethan—”
“Ethan is fine.”
“But—”
“Really. I checked a little while ago. Roberta has him downstairs. She’s feeding him some unidentifiable yellow slop mixed with some equally unidentifiable white slop.”
Rachel laughed at her lover’s excellent description of strained peaches combined with rice cereal.
“He loves that slop,” she said
“Which only proves Ethan’s a baby. She says she’s going to take him to the park when he’s finished eating.”
“Then I’d better hurry and get showered and—”
“I’m a man of the desert, habibi.”
“Meaning …?”
“Meaning,” he said, looking very serious, “I understand things you do not.”
“Such as?”
“Water is a precious commodity. So saving water is an imperative.” His mouth twitched. “Therefore we must make the sacrifice of showering together.”
Rachel smiled. “And a lovely sacrifice it would be,” she said softly, “but if Roberta’s taking Ethan to Central Park …”
“She loves the boy, Rachel.”
“I know. She’s wonderful with him, and—”
“And she has a very impressive certificate from a very fancy school.”
Rachel nodded.
“Yes. And you paid her tuition.”
“Mrs. Jensen told you about that?”
“She certainly— Karim! You’re blushing!”
“I am not blushing,” he said, blushing harder.
“First tutoring. Then college. Then nanny school.” She kissed his chin. “You really are a very nice man.”
Karim smiled.
“What I am,” he said, “is a man in desperate need of food.”
“That’s it. Change the subject.” She sighed. “Ethan will have a fine time with Roberta. And you do need food. We both do.”
“I love knowing I’ve given you an appetite.”
It was Rachel’s turn to blush. She put her palms against his chest and gave him a gentle shove.
“I’ll make us some breakfast.”
“And force Mrs. Jensen out of her own kitchen?”
“Oh. I didn’t think of—”
“I’d love to have you make breakfast, sweetheart.”
“But Mrs. Jensen—”
Karim gathered her to him. “I’ll send her to the market.”
Rachel batted her lashes.
“Such a wise man, Your Highness!”
“Training,” he said loftily. “When a man is destined to be king, he knows how to keep the peace.”
Her teasing smile faded.
“For a little while,” she whispered, “I almost forgot that.”
Yes. So had he. But now there it was. Reality. The commitment to duty. Honor. Responsibility. The very things that had brought this woman into his life.
There was only one problem.
He had never expected to fall in love with her.
But he had. She was everything to him.
How could that be?
She had been Rami’s.
No. She had said it herself. No one was anyone’s property. Besides, he had told her that the past didn’t matter.
And he meant it.
It didn’t.
What mattered was that he loved Rachel. She was good and kind and honest; he had never let himself even imagine finding a woman like her to complete him, and that was what she did.
She completed him …
The breath caught in his throat.
Suddenly he saw a path ahead of him—one that would enable him to fulfill his duties, maintain his honor, meet his responsibilities to his father, his country, his dead brother and his brother’s child.
In one simple step he could do all those things and keep the promise he’d made to Rachel about finding a way she could keep Ethan …
Be truthful, Karim.
Those things were all important … but they were not the real reason for what he was about to do.
Duty was important.
But love was everything. Everything—
“Karim?”
He blinked, looked into the face of the woman he loved. She looked worried. For him. And wasn’t that amazing? Had he ever thought a woman would care for him, the man, and not for him, the Sheikh?
“Karim. Please, talk to me. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he said—and then he gave a whoop of laughter, tugged her to her feet, whirled her around the room to music only he could hear and, when she was breathless and laughing with him, brought them to a halt and took her in his arms.
“Remember when I promised you I’d find a solution for our problem?”
Their problem.
Ah, God!
In her joy these last hours Rachel had managed to tuck reality aside. Now it had returned.
“Yes,” she said slowly. “I remember. You want Ethan.”
He nodded and drew her closer.
“At first he was all I wanted.”
“You said—you said you wouldn’t take him from me …”
“Sweetheart.” Karim cleared his throat. Framed her face with his hands, lifted it to his. “The answer to our problem is to see that it isn’t a problem at all.”
“But it is. I wish it weren’t, but—”
“I love you, habibi.”
His voice was gruff; his words were the most beautiful she’d ever heard. Tears stung her eyes. He kissed them away, then kissed her mouth, gently and tenderly.
“Rachel.” He took a deep breath. “I’ve lived my life alone. By choice. I—I don’t want to sound like one of those TV shows where people put their emotions on display.” He gave a small laugh. “Hell, there’ve been times I’ve been told I don’t have emotions.”
Rachel shook her head. “You’re a wonderful man,” she said fiercely, “with a heart as big as the world.”
“A heart you have awakened, habibi.” He kissed her again, his mouth soft against hers. “What I said … that I love you … I’ve never said those words before. Not to anyone.” He paused. “And I’ve never trusted anyone fully. Never—not since I was a little boy.” He smiled. “And then—and then I found you.”
Tears rose in Rachel’s eyes. This was it. She had to tell him the truth, no matter what the cost …
“Rachel.” Karim looked deep into her eyes. “Marry me. Become my wife. The mother to the children we will have together as you already are to Ethan, who I’ve come to love as my own, who I will adopt and give my name.”
Rachel began weeping.
“Rachel? Sweetheart, I adore you. I thought—I thought you felt the same—”
She flung her arms around his neck. Lifted herself to him. Kissed his mouth with all the love he had brought to her lonely heart.
“I love you,” she whispered, between kisses. “I love you, love you, love you—”
“Marry me,” Karim said.
No, a voice inside her whispered. Rachel, you mustn’t …
“Rachel?”
Rachel threw caution to the wind and said, “Yes.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WHO would have thought that busy, crowded, shark-eat-shark Manhattan could be a paradise for lovers?
Not Karim.
He knew the city the way he knew London and Paris and Istanbul, knew its hotels, its restaurants, its business centers.
And, though he wasn’t given to musing about romance, if pressed, he’d have said those cities were probably romantic.
Paris had a unique beauty and charm. Istanbul had a mystery that came of the blended cultures
of east and west. London had crooked streets layered in history.
But New York? Frenetic. Impatient. Crowded. Rude. Boisterous.
And yet magnificent.
Those were the words that described his adopted home.
But romantic? No. That was what he would have said, had anyone asked. Had he even thought about such things. Which he didn’t, because, after all, what did he know of romance? What place did it have in his life?
Not a thing—until ten days ago.
Rachel had changed his life.
He had lived in New York for a decade. And yet he knew he’d never really seen it before.
Central Park was no longer just a place for an early-morning run. It was, instead, a stretch of green as beautiful as the forested slopes that rose above his desert home. The cobbled streets of SoHo and Greenwich Village weren’t places to avoid because of the traffic; they were as delightful to stroll as Montmartre.
Hand in hand, they explored the city together. They discovered quite cafés, pretty little parks, places where a man and woman could be alone despite the crowds all around them.
He managed a small miracle, too, when he finally convinced his bride-to-be that there was nothing wrong in letting him take her into half a dozen elegant boutiques and buying her soft, summery dresses, delicate lingerie and pairs of shoes that made her ooh and ahh with delight.
Heels? Yes.
“But no stilettos,” she said, with a mock shudder.
That was when he learned she hadn’t been a dancer, that she’d been a waitress, that she’d hated the shoes and the spangles and the thong, and her expression had turned so grave that right there, at the crowded intersection of Spring and Mercer, he’d taken her in his arms and kissed her.
In all the ways that mattered, the city was almost as new to Karim as it was to Rachel.
Even the restaurants he took her to were places he’d never seen before … except he had. He’d taken clients to the Four Seasons, to Daniel, to La Grenouille, but they were different places when he went to them with the woman he loved.
The woman he loved, he thought as he and Rachel sat at an intimate table for two in the River Café, the lights of Manhattan reflected in the dark, deep waters of the East River visible through the wall of windows beside them.
Karim’s mouth curved in a very private smile.
He loved Rachel. And she loved him. He was still trying to get used to the idea.
There was so much to get his head around—starting with coming awake each morning with her in his arms and ending with falling asleep that same way each night.
Sheikh Without a Heart Page 12
