“Please, Zahir.”
“Please what?” he asked, his voice a low rumble, so deep that it shot to her very core with its masculine essence.
She opened her eyes long enough to look into his, to see the beseeching within. “Please make love to me.”
I don’t know what I’m doing, but we could have died and…
“Are you sure?” he asked, even as his fingers teased her folds.
“I’m more than sure. You’re exactly who I want. I…maybe it’s the adrenaline and the last few days, but I need you right now. I need to feel you inside of me. Please.”
He smiled at her. “I’m so glad that the twins have chosen a kaftan for you.” With that he threaded his fingers through the lace and pulled, shredding her panties with no effort at all. Then he plunged his forefinger inside her, tracing the length of her channel, teasing her very core. “It gives me perfect access, my artiste.”
She mewled. Normally, Felicia would have felt embarrassed for sounding like a kitten, but it didn’t matter now. Nothing mattered but the strong arm wrapped around her shoulders and the bulge of his erection poking up against the fabric of his trousers, tantalizingly close to her womanhood. He added a second finger to her channel and she bucked against him, no longer interested in Zahir’s teasing. She wanted everything he could give her, wanted everything inside of her, just as she’d begged him.
Arching her neck up, she grazed her teeth over the strong line of his jaw, loving the way he shouted at her onslaught. Then she moved her mouth to the left and sucked his earlobe in between her teeth, teasing the soft flesh with just the tiniest bit of pressure.
“I need you, Zahir. I need more than fingers.” The breathiness of her voice amazed her.
His grin widened. “Haven’t you ever heard about patience being a virtue, my artiste?”
She shook her head and kissed him, letting her tongue plunder his mouth. When she spoke again, her voice had transformed to a deep, throaty growl. “It’s only a virtue sometimes. You saved me, my sheikh. I just need to feel you.”
“As you wish.” He unbuckled his belt and unzipped his pants.
“I…I never do this,” she said, as he teased her entrance with the tip of his length. Felicia hissed at the heat of him.
“What? You never have sex with a sheikh near the market place?”
“Noooo,” she said, moaning when he slid in deeper. Each inch seduced her further, and he overwhelmed her senses—from the spicy turmeric teasing her nose, to the taste of his mouth on her tongue, like coffee and sugar, to the thickness of his length buried deep inside of her. “I’ve just never done anything like this.”
He chuckled, that low rumble of his that she was convinced he wielded like a weapon. “I should hope not.”
Then he began to move, his hips undulating just the slightest amount at first. That damn devil was teasing her all over again. Felicia slapped his shoulder. “No more games, my sheikh. I don’t want to deal with them.”
“But I love hearing you beg,” he said, tracing his tongue over the hollow of her clavicle. “I think it’s the only noise you should make, that mewling tone of yours.”
She mewled again, on cue, hoping to entice the sheikh to move more. When he still kept to tiny, teasing motions, she bucked her own hips against his. Felicia lifted her core up and down, wriggling as best she could over his length. “Now, Zahir.”
“Oh, be careful what you wish for, my artiste.” He thrust forward with sudden force.
Zahir pumped hard into her, his member driving deep into her core. He also reached down with one arm, even as she gripped him tightly with her legs, and stroked her clit. Those arcs of electricity she’d felt before were now coursing through her, making her feel alive in ways she never knew possible. It was all spinning through her, a peak current she could hardly imagine. Then Zahir came, arching his back and shooting his seed deep inside of her. The sparks under her skin erupted into bolts of lightning.
She screamed, not caring who overheard them. Then Felicia dropped her head to rest against her lover’s shoulder, even as she shuddered, lost in her own orgasm and ecstasy.
“Are you happy, my artiste?”
“I love you.”
She blinked, replaying what she’d actually said. Felicia had meant to make a joke, to say something teasing to match their tone before. She couldn’t have possibly just said what it sounded like.
That’s crazy. I don’t even know him.
Besides she’d only had two other boyfriends in her life, one in high school. She wasn’t…what the fuck had she been thinking?
Zahir stilled and she swore she could feel his heart pounding in his well-muscled chest. “What?”
Slowly, feeling as if she’d just swallowed broken glass, Felicia raised her head to look at him. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I…thank you.”
“For the sex?” he asked, studying her. She wasn’t sure what he was waiting for. Did he want her to come off as the clingiest woman of all time?
“Yeah,” she said, tapping his shoulder until he let her down to settle her kaftan back into place. She had no hope of salvaging the scrap of lace that had once been her panties. “I think we should get back to the palace. You can only slip the guards so long before they all freak out.”
He nodded and righted himself, then offered his hand to her. Reluctantly, Felicia took it. How could he not hate her for being so transparent, for rushing things out of nowhere?
God, is my hand a clammy mess? It sure feels like it!
Concerned chestnut eyes studied her face before Zahir turned toward the end of the alley. “You’re right, my artiste, let’s go.”
Chapter Ten
One Month Later
“I cannot wait to see the doctor today,” Felicia moaned as she hunched over the toilet in her bathroom.
Her sister—the meddler—crept in from the bedroom and placed her hand on Felicia’s shoulder. “Wow, you guys haven’t even been that cuddly yet, or I thought you hadn’t.”
She narrowed her eyes back at Elena. “What? Who told you?”
“Jaheer has a big mouth. I’m not stupid. I know that we don’t get all of this for no reason, even if some rich guy took pity on you. I thought it was a surrogacy thing and you hadn’t mentioned any procedures, so I asked Jaheer when you started showing symptoms. I mean, unless you have food poisoning or the flu.”
Felicia groaned and thought back to when her period should have come. She was at least two weeks late. If she’d been at home, or even in Cairo, she could have gotten a test at the drugstore. But here, it was hard to get out of the palace, and she never left alone.
If the doctor confirmed the probable diagnosis today, then it was good for the timeline the Ahmed family line needed, but it was just going to make things even more confusing between Zahir and her. Since the fiasco at the market, she’d avoided him. Officially, Sheikha Adira didn’t expect them to start trying until after she was presented at the ball tomorrow night. But they’d jumped the gun so fast. Felicia had not only had sex with him but blurted out the most impossible, most embarrassing statement of all time. Love was not part of the contract—and impossible after only five days. Out of shame, she’d hidden away in her wing and tried to only see him at formal dinners.
Of course, if the doctor told them—because Zahir would be there—what Felicia thought he would, then Zahir would be a much closer presence in her life than he had been over the last month.
“Ugh, I didn’t want you to know,” Felicia said.
“Wait, so they did turkey baste you?” Elena asked.
Felicia had to remember that she was (probably) in a delicate condition and not to throttle her less-than-discreet sister. “No. I…we were supposed to get to know each other first because his mom has this weird edict that it has to be a ‘natural’ heir for the child to qualify,” she said, making air quotes with her fingers. “But we snuck out about a month ago to spend a day in the market and one thing led to another…
”
Elena shook her head. “That’s, oh wow—I can’t even comprehend it. My sister is literally going to be the queen of a foreign country and a mom! I’m not sure which thing is more nuts.”
“I’m not sheikha, and I probably won’t be. This is business. It has to be a certain way to ensure that the heir counts, but I’m doing this because Mom needs the care and still needs all the help she can get at the super-expensive rehab center he sent her to. I wanted you to have a chance to pay for any college you wanted.”
“So you’ll just abandon the baby?”
She gripped her stomach, not even sure anything was there yet. “I don’t know. It’s all what Zahir wants. I have to do what he orders.”
Elena shrugged. “Then that’s a no-brainer. Have you seen the way he looks at you? If you ever said more than two words to him at dinner, you’d probably already have a tiara on your head. I mean, Jaheer and I joke about it all the time. He has it bad.”
Felicia felt her cheeks flush. She’d love to believe that, but there was no way for her to be sure. It couldn’t be true, not after she’d said the creepiest, least appropriate thing ever after they’d made love.
No, sex.
It was probably nothing more than sex to Zahir. As kind as he’d been to her and her family, she had to remember this was an arrangement. If she was pregnant, then he was getting exactly what he wanted out of the deal. And what he wanted wasn’t a neurotic curvy girl, just an heir.
“Maybe, but I can’t be sure, and I was so dumb. I was supposed to ease into all of this, but I came off like a total slut, you know? I can’t even explain it, really.”
Maybe she could justify it in her own head, but she wasn’t about to share all the sordid details with her little sister. Adrenaline had flooded her that day in the alleys by the market, and relief had coursed through her when Zahir had turned out to be her perfect hero. He’d risked his life and the cut of a blade to save her, and she’d been swept up in emotion. That had to explain why she’d been so freaking forward, right? Sure, she’d been attracted to him and drawn to him since the moment they’d met—any woman with eyeballs would be—but that wasn’t enough to explain the big “I love you.”
“I don’t think it matters as long as Zahir makes you happy. And he must!”
She eased herself to her feet and then leaned on her younger sister for support. “There’s a difference between having him give us both a lot of stuff and being happy.”
Of course, the way he’d made her feel, that explosion of sparks and sated contentment through her body, had been as close to happy as Felicia had been in years, but that was before she’d blown it.
“Maybe, but it’s clear he likes you, and if that happened,” Elena said, gesturing to Felicia’s stomach. “Then you like him too.”
“I…just help me lie down and maybe run for some ginger ale. I’m going to feel like crap until I see the doctor. Maybe he has something for the nausea.”
“But we have to talk about this!”
“No, Elena, we really don’t.”
***
Of course, the doctor’s office had been well-stocked with urine tests, and the nurse had given her one and directed her to the bathroom first thing. Felicia gripped Zahir’s hand as they waited for the doctor to arrive with the results. Felicia hadn’t said much to Zahir as they’d been ushered into Dr. Galud’s office, but she wasn’t sure where to start.
Sorry I was first going all Fatal Attraction on you and then started ignoring you. Or maybe I should say “So I’m having your baby—what a wonderful way to say I love you.”?
God, she was so screwed. She’d hoped that being in the medical setting, even investigating the possible pregnancy, would help her somehow, that it would make her an expert on saying exactly the right thing. Yet the words eluded her, slipping away like sand in an hour glass. Now, she embraced the silence and waited with Zahir. The doctor arrived with a knock on the door and a big smile.
“It’s positive,” he said. “We can do a blood test to confirm, Sheikh Ahmed, but with the symptoms the sheikha has described, there’s little doubt. If you know when you conceived, I can give you a due date.”
“December fourth,” she blurted, blushing at the admission. The date was seared into her brain—she’d been reliving it for the last month.
Zahir nodded, and there was a twinkle in his eye that hadn’t been there before, a confidence and joy that seemed to make him look even more regal. “Thank Allah that there will be a new heir to the throne.”
Right, the throne, the business deal. The only reason you’re here.
“Yes, thank everyone out there,” she said, at least agreeing with the sentiment. “Now I guess I’m going to be getting all the prenatal vitamins and a check-up schedule to come see you and everything.”
Zahir got to his feet. “Actually, Dr. Galud will move into the south wing of the palace. We’ll have all of his equipment moved there and anything else he should require. You’ll be able to see him at any time of the day or night—just extra insurance beyond the standard check-ins. I don’t anticipate a problem, but the baby is so important to the people of Jardania that we need to do everything possible.” He looked at her, chestnut eyes brimming with sincerity. “I need to do everything possible for both of you.”
Her throat felt as if it were stuffed with cotton. Zahir was trying, but she just felt so incredibly lost and so unsure of herself. But she had to take her share of steps forward as well. “Dr. Galud, can you give us a minute?”
“Of course, my sheikh and sheikha.”
“I’m not,” she said, biting her lip and regretting the crestfallen look that instantly came over Zahir when she said the words. “I just mean…nothing’s official.”
Dr. Galud gave her a knowing smile as he bowed in her direction. “So you say, but things have a way of working themselves out, Ms. Ryan.” With that, he hurried out of the exam room.
She stayed sitting on the examination table and smoothed her hand over her belly. It made the child they now shared that more obvious between them.
“Hey,” Felicia started in a quiet voice. “Do you want to feel? I know we’re about four months shy of actual kicks and the baby doesn’t even have legs yet, but I just thought…”
“You thought that now I could touch you?” Zahir asked. His voice wasn’t clipped or bitter, but she still dropped her eyes downward at the truth of his words. Despite what he’d said, Zahir reached out and cupped her stomach.
Felicia had to bite her lip as a moan threatened to escape her lips. The things he could do to her, no matter how hard she resisted. She was here to provide an heir, and there was no guarantee that Zahir would ever see her as a more than a means to an end. Yes, someone whom he had fit with once for great sex—fuck, the best sex of her life—but none of that meant he wanted her forever. She had to remember that, or she might go insane. Her heart had been played with so many times, by her mother’s constant irresponsibility, her father’s abandonment, and by that newest slight—the betrayal from Sienna and Louis was only a month old and still fresh in her mind.
She wouldn’t survive if Zahir were the next one.
Better to keep a wall up. It was the only way to survive.
She put her hand over his, over their child, and offered him a small smile. “I’m sorry I cut you off. I’m sorry I haven’t been around as much.”
“I know where you are, but you seem incredibly busy in your wing. I think the twins grow tired of relaying transparent excuses. What’s wrong? Not to put too fine a point on it, but everything felt like it was working out just right, that we were on the correct track.”
“You mean after the alley and the…” she broke off, feeling her cheeks flush.
He put the long fingers of his other hand under her chin and coaxed her to look up at him. “We had sex, my artiste. We shared so much and created a child.”
Her words were raw and quiet when she spoke again. “We fulfilled the deal so far. I’m sure your mothe
r will be happier tomorrow night at the party when we announce everything to the court.”
“I don’t care about that. I just don’t know why you pulled away. That’s the only thing I want to understand.”
Because we had sex, but it felt like more to me. Because I’m just a damn broodmare, even if I did it to myself. Because I just don’t know how not to fall for you.
All of those were good reasons, sane reasons that kept driving her. Yet, she was so scared to say them out loud. Instead, she offered the most truth she could. “I know I made you uncomfortable. What I said, um…”
“The ‘I love you?’” he asked.
“Yeah, I just was carried away with the moment, and I was embarrassed after. I don’t expect anything. We signed all the paperwork.” How romantic. “So I know exactly where I stand. I don’t want you to say we have a future when we don’t. I know that this baby is what we have, and that’s all.” She sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “I didn’t want to come off as some stalker chick.”
She pulled away and set her shirt back over her stomach. The heat of his eyes poured over her as she got to her feet. When he spoke, his voice still held the rumbling affection it always did. “You could never be that. Believe me.”
“I do.”
Zahir stroked her cheek and, despite herself, Felicia couldn’t help but look up at him. He pressed his lips together for a moment and said, “I don’t know if you do. I care about you, and it’s not just because of the miracle growing between us.”
She felt her throat constrict, and it was almost impossible to get the next words out. “But it’s not really a miracle. It’s what we, well you, planned to have happen. We should get back to the palace. I bet there are a million details to be settled before the ball tomorrow night.”
“The only detail I care about right now is us. It’s not good for the baby for us to barely be talking,” he said, emphasizing his point by letting his hand stray to her stomach. “We need to be together.”
She gave him a tight smile. “We’ll be a team, a team that has a huge event to attend tomorrow. I think we need to focus on that.”
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