“I think it’s a fine idea. So what’s on the agenda for tonight’s first-time experience?” she’d said, coming closer.
Ephraim’s jaw had tightened as he noted the way Darius was looking at her. Had Darius fucked her too? Was she here to see him? Had she chosen Darius over Ephraim? Did she like his cock better? Did she love him?
The thoughts had rushed through Ephraim in a fury, and it had ignited a wild competitiveness in him. Even then he knew it wasn’t so much about that Norwegian heiress as much as it was about something else: Competition. The thrill of the fight. The need to win. Ephraim wouldn’t have given the woman a second thought if he hadn’t sensed that she might prefer Darius to him, that she might be willing to give Darius more than she’d given him, that Darius had satisfied her more than Ephraim had, that Darius had made her come harder.
One look at Darius and Ephraim sensed it in him as well: That feeling of competition. Darius’s jaw was fixed and hard, his green eyes focused as if the adrenaline had sobered him up. Slowly Darius turned his head and made eye contact with Ephraim before glancing back at the smiling heiress in her silk pajamas.
“I think you know what is on the agenda,” Darius had growled, stepping forward and grabbing the woman by the hair as she gasped in shock, her mouth hanging open. But Darius stopped short of kissing her. He held her tight, glanced at Ephraim, and then back into the woman’s blue eyes, which had widened at first but were now narrowing and showing that sparkle once more. “Yes?”
Ephraim had stared at Darius, then at the woman as the adrenaline shot through his own body. But it was more than just adrenaline, he knew. Something else was fueling his arousal, and Ephraim knew that Darius could feel it too. Was Darius more attracted to her because he knew that Ephraim had slept with her? Was there something about the two of them fighting over something that got both of them going? Fighting over territory? Possessions? Who knew. All Ephraim knew at the time was that if this woman nodded her head and said yes, this was going to happen. A one-time experience.
Ephraim was broken out of the daydream by the sound of applause, and he looked toward the stage to see the good Sheikh Darius stepping up to accept some kind of award for his donation. Ephraim scanned the crowd and quickly found Jan, his cock stiffening when he caught a glimpse of her from behind, the rounds of her bottom perfect and pronounced in that regal blue gown as she clapped her gloved hands along with the crowd.
Yes, he thought as he drained his drink and turned to the bar, his frown deepening. There is no doubt Darius is recalling that experience and wants me to recall it too. But why? Has it something to do with the woman’s views on shared marriages? But what sense would that make? The only shared marriages in our world involve one man and multiple women. This does not make sense, unless . . . unless Darius actually believes . . . ya Allah, no. That is too radical. Too much. Sharing a woman for a night is one thing. But sharing her for longer? Sharing her for more than just sex? Sharing her for . . . ever? Forever?
A chill ran through Ephraim as he tapped his knuckles on the oakwood bar and asked for a glass of iced-tea. The thought had crossed his mind when he’d read Jan’s research, and now, after seeing Jan, the way she carried herself, the way she’d responded to him calmly after he’d tried to rattle her . . . yes, now Ephraim was forced to consider the thought again, that this really might be Darius’s plan. After all, Ephraim knew enough about history to understand how marriages created political alliances, how a strategic marriage could prevent a war. And it didn’t take much to understand what it might mean for two Sheikhs to marry one woman: They could turn tradition on its ear, shock and delight the world, make Noramaar and Habeetha the toast of the world’s media! A wild idea, but not impossible. Was that seriously Darius’s game? Did he seriously believe such a plan could work out over the long term? And what about Jan? What did she think? What did she even know?
Yes, what about her? She was the biggest unknown, was she not? And Ephraim could not consider anything before knowing more about her, before knowing her. All of her. Inside and outside.
So Ephraim took a breath as he glanced at the tall glass of iced-tea in front of him. Then he reached into the inner pocket of his maroon jacket and pulled out a small vial. “The sweet nectar of our shared land,” he muttered as he poured the aruha extract into the tea and stirred it carefully. “All right, Darius. I will play. But not by your rules. I will not politely step onto the dancefloor and ask to cut in. I will step in and take control. On my terms.”
He straightened his tie and took the glass over to where Jan stood, looking deep into her eyes as he watched her drink it. She frowned after taking a sip, licking her lips and cocking her head as she looked at the glass. Then she looked back at him, holding the eye contact even though he thought he saw a streak of fear whip through her behind those big brown eyes. A moment’s hesitation, and then she gulped the rest of the glass down and handed it back to him.
“I must be insane,” he heard Jan whisper as she leaned against him, and a chill ran through Ephraim when he realized that ya Allah, she knows what is happening and she is going forward anyway! She is not some innocent in the game. She is a player in the game.
She might even be in control.
15
I’ve lost control, Jan thought. She blinked three times and licked her lips, taking in the now-familiar aftertaste of the sweet aruha. She’d tasted it in the first sip of the tea Ephraim had offered, and she’d gulped it down anyway. Truthfully, that’s why she drank the tea—after all, she didn’t particularly like iced tea.
Yes, I’ve lost control of myself, my mind, my grip on reality, she thought again as she tried to get her bearings. Was she on a plane? Already in Habeetha? Somewhere else?
I’m in a bed, she realized as her senses came back to her and she felt the pillows beneath her head and the cool sheets against her body. Against her naked body.
“Oh God, no!” she cried out when she realized she didn’t have a shred of clothing on beneath the sheets. “Oh, please no!”
Jan sat up straight and pulled the sheets up over her bare breasts as panic gave way to a sinking feeling of dread. Had this really happened? She didn’t remember a thing, but she was in what looked like a hotel room, naked to the toes after being drugged by a Sheikh who was king of Sin City, Arabia!
He raped me, she thought in anger as she carefully touched herself between her legs to see if she was sore, if she was bleeding, if that sick animal’s semen was oozing out of her after he’d taken what he wanted when she was powerless to resist. She didn’t have any soreness or pain, and there was no blood or semen on her or in her that she could feel. After making sure the bedroom was empty, she pulled the sheets away and examined herself and then the bedsheets beneath her bottom. No bruises on her smooth, creamy skin. No damp spots or stains on the pristine white sheets.
“That doesn’t prove anything,” she muttered, fighting back a dreadful sense of guilt as a part of her whispered that she’d slurped down that aruha drug like a goddamn witch-whore and put herself in a position of absolute vulnerability. What did she expect was going to happen? Another round of hot sex on a private plane? Nope. You get used like a harlot while you’re passed out. It’s his fault for doing it, but you’re still a goddamn fool.
Jan looked around the room again. Certainly a hotel room. There was a window at the far end, but the curtains were drawn. She looked for a phone. No phone. Cameras on the walls? No cameras. What about clothes? Um, no clothes anywhere in sight. Neither hers nor his. Where the hell was she?
She swung her legs off the bed and wrapped the sheets around her, carefully standing and bumbling over to the window. She took a breath and pulled the curtains away, squinting and turning her head when the sun hit her full. When she got her sight back she looked out, letting forth a deep sigh when she saw the Tower of London in the distance. She was still in England.
“What do you think he w
ill do?” came the voice from behind her, and Jan was so startled she almost dropped the sheets.
She turned on her feet, making sure not to fall flat on her face as she trampled on the sheets and tried to look calm and composed in the presence of the man who’d just raped her. “How could you?” she said, frowning when she saw that Ephraim was still wearing that maroon tuxedo, tie included. “Have you no shame? What kind of a man does that?”
Ephraim didn’t flinch. “What kind of a man did you think I was when you drank the aruha? When you knowingly drank the aruha, I should add.”
Jan blinked hard and swallowed. “I don’t know what you mean. All I know is that you drugged me last night, and now I’m naked in a hotel room with no memory of what happened.”
Jan blinked again as she looked at Ephraim. He seemed calm, in control, his dark green eyes unwavering and alert. She glanced at his clothes again. The shirt had lost some of its crispness and the jacket had a definite crease in it, like he’d been wearing those clothes all night. But that still didn’t prove anything. He’d done it. Hadn’t he?
Is he trying to mess with my head, she wondered as she forced herself to look into his eyes, guilt creeping through her when she realized she didn’t feel the hate and anger she wanted to feel. Was it the drug that was numbing her? Or was it the look in his eyes—a look that whispered the truth: that perhaps he wasn’t an unhinged rapist, that perhaps he had simply decided to enter the game on his own terms.
Ephraim smiled, his thick red lips parting, his perfect teeth shining white against the dark stubble that lined his strong jaw. He shook his head while holding the eye contact, his long black hair looking like a stallion’s mane, his eyes narrowing as he laughed. “Those are indeed the facts, I suppose. You were drugged, and now you are naked in a hotel room. As for your memory . . . yes, the strain of aruha that grows in Habeetha is more potent, and it does cause a blackout effect. Too bad. I am sure you would enjoy the memories of last night, Professor Janice.” He paused. “May I call you Jan?”
She snorted. “You may not call me anything. We don’t know each other, and we never will, after what you’ve done.”
“I disagree,” Ephraim said drolly, raising an eyebrow and rubbing his stubble. “We already know a lot about each other simply from our actions.”
“What actions? I didn’t—”
“You knew what was in that tea, and you drank it anyway. That means you’d tasted aruha before, and since it only grows in the desert around the Golden Oasis, it must have been Darius who gave it to you the first time.” Ephraim paused, that smirk returning as his eyes gleamed. “The good Sheikh Darius. Did he tell you I was the evil king in this story? Are you sure you know who is the good king and who is the evil one?”
Jan took a breath and frowned as her head spun. A part of her still couldn’t fathom why she’d downed that tea when she tasted the drug in it. Did she want to be powerless and vulnerable? Did she want to give up control and let the so-called evil Sheikh have his way with her? Was it because of the madness of what she was getting herself into, the strange mix of guilt and excitement that was impelling her forward even though by all logic she was in a situation that was disgusting at best and deadly at worst? After all, these were kings threatening to send their armies into battle for the future of their kingdoms! Would they even think twice about manipulating and using her, disposing of her if it suited them?
“He told me . . .” she started to say. “He told me . . .”
“Say no more,” Ephraim whispered, still smirking though his eyes revealed something that made Jan shiver—and not in fright but excitement. “Your actions have told me enough. The game is on and you are playing it, Professor Johansen. We are all playing it. Darius set this in motion, but all three of us have made conscious, deliberate moves. I made the move of drugging you. You made the move of allowing yourself to be drugged. Now it is time for Darius’s next move. I am hitting the ball back to him.”
Jan frowned, pulling the sheets tight around her curves and then glaring up at him as that sense of excitement grew to the point where all fear was gone and it was just excitement. “I’m the ball in this game? Did you just call me a ball?”
Ephraim took a step forward, his dark eyes shining as he cocked his head. Slowly he walked toward her, and now Jan could smell him, an earthy, heavy musk of sandalwood and desert oak that overwhelmed her senses as she felt her nipples stiffen beneath the sheets. What was she doing? Was she actually flirting with this asshole?
Slowly the dark Sheikh circled her as she stood there barefoot and vulnerable, and the arousal began to build as her thighs tingled, her buttocks tightened, her toes curled. When he got so close she could feel his clean, warm breath on her bare neck, the wetness began to flow from her secret space, and when he brought his lips close to her face, she opened her mouth and gently sighed as she felt herself close to losing control.
“There will come a time when I shall call you what I want, when I want,” he whispered without touching her. He glanced into her eyes and she almost swooned as she sensed the movement in his fitted maroon pants as he stiffened, as if his cock was straining to be unleashed, as if her oozing cunt was calling out from beneath those white sheets. “But for now, I will call you Helen.” He took a long breath and smiled tightly, as if it was taking all his willpower to not touch her, to not take her. “My attendants will bring your clothes back shortly. There will be a car waiting for you whenever you choose to leave. Good day . . . Helen. It is time for you to return to the good Sheikh Darius.”
Jan blinked and frowned as the Sheikh suddenly stepped away from her and walked across the room toward the door. She blinked again when she saw the way his trousers were peaked at the front. Clearly he was aroused beyond belief. The way he’d backed off confused her even more than him calling her Helen when he knew her real name was Jan. Helen? Who was Helen?
And then it hit her. Helen of Troy. The woman who’d been kidnapped by a king, starting a war that changed the course of history. Suddenly she knew he hadn’t raped her. He hadn’t even touched her. And something about the way he’d backed off despite his arousal told her that perhaps he hadn’t even undressed her himself, had perhaps not even taken the liberty of looking at her naked body when she was passed out.
Helen of Troy. That was his first move, wasn’t it? Ephraim wanted to see if he could provoke Darius into doing something rash, perhaps even violent. That’s why he wanted her to think she’d been raped. Yes, of course! She’d go running back to the good Sheikh Darius, tell him what the evil King Ephraim had done, and spark a war! Was Ephraim testing Darius to see if Jan meant anything to him? Was he testing Jan to see what she’d do? Was he testing himself? All three at once? Who knew?
Only one way to find out, she decided as the blood rushed to her head. Only one way.
“Helen of Troy wasn’t sent back, you know,” she called after him, her heart almost beating its way out of her chest when she realized what she was doing.
The Sheikh stopped at the door, his broad back to her, his thick long hair looking wild against the dark red of his jacket. Slowly he turned, and it took all of Jan’s strength to stay focused on his face and not the enormous peak at the front of his trousers. “Ya Allah,” he whispered as his jaw went tight and his eyes blazed a deep green. Slowly he looked her up and down, his lips trembling as he clenched his fists. “Careful,” he whispered. “Once you step all the way into the arena, there is no stepping out until the game is finished.”
He took a step and stopped, his eyes giving her one last chance to take back the move she was making. But Jan was outside herself now, logic and common sense thrown to the wind, her entire being operating on nothing but instinct and intuition. And though every part of her brain screamed for her to stop, her body wouldn’t listen, and slowly her fingers loosened their grip on those sheets.
The soft white cloth slipped off her shoulders, past her
breasts, finally falling away, leaving her naked as the day she was born, smooth white breasts with peaked red nipples, her dark brown triangle shamelessly exposed to the man who’d abducted her. She could smell herself, wet and ready, hot and heavy, and as the Sheikh’s entire body tensed up visibly, she whispered from a part of her that she didn’t know existed:
“I think I’m already in the arena, Sheikh Ephraim. I’m already in it.”
16
He came to her slowly, deliberately, stripping as he approached. First the dark red jacket dropped to the carpet, then the fitted white shirt was unbuttoned and removed. He stopped in front of her, bare-chested and hard, unbuckling his belt as Jan watched in a state somewhere between paralyzing shock and overwhelming arousal.
Oh, God, what am I doing, came the desperate thought when she felt her own wetness dripping down the insides of her quivering thighs as she stared at Ephraim’s thick brown pectorals, heavy and glistening in the yellow light, his tight dark nipples like black moons, his abdomen built with ridges of dark muscle, a sharp treasure trail of coarse hair running from his belly button down the front of his pants.
Jan swooned when Ephraim slid his heavy leather belt through the loops and dropped his pants, smoothly stepping out of them and straightening to full height, baring his broad shoulders, cracking his neck as if stretching before a fight. He stood before her in just his black underwear, which was straining to hold the heavy swell of his crotch. Jan could clearly see the outline of his cock, coiled like a python, thick like a log, its head pushing against the black silk of his underwear like it was trying to burst free and take her. His thighs were like tree-trunks, rippled with muscle, lined with veins, and Jan swallowed hard as she tried to push away a vivid image of Ephraim’s beast of a cock disappearing between her legs as those powerful thighs of his pumped her so hard she screamed. What was happening to her? What kind of a woman had she become? Or was she always this woman?
Shared for the Sheikh: A Royal Billionaire Romance Novel (Curves for Sheikhs Series Book 10) Page 7
