Prince of the Desert

by Penny Jordan

  Now she was having to accept that he was a man of principle and integrity. And the only barrier she had to protect her was his lack of any real emotional interest in her.

  But that was all the barrier she needed, wasn’t it? After all, she wasn’t going to throw herself at him! What would she say?Take me—oh, and by the way, I’m still a virgin, even if you’ve refused to believe me, and now I get to prove it to you.

  ‘I appreciate your concern,’ she told him, trying to sound as cool and professional as she could. ‘But I’m sure I will be perfectly safe once I get home.’

  ‘I can’t afford to take the chance that you won’t be,’ Tariq informed her bluntly. ‘You may be aware that Zuran is investing its oil revenues in developing the country as a resort and sports destination. In order for us to succeed we need to be able to assure visitors of their safety. If you were to be followed home and attacked in some way it wouldn’t be very long before it became linked to your visit here. That could have an adverse effect on our reputation.’

  She couldn’t argue against what he was saying, Gwynneth knew, and, although she hated admitting it, what he had told her had left her feeling vulnerable and uneasy. He was plainly not going to give in—which meant that she would have to.

  ‘How long would I have to stay with you?’ she asked him with resignation.

  ‘Not long. A matter of a few days—a week at the most. The Chief of Police is virtually sure that they have all those involved in custody now. He simply wants to double check.’

  Gwynneth lifted her shoulders in a small shrug of defeat.

  ‘Very well. Mjenat has a fascinating history. In different circumstances I would have enjoyed visiting it, especially in view of your project to recreate the hanging gardens.’

  ‘Work in the valley has finished now, until the cooler weather returns. I do not want to disturb the wildlife by lighting the area at night, but I confess I am impatient to move things forward. It was my father’s idea originally, and I am sorry that he will never see the end result.’

  ‘It will be a wonderful testimony to him, though, won’t it?’ Gwynneth said quietly. ‘To both your parents, in fact. To create something so beautiful and fragile in such a hostile environment calls for a tremendous act of faith.’

  ‘The same could well be said of love within marriage,’ Tariq told her softly.

  Gwynneth looked at him. He was looking back at her. Suddenly she felt as though a subtle emotional change of gear had taken place. The silence they had been filling with their conversation had somehow deepened and almost wrapped itself around them, locking them together in a dangerous intimacy. If he came to her now…

  But he didn’t. Instead he stood up and said dismissively, as though he couldn’t even feel it, ‘We need to leave as soon as we can.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ‘I’M AFRAIDwe’re going to have to fend for ourselves whilst we’re here. My housekeeper and her husband are away on holiday,’ Tariq informed Gwynneth,

  They were in Mjenat, standing in the main courtyard to a large villa, having arrived only a few minutes earlier.

  ‘I’ll just deactivate the alarm system and then we can go in.’

  Gwynneth studied her surroundings covertly. A high perimeter wall protected both the villa’s privacy and its security. She had seen the discreetly placed security cameras as they drove into the valley itself, and Tariq had informed her that the collection of buildings just inside the valley were normally used to house those working there but that half a dozen policemen were already in residence there, along with back-up personnel to make sure that they didn’t get any unwanted visitors.

  His words were a reminder to her of just who and what he was.

  ‘I suppose that by rights I ought to be addressing you by your title,’ she commented, as he pushed open the high arched wooden doors.

  ‘I don’t use it—other than on State occasions or when my second cousin insists,’ he told her matter-of-factly, adding, ‘I don’t see the need. A man should surely be able to command the respect of others by virtue of his own acts, or not at all.’

  The interior of the villa, cool and shadowy after the heat outside, smelled faintly of incense and roses.

  ‘I will take you to the women’s quarters. Please follow me.’

  The women’s quarters.The words conjured up images of sloe-eyed concubines waiting dutifully to please their master.

  ‘The villa was built for my grandfather, and after my father’s death my mother chose to live as a traditional Muslim woman, keeping to her own quarters.’

  ‘But what about you? Were you allowed to live there with her?’

  He stopped walking to turn round and look at her, frowning slightly. Her question, with its obviously genuine concern, had caught him off guard. Listening to it, hearing the almost maternal anxiety of a woman for a child, touched gently on the painful bruises of his childhood which now as a man he preferred to forget he had once felt. And yet there was something sweetly healing and tender about hearing the emotion in Gwynneth’s voice legitimise his childhood pain.

  ‘I went to live in the palace in Zuran, where I became part of a household in which there were many other children,’ he answered her lightly. ‘As was the custom then, we were cared for by others.’

  In other words he had been abandoned by his parents in much the same way as she had been abandoned by hers. Without thinking, she reached out to touch his arm in an automatic gentle gesture of compassion. To her shock just the simple act of her fingertips brushing against his robe-covered forearm made her heart lurch against her ribs and her belly turn to liquid female heat. Her reasons for touching him were forgotten as she was overwhelmed by a need to slide her hand beneath the fabric of his sleeve so that she could stroke her fingertips through the soft furring of hair on his arm. She wanted to trace a line of hungry kisses from his throat all the way down to the flatness of his belly whilst she watched his helpless reaction to her touch; she wanted to lace her fingers through the darkness of his body hair where it grew soft and thick around the base of his manhood; she wanted to slowly and thoroughly explore every rigid inch of that male part of him until she knew the shape, texture, heat, scent and taste of ‘the pleasure giver—the great scimitar of love’, as she had smiled to see it described in a book on the Middle East. Presumably the words sounded far more impressive in Arabic.

  But she didn’t need words—the image she had conjured up inside her head was enough to melt her bones—and the walls she had thrown up inside herself against this kind of desire. She should not have agreed to come here with him. She was too vulnerable, both to him and to the way she felt about him.

  The way she loved him. The way she would always and for ever love only him. Fear quickened inside her, making her want to push back from the reality she had just exposed.

  As a child, confronted with her parents’ divorce, she had carefully picked up all the bits of the person who had once been her and tidied them away—just as her mother had always insisted she should pick up her toys and put them away. It had been her coping strategy then, and it still was now.

  Only this time it wasn’t working, and she wasn’t coping—because this time her sexuality, which she had always so tightly controlled, had rebelled and broken down the doors to its prison. And, what was more, it had freed the emotion which had been its cellmate as well. Between the two of them they were now intent on taking over the controls.

  This was crazy. How could she have let herself fall in love with Tariq?

  Tariq looked down to where Gwynneth’s hand lay against his arm.

  No one—not anyone at all, not even when he had been a child—had managed to break through his barriers and touch the heart of his pain so immediately or so accurately.

  But then, she was not just anyone. She was…

  She was a woman with a string of lovers in her past, who could walk out of his life even more easily than his father had done and hurt him far more badly.

  He lifte
d his own hand to remove hers from his body, but instead found he had placed it over hers, as though he wanted to keep it there.

  How could a mere silence be this intense and profound? This charged with emotional and sensual urgency and promise? They were even breathing together, their hearts pumping the blood through their bodies in perfect time with one another. They stepped closer to one another, as though they were engaged in the mutually known steps of some intimate private dance. From one synchronised breath to the wild, driving thrust of his body and the clamouring, seeking need of her own to be filled with it—it was the dance of life itself, Gwynneth recognised.

  Panic filled her. She wasn’t ready for this; she was too afraid of the emotional pain that would follow. She snatched her hand away from under Tariq’s and reminded him huskily, ‘The women’s quarters?’

  ‘They’re this way,’ Tariq answered tersely, turning away from her to stride so quickly down the corridor that she almost had to run to catch up with him.

  When he eventually pushed open the fretted double doors at the end of the corridor, Gwynneth waited until she was sure she wasn’t going to risk coming into any kind of contact with his body before she followed him into the room beyond them.

  Large and rectangular, the room was decorated in a very Moorish style, with stylised arches and alcoves and fretwork. It was furnished with low divans piled high with richly coloured silk cushions and beautiful Persian rugs.

  ‘This is the main salon. When the shutters are opened you will see that the room opens out onto a private courtyard. There are several bedrooms, all of which are prepared for occupation, so you may choose whichever you wish.’

  ‘Which was your mother’s?’ Gwynneth asked. ‘Only I wouldn’t want to…’

  ‘She had her own private suite within the women’s quarters. It is closed up now. I suggest you use the room closest to this salon. It too has direct access to the garden.’ He paused, the terseness leaving his voice as he added, ‘I am afraid that until my staff return we shall be eating from the freezer. For myself I don’t mind, but…’

  ‘You can cook?’ Gwynneth couldn’t conceal her disbelief.

  He gave a brief shrug. ‘Of course—if I have to. I learned around the campfires of our people. But since there are only the two of us here it makes more sense to eat the meals my chef has prepared and frozen. I’ll leave you to settle in now.’

  Settle in? How could she do that when she was going to be living under the same roof with him? Get a grip, Gwynneth advised herself unkindly. You’ve been sharing a two-bedroomed apartment, now you’re sharing a small palace. You probably won’t even see him.

  But somehow being here in what was the childhood home he had shared with his parents was far more intimate than sharing the apartment with him.

  Although she had told herself she would not do so, in the end Gwynneth settled on the bedroom Tariq had suggested—because it had access to the courtyard garden with which she had fallen totally in love.

  Tiled pathways led to rose-covered arbours, and beyond them to formal beds set out with plants and fruit trees. Fat goldfish swam lazily beneath the equally fat lily pads of the central pond. Beautifully detailed ornamental trellises divided the garden into separate rooms, each shaped like a pomegranate seed, which together, Gwynneth realized, formed a stylised pattern.

  But surely best of all was what she thought must be an Arabian Nights version of the modern Western outdoor hot tub. Enclosed by gold-and-blue painted trelliswork and smothered in scented pink roses, the rich blue-tiled tub was semi-sunken into the ground. Opposite the tub was an alcove containing a low wide divan the size of a double bed, its rich blue cover heaped with crimson, gold and jade silk cushions, and on the table between the divan and the tub there were several glass perfume bottles.

  The small area was a sybarite’s paradise, and it was all too easy for Gwynneth to imagine some naked houri enjoying the scented warmth of the water whilst her robed lover reclined against the cushions, enjoying watching her. Perhaps he would go to her, feed her a piece of sugar-dusted Turkish delight from his own plate with one hand whilst with the other he slowly caressed the naked curves of her exposed breasts, tasted the damask darkness of her nipples…

  Stop that, Gwynneth warned herself, as she wiggled her fingers experimentally in the crystal-clear water, savouring its warmth.

  She really shouldn’t be doing this, she told herself less than half an hour later, and she glanced round just to check that she was totally alone, before dropping the towel she had wrapped around herself and stepping into the tub. But she just hadn’t been able to resist.

  She reached for an overhanging rose that was already dropping its petals, harvesting them to scatter on the surface of the tub, breathing in their perfume.

  The water closed round her body like warm silk. There was no real reason why she shouldn’t indulge herself other than her own awareness of the sensuality of her private thoughts. But only she was privy to those, and, since Tariq had already said that he had work to do, she wasn’t going to be disturbed.

  Not by his presence, at least. But the thoughts she was having about him were certainly disturbing her, she admitted as she pushed through the water to the far side of the tub. A giveaway burn of colour heated her face as she felt the soft pressure of the water stroking between her legs as she moved. If she closed her eyes she could almost imagine that Tariq…

  The unfamiliar sensuality of her thoughts might be making her face burn, but her self-consciousness wasn’t strong enough to stop her hand from sliding down her body. Her breasts felt heavy, her nipples tight and aching. She was acutely physically aware of her own female flesh, of its pulse within the folds of her sex. She moved, not sure if her movement was designed to stop the quickening sensual beat or to savour it. She closed her eyes and let her body dictate to her mind the fantasy it wanted it to create.Tariq. His name filled the air around her, its vibration shimmering on the water and filling all her senses, even though she had only spoken it within herself.

  Tariq pushed back his computer chair and stood up. He had just received an e-mail from the Chief of Police, informing him that he now believed they had all the potential danger and those responsible for it under control.

  I would ask that you remain in Mjenat for the time being, though. Until I am able to formally confirm that it is safe for you to return to Zuran City.

  The Chief of Police and his men had been praiseworthily efficient and speedy. He glanced at his watch. He would go and tell Gwynneth. She would, he knew, be delighted to learn that their stay here in the villa was going to be so short-lived. And so, of course, was he.

  So why did the prospect fill his heart with something more akin to heaviness than relief? He was falling victim to his own imaginings, he derided himself as he made his way towards the women’s quarters.

  The sitting room was empty, and then Tariq saw that the doors were open to the garden. He headed for them, stepping through them and out onto the tiled terrace. The garden was silent, apart from the singing of the birds, and then he heard the small sound of the movement of gently lapping water. He stepped out into the garden and stood there bareheaded, his concentration that of a desert hunter, watchful and still, before he started to walk, as soft-footed as a sleek-pelted panther, following the sound of the water.

  She was half reclining, half seated in the hot tub, lying back, her eyes closed, her hair tied up on top of her head, loose tendrils caressing the pale oval of her face. Rose petals floated on the surface of the water, dappling small shadows through the water onto her naked body, their perfume intensified by the enclosed space and the heat of the sun. Unaware of his presence, she moved lazily in the water, her movement disturbing the petals and revealing the neat almost heart shape of her body hair, sleekly dark against the pearl beauty of her skin.

  From where he was standing he could look down and see the delicate shaping of the outer lips of her sex, now furled as neatly and tightly together as the shell of an oyster
. But, unlike the hard sharpness of a shell, the warm flesh of her lips could be teased apart by the stroke of his fingertip moving over and over again against them, until they swelled and parted of their own accord to offer him the pearl that lay within them, small and perfect, its female rigidity waiting eagerly for the caress of his hand and mouth.

  The ache in his body pounded out its unmistakable message.

  As he watched her she sighed and smiled, and lifted her hand to her midriff, letting it lie there as her fingers played against her own flesh. What was she thinking behind those closed eyelids? His own drooped as he let himself soak up the erotic visual stimulation of looking at her. A drifting rose petal rocked against the hard point of one not quite submerged nipple. A small convulsion rippled through her, as though even such slight stimulation was more than her body could endure without reacting. If a rose petal could do that, how would she react when it was his mouth that was stimulating those tight rose damson studs?