Stockings for the Sheikh: A Royal Billionaire Romance Novel (Curves for Sheikhs Series Book 5)

by Annabelle Winters

  “What God do I answer to in the darkness,” she whispered again as he looked down past his hard, tensed up body at this woman in her hijab, and she was a nun and a witch, a priestess and a whore, somehow balancing the darkness he had awakened in her with the natural light that was her gift, her gift to the world, her gift to him.

  Ya, Allah, she is calling forth my darkness now, is she not, he thought as he watched her go down to her knees and grasp his throbbing, glistening cock by the shaft, her other hand massaging his heavy balls as she looked up at him with those brown-black eyes, those dark-red lips, that smile that showed she had somehow conquered him even though she was on her knees before him.

  “What God do I answer to now,” she whispered again, slowly pulling on his shaft as his balls seized up, his release gathering, that beast inside him saying that it was his turn to lead again, to respond with that delightful darkness she was calling out in him with her touch, her look, her words, her smile.

  “You answer to me,” he thundered now, his voice making the metal bars vibrate with joy as the Sheikh reached through those iron bars and grasped her by the hair, tight and full, making her wince and look up at him, mouth hanging open. Then he yanked her head back close against the bars, and pushed his long, gleaming cock all the way in, all the goddamn way, gritting his teeth as she choked and gagged and then relaxed and took him.

  “I am the God you answer to down here,” he whispered into the darkness as he held her head tight and with a deep, guttural groan began to thrust. “You answer to me.”

  44

  “So what God do you answer to now?” Grady asked as he glanced over at Clarissa as she stood there in sunglasses and a scarf, black jeans and black cashmere, black leather choker still around her neck.

  “For fuck’s sake, Grady. Stop it. At least I don’t answer to a wife and three screaming brats,” she snapped, lowering her shades for a moment and glaring at Grady.

  Grady sighed as he checked the time. He glanced up at the flight monitors just below the sign that said Dubai Airport. Then he sighed again. “It’s two children, and they’re very well-behaved teenagers now. And it’s ex-wife, by the way. Now remind me again why we’re sitting here in the middle of the goddamn night, waiting for some tiny puddle-jumper to take us from Dubai to Nihaara? I mean, surely Akbar could send us his private jet, considering what you just did for him. If he weren’t in jail, I guess. Apparently waiting for you of all people to save his royal ass.” One more sigh, and then Grady muttered, “And remind me again why the hell you needed to drag ME along on this desert safari?”

  “Desert safari? Be nice, Grady,” Clarissa said. “These people aren’t animals, you know.”

  “I was talking about you, Clarissa.”

  “Oh, snap. Very nice, little cousin. But let’s back up a sec. Ex-wife? When did that happen? Do tell!”

  Grady shrugged. “Been in the works some time now. Just wanted to wait till the youngest turned sixteen. It’s all cool, though. We’re always going to be great friends. Always going to be family.”

  Clarissa sniffed once. “Well, that’s not very exciting.” She looked at her phone. “So you’re finally admitting you’re gay, huh.” She smiled now, sticking out her tongue at Grady, who didn’t react. Didn’t react at all.

  Now Clarissa put her phone down and lowered her sunglasses again, finally taking those shades off and staring at her cousin. “Wait, why aren’t you laughing or telling me to fuck off? Grady? Grady? Really? Ohmygod, are you serious? Well, that’s . . . that’s AWESOME!”

  Grady raised an eyebrow and swallowed hard. “Really?”

  “Well, of course, honey! You gotta accept who you are and let your freak-flag fly! Always! Like I know I’m a kinky, twisted bitch who’d piss on a Bible while spitting on the Quran.”

  “OK, keep it down,” Grady rasped, staring wide-eyed to see if anyone heard. “This is the United Arab Emirates, and I think what you just said will get you forty lashes in the town square.” He paused a moment, shrugged and narrowed his eyes. “Of course, you’d like that, wouldn’t you, you kinky, twisted bitch.”

  And Clarissa spread her long wingspan out wide and went to Grady and hugged him in a way that made her feel strangely warm, like maybe she wasn’t that far gone, like maybe there was a little bit of humanity alive in that twisted shell that looked great in tight jeans and rawhide.

  A little bit of humanity that along with the warmth whispered a little bit of cold truth to her, a truth that she had perhaps known all along but couldn’t acknowledge, the truth that Akbar wasn’t hers, had never been hers, could never be hers because he had given himself to someone else, given himself in a way he couldn’t give himself to her, couldn’t give himself to any other woman, because the universe simply wouldn’t allow it.

  That inexplicable feeling of despair rose as she watched the people walk by, people in hijabs and salwar-suits, Indian sarees and Arabian tunics, and Clarissa frowned as she looked down at her hands, her ringless hands, and she wondered what the hell she was thinking, wondered what the hell she was doing, wondered what kind of woman she had become, what kind of woman she wanted to be.

  And as she seriously considered just saying fuck it and heading back home, the boarding announcement for the flight to Nihaara rang out above her seat, and at the same time her phone vibrated in her pocket, and as she reached for the phone her fingers closed on that piece of paper where she had signed her name without much thought, and as she frowned and stared at those Arabic letters, she got a strange feeling that she should keep going, that maybe there was something waiting for her in that God-forsaken desert country.

  45

  Perhaps there is indeed no point in waiting any longer, Prince Kaizad thought as he watched that wiry emissary with the intelligent eyes and the quiet voice leave his chambers.

  Yes, what have I been waiting for, he thought now as he went over what the emissary had told him about ascendancy and the laws, the choice he had placed before Akbar, the conversation he had had with the American woman, the choice he was now placing before Kai himself. Ya, Allah, here I am at age twenty-four, still a virgin, still a child in so many ways! I can make all the excuses I want about being coddled and sheltered, spoiled and pampered, perhaps brainwashed and bullied into staying a boy well into manhood, but in the end it is my life and my responsibility to grow up. So perhaps this is my call, a sign from Allah that I must step up and be a man. And the first act of being a man is to take a woman.

  But who will be that woman, Kai thought as he thought back to what the emissary had said about the time pressure. Yes, the emissary had made it clear that if Akbar and the American woman were married by the New Year—assuming the American woman completed her conversion—then Akbar of course would take over as Sheikh. But that was not playing on Kai’s mind now as he paced his chambers in this dark hour before dawn. No, the Sheikhood was the least of his concerns. Akbar was clearly the right man to rise up, and Kai somehow knew that Akbar sensed this and would figure out a solution like he always did through the sheer power of his will.

  No, none of that troubled Kai right now. What was making him pace was the anxiety that this last conversation about marriage and women had awoken in him. An anxiety that he had carried with him for a long time, ever since he had ogled at the buttocks of those female attendants who served his mother and aunts and were like family themselves, ever since he had stared at the bulging breasts and swinging hips of the other queens, his stepmothers, always wanting to touch but always feeling the shame of lust, a shame that he sensed came from being raised almost entirely by these women, women he of course could not lust after without venturing into the dark realm of taboo.

  So what now, Allah, he wondered as he stepped out onto the balcony and looked at the setting moon, its crescent almost a smile in the deep blue of the sky. Who now, what now, where now?

  And as the anxious young prince, that virgin with the cherubic face, Snow White’s lumbering dwarf, turned away from the vista
, across that starry sky zipped a small plane, the first daily flight in from Dubai Airport . . .

  Be careful what you wish for, young prince, whispered that smiling moon, cackling with mischief and delight. Because here she comes, forked tongue and bitch boots, tight jeans and rawhide. Allah hu Akbar, baby. Yee haw, here she comes.

  46

  Here he comes, she thought as she felt the Sheikh’s body tense up, his fingers digging into her thick hair and pulling hard from down by the roots, holding her head in place so tight Elle couldn’t move if she wanted to. He was behind bars but his power totally controlled her, controlled her in the most wonderful way, and she could feel herself smile as she sucked him, the last vestiges of shame and self-consciousness stripped away as she pulled at his balls with one hand, stroked his muscular thighs with the other, running her fingers along the underside of his wet shaft each time she drew back, reveling in how this man trembled at her every stroke, shuddered as she sucked him, groaned as she massaged his balls, now calling out to his God and her God as he went up on his toes and pushed himself down her throat and flexed as he prepared to explode in her warm mouth.

  “Inshallah and Amen,” he grunted as she felt his hand close around the back of her neck, other hand still in her hair, his double grip locking her head in place as his body tensed up for that release, his balls seized up to deliver their load. “All Gods are one just like we are one, my angel of light. All Gods are one, and we are God. Together we become God. Inshallah and Amen.”

  And then he came. Inshallah, he came. Amen, he came. Oh fuck, he came.

  And only when the Sheikh’s body stopped thrashing against the metal bars in ecstasy, his cock flexing and pumping its sweet heat down her throat, his balls seizing and releasing as he came hard, came long, came deep . . . yes, only when he released his death grip on her head and staggered back from the bars, his long cock sliding out of her mouth, saliva and semen rolling off the throbbing shaft as he muttered and groaned and fell against the back wall, shattered by his orgasm . . . only then did Elle sit back on her bottom, gathering her hijab around her as she took deep, gulping breaths in the darkness . . . only then did it come back to her what the Sheikh had muttered about finding Christ through his “captor. ”

  His captor and her . . . her mother?

  47

  “I am her mother,” said Beth Easton, bowing her head and then looking up and smiling at the old Sheikh in his purple easy-chair.

  “Whose mother?” the old Sheikh Salim asked, frowning as he glanced over at the terrified attendant who seemed to have realized that Beth had tricked him into bringing her to the king by saying she had an appointment.

  “The beautiful, strong woman who is to be your daughter-in-law,” said Beth, holding the smile even as panic raged through her frame, panic that this wasn’t going to work.

  Between Kai and the Internet, Beth had a pretty good idea of what was happening, of what was going to happen, of what could go wrong, of what should go right. The one thing she couldn’t figure out was how much the old king himself knew. It seemed that everyone from Akbar and his brothers to the few news reporters who were covering the story in depth were simply assuming that the old king was indeed unhinged, senile, perhaps completely insane. And that seemed like an oversight to Beth. She herself wasn’t close to eighty, but age had taught her enough that she was confident that people didn’t get stupider, they instead got wiser, they didn’t lose their faculties of logic and common sense but it sometimes seemed like that because they simply didn’t give two hoots about what others thought.

  Yes, certainly this man was homophobic and stuck in the past, but so was the Catholic Church on matters like that, Beth had thought for some time. And so she had come here, despite her misgivings, despite her fear that she might make a mess of things if this man truly had no idea that these conspiracies were brewing around him and the world was waiting for the poor man’s birthday to unceremoniously take away that purple throne that looked suspiciously like her late husband’s Lay-Z Boy which she always hated.

  “The American girl,” he said grumpily, glaring at the attendant and then focusing on Beth, his old eyes looking remarkably lucid, Beth thought.

  “She’s a woman, not a girl,” said Beth, smiling pleasantly.

  “Ah, she is not your little girl?” said the old Sheikh, smiling now, gold fillings flashing in the early morning sun that was still not strong enough to hide that smiling crescent moon.

  Of course she’s my little girl, Beth thought. But she didn’t answer. “And is Mohammed not your little boy? Is Akbar not your little boy?”

  The old Sheikh’s smile changed form, and Beth swore she could see a twinkle in that man’s dark eyes as he narrowed his gaze and rubbed his scraggly white beard and touched a button on his purple throne, bringing up the backrest and making him look taller as he sat there.

  “It is my family, and my family is not your business,” he said gruffly.

  “Actually, it’s soon going to be my family as well,” said Beth. “When our children are married, we’re going to be one family, like it or not, Sheikh Salim.”

  The Sheikh snorted. “Married? I have not been informed of any marriage.”

  Beth held her frame. “But you aren’t a fool, Sheikh. You obviously know that Akbar arrived here with an American woman and . . .”

  “And her mother, yes. Obviously,” said the old Sheikh, raising a bushy eyebrow as he waved away an attendant who had shown up with a silver metal pot of Arabian sweet tea. “No, I am not a fool. Not the fool everyone else seems to believe. Still, the fact remains that I have not been informed of any marriage.”

  “Well, I’m informing you,” said Beth as she realized now there was no turning back and those years of prayer had better start paying dividends and help her get this right.

  The old Sheikh moved in his chair, but there was no outburst of rage, like Beth had perhaps expected before coming in here. If anything, the man seemed quite calm, almost like he was in control of everything that was happening—or at least aware of it.

  The old Sheikh nodded now. Just once. “My son must marry a Muslim woman. Is your daughter Muslim?”

  Beth took a breath and held her head high and met the king’s gaze. “My daughter must marry a Christian man. Is your son Christian?”

  Now that gold-tinted smile broke through the old Sheikh’s white beard, and he nodded again and finally sat back in his chair. “I think we both know the answers to our questions, do we not?”

  And now Beth smiled, looking down at the sandstone floor and then back up at the old Sheikh. “Are you sure, great Sheikh? Are you sure?”

  48

  “What?” said Akbar, staring at Elle through those bars. “You did WHAT? Tell me you are joking, Elle! Tell me this is a lie!”

  Elle reached beneath her hijab, to the waistband of her panties, where that paper was folded and still tucked in tight.

  “Nope,” she said. “There are still some ceremonies and lessons and all that which need to happen over the next few months, but as of now, I’m a—”

  “Stop!” he shouted, raising his hand and lowering his head. “Stop talking. Just stop talking. I cannot hear this.” Now the Sheikh paced behind those metal bars, a deep frown on his face, the long brown muscles of his naked thighs glistening in the darkness as Elle watched him in silence.

  “Elle,” he said now, his voice low, an expression she could not quite understand on his handsome brown face. “Elle, you know I would never ask you to do that for me, no matter what the cost, no matter how long I have to sit in this cell, no matter how long Mohammed has to stay in prison. I would never—”

  “I know,” she said softly. “Of course I know. And that’s why I did it, Akbar. That’s why I did it without any thought, without any guilt, without even a hint of that sick feeling I expected to get when I signed that paper.” She shook her head now, looking down at herself in that black hijab, now absentmindedly pulling at the veil that covered her hair. �
�I mean, I’ve got my faith, and I’ll always have my faith. And perhaps I’m going to burn in hell or something, but it certainly doesn’t feel that way. If anything, it feels like if there is a God or Gods or Goddesses or whatever, then they’re looking down at me and saying I did exactly the right thing, that in a way by forsaking the narrow view of God claimed by one religion and pledging myself to another religion’s equally narrow view of the same God I’m perhaps more religious . . . truly and honestly religious . . . than so many who go through the motions of church or mosque, baptism or namaaz, mutter the words of prayer while scrolling through their iPhones on Sundays.” She sighed now, blinking and shaking. “I don’t know if that makes sense, Akbar. But it makes sense to me. Does it make sense? Do you understand? Can you unders—”

  “Elle . . . oh, Elle, Elle, ELLE!” he roared now, his body doubling over as he placed his palms against the back wall and pushed against it like he was a brown, naked Samson or a glistening Atlas. “Elle, of course I understand. Of course I understand. I understand because I have lived it. Because I have . . . because I have . . . ya, Allah . . . I mean by Christ . . . I mean . . . oh, God, come here. Come here and listen.”

  “What?” she said, frowning as she stepped close to the bars once more even as the meaning of his words began to dawn on her, the understanding coming through along with the annoyingly self-righteous voice of her mother, who seemed to be shrugging and saying stuff like, “I know what I know,” and “Your mother was right,” and “Mom will handle it.”

  49

  “I know what I know,” Beth said.