by Ella Brooke
"It will go more smoothly if I am the one who is paying anyway," he said, waving his hand. "Do not trouble yourself."
And of course there was Adil.
Ever since her realization at Marissa's first hospital visit, Annabel could feel the love she had for him fluttering like a bird under her heart. Every day, she could feel it more strongly, and with every smile he gave her, every touch, every sweet gesture, she knew that he was what she wanted.
He was with them constantly in their desert hideaway, and when he had to return to the city for an appearance or to meet with officials within the government, he was always back in a day or two.
They had fallen into a pattern. On the nights when he returned, the three of them ate dinner as a family, and then after Marissa had gone to sleep, Adil and Annabel went out to the sheltered pavilion behind the house. There was a sunken fire-pit with bench seating around it, and as Adil stoked a fire, Annabel carried out some blankets from the house to fend off the night's encroaching chill.
"I was never meant to live in the city," Adil said one night. Annabel snuggled close under his arm, half asleep as she stared at the fire, but at his words, she looked up.
"What do you mean?"
"The al Mahsi clan, we have ruled for a long time, and we did not win our right to do so by sitting in large glass buildings and smiling for investors. We were nomadic before we settled here in Sakhi, riders who went wherever we wished, who raided and herded and lived our lives under the open sky."
"Do you ride?" she asked softly, and he glanced down at her with a smile.
"I do. Perhaps some time soon, I will have some of my stable sent here. I find that I do miss it, and I am sure that there is a gentle-tempered gelding among my herd that would suit Marissa very well. For you, perhaps a lovely mare, or perhaps... perhaps you would ride with me."
Annabel laughed a little.
"I'm afraid I would disappoint you if you were a nomadic chieftain," she said. "I've never been on a horse a day in my life."
She gasped as he took her by the shoulders and dragged her on top of him. With an ease that spoke of his great strength, he lay back on the bench, letting her drape over him like a blanket.
"Oh I wouldn't say that," he said mildly. "One of the things that kept the nomadic nations strong was our interest in strong breeding stock of all kinds."
Annabel couldn't help but squirm slightly as his hands squeezed her haunches. She could feel the warmth of his body even through their clothes.
"Oh really?" she asked, her voice deep and husky, and he grinned, his teeth flashing white in the darkness.
"Hmm, yes. So perhaps I stole you from your own clan, or perhaps you were even given to me, designed to buy my goodwill and clemency. You would be taught to ride, even if you had never done such a thing before, and at night, well, I would teach you a different sort of riding.
"That sounds... terrifying and exhilarating," Annabel said. She could hear the desire in her own voice, and she could feel it in his body. He pressed his hips up against hers, and she could feel the hardness of his male desire.
"Perhaps you would be terrified at first, but I know you. Soon, you would lose your fear. Soon, you would be an excellent rider."
She started to say that she didn't know about that, that she was never someone who had excelled at any kind of sport, but then he cupped his hand around the nape of her neck, bringing her down for a kiss that lit the fire inside her immediately.
"Oh!"
He kissed her until she felt as if sensations were overrunning her body. Everywhere his hand could touch, there was desire and need. On one side, she could feel the warmth of the fire. She could also feel the chill of the desert night, and she wondered if this was what a sold young woman would have felt, alone for the first time with a desert lord who watched her with eyes of obsidian.
Adil only broke the kiss to reach for the blanket draped over the back of the bench. Annabel had only just brought it from the house, and it was soft and clean, smelling slightly of the pine sachet with which it had been stored. He draped it over Annabel, and then he grinned up at her.
"I do not want you to catch a chill tonight," he murmured, "not when you are so warm for me..."
Annabel bit her lip at how good he felt underneath her, but she started to rise with reluctance.
"All my clothes," she murmured, but he kept her still, shaking his head.
"I'm not worried about your clothes," he murmured, and there was such desire in his voice that she shivered, eyes wide.
Slowly, as if he had all the time in the world, he inched her long skirt up over her hips. The blanket kept her covered, but when she felt its smooth surface against her bare legs, she suddenly felt even more naked than she would have if it wasn't there.
"My beautiful captive prize," h murmured. "I would not want to you to sicken or even be uncomfortable. You are mine now, and I mean to take the best care of you..."
She felt him dig for the small pocketknife that he always carried with him. She shivered when he flipped the small blade out, and then under the blanket, she felt the moving prick of cold along her thigh. He was tracing the blunt edge of the knife against her skin, but it wasn't just to make her shiver.
"I want you to hold very still, my beauty."
He nudged the blade between her skin and the wispy waistband of her panties, and then with a smooth pull, he ripped the fabric along that side. It was even easier for Adil to cut out the second side, and in a moment, he had put away the knife and tugged away the scrap of cloth that had once been lingerie.
Throughout all of this, Annabel had sat very still, both in respect to the knife and to the desire that was beginning to raise a demanding voice through her. Adil's warm had retraced the path the cold knife had taken, and he looked up at her, the firelight reflected in his eyes.
"I want you," he growled. "Now."
There were a dozen reasons to simply rise, douse the fire and walk the very short distance back to the bedroom that they shared, but Annabel could feel all of her objections melt in the face of the need they had between them. Instead, all she could do was nod mutely and rise up as he fumbled with his own trousers.
He had been nothing but graceful with the knife in his hands, but there was something clumsier about him now.
"I have... missed... you so much," he murmured low in his throat, as if it was something that was difficult for him to say,. There was a tremble in his hands, and she marveled that she bring this reaction about in a man that had everything.
He had taken her with little preparation before, but she was never unready. A few strokes of his skillful fingers was sometimes all she needed before she was keening for him, and now he sought her depths with his hands. She groaned when she felt his fingertips sliding over the center of her desire, but when she could feel the blunt strength of his manhood pressed against her, she knew that nothing else was going to enough, not at all.
"No," she whispered, her voice hoarse with a need that she could barely explain. "I need you, and I need you now..."
He groaned at her words, and she could intimately feel the effect that they had on him as well. His hard flesh pressed against her even more firmly, and she knew she had to have him, needed more than he had given her.
"You're not ready," he growled, but his hips flexed up against her, telling her that he was nearing the edge of his control.
"I am, I am, I am always so ready for you," she gasped, and she could feel his control, that finely tuned machine that allowed him to rule as he did, shatter into a million pieces.
He took hard grip on her hips and lifted her as if she were a doll. For a few agonizing moments, he pressed his manhood against her without entering, making them both moan. Then he pushed up inside her, joining them intimately with a single stroke.
Annabel cried out in pleasure, her fingernails digging hard into his shoulders, but before she could even process how good it felt, how complete he made her, he started to move. He dug his heels into
the bench, and now he was pushing up against her.
Riding, the thought occurred in her head, and yes, she could see that. She could feel how powerful and muscular he was underneath her, and she could feel all of that power leashed under her thighs. The loose coil of heat that had built up in her belly started to tighten up more and more, and every muscle in her body started to tense.
"Touch yourself," Adil growled, utter command in his voice. "I want to feel you..."
She stifled a groan. She had told him once how shy she was about her own pleasure, how with Iain it had always been a secondary thing that she had had to hide. Now Adil was asking for it, no, demanding it, and she found herself helpless except to comply.
She sat up slightly even as he continued thrusting up into her, and she made enough space to slide her own fingers down between their bodies. She whimpered when she felt her own wetness, and clumsily, she started to touch herself as Adil loved to do.
For him, she thought wildly. I would only ever do this for him...
The thought exploded bright and white in her mind, and just a few minutes after that, the heat inside her drew together and made her start to shake. She buried her face in his chest as her climax struck with no mercy at all. Her body lit up from the inside out, and she bit her lip so she wouldn't simply scream with it. Almost as soon as her climax peaked, Adil's body arched up and his hands dug hard into her hips, dragging her as close to him as he could get.
Under the blanket by the fire, they gave themselves to each other, and only the desert was witness to their sated desire.
It took Annabel several moments to bring herself back under control. Even after the first tide of her pleasure receded, she could feel herself shaking. Her body hadn't yet cooled from their exertions when she could feel tears leaking from her eyes.
She was quiet, because she knew that it was not pain or grief that caused them, but when they dripped onto Adil's neck, he stiffened.
"Are you all right?" he asked, his voice hoarse. "Did we do something that hurt you?"
He lifted her off of him and started to pull away, but she held him down with her hand pressed against his shoulder.
"No, not at all, it is just..."
She sought for a word that would explain how she felt to him, but in the end, she was left shrugging and snuggling back down on top of him.
"It was just intense," she murmured, and after a moment, she could feel him relax.
His arms came up to loop around her loosely in a soft embrace, and she could hear him sigh.
"I cannot hurt you," he said. "You must not allow me to do so."
"I'm not sure that that is something within my control," she said with a slight laugh, and he growled deep in his throat.
"I mean it, Annabel," he said. "You must not let me hurt you. It would kill me if I did."
There was something strangely touching about his words, and she lifted herself up enough to look down at him.
"I promise," she said, and only then did he look a little bit relieved.
"Good," he said, and he brought her down for another kiss.
They did not make love again that night, but until the fire died down to coals, they kissed and touched under the blanket. The sky spun over them, and as they returned to the house, moving quickly because of the chill, Annabel wondered if anyone had ever felt as good as she did.
Then she remembered that earlier, when she had been describing her tears to him, she realized that intense was only a pale imitation of the words she had truthfully wanted to use to describe what it had been like when they were together.
I'm in love with you, and it is so beautiful.
Adil, exhausted from his time in the city and his trip back to them, fell asleep nearly immediately when they lay down, but Annabel stayed up much longer, resting with her hand laid over his heart.
Should she tell him? Was it wise?
Chapter Thirteen
Adil could feel the irritation and frustration coiling inside him as the minister of finance droned on and on. The man had a gift for turning mountains into molehills and for making sure that things that should have taken some twenty minutes take an hour. The man had gone over the same budgeting restrictions twice now, and Adil was sure that the other members of the committee sighed with relief when he finally brought it to a close.
"I think we've heard enough to make our decision, minister," he said, trying to keep his voice as kind and as level as he could. "Thank you."
As the meeting ended and he headed out towards his dark car, he couldn't stop his thoughts from turning to Annabel as they so often did these days.
Sakhi was one of the greatest cities in the world, with a tradition that went back centuries and a modern sensibility for skyscrapers and ultramodern fare that could compete with Tokyo and London, but it was lacking these days.
Adil wasn't sure that he understood it himself. No matter what he planned or what business called him to Sakhi, there was always a part of him these days that longed to be at the hacienda on the edge of the desert. Just seeing Annabel and Marissa after a few days away was like waking up from a bad dream. Suddenly all of the stress and frustration of the day before was gone, and he was where he wanted to be, doing exactly what he wanted to do.
It was still early enough to call Annabel, and like a silly teenager, he counted the rings until she picked up. It only took three, and there was a slightly breathless quality to her words that made him wonder if she had run for her phone.
"Hi!" she said. "It was getting late enough I wasn't sure that you would get to call..."
"Believe me, I didn't think that I was going to get to either," he said making a face. "but right now, about the last thing in the world that I want to talk about is the budgeting plans for the trade commission this year. Tell me what you are doing today instead."
He leaned back in the plush leather seat of his car and let his eyes drift closed as she spoke. Strange, Adil had never thought that he would be fascinated to hear about a mother talking about the fact that she and her daughter had done plant rubbings with thin paper and crayons that day, but here he was.
"And let's see, I made us a roasted garlic and bean soup for lunch, and Marissa liked that a great deal. I wonder if it's one that you would like as well; I could certainly cook it for you when you got back. I sincerely doubt that Marissa will mind having it again."
"That sounds very good," he said with a chuckle. "I've been eating terribly since I've been back in the city, nothing but street food and whatever catering the men running the meetings have decided is appropriate."
"Aw, poor thing. We'll be sure to feed you up when you get back."
Suddenly, Adil found it in himself to hate this arrangement. Sometimes he could be gone for four or five days from the desert. He hadn't been kept away more than week, but it was bound to happen at some point. Flying back and forth was simple enough, but the sheer amount of time away was beginning to wear on him.
He listened as Annabel told him about what else they had been doing, but a part of his brain was working fast. He had thought for the first few months that he was simply a little restless at being in the city because the desert was calling him, because he had always felt as if he were made for the desert. Now, though, he realized that whatever pull the desert had on him, it was nothing compared to the pull that Annabel and Marissa had. It was the small family that he had found, and suddenly, he did not want to be without them. It was a strange realization, and he didn't notice how deeply in thought he was until Annabel laughed at him.
"What, what is it?"
"You are not listening to me at all," she said with a giggle. "I just told you that Marissa is really enjoying her modern warfare and tactics class at the school."
"Well, it is a very good school," he said with as much dignity as he could muster. "I am certain that their curriculum is well-chosen for the future leaders of the world."
She laughed again, and he realized he had never quite heard a sound that he enjoyed so we
ll.
"All right, that's your story so you should stick with it," she said. "But it really does sound as if you need a bite to eat and some sleep. I don't know if it's right or not, but when you said hello, your voice made it sound as if you have been dragging yourself through the worst parts of the apocalypse."
Adil sighed.
"I suppose it has felt a bit like that lately," he said. "I wanted to see if it was possible to get home tonight, but I am not sure it wouldn't be better to fly in tomorrow morning."
She sighed, and he could hear a genuine longing in her voice for him.
"I want nothing more than for you to be sleeping next to me tonight, but it probably is best for you to stay where you are. Getting on your plane tonight is just more trouble, and that might mean that you are even more exhausted when you get here.
"Get some sleep, and maybe we'll see you for lunch tomorrow?"
"Breakfast if I can swing it," he promised, and she laughed again.
"Just get some rest. I... I am thinking of you, all right? And Marissa is too."
"All right, that sounds good. I am thinking of you every moment, and I will get back to you and Marissa as soon as I can."
They said their good-nights, but Adil did not immediately start driving. Instead he sat with his eyes closed, thinking about Annabel and her touch, her smile, and her grace.
When he had begun this endeavor, the quest to sire an heir with a woman he knew was a good mother, it had seemed very clear to him. A part of him had assumed that when he found her, a part of him had recognized what a good parent she would be and that she would be an excellent choice. Now he was wondering if it was something a great deal more primal, a great deal more basic than that.
The need that he had for her was elemental and primal, a hunger that seemed to reach throughout him. The fact that he would not see her that night made something inside him want to roar. The fact that he would see her as soon as he could tomorrow made that fury subside a little bit.
