To Touch a Sheikh (Pride of Zohayd 3)

The heat, the friction escalated until he sensed she couldn’t take any more, needed release before the heart thundering beneath his burst from the buildup.

He tilted her hips, angled himself before he sank inside her to the root, hitting her inner triggers in a plunge that had him lodging into her womb.

She lurched like a marionette with her strings snapped, plunging him deeper inside her. Then she shattered around him, her flesh gripping at his shaft, wringing her pleasure from him, the flood of her release razing him, the current of her peak almost agonizing in its pleasure.

He’d been able to practice control, not only to prolong the pleasure, but because he’d been too afraid of himself, of hurting her, of her response if he unleashed his full ferocity. And they’d practiced the incredible experience together, building their pleasure to near-infinity.

But after he’d become secure she could take him, did want him in all of his moods, there had been times when he’d wanted to be rough and wild, no buildups, just abrupt possession and explosive release inside her. Every time she’d read him right, had begged him to let go.

Now was such a time.

She again knew, urged him on. “Give to me, Amjad…fill me.”

Her frenzy snapped his sanity. He detonated inside her, a stream of ecstasy surging through his length, pouring his essence into the recesses of her femininity.

In his long-receded coherence, something niggled. Something that felt like regret. That it wouldn’t take root, wouldn’t bind them in even more profound ways than what they shared now…

Then everything vanished. He heard nothing but his groans echoing her sobs, felt nothing but their flesh straining together, melting into each other in the quivering surplus.

When his senses coalesced, it was dark and it had stopped raining. He lifted his weight from her on shaking arms. She seemed to come to only when he moved, then she whimpered, limp hands trying to pull him back as he left her depths.

He kissed and folded them on her tummy before swaying up to light the oil lamps. He came back, and she stretched up her arms.

He huffed in self-deprecation. “I’ll oblige you. In a while. You can’t have your fill of…cake and eat it, too.”

She chuckled as she rubbed her thighs together. “I don’t think I can have more…cake for a while either. That was one hell of a doozy. All I’m good for now is snuggling.”

He laughed as he bent on unsteady legs, scooped her up and headed to the spring. He stepped into the cool waters, sat in the shallow end with her draped across him, sank into the luxury of her kisses and sighs.

At length he sighed, too. “Snuggling is good. Very, very good.”

She chuckled and dragged him deeper into the goodness.

His time with her was the best thing that had ever happened to him. Better than he’d ever dreamed.

Better than he deserved?

He swatted that thought away. As she’d told him, whatever he didn’t already deserve, he would do what it took so that he did from this time forward.

Anything? A voice scorned. Have you forgotten how this all started? Pride of Zohayd. Her thief of a father. Ring any bells?

It could ring a million bells. More than ever, he had to make sure Maram didn’t get a whiff of the sordid mess. Starting tomorrow, he’d deal with it. And she’d never know a thing.

Everything depended on it.

Maram stretched in bed, gloriously sore and satisfied.

She listened for Amjad’s movements outside. Nothing. She turned her head and saw the note by the room’s opening.

Gone to feed my other Dahabeyah. Will return to feed the feline one I left purring in bed in thirty.

She giggled, hugged herself and again went over the lifetime they’d shared during the past days in stunned wonder.

She’d thought there was nothing to do around here but love Amjad. He’d proved her wrong and then some. He’d taken her hiking through the majestic desert by moonlight, exploring the incredible caves at dawn, climbing palm trees for ripe dates in the afternoon and skating on the dunes and jogging on the hard sand trails at twilight. After each exhausting, exhilarating activity, they’d set up a picnic, replenished and then they’d loved, in every possible way.

It had been better than heaven. Amjad in real life was better than her most exaggerated dreams of him. And how she’d dreamed. She constantly sizzled with the enormity of what she felt for him. Eshg. That emotion that he’d so adorably bared his fangs and growled didn’t exist only to go on and demonstrate in everything he did and said that it did…

A one-note noise jerked her out of the luxury of her musings.

Before she recognized it, it deluged her mind with melancholy impressions. Of lost chances. Of years without Amjad.

Then she realized it was his phone, ringing for the first time since they’d come here. Her unease crystallized into fear. That it would somehow take him away from her like it had after the bomb scare.

Which was stupid to the max. First, of course he’d get phone calls after ten days of absence. He must have turned his phone off after he’d assured everyone of their safety and on again to touch base with his people. Everyone must be eager to contact him. Second and foremost, Amjad might not have said it, but he was hers. Nothing would take him away from her again.

She let it ring. Amjad would call back when he returned.

But the ringing ended only to start again almost without pause, sounding like someone shrieking in ratcheting hysteria.

Maybe it was an emergency. Something that needed his intervention. Something they had to go back for right away.

Amjad hadn’t even brought up their return. He seemed to have forgotten the outside world. As she had.

But it was intruding on them now. He might not have any choice but to let the world crash in on their magic.

She rose, pulled on his shirt and headed outside. Her heart shivered with foreboding as she neared the phone as if it was a grenade with the safety pin missing.

It’s just a phone, you drama queen. Just take it to him.

She picked it up, glanced at the screen, shook her head at her pointless action. As if she’d recognize the number.

As she crossed to the corridor leading to the door, something made her take a closer look and…she did!

It was her father’s.

She froze, her thoughts stumbling over each other, tangling.

Her father must know that the sandstorm had abated. Days ago. He must be very curious to know what was keeping them.

Would she come clean to him?

Why would she? He hadn’t to her. And then he’d probably go all fatherly and horrified on her. The last thing she needed was him butting in on her and Amjad’s relationship. He’d already almost spoiled it once. And if he started demanding that Amjad do “the honorable thing,” she might have to strangle him for real!