Читать книгу Desert Sheikhs Collection: Part 1 - Люси Монро, Jane Porter, Люси Монро - Страница 14

‘OH, IT’S beautiful,’ said Lara softly. She leaned over the balcony and gazed out. The mist of earlier had cleared, and now the lights of the city sparkled like precious gems against the navy velvet of the night sky. ‘Just beautiful.’

Darian eased the cork from a bottle of wine and watched the way the breeze ruffled her dark silken hair, so that it fluttered behind her like a banner. ‘Yes,’ he agreed slowly.

For once he had been wrong—imagining it would take more than a little persuasion to get her to come back here with him tonight. The prickle of anticipation he had felt—that here was a woman who might make him fight a little—had been replaced by the much more familiar feeling of slightly jaded anticipation, but not jaded enough to stem the rising tide of desire.

‘Some wine?’ he drawled.

Lara turned round. He had removed his jacket and he looked relaxed, almost domesticated. Behind him, the brightly illuminated room looked like the stage-set of a play, with he the hero of the piece.

Or the villain.

Her heart thudded. ‘I thought you promised me coffee?’

‘I did. But how about a little wine first? You hardly drank a thing in the restaurant.’

A faintly bored note came into his voice, as if her inference that he was trying to push alcohol on her was offensive.

‘But I’ll go and make coffee if you’d prefer.’

‘No. Actually, I’d love some wine,’ she said truthfully. Perhaps wine might make her stop feeling like a woman who had never been invited into a man’s home before. She wasn’t such an innocent! She crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed them up and down her bare arms. ‘Brrrr! It’s freezing.’

‘Go inside. Make yourself at home.’

She felt his eyes on her as she made her way back into a sitting room which was a byword for luxury. This was crazy, she thought. She had spent her life being watched, sometimes on stage and sometimes by the camera, and usually she managed it with aplomb—easily becoming the person the director wanted her to be.

And maybe that was the problem here—that she was being herself. Only she was discovering an unwelcome and unfamilar nervousness in the company of a man who intrigued and attracted and disturbed her, compounded by what she had read in the letter.

Darian followed her into the room, tipping just a tiny amount of the rich red wine into two crystal glasses while she sat down primly on one of the giant leather sofas.

He noticed the way she pressed her knees tightly together as he handed her the glass. Did she always do this? he wondered. Send out such beguiling and conflicting messages? She had agreed very quickly—too quickly—to come home with him, and there was a not-so-subtle subtext to deals like that. If you didn’t want a man to make a pass at you, then you did not go back to his apartment late at night on a first date.

Darian was used to knowing the score. To women quickly and blatantly letting him know that they wanted him. It happened so frequently that it was just par for the course, as natural as breathing for him—he had never had to fight for a woman in his life, though sometimes he had idly wondered what it might be like to have to do so.

He was instinctive enough to know that the attraction between he and Lara was mutual, but only up to a point. Because now there was a wariness about her, almost a shyness, which seemed to contradict her innate sensuality. And mystery and contradictions were always fascinating, he acknowledged with a slow ache of awareness as he sat down on the sofa—just far enough away not to threaten her, but close enough to smell the soft scent of lilac which drifted from her pale skin. Close enough to touch…

Lara sipped her drink, but her throat felt tight and she had to force down a mouthful of the smooth, rich wine. ‘Lovely,’ she remarked politely.

‘So where were we?’ He put his glass down on the coffee table and half turned to look at her, a small smile playing around the edges of his mouth. ‘Ah, yes, your tender heart was melting at the thought of my underprivileged upbringing.’

With a shaky hand she put her glass down next to his. ‘Don’t make fun of me.’

‘Is that what I was doing?’ he murmured.

‘That or patronising me,’ she answered quietly. ‘You don’t have to talk about your childhood if you don’t want to.’

Liar! Liar! But her words had exactly the desired effect. By telling him he didn’t have to talk, he immediately began to relax—although had she known that on some deep, gut-level? That here was a man who would not be forced into telling anything about himself—and the only way to get information about him was to appear not to care?

‘And poor doesn’t mean unhappy,’ she continued coaxingly.

He gave a low, mocking laugh. ‘That’s the fairytale version, spoken with the voice of someone who has absolutely no idea what material deprivation is like.’

‘You can’t know that!’ she protested.

‘True,’ he agreed. ‘But I’m right, aren’t I?’ The golden eyes flickered over her lazily. ‘Let me guess—you grew up in the country? A stable family life with brothers and sisters? Fresh air and exercise and three meals a day? A pony in the stable and dogs barking when you came home from school?’

Lara froze, then swallowed, and the tiptoeing of fear began to shiver its way down her spine. ‘That’s…that’s bizarre. Well, except for the brothers bit—I have two sisters and they are much older. And my father was away a lot. But the rest is correct.’ Her blue eyes were as big as saucers as she looked at him. ‘How could you possibly have known?’

‘About the country?’ Some things you didn’t need to be told. He reached his hand out and lightly touched her cheek. ‘It’s written all over you. Skin like this wasn’t made in a city.’

Was that a trace of wistfulness in his voice, or was she imagining it? ‘W-wasn’t it?’

‘No.’ He let one of his fingers drift over skin that felt like satin. ‘You’re a real milk and honey girl!’

Lara found the compliment shockingly satisfying—almost as gratifying as the all too brief contact when he had touched her, making her want him to touch her again. She shook her head slightly, trying to remember why she was here.

‘Very good. Ten out of ten,’ she said lightly. ‘Your turn now.’

‘Isn’t this supposed to be a guessing game?’ he mocked.

‘Well, I know you grew up in the city.’ Lara drew a deep breath and decided to go for broke. ‘I’d say that you are an only child and that your parents were…separated.’

There was an odd pause. ‘Is it really that obvious?’ he questioned, and a slightly bitter note came into his voice. ‘Do I have one-parent family written all over me?’

Lara felt guilty, but she managed not to show it. ‘Not at all,’ she said hastily. ‘It’s more a case of working things out from the information available. Putting bits in, like a jigsaw. The area you mentioned doesn’t really conjure up a cosy family scene, with roses round the door.’

‘As opposed to the image of a mother who was hard-pressed to put food into her hungry child’s mouth?’

‘Is that what it was like?’ she whispered, horrified.

‘Not quite,’ he commented sarcastically. ‘But I should hate to puncture the little bubble-picture you’ve invented in your head!’

‘Now you are making fun of me.’

‘I thought that all women liked to be teased?’

He was making her feel gauche and unsophisticated. And she didn’t like his constant references to what ‘women’ liked—it made her feel one in an endless line of them—which, when she stopped to think about it, she probably was. But this isn’t about you, Lara, she reminded herself—it’s about him. And Maraban. ‘But you were poor?’ she questioned bluntly.

His eyes grew flinty. ‘Do you want me to give you a breakdown of our weekly finances?’

She heard the distaste in his voice, and she didn’t blame him—her questions were crossing over the line between good taste and bad, and unless she gave him some kind of explanation she couldn’t possibly keep on asking them. What on earth was she going to do? Tell him, or tell Khalim first?

‘You’re right. I’m sorry—I was just being nosy. Don’t worry, I won’t ask any more.’

Darian studied her, noting the way her blue eyes were suddenly looking haunted. The vulnerable little tremor of her lips made him want to kiss them. ‘You know, you really are very sweet, Lara,’ he said softly.

A pain stabbed at her heart. What would he say if he knew? And how could she suddenly just blurt it out— Darian, I am almost certain that you are the illegitimate brother of the Sheikh of Maraban?

‘I am not sweet,’ she contradicted, and bit her lip.

‘And so modest, too,’ he teased. ‘Now, don’t frown. Relax.’ Casually, he reached out to capture a handful of her hair, and began to trickle his fingers through the silky curls so that they touched and tickled the back of her neck. ‘Relax,’ he whispered softly.

‘Darian, don’t,’ she said weakly.

A woman didn’t cross and uncross her legs in quick succession and then wriggle her head back into your hand if she meant don’t.

‘Don’t what?’ He moved closer, moved his hands from her neck to her shoulderblades. ‘You’re tense,’ he exclaimed softly, and began to gently massage the tight flesh. ‘Very, very tense.’

If only he knew why! ‘This…this isn’t such a good idea—’

‘What isn’t? A simple massage? I’m very good at it, you know.’ His fingers continued to knead away, lulling her into a dreamy and hypnotic state. ‘Relax, Lara—if you don’t like it, then I’ll stop.’

Which made it even worse. He was giving her a let-out. The decision was completely in her hands. She could stop him whenever she wanted to, and she should stop him now. Except that she did like it; that was the trouble. She liked it a lot. It’s only a massage, she told herself dreamily.

‘Is that good?’ he whispered.

Helplessly, she closed her eyes. ‘I, oh…yes.’ The decision wasn’t in her hands at all, she realised—he had all the power.

‘Why not lie down?’ he suggested. ‘You’ll be more comfortable that way.’

It was, after all, only a massage. She tried to tell herself that as he was gently pushing her back against the sofa. But the word ‘push’ implied force, and there was no force involved—merely a delicious compliance as she sank down onto the leather, her cheek resting on its soft surface, her eyelids fluttering to a close.

Darian worked on her neck and her shoulders, gradually feeling some of the tension released by the rhythmical movement of his fingertips. ‘Is that better?’

‘It’s…heaven,’ she mumbled.

It felt pretty good from where he was sitting, too. A little too good. Darian shifted his body slightly as the tight-ness easing away from her body was replaced by a growing tension in his own.

Lara’s limbs felt as fluid as water, her blood as thick as warm honey, and the pulse-points around her body began to deepen and speed. She could feel their slow and relentless pounding in her temple, her wrists, and somewhere deep in her groin. This is sheer craziness, she told herself. But she couldn’t move; she didn’t want it to end.

He heard her sigh, and his hard mouth glimmered in a brief smile, his eyes drifting over the tight, firm curve of her bottom.

‘Am I sending you to sleep?’

‘Well, yes,’ she murmured drowsily, knowing that was only half the story.

‘Then I’d better stop. We can’t have that.’

He took his hands away. ‘Oh!’ Lara whispered disappointedly.

‘Turn over,’ came the soft command.

Somehow she managed to, even though her body felt so deliciously lethargic that it took all her energy.

Her hair was all mussed, her cheeks pink and flushed, and behind her half-hooded eyelids her blue eyes glittered hectically. He read in them self-doubt and utter confusion and, almost without intending to, dipped his head and brushed a featherlight kiss over her lips, felt her shiver in response.

‘Darian—’

‘Shh.’ He kissed her again.

This was dangerous. The brush of his lips was barely there and then gone again, only to return. Tiny, butterfly kisses which coaxed and maddened. ‘Oh,’ she murmured instinctively.

His mouth smiled against hers, and this time his lips stayed longer, teasing and caressing until hers opened beneath his and her arms came up to wind around his neck, like tendrils of ivy clinging to sun-warmed brick.

‘Darian—’

‘You don’t like it?’

She grazed her lips over his, unable to stop herself. Just once, she told herself. She would kiss him just once. But she kissed him again, and again, and then again, and his low laugh of delight made her want to do it some more.

She tried to speak, but her lips were so dry and her head so spinning that the words came out as a parched kind of whisper. ‘It isn’t a question of not liking…’

‘But that’s the only important question, darling. Nothing else is worth asking.’ He drifted his mouth along the line of her jaw. ‘Is it?’

Her head fell back and his lips moved immediately to her neck. Lara shuddered. In her befuddled state of desire his words seemed to make perfect sense, and this was dangerous indeed. Very dangerous.

She should pull away and ask him to take her home. If he wanted her that much then he would be prepared to wait—and wouldn’t that be what any woman in her right mind would do? Wait at least until she had told him the momentous news she had?

So why were her fingertips running over the back of his head as if learning him by touch? Why was she doing nothing to stop him when he ran the flat of his hand down over one breast and then back again, where it lingered, and she could feel it growing tight and hard against him.

Because she couldn’t, that was why.

She lifted her head, which felt as if it was weighted with some heavy metal—like the gold which matched the hot, molten colour of his eyes. Two flares of colour ran along each aristocratic cheekbone, and at that moment he looked like a pure Marabanese, with all the accompanying pride and arrogance that went with that ancestry.

Yet his hard mouth had been softened by her kisses, so that for one second he looked unexpectedly vulnerable. It was like having a curtain twitch and seeing behind it a glimpse of a man you dared not dream existed. A man with softness beneath the hard, polished exterior, making him utterly irresistible. And with something approaching shock Lara realised that she wanted him now, no matter what the consequences.

She remembered the first time she had seen Khalim and had almost melted into a puddle on the floor. Was she just one of those women who were suckers for arrogant and exotic-looking men who seemed to make most normal men look like a pale imitation of the real thing?

Darian sensed her reservations melting away and smiled lazily as he ran his hand down over her stomach, which curved faintly beneath the clinging cream fabric of her dress, and then down further still, until it edged up beneath the thin material. He splayed his fingers with arrogant possession over the space of cool flesh above her stocking top and Lara felt her thighs part, as if no power on earth could have stopped them.

‘You do like it,’ he purred approvingly, and the pad of his thumb stroked the silken flesh there. He felt her squirm, enjoying the look of helpless pleasure which made her lips form a disbelieving little Oh!

She tried one last, futile time. ‘We shouldn’t be doing this,’ she protested half-heartedly.

‘Want me to stop?’ This as his fingertips floated tantalisingly close to the moist, filmy barrier of her panties, and she shook her head distractedly.

‘No!’

He kissed her, and his words were muffled against her lips. ‘You just want me to know that you aren’t in the habit of leaping into bed on a first date, is that it?’

Lara felt her cheeks grow hot. ‘Well, I’m not—’

‘And neither am I,’ he murmured silkily. ‘So we’re equal, aren’t we?’

If only he knew!

‘And now that we’ve established that…’ He pulled her into his arms and began to kiss her—only this time he really kissed her, deep, searching seeking kisses, which dissolved away everything but the need to be joined with him.

‘Darian,’ she moaned weakly as he started to unbutton her dress, little by little, bit by bit, lowering his head so that where his fingers led his mouth followed, annointing her skin with gentle kisses which made her squirm with pleasure. He slipped the dress from her shoulders and it slid away unnoticed, so that she was lying there in a tiny cream bra and knickers, her stockings and black leather boots.

Darian sucked in a hot, ragged breath. Women only ever wore undergarments like that if they were expecting to be seduced. This was what she wanted. What she had obviously expected. The heat built up inside him. ‘Undress me,’ he urged. ‘Take my clothes off, Lara.’

But Lara felt almost kittenish in her helplessness. Her fingers fumbled at the buttons of his shirt until he made a low sound that was halfway between a groan and a laugh and tipped her chin up with his fingertip, unbearably excited by the beguiling contrast beween wanton abandon and a kind of sweet shyness.

‘Your hands are shaking,’ he said gravely.

Her whole body was shaking—surely he could see that?

‘Yes.’

He pulled at his shirt with a hunger so sharp he scarcely recognised it. What invisible buttons was she pressing? he wondered distractedly as he yanked it off and impatiently threw it aside.

She saw the tension on his face and managed to undo his belt, but he unzipped his trousers himself, as though not trusting her to do so. Her lips were parched with both fear and excitement as the last of his clothing was removed, and she gave an instinctive sigh as she feasted her eyes on him.

His body was as beautiful as she had known it would be—his skin the colour of deep honey, his limbs long and lean and strong. And he was very, very aroused…

He ran a slow finger over her leather boot and up along her thigh, and felt her shudder in response. ‘Do you want to wrap these round my back?’ he whispered.

It was one of those questions which told her exactly what the score was. A deliberate and studied celebration of sensuality and nothing more than that. But Lara was too much in thrall to back out now—and what reason could she possibly give? That she was afraid he was going to hurt her as no man had ever hurt her before nor would again?

Instead, she reached her arms up to pull him close, and as he lowered his body down onto hers she had the strangest feeling of inevitability—as though this moment had been determined from the first time she had set eyes on him, as though her life would somehow be incomplete without this.

‘Wait!’ he commanded, and reached down to pull a packet of condoms from the pocket of his trousers.

‘I’m…I’m on the Pill,’ she said, her voice shy, which in itself was madness in view of the intimacy of their naked bodies.

Golden eyes glittered. ‘Let’s just be sure, shall we?’ he murmured, and slid one on.

Lara felt heat suffuse her cheeks. He was only being safe and sensible, the way she would have wanted and expected him to be, but it made her feel as if this was just…mechanical instead of special. Part of her wanted to pull her clothes back on and run away, but he had started to kiss her again, and the sweetness of his lips made flight impossible and unwanted.

‘Lara!’ Darian groaned as the hard, flat planes of his body met her moist and giving heat, bending his mouth to hers. Their lips met and fused and a strange warmth filled him. What the hell was she doing? What game was she playing that could have him feeling like this?

All she was doing was holding him in her arms, her hips rising up as if to invite him inside, and suddenly he knew he could wait no longer.

The last of her doubts fled as she felt him tremble because helplessness in such a strong man could be very potent. ‘Yes,’ she whispered, as if she had read his mind. ‘Oh, yes.’ But he was already entering her, plunging deep, deep inside her, and she gasped with delighted pleasure.

He heard the sound she made and felt a wild and exultant kind of joy, steadying himself as he began to move. She moved in harmony with him, and he watched the rapture flower and bloom on her face.

Lara’s breath caught in her throat. It had never been like this. Never. So… Her eyes snapped open and she saw the dark and golden man who moved above her with such sweet and piercing precision. How could she be this close? This soon? This…?

‘Darian!’ It was a sigh and a cry laced with a sense of wonder.

But he was a silent lover. There was no response at all bar the silken touch of his skin and the feel of him moving inside her—the sudden brilliant gleam from his eyes was the only sign that he had heard her. She had to bite back words of passion, because even though they were joined so intimately there were some things you didn’t do. And telling a man like Darian that you thought he was the most wonderful lover was one of them. And then she was past thought…past caring…

Holding back until he thought it might kill him, he looked down and watched her until the instinctive and frantic arching of her back set him free. He let his seed spill into her with a spasm of pleasure which seemed to go on and on and on, and when it was over he felt as though she had robbed him of something. Taken something from him which he had not been ready to give.

They lay there, spent, in shuddering silence for a moment or two, and a tiny sigh escaped from her lips.

‘Oh, Darian,’ she whispered, and, turning her head, she kissed his shoulder. But he didn’t move, didn’t answer, just lay there like a statue made of flesh and bone and blood—and that was when the doubts came flooding back, startling her out of her post-coital haze, and she closed her eyes in despair.

What had she done?

Lara knew that regret was a waste of time emotion, but it washed over her in a great wave, leaving her shivering and cold in its wake. What in God’s name had she been thinking of? To have sex with a man so quickly—and not just any man—this man. And she still hadn’t asked him the most important question of all.

She licked her dry, parched lips. ‘Darian?’

Darian gazed at the ceiling. Usually he felt restless, not dazed like this. He would jump up, make coffee, perhaps play a little music. Indulge in physical activity which put a distance between him and a woman, and that was the way he liked it. A bout of sensational sex should be seen in context, as nothing more nor less than just that.

But tonight felt different. His limbs didn’t want to move and sleep was tempting his heavy eyes as his heart slowed into a regular pounding beat. It was as if he’d landed in a warm, safe place and didn’t want to leave it.

He fought it, and yawned. He would offer to take her home now. It was always the acid-test—how the woman reacted. Like a cool, emotionally independent woman or like a clinging little girl. The moment you let a woman stay the night she started moving in her toothbrush and leaving pairs of panties around the place—marking her territory. Though when he stopped to think about it he wouldn’t mind the tiny little scraps of nonsense which Lara wore lying anywhere. In fact, he’d preferably like her wearing them, so that he could slowly remove them and…

‘Darian?’ Lara said again, as she felt him begin to harden against her, and she wondered if he could hear the worry in her voice.

‘Mmm?’ He had been about to pull her into his arms again, but something in her question, something in her body language made him tense, and instinctively his features became shuttered. ‘Yes, Lara?’

She sensed just as much as she saw his mental retreat. It was there in the yawn, the way he hadn’t been tender, or kissed the top of her head, or told her that it had been amazing. But there were still things she needed to know. She had allowed herself to be seduced, and in so doing she had momentarily veered off course, but she needed to know one thing above all else.

‘How old are you?’

Darian was rarely surprised by a woman, particularly after he had just had sex with her; women tended to be predictable in their reactions to fast physical intimacy—they either acted as if you were about to start choosing the ring, or they started asking unanswerable questions like, Do you still respect me? But this was the last question he had been expecting.

Was it a Why aren’t you married yet? kind of question? And would other inevitable questions follow—like why had he never settled down before and didn’t he ever want children? The last drop of pleasure evaporated in an instant, like rain splashing onto a sunbaked pavement. ‘Thirty-five. Why?’

She felt the walls close in, and it had nothing to do with the odd, cold note which had entered his voice.

Thirty-five!

Which made him exactly the same age as Khalim. Or, rather, it probably made him older—because surely Khalim’s father would not have had a lover straight after he was married? And the repercussions of that just didn’t bear thinking about.

Suddenly something which had been almost abstract was brought into harsh and painful reality, and she knew that this was a responsibility too much to bear alone.

She had to tell someone, but it could not be Darian.

Not yet.

She ran her fingertips over his chest, her blood running icy-cold in her veins.

‘I think I’d better go home now,’ she said.

He only just resisted a sigh of relief. ‘Okay,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll get dressed and then I’ll drive you.’

‘I can get a taxi.’

‘I said I’d take you,’ he said, in a tone which broached no argument.

Lara thought that she would have preferred to take a cab, alone with the reality of what a huge mistake she had just made.

Because the fact that he hadn’t tried to talk her out of leaving told its own story.