Читать книгу Modern Romance September 2016 Books 5-8 - Natalie Anderson, Carol Marinelli - Страница 17

CHAPTER SEVEN

THEIR DEPARTING FLIGHT from Zazinia was very different from their outward flight. Despite the pilot’s best efforts to climb above it, turbulence carried them home.

Kedah tapped his diamond, cursing the missed opportunity with his mother, and Felicia looked out of the window to the seemingly black lake of desert below. She was still angry about being ignored and dining at her desk alone, while cross with herself for expecting it could be any other way.

As they bumped through the sky she decided to try to do some work and put on her headphones. She would look at the presentation that she had been asked to send to Hussain. But, without thinking, she opened the file in the first email that Kedah had sent her.

Realising it was the one he had sent in error—the one he had told her to delete—she was about to exit from it when she paused.

She had sat through a lot of presentations these past weeks. She had expected to see a proposal for the Dubai hotel and the walkway, and to label a few files, but instead she saw magic.

It was Zazinia, she quickly realised.

It was Kedah’s vision of Zazinia.

With each passing frame the bare skyline was filled with graceful buildings, and each was a work of art in itself. Instead of gleaming silver or gold with mirrored windows, the buildings blended with the ancient surrounds. There were delicate artistic murals on the walls that faced the palace, and the city spread gently outwards rather than up. There were carefully thought out roads, railways and bridges to link communities, while the desert retained its remote beauty.

He had poured everything into this, Felicia knew.

It was a life’s work in the making.

And she knew he had never meant her to see it.

She snapped off the presentation and then looked over. His eyes were waiting for hers to meet his. She pulled her earphones off, wondering if he somehow knew what she had just seen.

The truth proved to be just as disconcerting, and it troubled her how deeply he could bore into her heart.

‘I apologise for the way I treated you back at the palace.’

Despite being strapped in, she almost fell off her chair in surprise. The apology jolted her, even if her expression barely faltered.

‘I have never brought a woman there. Colleagues, of course, but...’ He gave a tense shake of his head. ‘If there had been even a hint that we were involved then it could have made things awkward for you. I didn’t handle it well.’

Please don’t be nice, Felicia thought, because her feelings were so much easier to deal with when she was cross.

‘Well, it’s done now.’ She shrugged. ‘And I shan’t be back there again.’

‘I doubt there would be any reason...’

‘No,’ Felicia said. ‘You misunderstand. I shan’t be going back there again, Kedah. We all have our limits, and your treatment of me in Zazinia far exceeded mine. Anyway, there’s no need for me to be there.’

‘No.’

It had been too far out of her comfort zone. Had she only been working for him, she might not have liked it, but of course she would have accepted his treatment of her.

But they were lovers.

Oh, it was a business arrangement, perhaps, but still she could not flick a switch. She refused to go from being his lover to a servant who walked behind him, being ignored. His little hand-flick had incensed her.

An hour out of London the turbulence finally eased, and by then Felicia was dozing. Kedah went to his bedroom, but there wasn’t time to shower so he just changed out of his traditional clothing into a suit.

He could have slept for an hour, maybe, but instead he sat on the bed with his head in his hands.

Despite his brave words, he did not know what his response would be should his father back Mohammed.

Should he risk his mother’s past being exposed by taking it to a public vote? What if the title of Crown Prince wasn’t rightly his?

Usually Kedah looked immaculate.

Not this morning.

* * *

London was beautiful, Felicia thought from the back of a luxurious car, and yet it wasn’t the same as when she’d left. The last few weeks had been spent exclusively with Kedah, and nothing felt the same.

This wasn’t a date. He didn’t drop her home first. Kedah was both royal and her boss, so they pulled up outside his apartment and she got out and ensured all his luggage had been removed.

Here, they always said goodbye.

‘I’m assuming that I’ve got the rest of the day off?’

‘Of course.’

It had been a very long business trip, and new boundaries needed to be established now.

‘I’ll see you tomorrow at eight,’ she said, and as she did so Big Ben chimed and they stood there. It was seven in the morning, which meant a separation of twenty-five hours.

‘Come up,’ Kedah said.

‘I’m really tired.’

‘I know you are.’

He could see the shadows under her eyes, and he was exhausted too. But the turbulence on the plane was nothing compared to now.

They were on the edge of being stupid.

Sleep-deprived, wanting, holding back...neither really knew.

She should run, Felicia thought. Jump in the car and go home.

Go to her mother’s tonight for a timely reminder on what falling in love with a certain type of man could do.

But, truly, she didn’t know how to play tough today—especially when Kedah spoke on.

‘You said that if I decide to tell you it won’t go any further. Does that still apply?’

And just when she knew she should walk away, he beckoned her in.

‘You know it does.’

He took her hand as he signalled the driver to remove her cases from the car too.

She stood in the antique elevator beside him, and even then she knew she should get out.

But it wasn’t curiosity that had led her back to him. It was desire.

Every minute available to them she wanted to claim.

She would heal later.

Felicia had been in his apartment a couple of times, though never with Kedah there. Usually she went there to speak with a maid, or went with his driver to collect his luggage.

Now, she was a little unsure of her role as she stepped into the magnificent abode.

The drapes were open, revealing beautiful private gardens, and she gazed out at them as the driver deposited their bags in the hallway.

Felicia knew she wasn’t here as his PA, and yet she wasn’t quite sure if it was her troubleshooting skills that Kedah was seeking now.

‘I’m going to shower,’ he told her, and she nodded. ‘Join me?’

She gave a tired laugh and carried on staring out of the window as Kedah headed off. His presumption should irk her, yet it didn’t.

She wanted him, after all.

It was later that concerned her, not now.

Kedah walked into his large bathroom and removed his clothing. It should feel good to be home after all this time away, yet it never quite did.

Home was Zazinia.

He turned on the shower and the jets of water should have blasted him awake, but he was too tired for that. He stood soaping his body, still questioning the wisdom of telling the truth to another person.

But then he watched as Felicia, a little late, took up his offer to join him.

And for the first time it was good to be home.

‘Wait,’ he told her as she started to undress.

Kedah came out of the shower and she stood as he took care of the intricate buttons he had itched to undo so many hours ago.

This time he gave no orders. Instead he simply did what he must to get her naked. He peeled off her robe and then helped her out of her underwear.

‘You’re shaking?’ he said, because he could feel the tremble in her as she stepped out of her knickers.

‘I think I officially have jet lag,’ she said.

She didn’t.

Well, she probably did. But in that walk from the lounge through his bedroom to the bathroom she had known she was entrenching herself deeper into his life.

He lifted her hair and kissed her neck softly, deeply, intimately, in a way that made her dizzy. And she wished he did not take quite such care, so that later she could fault him, but instead he took her, tired and aching, into the shower.

First he washed her hair, and those strong fingers worked her into a quiet frenzy. He soaped her body and he missed nothing—not a finger, nor that patch of skin behind her knees that she had become aware of on the very first day they met.

And she did nothing. She didn’t even touch him. She just felt the arousal that swirled around them thicken and knew of his increasing pleasure as his breathing tripped on occasion.

She faced away from him and he splayed her hands against the glass. He kissed down her back and it was the first time since childhood that Felicia had cried. Not that he could see that she did, for the water took care of that, and not that he could hear that she did, for she sobbed also with desire.

‘Turn around.’

They were the only words spoken, and when she did she was met with a wall of muscle. He held her and lifted her hair and kissed her, so the sound of water was but a distant thrum. It was so distant that it took her a moment to realise that he had turned the taps off. Taking her hand, he led her dripping wet to his bed.

They would pay for this later, Felicia was sure. They would wake up in soaked sheets, with her hair in chaos, but she cared nothing about that now.

She shivered—not just from the cool of the air on her wet skin, nor her building need, but from the darkness of the bedroom that shut out the morning sun, from the upending of her senses.

In his room, she was deeper into his life.

He pulled back the covers and she climbed in, and then he wrapped her not in linen but in the cocoon of his body. He was barely on his elbows, their skin was in full contact, and his weight was pleasurably heavy upon her.

Then he took her, and Kedah had never meant to take her like this. He drove in on a kiss and told her her name. He told her just who he needed to chase away the demons.

And she said stupid words—like yes and his name.

All her anger and fury at being ignored and having to walk behind him was not eliminated by his kiss—in fact it was intensified. As he took her, hard and fast, there was almost a fight to the death taking place. Delicious anger burned and cleansed.

He pounded her senses until she could take it no more, and she came but did not surrender, even while moaning his name and unfurling at her core.

He met her, matched her, he filled her deeply and she lay there beneath him, breathless.

And she was still angry.

Did he think this was a part of the service? Did he think she could just give herself to anyone like that?

Clearly he did, Felicia thought, for she assumed all his lovers were treated to such intimate bliss.

She could never have known she was the first in this bed.

He rolled from her.

He had spent a lifetime wishing he had never opened that door, wishing he had never seen what he had. Now he checked that Felicia wanted to come further into his world.

‘Do you want to know?’

She glanced at the clock by the bed and it told her it was nine.

Her cases were there in the hall. She could easily dress now, make some casual comment and tell him it would keep and head for home.

Get out now, while she still had a chance.

It was already far too late for that.

Her tears in the shower had left her surprisingly clear-headed, and she knew now she could not leave him by simple choice.

‘Yes.’ She turned and nodded. ‘I want to know.’