‘Oh…’ Her dazed green eyes flew wide open as he let an exploring hand travel over the pouting thrust of her small breasts beneath the dark blouse she wore. The straining tips of her tender flesh tightened and swelled within the cups of her bra.
‘Oh…’ Shahir mimicked her with a sensual mockery that felt as unreal as everything else that had so far happened between them.
But, unreal or otherwise, she was already in thrall to the insistent demand of her own body. He pressed his knowing mouth to the tiny pulse-spot below her ear and nuzzled the sensitive skin there. Startled by the resulting leap of sensation, she clenched her fingers convulsively into his sleeves.
‘I’ve never been into discomfort.’ With that husky declaration, Shahir gathered her up into his arms and stood up as if she weighed no more than a china doll. ‘And as a rule I prefer to make love in bed—although I am not saying that I could not be tempted by a more adventurous venue.’
Bed? Never had a single word seemed more graphic in its connotations!
Kirsten tensed in dismay, for she had not thought beyond the defiant act of enjoying kissing and getting close to him. But Shahir chose that exact same moment to bend his well-shaped dark head and let his tongue dip between her parted lips in a provocative and incredibly enervating sneak invasion. Kirsten melted like ice cream on a hot griddle, and did not surface from the grip of that all-encompassing loss of rational awareness until she found herself standing positioned between his splayed thighs while he sat on the edge of a bed. He had already undone the clasp at the nape of her neck to release her hair from confinement.
‘I desired you the first time I saw you,’ Shahir confessed, skimming lean brown fingers slowly through the shimmering fall of her pale silvery blonde hair. ‘Every time I saw you from that moment I desired you even more…’
She was so tense that her knees wobbled beneath her. ‘Truthfully?’
‘Though you do not seem aware of the fact, you are extraordinarily beautiful.’
The clear green eyes clinging to his lean dark features clouded with sorrow. Her hand fluttered up to touch the ugly bruise. ‘Not today, I’m not…’
Shahir enclosed her thin hand in a firm grip. His dark golden eyes were as bright as the heart of a fire. ‘Today you seem even more beautiful to me.’
A laugh that wasn’t a laugh at all was wrenched from Kirsten. Her eyes glimmered and her throat worked. Suddenly she was tipping herself forward and claiming his perfectly moulded mouth for herself, with passionate urgency. He unbuttoned her blouse, and the fastener on her trousers, tugging her down on to his lap to extract her with smooth expertise from her clothing while his kisses held her imprisoned.
‘You wear so many clothes,’ he censured thickly, one hand knotted in her silky hair to tip her head back so that his marauding mouth could trace an enterprising trail across the sensitive skin of her throat.
As her bra fell away, and cooler air brushed her nipples, Kirsten went rigid with shock and closed her hands over her exposed breasts.
Shahir stilled and tipped back his handsome dark head. He swept her up and settled her back against the pillows, straightening again by the bed to look searchingly down at her. ‘I assumed that you were no stranger to sex. If I am mistaken, tell me, and you can leave without reproach,’ he murmured tautly. ‘I don’t seduce virgins.’
Her lashes lowered over evasive green eyes. She hugged her knees to her chest, silvery fair hair falling round her like a screening veil. Her thoughts were in turmoil.
Growing up in Angus Ross’s home had made her familiar with constant disappointment. Virtually everything that might give her pleasure had been denied her. Now she wanted Shahir more than she had wanted anything in her whole life. His candour gave her a choice. If she told him the truth, he would send her away from him, and she could not face that conclusion.
‘I’m not a virgin.’ she muttered in a rush, telling the lie before she could think through what she was doing and lose her nerve.
Shahir was very much in the mood to be convinced. Though in every way that mattered she was different from every other woman he had ever known. ‘You seem very shy…’
Kirsten focused fixedly on her bare toes. ‘Do you have a problem with that?’
He surveyed her delicate profile with smouldering golden eyes full of appreciation. ‘No.’
‘Then could you please close the curtains?’
Taken aback, Shahir raised a questioning brow. ‘Do you only make love in the dark?’
Kirsten nodded vehemently.
Torn between a desire to laugh and an uneasy stab of tenderness that discomfited him, Shahir hit the buttons that closed the blinds and the curtains.
In the sudden darkness, Kirsten slid nervously off the bed. Her toes tangled with the garments scattered on the floor and she fell over her own feet.
Winded, she lay there until Shahir picked her up, saying, not quite steadily, ‘You may make love in the dark, but I don’t think you have night vision.’
‘Obviously not…’ The lamps on either side of the bed lit up and she blinked rapidly at the sudden restoration of light.
His attention zeroed straight down to the prominent rosy nipples that crowned the pert thrust of her breasts. ‘Why would you seek to hide such perfection?’
He closed his hands over hers before she could cover herself again, and backed her down on to the bed with masculine purpose. He cupped and stroked the small tempting mounds, and let his thumbs rub over the straining crests. She gasped as liquid heat snaked down to her pelvis and pooled there to form a knot of intense physical longing. He lowered his dark head and let his hungry mouth play over the distended pink buds.