Was someone in the tent with her?
Still groggy with sleep and the myriad erotic memories that had pursued her in dreams, she leaned over on her elbows and drew back the curtain.
Her gaze drifted to the far corner of the room—and her breathing stopped, squeezed to a standstill in her tortured lungs, as every one of her pulse points thudded in unison.
I’m still dreaming. I must be.
The soft shimmer of torchlight caressed Zane’s tall muscular form as he stood in the tub, completely naked, facing her, water glistening on the defined contours of his chest and legs. But instead of bathing himself, he held his iron-hard erection in his fist, his fingers gliding over the solid column in a fast, relentless rhythm.
Blood powered into Cat’s clitoris, making it swell and ache, and moisture flooded between her thighs.
He looked magnificent, his skin given a golden glow, the trail of hair across his chest tapering into a line through the bunched muscles of his six-pack and then blooming into a thicket at his groin, where his penis stood, thick and proud.
She watched him pleasure himself in rough strokes. His body bowed back, the guttural moan rasping deep in her own sex as he reached his peak.
His breathing deepened, the rigid lines of his body softening.
She shifted on the bed, trapped in an erotic trance. The fine silk of the sleeping robe slid over her skin like sandpaper, her own body still fraught with arousal. She breathed, mesmerised by the far-too-graphic dream, as Zane picked a cloth up from the water and washed his genitals.
The splash of water sounded so lifelike, the sensation prickling over her skin felt so vivid, the scent of jasmine incense and woodsmoke smelled so distinct.
How can this dream be so real? Why don’t I want to wake up?
But then he dropped the washcloth and swung round to lift one of the linen towels by the tub and the torchlight illuminated his back.
The erotic dream evaporated as she took in the ragged scars marring the smooth skin.
Her breath guttered out on a harsh sob of distress, which sounded deafening in the heavy silence.
Zane jerked round and their gazes locked.
The erotic tension snapped tight in her abdomen.
‘Catherine, what the hell are you doing in my bed?’ he rasped.
Not a dream. Her mind screamed but still the hunger built like an inferno. The sheer fabric rubbed against her nipples, and she suddenly became far too aware of the sight she must make to him in the transparent robe. All her senses on high alert.
She scrambled to lift the sheet and cover her nakedness.
‘I... This is where Ajmal told me to sleep,’ she managed to get out round the shock thickening her throat.
The swell of emotion at the sight of his ruined back combined with the deep throbbing in her sex to leave her feeling raw and exposed and far too needy.
Zane swore, hooking the linen towel around his nakedness. ‘I’m going to murder Kasim.’
Had Kasim planned this? But why would he do that...?
‘He didn’t believe us when we said we weren’t a couple?’ she asked.
‘It doesn’t matter what he believed,’ Zane snarled, sounding furious with the Kholadi chieftain. ‘He had no right to treat you with such disrespect.’ Marching across the room, he began to pick up the clothing he must have discarded.
‘When I get hold of him, he’s a dead man,’ he said.
Before she could think better of the impulse, Cat dropped the sheet and scrambled off the bed.
‘Zane, don’t.’ She caught his arm, her heart breaking all over again at the sight of those terrible scars.
Was this the punishment Nazarin had told her about? How could his father have done such a thing? What kind of a man would treat his own child with such brutality?