Tori shook her head, bemused by her imaginings. Yet she wasn’t imagining the bone-deep yearning for completion. Or her lover’s waiting stillness as he looked down at her.
Her lover.The words washed through her, and with them a kind of relief. Whether she thought of him as Ash the honourable stranger or Ashraf the determined King, she wanted him.
What more did he want fromher?
She’d already proved she was no match for the desire he ignited in her. It was a mere week since he’d come back into her life and she was amazed she’d withstood his allure so long.
Desire made her limbs tremble as she looked up into eyes that beckoned and challenged at the same time.
Tori’s mouth firmed. If he was waiting for her to say she’d changed her mind about marriage he’d have a long wait. Or was it something else he wanted?
She lifted her hand from his and cupped his shoulder, pushing him back. Her pulse accelerated with excitement as he let her, falling back onto the bed.
He lay there, big and bold and utterly still, like a bronzed cat lazily sunning itself in the pale light spilling across the rumpled bed. Yet there was nothing lazy in the eyes that meshed with hers. A frisson ran through her at the invitation she read there.
Shedding any hesitation, Tori rose to straddle powerful thighs. Ashraf was all heavy muscle and heat—incredible heat. His mouth tugged wide in a satisfied smile but otherwise he didn’t move. Until Tori leaned forward to lick to one dark nipple and a tremor ran through his supine body. Hard hands grasped her hips. She licked again, then nipped with her teeth, hearing his breath catch as he lifted beneath her.
This time she took the lead. She brushed kisses across his torso, with its scattering of dark hair, then drew on his other nipple and heard what sounded like a low growl. His fingers tightened on her. Lifting her gaze, she found his eyes locked on her and a thrill of empowerment zigzagged through her.
Levering herself higher, Tori stretched up his body, letting her breasts skim his chest. It felt so good she had to stop and stiffen her wobbly arms.
There was no laziness in Ashraf’s face now. Watching the convulsive movement of his throat as he swallowed, feeling the swell of his arousal beneath her, Tori knew for the first time that he was at her mercy. It was delightful—if short-lived. For then Ashraf lifted his hips, letting her feel the full force of his appetite for her. Tori’s pulse hammered in her throat, her lips firming over a moan of need.
‘Ride me,habibti.’
So much for being the one setting the pace. But how could she object as he urged her up onto her knees? Besides, his voice was more gravel than velvet, and his hands on her hips betrayed his desperation.
Tori knelt above him, dragging out the moment of anticipation, one hand on that broad chest the colour of old gold. Beneath her palm his heart raced. That was what undid her—feeling Ashraf equally at the mercy of their mutual desire.
Closing her other hand around him, watching his hooded eyes, she lowered herself so slowly that the sensation of him rising to complete her seemed to take for ever.
When, finally, she rested fully against him, Tori experienced again that sense of quiet magic. As if time stood still in the presence of something extraordinary.
But it couldn’t last. Already the need to move was unstoppable. Tori rose high, then slid down with an exquisite friction that made everything inside her quiver.
Ashraf’s body was fiery hot, his eyes glittering fiercely as she moved again and again, arching in an instinctive dance against him. She set the pace and every movement took her closer to bliss.
The threads inside her body tightened, pulling into a coiling knot where every feeling converged. Then, without warning, a searing white light engulfed her. Tori heard a threadbare voice in the distance calling for Ash. Felt the sudden, cataclysmic wave of ecstasy and could do nothing but ride it out, her eyes locked on his.
She watched as the wave took him too. And the sight swept her from rapture to oblivion.
All Tori knew was the fire-burst of bliss and Ash—everywhere Ash, within her, around her, below her, his hands anchoring her, his body worshipping her, his rough voice praising her.
She didn’t even remember falling. Just knew, as Ash’s arms roped her to him and she inhaled the familiar cinnamon and spice scent of his skin beneath her cheek, that she never wanted to be anywhere else.
* * *
Ash emerged from the shower in Tori’s suite wearing a mile-wide smile.
Life was good. The afterglow of spectacular sex filled him, but it was more than that. Everything was falling into place. He’d announce their impending marriage at the upcoming royal reception.
Now he’d cleared up Tori’s fears that he’d hidden her and Oliver out of shame all would be well. He’d reassured her that she was free to make her choices and she’d chosenhim, coming to him utterly of her own volition.
It was good that they’d had that confrontation. It had clarified things, allayed her doubts. And it had showed him another facet of his future wife. She was a woman who would stand for no insults against her son, a woman who’d defy anyone, even Ashraf, to protect Oliver. The way she’d argued her points, standing toe to toe with him, had aroused his admiration.
And his libido.
He grabbed a towel and rubbed his hair, remembering the spark in his belly as she’d faced him. Even his annoyance at her misconceived doubts hadn’t quenched that.