The words emerged as a terse order, but Safiyah read his juddering pulse and the convulsive movement of his throat as he swallowed. Karim was at the edge of his control, just as she’d been on the beach. The thought thrilled her and she complied, wrapping herself around those tight hips, clinging to his wide shoulders.
But there was no time for triumph. Instead she bit back a gasp as he brought them together in one slow, deliberate thrust.
Safiyah’s eyes were snared on his and she couldn’t look away. She fancied she saw his darken as a second thrust unlocked something deep within her and sensations rushed through her. This felt unfamiliar and a little scary—especially as she was pinned high against his tall frame, not even supporting herself. Yet at the same time she exulted in it when she moved to meet him and felt a shudder rip through him.
‘Yes,’ he whispered through gritted teeth. ‘Like that.’
His big hands held her hips, helping her angle herself to meet him. Instead of feeling used, Safiyah felt powerful. She’d chosen this. Nor was it solely about Karim’s pleasure. She craved this with every cell in her body. And, impossibly, the flames she’d felt on the beach were flickering again deep inside her.
Those flames skyrocketed when Karim palmed her belly and pressed his thumb down on that sensitive bud between her legs. Safiyah jerked as lightning sheared through her.
Karim grinned, the picture of male smugness.
She responded by tightening her muscles around him.
His grin solidified and his powerful thrusts turned jerky.
Safiyah saw the bunch of his muscles, the tendons standing proud in his neck and his eyes glazing.
But this wasn’t a contest. Nor was it duty. This was what she’d craved for so long. This was Karim and her together, connected in a way that felt almost too profound to be just sex.
Then all thinking stopped as Karim changed the angle of his thrusts. For a moment everything stilled. A second later she was flung into a cataclysm that melded delight and something much more far-reaching.
Safiyah heard a deep shout, felt the hard pump within her and fell into ecstasy, holding Karim tight as he gathered her in.
They lay sprawled sideways across the bed. The pillows had long since disappeared, but no matter. Karim felt as if it would take a tsunami to make him move.
He lay on his back, his bones melting into the mattress, his body limp with satiation. With a supreme effort he slid his hand through the spill of Safiyah’s hair, lying like a silken cloud across his chest and shoulder. Predictably, even that simple caress stirred an eagerness for more.
She lay draped over him—a lush, erotic blanket. If he’d had more energy he’d have devoted himself to exploring that delectable body again. He’d been fascinated by her reactions, a mix of wholehearted responsiveness and shyness. But after a night devoted to carnal pleasure, giving in again and again to the urge for just one more taste of his bride, he’d have to wait to summon some strength.
That didn’t stop his mind from working. On the contrary, it was busier than ever, trying to make sense of tonight’s events with something that in another man might have come close to panic.
But Karim never panicked. He assessed, reviewed, and determined the logical course of action. It was what he’d been trained to do.
Right now logic wasn’t helping.
Sex with Safiyah was phenomenal. Urgent and explosive, yet deeply satisfying. Terribly addictive. The more they shared, the more they wanted.
Karim had been taken aback by the demands of his libido, as if after years of denial he was making up for lost time. As if sex with Safiyah was more real, more satisfying, than with any other lover. Even when they did no more than lie together, body to body, sharing the occasional gentle caress, it feltdifferentfrom previous experiences.
The notion was unsettling. Karim had expected their first night together to be memorable. He’d waited long enough for it, having never quite managed to excise her from his memory. But this was so much more than he’d anticipated.
He thought back over his actions.
The way he’d denied himself instant gratification on the beach because he’d decided on a whim that their first time needed to be memorable. It had been memorable, all right. Harder and hotter and more intense than anything he could recall, with Safiyah’s lush breasts jouncing up and down against him, her welcoming body wrapped so tight around him he’d detonated with the force of a rocket.
The way he’d spent so much time denying his own pleasure in order to bring her to climax again and again, despite her pleas and her pouting demands that he take her fully. And his desperation whenever he’d relented and joined her.
He’d taken his fill but he’d done far more. It was as if he’d tried to imprint himself on her consciousness, to make her associate ecstasy with him and only him. As if he’d wanted to obliterate any memory of her first husband.
Was he jealous of a dead man?
Of course not—especially since he’d learned that Abbas hadn’t had the sense or generosity to please his wife in bed. The idea of him using Safiyah for his own satisfaction but giving none in return twisted like a drill boring through Karim’s gut. He hadn’t liked the man but now he despised him.
Yet that didn’t explain the other riddle. Why it was that with Safiyah sex seemed more than just an expression of lust and physical pleasure.
He frowned into the darkness, telling himself there was a reasonable explanation. Release after the stress of recent weeks, perhaps?