The Fierce and Tender Sheikh Read online

  Princess Shakira lay against the cushions, also like those ancient miniature paintings, and opened her mouth to receive the succulent offerings from his fingers. Morsels of exquisitely spiced meat and vegetable, sumptuously prepared, luscious with fine oils, wrapped in delicate pastry, dipped in rich sauces, he fed her, and in between each taste his own tongue licked a last droplet from her trembling mouth.

  Her heart leapt with each caress, and she knew that desire pulsed in him, too, with a need that was both pain and pleasure.

  Wine he poured from a crystal decanter painted with gold, then lifted the gold-chased goblet in a strong, dark hand whose jewel flickered with molten green flame. In the lamplight the goblet, too, glowed so richly with claret and gold it hurt her.

  Her senses became confused then, so that his kisses were delicious and the food a caress. A sugared strawberry kissed her lips and shivered in her blood; his tongue was spiced as it traced the curve of her lips, his mouth honey as it moved over her throat, in the curve of her arm, her palm.

  Sharif’s hands were music and fire as they stroked and held her through the richly embroidered silk of her dress, and she heard the music and felt the heat of the fire as if there were one sense that understood both. Sensation flicked and curled around her, as his tongue on her tongue, his fingers in her hair.

  “My beloved, my wife,” he murmured low, and her blood sang at the grateful triumph in his voice. “How long I have waited for you!”

  She smiled, and for the first time had the confidence to tease. “Was it really so long? A few months?”

  His eyes burned deep into hers. “I have waited for you, my Princess, all my life, and longer.”

  She gasped, for so it felt to her, too. “Yes,” she whispered.

  His hand moved to her throat, and she felt the tiny button at her neck submit to his fingers’ firm authority. His mouth followed his hand, kissing each area of skin revealed by the parting folds of silk. The silk rustled as if it, too, trembled at the touch, and fell back willingly to expose her shoulders to him. Gently he lifted her and drew the tunic down, so that the lamplight played on the soft, smoky skin of her shoulders and arms. Now his mouth bent to the soft curve of her breast above the ruched and beaded green silk of her bodice, and she shuddered with pleasure at each kiss, each warm breath.

  At last he lay down beside her, and drew her up to bend over him in the tender lamplight that burnished her curls and his. His hands stroked the skin of her shoulders, slid down over silk to her waist and hips, holding her with a firmness that thrilled her.

  His eyes burned her, and his mouth smiled a smile of too much feeling.

  “Shakira,” he whispered. “Allah, how love tears the heart!” Then his hands cupped her small head, and drew her down to the hunger of his mouth.

  His hands were warm on her skin, sending a potent melting into her bones, and she whimpered with need, like a small animal seeking comfort. His fingers found the hidden fastening of her bodice, and with a small noise of satisfaction he opened it.

  “Oh,” she cried, for everything was new, so new to her.

  “There is nothing to fear,” he urged softly. “You are my life, Shakira. I can never do anything to hurt you, so long as I live.”

  Her lips trembled into a smile. “I’m not afraid.”

  Now she was naked except for the silky green trousers, like a harem girl of old. Her breasts shivered alive as they pressed against the silk of his shirt, and the strong chest underneath.

  His hand cupped one small, firm breast with possessive knowing, as if both hand and breast had been created only for this moment. His palm whispered back and forth, sending rumours of his intentions to her stomach and legs, down her back, along her arms, till even her fingertips understood.

  Then, in sudden impatience, he leaned up to strip off his own pearl-embroidered jacket. Bare chested, wearing the white shalwar, he looked like a genie from a lamp for a moment, but then he stood to strip the shalwar down his legs, and her eyelids drooped, for he was a genie no longer, but a man.

  “Oh!” she cried again.

  He extinguished all lamps but one, bringing a protective blanket of dream and shadow to shroud them. He bent over her in the faint lamplight, his hand possessive under her neck and head, his mouth drinking pleasure from hers as if he were starved of it. Then he lifted his kiss and moved it to her neck, her throat, her body. Outside a night bird whistled a delicious, drunken melody in her ears like the music of his lips against her skin.

  She wandered in a garden of longing as his mouth traced over her breasts, her stomach, and her hand found his head and her fingers ruffled the dark silk of his hair, twining themselves in curls. He turned his head and caught her hand, drawing it to his mouth, and sucked the palm. Pleasure shot through her with electric intensity, and she bent one knee up and hugged her thigh against his arm.

  He let go her hand then, and slipped his palm down to cup the small firm mound under the green silk, watching her face for the pleasure of seeing the desire that whispered across it.

  “Oh!” she cried again. “Oh, Sharif!”

  She arched up into his hand, and he smiled with satisfaction, and with the strain of leashing his hungry need. As his hand caressed her, building the pleasure in her, she lifted her head and looked into his eyes. In his dark gaze she read the glow of his determination, and the frown of his love. In that moment the promised pleasure erupted under his hand, and her head fell back against the pillows, and she cried her gratitude.

  “Oh, I never knew!” she said.

  He smiled a tender, possessive smile. “This is only the beginning, my beloved. There is much to learn, for both of us.”

  For a moment she was nervous, sensing the loss of control that was to come. But this was Sharif, and in the next instant the anticipation of pleasure drowned all other feeling.

  She felt his hands find the fastening in the silk that wrapped her, and he drew the whispering fabric down, his mouth kissing the skin that the departing silk revealed, stomach, abdomen, and then down the length of her leg to ankle and instep. Then he lowered his kiss to her body again.

  After endless time wandering in the garden of pleasure, she felt him lift his head, and his hands lifted her back onto the divan, and then his body was above her, powerful and demanding. His hand slipped under her neck, and his kiss seized her mouth, while his other hand moved to open her body to his.

  The universe waited for the stroke that was the seal of their love, the great breath caught in the moment before the whirlwind is unleashed. Then he pressed into her, with a cry that was almost a plea against pain, and she understood that for him such deep need was almost torture.

  Her own pain, the pain of newness, was lost in the sweep of wild joy she felt at the deep union of their bodies and souls, so that she welcomed his body in her with a singing cry. The night bird heard, and replied, and to them both it was as if all of nature joined them at the feast. He moved in her with an urgency now that could no longer be restrained, drunk on her pleasure-song.

  He pushed and thrust himself into her, searching for that one place that was his and his alone, the place where there was no more hunger, no more need, only utter peace. His throat cried out his searching need, his song joining hers in a duet against the background of nature’s symphony. For a long, unmeasured time the music played, and then at last they found the clear, fine note that was nature’s own, and their music arced up, exploded, and cascaded back down to earth in a dome of light.

  She clung to him, and felt tears of joy and gratitude drop from her lashes and take a curving path down her cheek, for she knew that her life had been healed, and her heart could hardly contain her happiness, nor her wonder at what was possible.

  Epilogue

  ISLANDERS LAUNCH CLASS ACTION SUIT

  The Gulf Island refugees are to launch a class action suit against Mystery Resorts, Webson Attary Pharmaceuticals and their parent corporation. The islanders, who were evicted from the islands and whose
homes were destroyed by the companies, will reportedly seek compensation and punitive damages in excess of $10 billion, it was announced today.

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-7683-7

  THE FIERCE AND TENDER SHEIKH

  Copyright © 2005 by Alexandra Sellers.

  The author would like to express her grateful thanks to Amina Shah and the publisher for permission to use the story of Yunus and the Well of Sweetness. It has been retold from ARABIAN FAIRY TALES by Amina Shah (Octagon Press Ltd., London 1989).

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

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  *Sons of the Desert