She slept as innocently as a child, a whore who had offered comfort as well as pleasure. Her cheeks were pale-from sleep? From exhaustion? From satiation?
Her clitoris had risen against his finger-once. Her vulva had clenched about his verge five times, tighter than his fist.
She had reached her peak six times in total.
He watched the stillness of her face, and thought of the man he had nearly betrayed-
He studied the fan of her lashes, and thought of the woman he had silently loved-safe in the knowledge that she had loved another.
And knew he would never again be the same.
He had experienced sexual union.
One night. With one woman.
Sexless duty was a pitiful substitute.
His biceps and calves ached. Dull pressure radiated inside his groin.
The first would ease with time and exercise; the latter with simple voiding. All he had to do was find the strength to get out of bed, he who had not lingered between the sheets since he was a thirteen-year-old boy, secure in who and what he was.
Moving slowly, so as not to awaken Megan, he slid out from under her head, her leg, and then the covers.
His toes curled. The wooden floor was icy.
Briefly he stood over the bed and watched Megan sleep. Her echoing cries of pleasure rang in his ears.
She had begged him. To not stop. To fill her more deeply. To love her harder.
Never had he been so humbled, yet felt so powerful.
Her black dress lay in a heap where she had stepped out of it to come to his bed. His white turban and
Prior to that night, he would have neatly folded his clothes away before retiring.
Prior to that night, he would scoop his clothes up now and fold them away.
Bending down, he grabbed the chamber pot from underneath the wooden slats of the sleigh bed. Crumpled rubber shone in the corner of his eye-the French letter he had used to protect himself from disease. Thin fluid congealed in the bottom of the sheath, proof that even he was capable of ejaculating.
Plucking up the used prophylactic, he crossed the plank floor. Setting the heavy porcelain down on the chair by the fireplace that no longer emitted even a vestige of warmth, he lifted the lid in his right hand.
Chipped black print stared up at him.
A slight smile hitched up his lips. There was a certain bawdy charm about the English.
Dropping the condom into the bowl, he reached down with his left hand to guide himself. For the first time the term
She had praised him for his size-he who had never thought to receive praise from any woman.
Hot urine arced into the chipped porcelain; it steamed in the chill morning air. Cursorily shaking himself dry, he replaced the lid.
Megan would need to make use of the chamber pot when she awakened; he turned, leaving it on the chair for her convenience.
Shadowy eyes stared up at him from the depths of the narrow sleigh bed. He did not need to see their color to know what it was: they were moss green. Verdant with life as the desert was not.
His first instinct was to hide himself. For the first time in forty years he did not.
His head felt oddly light, with no turban to protect his black hair that was liberally streaked with gray. But it was not his head that snared her attention.
Gaze oddly hesitant, she stared at his groin.
A prickle of heat rushed down his spine.
He stood still, waiting for her to laugh-as women in the harem laughed. Afraid to move, lest he invoke the very laughter that he feared.
'I did not know that men in Arabia shaved their private regions.' Megan's gaze skidded up to meet his, danced past him. 'Is it not chilly in the winter?'
Her sally fell flat in the chill morning air.
She had not judged him in the dark of night. But she did now in the light of day, else she would not make sport of his condition.
The surge of rage took him by surprise.
'Take another look, madam,' he bit out. 'It is more than 'private' hair I am missing.'
Her eyes widened. With uncertainty? Alarm that she had offended an Arab dog?
He had offered her a gold sovereign. How much more money would it take for her to accept him in the light of day, as she had accepted him in the dark of night?
She glanced back down and studied him for long seconds.
Her tongue flecked her lips, a darker shadow in shadowy twilight. 'You are not as… as large as you were last night, but that is understandable, surely.'
Megan's response was naive; it was not manufactured.
His head snapped back.
She was a whore. How could she not see the obvious?
How could she not have felt it last night-that lack of flesh which made a man, a man-when she had grasped him in her hand? How could she mistake him for anything other than what he was, after he had lain between her thighs, buried so deeply inside her vulva that not even the night air had come between them?
Unless…
'Who are you?' he snapped.
Her gaze leaped back to his. The paleness of her face bleached into stark white. 'I told you who I am.'
'You're not a whore,' he said baldly.
No whore could fail to observe what she had apparently missed.
His stomach clenched.
But if she wasn't a whore, why had she come to his room?
What was she doing in his bed?
He had cried, when he orgasmed, the tears he had not cried for forty years. She had held him, comforted him, loved him as if she were used to men who cursed and cried while they fought to find release inside a woman's body.
Tense seconds passed. A man's muffled shout for an ostler penetrated the outside hotel wall, a blaring reminder that the night was over and a new day had dawned.
'I am a widow,' she said finally, evenly. 'A patron of this inn, as you are.'
His eyes narrowed, remembering his observation-that she did not sound as if she were from around Land's End; remembering her answer-that she was not. Why hadn't he ques-tioned her further?
'How is it that you came to my room last night?' he bit out.
'I overheard you order the innkeeper to find you a… a prostitute.' Her breath fogged the air, blurring her face. 'I intercepted her in the hallway. I knocked on your door in her stead, hoping you would mistake me for her.'
A shrill whinny carried on the air; it was followed by a short, sharp, canine bark.
It dawned on him that he should be cold, standing naked before a woman in a chill English inn, but he wasn't. Blood pumped through his veins; vivid memories flashed through his mind like colored sand in a kaleidoscope, changing, shifting. Questions he had asked, thinking she was a whore; reassurances she had uttered, encouraging his abandon.
Had she been disappointed by his ignorance… or had she reveled in her sexual superiority?
Ten half-moons throbbed to life in his shoulders, the imprint of her fingernails.
Had her flesh clenched around his in enjoyment… or frustration?
