“How are you?” The question wasn’t about her, she knew. It was about her health. Her ability to continue with their conception project.
“Fine,” she confirmed with a crisp nod. “Will I see you tonight?”
Something like anger speared through her, passing from the look in his face through her body, like tiny little darts.
“How was the city?” He asked, ignoring her question.
“As usual.” She said with a frown, unwrapping the bright silk scarf from around her hair and placing it on the edge of her bed. “My charity is hosting a benefit. I’ve been neglecting my organizational duties so it was good to be able to catch up.”
“Your charity.” He frowned. “I recall you are engaged in some fundraising but I don’t remember…”
“A children’s hospital,” she said. “I’m on the board.”
“Ah.” He nodded. “I remember.” He’d received the letter notifying him of her appointment, though it had been over a year ago. He’d presumed she would run out of interest with it before now. He stood frowning for a moment.
Chloe neatened her hair and then prompted, “So? Was there anything else you needed?”
Raffa shook his head. “No. I’m glad you’re well.”
She compressed her lips. It was just a statement of fact – gratitude that she would continue as his lover, until a baby was conceived. “I’m fine. Tonight?”
Irritation was visible on his handsome face again, but he nodded. “Tonight.”
Chloe had purposefully dressed in a simple cream slip after her evening shower. What would the purpose be in wearing anything else? Removing her clothes added to the sense that more was taking place between them than a simple transaction. While away in the city, she’d come to the conclusion that she needed to remember at all times that they were simply working together to make a baby. Passion was irrelevant. The more businesslike she could make their encounters the better.
But when Raffa entered her room a little after eight, her heart began to thump hard and fast inside of her, and her eyes devoured him as though she had been deprived of him for months, not a week.
“You’ve eaten?” he asked, closing the distance, his own eyes performing a leisurely inspection of her body. The slip dipped low across her breasts, and fell to mid-thigh.
She nodded. “I’m ready.”
He made a noise of impatience and shook his head. “What happened to wanting to get to know one another?” He asked, but his hand lifted, almost seemingly against his will, to the strap of her slip. He pushed it down possessively, so that one creamy, rounded breast was revealed to his gaze.
“I know you,” she said hoarsely. “And you know me. At least enough for this.”
For a second his eyes flew to hers and then they were back at her breasts. His smile was cynical, but she couldn’t have said why.
“Have you missed me, Sheikha?” He asked, pushing the other strap downwards, so both breasts were displayed.
“Yes,” she said honestly. Her eyes held a challenge.
He understood. “That is a relief.” His thumb padded across her lower lip. “I haven’t been able to sleep for wanting you.”
Hope and her heart burst through Chloe, but she repressed both. Physical desire was a given. And there was no reason to think he hadn’t indulged himself with Elena, or anyone else.
She had no expectations from her husband. The more she reminded herself of that, the better she felt. The easier it was to keep her heart cold, to maintain an emotional distance.
“How are you otherwise?” She asked, realizing she hadn’t observed even the most basic of courtesies since her return to the palace.
“Is there an otherwise?” He said, lifting her easily and cradling her against his chest.
Her heart flipped over. If she pressed her ear to his chest, she knew she would hear the strong beating of his heart. But it would be slow and steady, not like hers.
“I guess not.”
He placed her on the bed gently, sliding his hands over her smooth thighs, pushing her dress to her hips, revealing her naked womanhood to his eyes.
At his enquiringly arched brow, she shrugged. “I thought I’d dispense with the preamble.”
“I see.” He padded his thumb over the fair hair at the apex of her thighs and she shivered, her hips writhing. She wanted him more than she could say. She needed him.
“I suggest you do likewise,” she said haughtily, so that he laughed.
“You are asking me to be fast?”
She bit down on her lip.
“And that just makes me want to be very, very slow,” he said, and to elaborate, dropped his head towards her thighs, running his tongue over her most sensitive flesh until she was incandescent with pleasure.
“It makes me want to torture every single one of your pleasure points until you can barely speak. To make you weak with needing me. To make you incapable of thinking of anything other than when we will next be together.”
“That would fall into the cruel and unusual category,” she said with great effort. Her body was trembling with desire, her mind foggy already. “When we both know once you’ve achieved your aim, there will be no ‘next time’.”
He paused for a moment, but then, he lifted his hands to her breasts, stroking her flesh there, circling her nipples, teasing her achingly slowly.
She held her breath, waiting for a denial, she realized. Waiting for a contradiction, a suggestion that their relationship had progressed in a way that would never be undone.
“So let us make the most of this, then,” he muttered softly, bringing his lips to the soft flesh at the base of her throat. His breath fanned her pulse point there and she whimpered beneath him. It was a sound of pleasure, and ever so slightly of heartbreak.
Despite her request, he did just as he’d said, tormenting her until she was almost at breaking point. Bringing her to the brink of pure white-hot pleasure before allowing sanity to seep back in, then stirring her back up anew. She was desperate for him, desperate to feel him within
