Midnight in the Desert: Jewel in His Crown / Not Fit for a King? / Her Desert Prince

Raja found it deeply ironic that the potential pregnancy from which she was so keen to protect herself would have been a source of much rejoicing in both their countries. He suppressed that knowledge, for once uninterested in the bigger picture and concentrating on his own reactions for a change. As he studied her stunning oval face with burnished golden eyes of anticipation, he was startled to discover that he was willing to want whatever would make her happy. ‘It’s OK. Don’t worry about it. I will protect you—’

‘We can’t be sex buddies … it’s indecent—’

‘I like indecent,’ Raja confided huskily, trailing provocative fingertips very gently along the tender skin of her thigh so that she became even more painfully aware of the awesome strength of her own craving. ‘In fact I could live beautifully with indecent.’

To silence the argument he sensed brimming on her lips he tasted her sultry pink mouth with the lingering eroticism that came so naturally to him, sensually teasing the soft fullness of her lower lip before penetrating her mouth in a smooth, explicit thrust. And while he kissed her he was skimming the ball of his thumb against the most sensitive spot on her entire body with a shocking expertise that made her stifle a scream while she writhed and gasped her response.

Before she could catch her breath from that onslaught, Raja leant back from her to rip open a foil packet and make use of a condom. Her heart thudded violently up tempo. She would not let herself think about what she was doing. She was rebelling against everything she knew because she had never wanted anything so much as she wanted him in that moment. And without a doubt she was ashamed of it, ashamed of the wild seething longing that controlled her, befuddling her brain and enslaving her body.

Raja sank into her in a long, slow surge, stroking her tender flesh with his. It felt so indescribably good that she cried out and her inner muscles clenched and convulsed around him. In the throes of extreme pleasure, he shuddered violently, as entrapped in that hunger as she was. ‘It’s never been like this for me before …’ he confided.

Or for her, her brain echoed but speech was beyond her. Her whole body was attuned to every movement of his. With every subtle shift of that lean, powerful physique of his the dark pleasure rose in a sweet suffocating tide. He withdrew and then delved deep, moving faster and faster and her spine arched and she moaned in frantic excitement, defenceless against the feverish beat of exquisite sensation. Her climax finally rippled through her in an unstoppable force and she flamed into countless burning pieces before she dropped back to planet earth again. Another cry was dragged from her as the violent tremors of his final pleasure rocked her slight body with renewed sensitivity and sensation.

Raja eased back from her to study her with appreciation. He bent his head to press a kiss to her cheekbone. ‘You’re amazing,’ he told her breathlessly.

‘What have we done?’ Ruby lamented out loud, already gritting her teeth, aware that in yielding to her hunger for him she had given way to weakness for the first time in her life. And that acknowledgement hurt her pride, really hurt.

Laughing, Raja described what they had done in the most graphic terms and she curled a hand into a fist and struck his shoulder in reproach. ‘This is not a joke.’

‘You’re my wife. We had sex. Our desire was mutual and natural and the slaking of it rather wonderful. Why the fuss?’ Raja enquired with a slumberous smile of satisfaction while he marvelled at the unfathomable way in which she drew out the lighter side of his nature.

Ruby was jolted by the reality that he was in a totally different frame of mind and mood. He was celebrating while she was filled with regrets. ‘It’s not that simple—you know it’s not. We made an agreement—’

‘A foolish agreement destined to be broken from the outset,’ Raja countered without an ounce of uneasiness. ‘How could we marry and live in such proximity and not surrender to the attraction between us?’

In rejection of that stance, Ruby twisted free of his arms and rolled away to the far side of the bed. ‘That’s not what you said to me at the time.’

At that precise reminder, an impatient look skimmed across Raja’s face. ‘Choice didn’t come into it—I had to win your agreement to marry me—’

‘Had to?’ Ruby prompted stiffly, her whole attention lodged to him with unwavering force.

Far from impervious to the threat of the drama waiting in the wings, Raja raked his fingers through the black hair falling into curls at his brow and sent her a look of reproach. ‘You are not that naive, Ruby. With this marriage we brought the end to a war and created a framework for a peaceful future for both our countries. There is nothing more important than that and I never pretended otherwise. We sacrificed personal freedom for the greater good.’

That grim little speech, voiced without sentiment, froze Ruby to the marrow and felt like an ice spear thrust through her heart. He had torn any possibility of fluffy illusion from their relationship to insist on showing it to her as it truly was. But had she ever been in doubt of what their relationship entailed? A marriage that was part of a peace treaty between warring countries? A royal husband, who had married her because it was his duty to do so? Exactly when had she begun to imagine that finer feelings might be incorporated in that logical and unemotional package?

Scrambling out of bed because she was hugely uncomfortable with any physical reminder of what had just taken place there, Ruby pulled on her wrap and folded her arms. She would be reasonable, totally reasonable and practical just as he was, she told herself urgently. ‘You said that we made a foolish agreement. On what grounds do you base that charge?’

‘When we made that agreement, we were already strongly attracted to each other.’

‘But you didn’t argue that at the time,’ Ruby protested.

‘Sometimes you can be very naive.’ Raja sighed, expelling his breath in a measured hiss and stretching back against the tumbled pillows, a gloriously uninhibited vision of male magnificence. ‘Why do you think I went to the UK to meet you? My job was to persuade you to marry me as quickly as possible and assume your rightful place as a royal here in Ashur.’

Ruby lost colour as he made that explanation. ‘Your … job?’

‘There is nothing warm and fuzzy about that peace treaty, Ruby, or the stability that rests on the terms being upheld to the letter of the law. Obviously I was prepared to do pretty much whatever it took to win your agreement,’ Raja admitted tautly.

‘Obviously,’ Ruby repeated, feeling horribly hollow inside as if she had been gutted with a fish knife. ‘So, are you saying that you deliberately set out to get me into bed in the desert?’

‘I desired you greatly.’ Brilliant dark eyes struck challenging sparks off her critical and suspicious scrutiny.

‘That’s not what I asked you,’ Ruby declared. ‘I asked you if I was seduced to order, another box to be ticked on your list of duties.’

His clever brow furrowed, his darkly handsome features still and uninformative. ‘To order?’ he queried huskily.

‘Your English is as good as mine, possibly even better!’ Ruby snapped, her temper hanging by a fingernail to a cliff edge as she forced herself to seek a clarification that stung her shrinking self like acid. ‘Stop faking incomprehension to play for time when I ask an awkward question!’

Unmoved by that indictment, Raja stretched, hard muscle rippling across his broad shoulders and abdomen as he shifted position with the fluidity and grace of a tiger about to spring. ‘Is that what I’m doing?’ he traded with an indolence she suspected to be entirely deceptive.

Being stonewalled merely aggravated Ruby more and her chin came up, eyes bright with antagonism and resentment now. ‘Let me bring this down to the simplest level. Did you or did you not take off your boxers and lie down with me that night for the sake of your precious country?’

Raja very nearly laughed out loud at that demand but restrained the urge, aware it would go down like a lead balloon. ‘I am willing to confess that I never had any true intention of allowing our marriage to be a fake. I hoped to make our marriage real from the day of our wedding.’

The barefaced cool with which he made that shattering admission shook Ruby, whose nature was the direct opposite of calculating, to her very depths. ‘So, you deceived me.’

‘You put me in a position where I could do little else. A divorce between us would be a political and economic disaster. Any goodwill gained by our marriage would be destroyed and offence and enmity would take its place. And how could I continue to rule this country without an Ashuri princess by my side?’ he demanded bluntly. ‘Your people would not accept me in such a role.’

Unfortunately for him, Ruby was in no mood to recognise the difficulties of his position or to make allowances. Deep hurt allied with a stark sense of humiliation were washing through her slight body in poisonous waves. ‘You deceived me,’ she said again, her voice brittle with angry bitter condemnation. ‘I gave you my trust and you deceived me.’

‘I always intended to do whatever it takes to make you happy in our marriage,’ Raja breathed in a driven undertone, his dark eyes alight with annoyance and discomfiture, for he was well aware that he had been less than honest with her and that went against the grain with him, as well. ‘That is the only justification I can offer you for my behaviour.’

‘But if it takes a divorce to make me happy you’re going to make it difficult,’ Ruby guessed, her face pale and tight with the self-control she was exerting as she turned on her heel. ‘I’m sleeping on the sofa tonight.’

As the door eased shut on her quiet exit Raja swore, jolted by a powerful wave of dissatisfaction more biting than any he had ever known. He had wounded her and he had never wanted to do that. Although it would have been very much out of character he badly wanted to unleash his temper and punch walls and shout. But the discipline of a lifetime held, forcing him to stop, think and reason. Pursuing her to continue the altercation in the state of mind she was in would only exacerbate the situation. He had chosen honesty and maybe he should have lied but he believed that the woman he had married deserved the truth from him.

Ironically, Raja believed that he knew what his wife wanted from him. After all, almost every decent woman he had ever spent time with had wanted the same thing from him: eternal devotion and commitment and all the empty words and promises that went along with them. At a young age Raja had learned to avoid getting involved with that kind of woman. His mistress Chloe’s unconcealed greed was a great deal easier to satisfy and the main reason why Raja much preferred relationships based on practicality and mutual convenience.

Ruby, however, was very emotional and she would demand more than he had to offer. Ruby would want things that would make him grossly uncomfortable. He looked back down the years to when he had been a student deeply in love for the one and only time in his life. She would want romance and poetry, hand-holding and constant attention and if he even looked at another woman she might threaten to kill herself, he recalled with a barely repressed shudder. He was no woman’s lapdog and, although his father was a noted poet in Najar, Raja secretly hated poetry. He groaned in increasing frustration. Why were some women so difficult? So highly strung and demanding? Her metaphoric cup was half empty but in comparison his was almost full to overflowing. Ruby was a very beautiful and very entertaining woman and he had just enjoyed the most fantastic sex with her. That was enough for him and an excellent foundation for a royal marriage between strangers. He was more than content with what they already had together. Why couldn’t she be content? And how was he to persuade her of the value of his more rational and reserved approach?

On the sofa, which had all the lumps if not the worn appearance of a piece of furniture that had served beyond its time, Ruby tossed and turned. She was stunned that Raja could admit to telling her a barefaced lie. He had agreed to her terms. He had said the words but he hadn’t meant them. Clearly he had been diametrically opposed to a platonic marriage and the first chance he got to change that status quo he had snatched at it.

Just as Ruby had snatched at Raja out in the desert, craving the hot, hard passion of that lean, strong body against hers! Lust, that was all it could have been, and she had given way to that lust and without much of a struggle. It didn’t matter how much she blamed the upsetting circumstances of their kidnapping for what had transpired. In her heart she knew that nothing would ever have happened between them had she not found Raja al-Somari downright irresistible in the flesh.

But it seemed that Raja had made love to her for much more prosaic reasons than mere desire. He had slept with her to consummate their marriage, to make it a real marriage and ensure that she was less able to walk away easily. How much did he really find her attractive? Was it even possible that he was the sort of guy who had set out to bring her down simply because she defied his wishes and expectations? How many women had actually said no to Prince Raja with his fabulous looks and even more fabulous wealth? Had she only made herself an irresistible challenge?

Her eyes prickled with stinging tears of humiliation that rolled slowly down her face in the moonlight that filtered through the windows, which had no curtains. She had never had the power to guess what went on in Raja’s arrogant, dark head. Their confrontation tonight had been an education. He had been a total mystery to her and a dangerously fascinating one at that, she acknowledged painfully.

Possibly she had been overdue for the experience of meeting a man who affected her more than she affected him. Had she got too full of herself? Too convinced she could not be fooled or hurt by a man? She had assumed she could call the shots with Raja and he had just proved that she could not. The guy she had stupidly married was much colder, more astute and ruthless than she could ever be. Raja had manipulated her into doing what he wanted her to do when she slept with him and in doing so he had crushed Ruby’s pride to dust.

Hermione was standing guard over Ruby’s sleep when Raja entered the room soon after dawn. With a snarl, the little dog launched herself at him and he caught the animal. He suffered a bite on his arm before he got the frenzied little dog under control and deposited her outside the suite with a word of command to the guards standing outside to take care of her. Raja then strolled quietly back across the room to study his soundly sleeping wife. She didn’t take up much space on the sofa and she looked achingly young. Below the tousled mane of blonde hair, only her profile was visible. He could see the silvery tear tracks marking her cheek and he cursed under his breath, his conscience pierced afresh. He had screwed up, he had screwed up royally. He should have kept his mouth shut. Lying didn’t come easily to him but the truth had done way too much damage.

Somehow he had to redress that damage and make their marriage work. With no previous experience in the marital department and only a long unhelpful history of unscrupulous mistresses to fall back on, Raja felt unusually weak on the necessary strategy required to make a wife happy. Particularly a wife as unusual as Ruby. An apology would probably be in order. It was not that he had done anything he shouldn’t have done, he reasoned in frustration, more a question of accepting that in her eyes he was guilty and that for the sake of better marital relations he had to respond accordingly. He would buy her something as a gift, as well. Flowers? His nostrils flared and he grimaced. Flowers had the same nauseous effect on him as poetry. Diamonds? He had never met a woman who didn’t melt when he gave her diamonds …

CHAPTER EIGHT (#ulink_d03645f7-eddd-522f-8d9c-84578efd656d)

FROM her small collection of clothing, Ruby selected a black dress she had bought to wear at her mother’s funeral and a beige cotton casual jacket. She would be too warm in the garments but they would have to do because she couldn’t wear the red suit again. Some minimal make-up applied to conceal the puffiness of her eyes and her pallor, her hair caught up in a high ponytail for coolness, Ruby forced herself to walk out to the dining area and join Raja for breakfast.

‘Good morning …’ Raja murmured lazily as if they had not parted at odds the night before.