Royal and Ruthless: Innocent Mistress, Royal Wife / Prince of Scandal / Weight of the Crown

Desperately Lexie broke it. ‘I’m no connoisseur, but I do like the wines made in Marlborough from Sauvignon Blanc grapes. In the north of the North Island, where I live, wine growers are also trying out unusual varieties of grapes to see which cope best with the humidity and the warmth.’

Oh, brilliant, she thought in despair. Talk about banal!

‘Shall we stop fencing?’ Rafiq suggested, his amused tone laced with another emotion, one that sent shivers of excited recognition through her.

‘I wasn’t aware we were,’ she lied, hoping she sounded crisp and fully in control.

He held out his hand for her glass, and when after a moment’s hesitation she handed it over, he set it beside his own on the low table. The moonlight glimmered on his white shirt, lovingly enhancing the breadth of his shoulders, the narrow waist and hips, the arrogant angles and planes of his features. Whenever she’d ridden a roller coaster she’d felt like this: both exhilarated and terrified.

‘Of course we were,’ he said, straightening up to smile at her. ‘We are like swordsmen, you and I, continually duelling for advantage. But it is time to bring an end to it.’

Once again her stomach did that flip thing. A hot rush of sensation drove away memories and common sense. When he looked at her like that she was aware of nothing but the drumming of her heart in her ears, and the relentless heat of desire building like a storm through her. Honey-sweet, potent as the strongest rum, powerful and frightening, it shook her to the core.

Eyes dilating endlessly, she watched his smile harden, and her breath locked in her throat at the slow slide of his hands up her arms.

‘Your skin is finer by far than the silk you’re wearing. For this whole interminable evening I have been wanting to touch it,’ he said in a low, harsh voice, and bent his head to kiss the place his fingers had caressed.

Sharp as joy, acute as pain, pleasure shot through her at the touch of his mouth. When he slid his hands across her back and pulled her against him, she sighed his name and met his seeking, demanding kiss with open passion.

It ended too soon. He lifted his head and looked at her, green eyes glittering, and in a tone that was almost angry said, ‘That is the first time you’ve allowed yourself to say that.’

Somehow the simple act of pronouncing the two syllables that made up his name was almost more intimate than the kisses they’d exchanged. ‘You’ve never told me I could,’ she said huskily.

A smile curved his sculpted mouth. ‘I didn’t know New Zealanders held to such strict rules of etiquette. In fact, I believed the publicity—that you are a laid back, ultra-casual lot.’

But her mother had not been a New Zealander, she’d been Illyrian, and she’d brought up her daughters to be more formal than their friends.

Rafiq went on, ‘We’ve kissed—that gives you the right to call me whatever you want.’ And he kissed her again, this time lightly. ‘And me the right to call you sweet Lexie—no?’

Sweet? Was he indicating that he knew she was a virgin, and that it was all right? Forcing a smile, she said, ‘I don’t think I’m sweet. Practical, perhaps…’

But a practical woman wouldn’t be like this, locked in his arms, her body rejoicing at the hardness of his, her heart pounding so heavily he must feel it.

‘Do you feel practical right now?’ His voice was low and tender.

She closed her eyes against him, afraid that he’d see just what she was feeling—total surrender, a desperate, wanton abandonment of all the rules she’d lived by until she’d met him.

‘No,’ she admitted, gaining confidence from the thudding of his heart against her. Whatever he thought, he couldn’t hide the fact that he wanted her.

‘So—how do you feel?’ And when she didn’t answer, he laughed softly. ‘A little wild?’

He punctuated each word with teasing kisses, but she sensed the inner demands driving him, and something unregenerate and fierce flared up to meet and match his hunger.

‘Reckless?’ he murmured, his mouth poised so close to hers that their breaths mingled.

‘Yes,’ she said simply, knowing what she’d just agreed to, knowing that after this there would be no going back—knowing, and not caring, because there was nothing in the world she wanted as much as learning about Rafiq in the most intimate way of all.

Later? Oh, she’d deal with later when it came.

She gave a squeak of astonishment as the world swooped, and he lifted her high in his arms and carried her across to that sinful double day bed.

Beside it he lowered her to her feet, sliding her down his lean, powerful length so that his need for her became blatantly, erotically obvious. Shivering, afire with sensation, she couldn’t drag her eyes away from his narrowed gaze, which darkened with an elemental need that banished all her shyness with its heat.

‘This pretty dress is a seduction in itself,’ he said deeply. ‘I’ve been wanting to slide these tiny, taunting buttons free, push them back so that the silk frames you…’

As he spoke his hands followed his words. Prey to an intensity of feeling she’d never experienced, she ignored the colour burning her skin and shrugged free of the bodice. And then stopped, acutely conscious that the only thing between her breasts and his deft, insistent hands was her bra.

Should she undo it?

Almost before the thought had formulated she felt his hands at the catch—knowledgeable and far too skilful at this, she thought on a spurt of sharp jealousy that kept her head high when he eased her bra away.

He stood looking at her, the dark, fierce hunger in his eyes satisfying something primitive and untamed in her.

On a raw note, he said, ‘You are—perfect,’ and took her eager mouth, bending her back over his arm so that his lips slid easily from hers to the demanding, importunate tips of her breasts.

The hot caress of his mouth splintered every inhibition. Moaning, lost in a carnal haze, Lexie’s hands clenched helplessly in the fine fabric of his shirt as his mouth worked erotic magic on her.

‘No,’ she muttered when he lifted his head.

‘What?’

He bit it out with such harshness she forced her eyes open, and saw the sudden rigidity in his features. ‘Don’t stop,’ she said on a gasp.

But he held her eyes in a measuring stare. ‘You are sure?’

‘Of course I’m sure.’ Frustrated, she stumbled over her next words. ‘If you stop, I just might kill you.’

Strong arms closed around her again, and he set her on the bed. Shivering with anticipation so keen it came close to pain, she watched him shuck off his shirt. Lamplight gilded his skin, picking out the smooth swell and flex of muscles as he dropped the garment to the ground. But when his hands moved to the belt of his trousers she looked away, suddenly and shyly aware of her total lack of experience.

Should she tell him? Would he think she was some sort of frigid freak? Worse still, would he be overcome by an outdated chivalry and refuse to make love to her?

Clamping her mouth to hold back the confession that threatened to tumble out, she kicked off her shoes, not caring whether they landed on the stone terrace beside the bed or in the pool a few feet away.

Lithely, Rafiq came down beside her, muscles shifting and coiling, a study in gleaming bronze power. Lexie swallowed to ease a dry throat as the sheer size of him struck home. Without the civilising influence of his superbly tailored clothes, the difference between her female slenderness and his forceful masculinity overwhelmed her.

But that initial qualm was immediately eased by his gentleness as he began to slide the dress down her body.

Only to stop when he saw the faint shadows on her ribcage. She said quickly, ‘They’ve just about gone now.’

‘I don’t want to hurt you.’ He bent his sleek black head and kissed them, his lips sending darts of sensation to her very soul.

‘You couldn’t hurt me.’ When he hesitated, she held her breath in an agony of supplication.

He said, ‘I will be very careful, and you must tell me if there is any pain.’

‘I will.’

Her eyes flew open in dismay as another thought presented itself. What if he thought she was using contraceptive medication?