Diamond in the Desert

Emir promised pleasure. He also promised a chance to forget, and, for however short a time, the prospect of that seemed preferable at this moment to doing battle endlessly on every front. How would it feel to have this big man hold her and bring her pleasure? She must have swayed towards him, for the next thing she knew he was holding her in front of him.

‘Why, Britt,’ he said with amusement. ‘If I’d known how badly you wanted this I’m sure we could have arranged something before the meeting.’

Emir’s blunt approach should have shocked her—annoyed her—but instead it made her want him all the more, and as he brushed her lips with his she found herself instantly hungry, instantly frantic, for more pressure, more intimacy, and for everything to happen fast.

But Emir was even more experienced than she had realised, and now he took pleasure in subjecting her to an agonising delay. As the clock ticked, the tension built and he held her stare with his knowing and faintly amused look. She guessed Emir knew everything about arousal, and could only hope it wouldn’t be long before he decided she had suffered enough. She voiced a cry of relief when he cupped her face in his warm, slightly roughened hands, and another when her patience was rewarded by a kiss that began lightly and then brutally mimicked the act her body so desperately craved.

It was in no way subjugation by a powerful man, but the meeting of eager mates, a fierce coupling between two people who knew exactly what they wanted from each other, and as Emir pressed her back against the boardroom table and set about removing her clothes she gasped in triumph and began ripping at his.

He tossed her jacket aside. She loosened his tie and dragged it off, letting it drop onto the floor. As he ripped her blouse open she battled with the buttons on his shirt. She exclaimed with pleased surprise when he lifted her and she clung to him as he stripped off her tights and her briefs. Suddenly it was all about seeing who could rid themselves of any barriers first. She was mindless sensation—hot flesh brushing, touching, cleaving, in a tangle of limbs and hectic breathing, while Emir remained calm and strong, and certain. He felt so good beneath her hands … so very good—

Too good! You have never felt like this about a man before—

Danger! This man can change your life—

You won’t walk away from this with a smile on your face—

Using sheer force of will, she closed off her annoying inner voice. She wanted this. She needed it. This was her every fantasy come true. Even now as Emir took time to protect them both she saw no reason not to follow her most basic instinct. Why shouldn’t she? Emir was—

Emir was enormous. He was entirely built to scale. Was she ready for this?

He made her forget everything the moment he caressed her breasts. Moaning, she rested back and let him do what he wanted with her. Just this once she wanted to feel that she didn’t have to lead or fight. Just this once she could be the woman she had always dreamed of being—the woman who was with a man who knew how to please her.

And I wonder what he thinks about you—

To hell with what he thinks about me, she raged silently.

To hell with you, don’t you mean?

CHAPTER THREE

BRITT WAS BEAUTIFUL and willing and he had needs. Willing? She was a wild cat with a body that was strong and firm, yet voluptuous. Her breasts were incredible, up-tilted and full, and he took his time to weigh them appreciatively, smiling when she groaned with pleasure as he circled her nipples very lightly with his thumbnails. She was so responsive, so eager that her nipples had tightened and were thrusting towards him, pink and impertinent, and clearly in need of more attention. He aimed to please. Kissing her neck, he travelled down, part of him already regretting that they had wasted so much time. She shuddered with desire as he blazed a trail through the dust she had collected when she changed her tyre. ‘You’re clean now,’ he said, smiling into her lust-dazed eyes.

She laughed down low in her throat in a way he found really sexy, and then weakened against him as she waited for him to continue his sensory assault.

‘Shall I take the edge off your hunger?’ he offered.

‘Yours too,’ she insisted huskily.

‘If that’s what you want, you tell me what you’d like.’

Her gaze flicked up and her cheeks flushed pink. She wasn’t sure whether to believe him or not.

‘I’m serious,’ he said quietly.

‘Please—’

As she appealed to him he decided that the time he had allowed for this visit to Skavanga wouldn’t be enough. He ran his fingers lightly over her beautiful breasts before moving on to trace the swell of her belly. Lifting her skirt, he nudged her thighs apart. She made it easy for him, so he repaid her gesture by delicately exploring the heated flesh at the apex of her thighs. When she whimpered with pleasure it was all he could do to hold back. So much for his much-vaunted self-control, he mused, as Britt thrust her hips towards him, trying for more contact. He wanted nothing more than to take her now. Clutching his arms, she tilted herself back against the table, moaning with need. Opening her legs a little more for him, she showed him a very different woman from the one in the starchy photograph he had examined in London, but this was the woman he had suspected Britt was hiding all along.

‘You’re quite clinical about this, aren’t you?’ Britt panted in a rare moment of lucidity as he watched her pleasure.

Duty could do that to a man. He never let himself go. Growing up the second son of the third wife had hardly been to his advantage as a youth. He had been forced to watch the cruelty inflicted on his people by those closer to the throne than he was on a daily basis. So, yes, he was cold. He’d had to be to overthrow tyrants that were also his relatives. There was no room now in his life for anything other than the most basic human appetite.

‘Don’t make me wait,’ Britt was begging him.

She needn’t worry. His preference at this moment was to please her.

This was insane. Emir was cold, detached—and the sexiest thing on two legs. He was frighteningly distant, but she was lost in an erotic haze of his making. She needed more—more pressure, more contact—more of him. The more aloof he was, the more her body cried out to him. The ache he’d set up inside her was unbearable. She had to have more of his skilful touches—

An excited cry escaped her throat when she felt the insistent thrust of his erection against her belly. She rubbed herself shamelessly against it, sobbing with pleasure as each delicious contraction of her nerve endings gave some small indication of what was to come. Emir’s hard, warrior frame was even more powerful than she had imagined, and yet he used his hands so delicately in a way that drove her crazy for him. Lacing her fingers through his thick black hair, she dragged him close. He responded by cupping the back of her head to keep her in place as he dipped down and plundered her mouth. Sweeping the table clear, he lifted her and balanced her on the edge. Moving between her legs, he forced them apart with the width of his body. ‘Wrap your legs around me,’ he commanded, pushing them wider still.

She had never obeyed a man’s instructions in her life, but she rushed to obey these. Resting her hands flat on the table behind her, she arched her spine, thrusting her breasts forward, while Emir reared over her, magnificent and erect.

Like a stallion on the point of servicing a mare?

With far more consideration than that—

Are you sure?

She was sure that any more delay would send her crazy. She was also sure that Emir knew exactly what he was doing.

‘Tell me what you want, Britt,’ he demanded fiercely.

‘You know what I want,’ she said.

‘But you must tell me,’ he said in low, cruel voice.

Her throat dried. The harsher he got, the more arousing she found it. No one had ever pushed her boundaries like this before. And she had thought herself liberal where sex was concerned? She was a novice compared to Emir.

She had also thought herself emotion-free, Britt realised, but knew deep in her heart that something had changed inside her. Even when she plumbed the depths of Emir’s cold black eyes she wanted to be the one to draw a response from him—she wanted to learn more about him, and in every way.

‘Say it,’ he instructed.

Her face blazed red. No one spoke to her like that—no one told her what to do. But her body liked what was happening, and was responding with enthusiasm. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes, please.’ And then she told him exactly what she wanted him to do to her without sparing a single lurid detail.

Now he was pleased. Now she got through to him. Now he almost smiled.

‘I think I can manage that,’ he said dryly. ‘My only concern is that we may not have sufficient time to work our way through your rather extensive wish list.’

On this occasion, she thought. ‘Perhaps another time,’ she said, matching him for dispassion. But then she glanced at the door. How could she have forgotten that it was still unlocked? Just as she was thinking she must do something about it, Emir touched her in a way that made it impossible for her to move.

‘Don’t you like the risk?’ he said, reading her easily.

She looked at him, and suddenly she loved the risk.

‘Hold me,’ he said softly. ‘Use me—take what you need.’

She hesitated, another first for her. No one had ever given her this freedom. She moved to do as he said and found it took two hands to enclose him.