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Mahindar blinked.Interesting.Rumor had it that Arabelle’s father had sent his daughter away to England to get her out of his sight, but Mahindar now wondered if Abdul had simply given into his wife’s request to have Arabelle educated elsewhere. If that was true, Abdul must truly love his wife. Few sheikhs allowed their daughters to be influenced and corrupted by foreigners.
He’d bet even his closest sheikh friends—Fayez, Jamal and Hamid—would never consider such an idea despite their own western educations. He resisted snorting. Not that he could talk. He couldn’t imagine sending any of his kin away, especially at such a young and tender age.
“Enough about me,” she said, her eyes suddenly watchful. “What were your parents like? Did they treat you well?”
His stomach tightened. Did she really need to learn about his distasteful childhood, where he’d grown up determined to be the opposite of his parents?
She blinked at him as the silence lengthened. “It can’t have been so terrible, not with the way you’ve turned out.”
“Oh?” he prompted.
She blushed, her paler skin offsetting her dark sable hair with its natural reddish-brown highlights. “You’ve turned a war-torn, long-suffering country into something…admirable. And from all accounts, your people have never been happier.” She dabbed at her mouth with a napkin. “Though that might have changed now you’ve married me, a foreign girl despite my sheikh father.”
His lips tilted at the corners. “And that bothers you?”
She tossed her head, reminding him of a hot-blooded, temperamental filly. “Of course not!” she denied. “You arranged the marriage with my father. I had no say in the matter. Your people can accept or reject me, it hardly matters either way.”
“And yet I can see that it does,” he said softly.
The sparks in her blue-green eyes were as clear as those in the fireplace. “Then you’re seeing what you want to see.”
She threw her napkin to the table and rose from her seat. “If you don’t mind, I think I’d like to retire to bed now.”
“You’re asking permission to leave?” he asked, no longer restraining a wide smile. “You’re becoming quite the malleable bride.”
Her plump, kissable lips tightened into a thin line. “I’m not the docile, obedient wife you no doubt expected. I never will be.”
He pushed to his feet, towering over her even in her heels. But she didn’t look one bit intimidated, even tilting her head back there was heat in her stare, the same passion that excited and aroused him. “I was going to offer dessert,” he murmured. “But bed sounds like a much better idea.”
“Dessert?” She licked her lips, as though she was more interested in a sweet treat than she was in having sex. “W-what dessert do you have?”
He forced his mind out of the fantasy filling his head which involved her lips and her tongue on his body, and croaked, “Kunafa.”
She patted a hand on her stomach. “I haven’t tasted that since I was a little girl.”
He smiled. “Then allow me to get you some before it goes cold.”
She sat. “Thank you.”
When he returned and sat in a chair next to her, placing a plate onto the table with one spoon and a chunk big enough to share, her eyes widened.
He used a fork to break off a piece and her mouth opened as she accepted his proffering, her eyes then sliding closed along with her mouth as she savored the food that would no doubt be nostalgic. “Mm.”
He pushed the fork back into the pastry with its sugary filling and pistachio top, the tantalizing scent of citrus and rose water filling the air. He closed his mouth over the bite-sized piece even as her eyes fluttered open again and she watched him suck the prongs clean.
“More?” he asked huskily.
She nodded. “Please.”
He proffered her another piece and this time she held his gaze as she sucked the dessert into her mouth, leaving the tines just as clean when he withdrew the fork.
He smothered a groan as he imagined her mouth wrapped around his cock and sucking him dry. He dropped the fork with a clank onto the plate next to what remained of their dessert, then leaned forward and claimed her mouth with his own.
He thought she might resist. Instead she moaned softly and kissed him back, their sweet breaths merging even as he stood and lifted her against him, then strode into their bedroom.
His bride mightn’t love him but her body most certainly did. And he’d use every trick in his arsenal to make her change her mind. He broke the kiss to lay her onto the bed and follow her down. Her eyes gleamed in the weak moonlight seeping into the bedroom, her lips plumped with passion and her breaths erratic.
That he was also desperate to fuck her—and was too often consumed by thoughts of fucking her—was a lucky fringe benefit.
