AllFreeNovel
Share Us
* * *
Zafar had never met anyone who blushed with such frequency as his new bride. Or trembled as much. He was stunned she hadn’t collapsed into a heap of nerves thus far. His earlier summation that she was as skittish as one of his mares couldn’t be more accurate. Even now, as they took their first dance, he sensed she was moments from tugging out of his hold and fleeing across the ballroom.
But just like before, right when he thought she would succumb to her nerves, she straightened her slender spine, raised that delicate little chin, and speared him with a look of such defiance it almost made him smile.
Almost.
Because this was no laughing matter. He had taken a complete stranger as his Queen. Granted, Amira had been little more than an acquaintance despite the arrangement to marry, but this was...unprecedented.
Just like that kiss on the balcony...
He clenched his gut as the memory drew another strange zing through his bloodstream. It had just been a kiss, nothing more. So why was the unique sensation lingering, luring him into wishing to experience it again? He wouldn’t, of course.
This whole near disaster had him on edge. The adrenaline high of salvaging a situation that could’ve exploded in his face was what had blown that kiss out of proportion.
But it was time to wrestle everything back under control.
Despite the press release holding at bay the dozens of questions he was sure were coming his way, his people would need definitive answers by morning.
He’d barely been able to stop Amira’s father from detonating the whole event even before it’d started. The man was rightly in search of answers for his daughter’s whereabouts and bewildered at the news that Amira had jilted the man she was supposed to marry. Only by asserting his full authority had
Zufar stopped his father’s best friend from causing a scene. Feroz had finally realised Zufar was the wronged party and agreed to return home to await further news.
Zufar resisted the urge to grit his teeth at the thought of his half-brother’s actions.
He had set his best investigators on the case to satisfy himself that Amira hadn’t been taken against her will, but instinctively he knew she hadn’t been abducted. In fact, in hindsight, Amira’s lacklustre interaction with him lately was revelatory.
That sliver of relief slid through him again, this time arriving with a cold acceptance that perhaps he’d dodged a bullet that could’ve seen history repeating itself. Because a wife that could’ve so easily been seduced by another man, as his mother had been, was one he didn’t want. Maybe his half-brother had done him a favour. Had even unwittingly ensured Zufar wasn’t distracted from his duty and responsibility the way his father’s preoccupation with his mother’s infidelity had made him?
His teeth met in jaw-clenching grit. He wasn’t so forgiving as to brush away the fact that Adir had done this today to extract maximum humiliation—
‘Perhaps you should take your own advice, Your Highness,’ his new bride stated softly.
He redirected his gaze to hers. ‘Excuse me?’
‘You want me to smile and not give the game away but you should see your face right now,’ she said.
‘And what does my face say?’
‘That you are terribly displeased by something. Of course, I’m sure I don’t need to guess what it is. You think you will find her soon?’ she asked.
He pushed his irritation away. ‘I don’t wish to talk about Amira.’ Further thought of his half-brother was not welcome. Moreover, Zufar found he was much more interested in the woman he held in his arms.
For the purposes of keeping in character, of course.
Because Niesha was right. He was at risk of giving the game away. He schooled his features as he continued to look down at her. As he did so, he noticed the changes in her.
The hair he’d believed to be mousy was in fact a lustrous thick chestnut, highlighted with dark gold strands he was sure didn’t come out of a tube. Her eyelashes were unbelievably long, fanning almost hypnotically against her cheeks when she lowered them. Lips painted a deep peach drew his eyes consistently to the soft, plump curve of her mouth. Her eyes were wide and alluring pools edged in kohl that emphasised the amethyst depths.
In her heels, she came up to his chin, bringing him that much closer to the lips he had tasted all too briefly on the balcony outside. Lips that his own thirsted to taste.
The zing threatened to spark into something else, something more as his recollection deepened.
She wasn’t experienced, that much he could tell by kissing her, but he had sensed an innocent eagerness in her that lit a fire in his belly. The temptation to kiss her, experience that thrill again, fanned his hunger. He curbed it ruthlessly.
He wasn’t weak like his father, controlled by his obsessional urges to the ruin of all else around him. Zufar enjoyed sex, and the carefully selected women he’d indulged himself with over the years had more than satisfied his needs. But not a single time had he let his emotions overtake him.
He didn’t intend to start now.
