AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The woman who entered was almost exactly like the photographs Ash had seen. Her silky, dark hair had been plaited and wound around her head, and a jewelled ribbon was weaved through the plait, created a shimmering effect. She wore a dark ruby red dress that covered her body from neck to the floor, and all the way down to the wrists, and yet somehow it was floaty and gauzey enough to hint at the curves it concealed in a way that Ash hadn’t expected. Her eyes were brown, yes, but there were flecks of honey and caramel in them, and they were enormous and round, with curling black lashes. Her skin was a pale golden, like melted butter, and there were several dark freckles across the bridge of her nose. Her lips were cherry red, almost the exact same tone as the dress.
She was just like the picture, but so much more beautiful. A picture couldn’t convey the depth of her features, the fragrance of citrus and lavender that seemed to accompany her, and it certainly couldn’t convey her emotions, which Ash could clearly see were sparking in that moment.
“Your Highness,” he murmured, bowing his head forward before moving towards her. His curiosity increased as he wondered at this unexpected, unaccompanied visit, and the sense he had that she was annoyed.
She compressed those full red lips and her eyes sparked with his, as though she was running through a thousand things she wanted to say and trying to select the one that was suitable.
“You are Sheikh Ashad Al’Eba?”
“Guilty,” he murmured. Ordinarily, he would have shaken her hand, but the princess was obviously riled about something and he wasn’t sure she wouldn’t reject the gesture. “Please, have a seat.”
She sent him a barbed look, and he knew, somehow, that she was contemplating saying ‘no’, but apparently she thought better of it and crossed to the set of armchairs to the side of the desk.
“Would you like a tea? Coffee?” His lips twisted into an expression of amusement. “Something stronger?”
Her eyes widened and she shook her head. “No. Thank you.”
He suppressed a grin as he moved towards the seats but did not join her. “You wish to speak to me?”
She nodded, her hands clasped neatly in her lap. Why the hell was Syed balking at the idea of marrying this princess? True, he’d spent less than two minutes in her company, but Ash couldn’t help but think her the most intriguing and beautiful woman he’d ever met.
“You are here to negotiate the terms of my marriage.”
Ash nodded, revealing nothing of his true purpose for coming to Falina.
“And yet you email palace officials and my father, rather than me?”
He startled visibly, but recovered quickly. “The arrangement has been made with your father,” he murmured, crossing to the buffet beside his desk and scooping some fruit into a bowl; berries, citrus, melon and passionfruit. He placed it in front of her then took a seat opposite.
“Yes, well, he understands that I want to be involved at this stage of negotiations,” she said, her voice flattened of any emotion. But he saw it. He saw it in the tense lines of her body, the brightness of her eyes.
“My apologies, Your Highness.”
She reached for a single red berry and held it for a moment. She had lovely hands. Small and fine boned with rounded nails that had been painted red, to match her lips. Were her toenails similarly painted? Unconsciously, his eyes dropped lower, checking his hypothesis. Only in order to arrive at her feet, they had to travel the length of her body, and he found his eyes lingering on the swell of her breasts and the hips he could see beneath her dress.
She wore closed toe shoes.
When he lifted his eyes to her face, he saw her cheeks had two bright pink spots in them that showed she’d been all too aware of his inspection. He wondered why he didn’t feel sorry for that? Why he didn’t feel that he’d been inappropriate?
“It is my marriage we are to discuss,” she continued. Was her voice breathy because she was discussing an event of such gravity? Or had his appraisal made her pulse hammer?
He felt his dick harden and was grateful he was sitting, covered by the folds of his robe. The reaction was unwanted, though. This woman was, more than likely, to be his cousin’s bride, but biology was biology.
He was only human, and whatever Syed might think, Charlotte Shareef was, hands down, the most stunningly desirable woman he’d ever met. She lifted a hand and toyed with her earring; it was an enormous diamond. Higher up her ear she had a slim gold band and he found himself fantasising about removing it, removing all the jewellery she wore, the clothes she wore, until it was just her and her sexy red fingernails and the toes he imagined were painted to match.
“My uncle has always dealt with your father,” Ash murmured, his eyes dropping to her lips as she pulled the lower between her teeth and massaged it distractedly.
“Yes, well. Now it is you, apparently, in your uncle’s place, and me in my father’s.”
Ash was more than happy to deal with Charlotte, except for one troublesome point. He wasn’t sure how the hell he was going to keep a lid on a very unexpected and unwelcome desire.
He needed to get laid.
And not by Charlotte.
Damn it! The thought alone conjured images he didn’t want. Her, straddling him, taking him deep inside of her, her dark hair falling over his naked chest as she dropped her mouth to run her tongue over his flesh. He groaned inwardly.
This was a disaster.
