Modern Romance September 2016 Books 5-8. Natalie Anderson

unsure of her role as she stepped into the magnificent abode.

      The drapes were open, revealing beautiful private gardens, and she gazed out at them as the driver deposited their bags in the hallway.

      Felicia knew she wasn’t here as his PA, and yet she wasn’t quite sure if it was her troubleshooting skills that Kedah was seeking now.

      ‘I’m going to shower,’ he told her, and she nodded. ‘Join me?’

      She gave a tired laugh and carried on staring out of the window as Kedah headed off. His presumption should irk her, yet it didn’t.

      She wanted him, after all.

      It was later that concerned her, not now.

      Kedah walked into his large bathroom and removed his clothing. It should feel good to be home after all this time away, yet it never quite did.

      Home was Zazinia.

      He turned on the shower and the jets of water should have blasted him awake, but he was too tired for that. He stood soaping his body, still questioning the wisdom of telling the truth to another person.

      But then he watched as Felicia, a little late, took up his offer to join him.

      And for the first time it was good to be home.

      ‘Wait,’ he told her as she started to undress.

      Kedah came out of the shower and she stood as he took care of the intricate buttons he had itched to undo so many hours ago.

      This time he gave no orders. Instead he simply did what he must to get her naked. He peeled off her robe and then helped her out of her underwear.

      ‘You’re shaking?’ he said, because he could feel the tremble in her as she stepped out of her knickers.

      ‘I think I officially have jet lag,’ she said.

      She didn’t.

      Well, she probably did. But in that walk from the lounge through his bedroom to the bathroom she had known she was entrenching herself deeper into his life.

      He lifted her hair and kissed her neck softly, deeply, intimately, in a way that made her dizzy. And she wished he did not take quite such care, so that later she could fault him, but instead he took her, tired and aching, into the shower.

      First he washed her hair, and those strong fingers worked her into a quiet frenzy. He soaped her body and he missed nothing—not a finger, nor that patch of skin behind her knees that she had become aware of on the very first day they met.

      And she did nothing. She didn’t even touch him. She just felt the arousal that swirled around them thicken and knew of his increasing pleasure as his breathing tripped on occasion.

      She faced away from him and he splayed her hands against the glass. He kissed down her back and it was the first time since childhood that Felicia had cried. Not that he could see that she did, for the water took care of that, and not that he could hear that she did, for she sobbed also with desire.

      ‘Turn around.’

      They were the only words spoken, and when she did she was met with a wall of muscle. He held her and lifted her hair and kissed her, so the sound of water was but a distant thrum. It was so distant that it took her a moment to realise that he had turned the taps off. Taking her hand, he led her dripping wet to his bed.

      They would pay for this later, Felicia was sure. They would wake up in soaked sheets, with her hair in chaos, but she cared nothing about that now.

      She shivered—not just from the cool of the air on her wet skin, nor her building need, but from the darkness of the bedroom that shut out the morning sun, from the upending of her senses.

      In his room, she was deeper into his life.

      He pulled back the covers and she climbed in, and then he wrapped her not in linen but in the cocoon of his body. He was barely on his elbows, their skin was in full contact, and his weight was pleasurably heavy upon her.

      Then he took her, and Kedah had never meant to take her like this. He drove in on a kiss and told her her name. He told her just who he needed to chase away the demons.

      And she said stupid words—like yes and his name.

      All her anger and fury at being ignored and having to walk behind him was not eliminated by his kiss—in fact it was intensified. As he took her, hard and fast, there was almost a fight to the death taking place. Delicious anger burned and cleansed.

      He pounded her senses until she could take it no more, and she came but did not surrender, even while moaning his name and unfurling at her core.

      He met her, matched her, he filled her deeply and she lay there beneath him, breathless.

      And she was still angry.

      Did he think this was a part of the service? Did he think she could just give herself to anyone like that?

      Clearly he did, Felicia thought, for she assumed all his lovers were treated to such intimate bliss.

      She could never have known she was the first in this bed.

      He rolled from her.

      He had spent a lifetime wishing he had never opened that door, wishing he had never seen what he had. Now he checked that Felicia wanted to come further into his world.

      ‘Do you want to know?’

      She glanced at the clock by the bed and it told her it was nine.

      Her cases were there in the hall. She could easily dress now, make some casual comment and tell him it would keep and head for home.

      Get out now, while she still had a chance.

      It was already far too late for that.

      Her tears in the shower had left her surprisingly clear-headed, and she knew now she could not leave him by simple choice.

      ‘Yes.’ She turned and nodded. ‘I want to know.’

       CHAPTER EIGHT

      ‘THAT ARTICLE YOU read on the day of our first meeting,’ Kedah said. ‘Do you have it?’

      ‘It was taken down from the internet.’

      ‘Come off it, Felicia.’

      He knew that she was savvy and would have taken a screenshot, and of course she confirmed it. ‘I’ve got it on my phone.’

      ‘Take a look.’

      He got out of bed and it troubled Felicia how little it bothered her that he went into her bag and took out her phone, which he handed to her.

      ‘Have another read of it while I go and make coffee.’

      She moved over to the side of the bed that wasn’t damp from the shower and read again about the very decadent Sheikh Kedah.

      ‘What do you see?’ He brought in some drinks and then climbed in beside her on the dry side of the bed.

      ‘There’s nothing I don’t know. They’re hinting that the Accession Council should meet...’

      ‘Read on,’ Kedah told her, and she frowned and read down.

      ‘There’s just a picture of Mohammed and your father.’

      ‘And what does the caption say?’

      ‘“Like father, like son.”’

      ‘There’s a subtext there,’ Kedah said. ‘A warning that if I push for change then the truth might be revealed...’

      Felicia frowned.

      ‘The truth?’

      ‘There is a rumour in Zazinia that I am not my father’s son. It’s not just that I look