Historical Romance Books 1 – 4. Marguerite Kaye

she slipped the garment over her head. He drew his breath in sharply. His chest lifted. The taut muscles of his belly rippled. She pulled him towards her, so that they were sitting facing each other, though twined together. Their kiss had a new, exciting intimacy. Mouth on mouth. Her breasts against his chest, the rough hair making her nipples tingle, teasing them into hard buds.

      What now? She remembered the way he had cupped her breasts, making her nipples tauten. Would it be the same for him? She touched him, tentatively flattening her hands over his chest. She could feel his heart thumping. His skin was damp, hot. His nipples were dark brown. When she covered them, they peaked just as hers did, and Rafiq breathed faster, just as she did. She used her thumbs to stroke, to circle, and when his breath became even more shallow, she leaned over, took his nipple in her mouth and sucked. He shuddered, and she felt an answering twist inside her. ‘You like that,’ she said. A statement, not a question.

      ‘Very much.’

      She licked the other one, but then she began to panic. What next?

      Rafiq must have sensed her hesitation. ‘You do not have to do anything you don’t want to,’ he said. ‘One word is all it takes, remember? There is no rush.’

      ‘I know, but I don’t want—it’s just that I don’t know what to do,’ she confessed.

      ‘I can show you, if you would like me to.’

      ‘I would.’ She wrapped her arms around him. ‘I would like that very much.’

      He eased her on to her back, one hand on one breast, his mouth on the other, sucking, licking, circling, setting up a fiery, tingling path of sensation from her breasts to her belly, between her legs. He lifted his head from her breasts and kissed her mouth. ‘An element of control heightens the pleasure, Stephanie. Let us test ourselves,’ he whispered, rolling her on to her stomach.

      ‘Rafiq, what...?’

      His body covered hers. His chest to her back. His mouth on the nape of her neck. His hands tracing the swell of her breasts at her sides, the dip of her waist. She could feel his arousal pressing against her bottom. His hands slid under her, untying the sash, and then he slid her pantaloons away. She could not see him. She could only feel him. And hear him. Rustling. The sound of clothes being discarded. And then he was on top of her again, quite naked.

      He did not move. She could feel him breathing, his chest rising and falling against her back, the shallow whisper of his breath on her neck. And then his mouth again, on her shoulder, and he eased her carefully on to her side, one leg over hers. His hand on her breast, his arm around her waist to steady her, and the thick, hard length of him between her legs.

      She shuddered. Instinctively, she arched her lower body against him, and felt him shudder too. ‘Rafiq?’

      She thought he was ignoring her, but when he spoke, his voice hoarse, she realised he was simply fighting for control. ‘Feel what you do to me,’ he said, taking her hand, wrapping it around his girth. Her fingers brushed her own sex. She was hot, wet. In contrast Rafiq felt silky, hard. He pulled her leg on top of his, angling himself away from her. ‘Slowly,’ he said, showing her how to stroke him. ‘When you do that to me, this is how it feels.’

      He slid his fingers inside her. Her muscles contracted instantly in response. His other hand still covered her breast, stroking her nipple into an aching bud. His breath was fast, shallow on her neck. And he pushed into her, his fingers sliding slowly in, her muscles clenching around them, holding them, turning the frisson when he removed them into a shudder. Encircled by her hand, his arousal throbbed with every slow stroke, as her muscles tightened with every thrust he made. She couldn’t hold out much longer. She could feel it, that exquisite tightening, that prelude, and she clenched tight. ‘Rafiq, I can’t...’

      His fingers thrust harder. Faster. Higher. And she stroked him, more urgently now. She felt him thickening. She felt herself losing control, and as she did, spiralling, shattering, into her climax, she felt him come too with a harsh groan, and he pulled himself free of her, though she felt him, his chest shuddering against her back, his hand still cupping her breast, as his climax gripped him.

      * * *

      A few hours later, it had grown quite dark while Rafiq sat alone, the Bharym Stud Book lying open before him. He turned the pages, looking despondently at the empty gaps waiting to be filled with the names of the new owners of Arabians which should have left the Bharym stables many weeks ago. Tomorrow, Stephanie had asked him to ride out to the stallions’ oasis. A potential breakthrough, she had called it. With only two months to the Sabr, he fervently hoped that she was right.

      He closed his eyes, lying back on the stack of cushions, and distracted himself by remembering their encounter earlier. The taste of her and the feel of her. The scent of her arousal. And his own. He didn’t remember ever being so hard. When he came...

      Groaning, Rafiq got to his feet, rolling out the kinks in his shoulders. Enforced abstinence—that would account for it. And he had never encountered anyone like Stephanie. There was that too. So bold and yet so innocent, so very alluring and yet so oblivious of that allure. So determined, tonight, to understand his needs, to make love with him, not to allow him simply to make love to her. Before tonight, he would never have believed that such lovemaking, without a true consummation, could be as satisfying. When he felt her pulsing around him, it had been every bit as arousing as if his shaft was inside her.

      The intensity of his climax unnerved him. Lovemaking was so very different with Stephanie from any other previous experience. The way she watched him while she touched him, the way their bodies communed, the way they talked, there was an intimacy between them which made him realise how oddly lacking in intimacy his lovemaking had been before. A physical connection, a joining of bodies, but not of minds. He had always remained a prince while playing the lover. A prince while playing the husband. Duty had drained the pleasure from lovemaking.

      His mind shied away from the memory. He would not permit that to happen again. Stephanie had reminded him of how it could be, and she had proved to him how much more it could be. A foretaste of his future, though of course, it would be a future without Stephanie in it.

      His mind rebelled at this thought too. Rafiq shook his head at himself in exasperation. Why couldn’t he simply enjoy what he had while he had it! A woman who spoke to him, as if she saw straight through his princely façade. No one had ever dared do that before. She forced him to look at the world afresh. His plans for Bharym and his people were no longer hazy, but shifting sharply into focus. The weight of his guilt was as heavy as ever, but it was no longer an intrinsic part of him. He carried it still, but it was a separate burden, one which he was preparing to discard for ever.

      When the sickness was cured. When the Sabr was won. He had faith in Stephanie. What he lacked was faith in himself. Gazing out the high window, Rafiq saw that the stars had made their appearance. The sky was inky blue. It was very late. Like Stephanie, he would learn from his mistakes. Like Stephanie, he would be become a different person.

      * * *

      Waiting for Rafiq at the stables the next afternoon, Stephanie was finding it difficult to remind herself that she was the Royal Horse Surgeon awaiting the Prince. Studying herself in the mirror last night, back in the harem, she had seen a wanton woman. A sensual woman, who was beginning to understand just exactly what the word sensual meant. When she touched him. When he touched her. There was a mutual delight in it. Last night, their bodies had communed. Their physical differences were fascinating, but their identical responses even more so. Pleasure echoing pleasure.

      Last night had not satisfied her curiosity, merely whetted her appetite. She had learned that lovemaking was about looking and touching and talking and listening, it was the taste of his skin and scent of him, and the shivering sensations they triggered and shared. She smiled to herself. Pleasure. Mutual pleasure. Those illustrations were no longer shocking, they were intriguing. She still wasn’t convinced by Tail of the Ostrich, but Love’s Fusion—yes, she could imagine that, and the other one, where his body was nestled into her back—that was a very delightful image indeed. Her body delighted Rafiq, and Rafiq’s delight delighted her. It was a