The Sheikh's Collection. Оливия Гейтс

rack her tall, shapely frame. He pressed her back against the wall and even through the barrier of the suit she could feel him hard and urgent and ready. ‘I want you. I have wanted you every day since you left Maraban… I can’t sleep for wanting you!’

      And although words were easy to say and often empty, something still quickened and tightened inside Saffy’s chest when he admitted that she exerted that much influence over him. Her robe came undone as he jerked it loose, sliding a hand below it to trail his fingers up her inner thigh. Instantly every sense went on red alert. In that moment she wanted him to touch her more than she had ever wanted anything and she went rigid with anticipation, unable to breathe for longing. She burned; she ached. And then with one stroke of his clever fingers he found her and an agonised moan was wrenched from her as he toyed with her tender flesh, rubbing the tiny bud that controlled her until she strained against him, whimpering, quivering, helpless with need while he explored the slick, hot heat between her legs and she gasped under his marauding mouth. Time had no meaning for her. Indeed it felt as if the world had speeded up because she was so frantically impatient, every skin cell reaching for the climax her body was so desperate to experience.

      Zahir paused and she heard the sound of a zip, the crackle of foil and she blinked like someone coming out of the dark into the light, but her hunger didn’t abate even a little when she met stunning coal-black-fringed golden eyes alight with desire. She trembled, tried to reason and discovered that she was quite incapable of logic in the grip of the uncontrollable need clawing at her like a kind of madness…terrifying and overwhelming, utterly shameless in its single-minded focus.

      ‘I cannot take you to another man’s bed,’ Zahir growled, snaking one arm round her waist to lift her off her feet. ‘Wrap your legs round me,’ he urged.

      And she did, hungry for him to put his mouth back on hers, unbearably hungry for him to touch her again. Her arms locked round his neck to steady herself and he braced her against the wall while he angled his hips and lowered her until she felt the smooth, hot crown of his bold shaft pushing against her most tender flesh. Her eyes widened to their fullest, her head rolling back on her shoulders as he slowly, strongly pressed his passage up into her tight sheath. Her excitement went into a tail-spin as he stretched her with his fullness, his grunt of all-male satisfaction vibrating sexily in her ear. He angled her back, withdrew from her achingly tender flesh and then brought her down again hard, sending shockwaves of sensation pounding through her lower body.

      ‘You’re so tight,’ he growled through gritted teeth, repeating the movement until he was fully seated inside her. ‘You feel so good. I would kill for this!’

      ‘Don’t stop!’ she cried, shivering as another wild, exhilarating wave of pleasure-pain pulsed through her pelvis, pushing the excitement higher until it was all-consuming and she was battered by both frustration and uncontrollable need.

      ‘I couldn’t…’ Zahir husked, positioning his hips, grinding against her and withdrawing before driving home again hard. Over and over he repeated that movement until she was literally roused to screaming point.

      And the first throbbing upsurge of climax splintered through her like a lightning bolt then and she cried out as the successive spasms of intense pleasure rippled through her. He came with a shudder and a shout and slowly, gently, lowered her legs back down to the floor, which was unfortunate because her legs didn’t want to hold her up. She tipped forward as he balanced her, hands strong on her slim shoulders, and he kissed her breathless in the interim before lifting his tousled dark head and saying with typical practicality, ‘Where’s the bathroom?’

      She told him and had to stagger back against the wall to stay upright. She was feeling horribly dizzy. Shock was tearing through her every bit as powerfully as the orgasm had. He had had her against the wall and it had been hideously, horribly thrilling but she didn’t want to accept that she had not only let that happen but urged him on to commit that sin. Her knees wanted to give way but she wouldn’t let them. With shaking hands, she tied the sash on her robe and covered herself up. A little late, a snide voice remarked in her brain and she squashed it. Her body was still pulsing from his possession and she was weak as water, drained by disbelief at what she had allowed to take place between them.

      ‘Are you OK?’ Zahir asked huskily from the doorway.

      Saffy shot him a look from below her tumbled hair that would have slaughtered a weaker man where he stood. ‘Not really,’ she answered truthfully.

      ‘You’re very pale—perhaps you should sit down.’

      Saffy dropped down onto the nearest sofa, lowered her head and breathed in slow and deep while she fought to reclaim her composure. Her head was swimming, her skin damp with perspiration and she felt slightly sick.

      ‘When would you like to move out?’ Zahir enquired smoothly. ‘Give me a date and I will have all the arrangements made for you. There will be no hassle, no inconvenience—’

      ‘Move out?’ Saffy questioned blankly. ‘I’m not moving anywhere!’

      ‘You can’t continue to live here with McDonald.’

      With unsteady hands Saffy caught up her trailing hair and shoved it back from her clammy face as she clumsily sat up. ‘What just happened was a bad idea. A really bad idea and letting you keep me in an apartment somewhere as a mistress is never going to happen, Zahir. Just accept that.’

      ‘I will not accept it.’

      Saffy sprang up on a surge of temper and just as suddenly the room seemed to spin violently around her. Disorientated, she swayed sickly, so dizzy she couldn’t focus and she couldn’t combat the rising tide of darkness that engulfed her as she fainted.

      With a sharp imprecation, Zahir snatched her limp body up from the wooden floor and he settled her down on the sofa. Saffy recovered consciousness quickly and blinked in confusion to find him on his knees beside her. ‘What happened?’

      ‘You just dropped where you stood,’ Zahir breathed tautly. ‘Did I hurt you? Are you ill?’

      Her lashes fluttered in bemusement as she dimly registered the sound of the front door slamming. ‘No,’ she whispered weakly. ‘But I think the real problem may be that I’m pregnant…’

      ‘Pregnant?’ Zahir exclaimed, his strong bone structure pulling taut below his olive skin. ‘When did you get pregnant?’

      ‘Oh, dear,’ a familiar voice interposed from the door, which Zahir had left ajar. ‘Is this one of those moments when I walk out and come back in making more noise so that you know that I’m here?’

      ‘Cameron?’ Saffy craned her neck and began to sit up as her flatmate stared at her anxiously from across the room. Her brain felt as lively as sludge. She had not meant to blurt out her suspicion that she might be pregnant; she had simply spoken her thoughts out loud and now felt exceedingly foolish. ‘I fainted. I’ve never done that in my life before.’

      ‘There’s a first time for everything,’ Cameron said soothingly.

      ‘Pregnant,’ Zahir said again as though he could not get past that single word, and he studied Cameron grimly. ‘Your child?’

      ‘No, you can leave me out of this little chat. I bat for the other team,’ Cameron confided with a wry smile. ‘You need to make an urgent appointment with the doctor, Saffy.’

      Zahir’s brow indented. ‘What do you mean?’ he queried.

      ‘I’m her gay best friend and you can only be Zahir,’ Cameron responded ruefully. ‘The guards at the front door and the limo flying the little flag parked outside are a dead giveaway.’

      ‘You’re gay?’ Zahir murmured wrathfully, and he fixed brilliant dark golden eyes accusingly on Saffy. ‘Why didn’t you tell me that?’

      ‘It was none of your business.’

      ‘And the baby?’ Zahir prompted tautly.

      ‘Excuse me,’ Cameron