Chapter Five
Liliana left all details to Rafiq.
There was no room in her mind to fathom the hows and whys, but even the short time it took for him to arrange for them to be alone felt far too long.
But soon an escort had invited them to please follow him to their suite. While he led them up the carpeted stairs they walked together, though not holding hands.
They were taken up another flight of stairs and turned towards a secluded wing in the grand old mansion.
Rafiq didn’t dismiss their escort as such, but subtly let him know he wanted no more intrusion. With a polite “thank you” that said he would manage the door himself, Rafiq took the key and their escort melted away.
She stepped into a room that glowed amber from the light in a colossal stone fireplace dominating one wall.
Then her eyes were drawn to the huge four-poster bed that anchored the room, draped in scarlet-and-gold linens.
She looked up to the wooden-beamed ceiling and around the magnificent suite—to the chaise longue beneath the window and then back to the roaring fire that seemed to leap with the same primal energy that danced between them…
Rafiq too was checking the room. He left her for a brief moment and went to pour some spiced wine from a decanter, but she shook her head so he placed it back down.
Then he headed to the heavy oak bedside table, sliding open the drawer, and the silver-foil-wrapped condoms seemed too modern for this ancient place.
For Rafiq even?
The palace usually took care of such details. Tonight, the brand-named packages seemed a little crude compared to the bespoke gold-foil wrappers he was more used to.
This night went against all instructions, all logical knowings and serious edicts.
Then he looked over to where she stood, shivering in the warm room, as if alone without his touch, and this night was the most vital, the most imperative he had known.
‘Come here,’ he told her and she stumbled towards him.
‘I am nervous,’ she admitted, ‘But please, I want you so much.’
‘I know. You can tell me you’re nervous.’
‘Yes.’
She felt as if she could tell him anything. Ask for anything. ‘Kiss me.’
He obliged, toying with her mouth, until the goosebumps had gone from arms that now coiled around him.
She adored his kiss and the stealth of his warm fingers and she was so happy she’d designed such a simple dress as it slipped off, and then he pulled back a little, admiring her jade lacy underwear.
‘You are perfection…’ he told her, stroking her pert breasts until her nipples thickened and ached beneath the lace. Then he took off her bra and his touch was light on her pale breasts, and then with the back of his hand, stroked down her stomach.
There was nothing shy about them, just tenderness and want.
Both discovering her together. He liked how she moaned as he slipped his hand into her knickers and stroked her, how she writhed a little as he added to the bliss with deep kisses to her neck.
And Liliana liked how he then slowly peeled off her knickers, how he knelt and admired her, fluffing the flame of pubic hair, admiring her golden curls and then kissing her there.
‘Oh, God,’ she said, wishing she wasn’t suddenly so unsteady in stilettoes. So intense was the pleasure as he parted her intimate lips and kissed her there, she was holding his head just to stay upright.
‘Stay there,’ he ordered in a ragged voice and as his tongue flicked her tenderly, he slipped his hand between tense thighs and explored her intimate lips with both his mouth and his fingers.
‘Rafiq…’ She was already in bliss, or on the edge of this rush of craving, for she stood naked in her shoes and was being softly devoured and tenderly stroked.
‘I want to…’ She didn’t quite know what she wanted, or quite how she was feeling, but she was tensing to his touch, holding on to his wide shoulders as her thighs started shaking…
The moment they had met she had told him she was more than capable of standing.
She was close to incapable now.
As he rose to his feet she impatiently tugged at his jacket, wanted him naked and for their skin to know each other.
Rafiq read her wants and soon that divine suit had dropped to the floor.
When even the mere thought of sex had made her a little anxious before, being with him felt as natural as breathing.
His chest was wide and with a fan of black hair and she was clumsily trying to kiss his dark mahogany nipples as he dealt with the bottom half of his clothes…
And then they were naked, warm and deeply kissing, his manhood between them, and she could stand for not a moment more.
Rafiq turned to push further back the covers on the downturned bed and her breath caught when she saw the scars on his back, jagged and vicious.
No, the mark on his wrist was not a tattoo—indeed they were scars, for they were on both wrists and his ankles too.
Rafiq turning his back was deliberate.
He did not want to see her shock, and no masseuse or lover of his would dare inquire. Back home they knew; here they knew better than to comment.
Rafiq was about to turn back to face her and to get back to kissing her as if to erase from her mind what she’d just seen, but then her fingers came to his back and gently acknowledged the darkened, thick scars.
It was the first true tenderness he had allowed.
A light dust of her fingers, and there was comfort in her touch that he allowed for just a brief moment before turning around, and they stared in silence.
And he had never been more grateful that she did not ask for details, but there were tears in her eyes.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, for whatever had happened.
‘It’s okay,’ he assured, and then told her something that felt important. ‘I’m okay.’
‘Good.’
That was it.
The hurt acknowledged.
And nothing outside them mattered. They were on the sumptuous bed, side on and kissing and licking and exploring each other. His mouth on her breasts, his erection nudging her thigh and her untutored hand crept down to his…
‘I really should be scared.’ She gave a soft laugh, and they both knew she referred to his impressive length, ‘Why aren’t I scared, Rafiq?’
‘Because this is…’ He did not know.
They were stripped of more than their clothes; they were baring themselves, and there were no titles or rules in this bed, no touch denied.
He trapped her in his legs, and she kissed his chest, her teeth nipping, moving up to his neck and inhaling him. Then the tighter trap of his legs turned her like a death roll and she lay breathless on her back. Rafiq spread her legs with his knees, and knelt between them and stared down at her.
As if considering.
‘Please,’ she said, and lifted her head to aim for his mouth, but he knelt up and reached for a condom.
Rafiq had indeed been considering.
God knows he wanted to feel her with his naked length, and seeing her willing eyes, her pleas, it took the last grains of common sense to reach for a condom.
Rafiq came over her, kissed her again, felt her hot body eager for his.
He had never made love like this.
Never before.
Not like this—there was eye contact, kissing, tenderness and assurances as he nudged into her tight space.
‘Oh, God…’ She was both in pain and in heaven as he nudged into her, biting the salty skin of his shoulder. He liked the nip of her teeth, and how raw they were together. How much of each other both wanted.
‘Ow…’ she said and regretted it, for she could feel him holding back, trying to be gentle as he filled her. Even gently there was a moment of agony as he tore into virgin flesh and then she no longer was, for he was moving inside her.
Liliana felt as if they were one, as if they were moving together, but more, sharing their bodies, giving and receiving, but always giving…
giving her kiss, giving her hips up to meet his, just giving as he too gave, a deeper thrust, then moving onto his elbows, as if he knew the very second the crush of his large body became too much.
Giving her more pleasure and she did not know what this was—it couldn’t be love, but it felt like possession, as if this night she was absolutely his. And then he perhaps felt the same, because the thrusting slowed, though it was very deep and intimate as he looked into her eyes.
‘You say,’ he said as he kissed her parted mouth, drank her hot breath between words.
‘If he asks you to…’ He closed his mind in distaste, not wanting to think of her manager in the moment, or of visions of her being asked by another to dance, but he said it with reason.
He gave her the words to say when he could not be there to intervene: ‘Rafiq would not like it.’
The room went black, the amber gone, as if the fire had leaped from the fireplace to their centres, and he thrust into her.
He gave a shout and she shattered beneath him, tightening as he released into her.
Her intimate space felt as if it gave aching kisses back.
She was, Liliana was sure as she came back to amber light, a hot, sweaty mess beneath him, but he looked at her with eyes that adored.
And she was already dreading the morning.
For she felt the turn of her heart.