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‘Oh,’ she said, her disappointment evident as he moved away from the bed.
‘Be patient, my little pussy Cat. And let me lose this damned suit.’
Catrin squirmed with anticipation as she watched him undressing, revealing the magnificent body beneath. The olive-skinned perfection of his torso was marred only by a scar which arrowed across one side of his abdomen. When she had first seen it, she had run wondering fingers along the raised ridge and asked him whether he had sustained a wound in battle. And he had responded rather drily that it was the legacy of a childhood appendectomy, performed at the children’s hospital in Qurhah’s capital city of Simdahab.
The rest of his clothes were quickly discarded and she saw just how aroused he was—his erection completely dominating her line of vision as he joined her on the bed. She could feel its hardness pushing against her belly as he leaned over her and ripped open her brassiere with a hunger he didn’t bother to hide.
She told herself she should be despairing that yet another costly piece of lingerie would now be unwearable—but right then she didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything except feeling him inside her again.
What did he do that made her feel like this?
What did he do that made her love him so?
‘Murat,’ she moaned, brushing her mouth over his jaw and feeling its rough graze beneath her lips. ‘Oh. Murat.’
‘What is it, my sweet?’ His deep voice shuddered with undisguised pleasure. ‘Tell me.’
She wondered what he would say if she told him the truth. If she told him she wished he would confound the gloomy expectations of her mother and make a decent woman of her. She wondered how he’d react if he knew that night after lonely night, when he was back in Qurhah and she was lying alone in this great big bed—sometimes she allowed herself to fantasise about marrying him. About him taking her back to his desert country as his bride...his Sultana—where she would learn to speak his language and bear him fine, strong sons and live with him to the end of her days.
She guessed that he would probably recoil with horror—and then she wouldn’t see him for dust. Because after more than a year of her being Murat’s mistress, any sign of commitment was just as distant as it had been when he’d plucked her from the valleys and brought her to London, quivering with passion and innocence and a fierce sexual hunger.
He’d said from the start that there was no future in this relationship and that marriage was never going to happen. She’d known that when he took a bride, it would be one as unlike her as it was possible to be. And even though she’d told herself she was fine with that, sometimes she wondered if she was just kidding herself. Lately, she had found herself longing for some kind of commitment. For the comfort and security she’d never really had.
But that was a waste of time and energy.
‘Would you like me to tell you how much I missed you?’ she said eagerly.
‘You may tell me whatever you please, my beauty—just as long as you let me reacquaint myself with these magnificent breasts of yours,’ he said, disposing of the now tattered brassiere with a careless flick of his fingers. ‘For I have been dreaming about licking them like this.’
Catrin stifled a moan. ‘So have I.’
‘Shall I play with your pretty nipples?’ he continued. ‘Shall I lick them and suck them and make you wet in lots of different places?’
‘Oh, yes, please,’ she breathed.
‘And is there anything else I should do?’ His hand began to move down over the concave dip of her torso. She felt the exploratory caress of his palm as it skated over her belly, a forefinger briefly circling the faint dip of her navel before it continued its journey. ‘Anything else I can tempt you with?’
‘Can’t you...guess?’ she whispered.
‘I can try. I think you might want me to slide down these rather schoolmistressy panties you’re wearing...’
‘You don’t like them?’
‘They are a fantasy I didn’t realise I had until now. I just want to get the damned things off.’
His finger hooked inside the garment to give action to his words, but then it stilled. Lifting her head to see why, Catrin looked into his face and she saw something in his eyes she didn’t recognise. Something which made her screw her face up in confusion because...was it sadness she read there?
‘What is it?’ she whispered. ‘Murat—is something wrong?’
But the sadness—if that was what it had been—had now been replaced by the much more familiar smoulder of lust.
‘No, nothing is wrong,’ he growled as he slid the panties down over her knees and started to kiss her.
Catrin shuddered out a sigh as he brought her closer to him, because this was a dance she knew so well that it had become almost second nature to her. Her sexual experience before she’d met Murat had been zero, but the Sultan had changed all that. He had taught her so much. To trust her body and to love it. And that sex was the most sublime of all pleasures and she should never feel guilty about enjoying it.
A whole month of being without him had left her feeling desperate to touch him like this. She marvelled at the seamless slotting of their bodies. She cried out with joy as he entered her.
‘Oh, Cat,’ he murmured as he paused to allow her body to accommodate him.
‘You feel so...good.’
‘And so do you,’ came his unsteady response. ‘Sweet storm of the desert—so do you!’
Murat felt his mouth grow dry as he concentrated on each exquisite thrust. His hands cupped the silken globes of her buttocks as he moved deeper inside her. He thought that she felt like velvet. Hot, smooth velvet. He wanted this feeling to last. He wanted to stay trapped inside her and to spend the rest of the night kissing her soft, sweet lips. But nothing lasted. He knew that. And the sudden bitterness of what lay ahead made him drive into her more deeply still.
Her body began to arch and to quiver as the first spasm of orgasm claimed her and he took just long enough to watch the flush which bloomed over her breasts, before he too went under. Crying out in his native tongue, his seed seeming to burst from him in a fierce explosion of pleasure.
Time slowed and a torpor began to steal over him. He lifted a lazy hand to tangle his fingers in her hair but he could see a sudden wariness on her face as she gazed at him. He wanted to sleep but it seemed she was not keen to let him.
‘So what brought you back so early?’ she questioned, leaning over him so that her long hair tickled his chest.
‘I juggled my schedule a little.’ He yawned. ‘There’s someone I need to see. In fact, we’re having dinner with him tonight.’
‘But—’ she frowned ‘—I’ve made gazpacho—and some lemon soufflé.’
He laughed. ‘Now you sound like a housewife.’
There was a pause. ‘I thought you liked me to play housewife.’
‘Well, sometimes I do.’ And sometimes I don’t.
‘And you always reserve your first evening back for just the two of us.’
‘I know I do.’ He failed to stifle a second yawn. ‘And I’m sorry, Cat—but this meeting can’t be postponed.’
‘Right.’
Murat registered the disappointment in her voice even though she was doing her best to disguise it. Yet surely she must realise that she had been given more access to him than any other woman he’d ever known. Maybe now might be a good time to remind her. But the sudden darkness which was clouding her eyes made him want to placate her instead, so he stroked his hand down over her hip. ‘But you will enjoy meeting Niccolo. He’s flying to New York in the morning and so it made sense to meet him here in London.’
Her face relaxed a little. ‘Not the infamous Niccolo Da Conti who I’ve never been allowed to meet before? One of your Three Musketeer friends?’
‘Yes, that’s him,’ said Murat. ‘And it’s not a case of you not being allowed to meet him—it’s just that our paths don’t often cross in London, which is why I usually meet up with him in Qurhah.’
‘And I’m never allowed to set foot in Qurhah, am I?’
‘Unfortunately, no.’ With a soft growl he extended his hand and pulled her closer and as soon as he felt the softness of her body, he wanted her again. ‘But I don’t want to talk about all the factors which keep us apart. In fact, I don’t want to talk about anything. I haven’t seen you for almost a month and there’s only one thing on my mind. So lean over and kiss me, Cat.’
She did, of course. Because how could any woman resist a man as gorgeous as Murat the Magnificent? Against the whiteness of the bedding, his body gleamed like burnished gold. He was like a god, she thought as she lowered her head to brush her lips over his. A dark golden god, lying next to her.
But, out of nowhere, that scary feeling came back again. The one which made her feel as if she were falling off the edge of a cliff in slow motion. The one which gave her more pain than pleasure. The one which made her silently want to scream her denial. She wasn’t in love with him. She didn’t want to be. There was nothing to be gained from loving him.
More of her mother’s words came filtering back and she didn’t seem able to silence them.
Has he spoken to you about the future, Catrin? Has he?
Catrin moved restlessly. No, he most certainly had not. Their relationship contained plenty of fancy bows—but no strings. The future had been discussed and dismissed at the very beginning. Put away in a drawer which had been slammed shut and locked away.
‘Stop frowning like that,’ he murmured. ‘And feel this instead.’
His boast was unashamedly sexual as he guided her hand between his legs and her cheeks grew hot as she met the mocking look in his eyes. Her fingers curled around his silken hardness as he pulled her mouth down towards his, and suddenly there was nothing in her mind but sensation.
She wondered if she was a weak person, because all her doubts flew straight out of her mind as soon as Murat began to kiss her. Yet this, more than anything else, felt right and, oh, so familiar.
Her thoughts splintered as she felt his fingers begin to explore her flesh, because hadn’t it always been this way? Hadn’t the chemistry between them exploded from the moment their paths had first crossed, when the impossible had happened?
And a humble girl from the valleys had captured the eye of a powerful and impossibly wealthy sultan.
CHAPTER TWO
IT HAD BEEN one of those amazing mornings in Wales, where spring came later than anywhere else in Britain. Blossom was frothing like candyfloss on the trees, and all you could hear was birdsong. Nobody could have predicted that the peace of the small town was about to be broken by the arrival of an exotic stranger with his convoy of bodyguards, who all carried guns beneath the straining suits which covered their bulky frames.
Catrin had been enjoying life and relishing her freedom. She’d finally escaped from the poisonous atmosphere of home and found herself a job in a small hotel on the other side of Wales, though she was still close enough to pay duty calls to her mother. Their relationship had always been difficult, and if it hadn’t been for her younger sister, then Catrin would have left home much sooner. But you couldn’t leave a young girl alone to live with a drunk, could you? Just like you couldn’t stop someone from hitting the vodka, no matter how many bottles of the stuff you tipped down the sink.
Her whole life felt as if it had been consumed with shielding her sister from the daily drama of their mother’s life, but with Rachel now at university Catrin had been able to make a new life for herself.
Freedom felt heady. It made her feel giddy—like a new-born lamb stumbling from the darkness into a sunlit meadow. No longer did she feel fearful whenever she opened the door. She didn’t have to rescue anyone or bail them out. She didn’t have to pretend that things were hunky-dory when patently they were not. She could stay out late and not have to explain herself. Not that there were many opportunities to stay out late—when the nearest big town was miles away and the buses irregular. It was just the principle of freedom which she found so exhilarating.
She was trained for nothing in particular, but she was bright and adaptable and her willingness to work meant that the rest of the hotel staff liked her. Her bookworm habit had given her a knowledge of the world which didn’t match her haphazard schooling, which meant she could talk easily to anyone—so the customers liked her, too. A year after joining the Hindmarsh Hotel, she could begin to see a future for herself in the hospitality industry.
The barmaid had been off sick one day and Catrin had stepped in at short notice, when Murat Al Maisan walked into the bar. A sudden silence descended and Catrin glanced up to find herself looking into a pair of inky eyes. He was staring very hard and it took a moment or two for her to realise that his narrowed gaze was directed at her. If she hadn’t been standing with her back against a wall, she might have thought he was looking at someone else. But he wasn’t.
He was looking at her.
His eyes were travelling over her in a way which if it had been anyone else, Catrin might have found offensive. But with him it didn’t feel a bit offensive. With him, it felt...natural. As if she had been waiting all her life for him to look at her that way. Every vein in her body seemed to open wider to let the ever-quickening pulse of blood through. She could feel her breasts growing heavy and the palms of her hands getting clammy. Her reaction confused her. It scared her and excited her. It made her words come out sounding more clipped than usual, although nothing could disguise the soft lilt of her Welsh accent.
‘Can I help you, sir?’
There was a pause. His eyes were still narrowed. His voice was low and caressing. ‘I suspect you can help me in ways you haven’t even begun to dream of,’ he said, in an accent she’d never heard before.
‘I’m sorry?’
He shook his head, the way people did when they were trying to clear their ears after they’d been swimming. As if he’d just found himself in a place he hadn’t expected to be. ‘Some coffee, I think.’
Catrin raised her eyebrows and spoke to him in exactly the same way as she might speak to any young farmer who had taken temporary leave of their manners. ‘I usually respond better to the word “please”.’
He smiled then, before looking at her with a hard and playful gleam in his eyes. The way a cat looked at a bird which was high up in a tree. ‘Please.’
Afterwards she would discover that it had been impulse which had brought him into the old-fashioned hotel, leaving a whole fleet of accompanying bodyguards kicking their heels outside. He told her later that fate must have lured him there, because he had been meant to meet her. And that she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
Of course, she hadn’t known any of this as he sat down and began to sip his coffee and asked what her name was. And although she rarely socialised with customers, she found herself standing on the other side of the bar talking to him—or, rather, listening to what he was saying about wind farms, which was the reason for his visit to the area. At that point she still hadn’t discovered that he was a sultan who ruled a vast area of oil-rich land and was wealthy in a way which was outside her understanding.
All she knew was that he spoke like no one else she’d ever heard. His accented voice made her think of velvet and stone. He exuded an air of self-possession she found irresistible. And he flirted in a way she knew was dangerous, but which didn’t stop her from responding. She would have defied any woman on the planet not to have responded.
‘I suppose people must tell you all the time that your eyes are very beautiful,’ he said, making her stomach flip as he sucked on a coffee-dunked lump of sugar. ‘They are the colour of a cactus.’
‘A cactus!’ She looked at him perplexed, and pursed her lips together. ‘A horrible prickly cactus?’
‘That is the general perception of the plant, yes,’ he agreed, his voice dipping into a silken caress. ‘But it happens to be one of the world’s most underrated examples of vegetation. Not only can they can store water and survive in the most arduous of conditions, but they provide nourishment and have many medicinal properties.’ He smiled again. ‘As well as producing flowers of quite breathtaking beauty.’
Rapt now, Catrin nodded. His words sounded...incredible. Like poetry. She wanted to hear more of them. They made her want him to whisper things. Things which weren’t about plants. Things about her. Things about...
Her cheeks were burning as she walked to the other end of the bar and took ages pulling a pint of beer for another customer, because it was wrong to think that way. She knew that there were two types of men and this one was the wrong type. Hadn’t her mother always told her to look in the mirror if she needed any proof about the wrong type?
‘Why are you blushing?’ he asked softly.
She looked up and suddenly she could think of nothing but him. Common sense and playing safe seemed like quite reasonable endeavours for other people, but not for her. Everything she’d ever been told about handsome, dangerous men began to trickle away, like the froth on top of the pint she was pulling. She looked deep into his eyes and wondered what it would be like to kiss him.
‘I’ve never actually seen a flowering cactus,’ she said.
He smiled, and there was the heartbeat of a pause. ‘Haven’t you?’
The next day, a delivery was made. At first it looked like a regular florist’s delivery—with its shiny cellophane and fancy ribbon. It was only when she opened it that Catrin discovered the succulent green leaves of a cactus on which bloomed miniature petalled suns, in shades of cerise and rose. She’d never been sent flowers before and she’d certainly never been given anything like this. The originality and unexpectedness of the gesture stabbed at her heart with a fierce kind of joy.
She guessed it was inevitable that she should agree to have dinner with him. What she didn’t anticipate—and which afterwards surprised her as much as him—was ending up in Murat’s four-poster bed overlooking Bala Lake that very same night.
It was wild. Or rather, she was wild. She had never known something could feel so good. Her hands splayed eagerly over his naked body as he kissed her and she clung to him as greedily as a barnacle to a rock. At first, he seemed a little taken aback by her passion, but the moan he gave as he thrust deep inside her made her feel almost powerful.
The next bit wasn’t great because it hurt and because he was furious that she’d omitted to mention the small matter of her virginity.
‘Why me?’ he demanded afterwards, as if giving someone your innocence were a burden rather than a gift.
‘Because...because I’d waited for someone who knew what they were doing and you fitted the bill. I wanted it be fantastic. And it was. Why?’ She rolled over, resting her elbows on his chest and looking straight into his eyes. ‘Is it important?’
‘Of course it is,’ he said. ‘I’m not in the habit of seducing virgins. Their dreams are still intact.’
‘Too late,’ she teased, her mouth trailing over his hair-roughened chest.
He did it to her again. And again. And the third time she lay trembling in his arms, kissing the same spot on his shoulder, over and over again. He was stroking her hair and when she spoke, her voice was dazed.
‘That was...amazing.’
‘I know,’ he said, running the tip of his tongue over her ear. ‘They say it takes a little practice for a woman to orgasm.’
‘Then I think it’s very important I keep practising,’ she said solemnly and he laughed.
‘You are a curious mixture,’ he observed slowly, ‘of the unworldly and the seasoned.’
‘And is that a good thing or a bad thing?’
‘I can’t quite decide,’ came his answer. ‘All I know is that I find you quite enchanting and I’m not sure that I’m prepared to let you go.’
She snuggled up to him. ‘Then don’t,’ she whispered. ‘Keep on holding me, just like that.’
They were both talking about different things, of course. As someone who had learnt never to project, Catrin was thinking about the glorious present, while—unusually for him—Murat was speculating about the future. She said goodbye, telling herself that she would probably never see him again—but to her astonishment he returned the following week, when she had two whole days off.
‘You see,’ he said lightly. ‘I just can’t keep away from you.’
She made no attempt to hide her delight as he pulled her into his arms. For the first time in her life she understood the meaning of the expression walking on air. She found herself thanking some unknown fate, which had brought her to the other side of Wales, leaving her to conduct her love affair without fear of her mother turning up and creating a scene.
But that was something else she liked about Murat. He wasn’t interested in her family, or her background. Why would he be, when this was never meant to be anything but temporary? It meant that she didn’t have to go through the agonising torture of explaining what her home life had been like.
They booked into the same hotel overlooking Bala Lake and for two whole days they scarcely left the bedroom. She wondered how she was going to cope when he went back to his other life. His real life. His desert life, which he’d told her about and which had no room for someone like her.
She tried not to think about it, but it was impossible not to. It was hard to equate her fierce lover with a man who ruled a vast kingdom and rode a black stallion over hot and arid sands. She ran her fingertips through the rich silk of his ebony hair and tried not to think about losing him.
Did he guess at her thoughts, or did he read it in her eyes? Was that why he came out with his extraordinary proposition on that last afternoon, before he was due to drive back to London for a business dinner?
‘Come away with me,’ he said, pulling on the jacket of his elegant Italian suit.
She blinked. ‘Where?’
‘To London. I have an apartment there. You could live there.’
‘With you?’
He gave a funny kind of smile. ‘Well, sometimes.’
If only she hadn’t been so naïve. If only she’d realised what she was getting herself into, and that women like her were never offered permanence. The only permanence in Murat’s life was his palace and his busy schedule in Qurhah. The trips he made to England were fleeting and irregular and he certainly wasn’t offering her a conventional relationship.
But she wasn’t used to convention—or relationships. She was a stranger to commitment and she told herself she didn’t do emotion. Emotion brought chaos—and she’d had enough chaos to last a lifetime.
She thought of turning him down and then asked herself why she would do something that insane. And really, what alternative did she have, when the thought of him walking out of her life made her feel as if someone were trying to hack open her heart with a blunt chisel?
That was when and how she had become a rich man’s mistress. She had gone to London to be with Murat and slowly but surely her independence had begun to ebb away. The job she’d found at a big hotel soon proved incompatible with her new life, because quickly she learned that was the first rule of being a mistress.
You always needed to be available.
Murat told her that his world was full of pressure and that she—uniquely—soothed his frazzled nerves. He liked her being there when he arrived in England and didn’t want her working shifts and wasting precious time when she could be with him. He waved aside her initial protests that she couldn’t possibly use his charge card. He told her that he had more than enough money for both of them. That she was, in effect, acting as his housekeeper since she made his apartment feel like a home.
So she had let him slide that plastic card into her brand-new designer wallet. Just as she’d let him kit her out in silks and satins and started having her hair done regularly at one of London’s most exclusive hair salons.