Кристи Голд – The Sheikh's Hidden Heir: Secret Sheikh, Secret Baby / The Sheikh's Claim / The Return of the Sheikh (страница 9)

‘I know all that.’ Felicity clawed at her scalp—because she was sick of it—sick of going over and over it in the hope of a different outcome. Always the result was the same. ‘My father was a controlling drunk. There was no abuse as such…’ She hated all the questions, the assumptions—because they were all wrong.

‘Abuse does not have to be sexual or physical to be abuse.’

‘No…’ Felicity breathed, glad that at least he understood that—that her father’s controlling ways had been enough to damage her in a way that wasn’t as obvious as her mother’s or Georgie’s. She had been left with an intense private fear of giving trust, of losing control, that couldn’t be logically explained.

He didn’t make her try.

‘You have never once felt aroused?’

‘No. Never.’

‘Not once in your life?’

‘No…’ Her eyes darted to his, and then back down. This was the reason she was here—because yesterday she had! Yesterday Karim had flicked a switch. She didn’t know how, but she wanted to know why.

He stood torn with rare indecision. He was moved by this beautiful selfless woman who delivered babies, who had so bravely saved a life yesterday, who put her family first and was, for whatever reason, holding a part of herself back, too nervous to trust. The clock was ticking on his last days of freedom. He could be out there enjoying himself, but he actually wanted to be here. He wanted to spend his last days with this shy, deep stranger, to bring passion and joy into her life—and of course there would be a reward for him too!

‘I’m not being a doctor now,’ he said. ‘Because as a doctor I cannot speak like this. But as a man I can fix it.’

‘Paul said the same,’ Felicity sneered—because his was a typical response, such an arrogant thing to say, and it told her he didn’t really understand.

‘I’m not Paul, though.’

She pressed her fingers into her eyelids, because he had made a vital point.

‘And I am telling you that you are not frigid. I assure you, this can be fixed.’

‘How do you know?’ She was angry at his assumption. ‘How do you know that I’m not just going to feel worse if the world’s sexiest—?’ She stopped then, watched his beautiful mouth curve into a smile, and she cringed back on the sofa but sort of smiled too.

‘Compliment accepted,’ Karim said—and then he stopped smiling, serious now, and knowledgeable too. ‘I can fix it. Because to be frigid, or whatever you choose to call it, means you are unable or unwilling. You think you are unable, but you are willing. In the lecture theatre, when we stood in the dark near each other, were you aroused then?’

‘I don’t know—I don’t know…’ She was trying to stand up, like an animal trying to escape, mortified, confused. He held her wrists.

‘Suppose we took it slowly…’ Karim watched her through narrowed eyes. ‘Suppose you said yes to dinner tonight.’

Tears were spilling out of her eyes as he deliberately said the wrong things, and he knew he was right then—knew he was right to say what he said next.

‘So why don’t we get it out of the way—and then…’ He forced her chin up to see his smile. ‘You can actually enjoy dinner.’

‘I don’t know…’ she breathed. ‘I don’t even know how I felt yesterday.’

‘You were aroused,’ he said. ‘I could feel it, I could smell it, and I could taste it.’

‘How?’

‘Because I was aroused too.’

So she hadn’t been imagining it.

And as he watched his words settle in her mind, Karim knew he was right to do what he did next.

‘This,’ Karim said, guiding her hand to his thigh, ‘was how you were feeling.’

She could feel him beneath her hands, long and thick and hard, and so huge it really brought her no comfort. She went to pull her hand away—because if she hadn’t been able to accommodate Paul, then how the hell could she accommodate Karim—but he was speaking on, talking in low, sensual tones that held her hand there. ‘As I stood in that room I could feel it, and I could feel you. I wanted to go over to you…’ She could feel him stretch beneath her fingers, feel a stirring in him just as she had felt herself. She felt him harden as he spoke, yet still her hand stayed. ‘I could of course do nothing about it. I stood there like this and saved it for later.’

‘For later?’

He glanced to the left, to the bedroom and the massive rumpled unmade bed. ‘Last night after dinner I could have called many women. Yet I wanted you.’

She could feel his manhood steeling upwards, feel the strength of his erection beneath her fingers. A sick excitement built in her as she pictured him on that very bed. She was not even looking at him now, just holding him and staring at the bed.

‘I had you last night, Felicity.’

Oh, she could feel a terror building deep within—only it didn’t exactly feel like fear, more a nervous flurry that was usually evident in her chest, but was much lower now, as his voice rumbled on, as he grew in her hand.

‘I stroked myself and thought of you, and I know you did the same.’

‘No.’ She jerked her hand away. ‘I didn’t. I can’t,’ she begged.

‘But do you want to?’

Did she?

It was a dangerous situation, and yet somehow she had never felt safer. He was beautiful, and for the first time she was starting to feel it was not impossible.

‘Yes…’ It was the most honest she had ever been—because right here, right now, she did want to. With him, with this man who knew how to hold her, how to kiss her, how to talk with her. This man who had known to take her by the hand and walk her back to the hotel. It was reckless and dangerous, and there wasn’t a hope of justifying it, but if she couldn’t do it with him today then she could never do it with anyone.

Here, with this beautiful man, was her chance to start her life over, to cast aside the demons that plagued her. She had never been so attracted to anyone. Oh, yes, physically—but everything about him enthralled her. His rich voice, his piercing eyes. And as for his smile…A smile that was turned on her now…

‘What if I can’t?’ Felicity asked—not angrily this time, but because it was what was worrying her the most.

Still Karim smiled. ‘You worry too much.’

Someone knocked at the door and Karim stood. Felicity’s eyes glanced down to his groin, to all that she had felt, but there was no real evidence of it now—just a long shadow against his lean thigh. As Karim called the butler in, it was like a bubble bursting, and real life invaded. Terror caught up with her as she realised what she had agreed to.

‘I am going now for a shower.’ He gestured to the table that was being laden with food fit for a king. ‘You will eat.’

As the butler exited discreetly, Felicity stood, unsure what to do.

‘Eat!’ Karim called from the shower, as if he could read her mind.

Eat?

She didn’t want to eat, she just wanted to get it over with—which was undoubtedly the wrong way to think, but it was how she felt. She was tempted to turn tail and run, listening to the running water. Oh, Karim didn’t know the extent of her problem, couldn’t understand just how real her fear was. That despite honest, desperate efforts by Paul she was so closed up he couldn’t enter.

Karim took his time showering. He wondered, as he dried off and pulled on a bathrobe, if she would still be there when he came out.

Last night he had wanted her, yet he had sensed her nerves, and as his guest it would have been wrong…

He had wanted her, though.

She had him curious.

Karim shaved himself, and thought about her, then grinned in the mirror as he recalled her words and nearly cut himself as he stared at ‘the world’s sexiest man’!

She was cute, Karim decided, paying closer attention to his heavy overnight growth but his mind was still on Felicity.

Karim read women well—he’d had plenty of practice. Yet Felicity was a challenge—which suited Karim fine.

He loved two things in life—women and challenge. Felicity was both.

He knew she was terrified, knew she was probably expecting him to lie her on the bed and devour her for hours, yet he also knew that would be pointless. She wouldn’t relax when in the back of her mind she would be waiting. Despite her protests, despite her insistence that she didn’t like it, he knew he had aroused her back there in the lecture room. And Karim mused on that as he walked out of the bathroom, to see her nervously sitting there, as if she were waiting for a dental extraction. He realised that only when it was impossible to do anything did she relax.

‘I have to make some phone calls,’ Karim said. ‘Important calls. I am sorry, I cannot avoid them.’

‘Of course!’ Felicity smiled, but inwardly her heart sank.

As he leafed through his diary—no doubt wondering where he could pencil in their ‘sex hour‘—he chatted away in Arabic on the phone, and then switched to English. ‘Tell him to call me back in five minutes!’ His voice was dark and full of foreboding. ‘If he calls back one minute later the deal is off!’

He turned to her. ‘Why don’t you have a bath and relax while I make these calls?’ Karim offered.

Though he probably thought he was saying the right thing, Felicity was tempted to pick up her bag and run. If only it were so easy, she thought wryly. How many bubble baths had Paul run for her? There was no chance of her relaxing, knowing what was coming…why couldn’t anyone understand?