The Desert Prince / The Playboy's Proposition: The Desert Prince / The Playboy's Proposition

He slowed the rhythm, layering kisses along her collarbone until her eyes opened. In the semidarkness they were blue as the night-dark sea outside.

A smile tilted her sensual mouth. “You’ve filled out, too. All muscle.” She squeezed his bicep between her long fingers. “It seems cruel that you should get even more handsome as you get older.”

“I could say the same for you, but I’d rather enjoy your beauty.” He kissed her cheeks and her mouth, slow and gentle, relishing each brush of their skin. Her scent was intoxicating, like wild honey discovered just where you least expect it, filling the senses to the point of madness.

Madness. This must be madness. Wasn’t he trying to cure himself of Celia?

Their tryst was having the very opposite effect.

A flare of anger—mixed inexorably with pure lust—flashed through him.

How did this woman have so much power over him?

Almost as if she heard his unspoken question, Celia angled one of her long legs over his, and deftly flipped their positions until she was on top.

Triumph flared in her eyes as she took him deep.

Salim moaned as pleasure cascaded through him. He’d always adored her sexual confidence—which they’d found and nurtured together—and the way she loved to take charge.

Her nipples hovered over him in the dim light, darker and fuller than he remembered, tempting his thumbs to strum their peaks. Celia sighed as he stroked her breasts, and she moved in a hypnotic rhythm, like a belly dancer, drawing him deeper and deeper.

She was taking him into a world where none of his senses functioned properly. A strange yet familiar place where his nerves were alive and tingling with pleasure so intense it felt like pain.

Celia bent and kissed him on the mouth, bold and beautiful, claiming him.

He kissed back, unable to stop himself. Lust and mischief soon had them clawing and nipping at each other. He was tempted to suck hard enough to brand her with the mark of his desire.

But he didn’t. He was a gentleman, even in this moment of unbearable and delicious torture.

With a movement faster than her own, he grabbed hold of her thighs and maneuvered them both into a sitting position. Legs wrapped around each other, they sat face to face, with him still buried deep—and active—inside her.

She laughed. He’d picked one of the familiar positions from ancient India they’d studied and enjoyed all those years ago.

“It’s a classic,” he murmured, enjoying the face-to-face contact the position allowed. He kissed her on the mouth hard, then pulled back.

“It always slows things right down, doesn’t it?” She looked at him through narrowed eyes. Her tongue flicked over her lips, tantalizing.

“Sometimes it’s good to slow things down.”

“When you’re about to lose control?”

“I never lose control,” he growled.

“Now that’s an outright lie.” Celia leaned forward, and brushed his chest with the aroused tips of her nipples.

“Okay,” he rasped. “Only sometimes.”

“Like when you’re with me.” She brushed her thumb over the curve of his mouth, daring him to argue.

“When I’m with you,” he echoed. He seized her, flipping them again until he was on top, and sinking deeper into her hot and enticing depths.

Celia let out a long, shivering sigh and clutched him close.

Her muscles contracted around him when her climax seized her. In an instant he lost control.

He let out a tortured groan and clutched her to him while sensation rocked him like an earthquake. Colors and patterns burst in front of his eyes, and he clung to Celia as his whole world shook and shuddered and threatened to crumble.

He didn’t want to let Celia go.

And that in itself was a big problem.

* * *

If Celia could stay right here, in Salim’s warm, strong arms, she’d be fine. She was sure of it.

She could hear the sea outside the window, waves lapping against the soft white sand. The tide going in, or out, whichever it was, just as it did every day and night since the beginning of time.

If only she could stop the clock and hold them both here in this magical place where nothing else mattered but that they were together. But already, prying fingers of light crept around the blinds, ready to tug her back into real life.

She sat up with a start. Was it seven o’clock yet? She’d pledged to call Kira every day at 7:00 a.m. Salalah time, which was four in the afternoon in Connecticut, soon after Kira got home from daycare.

Salim stirred and his eyes opened a crack. His dark gaze sent a lightning bolt of guilt to her core.

She still hadn’t told him.

And now she’d slept with him.

“I’ve got to go.” She slid to the side of the bed, afraid he’d stretch out a muscled arm and pull her back into his embrace.

Salim lay sprawled on the pillows, broad chest bared, his seductive trail of black hair leading beneath the white sheet that barely covered his hips. “So soon? I think you should sleep in today. I’ll talk to the boss.” His mouth tilted into a sly smile.

A curl of fresh, hot desire unfolded in Celia’s stomach. Which only deepened her sense of guilt. How could she do this to Kira, let alone Salim? Did she have no self-control at all?

Apparently not, at least as far as Salim was concerned.

She tugged her gaze from his dark, sleepy eyes and tousled hair and cleared her throat. “I wish I could, but I have a meeting at the job site. I don’t want to mess up other people’s plans.”

“You’re very devoted to your work.” His low, seductive voice seemed to suggest that was a bad thing. He shifted onto his side, giving her an eyeful of his sculpted chest and hard biceps.

“Isn’t that why you hired me?”

Something glittered in his dark eyes. “Not really.”

Celia’s belly tightened. Had he truly brought her here because he wanted … her?

He wouldn’t have done that if he knew she’d concealed his own daughter from him.

Adrenaline propelled her from the bed. “I’ve got to get moving.” She bit her lip at the sight of her crumpled blue finery. “I’m going to look pretty silly sprinting across the hotel complex in this.”