It seemed like the memories of his warm body around me had burned in my mind. I couldn’t stop thinking about that morning, the way I had been so flustered and aroused. His grip on my waist was strong, his thrusts powerful when they rubbed over me, making me ache for him, his words dirty but his voice velvety smooth.
That was one thing, but the way he had reacted to my touch… that had been one of the most erotic sights I had ever seen. Zain Al Latif loved to be vocal when he was on the receiving end of oral sex. The thrill of sucking him and taking him in my mouth was something I had never experienced before. It had aroused me. Pleasuring and pleasing him had aroused me.
I wanted to whine when he had to leave, wanting to wrap myself around him once again and make him release inside me.
It was absurd. How badly I wanted him to fuck me.
Shaking my head at my impure thoughts, I stepped out of the bathroom and got ready for my first day as the Sultana of Azmia. I had breakfast with the family, but Zara was absent from the table. Both Khalid and Zain glared at their plates. Even Grandma couldn’t make them break out of their silent anger. Something must have happened when Sultan had to leave early in the morning to check up on her.
Was she okay? If she wasn’t, he would have told me, but he wouldn’t even look at me. I would need to check up on her as soon as I could.
I was led to Sultan’s study, an enormous room with floor to ceiling bookshelves and a mahogany desk with papers and documents atop it. A balcony overlooked the beautiful city shining like gold in the sunlight.
“Nasrin.” I turned around to see Zain, his hair slicked back in a rough tousle. He looked as sharp as ever in a dark suit. “What are you doing here?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat, remembering about that morning, how flushed his cheeks had turned after releasing inside my mouth, the gentle caress of his hands on my thighs.
“I wanted to see where you work. Would I have my space like this for being a sultana?”
“If you want, I will get it arranged, but you don’t need to worry about handling everything like a sultana. I will ask you only when I need your help.”
I sighed, trailing my finger on the mahogany desk. “That’s no fun.”
“I thought you wanted to work as a vet?” he asked, placing his suit jacket over his chair and sitting on the seat, rolling his sleeves over his arms. My throat went dry at the sight of his arms.
I must have not slept well if I was getting aroused at just the sight of his arms.
“I do. I talked with Zayed as he handles our stables. I will meet the doctor at the vet clinic today,” I said with a small smile on my face.
I had missed working with animals and treating them. It made my heart full to help the animals with their needs. In London, I had worked in a vet clinic, so I needed to learn about working with horses and how to treat them.
Zain tilted his head, a lock of hair falling over his forehead. “Did you have any pets growing up?”
“Other than horses, we didn’t have any pets. I wanted to have a farm with chickens, horses, dogs, cats.” I laughed at my childhood dream, feeling embarrassed to talk about it in front of Sultan, in front of Zain. “It was a silly childhood dream.”
He seemed amused hearing my answer, “It’s not sillier than mine.”
“Really? What was your childhood dream?”
“I wanted to save the world, be a superhero and have a pet tiger named Teddy.”
A laugh bubbled out of me, my hand clutching my stomach. My brain imagined Zain in a cape and spandex, saving the world with a tiger. I shook my head, wiping the tears from my eyes.
“Okay, you can stop laughing now,” he muttered. “My heart is wounded.”
I giggled, striding towards the plush chair he sat on. “I wonder how you would look in spandex.”
Zain raised his eyebrow and said in a husky voice, “Don’t get any naughty ideas, wife.”
Wife. I loved how effortlessly that rolled off his tongue. It made my heart flip.
“I thought the Sultan of Azmia would be a little adventurous when it came to nightly physical activities,” I teased.
He parted his lips to reply when someone knocked on the door of his study. Right, I had forgotten that we were in his study and he was a busy man.
“We will continue this talk of being adventurous in our nightly physical activities later, Nasrin. Come here,” he said, leaning back in the chair in a way that made my stomach dip.
When I was close within his reach, he held my arm and pulled me close enough to brush his lips against mine, kissing them. “Wear something comfortable this evening,” he whispered, tucking the lock of hair behind my ear.
“Why? Are we going to be adventurous?” I asked.
Zain laughed, the husky, soft sound tickling over my cheek. I loved the sound of his laugh, the sight of his white teeth and the small crinkles of his eyes. It was so sincere and raw and adorable that I wished I could take a picture of him.
“We will be adventurous, but not in the sense you are thinking, you naughty girl.” He grinned.
“You’re no fun,” I mocked, kissing him on the lips before pulling away. I had to turn away from him to hide the rising blush on my neck when I made my way to the door, hoping he wouldn’t notice the tremble in my legs.
He had kissed me out of the blue. He was not what I had in mind for marrying the Sultan of Azmia. I had thought of the worst, about him and how he would treat me, but Zain was nothing like that. Guilt washed over me as I left the study, the guard bowing at me before he entered the room.
* * *
Zara wouldn’t open her door when I went to check up on her. Her maid and guards had warned me that the Princess didn’t want to be disturbed, but I didn’t care. I knew something had happened and wanted to make sure she was okay. Her silence meant that she was not.
I tried not to worry, knowing she would come out of her shell on her own and maybe even chastise her brothers.
I would have asked Zain what had happened, but I didn’t want to be nosy, and he was busy. Khalid, too, had shut himself in his studio to paint.
That evening, I had finished getting freshened up after spending the day in the vet clinic and was smelling like soap and baby powder when Zain entered our room. He asked me if I was ready. I tried to ignore the butterflies in my belly when he took my hand in his.
“Do you want to tell me about what happened this morning?” I asked, wanting to know about the feud between the siblings.
Zain smirked at me. “Which part, wife? The one when you snuggled up to me or when I came inside your mouth or when we were about to have se—”
My cheeks warmed, and I looked away, wishing the ground would swallow me up. “I didn’t mean… that. I was talking about Zara.”
His smirk slipped off. “Khalid found out about her sneaking away, and it was pure agony to see both of them angry with each other.”
Even though Zara and Zain were close, she was closer to Khalid.
“She went out of the palace?”
Zain flickered his eyes to me and said, “Yes, on New Year’s Eve, the night before her birthday. I had allowed her to go to our club with Khalid, with us, knowing well that he would keep his eyes on her and make sure she was safe. I had even doubled her security—”
“But?”
“She fooled the guards by dressing up as a maid. She went to a different club on her own.”
She was smart, kind, beautiful, and cunning. Was there anything that girl couldn’t do?
He squeezed my hand, “Stop smiling.”
I grinned. “I am wondering how clever she is to convince her maid to play along with it and even trick the guards. Was she safe at this other club she went to?”
Zain sighed, looking at the blue sky when we walked out of the palace. “We are not sure. She said she was safe, but that club is a tourist spot. Khalid realized she didn’t once meet him at our club, so he looked for all the surveillance footage and found her talking to some… some man at the club.”
Oh. I could understand why they were both mad. Being overprotective brothers, they thought some stranger had tainted their little sister.
“Was she hurt?” I asked, my voice clipped.
“No, if she was… I would have made sure he can never walk and talk again. She didn’t tell us about what happened afterwards, but we both suspect what must have happened.”
I held his fists, caressing the knuckles, and met his dark eyes, furious and guilty. “Give her some space and time, Zain. She is young—”
“She is nineteen. She should know better than to mingle all night with some strange man.”
“Zain,” I said. “Give her some time. She will apologize to you for sneaking out, but you need to stop restricting her to the palace. She won’t grow up or get to enjoy her life if you keep her locked in these walls, no matter how beautiful it is.”
“I don’t keep her locked,” he said. “I allow her to go out.”
“With her guards,” I pointed out. “Ask her if she has any friends other than the guards or maids who always surround her everywhere she goes.”
Zain’s silence was my answer. I kissed his knuckles and whispered, “Give her your love and the freedom she needs.”
He gazed at our entwined hands and pulled me closer, wrapping his arms around me, giving me a hug. I heard him take a deep breath as I caressed his back, feeling him relax.
“I wish you had been there with me this morning. We raised our voices in front of her, Nasrin,” he said, and I could hear the hurt and the guilt in his soft voice. “For the first time, we raised our voices towards our little sister and I saw how much pain we caused her. Not even listening to what she had to say.”
I pulled away to look at him and saw how tired his eyes looked. It hurt me to see him that way. “Apologize when she is ready. Listen to what she has to say and then try to understand her, okay? I will be with you if you want me to.”
“I would like that.”
I smiled at him as he led me to the stables, my eyes trailing over the gorgeous horses, their coats shining as some of them snorted at us.
“You went to London for your degree when you were the same age as her,” Zain said. “Were you like her?”
I chuckled at him and remembered my university days. “I was not a rebel like her, nor did I sneak out. I used to stay in the dorms and on the weekends we would party, get drunk and…”
“And?” he asked, raising his eyebrow.
Say it, Nasrin, he is your husband and the Sultan after all.
“And sleep around,” I finished, confused by the shocked look on his face, which he quickly recovered.
“You have had lovers before,” he said, more to himself than me.
“Yes, Zain.” I asked, patting the muzzle of the white horse. “It doesn’t bother you, does it?”
He shook his head, checking the reins and the saddle, making sure it was comfortable. “No, it doesn’t bother me.”
“Right, it shouldn’t.” I chuckled awkwardly. “I mean, you are a sultan, so you must have had many lovers as well.”
Zain didn’t reply.
“Zain?” I asked, peering at his face.
He held me by my hips and settled me on top of the horse, making sure I was comfortable. “I didn’t have any lovers. Other than you,” he said in a clipped voice, his neck flushed when he took hold of the reins and sat behind me in one graceful sweep.
I was glad he couldn’t see me because I was gaping and clutching the leather tightly after hearing his words. He didn’t have any lovers? He was not someone I was imagining him to be.
But how? The way he had touched me and had sex with me that night. The way he had made me come apart in the bath, the way he had guided me over his length… I thought—
He was a virgin? The Sultan of Azmia was a virgin, and he slept with me, a stranger, that night. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Not once did I think he would be inexperienced by the way he had acted that night. I had confused his blushing and fumbling hands for excitement and nervousness. Not inexperience.
I swallowed the lump in my throat.
Oh God.
I am a terrible person to ever think that Zain was a terrible ruler like my father, a man after his own selfish needs and never once caring about me. I thought he had been with plenty of women and I was so, so wrong. He was never that. He was just Zain. My sweet, handsome and a little wild husband.