Page 35 of The Desert King's Kidnapped Virgin
That age-old song of his people. That call to lust and longing.
With that same sensuality that he saw in everything she did, Hope danced like fire, like flame.
Her feet were bare against the floor. He could see the enticing length of her legs nearly all the way up to her thighs, depending on how the silks moved. He could see most of her belly, jewels winking in her navel. And the top she wore looked soft and gleamed as she swayed, picking up the light in the room.
As she danced, she tipped her head back, a smile on her lips as if she was as lost in the pleasure of this as much as he was.
Maybe more.
It was too much.
“Open your eyes,” he ordered her, in a gravelly voice he could not seem to control. “Dance for your king.” She lowered her head, still moving, and opened up her eyes as he’d commanded. But that meant he was caught by all that gold. And revealed by it in turn, for he could not keep himself from gritting out what he shouldn’t. “Dance for your husband, Hope.”
And then everything was flame.
Everything was the roll of her hips, the fire in her molten gold eyes.
She danced and she danced, until they were both breathing too quickly. Still she kept on, whirling around and around the room, until Cyrus couldn’t tell if she was claiming it, or him.
Or if she already had.
Maybe that was what pushed him to stand and go to her, sweeping her up into his arms, then carrying her across the vast chamber to his bed.
At last.
“I want your kisses,” he told her, feeling rough and outside himself and as if he might perish if he did not do something about this madness clamoring inside him, this abominable need he could neither quit nor ignore. “But tonight,omri, I do not want you to stop.”
She looked too beautiful there, finally lying in his arms. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were bright. Her golden hair fell all around her.
And she could not seem to lie still, as if the dance claimed her still.
As if she wanted to test out that same age-old rhythm with him, in the time-honored fashion.
Hope took a steadying sort of breath, and when she smiled he was sure he saw a wickedness there. It called to things in him he would have said could not possibly exist.
For Cyrus had been raised hard. His duties and responsibilities had been hammered into him again and again and again. He was the Lord of the desert and he did not bend, he did not break. He did not deviate from his path, and woe betide any who dared stand against him.
Even in song inside his own head.
But they were not standing, Hope and him.
And her smile made him wonder if he knew himself at all.
“I won’t stop if you won’t,” she said, and it was a challenge. A dare.
And then she pressed her lips to his, rocked her hips against him, and Cyrus forgot he was anything but this.
Flesh and blood and a man.
And hers, whether he liked it or not.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SENSATIONWASLIKEthe music for dancing that Hope quickly found she didn’t miss.
This melody was heat and flame.
It was the way Cyrus used his hands, his palms creating their own symphony against her skin.
