The Pearl of Penang by Clare Flynn (best mobile ebook reader txt) 📕

for the slightest offer of comfort. But he placed his long fingers on her shoulders and began to work them. For the first second or two, all she felt was more pain, then she relaxed as tension leaked out when he pressed the heel of his hand against her spine.

“God, that feels good. Where did you learn to do that?” He was a surprise and a half. Akeem Abdul, prince of the desert, as a trained masseur?

“Horses,” he said behind her.

Of course. She rolled her eyes, a smile tugging at the corner of her lips. He was treating her like a horse. But she wouldn’t have moved an inch. What he was doing felt way too wonderful.

When he was done with her neck, he moved to her shoulders, then to her back, her lower back, then back up again to her arms. Tingles galore. When he was done with the arms, he turned her sideways in the bracket of his legs.

She was really hoping for a kiss. Pitifully so. But instead, he took her left hand, worked through each individual finger, joint by joint, then her palm. When he was done, he did the right hand. “Lie down,” he said after that.

She did so, thinking they would be going to sleep, getting ready to fight down the heat that had spread through her body, to ignore the needs he’d awakened inside her. But instead of lying down to rest, he positioned himself at her feet.

Oh.

She wasn’t sure if she could handle that. “You don’t have to—I don’t think—”

He was kneading her calf muscles already. “We have a big day tomorrow. If your muscles stiffen up and you can’t move when you have to, or if you can’t move fast enough…”

He didn’t have to finish the sentence. She let go of all feelings of embarrassment over the fact that she was melting in his hands and gave herself over to the feel of his long fingers moving up her legs. She could feel the warmth of his hands through the fabric of her pants, and desire soon raced across her skin.

He was silhouetted in the moonlight, on his knees before her, leaning over her. She closed her eyes, meant to turn her head to the side but ended up arching her neck instead and even perhaps her back, too, as his hands moved above her knees.

She didn’t think he noticed, but when he stopped a few minutes later and asked, “Feeling better?” his voice was dangerously raspy.

The air was thicker than Houston at a hundred percent humidity, and they were in the desert. The guardhouse seemed to be getting smaller by the minute.

“Mmm, hmm,” she said, then realized how pitiful that sounded and gathered all her strength for a “Thank you.”

She should have probably returned the favor; his muscles had to be hurting as much as hers. But for once, she was smart enough to know when to stop. No way she could have touched him and not made a complete fool of herself. So she simply pulled aside to make more room for him on the floor.

He stretched out next to her and came up on his left elbow. “You look beautiful in the moonlight.”

Which was so not what she needed to hear. They would both have been much better off if he’d said something like her feet smelled. Too much touching, too much intimacy had filled the tiny place. They needed to neutralize that before one of them did something stupid. Okay, before she did something stupid. Because, God help her, she was on the verge of begging him to kiss her again and make her forget all the danger around them and the situation they were in, make her forget just for a night.

But she’d done the begging before. And he had said no and walked away. And she had sworn that if she survived the embarrassment, she was never going to do anything as stupid as that ever again.

“I think tomorrow—” She started into a random thought, having no idea what she was going to say next.

Which didn’t turn out to be a problem.

Akeem’s lips sealed hers long before she could have gotten to the end of the sentence.

Firm. Warm. Coaxing.

Surprise made her stiffen, but only for a moment. Her body took over next. She tasted him first, which surprised him in turn. His dark eyes flared with heat.

Fantasies that were nearly a decade old came back in full force as his dark eyes closed and his chest expanded under her palm. They were close enough for her to feel his body harden with desire. The thought that she had caused that surprised her again and aroused her at the same time.

Then some sort of Texas tornado formed inside the guardhouse and blew their clothes clear off before she even knew what was happening, leaving her in her bra and underwear, and Akeem in dark gray boxer shorts. She couldn’t remember touching a single button, yet the speed with which their pants had been divested indicated that she had helped.

All she knew were Akeem’s lips on hers, tasting her, demanding entry, his palm closed over her breast, her mind melting under the onslaught of desire.

His long fingers caressed her skin, heating her flesh further, melting her at her core as she arched her back. He immediately took advantage and sealed his lips around her sensitized nipple, with nothing but some flimsy lace between them. Her blood sang as it pulsed through her body.

It seemed crazy, but after all her wanderings, in that dilapidated guardhouse in the middle of Hell’s Porch, when she was in Akeem’s arms, she felt like she had found home at last.

Chapter Six

Going slowly had been his mantra over the past few months when it came to Taylor. That resolution was flying out the glassless window with racehorse speed.

She was practically naked, and she was perfect. Beyond perfect. She was so beautiful it made his throat