and into the beautiful golden peace that lay beyond it.
‘Mmm.’ Sleepily, Petra drew a small heart on the smooth skin of Blaize’s bare shoulder with her fingertip. He was asleep and she could see the dark fans his eyelashes made against the warmth of his tanned skin in the soft light of the lamp. She had been asleep herself until a couple of minutes ago, but it seemed that her body didn’t want to waste a moment of the time it could have with Blaize in sleep when she could be awake, watching him, touching him… loving him.
There—she had acknowledged her love! Admitted it! Accepted it?
She closed her eyes, testing the words inside her head. I love him. I love Blaize.
Yes, it was true. She could tell that from the way her whole being responded to the inner vibration of the words. She loved him! She loved Blaize.
She moved closer to him, bending her head to replace her fingertip with her lips, slowly retracing her heart with tiny whisper-light kisses.
His skin felt so warm, his body so excitingly different from her own and yet now so wonderfully, preciously familiar.
From now until the very end of her life she would remember tonight. Until the day she died she would be able to close her eyes and recreate his image inside her head. Her hands would never forget what it had felt like to touch him; her lips would never forget the taste of his, the heat of his mouth, the way he had kissed her.
Her eyes soft and dark with her own emotions, Petra traced the shape of his arm and then the length of his back, the curve of his buttock.
‘Two can play at this game.’
Petra gasped as Blaize’s hand suddenly slid over her, down to her waist and then up again to cup her breast, whilst his voice echoed in her ear.
‘You wouldn’t be trying to take advantage of a sleeping man, would you?’ he teased her.
‘I just wanted to see if you felt as good as I remembered,’ Petra told him honestly.
She felt him move, tensing a little, as though her words had somehow touched a raw nerve, or were something he didn’t really want to hear. But she decided that she must be wrong when he demanded, ‘And do I?’
As he spoke his thumb was deliberately teasing the unexpectedly taut and excited peak of her breast.
The shock of discovering how easily and quickly he could make her feel so hungry for him distracted her. Her hands were already curling, weaving rhythmically against his skin as her body started to pulse and ache.
Eagerly she kissed his throat and then his mouth, making a soft, taut sound of need deep in her throat as she pulled his head down towards her breast.
The sensation of his lips covering her nipple, caressing it, drawing it deeper into his mouth, made her dig her fingers into the hard muscles of his back. Already she was imagining the feel of him inside her, aching for it and for him, so much that she reached out and ran her fingertips down his body, touching him with a knowing intimacy that would have shocked her twenty-four hours ago.
Against her breast he made a sound she couldn’t decipher, smothered by the urgency of her compelling need as she arched against him and gloried in the swelling hardness of the male flesh beneath her touch.
Blaize had released her breast and rolled onto his back. She felt his hands on her waist. To lift her away? Swiftly she bent her head towards his body, her lips touching the hard shaft of flesh that compelled her, that she knew would complete her!
‘Petra… Petra…’
Her name was a raw, tormented sound of broken male control that filled her with sweetly savage pleasure.
His hands were still on her waist, but this time as he lifted her it was not away from him but towards him.
As he positioned her Petra shuddered, her eyes huge and dark with the realisation of how quickly and wantonly her body had adjusted to its newly dominant role.
Slickly they moved together, deeper, stronger, faster, whilst she stared into the mask of agonised pleasure that was Blaize’s face, his need openly revealed to her as he cried out and his body jerked in fierce spasms just as the pleasure exploded inside her.
She was trembling so much that she couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything other than lie against him whilst he wrapped his arms around her and rocked her.
‘That shouldn’t have happened,’ she heard him telling her in a voice that was raw with emotions she didn’t have the energy to analyse as a fog of exhaustion enveloped her.
‘That should not have happened,’ he repeated.
‘Yuck, camel’s milk! How totally disgusting!’
Petra forced herself to try and smile as the girl next to her, sharing the communal breakfast they had been served at the tourist village, turned towards her, waiting for her to respond to her friendly comment.
Ordinarily Petra knew that she would have enjoyed joining in the good-natured atmosphere of the alfresco breakfast they had been served. But when she had woken up this morning she had woken up alone and in her own bed!
Blaize must have carried her there whilst she was asleep. Why hadn’t he wanted her to stay with him? Why hadn’t he wanted to keep her with him?
Now last night’s euphoria had disappeared, leaving her feeling frighteningly hollow and cold inside.
What she needed right now more than anything else was Blaize’s presence, Blaize’s reassurance—and most of all Blaize’s love!
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘THANKS for the lift…’
Petra watched as the young tour guide reiterated his grateful thanks to Blaize, before jumping down out of the Land Rover.
They had all been on the point of departing from the oasis when the tour guide’s Jeep had refused to start.
Places had been found for his passengers in other vehicles, but unfortunately there had not been enough room for him, so Blaize had offered to give him a lift back to the complex.
Of course his presence had made it impossible for Petra and Blaize to discuss anything personal, but Petra suspected that she minded this far more than Blaize did.
The truth was that he was probably relieved she couldn’t say anything about last night, Petra acknowledged unhappily.
After all, if he had felt anything for her—even a mere small percentage of the love she knew she had for him—then he would have told her so last night, instead of returning her to her own bed and then treating her this morning as though… as though she meant nothing to him!
She might mean nothing to him, but he meant everything to her!
Still, at least one good thing had come out of last night, she tried to tell herself with a brave attempt at cynical courage.
Rashid certainly wasn’t going to want to marry her now. Not once he knew she had spent the night with another man! Given herself to another man! A man, moreover,
