but exhilarating rehearsal in her late teens and the rehearsal had been so much better.
Not that she’d told Nadir any of that. She hadn’t known how. To tell him in the car ride to his apartment that she was pretty new to all this would have seemed presumptuous in the extreme and then when they had taken the lift—the very tiny and interminably slow lift—to his floor he hadn’t touched her. He hadn’t said a word to her in fact and nor had she to him, but her body had hummed with a life of its own and a hollow ache had risen up between her thighs with every floor that flashed past.
Finally they’d arrived. Nadir had pushed the door open, Imogen had made to move past him and accidently brushed her bare arm against his. That was all it had taken. One touch of his skin against hers and she had been lost. Gone up in a fireball of heat and need and powerful yearnings that had driven out all sense and caution. She remembered that the door had slammed shut and then thankfully she was up against it as her body had grown too heavy for her legs to hold her up.
Nadir had groaned against her neck, told her how much he wanted her. He’d cupped her face and pushed her hair behind her shoulders. Then he’d taken her mouth with his, ran his hands all over her body, pulled up her too-short dress and ripped her silky panties away. Awestruck, Imogen had been unable to do anything but grab onto his broad shoulders and kiss him back as he’d filled her. His body hot and hard and so powerful as he’d thrust into her. She’d had a moment’s discomfort, which he’d sensed because he’d slowed and the change in pace had pushed her over the edge embarrassingly quickly. She’d cried out. He’d cried out and then they had been meshed together, both panting in the silent, dark hallway. He’d given a self-deprecating laugh, told her it had never been like that for him before and carried her into the bedroom. Ran the tub. Made love to her what felt like a hundred times more throughout the night.
‘What are you thinking about, habibi?’ His deep voice broke into her reverie and she started, her hands pleating the sides of her dress.
She took a deep careful breath in and eased it out. She wasn’t stupid, she knew what he’d been suggesting before and she knew she wasn’t emotionally ready to take that step. Not after a night of having his focus on her as if she was the most important person in the world to him. ‘Nothing.’
He stepped in front of her. His eyes were dark and intense on hers. She wanted to look away because she knew her own must mirror the hunger she saw there but she couldn’t. She was trapped by a desire that was becoming harder and harder to ignore the more time they spent together.
His eyes slid down her body, warming her from the inside out until they stopped on her hands.
‘Where’s your ring?’
All night he’d been at her about the ring, telling her not to fidget with it because then everyone would know that it was new.
‘Everyone would be right,’ she had whispered irritably at the start of the night. ‘And it feels wrong on my finger.’
Of course he’d been annoyed by that. ‘Before you know it you’ll forget it’s even there.’
Just as he would one day forget her and Nadeena were even there? ‘What did you do with it?’ he asked now.
‘I took it off,’ she said with a touch more defiance than she’d meant.
A muscle ticked in his jaw. ‘So you can keep pretending this is not happening, habibi?’
When she didn’t answer, because yes, in some way it was easier to pretend this wasn’t happening, he stalked past her and straight through the doorway into her bedroom.
‘Nadir!’
Worried that he would wake the baby, she ran after him and nearly collided with him in the doorway. Grim-faced, he reached for her left hand and jammed the ring back on her finger. ‘That stays on.’
Supremely irritated with his overbearing attitude, Imogen wrestled with the ring, not sure what she intended to do with it once she got it off, but Nadir grabbed her hands and shoved them behind her back, bringing her body into full contact with his own.
Time seemed to stop as they stared at each other, both breathing hard. She wanted to tell him to let her go and perversely to hold her tighter at the same time.
She stared up at him, slightly dazed. Perhaps she was losing her mind...
‘Dammit, Imogen, you would try the patience of a saint and I’m definitely not a saint.’
She’d had every intention of resisting his kiss but every moment seemed to converge with her wanting his mouth on her. His hands. It was madness. It was glorious and when his mouth came down over hers and his hand rose to palm her breast Imogen moaned and gave herself over to the mindless pleasure of being close to him again. This—touching him, tasting him—was thrilling and she wasn’t sure how far she would have gone or when she would have called a halt to things when fate stepped in—or was it luck?—and they both broke apart as the high-pitched wail of a baby’s cry rent the air.
Panting and shocked at the sheer wantonness of her own response, Imogen nearly fell out of Nadir’s arms in her haste to put some space between them, her mind spinning, her body sluggish with arousal.
Nadir stared at her, his own chest heaving, and beneath his heated gaze and Nadeena’s sharp cries her breasts started to tingle and leak milk all over the front of the exquisite silk dress. Mortified, she cupped her hands over her breasts and fled next door to her daughter.
Trying to slow her breathing, she reached for the baby and cradled her against her chest before easing into the corner chair to feed her. ‘It’s okay, angel. Mummy’s here.’ She closed her eyes, her face hot with embarrassment at how easily she had slipped back into Nadir’s arms without thought or care of the consequences. Yesterday she had been trying to convince him that marriage was a mistake and now she had agreed to it. She had his ring on her finger and she still wasn’t sure she wasn’t about to make the biggest mistake of her life.
As if conjured by her thoughts, Nadir materialised in the doorway, his hair askew where her fingers had tangled in it, his features drawn tight with unfulfilled desire.
‘Do you need anything?’ His deep voice rumbled through her and momentarily distracted Nadeena. She glanced down to find her daughter’s eyes open and staring, trying to find her father and feed at the same time.
‘I’m fine.’ Imogen stroked her hand over Nadeena’s head, settling her. She wasn’t fine, of course—she was flustered, confused, unsatisfied.
‘Water? Can I get you water?’ For the first time he looked out of his depth and her heart clenched. ‘I read that breastfeeding mothers need to drink lots of water.’
He had? Her surprise must have shown on her face because he ran a hand through his hair and his jaw set hard.
‘Water would be nice,’ she said softly, her mind struggling to adapt to the return to normality between them. She shook her head at that. It struggled to adapt to what passed as normality between them since Nadir had stepped back into her life. A normality that was still defined by past hurts and an uncertain future.
‘Here.’
She blinked as a glass of water was thrust in front of her.
‘Thank you.’
‘You’re
