Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 59308 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 297(@200wpm)___ 237(@250wpm)___ 198(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59308 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 297(@200wpm)___ 237(@250wpm)___ 198(@300wpm)
“Get the fuck out of here, Your Majesty.”
The king and the other sheikhs laughed their way out of Tarif’s office.
“May you please put me down now?” Anisah asked the moment they were alone.
“I don’t want to.”
“This is highly improper—-” She broke off when she realized they seemed to be heading straight to a wall. “What are you doing?”
“Hold on to me, my sweet.”
It was the only warning Anisah got before the sheikh adjusted his hold on her to free one of his hands, and she would have tumbled down to the floor if she had not managed to throw her arms around his neck while her legs wrapped around his waist.
Opening her mouth to tell him off, sheikh or no sheikh, Anisah found herself gaping instead when the sheikh placed his palm on the blank wall and a screen immediately lit up under it. A moment later, one panel of the wall automatically slid open to reveal a secret, well-lit passageway.
Tarif grinned down at her. “Surprised?”
She made a face. “Who wouldn’t be?” The secret door slid shut silently behind them as soon as the sheikh stepped inside the passageway, and for a few moments, she could only look about her in quiet amazement.
Like most Ramilians, she had heard about the palace’s legendary maze of secret passageways, and when she had been young, she had imagined the excitement of stumbling upon one of them. She had always imagined them to be as eerie as the underground catacombs of Paris, but the reality couldn’t be more different.
Although the sheer number of intersecting passageways was as extensive as the network of tombs below the City of Lights, the palace’s hidden pathways were more hauntingly romantic than spine-chilling, with its wall-mounted scones casting an incandescent glow that made the ground appear like a floor of gold.
The sheikh grinned when he caught sight of Anisah’s starry-eyed look as she looked about her. For a history buff like his harpy, this newfound knowledge about the palace’s secret passageways was probably more exciting than taking her to Europe.
“If you have any questions—-” But Tarif didn’t even get to finish his sentence.
“Were you required to master these passageways as part of your royal training? Who else knows about them? Are there any emergency protocols for using them in the event that the palace is under attack? What if—-”
“Slow down,” Tarif interrupted with a laugh. “The passageways are here to stay, anisdi.”
Anisah’s cheeks heated up. “Maehdina, alshaykh.” And she was sorry, but it wasn’t only because she hadn’t allowed the sheikh to say a word edgewise in her excitement. What she was even sorrier to realize right now was how she had been in the sheikh’s arms all this time, clinging to him like some cursed monkey, and it had felt all too natural!
“Sheikh, I think I really should—-” She stopped mid-sentence when the sheikh suddenly halted at the end of a long hallway and reached out to pull down a lever. Another section of the wall slowly swung open, its other side made of the same gleaming white marble the palace was famous for.
Tarif smiled when he felt Anisah’s body jerk in shock against him.
“Is t-this what I think it is?” she choked out. A room ten times as big as the apartment she shared with Hyacinth, decorated in a palette that reminded her of the sheikh’s favored hues, and so luxurious that every square foot must be worth a thousand dollars.
“Nem, anisdi.” The sheikh’s tone was silky and his touch excruciatingly tender as he slowly lowered Anisah to the floor.
She expected him to release her the moment she was on her feet, but instead his hands tightened around her waist, and she sucked in her breath at the way his touch turned from tender to hot and possessive in an instant. All thoughts of secret passageways and fake engagements vanished completely from her mind, and suddenly all she could think about was the fact they were in the sheikh’s room...and they were alone.
“I think I should go, Your Highness.” Anisah’s voice was a faint croak.
“I think you should stay, anisdi.” The sheikh’s, however, was a seductive rasp.
Oh, dear heavens.
Anisah squeezed her eyes shut, fervently hoping that not seeing the sheikh in all his alluring beauty would help her resist him.
She was wrong.
As soon as her lips parted and she started to speak, she was doomed and made defenseless by her unseeing eyes. “I really think I should – mph!” The sheikh’s mouth closed over hers, his hot, soft lips moving hungrily over hers just as his tongue thrust inside her mouth.
AAAAAAH.
She tried. Oh, the stars in heaven knew how hard she truly tried to resist him. But then the sheikh’s tongue drove deeper just as his hands moved down to curve around the cheeks of her bottom. He squeezed the soft flesh – hard enough to make her cry out. But it was not out of pain – and they both knew it.