Master of the Desert (16 page)

That plaque was the best gift Ra’id could ever have given her, Antonia reflected, gazing at the casket of fabulous jewels he had given her the previous evening. She smiled, remembering him commanding her not to take them off during their wedding ceremony, as she had removed her jewels once before. ‘Our people must see you,’ Ra’id had insisted, when she protested at the size and quantity of the sparking diamonds.

‘They’ll hardly miss me wearing these,’ she had replied, touching the glittering stones he had fastened around her neck. ‘They must be worth a king’s ransom.’

‘No—a sheikh’s,’ he had told her dryly. ‘You may consider me your hostage for life.’

She would, Antonia thought, hugging herself in anticipation.

She turned at the sound of footsteps. The women had come for her, she noticed, her excitement mounting as they slipped silently into the pavilion. She still couldn’t believe they had come to dress their queen.

They bathed her, prepared her, scented her and polished her, until her skin glowed and her body yearned for the touch of Ra’id—her lover, her soul mate, her king. They laced the diamonds in her hair and arranged her filmy, ivory-coloured veil beneath them—the veil that Ra’id would remove in their wedding tent prior to…

The sound of the
nafir
, the horn with a single true note, was a fortunate disruption to Antonia’s progressively sensual thoughts. There were people to greet, and a ceremony
to undergo with grace and dignity, before the longed-for moment when she could be alone with Ra’id.

And when that moment came she trembled like a virgin. Or, at least, that was how she felt as Ra’id removed her veil with a teasing lack of speed. She felt like a virgin waiting to be kissed by her lover for the very first time. But when Ra’id kissed her brow, and then the swell of her belly where their baby lay safe and loved, she knew this was going to be better and far deeper than anything she had experienced before.

‘Our child,’ he murmured, sharing her sense of wonder.

‘Our family,’ she answered, quivering with enough expectation to found a dynasty as Ra’id’s lips brushed her mouth. That kiss was all the more arousing for his lack of haste or pressure, she realised, shivering with frustration beneath Ra’id’s tantalisingly light touch.

‘We have all the time in the world,’ he murmured, teasing her as he always did.

‘Don’t make me wait that long,’ Antonia protested, while Ra’id laughed. And, falling back on the bed, he drew her on top of him. ‘Tiger woman.’

‘Meets rampant lion?’ she suggested, tracing the lines of the tattoo on Ra’id’s chest.

‘An interesting coupling,’ he agreed.

‘Let’s find out, shall we?’ Antonia suggested, slipping out of her fabulous robe.