Guarding the Princess (20 page)

And hang it where he could lie and look at her every night...

He lowered himself to his knees in front of her, taking her hands in his.

“I never dreamed I’d be lucky enough to actually bring you home, Dalilah.” He drew her closer on the edge of the bed, parting her legs around him as he spoke. “So I stole something I could keep, just for me. Do you mind?”

Her vision spiraled as he pushed up the hem of her dress and slid his hands up the insides of her thighs. She couldn’t even think of words to answer him with. His hands went higher, fingers hooking into her G-string as she stared at the photo of her naked self, thinking of how she’d caught him in his own state of arousal. She didn’t feel affronted by the photo—it speared heat into her belly, made her breasts ache. She lifted herself slightly as he rolled her G-string down her thighs, and a soft sigh escaped her, her eyelids fluttering low as he drew her right to the edge of the bed and opened her legs wide.

She felt his tongue, teasing, warm, slick, the rough stubble of his jaw rubbing against the sensitive skin on her inner thighs. Dalilah couldn’t breathe. She arched her head back, widening her thighs, giving him more access. She felt his tongue entering her. Dalilah groaned, her entire body going white-hot as outside the birds screamed, jockeying in a tree for best position for the night.

He went in deeper, and her pulse started to race so fast she thought she might faint. He grated her with his teeth until pleasure built so raw and wild in her chest she thought she’d burst, scream. Her hands fisted in the sheets, head going back as she grew wetter, aching, desperate for him.

Suddenly he stopped, yanked off his shirt and dropped his pants—no underwear, his arousal evident, powerful. Perspiration glistened over his muscular body.

He lifted her dress over her head and gave a soft inhalation as he saw she wore no bra.

Gently he eased her back onto the bed, his tongue, wet, teasing slowly up her abdomen, circling the emerald jewel in her belly button. She arched her pelvis, clawing the covers, desperate to have him inside. Now.

But he was taking his sweet time, torturing her, making it last. Sweat broke out over her body, desperation growing unbearable. She reached down, cupped him between the legs, massaged the hot, hard, quivering length of him, writhing her hips up to him with a need and instinct as old as time.

He grabbed her good wrist suddenly, held her arm up over her head, pressing her into the bed with his body as he kneed her thighs open wide. Her breathing was fast, breasts rising and falling, eyelids heavy, mouth open—all she wanted was him, in her, all of him. She was going to implode.

He entered her with just the smooth tip of his erection. Dalilah went dead still, blood pounding loud in her ears. He pushed slowly deeper, then pulled out. Then again, this time going even deeper. She arched her spine, trying to get more of him, but he pulled out again, and then suddenly reentered with a sharp, hard, long thrust. She gasped, her world spiraling into shades of scarlet and black as a sweet, sharp pain seared up through her abdomen and caught her in the throat. Tears flowed from her eyes.

He stopped, a look of concern suddenly in his features. But she shook her head, pulling his body against hers, wrapping her legs around him, holding him in tight. He held still for a while longer, and she could feel him, quivering and hot inside her as her body accommodated the size and delicious feel of him. Then Dalilah began to rock her hips, stroking herself against him, breathing light, fast, faster. She moved harder. Then suddenly she stilled, long fingernails digging into his back, and she shattered around him with a cry, her body besieged by rolling contractions as her muscles spasmed around the length of him.

Brandt’s control cracked. He grasped her hips, yanking her against him as he thrust hard, deep, fast. And almost instantly he released, the pure pleasure, the pain of restraint too much to hold on to. Tears of release filled his eyes as a feeling of indescribable warmth rolled through his body. He gathered Dalilah into his arms, and they lay there like that, in the velvet dusk, still joined as they listened to the bush readying for the night, feeling the warm African air on their hot, damp skin. He stroked her hair back off her brow and loved the smell of her, the sensation of her thick curls against his cheek.

“I believe I’m the luckiest man alive right now,” he whispered against her skin

They heard the hyenas, a rising
whoop whooooop whooping
call as they started on their night hunt.

“Do they come close?” she asked softly.

“Right up to the house sometimes—you can see their prints in the morning. They’re the top predator on my land. They ousted the lions.”

“Tautona has no lion pride?”

He laughed softly. “No. There apparently was a pride here before I bought the place. But some really dominant hyenas challenged them. There was a huge bloody battle. The lions were defeated and moved out of the territory. The hyenas control the place now.”

Silent, the two of them lay naked, side by side, time stretching out before them.

“Do you ever think of starting your own safari business out here, Brandt?”

“No,” he said quietly.

“Why not?”

“I told you. I don’t like people.”

“I do.”

He was silent for a long time and when she said no more, Brandt thought she might have fallen asleep, but she said suddenly, “We do make a good team, you know.”

“You say that like you were having doubts.”

“I was just thinking, I could handle the people side of things.”

He grinned, found her hand, twined his fingers through hers. Truth was, Brandt had started thinking about a way to keep her busy out here. Because then he might find a way to keep her.

“I love you, Princess,” he whispered.

Dalilah smiled in the dark, squeezed his hand. Then she heard his breathing change. She propped herself up on her elbow, hair falling over her breast, and she watched his face in the shadows.

Finally,
she thought,
Brandt sleeps. Now that he’s secure, when the job is done.

She watched him for a long while, his chest rising and falling, naked. So strong, yet so darn tender it cut right through her heart. She breathed in the scent of him, the scent of their sex, and mingled with it was a fragrance of wild honeysuckle that grew below the window.

“I love you, too, Tautona,” she whispered, and kissed him softly in his sleep.

Epilogue

T
hey married eighteen months later—the mercenary and his princess—under a baobab tree over a thousand years old. The base of the tree was wide enough to hide an elephant, and its top tapered to form a perfect bottle shape, branches clawing up to a clear blue, infinite sky.

The tree had a magic about it—it had become a favorite spiritual place of Dalilah's. She liked to sit under it and imagine what the baobab might have witnessed roaming these plains over all those thousands of years—herds of elephant, now-extinct rhinos, humans moving in as cattle herders, great prides of lions.

It was the perfect place for an informal church, and informal was what Dalilah wanted, as far removed from her long-planned royal wedding with Haroun as possible.

And seeing that they were defying convention, Brandt had decided he wanted two best men—Omair and Jacob.

Omair stood to his right now, Jacob proudly at his left. Jock sat obediently at Jacob's heels, as always, but today the dog sported a special wedding bandanna around his neck.

Jacob had been officially hired by Brandt as his tracker, and Tautona Safari Expeditions was into its second season as a fledging safari outfit. This was all a result of Dalilah's prodding—she'd insisted she wanted to run a business, and she'd insisted on providing substantial seed financing. She'd also set up an arm of ClearWater in Gaborone, and Brandt flew her to the city once a month to check up on staff and the office. He also flew clients in and out of the new bush camp they'd established not far from this baobab. The camp was constructed around a giant old nyala tree and consisted of Meru-style tents with en suite bathrooms open to the sky. The camp could accommodate a maximum of forty guests—a boutique safari outfit Dalilah had called it. He'd raised his brows, but she'd soldiered on.

Brandt had meanwhile bought and outfitted new jeeps, hired two guides, brought Jacob and Jock on as full-time trackers and game spotters, and he'd hired staff from the tiny village nearby as cooks and other help. He'd also built a pool and an outside bar and
lapa
near the main house.

Brandt couldn't be happier. He loved seeing Dalilah energized whenever a new group was due to fly in. He'd sometimes even do some guiding himself, and he liked to sit back at the end of the day, by the outdoor fire, and watch Dalilah laugh and tell stories around the bar.

She'd never be bored, Brandt had thought when both the business and ClearWater Botswana really started to flourish. Their camps were booking out well over a year in advance now, and that's when Brandt decided she really might be happy to live permanently with him out on this farm—she'd never be isolated. Not Dalilah. She was a vivacious, exotic creature who brought the party to her. And he'd finally felt secure enough in her happiness to ask her to be his wife.

So the planning had begun—more Meru tents had been flown in, the bush camp expanded, invitations sent out to family and very close friends. Small, intimate and informal.

Brandt waited for his bride now, under the tree. Nervous.

In front of him, filling the chairs that had been placed in rows under an awning of reeds to shade guests from the sun, were a few of Brandt's pilot connections, a group of Dalilah's closest friends from New York, including colleagues from ClearWater, and of course, the immediate Al Na'Jar royal family. Blonde Queen Nikki sat in the front row along with her extensive brood of children, the kids—apart from Solomon, the eldest—fidgeting and poking at each other as she fussed with them to be quiet. Tariq and his wife, Bella, had also flown out from the States, and Omair had brought his wife, Faith, and their young son, Adam. It was a time of reunion, happiness and peace for the Al Arif clan, thanks to Brandt and Dalilah—a time of celebration.

They were all going to stay in the bush camp tonight, where the wedding feast was already being laid out—traditional African style, under the giant nyala tree hung with lanterns, music provided by locals from the village.

One of those locals hit poignant notes on his xylophone now as Brandt waited. He checked his watch, wondering if it was written in law somewhere that grooms should fret over whether or not their bride would show.

Omair leaned over to him. “You look after my sister well now, or else.”

Brandt's face cracked into a grin. “I have no doubt,” he murmured, but his attention was suddenly solely on Dalilah as the jeep with white ribbons drew near.

The guests rose. The xylophone and traditional instruments started up in an African rendition of the wedding march, and the voices of three women rose in haunting song. Then, just as Dalilah stepped out of the jeep with her oldest brother, blind King Zakir taking her hand, the music shifted into a loud and joyous rendition of a traditional southern African favorite—“Mama Thembu's Wedding Song.”

Brandt's heart twisted as he saw Dalilah laugh, her black eyes glittering with delight at his surprise. Her dress was white silk, strapless, and her hair was done up with a sprig of white flowers, showing the lines of her shoulders and neck to their most beautiful advantage. She led her brother slowly down the aisle, her gaze fixed on Brandt. He swallowed as King Zakir placed his sister's hand in his.

Everything fell silent—as silent as the bush can fall—and an old African Zionist priest began to preside over the ecumenical ceremony in Setswana, a language Dalilah had been learning over the past eighteen months. And when Brandt slipped the simple platinum band onto Dalilah's finger, and kissed his bride under the African sun, he knew—he really, finally, had come home.

“I love you, Stryker,” she whispered into his ear as the music rose joyously around them again. “I'm glad you came for me.”

“Me, too,” he whispered.

He might have regretted that one phone call from Omair, but it had changed his life. And hers. All of theirs.

* * *

Later that night, Omair rose from his table and clinked his champagne glass, getting ready to make a speech. The prince looked dark, handsome, like his brothers—an exotic, strong family all around, thought Brandt, and they'd embraced him fully.

But before Omair could toast the bride and groom, Jacob appeared like a shadow behind Brandt, and placed his gnarled hand on his shoulder, leaning forward to speak in his ear.

“What is it, Jacob?”

“The lions, Mr. Stryker.” His eyes gleamed. “They are back. I saw the pride this evening, down by the river.”

Dalilah met Brandt's gaze and something raw and powerful passed between them. She reached for his hand under the table.

“It's supposed to be,” she whispered. “They've come home.”

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt of
Colton Showdown
by Marie Ferrarella!

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