Sheikh's Stand In (8 page)

She stroked her had down his cock, pumping it to full hardness with just a few motions. When she pulled her hand away, he groaned, arching up towards her.

"Oh, I don't think you're going to give me much of a problem …"

She leaned down to press her weight against his body. She was far lighter than he was, and she knew that if he truly wanted to, he could have shoved her off easily. The fact that he wanted to obey was intoxicating.

"That's beautiful," Viviana sighed. "You're so beautiful …"

It was tempting to take him right now. She could do it. She was already slick from the eagerness of being so close to him. In just a few moments, she could lean over him, and slide him inside her with just a single squirming motion.

No. That wasn't what she wanted, not after everything he had put her through.

Instead, she squirmed over his body, pressing his cock tight between their bellies as she slowly writhed and twisted above him. When his hands came up to clasp her hips, she grasped him by the wrists and pinned them down onto the mattress.

"Not yet," she whispered, and when he might have protested, she started kissing his face, running sweet kisses along his jawline and his chin before kissing his mouth. There was something desperate there, something needy and wild, but for now he was willing to stay with her, to obey as she worked herself on top of him.

After a few moments, she hitched herself higher on his body, her humid crevice caressing the hot skin of his cock. Now she felt his hips flex against her wildly, but still he was obedient to her needs, giving her what she demanded even as she felt the bonfire of desire course through him.

"I can't get enough of you," she whispered, grinding down on him. "Never. I want this … I always want this …"

"Let me have you," he groaned. "Please, please, Viviana, I want you so damn much …"

"Soon," she replied, and she delighted in his needy moan.

She started to kiss her way down his body, squirming deliberately as she did so. She explored him with her mouth, tasting his skin, nuzzling in spots that she knew were sensitive. He caught his breath as she touched her sharp teeth to his nipples, and he held himself brutally still as she kissed the curve of his hip. She could smell herself on him, and that turned her on more than she thought it would. There was need there, and it was all for her.

"Please," he begged again, and this time, she couldn't deny him.

It had been her thought to get on top of him and ride him, but now she discovered that it wasn't what she wanted. Instead, she knelt down on the bed, sinking to her elbows.

"I want you to ride me," she murmured, astonishing even herself with her boldness. "Put on that condom, and come inside me, hard and deep."

He moved far faster than she thought he could. In a matter of seconds, he was taking his position behind, hands on her hips, and the head of his cock brushing against her hot entrance. She growled when she felt him press against her experimentally.

"Now," she demanded, and he complied.

The first deep stroke drew a long cry from her throat. It wasn't painful, but it was intense. He didn't stop until he was buried in her to the hilt, pushed flush against her body.

"Oh yes, please!" she wailed, and that was all the signal he needed.

Suddenly, he was thrusting into her hard and fast because she was everything he needed in the world, everything that they both needed. He was thrusting into her so hard that she nearly went down on her face until she braced herself to push back nearly as hard.

Viviana knew that she was going to be sore later, she knew that her voice would be hoarse from calling his name, but at the end of it all, she simply didn't care. All she wanted was this, this man buried deep inside her, his pleasure carrying hers further and further.

She wasn't focusing on her climax at all. The sensations that he was giving her were so intense that she simply allowed herself to be carried away by them. Without her being aware of it, she felt herself growing hotter and hotter, pushed towards an orgasm without her will at all.

Viviana fought it for a moment, wanting more of the intense feelings that were coursing through her. Then as her body started to shake, she gave up, because it was too much, it was all too much. She let the fire take her, and as she clung to the sheets, she started to cry out in pleasure that seemed to take her far beyond what she should be able to feel.

She was still shaking, her entire body exhausted and worn, when he thrust into her one last time, crying out as he attained his own release.

He collapsed on top of her, and she felt herself buckle as well. Joined as one, they sunk to the bed. After a moment, Mikal rolled to his side while still holding her tight.

"You're lovely," he whispered, nuzzling the back of her neck. "I am not sure that I have ever met a woman like you."

"And you won't again," Viviana said with a tired chuckle.

With a slight wince, she pulled away from him, rolling over onto her back. Her entire body still felt oversensitive, raw after all the pleasure.

"Are you all right?" Mikal asked, immediately concerned.

"I am," she said with a smile. "I'm just a little winded, I guess. To be honest, I've never met anyone like you either."

"Ah. Not quite the geek you thought I was, then?"

Viviana groaned. If she had had the energy, she would have bopped him with a pillow.

"No, and if you would be so kind as to remember that I thought you were a geek years ago, when we were back in school. That should hardly count against me. I was barely more than a child. I mean, look at the way I was dressed, for god's sake."

Mikal chuckled, brushing his hand across her loose hair lovingly.

"No, I'll let it go. At the very least, I'll let it go when it stops being funny to me."

Viviana shook her head in mock dismay.

"You better be glad that you're so darned good in bed," she said. "Otherwise, I think you would be completely insufferable."

***

As much as Viviana would have loved to spend every day in bed with Mikal, they were swept up in a round of lobbying, lunches, and other occasions where the goal was always to further the legislation he had put forth. When she looked up, she realized that it had been three weeks straight of campaigning, and now her assistant was getting frustrated with her.

"Viv, you are in high demand, and if you don't start meeting some of that, it's going to start falling. I'm pretty sure you can survive being off the market for a while, but we both know …"

"But we both know that if you stay out of the public eye for too long it’s a special kind of career suicide, yeah …"

Viviana chewed on her thumbnail as she paced. She looked up as the door opened, and she waved at Mikal to keep quiet as she talked.

"Look, it's your career, and I'm going to be the last one to tell you what to do—"

"That's a lie and we both know, Marnie."

"Yes, well. Basically, decide what you're going to do so I have something to tell these people who want to work with you. You have the assignments that are coming up? If you could just pick even one of them, that would be good. Just one. Doesn't have to be a long one, though I have my own opinions as to how public it should be. Just look them over, Viv."

"Gotcha. I'll call back in twenty-four hours, and we'll figure something out."

After hanging up her phone, Viviana threw herself backwards on her bed, staring up at the ceiling.

"Tough call?" asked Mikal, coming to pat her shoulder.

"Dumb call," she said. “Marnie wants me to do an appearance of some sort somewhere. She thinks it's hurting my image to stay off the radar for so long. I'm telling her that it doesn't matter because I've been doing so much work with you, but she disagrees."

Mikal made a thoughtful sound as he rubbed her shoulder gently. Viviana moaned a little as his touch grew firmer. She flipped over onto her stomach, and without paying much attention, he started to massage her tight shoulder muscles. She hadn't realized how tense that message had made her.

"Well, is she telling the truth?"

Viviana thought for a moment, and then sighed. "Honestly? Yeah, she probably is. Marnie might be completely tactless, but she's definitely someone who has my best interests at heart. If she tells me something's good for my career, she's usually right."

"Hmm, then you should definitely do an appearance."

For some reason, the idea that he wanted her to go do an appearance made something in her crack a little. It was a strange feeling, and an unwelcome one, and she shied away from it.

"I don't know," she said. "Isn't there a lot of work to do here? I mean, I hate leaving a project half done."

"No, as it turns out, we're just coming up on a break. We have almost six days free before we need to start hitting things before the big vote. Even if we wanted to get out there, people are probably sick to death of hearing us. That means that we need to take a break and maybe lie low for a little bit. I was thinking about taking a trip somewhere."

"Oh," she said, feeling an unwanted blush coming up her face. She wasn't a woman who was used to feeling foolish, and she didn't believe that she cared for it.

"Why don't you take a job," he said, dropping a gentle kiss on the small of her back. "If you don't mind, I might like to come with you, to see what you do when you're not at my beck and call."

It might have been simply curiosity on his part, but she couldn't deny that that sounded far better. The idea of her pitching a product in London while he enjoyed Lisbon or Barcelona was disturbing to her in a way that she didn't care to think about.

"All right," she said. "I'll give Marnie a call back and see what she has for me in a suitably exciting location."

***

Mikal watched Viviana get up for her phone call with her assistant, so many emotions tumbling through his body. He took a deep breath and concentrated on keeping a calm look on his face, because the last thing that he wanted was for Viviana to get the idea that he was some kind of jealous monster, despite the fact that that seemed to be exactly what he was.

The idea of her leaving Khutal, even for a short job, stabbed him straight through the heart. In that moment, he wanted to come up with another handful of expos and luncheons she had to go to, one after the other, and he knew that she was good enough and decent enough that she wouldn't have left. That would have been one of the most unworthy things he could have done, however, and he kept silent.

At least she hadn't objected to him coming with her. It felt a little like a cold comfort, a bone a careless woman might toss a starving dog.

Or that the prom queen tossed to the geek,
he thought with a wince, but he squared his shoulders against that thought before it could take root. He was a different man now. He knew he was.

Now he only wished that she could see it.

CHAPTER SIX

Viviana had expected to simply make her own way to Paris. After all, it was for her job, and it should have been all on her dime. When she had started to make the arrangements though, Mikal stepped in with that calm control and confidence that seemed to be second nature to him.

"I have an appearance to maintain," he said with a grin. "After all, I can't have my wife-to-be flying in anything less than style."

Viviana had grinned at the time, but she was getting a bigger and bigger twinge whenever he started talking about the charade that they were putting on. The issue, she decided, was that he was simply too good at it. When he looked at her with those bottomless green eyes, and when he smiled at her like that, it was just too easy to think that it was a permanent thing that would end in a wedding.

She was an independent girl who never went in looking for the wedding ring or the bells and whistles, but there was definitely something strange about all of this for her.

However, Viviana pushed her fears aside because, after all, she had a job to do, and never let it be said that Viviana Johns backed down from fun.

She had to admit, flying to Paris in Mikal's jet was fun. There was no masseuse this time, but there was a fine five-star meal cooked by Mikal's chef, and when she grew a little sleepy, there was a closed compartment that was basically a wall to wall bed. There had been time for an excellent nap, and after that, when Mikal came to sleep next to her, there had been time for some other fun …

In her mind, Viviana was starting to call Mikal the one-night stand that was lasting for weeks at a time. She knew that eventually the ride would end and they would both get off to go on with their lives, but perhaps they could stay on for just a little longer.

When they landed in Paris, Mikal directed the driver to a beautiful building in one of the residential areas.

"I thought we would stay at one of the hotels," she said, mystified.

He grinned. "My family likes having properties all over the world. This is one of our Paris properties, and this is where I like to stay when I'm in town."

Delighted, she went up the winding staircase to find a large airy flat that was decorated in a surprisingly sleek, austere style. The walls were painted a gorgeous powder blue, and she suspected the gold on the fixtures was real.

"If you want something more modern, I can take you to our Rive Gauche property …"

"No," she said forcefully, turning to throw her arms around him. "I love this property. I want to live here. I want live here during the times of Hemingway and Baker and be completely dissolute and debauched …"

Mikal's grin warmed her up as he caught her up in his arms.

"I can't really turn back time, but debauchery, that I can handle …"

She let him pull her into a passionate kiss for a moment, but then she had to push him away with regret.

"I'd love to fulfill my dreams of being a Parisienne, but I don't have that much time to get ready for the event. You can come if you can scare up a tuxedo, but I'm going to warn you, I'm going to be in work mode. I like my work, but it's probably not that interesting for someone who's actually not in the industry."