The Pleasure of Your Kiss (11 page)

Clarinda had lost count of the strokes as they drew their brushes and combs through her hair until it gleamed like spun flax beneath the smoky kiss of the lamplight. Something about being the center of such focused attention was undeniably seductive, especially when that attention was devoted solely to pleasures of the flesh. It would have been only too easy for her to close her eyes and give herself over to the long, gliding strokes of brush and comb, to embrace the way they made her feel as if every inch of her body were tingling to life after a long slumber.

After tending to her hair, they had unpacked their rattling collection of vials, pots, and bottles, using the contents to dust her cheekbones with genuine gold dust, rouge the pronounced cupid’s bow at the top of her upper lip, and draw a delicate line of kohl around her eyes.

One of the women had tugged the glass stopper from a costly vial of myrrh and dabbed the musky scent behind her ears and in the hollow of her throat. They would have applied the perfume in even more intimate areas if Clarinda hadn’t grabbed their eager hands and shooed them from the alcove, ignoring their wounded scowls and muttered Arabic protests.

She would do well to remember that they did not perform these tasks for her pleasure but to make her more desirable to the eyes of men.

On any other night Clarinda might have found their pampering to be a pleasant distraction, but on this night her nerves were strung so tight she feared she would scream if she had to endure another pair of impersonal hands on her body. Without warning, her mind summoned up the provocative image of a pair of hands stroking her skin, their backs bronzed by the sun and lightly dusted with crisp brown hair, their touch anything but impersonal.

Cursing her unruly imagination, she made another restless circuit of the alcove, the emerald green and peacock blue of what the Moroccans considered skirts rippling around her ankles. Back in England, she had been bound in the chains of her corset and discouraged from so much as thinking about the ripe flesh that lay beneath. Here she was not only encouraged to think about it, but deliberately kept in a nearly constant state of awareness of its needs and its wants. As a woman who had struggled to keep those powerful desires in check for nearly a decade, Clarinda was beginning to fear she was more of a danger to herself than Farouk could ever be.

The gossamer silk of her skirts was so fine it might have been woven from spiderwebs and moonbeams. The only thing that kept it from being completely indecent was the care taken to drape the sheer material in multiple layers over all of her more
delicate
areas. That scant courtesy made it impossible to tell if one was actually stealing a peek at something one shouldn’t be peeking at or falling prey to a teasing trick of the lamplight.

Clarinda’s acute mortification at wandering around in what the English would have considered the most decadent of undergarments had begun to fade after their first few weeks in this place. Compared to what Yasmin usually wore—or didn’t wear—when parading around the harem, Clarinda’s own attire was positively virginal.

But tonight it would be Ash’s gaze that sought to penetrate the fluttering layers of silk, his amber eyes caressing the ivory swell of her breasts revealed by her low-cut bodice. She touched a hand to her throat, the thought making her feel flushed and shaky, as if she were coming down with some sort of exotic desert fever for which there was no cure.

Despite her long-standing affection for Max, she hadn’t truly felt this way since she was seventeen years old. She had wanted Ash to turn and look at her, to really
see
her, for so long that when he finally had, it had gone straight to her head. She had been giddy with triumph and drunk with power.

She could still remember delighting in the effect her slightest touch had on him. How it could make his eyes burn with hunger and his voice roughen with passion. How he would hold her so close she could feel the thick ridge of his desire pressing against the front of his trousers, pressing against her. She had savored her power over him the way a horseman might savor his control over a prize stallion. Until the morning she had discovered her power was only an illusion and that she had wanted him to lose control as badly as he had.

She gave the top of her bodice a nervous tug, wondering what gown she might have chosen from her extensive wardrobe back in England for such a momentous occasion. Her rose-colored watered silk with its shirred sleeves, tiered skirt, and off-the-shoulder lace collar? Or perhaps the bronze silk taffeta that so perfectly offset the green of her eyes? Given how erratically her heart was beating in her throat, she would have been wiser to choose something that modestly covered her from throat to toe—gray flannel perhaps or something borrowed from the nearest nunnery.

There was no denying the spark that had flared in Ash’s eyes when he’d first seen her, but she would almost have sworn it was a spark of enmity, not desire. Was he even now pacing his own bedchamber and believing the very worst of her? Had he convinced himself she had willingly embraced this life? That she had surrendered herself to Farouk and spent the long, torrid nights eagerly sharing the sultan’s sleeping couch?

She scowled, disturbed by the direction of her thoughts. Why should she care what Ashton Burke or any other man thought of her? She had done what she had to do to survive, and Ash could make of that whatever he would.

Sensing a presence behind her, she turned to find Solomon’s shadow darkening the arched doorway. The eunuch inclined his gleaming head toward the corridor, indicating that their master’s summons had come.

Clarinda wished that Poppy could be by her side on this night to bolster her courage, but for some unfathomable reason her friend made Farouk as jumpy as a cat. Squaring her shoulders, Clarinda fought to tamp down her rioting nerves. This was no different from serving as hostess for one of her papa’s dinner parties, was it not? And hadn’t she played that role dozens of times through the years with dazzling success?

Pasting a bright smile on her lips, she glided forward to link her arm through Solomon’s, thankful once again for his solid presence. “Come, good sir. We would not want to keep the sultan and his guests waiting.”

As Ash waited for Clarinda to appear, he took a carefully measured sip of the spiced wine their host had provided. The rich blend of cloves and fermented red grapes was much stronger than the spirits served in most English dining rooms. Given that Farouk did not indulge at all, Ash had no intention of letting the liquor dull his senses. If he hoped to steal Clarinda right out from under the man’s nose, he would have to keep all of his wits about him.

Luca, however, appeared to have surrendered his wits without so much as a single shot being fired. “Come here,
bellezza
!” he sang out, already looking flushed and glassy-eyed as he snared one of the dancing girls by the wrist and tugged her into his lap.

She giggled as he sloshed wine into the valley between her ample breasts, then tried to steal a peek under the gauzy veil she wore over her nose and lips. As she ducked her head to nuzzle his neck, he gave Ash a delighted grin that said he wouldn’t mind staying in this place forever.

Luca’s antics earned him a disparaging scowl from Farouk’s uncle Tarik. Apparently the man still did not approve of his nephew opening his home to the Western infidels. Although Ash knew it might not be the most diplomatic move, he could not resist lifting his jeweled goblet to the man in a mocking toast. Tarik’s scowl deepened to an outraged glower and he deliberately turned his face away from Ash to confer with the hawk-nosed man seated next to him.

Seemingly oblivious to the minor dramas going on around him, Farouk sat across from Ash, a broad smile splitting his handsome face as he clapped in time to the music of drum, flute, and lyre.

Ash reclined on one elbow against the mound of cushions behind him. A casual observer would have sworn there wasn’t an ounce of tension in his lean, rangy frame. The ruse was honed through years of both practice and experience. Even as he gave one of the dancing girls a lazy smile, his eyes were warily scanning the room, noting every potential threat and possible escape route.

After seeing Clarinda nestled so cozily in Farouk’s arms, Ash was no longer entirely sure she wanted to be rescued. During his years with the Company in Burma, he had seen the spirits of even the strongest, most resilient men broken while in captivity. They had endured torture and unspeakable hardship only to end up becoming little more than slavering toadies to the enemy they had once despised.

Clarinda possessed one of the most stubborn and shining spirits he had ever encountered, but he still had no way of knowing what she might have endured at Farouk’s hands or at the hands of the Corsairs who had abducted her.

When he had accepted Max’s money, he had promised himself this would be no different from any other mission. But the thought of Clarinda suffering beneath the brutish hands of any man made him want to sweep her into his arms and carry her away to a place where no harm could ever come to her again, after destroying whoever was responsible, of course.

But that wasn’t what his brother had hired him to do, he reminded himself grimly. Max had hired him to retrieve her, and it was Max who would be waiting to sweep her into his arms and tenderly nurse her spirit back to health. Ash’s job was simply to get her out of this prison of a palace, and that was exactly what he intended to do—with or without her cooperation.

The banquet was being held on the top floor of one of the square towers that crowned each corner of the palace. Instead of being confined to a table and chairs, the sultan and a dozen guests, all of them men, reclined on plush nests of tasseled pillows and satin-covered bolsters in brilliant shades of emerald, sapphire, and vermilion. Low-slung benches laden with food had been arranged in a rectangle in front of them, leaving ample room for the dancing girls to use the open area in the middle of the rectangle as an impromptu stage.

Broad windows flanked each wall of the spacious chamber. Their wooden shutters had been thrown open to welcome in a balmy breeze redolent with night-blooming jasmine to mingle with the enticing aromas wafting from the platters and bowls being delivered by a steady parade of servants.

True to his word, Farouk was making every effort to tempt his guests’ palates with all of the exotic delicacies at his disposal. The benches were crowded with bunches of plump grapes and platters of fresh figs and dried dates glazed with sugar. Clay bowls brimming with stewed lamb and mutton swimming in a golden sea of olive oil sat next to heaping mounds of couscous richly spiced with turmeric and cumin and steaming loaves of
khobz
—the flat, round bread Moroccans used in lieu of a fork or spoon.

Of all the delicacies on display that evening, none were more exotic or tempting than the dark-eyed beauties shimmying and twirling to the soaring song of the flute and the throbbing beat of the drums. Ash absently brought his goblet to his lips as he studied the sinuous sway of one dancer’s hips, hypnotized against his will by the suggestive motion.

The dancer’s skirt—if one could call it that—was precariously balanced on the graceful flare of her hip bones, giving the impression that one wrong move might send it shimmying to the floor. A high slit in the fabric exposed a flash of long, tanned leg every time she twirled. A narrow string of rubies rode low on her slender waist, matching the larger gem nestled in the tantalizing dip of her navel.

Her skintight bodice covered little more than the ripe globes of her breasts. Even those were allowed to spill over the top, as if just awaiting the casual brush of a man’s hands to break completely free from their moorings. Ash took another sip of the wine, thinking wryly that most Englishmen wouldn’t see that much naked flesh in the entire course of their marriage.

She danced closer to him, deliberately bringing herself within arm’s reach. Her nose and mouth might be veiled, but the invitation in her sultry, dark eyes was as unmistakable as the rhythmic thrust of her hips.

Her boldness only served to remind him that he had strayed into a world of masculine privilege even greater than the one he had left behind in England all those years ago. Here a man’s word literally was law, and women were considered little more than pretty playthings to be used and then discarded when a man’s attention wandered to a more enticing pleasure.

Unfortunately for him, that more enticing pleasure appeared in the doorway just as the dancing girl twined one hand through his hair and leaned down to bring her veiled lips to within a heady wine-scented breath of his own.

The flute crested on a shrill note. The drumbeat swelled to a thundering crescendo, then crashed into silence, allowing Clarinda’s dulcet tones to ring through the room like a bell. “Why, Captain Burke! I’m so glad to see you taking full advantage of the sultan’s gracious hospitality!”

C
larinda stood in the doorway of the tower, looking less like a captive than a haughty young queen perfectly capable of ruling the heart of every man in the room, if not the kingdom. She wore a fitted bodice accented with glittering beads and flowing skirts in vivid shades of emerald and sapphire. Her garments were far more modest than the snippets of silk the dancing girls were wearing, yet somehow the illusion of uncharted territory only added to her mystique.

Her hair had been left loose to flow over her shoulders, its only adornment the thin circlet of beaten gold crowning her brow. A teardrop of an emerald a shade darker than her eyes nestled between the gentle swell of her breasts, dangling from a gold chain nearly as thick as her pinkie. Her very skin seemed to glow as if it had been massaged by countless hands whose sole purpose was to enhance its radiance. Ash found it only too easy to imagine his own hands gliding over her satiny skin, stroking oil of myrrh or sandalwood over every enticing inch of her.

He shifted, grateful Farouk had been kind enough to outfit him and Luca in native robes for the evening. Had he been wearing the skintight riding breeches they’d arrived in, it would have been impossible to hide the fact that Clarinda still stirred him in a way no anonymous dancing girl could ever hope to do.