“It would bring dishonor upon my family and myself if my child were born out of wedlock,” Rafe said.
Violet shouldn’t have been surprised by this. She had basically guessed it when she’d looked up information on his country.
That didn’t mean it was what she wanted to hear seconds after one of the best orgasms of her life. She sagged against his chest. “Do we—will we have to get married? Is that what happens in your country?”
He paused. “In my family … we do not have a choice. We are married for power, we bin Saleeds. Love …”
She closed her eyes. Love. They had talked about a lot of things, but love was not one of them.
Rafe cleared his throat. He began to rub his hands up and down her back. “It is something to consider, yes. But I have made you this promise, Violet. I will not force you to do something you do not wish to do.”
“Oh. Okay.” But honestly, did she know him well enough to believe he’d keep that promise?
* * *
A Surprise for the Sheikh is part of the series The Texas Cattleman’s Club: Lies and Lullabies— Baby secrets and a scheming sheikh rock Royal, Texas.
A Surprise for the Sheikh
Sarah M. Anderson
SARAH M. ANDERSON may live east of the Mississippi River, but her heart lies out West on the Great Plains. Sarah’s book A Man of Privilege won an RT Reviewers’ Choice Best Book Award in 2012.
Sarah spends her days having conversations with imaginary cowboys and American Indians. Find out more about Sarah’s love of cowboys and Indians at www.sarahmanderson.com and sign up for the new-release newsletter at www.eepurl.com/nv39b.
To Dad, who taught me the importance of never saying “very” when “damn” would do.
Contents
This was really happening.
Ben’s hot body pressed Violet against the back of the elevator. Something hard and long bumped against her hip, and she giggled. Oh, yeah—this was so happening.
She was really doing this.
“Kiss me,” Ben said in that sinfully delicious accent of his as he flexed his hips against hers. She didn’t know where he was from, but his accent made her think of the burning heat of summer sun—because boy, did it warm her up.
Violet ran her hands through his thick black hair and lifted his face away from where he’d been sucking on her neck.
He touched his forehead to hers. “Kiss me, my mysterious, my beautiful V.” Then—incredibly—he hesitated just long enough to make it clear he was waiting for her decision.
Power surged through her. This was exactly why she was riding in an elevator in the Holloway Inn up to a man’s room—a man who did not know she was Violet McCallum, who did not know she was Mac McCallum’s baby sister.
Her entire life, she had been Violet. Violet, who had to be protected from the big bad world. Violet, the lost little girl whose parents died and left her all alone. Violet, who still lived at home and still had her big brother watching over her every move to make sure she didn’t get hurt again.
Well, to hell with that. Tonight, she was V. She was mysterious, she was beautiful, and this man—this sinfully handsome man with an accent like liquid sunshine—wanted her to kiss him.
She was not Violet. Not tonight.
So she kissed him, long and hard, their tongues tangling in her mouth, then in his. She did more than kiss him—she raked her fingers through his hair and held him against her. She made it clear—this was what she wanted. He was what she wanted.
She hadn’t come to this hotel bar a town away from Royal, Texas, with the intent of going to bed with a stranger. She hadn’t planned on a one-night stand. She’d wanted to get dressed up, to feel pretty—maybe to flirt. She’d wanted to be someone else, just for the night.
But she hadn’t counted on Ben. “You have beautiful eyes,” he said in his sunshine voice, his hands sliding down her backside and cupping her bottom. “Among other things, my mysterious V.” Then he lifted, and it was only natural that her legs went around his waist and that the long, hard bulge in his pants went from bumping against her thigh to pressing against the spot at her very center.
Violet’s back arched as heat radiated throughout her body. Ben held tight to her, pinning her back against the elevator wall as he pressed his mouth to the cleavage that this little black dress left exposed. One of the hands that was cupping her bottom slid forward, snagging on the hem of her dress as he stroked between her legs. The heat from his hand only added to the raging inferno taking place under her skin.
“If you leave this elevator, you will be mine, you understand? I will lay you out on the bed and make you cry out. This is your last chance to take the elevator down.”