A/N: Another small bit of housekeeping — I wanted to get this promised chapter posted early in the week because I will be traveling over the weekend. For my international readers who may not know, this is the weekend of Independence Day (sorry, UK readers) and I will be heading to California for a writer's retreat with two of my other writer friends. Since I've basically dedicated all my recent writing energy to this little side project we've all become so obsessed with, I haven't done much work on my novel project. I'm going to spend most of my time — when I'm not enjoying new restaurants and the beach — working on my piece of original fiction, Intrepid, which is a fantasy story set in a world like the early 1900s, where a cultural war between those praising technology and those fighting to restore magic and the gods are in conflict. In your interested in that story too, let me know in the comments and I'll direct you where you can also read it online.
And, now without further ado...
(low whistle) Wow. I think I need a cigarette after writing this. You might too after reading it. And, if you don't smoke... you might start. I have written romantic scenes before, but this... just kind of happened. And It. Wouldn't. Stop. I've never written anything this detailed before, but I feel like I still left it feeling tasteful. I'll leave you to decide.
You enjoy this while I go adjust the rating... I hope it was worth the wait. I, for one, am very glad I took my time and did not rush this.
Clusters of candles were scattered around the bath. They kept the light low, much lower than oil lamps. Flames danced on their wicks behind geometric cutouts, casting shapely shadows flitting across the walls. Steam lifted in slow rising plumes to mingle with the drifts of frankincense scented smoke, blending with the heady rose oil of the bath water.
Enveloped by the water and Jasmine's body, lulled by the soothing heat from both, Aladdin hovered on the edge of lucidity. Seated between her legs, head pillowed by the swell of her breasts, he fought the urge to sleep. Despite the promise of the rest of their evening to come, blissfully content in this moment, it was hard to not succumb to the call of a restful sleep that had been so perniciously evading him.
She could tout the magnificence of his hands all she wanted, but Jasmine's were capable of just as much magic. Reclined on the slant the soaking tub, she dug her thumbs into the seemingly impenetrable knots embedded at the crook of his neck. The result of her work was a series of whimpers and groans as the cords of taut muscle became pliant under the pressure of her touch.
It was weakening his resolve. How could he keep all this misery buried deep inside when he was literally melting under her fingertips? Her efforts weren't lost on him. She was trying so hard. Jasmine was the Sultana of Agrabah — a woman so powerful she had an army at her beck and call — yet, here she was laboring over him. As much as he needed her to know that he was fine, she was trying to prove that she could handle that he wasn't.
Shame was burrowing into his heart. The fact that he had doubted her ability to juggle the needs of her people with the needs of the people she loved, frankly, that embarrassed him. If he had learned anything from his time as Prince Ali, he knew, above all else, Jasmine considered duty the foremost aspect of character. To accept responsibility only to shrink away from it when times became too hard, in her mind, that was an act of cowardice. And, trapped alone in this spiral by his own stubbornness, he had lost his perspective, forgetting an important truth. Yes, Jasmine had accepted a crown and the duty it carried. But, she had also accepted his hand, despite having refused so many others. The woman who had fought so avidly to avoid a marriage that would put someone in a position of authority over her people, had chosen him above all others. Jasmine would be damned before she willingly neglected the duty she had willingly accepted as wife.
At that realization, his efforts to protect her suddenly felt selfish and misguided rather than self-sacrificing and noble.
"I feel guilty," he offered meekly.
"About what?"
"Ruining such an important day."
Chuckling at his disappointed whine as her hands left his shoulders, they wrapped around his waist. Dropping her cheek to his shoulder instead, she kissed the oil soaked skin with the side of her mouth.
"While it was not your finest moment, I understand why you reacted the way you did." One of her hands migrated up the sensitive skin of his stomach, tracing the definition of the subtle muscles on his abdomen. He shivered, and she smiled against his skin. "Regardless of what transpired, it doesn't negate the impact the school will have on your old neighborhood. Aladdin…" Her next words carried a sense of awe. "...you didn't just change lives today, you saved them."
"It's not enough, Jas," he sighed, squeezing his eyes tight shut, forbidding to release the tears fighting for freedom. "It feels like it will… I'll never be enough. I wasn't raised to be a prince. No matter what I do, I'll never be what you need."
At his words, Jasmine's grip tightened protectively, cinching him to her like a rope.
"I am the only person who gets to decide what I need. And, once I make up my mind, have you ever known me to waiver?"
"You changed your mind about me before," he reminded. "You thought I was a thief, remember?"
"You are a thief," she laughed incredulously.
"Yeah, but in the street, when you asked for the bracelet… you thought I was the worst kind of thief."
"I knew what you were from the moment you stepped between Jamal and me." She tugged at the lobe of his ear with her teeth. " The kind that steals hearts."
"You changed your mind about Ali…"
"No, I didn't, Aladdin," she pulled back when she realized her attempts were in vain, and he could hear how affronted she was at his suggestion. "I knew what Ali was from the beginning too — a pretender, just like every other prince who swaggered into my throne room. Four little words — Do you trust me? When you spoke those words Prince Ali ceased to be and I recognized my thief all over again. There was nothing to change my mind about." Guiding his head with a hand at his opposite cheek, she met the periphery of his dark gaze. "You have nothing to prove to Agrabah, or to me. Stop living in the fear that I'm going to wake up one morning and suddenly realize I've made a mistake. I'm never going to regret choosing you."
"Promise?"
"I swear." Brown eyes bored into him, hard as diamonds, not out of anger, but out of steadfast determination. "I love you, doniety."
A slow easy grin pitched up the corner of his mouth. "I love you too, habibti."
Urging his with a gentle push, and a peck on his cheek, she suggested, "Let's eat."
As she donned her robe, he was dismayed at the loss of all that soft, supple skin as she tied the wrap around her waist. Squeezing a towel around her long, ebony hair, she removed the excess water before twisting the fabric around her head with practiced precision. Picking up her brush from the vanity, she made her way to the balcony. Slipping on a navy sirwal, he decided to forgo a tunic and follow her instead.
The staff had moved the majlis and rug from the lounge space in their suite to the expansive open balcony, where they could enjoy the view of the thriving city under the crescent moon and twinkling stars. Silver trays were spread across the rug, picnic style, filled with an assortment of snacks and finger foods — goat cheese and bread slices, pomegranates, dried meats, olives. A carafe of wine stood next to two glasses, which Jasmine filled as he approached, offering one as he sat. Taking a sip, he set it aside before plopping down casually to her left, leaning on his side with a propped elbow and legs stretched away from her. Jasmine spread the soft cheese on two slices of bread as Aladdin tossed olives into the air, catching them with his mouth.
"Well, I see you're in better spirits," she teased. "Looks like tonight is just what the physician ordered."
"The only medicine I need are your hands on my back." Rolling his shoulders he marveled at the newfound release of tension. "I swear, you have a healer's touch."
"Perhaps I missed my true calling?"
In a single deft motion, Jasmine unwound the towel, tossing it aside, releasing damp, wavy tendrils that curtained her face. As she reached for the brush, his hand halted her movement as it rested over the top of her hand gripping the brush.
"Allow me?"
Considering, she shrugged a shoulder affirmatively, harboring an amused smirk. Pushing himself off his elbow, he positioned himself behind Jasmine like she had done in the bath, his legs kicked out at each of her sides, the inside of his acrobats calves pressed firmly to the outside of her thighs, leaving just enough space to work. Hands starting at the small of her back, he ghosted his fingers over her delicious curves through the thin silk of her robe. Grazing the pads of his fingers effortlessly over the corrogation of her ribs, the sharp angles of her shoulder blades, the ridges of her spine, he sank them into the sensitive skin of her scalp. Raking his trimmed nails up and into her crown, parting the black veil to opposite sides. Humming her approval, she clenched her hands into his legs, digging her own nails into his calves, arching her back into his chest. Reversing the direction of his hands, he drew out and gathered the length of her hair into his hands.
Starting at the nape of her neck, he pulled the soft bristled brush up and back in long swoops. The tangles unraveled under his strokes, hair falling down the slope of her hunched shoulders as she let her head drop to her chest in subdued relaxation. In fluid movements from the root of her bangs, then each of her temples, he slicked the top layer of hair smooth in three more long strokes. Having successfully tamed the wildness of her tresses, he repeated his motions through two more rounds, merely for the sake of loving the touch of her hair as much as she loved it being touched.
Discarding the brush next to the now ignored feast, he put his nimble fingers to task in separating her hair into evenly sized portions. Sure, any handmaiden worth her salt could braid, but none of them had the practiced dexterity of his magician's hands. Parting, twisting, overlapping, he maneuvered the parceled out strands into an intricate work of art befitting any queen.
In one last slow caress across the span of her neck, he swept his completed masterpiece over her shoulder. The plait cascaded down over her left breast. Nape once again exposed, he pressed his lips to the very center of her neck just below the hairline before trailing a line of excruciating slow kisses down her vertebrae. From the front, he hooked his fingers under the fabric draped over her shoulders, loosening it away enough to slip off each side as he worked downward, until it fell, pooled at her waist. Reaching the limits of how far he could bend in such close proximity, he again reversed direction to drag the velvety inside of his bottom lip upwards adjacent to her spine until he reached the pulse point at her throat.
Either Rajah had found his way past a locked set of doors, or he had reduced his wife to panting.
"After all this time… you still… find ways… to surprise me, doniety."
"Either you're already drunk, or I'm slipping, because we both know that thing with my lip is my signature move…"
"Clearly... I meant the thing… with my hair." She corrected, examining his handiwork with a lift of the plaited tail. "Where did you learn to braid hair so skillfully, and why have you never revealed this before?"
"I used to do it for Ummi." Hovering just behind her ear, he whispered. "She told me it would impress girls."
Twisting on him, bringing herself to crouch on her heels, she sunk her hands into his hair. "Consider me impressed."
Diving into him, her mouth was voracious, warring with him over who could lay claim to the other's first. Aladdin's hands exploited the delicate skin of her now exposed back. Jasmine scratched her nails over his own. Abruptly, she broke away, leaving his lips cold in her absence and eyes blinking like a drunkard. When his eyes finally adjusted again, she was recumbently stretched as far away from him as his grip on her hips would allow. One hand splayed on the majlis behind her, the other nonchalantly sucking pomegranate seeds from her index finger.
Leveling a hungry glare in her direction, huskily he demanded, "Come back here."
Darting her tongue over the juice on her lips, she replied, "Make me.
"With pleasure."
Pinning her to the cushions, he pressed his chest against hers. "Trust me, habibti…" He smiled into the line of her jaw. "... you have to be careful what you wish for."
"Three little wishes," she purred, "and, suddenly your an expert?"
Sucking at the dip in her clavicle, he mmhmm'd before working through the valley of her breasts. Each kiss a punctuation. "It's. All. In. The Details."
"You've always been very detailed oriented," she all but moaned as he swiped his tongue around the 'O' of her belly button.
"I take my job very seriously," he joked. "I serve at the pleasure of the Sultana."
"At my pleasure — " She arched an eyebrow. " — or, to pleasure?"
"I like to think a little of both."
The next move he made to use his mouth sent her hands grasping for anchorage on any available object. Frantically, she fisted the rug, yanking it several inches. The dinnerware rocked and clattered. Eyes cast upwards to the wide, ink-stained sky, she writhed beneath him. Jasmine wasn't the only one seeing stars.
When she could take no more, she hooked her hands under his arms and yanked him over the top of her to finish the job he had started. The guards in the courtyard below could surely hear her — hell, probably most of Agrabah — but he couldn't bring himself to care. Considering how loud she was being, obviously neither could she. Sometimes, it was good to be Prince Consort.
In the slow de-escalation of their love, Aladdin rolled to his side to spoon her. Instead, she rotated in his arms to curl into the plane of his chest. Setting his chin atop her head, she nuzzled into his neck.
"Here's the plan," she murmured, her words thick and lazy from exertion. "I will worry about the state and politics and trade and all the other official nonsense… and you, just take care of the people… because honestly, they couldn't be in better hands." As the words fell from her lips, she clasped his hand, thumb entwining with his, her fingers enclosing around the side of his palm — a gesture of promise, a pact. "The best partnerships are built upon each party bringing their own strengths to the table. Being my prince isn't about being my equal in skill — it's about being my equal in virtue."
Ruminating on her words, he let a beat of thoughtful silence hang between them as he let them settle into his heart.
Brushing his nose along the side of hers, he whispered with a smile, "Deal."
A/N:
sirwal — thanks to my new book, I have learned the proper name for "harem pants"
majlis — a low set arrangement of cushions forming seating like a couch, also a new term I learned
Umm — mother