This book is a sequel to Khalifa and cannot be read as a standalone. To avoid spoilers, description and excerpt are added inside the book.
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Started: May 2, 2022.
Completed: December 3, 2022.
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cover by @xniftykayx
If anyone else were to kiss me, all they would taste is your name.
— Clementine von Radics
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Him
"Push me up the tree."
She has a long stick in her hand which she points up at the apple tree. He uncertainly looks between her and the tree. She has a wide grin plastered on her face.
"I'll get you an apple too," she coaxes him. When he doesn't budge, she changes her offer, "I'll get you two. You can have the big ones."
"But how?"
"I'll beat them down with this stick." She waves it at him. "Come here, Joojoo."
He goes over to her. She readies herself to be lifted up and he has no idea how to do so. After a few failed attempts of pushing her into the bark rather than up the tree, she huffs and turns back at him.
"I'm big. You're tiny. I'll lift you up," she suggests instead and hands him the stick, coming to stand behind him.
A few more failed attempts go by, of her digging her small palms into his hips but barely managing to move him, until she eventually gives up and looks around for help.
"I have apples in my chambers. Come with me. Umi (mother) will give us," he asks her sweetly.
"Baba!" she squeals and runs away, and he looks in the direction after her.
A man kneels down and opens his arms for her. And he recognizes him from having seen him with his uncle, Khalid, before. His grand advisor, Saud Al Makhzum.
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Her
He draws a finger up her forearm, eyes staring but impenetrable, fixing her, silent like a night, yet raging like a desert storm. They're fervent, momentarily disarming her, yet there's no fury in the specks of fire aflame there.
His finger continues to trace the span of her arm, up to her shoulder, unbothered by her dagger at his throat. He holds her shoulder firmly, pulling her down to himself, the naive fondness of his earlier smile replaced by a wicked smirk. Sitting there on the ottoman with her leaning over him, Noura has to put her free hand down on his thigh to keep her balance.
"What explanation do you need from your beloved husband, zawjati alhabiba (my beloved wife)?"
She flattens the blade against his throat, the sharp edge of it facing upwards.
"How about you start with who was the woman?"
"I don't know. I didn't get to ask her," his response is smooth, unfiltered, and his hand abandons her shoulder to flatten against her back. "Are you shivering at my touch, or are you cold?"
