Chapter 4: Reclamation at Dawn
The soft grey cashmere of Zahra’s sweater was damp where his breath had warmed it. He woke slowly, the deep, unthinking sleep of exhaustion giving way to a hazy awareness. The lamp still cast its golden pool. Her fingers were still in his hair. He felt profoundly, unsettlingly rested.
He tilted his head back. She was looking down at him, her eyes dark and unblinking. She’d been watching him sleep. A slow smile touched her lips.
“Welcome back,” she said, her voice rough.
“How long?”
“An hour. Maybe more.” Her thumb stroked his temple. “You were dead to the world.”
He pushed himself up, rolling onto his back beside her, looking up at the silk canopy. The weightlessness of good sleep was already being replaced by something else—a returning energy, a familiar magnetic pull towards her. The vulnerability of before felt like a dream itself.
“I feel human again,” he said, stretching his arms above his head. The hem of his shirt rode up.
She watched the strip of exposed skin. “Good.”
Her phone was beside her, screen down. She picked it up, tapped it open. He saw her gallery app flash. She selected a photo, zoomed in. It was a close-up, from her perspective. Him, asleep, his face pressed against her stomach, his features soft and unguarded. Her hand was in the frame, cradling his head. It was an intensely private image.
“Zahra.”
She didn’t look at him. Her thumbs moved quickly. Tag. Qamira. Send.
The swoosh sound was soft in the quiet room.
He sat up. “What did you just do?”
She placed the phone back on the bedside table, screen down. “I reminded her.”
“You sent her a picture of me sleeping on you?”
“I sent her the truth.” She finally turned to him, and the tenderness from before was gone, burned away by a cool, victorious fire. “She needed to see where you go when you’re tired. Who holds you. It’s not her.”
He should have been angry. He felt a spike of irritation, but it was drowned out by a darker, more potent thrill. The rivalry was an engine, and she’d just poured gasoline on it. He was the prize. This was proof.
He shook his head, but a smirk betrayed him. “You’re ruthless.”
“I’m clear.” She leaned in, her voice dropping to a whisper. “She texts you, crying, after one kiss? Let her see what happens after. Let her see where you rest.”
Her words were a match to the kindling of his returning energy. He looked at her mouth. “You talk a lot.”
“You like it.”
“Maybe.” He reached out, hooked a finger in the neck of her cashmere sweater, and pulled her closer. “Maybe I just like that you can’t stop thinking about her, even when I’m right here.”
Her breath hitched. The challenge was back. The game was on.
“I’m not thinking about her now,” she breathed, her lips inches from his.
“Prove it.”
The kiss wasn’t soft. It was a reclamation. Her mouth was hungry, insistent, and she pushed him back onto the bed, following him down. The careful nurturer was gone, replaced by the possessive woman who sent proof to her rivals. She kissed him like she was stealing something back, her tongue sweeping against his, her teeth grazing his lip. He let her, his hands coming up to grip her hips, pulling her flush against him. The ache of fatigue was gone, replaced by a different, sharper ache.
She broke the kiss, her chest heaving. “Tell me you’re mine.”
“Right now?” He grinned up at her, his hands sliding under her sweater, finding the warm skin of her back. “Feels like you’re mine.”
She made a sound, part frustration, part desire, and kissed him again, harder. Her hands were everywhere, pushing his shirt up, her nails dragging lightly down his chest. He flipped them, rolling her onto her back, settling between her legs. The cashmere was in the way. He pulled the sweater over her head, tossed it aside. She wore nothing underneath.
The lamplight gilded her skin. He just looked for a moment, and the raw want in her eyes was better than any compliment. “See something you like?” she asked, her voice trembling just slightly.
“Always.” He bent his head, took her nipple into his mouth, and she arched off the bed with a sharp gasp. Her hands fisted in his hair, not guiding, just holding on.
It was a collision, not a slow burn. The earlier intimacy had stripped everything to the bone—there were no more games here, just need. She whispered against his skin, a mix of Hindi and Arabic and breathless English. “Here, yes—don’t stop—meri jaan, just like that—” Her words were commands and pleas, a running commentary of her possession. She kissed him until his lips felt swollen, biting his shoulder when he pushed inside her, the sound she made one of pure, triumphant relief.
He tried to set a rhythm, but she took it over, meeting him thrust for thrust, her heels digging into the small of his back. “Look at me,” she demanded, and he did. Her gaze was locked on his, unblinking, fierce. “You’re here. With me.”
He couldn’t speak. He just kept his eyes on hers, the connection deeper, more terrifying than the physical joining. She owned this moment, completely. She leaned up, capturing his mouth again, swallowing his groan as everything coiled tight and shattered.
For a long time, the only sound was their ragged breathing, mingling in the still, perfumed air. She was stroking his back, slick with sweat. He finally shifted, rolling to the side, but she immediately turned into him, her leg thrown over his, her face buried in his neck.
“Don’t move.”
“I’m crushing you.”
“I don’t care.”
He laughed, a low, tired sound. The phone on the table buzzed. Once. Then again. And again. A persistent, angry hum.
Neither of them moved to check it.
“She got the photo,” he said finally.
Zahra’s smile was against his skin. “I know.”
“She’s pissed.”
“Good.” She traced a pattern on his chest. “Let her be. She’s not here.”
Later, in the enormous ensuite, steam rose from the jacuzzi, fogging the mirrors. She sank into the bubbling water across from him, her hair piled loosely on her head. The scent of jasmine from the bath oil was dense and soothing. He watched her, the way the water sluiced over her shoulders.
“You’re staring, amu,” she said, echoing Qamira’s pet name with a sly, challenging glint. Testing him.
“You’re beautiful when you’ve won,” he said, not taking the bait, choosing his own truth.
She liked that. She slid through the water, coming to straddle his lap, her arms looping around his neck. The bubbles fizzed around them. “I am beautiful always.”
“Yeah. You are.”
She kissed him, slower now, a lazy exploration. “You taste like me,” she murmured.
“You taste like expensive water and trouble.”
She laughed, a real, unguarded sound that echoed off the marble. She rested her forehead against his. “Stay tonight. The whole night.”
He thought of the buzzing phone, of Qamira’s silent, furious texts piling up in the other room. He thought of his empty apartment. He thought of the way Zahra had held him while he slept, and the way she’d taken him apart afterward.
“Okay,” he said.
It was a surrender, and she knew it. Her victory was complete, for now. She kissed him again, deep and promising, under the warm, churning water, while somewhere in the dark bedroom, a phone screen illuminated with a fresh, unanswered torrent of rage.