Possessed by Desire by Elisabeth Naughton

assumed Zoraida had multiple pleasure slaves. I didn’t think she’d send you.”
    Zoraida did have multiple pleasure slaves. And she probably wouldn’t have sent Ashur, but Nuha had advocated for him. The first time in his life he’d strived to succeed at something, and it had turned into this.
    Was it a blessing or a curse?
    Claire combed her fingers through her hair. “I…Tariq and Mira knew I was searching for the bottle too. But they thought it was because I was helping them. They didn’t know the real reason I needed to find it.”
    His eyes narrowed, and an odd foreboding slid down his spine. “And what is that reason?”
    She drew in a shaky breath, then let it out. And as she stared at him in the moonlight, he had the strange sense that maybe this was something he didn’t want to know. There were reasons angels and djinn did not interact. Some mysteries of the universe were supposed to remain just that—mysteries. Otherwise, everything a soul counted on could change in an instant.
    “You’re not the only one who’s been imprisoned, Ashur. My people have been enslaved for years. Our prison might not have walls and chains, but it’s a prison just the same.”
    She drew in another breath, seemed to be thinking through what she needed to say, and though he waited, something in his mind screamed, run away, now ! But he couldn’t. Not just because he was bound to the opal around her neck, but because a space inside wanted—needed—to hear what she said next.
    “I went looking for the bottle,” she continued, “so I could bind a pleasure slave to my will and eventually convince him—you—to take me to your realm. You were right when you said I was after something other than pleasure. I never wanted you. I only want what waits for me in your world.”
    He should have expected it, but disappointment felt like deadweight pressing down on his chest. All those months of imprisonment. The endless training sessions. The only thing that had kept him going was the promise that at some point, the female who summoned him would want him . Request him . Need him . And here she was telling him even that wasn’t true.
    He couldn’t seem to do anything right. He was also growing slow, because when she moved a half step closer, he realized he’d been so distracted by his thoughts, he’d let down his guard. If she wanted to steal his powers, she could do it now, and he’d barely have time to react.
    He tensed, but nothing happened. No magic filled the air; nothing swirled around him. Her face only softened until it was as if…as if she was looking past the djinni he’d become and was searching for the one he’d once been. Or could be…
    “You were a means to an end for me, Ashur. I never once cared about who you were or what would happen to you when I reached my goal. Until now. Now…everything is different. And I’m going to try to figure out a way to help you. If, that is, you’ll let me.”

 
     
    CHAPTER SEVEN
     
     
    Claire waited for Ashur to say something—anything.
    She was putting herself out on a limb here, and she wasn’t entirely sure why. Until a few minutes ago, he’d been a hot fantasy and, like she’d told him, a means to an end. But watching him with his brothers, seeing the way he reacted to them and feeling the confusion and agony she knew he was experiencing, something inside her had changed.
    It didn’t mean she was giving up her quest. And it didn’t mean she wasn’t still going to try to convince him to take her to the djinn realm. But maybe there was a way for her to get what she wanted and to free him as well. Maybe there was a way they could both win.
    Wariness, heat and something dark swirled in his eyes as he stared at her in the moonlight. She couldn’t read his expression. His eyes sharpened, then he grasped her at the shoulders and pushed her back against the trunk of a tree. Surprised, Claire gasped and her eyes widened.
    “What kind of game are you playing, noor