The Sheikh's Triplet Baby Surprise (The Sheikh's Baby Surprise 3)

SIXTEEN

Two weeks later, Amity found herself positioned in the very room in which she’d last seen Aziz, addressing her colleagues and interns—the people she’d been surrounded by for so many years, the people she woke up for every day.

She cleared her throat as the many twentysomethings blinked up at her, some of them drooping with early morning hangovers.

“Thanks for coming today,” Amity began. She cleared her throat, placing her fingers on her belly. It had grown exponentially in the weeks since she’d learned of the pregnancy. She now understood that her balance would take a toll as she toted three humans toward life.

“As many of you know, I did something that was quite out of character for me.”

A few of the people in the room gave her knowing smiles. They all knew about her fling with the Sheikh, but none of them had approached her about it. Flora flipped her hair in the corner, eyeing the clock. She’d already offered to babysit, and Amity had already made a mental note to never allow that to happen.

“But honestly, since I became pregnant,” Amity continued, “I’ve done quit

e a bit of soul searching. And I’ve taken inspiration from many of you. In actuality, I never had a youth—not really. I worked hard to get where I am. And while I’m proud of my station, of this job, of our many accomplishments as a team, I don’t exactly know what the real world is like anymore. I don’t know what my friends are up to. I don’t know what Joshua Tree is like this time of year.”

She cleared her throat, feeling like she might weep. The hormones were really throttling her. “And, in any case, I don’t really know what beauty I’d like to share with my children, because I haven’t given myself the space or the time to discover that beauty for myself.” She sighed, smoothing her eyebrows with her fingers. “And for that reason, I’ve decided to take a sabbatical, until my children are at least a year old.”

Many in the crowd raised their eyebrows high. Their fearless leader—the woman who seemed to love PR more than she loved anything else—was abandoning them.

Amity felt her heart palpitating in her chest, but she knew she was doing the right thing. She knew, as she gazed at the sun from her office window, that she needed to escape the walls she’d built in her life. She needed to set herself free, to find something better. And if that meant she’d come back eventually—to the job she’d built for herself, to the life she loved—that was fine.

She tugged her cardigan around her pregnant belly and gazed around the room, assessing their faces. Only Mark spoke.

“Well. I have to admit, I never thought you’d do it.”

A few others laughed. Flora gave him a hasty smile.

“But you think it’s right?” Amity asked, nearly breathless. She felt uncomfortable standing for long amounts of time, and she yearned to collapse in the chair.

“We all think you work way too hard. And it’ll be nice to have you off our backs for a bit,” Mark said, his voice jovial. “You’ve been through more than we could understand. And know that we’ll stand aside and fight for you to return, if and when you so choose.”

Amity felt a smile creep across her face. The members of her team started to clap, their rings and bracelets glittering in the bad lighting.

“Well,” she murmured. “Thank you, all of you. It has been an incredible privilege working with you all.” She shrugged, tossing a few folders onto the table. “I would help you coordinate who gets what client, but I can’t very well make assignments if I’m out of here, can I?”

Mark swept his hands toward the folders and nestled them against his chest, nodding curtly. “Don’t worry, Amity. We’ve got you covered.”

Amity looked at them all warmly, remembering how she’d spent so much of her time there irritated at their sheer inability to get anything done. Perhaps she hadn’t allowed them to work because she hadn’t trusted them. Perhaps she’d gotten in the way of her colleagues’ own success.

She moved to leave the room, collecting her small bag and striding toward the elevator for a final time. This wasn’t her world anymore. She had to cultivate something beautiful for her children. For herself. She deserved it more than anything.

SEVENTEEN

As she drove home, Amity dangled her fingers through the window, feeling the aching way the August heat was moving toward cooler September air. She yanked up the radio volume and drove past her apartment building, toward the beach. For the first time in years, she didn’t have anywhere to be or anything to do.

Minutes later, she found herself ankle-deep in the ocean, gazing out at the horizon. Somewhere, across the water, she knew, was her children’s father—perhaps guzzling priceless champagne, bumping elbows with celebrities, or, sure, donating massive sums of money to an orphanage without telling anyone about it. People were complicated, she reminded herself. Aziz was, certainly—and so was she. She’d leave space for her children’s complexities. They deserved to feel important, to feel like so much of something, even when their relationships faltered, when they didn’t get the promotion they wanted, when the world turned too quickly for them. It had taken her a long time to accept this about herself—that she deserved space and time to think, that she deserved to love and be loved. But she hoped to pass this lesson on to her children.

She arrived home later that night and ordered herself a pizza—something she never normally did. But she was celebrating her new ideas of life, of the world—and that, she had decided, included pizza. She shelled out the cash for the delivery driver, tipping extra, and hustled back to her living room to watch a film, the cardboard box on her lap.

Normally this would have disgusted her, she thought, as she slipped the first slice into her mouth. But she’d already done something so immensely distasteful—accepting the money from Aziz—that she almost didn’t mind seeing how far she could go. The previous week, Amity had received an email from Aziz’s accountant, informing her that the money would be deposited into her account in a month’s time. And now, she was eating pizza in her underwear. The world was a strange place, but pizza was effortlessly delicious. Accept the good things in life, she thought.

She hadn’t responded to the email from the financial advisor. She’d wait for the deposit, and then she’d close that chapter of her life.

After eating just two slices of pizza (she wouldn’t go crazy, after all), she boxed up the leftovers and slipped them into the refrigerator, centering her mind on getting a good night’s sleep. She had a doctor’s