Dialing in his number, he waited with baited breath and hoped against hope that this wasn’t what he feared it was.
“Hello? Bahan? God, this is Rose. I haven’t been able to get Jennifer, and maybe she didn’t get an international SIM card. I don’t know. I tried the hotel, too, but they said you were out, and I don’t know what to do. It’s Sydney. She had been doing fine with the dialysis and her kidneys are alright, but for some reason her blood sugar is spiking incredibly high. They’re afraid she’s going to fall into a coma and they’re working as hard as they can. I know you were supposed to come home on Tuesday, but if you could hurry back… Please, Bahan, she needs to be here in case.”
Bahan dropped the phone even as it beeped to yet another frantic message from Rose.
“Dear Allah, no.”
He leapt back from the main room of the suite and into the bedroom. Stopping there at the threshold, he gave his bride one last moment to enjoy her peaceful slumber, to feel the relaxation her life had lacked for so very long. She’d kill him if he didn’t tell her soon, but she deserved just a few extra seconds of sleep. She’d had so little since Sydney had been admitted to the hospital, and she was going to have so little from now on.
But time was of the essence.
Reaching over, he shook her shoulder. “Beloved, you have to wake up.”
She snored once more and then rolled onto her back. “I don’t care if you’ve ordered the greatest croissant spread in the world and all the crepes and some other luxury breakfast. I am going to sleep until ten, and you’re going to let me,” she said, her tone joking and light.
Oh Allah did he hate to shove reality in her face like this, but her sister needed her.
“It’s Sydney.”
Those words had the effect of pouring ice over her body. Jennifer snapped out of bed and was rushing for her suitcase. “What’s going on?”
“Rose called. We had our phones off but I checked mine. Her kidneys are doing fine with the dialysis, but her blood sugar keeps climbing and they’re having trouble fighting it. They…”
“She needs me, and this is all your fault.”
Bahan blinked at her, and then he held up his hands in a placating gesture. “I don’t understand. I’m trying my best to help you and to help your family. How is this my fault?”
Her back stiffened a bit, but Jennifer kept rushing for her toiletries in the other room, zipping about faster than a jackrabbit. When she spoke, she focused on shoving her bottles into the suitcase. “It’s not your fault that she’s hopefully going to get better if we can get past this spike, and I do appreciate that.”
“Why
are you dismissing me so fast?” he asked, putting his hand on her shoulder.
She spun around and dodged him as quickly as if his touch had scalded her. “I let myself be distracted.”
“You’re allowed to have one day. You saw her same as I did on Friday. Sydney looked as perky as ever, and she wanted you to have a good time. This could have happened just as easily with us back in New York.”
“But it happened here!” she said, throwing down a teddy that was in her hands. The lace fell through the air slowly and finally fell onto the bed between them. “I have tried so hard to be there for my mom and my sister, and I was here when I shouldn’t have been. I gave myself five seconds to feel I could have a life, to even have a fake marriage like this, and now…it’s like I’m being punished.”
“You’re not,” he said, reaching out and trying to at least stroke her cheek.
She stepped back again, and it tore at him to see the pain etched on her face, those huge tears welling up in her eyes. “I can’t have anything for myself. I can’t have you. I mean, I’d never annul this. I know that you need to have the marriage complete the terms of your agreement, I do.”
“And I’d never deny aid to Sydney, not now. I mean it. She feels like my little sister sometimes as well.”
“But I can’t be a day-to-day wife. I just can’t be. There’s nothing I’d like more than to have fun in Paris or to take time to go and see ‘my kingdom,’” she said, smiling ruefully. “I bet that Yemen is lovely.”
“Its beauty is only second to your own,” he said, bowing low. “You don’t have to face everything alone. You never have to feel that way. I’m right here, and I can help you.”
“I just need to get home, and frankly, Bahan, I can’t be distracted.”
“So I’m a distraction now?” he asked, an edge coming into his own voice. Bahan had tried to be patient, tried to reach her. Damn it all, he was trying to reach her now, but this bloody woman was the most stubborn being he’d ever met. It was growing impossible to be rejected all the time, and he didn’t understand how she could keep pushing him away. He was a sheikh, damn it, and he didn’t have to take these torturous vacillations in her mood. “How is that even fair?” he asked.
“Because I loved last night. It was the best night of my life, hands down, but it wasn’t my real life. This isn’t a real marriage. You’re the one who knelt down in the hospital for me. You’re the one who told me all the specs that you and Fareed had come up with. I’m just the woman you inserted into slot B. You needed someone to help fill the spirit of the law. Yes, we have fun, but I just don’t have time for fun, and you can see why now, Bahan.”
“Your sister didn’t suddenly nosedive in her health because you were away for a weekend,” he said, starting to pace.
“But it feels like it. I was here when I should have been the person watching her by her bedside. I was here when I’m sure Mom’s a complete and utter wreck. I just…you’re too dangerous for my missions, Bahan, and I’m completely sorry about that.”