Sophie (The Boss 8)
“Sophie?” he whispered tentatively.
“Hmm?” was all I could manage.
“When I say that you pleased me today…I want you to know that I didn’t mean just our play. I meant earlier, as well—the advice you gave me about all of this. And your willingness to listen. I know it’s normal for us, but believe me, it wasn’t something I was used to before us.” He paused. “I’m sorry. You were sleeping. I should economize my words. Thank you, Sophie. For being my wife.”
I curled my fingers in his chest hair and listened to the beating of his heart beneath my ear. It had almost stopped, more than once. The sound was as precious to me as his statement, which carried the weight of our shared sorrows as well as his demons.
I told him, “Thank you for being my husband.” In the silence of my heart, I added, thank you for choosing to stay.
Chapter Eleven
We arrived at El-Mudad’s friend’s island at dusk, disembarking the yacht for the speed boat to cross the lagoon. Island staff stood in two uniform lines flanking the wide dock, flashing perfect hospitality industry smiles.
"No, seriously. Who owns this place?" I whispered to El-Mudad as we strolled toward the beach.
"Let's just say he's a bookseller."
He couldn't mean...
"Do we each get our own hut?" Rashida asked, skipping past to walk backward while interrogating us. "Can we have a fire on the beach?"
"They're not huts and not tonight," El-Mudad told her patiently. “You and Molly and your sister will stay in the main house with Mariposa and Olivia, and the three of us will be in private accommodations.”
"But we're still going to do family time, right?" Rashida asked.
I looked over my shoulder. Neil had been the last off the boat. He carried Olivia, deep in ragdoll level sleep. There was no way that man would miss out on family time.
"We will. But let the grown-ups rest a bit, first. Vacations are tiring." El-Mudad flashed me a smile; he knew what Neil and I had gotten up to on that first night of sailing because I’d slept until nearly two in the afternoon the next day.
Solar torches provided us a surprising amount of light as we approached the shore, where two men, a tanned blond who could have body doubled for Russell Howard and a tall, lean Asian guy with surfer-casual hair, waited for us. I'd expected them to be in some kind of uniform—the private island Neil and I had stayed on during our honeymoon had been staffed like an enthusiastic airport Ramada—but they wore board shorts and loose-fitting t-shirts.
"Mr. Ati?" The blond stepped forward, hand extended. "Welcome to Paradise."
El-Mudad slapped his palm against the man’s in an enthusiastic handshake. "Troy?"
"That's me," the man said with a broad smile and a surprisingly Canadian accent. "And this is Jackson."
The other guy leaned forward and fist bumped El-Mudad. "Recreation coordinator. If you need a boat or an excursion while you're here, I'm the man to talk to."
"And I'm everything else," Troy said. "If you need anything, any time, give us a call at headquarters, and my staff or I can help you out."
"Right now, what we need are our beds." My legs were still shaky from our harrowing approach; I wasn’t a big fan of little boats. "Which way would those be?"
"Absolutely," Troy said as if that were an answer to the question. He pointed toward a path of stone steps that led up from the beach in one direction, then to a winding path into the trees. "The main house is up there, that's where we have the kids set up, and the three of you are in the villa on the other side of the island. We can grab you a golf cart—"
"I think it would behoove us to walk," Neil said, handing Olivia off to Mariposa. She made a disgruntled noise but didn't wake. “Perhaps for our au pair?”
"Nobody wanted to drive us anywhere," Rashida grumbled.
"Your legs are young," El-Mudad said placidly. "Go on, girls. We'll see you for breakfast."
"And then laying on the beach and reading with no one to bother me?" Amal asked. It was rhetorical, of course. Amal would do whatever she wanted. It was one of the things I so admired about her.
Mariposa followed a staff-member up the path, where a golf cart zoomed up with a single word over Troy’s radio. She carried Olivia on her hip like a basket of laundry as, to my surprise, Amal joined Molly in dashing across the sand in an undignified manner.
El-Mudad noticed, too. "It's good to have your sister here. Amal needs someone to remind her that she's not..."
"A chronically jaded, thrice-divorced socialite?" Neil offered.
"That's...pretty specific," I said. "Not wrong, necessarily, but specific."
We followed the path behind Troy, who gave us an informative, enthusiastic history of the island. It cleverly glossed over colonization; maybe Columbus hadn’t taken the time to screw this place up.