Another Shot at Forever, page 8
He still had no clue what her father’s motivation had been for playing matchmaker, though if he had to guess Sharmarke had been thinking the same thing and had wanted to spy on him. Not just spy but ensure that he wasn’t getting closer to unearthing the truth about his criminal activities. And if that was true, Ara was to blame as he’d provoked her father’s suspicion when he had first tried to ask Sharmarke about the heinous crimes he had committed and tried to cover up.
All of it dredged up ugly memories that he had worked to put behind him over the course of the past year. Still, Ara often pondered what Zaynab’s life might have been like had he not endeavored to unmask Sharmarke’s misdeeds.
We might not have ever met.
And their baby certainly wouldn’t exist.
His throat worked around the hard knot that manifested at the awful thought. He swallowed it down when Zaynab’s friend walked away and she turned to him with a bright smile.
“Looks like our table might be ready.” Zaynab pointed to the host beckoning them to the back of the bistro.
* * *
“So, this is where you grew up.”
Zaynab masked her smile at Ara’s terribly concealed curiosity. Since he’d discovered this was her old neighborhood, he hadn’t stopped looking around with a gleam of intrigue in his eyes. He had barely touched his dinner, his spoon suspended over his red lentil soup, his food taking a back seat to his interest in her.
A familiar skitter of thrill electrified her as his dark eyes bore into her.
Once she would have loved to have this attentive version of him all to herself, and though she appreciated that he was trying now, a part of her remained vigilant and suspicious. It wouldn’t be the first time someone in her life had lulled her into believing that they had turned over a new leaf for the better. It had happened with Sharmarke—and it could be happening with Ara right now. Still, even as she considered that possibility, she couldn’t help but hope that she was wrong.
That Ara wasn’t tricking her like her father had done, and that he actually cared for her more than he was letting on.
Pushing aside her muddled thoughts, she munched on a fermented cauliflower, the comfort from the sour and salty burst of flavor settling her nerves.
And she was glad for it when Ara tipped his head slightly to the side and asked, “Will you tell me about your upbringing?”
Zaynab nodded, wariness creeping over her, the amusement she’d felt earlier at his curiosity now gone.
“What would you like to know?”
“Whatever you’re comfortable sharing with me,” he said and set down the spoon he had drifting over his still untouched soup.
Surprisingly that calmed her far greater than she would’ve thought, mostly because one glimpse into those dark pools of his eyes and she knew that he hadn’t said it merely as comfort. He was allowing her to take full control of the narrative. Besides her father, she couldn’t name another man who was as self-possessed as Ara, and so utterly in charge of not only every aspect of his life but that of the people around him.
After all, he’d talked her into living with him again. But he also hadn’t given her a reason to regret that decision so far.
Zaynab smiled at that.
Ara’s kissable full lips lifted in response, the corners of his mouth curling up ever so subtly, the warmth of the gesture touching the lightless depths of his eyes. As great as it was to have his attention exclusively to herself, even more than that Zaynab decided she liked his smile.
“Okay,” she said slowly, “but, fair warning, I might end up rambling on.”
With the way Ara continued to look at her, riveted on her every word, she surmised that he hadn’t changed his mind about hearing her tell of her childhood.
She started from the beginning, when she and her mother had first moved from their big, manor-like home in Hargeisa to London, the culture shock alone had almost been too much.
“I hadn’t wanted to leave my friends, my home...” I didn’t even want to leave Sharmarke. Because there had been a time when she’d loved her father so very dearly and couldn’t understand how she could live apart from him. “I was ten, so it just felt like my whole world fell apart overnight, and I was powerless to do anything about fixing it.”
She paused to savor another pickled vegetable, a carrot this time.
“For the first few months, all I remember was begging my mum to take us home, and when that didn’t work, I asked her to send me back alone. Back to Sharmarke because I was sure that he was missing us too. That he was missing me.
“But when those months had passed, and I heard nothing from my father, I started to accept that my mother might have been protecting me from the harsh truth: that Sharmarke wasn’t missing us at all, and that he had wanted us out of his life.”
She hurtled into the painful memories of her mother scrimping and saving her pay from a number of low-wage jobs to make ends meet, the disrepair of their low-cost housing, and the awkward readjustment to a new life that was especially hard on her when she’d been so young.
“I felt so out of touch with my classmates who were so far ahead in their English studies, and everything around me was so alien,” Zaynab recalled.
“Sharmarke sent us money, but it was never enough. Not for the rent, for the groceries, my schoolbooks and supplies and the English tutoring I needed on the side.”
Across the table, Ara’s brow grooved with deeply disapproving lines, his scowl darkening as her story unfolded. He interlaced his fingers together and, with his elbows on the table, he steepled his hands under his bearded chin. His look urged her to continue.
She didn’t think she had it in her, not around the bile curdling in her throat at the mention of how her so-called father had treated her and her mother, but she pushed on.
“The only thing that made it better was our next-door neighbors. My best friend, Salma, her parents and her five siblings.”
If it hadn’t been for Salma and her family, Zaynab didn’t know how her life might have ended up.
“Besides helping us settle in and navigate our new life in the UK, Salma’s parents would help my mum translate documents from Somali to English for the immigration offices. They would look after me while my mum would go off to work one of her night shifts, and they’d never treat me any differently than one of their own children. And Salma helped me a lot through school.”
She couldn’t ever repay them for their kindness to her and her mother. More than that, while Zaynab had lost her father, she had ended up gaining a whole bunch of new family members in Salma’s family. She wished that it was completely enough for her; that Sharmarke’s abandonment wasn’t a sore subject for her, that she felt nothing but indifference.
But she’d never fully understand why her own father hadn’t wanted her.
Not that that was Ara’s problem. Figuring she’d probably spoiled his mood for dinner, Zaynab looked up and startled at the menacing scowl on his face.
She gulped and stammered, “W-well, I didn’t expect for that to get so serious. I’m sorry if I ruined our dinner.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for.” His fingers flexed and tightened under his chin. “If I possessed the power to punish your father for those specific crimes against you, I would.”
And in that moment, in the face of the pure anger storming over his handsome features, Zaynab truly believed he would have. She even suspected that he was playing out exactly how he’d inflict the punishment on Sharmarke. Her stomach turned over and, shaking her head clear of unpleasant images of torture, she smiled weakly.
“As much as I appreciate that offer, I think he’s already been punished enough.” Multiple life sentences in prison in return for all the damage his political greed caused his victims seemed a fair enough sanction. And she hoped that her father was taking his criminal charges seriously and reflecting on his moral failings.
She bit her lip thoughtfully, not sure if she should ask the question in her head, but then gave in to the drilling need to know. “Was Sharmarke like that with you? I know that he was a friend of your parents.”
“No, he never showed that cruel side of himself to us.”
The fact that Ara had answered quickly and with no hesitation only proved what she’d always suspected: that her father cared more about her husband than he ever had her. Zaynab knew that Sharmarke was proud of Ara and his many professional achievements. From the moment he’d first mentioned arranging a marriage for her, Sharmarke had spoken highly of Ara.
And though his almost father-like pride for Ara was obvious, so was Sharmarke’s fear of him. It became particularly apparent when they had flown to Mogadishu in a hurry when news of Ara’s accident there had reached them in Berbera. While she’d been worried that Ara would never recover from his traumatic brain injury or wake from his medically induced coma, Sharmarke had wrung his hands outside Ara’s hospital room and had fretted about what secrets Ara had uncovered about him.
“I don’t know who got into his ear, but now he believes I’m capable of evil. He wants to ruin me—shame me!” Sharmarke had griped to her, the memory of him pacing back and forth across Ara’s private hospital room, sweat glistening on his brown brow and his white teeth bared at the very real threat Ara posed him still very sharp in her mind.
It wasn’t the first time she was hearing of Ara spying on him.
“I need to know what he knows, and I need you to tell me,” her father had instructed her after pulling her away from some of her mother’s relatives at her and Ara’s nikah. Using the pretense of taking special father-daughter photos, he’d found a secluded spot to grasp her shoulders tightly and make the request of her. No, not a request, she corrected. He had basically demanded for her to spy on her new husband. “You’re my daughter. My flesh and blood despite what poison your hooyo might have leaked into your ears. I’m the reason you’ve even married, so you owe me this.”
Zaynab hadn’t known what to think, or who to believe was the wrong party—Ara or Sharmarke. She could’ve asked Ara about it now, but she didn’t know what Pandora’s box that line of questioning would open, especially when they’d been doing so well living together.
She wouldn’t allow Sharmarke to wreck that for her. He’d caused her enough emotional harm to last her a lifetime and more.
Sadness clanged in her at that truth, and on impulse, she reached for her plate of pickled vegetables to soothe the ache in her soul, at least until her fingers scraped over the empty plate.
Before she could sulk too much, Ara placed his side of pickled vegetables by her.
“I’ll likely not touch them,” he said when she tried refusing.
“Oh, okay. Thanks.” Popping fermented cabbage into her mouth, Zaynab squeezed her eyes shut and moaned in sheer culinary delight. When her eyes landed back on Ara, she blushed, realizing she’d allowed her pleasure to run away with her. “Sorry, I’ve been craving pickles more than usual. I think it’s the pregnancy cravings because I could probably just eat heaps of the fermented vegetables alone and call it a night.”
After that, their dinner resumed more quietly but peacefully. Other than a few comments about their delicious Middle Eastern dishes, Zaynab didn’t mind that Ara was mostly silent.
In fact the next time he spoke was when their bill was delivered and Ara refused for her to pay.
“I ate way more than you did,” she argued.
“And that’s because you’re carrying my baby,” he said.
He made a good point, but she still conceded with a little huff.
Adding an extremely generous tip, and with a half-crooked smirk smacking of his victory, Ara stood and walked away to deliver their fully paid bill in person.
Unable to help herself, Zaynab followed him with her eyes. The tailored cut of his blazer molded to those broad shoulders of his, and his trousers hugged his backside perfectly and had her grateful that she was seated when her legs weakened on her.
Needing a distraction before she melted into a goopy puddle, she whipped out her phone and scrolled her apps aimlessly until a text from Salma popped up.
“Ready to leave?”
At the sound of his voice, Zaynab snapped her head up to Ara and then fixed her sights on the large jar of pickled vegetables in his hands. Not giving her a chance to ask, he explained, “I figured it would save some time rather than calling in and ordering when you had a craving.”
She couldn’t deny that the sight of the jar already had her drooling.
Ara then looked pointedly at her phone. “Did you want to finish writing your message?”
“Yes, if you don’t mind. Salma just texted to ask if I’d still want to have our first iftar together. It’s sort of a tradition for us.” It started after she and Salma both moved together to enroll at the University of Edinburgh. Between Salma’s nursing courses and her work placements in the Health in Social Science program, going home for all of Ramadan hadn’t been a viable option for either of them. Like her, Zaynab knew that Salma looked forward to iftar together every year.
But she was stuck on a response. With Ramadan less than a week away, and Ara being with her this year, it naturally made sense for her to spend that time with him.
He seemed to understand her dilemma. “Why not invite her over?” he proposed.
Concealing her surprise, Zaynab hedged, “You wouldn’t mind?”
Ara frowned down at her, looking adorably baffled. “Why would I mind? She’s a close friend of yours, and it’s Ramadan. Spending quality time with family, friends and community is a hallmark of the holiday.”
Huh. She didn’t take him for someone who really cared. When she’d first lived with him, she hadn’t met any of Ara’s friends. As for his family, though Sharmarke had already told her of the sad fate of Ara’s parents, Zaynab had heard he had a sister and expected to meet her. But at their nikah, he had informed her his little sister, Anisa, lived abroad in Canada and was too indisposed to attend their nuptials.
“And anyway, your friend will be around our baby. I should meet her.”
Zaynab grinned. That was more like the excessively cautious man she married.
Now she just had to wonder whether Ara would carry that suspicion with him when Salma came over for dinner, and if he even understood what he’d gotten himself into by giving Zaynab permission to officially introduce him to her outspoken best friend.
CHAPTER SEVEN
WHEN ARA AGREED to meeting Zaynab’s friend Salma, he had seen the opportunity for what it was: a chance to get to know his wife and the mother of his child better. Living with Zaynab this past month had been enlightening, but that short time couldn’t give him the same insight that her best friend of over twenty years could, and so he was looking forward to their iftar meal with Salma tonight.
And this was despite Zaynab teasing, “Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
“Only if you are,” he said with confidence. How hard could sitting through a few questions from her friend be?
“Famous last words,” she whispered, snickering. Her snicker cut short when he came up behind her while she set up their tableware for the evening. With his chest nearly touching her back, he held out the soup spoons she’d forgotten, and watched her transform into the portrait of shyness as she accepted the spoons from him and avoided his eyes.
Amused by this swift change in her, Ara cleared his throat and once she braved looking at him, he said, “We’re going to have a good dinner.”
“I’m sure you’ll win her over with your food. I still can’t believe you didn’t tell me you could cook.”
His chuckle only gained him a swat on the arm from her.
“Seriously, where did you learn how to make all this?” Zaynab swept her hand toward the kitchen where varied dishes rested on plate warmers for their first iftar meal.
It wasn’t that Ara kept that part of him secret, but before this night there was little time in his scheduling to cook as much as he’d like. Since moving in with Zaynab, he’d adopted more of a work-life balance, and that freed him up to not only spend time with her, but to help prepare dinner for her good friend.
And he should thank her. He’d forgotten how rewarding it could be to cook for someone else and watch as they delighted in his culinary talents. There weren’t a lot of people in his life now that cared about that part of him. His parents certainly hadn’t, not when he’d told them that he was considering taking a year off from his business program to apprentice with a well-renowned Somali chef who he’d admired. They’d nurtured his abilities in the kitchen up until that point. Then suddenly, almost overnight, his mother and father threatened to retract their financial support.
“Someone has to run our business someday,” his mother had urged.
“You’re our son. Naturally, it has to be you,” insisted his father.
Ara stiffened his limbs as their voices echoed down the chambers of his long memory. He didn’t like to think of them in that light. Didn’t like the way that version of his parents made him forget how much he missed them.
Unlike his mother and father, Zaynab clearly was interested, given the way she’d happily volunteered to taste test all of his dishes. Now she was looking at him and waiting patiently for his explanation.
Just as he opened his mouth to answer her, the doorbell rang.
“Well, that’s her,” Zaynab announced with a sigh and a smile. “Too late to back out now.”
He had the sense that she wasn’t just taunting him anymore. This dinner had to be far more important than she’d let on.
