Jen winced as Zeena launched herself at her the moment she opened the door for her and Fayza the next morning.
Fayza, her ball-of-energy nineteen-year-old sister, zipped around her and inside her apartment, excitement radiating from her eyes and spilling from her lips. “When they realized you disappeared from your own engagement party, Father and Hassan almost had strokes. Father with worry and Hassan with outrage. It was so funny.”
Though her sisters were in such good cheer, she still worried. “Is Father okay?”
“Yeah.” Fayza threw herself down on Jen’s huge floral couch in the living room. “His blood pressure is just through the roof.”
Jen groaned at what Fayza considered okay. “Ya Ullah, Fay, the way you take nothing seriously will one day give me a stroke! Please tell me you gave him his medication!”
“Yeah, yeah.” Fayza rolled her hands, in a hurry to attack the next topic. “I bet it didn’t work until we called him on the way up here to tell him you’re okay.”
But she wasn’t okay, might never be okay again.
Since she’d left Numair, she’d been unable to sleep or even sit, pacing holes in her wall-to-wall carpeting, her stomach eating itself with tension and hunger, yet unable to tolerate even a sip of water. Every inch of her buzzed with excess electricity, every nerve so taut she felt they’d snap.
“You know, sis...” Fayza stretched out, her knee-length raven hair a sharp contrast to the pastel print sofa, her gold eyes glittering with mischief, her face the very sight of admiration and smugness. “We always thought you were a wonder woman, but that stunt you pulled last night? That qualifies you for an all-time record in sticking your tongue out to our collective region, culture and history.” She guffawed, drummed her heels on the couch. “I would have given anything to see Hassan’s face the moment he realized you’d just up and left.” She jumped up onto her knees as Jen approached, draped herself over the couch’s back like an inquisitive cat. “So what did you do instead of attending that funeral? Caught a movie? Went roller-skating? Or came back here, ordered pizza, watched Will and Grace reruns and did your toenails?”
“She left with a hunk from some Arabian Nights fable.”
Zeena’s enthusiastic declaration was followed by total silence as Fayza’s irrepressible chatter came to an abrupt end. For three seconds. Then she exploded.
“What? And you didn’t tell me? Zee, I’ll kill you!”
Jen grimaced at her sister’s loudness as Zeena spluttered, “Tell you what? All I know is that this genie seemed to appear out of nowhere, materialized beside Jen and then poof, they were both gone.”
Jen had to laugh. As ridiculous as that account was, it sounded more plausible than what had actually happened.
Fayza turned excited eyes to Jen. “Spill!”
Knowing it was pointless to avoid their questions, Jen told them everything, with some key elements left out. Like Numair almost making love to her, and his pregnancy-to-marriage demand.
It was late in the day before Zeena and Fayza left, during which they did order pizza, watched Will and Grace reruns and did their nails—hands and feet.
The two girls floated away, buoyed by delight that their big sister wouldn’t barter herself for their kingdom’s peace and economic salvation, and that a knight in shining armor had charged to her rescue.
Jen closed the door behind them, slumped against it and let the smile she’d pinned on for their benefit crumble. If only they knew her knight was a black-as-sin marauder, and as unstoppable as a hurricane...
Though she still couldn’t bring herself to do as he’d demanded—tell her father everything would be taken care of—she did believe Numair when he’d said she didn’t have to say yes to his proposition in return for his help. That wasn’t why she was in such turmoil.
It was his demand itself. Becoming his lover, sleeping in his arms, sharing every intimacy sounded deliriously fantastic. Since he’d touched her, she’d been aching with need for him. She felt certain he was the man who’d show her what sex could really be like, what passion and satisfaction were.
Yet getting pregnant by him? It sounded terrifying.
But what was her alternative? She could continue to live alone, work, succeed, exercise, volunteer... Rinse and repeat. Sure, that was great, and it had been good enough—before him. But she’d had the hope that she’d one day find a man and fall in love, at least in lust. But now she knew no other man would ever compare to Numair. She’d never look at another man twice, let alone share her body with him. So if she didn’t indulge her feminine urges with Numair, she’d have to put them in deep freeze for life. That sounded as horrible as a lifelong prison sentence. Living in hope, even if it never came to pass, was one thing; knowing there was no hope was another.