A few minutes later, after ensuring she was covered to the tips of her fingernails, only her eyes showing, she approached the group of men waiting for her near the nomad’s cooking fire.
Zafir was in her periphery. She thought she felt his eyes on her, but didn’t look to check. It was probably just her constant awareness of him playing up anyway.
The tribal leader, the man who had tried to convince Zafir not to listen to her, set his palm on his chest, closed his eyes and bowed his head. Through Amineh, Fern expressed her relief that the girl would survive. The nomads spent a short hour packing and were gone before anyone was hungry for lunch.
The rest of the day was quiet, even the children not talking much. The men kicked a football with Tariq and Jumanah down the beach while Bashira settled in to show Fern the clothing she’d made for her doll with the help of one of the Bedouin women. Amineh joined them and sat down next to Fern with a huge sigh.
“Now we can relax.”
“Be honest,” Fern said as Bashira ran off in search of a dress she’d forgotten in her tent. “Did I cause a political disaster?”
“It could have gone south if you’d been wrong, but you weren’t. Zafir has to be so careful not to be seen as acting like our father and our father was so determined to not just modernize, but Westernize. He tried to settle land rights on the tribes and make them farm it. They’re already losing clansmen to cities and steady jobs. Their way of life is hard enough without government eroding it. Seeing Zafir with Ra’id, whose family always respected their rights to migrate, goes a long way. That’s why we make a point of meeting here like this. The Bedouins travel so much, and talk to so many different people, their opinion can be the difference between large-scale support or opposition for Zafir.”
“And I nearly derailed the whole thing.”
“You did the right thing. You know that. In fact, Zafir tells me you earned yourself an offer of marriage for it.” Amineh nudged her shoulder into Fern’s.
“What?” Zafir had told Amineh about them? And he wanted to—
“From the cousin of the girl you saved,” Amineh continued, her grin widening. “I guess this young man heard you were learning to weave and that the children liked you. He saw you have red hair, which intrigued him. You’ve already had your appendix out, so that will never be an issue...” She gurgled the last words with great humor.
That was not where she had thought Amineh was going. Mortified by how her hopes had soared under such a wrong assumption, especially when Zafir wasn’t even speaking to her, Fern could only look at the ground as an enormous blush flooded into her cheeks.
Amineh burst out laughing and called down the beach to the men, “I told you she’d turn red as a fire engine!”
Fern tried to act like she saw the humor in it, but she was achingly aware that she was secretly dreaming for more with Zafir when the hard fact was, Amineh had just outlined to her how completely wrong she was for him. Not worth the consequences, he’d said that first morning, and no doubt that had been reinforced for him by yesterday’s events.
Assuring herself it was for the best, that furthering their physical intimacy would only set her up for a broken heart, she maintained her distance, ate alone and was in a surprisingly sound sleep when she woke to a hand over her mouth.
CHAPTER FIVE
“IT’S ME. DON’T SCREAM.”