Three and a Half Weeks(186)
“Thank you very much, Mr. Girardi. I will certainly do so.”
“Good. My NYC studio is in Chelsea. Daniel can give you my number and we’ll discuss it further tomorrow. Is that suitable?”
“Very much so. Thank you. It’s a real pleasure to meet you, Mr. Girardi. I’ve been an admirer of your work for some time now.”
“I appreciate it. And, please, call me Derek.” He gifts us with another pretty smile and continues on his way, after blowing a kiss to his daughter.
The next day we spend doing touristy things in NYC, going to Central Park, dining at a little dive in the East Village, browsing the South Street Seaport. Monday, we visit museums, both MOMA and the Met. We were planning to hit the Natural History museum or the planetarium on Tuesday. Instead, we go to Derek’s studio where Ian attempts to purchase one of the smaller sculptures but Derek insists on gifting it to him. The Girardis are such nice people and I’m thrilled that Daniel and Olivia will be coming to Portland in June to attend our wedding. I feel as if we’ve made lifelong friends.
Chapter 51
Walking down a densely populous Broadway at midday on Thursday, Ian kicks an empty soda can in his path, watching the satisfying arc it makes as it takes flight and lands with a tinny plop in the gutter, with nary a casualty. A few feet away are two men wearing bright orange vests; they’re picking up litter from the curb, so his can-kicking has done them a small favor. Walking in New York City is akin to highway driving: there are multiple lanes of pedestrians, and some walk fast and some painfully leisurely. It’s always the tourists who do the ambling, savoring each bite of the Big Apple (and sometimes it bites back), while New Yorkers do everything just short of shoving them viciously into the gutter to get around them faster. Everything would work just fine if the slow-movers would just get out of the fast lane… just as on the highway. Individuals who clog up the fast lane with slow-moving objects, whether cars or bodies, cause traffic jams. Period. Why don’t some people understand the simplest things?
Right now what is taxing Ian’s brain is not a simple thing. Decisions as pointy as rapiers poke at his peace as his mind muddles through the past few weeks. He hasn’t yet told Ella what has become of Natasha: only to himself will he admit that he’s afraid of her reaction. Granted, the fate Natasha is suffering is better than being hunted down and killed by a professional sniper… but from a woman’s perspective, probably not all that much better. Since four is the maximum number of wives a man may take under Islamic law, Haddad couldn’t legally marry Natasha so she’s more of a concubine to him. For him. Not that Haddad is a devout Muslim, anyway, not in the least, but he puts on a façade of being pious in order to prosper in his world.
Essentially, he wants Natasha for dirty sex and that’s about all. He surely has enough children running around, considering he has four wives already. In a way, it’s the perfect payback for the conniving bitch who’s been out for his blood for God knows how long. Besides, knowing Natasha and her devious ways, Ian figures she’ll probably manage to turn the situation around to her advantage before too long.
What is gnawing at him the most is the text he received shortly after the operation went down: it originated from a Saudi telephone number. He hadn’t recognized the telephone number or caller name and when he looked up the country code prefix, he’d seen it was from Saudi Arabia and his blood streamed cold.
The person who’d sent the message had apparently been interrupted during the transmission. The entire message read, “Please h.”
Please help me? Was that it? It had to be from Natasha and it bothered the hell out of him. She sent it to him because she must have figured he was the only one who knew where she was, other than the people who took her. It made him feel horrible.
What he truly worried about was what Ella would think of him after he tells her. Will she see him in a different light? Will she think that a man who can consign a woman to such a miserable fate is one who cannot be redeemed?
Since then, he’s been trying to banish it from his mind with varying success. Daniel’s wedding helped enormously: he and Ella truly enjoyed themselves. Moreover, it was incredibly relaxing to see his friend not only at ease, but also happy. Since he and Daniel met, they’d been in one tense situation after another. Watching Daniel with his Olivia was a wonderful respite from all that darkness. He could plainly see—as could everyone with eyes—how much Daniel adored his new wife and how his devotion was fully reciprocated. That caliber of love is highly infectious, making everyone around the couple feel elated or at least more optimistic about life in general.