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Mikael pulled the phone from his ear. Zahid had hung up on him.
‘How did he sound?’
‘Relieved—which will soon turn to angry,’ Mikael warned. ‘But that’s normal, and it will be the same for your father. It was the same for me when you didn’t come back to the hotel that night.’ He took her in his arms. ‘Then, when they’ve calmed down, they’ll remember how relieved they are because they love you. As do—’
‘No.’ She stopped him before he could say it. ‘Those words belong between a husband and wife.’
He poured two glasses of sparkling water, added lime and ice and placed one either side of the desk as they took their seats.
‘Have you any mints?’ she asked, and he took a packet from his pocket and rolled them across the desk.
She didn’t take one; instead she put them in her tunic—she would keep them for ever.
She wrote him a note and folded it. ‘Read it when I am gone.’
‘Is it in English?’
‘No,’ Layla said as he pocketed it, and tried with all she had to make their parting easy on him. ‘It will be good to get back to my students.’ She gave him a smile, for it was surely kinder to do that than to cry. ‘And you can get back to your cases and your blonde girlfriends…..’
He said nothing—just looked at her for the very last time.
Sooner than they could ever be ready the intercom buzzed.
‘They’re here,’ Wendy said.
Mikael knew he was tough, but he wasn’t a patch on Layla. She put on her brightest smile and sat, her eyes rolling, as a furious Zahid marched in.
Then she stood and screamed at him in Arabic.
‘English, please!’ shouted a blonde woman—presumably Trinity. ‘I want to know what the hell has been going on too!’
‘I want to know why you called Father!’ Layla shouted. ‘All this could have been kept between us…’
‘We didn’t call your father,’ Trinity said. ‘Zahid said to leave it, to keep it between us. It was Jamila who couldn’t…’
‘How dare she step in?’ Layla flared. ‘How dare a lowly servant—?’
‘That so-called lowly servant held you the day you were born.’ Zahid was livid. ‘That lowly servant loved you when your parents…’ He halted.
Mikael noted it.
‘Go and take your fury to Jamila, Layla. Go and shout at an old woman who has been weeping for days over you,’ Zahid said. ‘You are a spoiled brat and you always have been. Well, you got your way again—no matter the cost to everyone else. So, what have you been doing?’
‘Having fun!’ Layla shrugged. ‘The same sort of fun you and Trinity have always had.’
‘What sort of fun?’ Zahid demanded.
‘Expensive fun,’ Mikael said.
‘And you’ve paid for it for she had no money with her?’ Zahid’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Mikael. ‘Why would you do that?’
‘I had a retainer.’ Mikael opened the safe and displayed the ruby. ‘I’d prefer a wire transfer.’
The room was starting to calm down.
‘Can I see your expenses?’
Mikael buzzed Wendy and asked her to bring in the current bill for Layla.
‘Today hasn’t been added yet,’ Mikael said, and handed the paper to Zahid, who scrutinised it for a few moments. So too did Trinity, who frowned.
‘How can you spend more than five hundred dollars on apples?’ Trinity asked, but that was the least of Zahid’s concerns.
‘These friends of yours…?’ He turned to Mikael. ‘I wish to speak with them.’
‘I doubt that they wish to speak with you,’ Mikael responded coolly. ‘Layla says that you two are expecting a baby of your own. Remind me to dump a problem like Layla in your lap a couple of days after your baby is born.’
‘Zahid…’ Trinity was the voice of reason. ‘She’s safe—that’s all you need to know.’
Mikael watched as Zahid’s jaw gritted and knew that Layla’s brother was struggling to hold back tears of relief.
Layla was right: they loved her.
‘We will go,’ Zahid said, and glanced briefly over to Mikael. ‘Your account will be settled as soon as I return to Ishla. Or now, if you—’
‘When you return to Ishla is fine.’
‘Come,’ Zahid said to Layla. ‘We do not discuss our business in front of strangers.’
Mikael handed over the ruby and glanced at Layla, who looked defiant, angry, happy—a strange combination only she could manage.
She shot him a brief smile.
‘Thank you for your assistance, Mikael.’
‘You’re welcome.’
That was it.
The coolest goodbye ever.
She turned and simply dismissed him, and Mikael stood there as they all walked out and did not flinch. He kept his face impassive.
For her sake.
Only when she was gone did he pull out her note and stare at the pretty curves and dots. He had no idea what she’d written.
Whatever it meant, Mikael felt it too.
For the first time in his life he did not have a solution.
For the first time in his life Mikael cried.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#udf5bcffa-daff-5220-88df-914fbf2b1eb6)
LAYLA RETURNED INTACT.
A little swollen, the doctor commented as she examined her.
‘I know!’ Layla said. ‘There was no one there to bathe me! The hotel refused to send someone, and the baths are high there and not sunken. I slipped getting out. I am still very sore.’
She spoke with the same authority she always did and looked the doctor in the eye as she lied.
‘Does my father have to know about that?’
The doctor hesitated, for perhaps King Fahid should know. Yet she was a kind woman, and she had been the one who had delivered Layla the awful day that her mother had died, and she had also fabricated the story about a seizure just to help Layla.
‘Of course not.’
The King breathed out a long sigh of relief when it was reported that there was not a bruise nor a cut on his daughter’s skin and that it appeared no harm had come to her. He sent for her and Layla stood, resigned, staring above and over his shoulder as her father delivered a very stern lecture and demanded more details as to what had happened in her time in Australia.
‘You lied to me,’ Fahid said. ‘Even now you lie. What was the whole point of running away if all you were going to do was sit with people who have just had a baby? You don’t even like babies.’
Layla breathed out through her nostrils.
‘I want the truth, Layla,’ her father demanded. ‘Did you dance?’
‘Yes, I danced,’ she said.
‘And drink alcohol?’
‘Once.’ She’d admit to once. ‘I had an Irish coffee. I have wanted to try one since Zahid told me you could have whisky in coffee and the cream stays at the top.’
‘What else?’
Layla said nothing.
‘What else?’ the King demanded. ‘What else did you get up to?’
‘I tried to get a joint.’
‘A joint?’
‘Weed,’ Layla said. ‘The same stuff that was found in Zahid’s locker at school! I had always wanted to try it.’
‘And did you?’
‘No one would let me.’
‘What about men?’ the King demanded—for, like her mother, Layla had always dreamed of romance. ‘Did you do anything of which you are ashamed?’
‘No, Father.’
Her answer was the truth.
‘Layla?’
‘No, Father, I did nothing of which I am ashamed.’
‘I’m very disappointed in you, Layla.’
‘I know that you are.’
‘Are you disappointed in yourself?’
‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘I am proud of myself and glad that I did it. I’ve had my rebellion. I am sorry that it had to hurt you.’
‘You are supposed to say yes, you are disappointed in yourself.’
‘But I’m not.’
‘You won’t be teaching,’ he said, and saw her lip tremble. ‘Who knows what you might suggest…?’
‘I would never encourage poor behaviour in my students,’ she said, ‘but I am an adult—’
‘Enough!’
The King went through her punishments.
‘No more teaching…’ He saw her chin jut. ‘No phone.’
‘I never had one in the first place.’
‘No letters.’
Layla was relieved. Otherwise poor Mikael might need to get a wheelbarrow for the thousands of letters in Arabic that might be delivered to him—letters he could never understand. Her heart squeezed as she thought of the small note she had left him and wondered if he would ever work it out.
Perhaps it was better to have their contact severed so brutally.
‘No internet—ever!’ Fahid continued.
‘What about chess?’
‘You can play chess with me,’ Fahid said. ‘And next week you will select a husband.’
Layla said nothing.
‘You don’t argue?’
