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The luggage she had packed the night of her kidnapping sat in the small living area after being found abandoned at the airport. What her kidnappers hadn’t foreseen was the identification tags inside each bag.
She would have to deal with unpacking it all now, as well as trying to get her job back and her life in order. And at the moment it all seemed an insurmountable task.
“I do not like this,” her father complained, his Greek accent still present even after so many years of living in the U.S.
“Shush,” her mother cautioned him.
“I will not shush,” her father informed her with a husband’s self-righteous anger.
Paige wanted to smile and declare her father paranoid, but she was too frightened that he could be right.
“Pavlos, don’t fuss at her now,” Marilyn Galbraithe chided him. She shot him a tight expression filled with anger and a need for vengeance.
“When should I fuss at her then, my dear?” he asked. “Perhaps after she is kidnapped again? Or should I wait until I am burying my children and wishing I had done more to protect them?”
He’d given Khalid the same lecture earlier. To give him credit, he had always claimed Khalid as his own despite the agreement that Khalid would be named by his natural father. The agreement also stated that Khalid would receive periodic visits by a member of the Mustafa family who would help him to learn about his father until he turned eighteen. At that time, Khalid had been required to return to the land his father had stained with so much blood.
Not that the “family” member arrived often. Pavlos Galbraithe had always been very generous in his duties as a host and provided a car, a driver, and credit at most restaurants, clubs, and casinos.
For nearly fifteen years it had worked.
“Our daughter and our son will be protected as well as we can provide,” Marilyn restated. She had made the same claim earlier. “Until then we can only pray for Azir’s early demise.”
Both husband and daughter stared at her in shock.
“What, can I not wish the bastard dead and buried?” she questioned harshly, her tone exposing the fear she had been living with for so many years.
“It’s just rare for you to voice it, Mother.” Paige spoke before her more blunt father could do so.
“Your father is well used to hearing me wish that bastard dead,” her mother stated as her face tightened with hatred. “If I could kill him myself then I would do so.”
After meeting him, Paige couldn’t say she blamed her mother in the least. Still, she wished the opportunity had presented itself while she had been in Saudi Arabia. For Abram, for Khalid, and for her mother, Paige believed she would have killed him just as easily.
“Marilyn, call and make certain Khalid, Marty, Abram, and Tariq made it to Khalid’s home for the night. You will not rest until you do so.”
Her father shoved his hands into his trouser pockets as her mother nodded quickly and extracted her cell phone from her purse.
Her father continued to watch Paige intently. That look had made her nervous for as long as she could remember. It was a look that assured her that her father was aware of something she may not want him to know about.
Nearing sixty, his gaze still eagle fierce, his body still powerful, and his mind still sharp, he was an imposing businessman, a man none wanted to make an enemy of.
“You’ve allowed Azir to live all these years201D; Paige said softly as she met his gaze directly. “Why?”
His head tilted to the side thoughtfully for long moments before he answered. “Because your mother has known enough pain. If she believed for a moment that I had killed him, then she would be certain my soul was damned and we would not meet in Heaven as she has always claimed. Besides, were he to die, I would be the first suspected of it.”
Paige glanced across the room as her mother stepped into the bedroom.
“She will take this opportunity to check your drawers, your closets, and so forth to see how you are conducting any intimate life or a lack thereof,” he commented.
“Tattling on Mother again, Papa?” she asked with a smile as his weathered face eased into a grin.
“She will say nothing to you, but to me she will complain of grandchildren she does not have and a son-in-law you owe her. Then once again she will make her lists of her friends’ sons to introduce you to. And she will stare into the night when she believes I sleep. And she will fear you have lied to us as she lied to her parents when she assured them that Khalid was not a child of her kidnapper’s raping of her. And soon she will cry, certain you lied to us and that Azir raped you.”
She could hear the question in his voice, the fear.
“Azir hit me,” she confided, knowing her father had a second sense when it came to her and Khalid’s lies. She wouldn’t lie to him about Azir.
“How hard did he hit you?”
She described the abuse, then paused and watched her father’s face closely as she continued. “Abram came in and stopped Azir. He had Tariq take me to his suite and I never saw Azir after that.”
Thick salt-and-pepper hair was pushed back from his dark face as gray-green eyes held a hint of suspicion.
“I swear, Papa,” she promised him. “If Abram wasn’t with me, then Tariq was. I was perfectly protected.”
Her father nodded slowly, then drew in a deep breath.
“Tariq and Abram often share their lovers as Khalid has,” he said somberly. “Did they seduce you, daughter?”
She saw the worry and the concern in his face as her own flushed in embarrassment. Sex was not a subject she discussed so freely, especially not with her papa.
“They didn’t,” she revealed softly. “But am I so wrong to wish they had?”
She saw the surprise, and also the discomfort in her father’s face as he cleared his throat.
“I see.” His voice was lowered in case her mother came into the room, she assumed.
“Do you think I’m bad, Papa?” She loved her parents. The last thing she wanted was to embarrass them or give them cause to feel shame because of her desire for Abram.
“Paige, what could make you ever imagine you are bad simply because you are a woman who deserves what her lover desires?” He gave a hard shake of his head and a hesitant smile. “Perhaps that did not come out as I intended, but I would never believe you bad because you are a woman.”
