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Wasn’t it?
Weren’t you supposed to look at the man you were marrying and feel giddy with excitement? Weren’t you supposed to want his kisses? Weren’t you supposed to want to be with him all the time, to talk to him and yes, argue with him, and laugh with him…and feel everything she felt for Qasim?
The room tilted. Caz tightened his hold on her.
“Kalila. Don’t be afraid. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Something was happening already, but how could she tell him that?
“Besides,” he added softly, “we have no choice.”
His eyes darkened; his gaze fell to her mouth. Later, she would wonder who made the first move, she or he. Not that it mattered. His kiss consumed her, burned away what little remained of reason and replaced it with his taste, his scent, his strength.
Shaken, she stepped back.
“No choice at all,” he said, and left her.
Time slowed to a tortoise’s pace.
Caz didn’t come back. She hadn’t expected him to. Wasn’t there some tradition about a bridegroom not seeing his bride on their wedding day?
And wasn’t that a sad attempt at humor? Megan thought, as she paced back and forth. She wasn’t a bride and Caz wasn’t her groom. They were two people trapped in a nasty game of treachery, and the sooner they got things finished here, the better.
The one person she half expected to see was Hakim, coming to demand she not go through with the wedding…but why would he do that? Hakim would know, as she did, that the next few hours would be a farce.
In midmorning, her serving women showed up with platters of food and pitchers of fruit juice. Their sullen expressions were gone. Now, they approached her with their eyes cast down.
Megan waved the food and drink away. One mouthful of anything and her stomach would revolt. Farce or not, it wasn’t every day she stood at an altar and said “I do.”
The women sat down and watched her. They giggled and whispered to each other. They shot her little looks filled with meaning, poked each other in the ribs and giggled again. She’d gone to enough bridal showers to know what was going on.
“Trust me,” she said, “it’s not like that.”
The youngest of them drew a deep breath. For courage, obviously, because a few seconds later, she spoke.
“The sheikh is very handsome.”
Megan raised her eyebrows. “You speak English?”
“The sheikh is very handsome.”
Megan hunched down in front of the girl. “Tell me, please, what will the wedding be like?”
“The sheikh is very—”
“Handsome,” Megan said glumly, and rose to her feet.
So much for speaking English. So much for finding out what lay ahead. So much for anything, except pacing and pacing, and telling herself this would all be over in a little while.
This wasn’t the way a bride was supposed to feel.
Not that she’d ever thought much about being a bride. Why would any woman want to give up her life?
That was what you had to do, even if the books said you didn’t, even if her oh-so-independent big sister had taken the plunge. Fallon might have forgotten the great lesson of their childhood. She hadn’t. She’d grown up watching their mother put aside her own needs for her husband’s pleasure. Mary would settle into a new place, start turning a usually decrepit four walls into a home, make a few friends and then Pop would come home one night, filled with enthusiasm for some new get-rich-quick scheme, and announce that it was time to move on.
What men wanted always came first. That was just the way it was. Some women were okay with it, but she wasn’t one of them.
Wasn’t it a damned good thing this marriage would only be a sham?
