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“So yet again your family issues their disapproval and you pack up and leave?” She asked angrily. “I can’t believe I fell for this again.”
“No, it isn’t like that,” he denied, expelling an angry breath. “Speaking with Zahir made me comprehend just what I have done, that’s all.”
“And he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like me.”
“It’s not about him!” Syed responded emphatically. “It’s about me. The decisions I’ve made. The justifications I offered myself.” His voice was b
leak. “I told myself that the end was justified by these means. That once you were my wife, we would be fine. That you would love me again one day and I could have a second chance to make you happy.”
Sarah didn’t want to tell him that she was already far happier than she’d been in a very long time. “But it’s not? You’re not?”
“I wanted to fix everything. But I was selfish. I should have given you money. Bought you a house. Made sure you never worried about something as basic as how to get food on your table.” His eyes were grim. “That first night when you hadn’t eaten dinner, I should have offered kindness. Instead, I propositioned you.” His hands shook with the intensity of his emotions.
“I am ashamed of my choices, Sarah. I have been wrong in every way.”
“You have helped me,” she pointed out, the words thick in her throat.
“That is worthless,” he responded severely. “All my help has come with conditions. I have used your desperation to get what I wanted; your poverty as a lever.”
“And what did you want?” She baited him crossly, her eyes sparking flames with his.
“I wanted to go back in time. I wanted to be with the woman I loved, the woman who loved me. But I’ve ruined it, haven’t I?”
Her heart froze in her chest, stammering painfully. The woman he’d loved? Why had he never said as much to her? How had she not known?
He took her silence as agreement when it was little more than shock.
“I should have helped you into a position where you could make your own decisions. And then I should have romanced you. I should have helped you fall in love with me again. I have bullied you, and I cannot continue to do so.”
She sucked in a deep, husky breath, tears sparkling on her eyes. “Do you love me?” She asked, fear making the words tremble in her mouth. “You just said it, but I need you to say it again.”
His eyes met hers. “If I loved you, could I have done this?” He shook his head. “I don’t know if I’m capable of love.”
She laughed, shakily, her mind processing everything he was telling her. “You’re right,” she nodded after a moment. “You have stuffed up. If I loved you any less, I’d probably leave you.”
“Don’t.” He placed the scotch down on the bench, staring at it, and Sarah reached for it, taking a small taste for courage.
“Don’t what? Don’t be honest with you?”
“Don’t offer me your love.” He corrected. “God knows, I don’t deserve it.”
“Why are you intent on torturing yourself?” She groaned, shaking her head in disbelief. “You left me five years ago and I have been miserable ever since. Miserable. My life felt like it was grayscale. And then you came back and I’m technicolour again. I’m happy for the first time in years. I’m excited for my future. Our future.” Her voice cracked with emotion. “Do you think leaving me all over is any kind of solution?”
“You will have money,” he said thickly.
“Oh my God,” she groaned, banging her palm against the counter. “And what good is money if I don’t have you? Don’t you get it, Syed? How many times, in how many ways, do I have to show you that all I care about is you! I wanted to come here, to sleep with you that night, because I’ve missed you so much it hurts. I married you because I would take any damned crumb of affection you want to throw me and being married to you seems like the best way to ensure that happens. I don’t want your money!” She said with dark anger.
His eyes glittered as they met hers and she felt hope. His? Hers? The room rocked with it. At length, he nodded. A sharp jerk of his head in the darkness of the room.
“Fine. Then I will go back to Kalastan and in six months, we will speak. And see.”
“And see what?” She cried with disbelief.
“If you want me, even when you no longer have a financial inducement.”
“I never had a financial inducement!” She shook her head. “I had a you-inducement. What do I have to do to prove that? Love you? Sleep with you? Marry you? Invite you into my daughter’s life? I have done all those things and I would do them again tomorrow whether you were king of the world or just, simply, Syed.”
“I want to believe that.” He reached for her hand and lifted it to his lips, kissing the sensitive flesh of her inner-wrist.
