AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Don’t be an idiot. You’ll be a mom when you’re one hundred percent certain it’s what you want.
She popped the pill and drank it down with her juice.
“What are you doing?”
Jamal’s sleep-roughened voice made her jump guiltily, her elbow hitting the foil packet of birth control pills and making them skitter across the kitchen counter and onto the floor.
She was frozen as he stalked forward and picked them up, his face at first incredulous than darkening with sick rage. “Why the hell are you taking these?”
She trembled. He was angrier at this than the millions she’d allowed her dad to withdraw from Jamal’s bank account. “I-I’m not ready to be a mother.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me that when we agreed on the marriage?” He shook his head, his face grief-stricken and hollow. “What did I ever do to you to make you lie to me?” He stepped back, his eyes hard and his mouth tight. “You know what, I don’t want to know. I don’t want to hear your excuses. I don’t even want to look at you.”
Grief hit like a sledgehammer. “You don’t mean that.”
His gaze glittered. “Oh, but I do. You’re no angel. You’re the devil in disguise. I just wished I’d seen it sooner.”
She blinked, confused by his sudden shift toward her. “It’s my body, my choice.”
“It’sourchoice!” he shouted, his face blanching of all color. “Having children was all I wanted from you.”
A punch to her stomach couldn’t have brought her any more pain. “At least now I know the truth,” she whispered.
His fists clenching at his sides, he said bitterly, “I knew you were hiding something from me. But I had no idea you’d stoopthislow. You betrayed me more than you could possibly know.”
“I’ve delayed having a family. I don’t see what the big deal—“
“Don’t.”He exhaled roughly. “I can’t hear your excuses. I can’t deal with them…withyouright now.”
She gaped as he pivoted and pulled open the front door, slamming it shut behind him as he stepped outside. But she was too shocked to go after him. Too shocked to do anything but stare blankly at the closed door.
But finally realization set in. This was it then…the end of her marriage. She had to admit it’d been ideal while it had lasted. Too bad she’d been completely wrong about her husband having feelings for her. He’d only ever been interested in her bloodline for their future children.
She sucked in a quivery breath. She’d been delusional in thinking he’d actually cared about her. He cared only about her being a mother to his progeny.
She retrieved her birth control pills. How had something so innocuous destroyed her marriage?
It’s not just about the pills. You betrayed him yet again.
She crumpled the packet in her hand before tossing them aside. There was more to his anger than that, she was certain of it. She’d exposed a nerve, uncovered an underlying emotion she’d probably never see again.
She dragged a hand over her face, suddenly suffocated by anxiety. She needed some fresh air. She stepped out onto the back sundeck where the lap pool beckoned. She ignored it and went down a dozen steps to the lower level where private jet skis were moored.
That had been today’s planned activity, and she’d been really looking forward to it.
Removing her sandals, she sat at the edge of the planks with a heavy sigh, her feet sinking into the water as she gazed sightlessly into the horizon of endless blue.
She’d thought her marriage with Jamal might actually work. That he’d been so good to her, so forgiving had planted tendrils of hope deep into her soul. Those same tendrils were already beginning to wither and die.
As a sheikha she didn’t have a lot of options. She was expected to marry someone important, have a load of children and stay in the background where she played her role as respectful wife and mother.
That she’d started to see her role with Jamal in a far nicer light was to her own detriment. She’d imagined love and romance, but all he’d ever seen in her was a womb to carry their children.
She was so lost in thought she didn’t at first hear the speedboat approaching. Only as it got closer did she look up and see it coming her way. She stood, and about to back away, she saw Yusef in the boat. She exhaled with a bitter, little laugh, then lifted a hand and waved.
She had nothing to fear with her bodyguard nearby.
Yusef nodded, but was otherwise too busy grabbing hold of the nearest wooden post to keep the boat from colliding with the lower deck. Only once the boat was secured did he jump onto the deck with Yasmine.
