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“So, no part of you feels passionate about the luxury travel industry?”
“Every time I walked into one of my own hotels I was very aware that my brother—if he was still alive—was being kept in appalling conditions. Every time I made a place for the wealthy to enjoy the heights of luxury, I was aware that my brother might be in chains. In many ways I was simply creating reminders. All around me, all the time. No. I do not feel passion for anything other than what I have done now. So now you know me. My story.” He leveled his eyes on hers. “Now you can tell me yours.”
“I love beautiful things. I always have.” She looked down. “And I suppose I am a very shallow girl. For I have always liked the way beautifully cut clothing made me feel.”
“Very nice. What a sound bite. Is that what you would say to the media?”
She looked up at him, her expression hard. “What does it matter?”
“You can continue to fight me, but the result will be the same. Will it make you feel better?”
“Perhaps nothing will make me feel better.”
“That seems a reasonable response.”
“Do you expect me to be reasonable?”
“No. I simply felt we might talk.”
“I’m not a thirteen-year-old girl, Cairo. Not anymore. You can’t bait me with an orange and a charming smile. We have gone beyond that.”
“Can we pretend? For a moment. The last time I ever wanted to know what another person thought or felt was in that garden. And it was you. So perhaps you could indulge me for a moment.”
He did not know where that moment of raw honesty had come from. He was not certain that such a thing had even existed in him before this moment.
And yet he found that it was true. Whether he could identify what it had come from or not.
She did not speak for a moment. And then she lifted her head. “Because I watched my mother have to come to terms with the fact that she married a monster. I watched her go from believing that she had a beautiful, perfect life, to being appalled by the realization of what my father had done. And she had to somehow keep her head held high. She would wake up in the morning, and she would feel... Destroyed. By what he had done to you, to me. By what he had done to us. And then she would put on the right shade of lipstick. A proper dress. A just so pair of earrings, and she would conquer the day regardless of what was going on inside of her. It was like watching a warrior suit up for battle. And I could appreciate then, the way that women wielded power when they did not have a sword. I watched my mother survive a very difficult betrayal, and whether or not you recognize that what happened hurt us too... It did. I was always interested in art and design, but the way that design could change the way my mother carried herself, the way that fashion allowed her to find some strengths, that is what propelled me in that direction. Perhaps I wanted to find some of it for myself. But at any rate I found that I was quite good at it.”
“And you feel passion for it,” he said.
“Yes,” she said. “I do. I feel immensely passionate about seeing my work, my heart, come together like this. I worked so hard. So hard to get where I am. It’s painful to leave it behind.”
“And lovers?” He had not meant to ask that question, and it bit the edge of his tongue. The idea of a man putting his hands on her body... It did something to him. Twisted something in his soul. And yet, was his task not to bring her to his brother so that his brother might have her? Of course it was.
He bit down until he tasted blood.
It did not matter what he wanted.
“Why do you insist on asking me about things that do not matter? You don’t care that I love fashion. And you don’t care why. You don’t care if I have a lover. You want only what you want. You do not care for me one bit.”
“I have not been able to afford to care for a thing beyond the liberation of my country, and my brother.”
“Well, what, then? What then—now that you have accomplished it?” she asked.
“I continue to fight.”
And he would do so from his own cage.
Everyone had a cage.
His was to keep him away from her.
CHAPTER SIX
“SHOWMETHEDESERT.”
“You hate the desert,” he said.
