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While he and Davis discussed the next steps, he made circles with the thumb on his right hand against his left palm, over and over, back and forth.
Repeatedly.
Endlessly.
Obsessively.
ChapterFifteen
More and more and day by day, he was starting to believe that this thing between them might not actually be able to work.
“Saraci, that doesn’t fit the theme I hoped to put in our new home. I was going for something charming and comfortable that we’ll both enjoy coming home to. Something softer.”
Lucas tightened his grip around the wire frame of the clock that had sparked this latest debate. As long as she was in this house, it didn’t matter what decor it had; it would be a house he would enjoy coming home to.
Still, he wanted this clock, and clearly, he and Raina had forgotten to discuss an essential part of moving in together.
“Charm?” he asked. “You mean like rustic? You know rustic is just a ruse to get people to buy old crap that others had sitting and oxidizing in their garages for decades, right? This is modern. We’re going with a modern, more contemporary theme like the one at my place.”
“Saraci, that isn’t a clock. It’s two pieces of wire inside another circular piece of wire. Who can even tell time on that?”
“Sane people.”
“So, only three of the four people in this room.” She motioned to herself, Delilah, and Miguel. The other couple watched on, Miguel holding a box labeledFragilewhile Delilah stood next to him, a stack of books cradled to her chest, her brown skin paler than usual.
“And when did we agree on a theme?” Raina asked. “What you have at the condo works for condos, but it won’t work for a house like this. We didn’t move here to replicate your place. The point was to do this on neutral ground.”
“This clock is a combination of art and function.” He softened his tone. “I like this clock, Raina. My mother gave me this clock.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Really. Your mother.”
“Yes. After her Hajj, her pilgrimage to Mecca, she picked it up on her way back to Maryland after stopping in her hometown of Bursa. My mother and I didn’t see eye to eye for most of my adult life. It’s one of the only good memories I have of us.”
It was the only true statement in anything he’d said. His mother had accused medicine of making him anti-religious, called him amurtaddfor “turning his back on Islam,” and took a vow of silence against him until terminal illness made her break it.
The last time they spoke, she told him that she regretted picking tradition over her love for him. That, despite all the years they went without speaking to one another, she never loved him any less than the first time she held him in her arms.
In an instant, he went from family blight to treasured son. Not long after that, he ended his relationship with Emmaline, and slowly, his ‘two roads diverged in a yellow wood’ merged into one path.
Raina was neither the impetus nor the catalyst for him returning to the doctor he’d always hoped to be, but she was there, on that path, at first a blur, until she lit the spark that ignited the rest of the way.
“I don’t believe you,” she said.
He shrugged. “You’re entitled to your disbelief.”
“If you get to keep the clock, I get to pick the living room furniture.”
“I don’t agree to that.”
“Then the clock is torched.”
“Try it.”
“I’ll throw that thing in the fireplace to prove a point.”
“Even after what I just told you?” he asked.
“Living room furniture, Lucas.”
