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“She is at the Scimitar having tea with friends.”
Hafiz’s muscles jerked with surprise. Friends? What friends?
His gaze darted across the skyline to the luxurious hotel. The tall building was like a glass and metal spiral reaching out to the sun, reflecting the rays against the dark windows. “I don’t understand.”
“I apologize, sir. I would have accompanied her, but I was dealing with the exit visas. She had left before I got back.”
Lacey had friends? Hafiz felt his frown deepen. Lacey had a world outside of the apartment. A world that didn’t include him. He wasn’t sure why he was so surprised. Lacey had a large group of friends in St. Louis.
But she never talked about these friends. That was strange. Lacey told him everything. Or he thought she did. Why had she been hiding this information?
“Who are these friends?” Hafiz asked tersely, interrupting Glenn’s excuse. If one of them had a male name... Hafiz gritted his teeth and clenched his hand into a fist.
“No need to be concerned, sir,” Glenn replied. “These women are above reproach. They are the wives of ambassadors and government ministers.”
Hafiz went cold as he remained perfectly still. His ex-mistress was socializing with the most influential and powerful women of Rudaynah? The very mistress he broke up with so he could marry another? Hafiz slowly closed his eyes as the tension wrapped around his chest and squeezed. Glenn was incorrect. He had every reason to worry.
* * *
Lacey always thought the tearoom at the Scimitar was an unlikely mix of cultures. She stared at the plate that offered scones and slices of cinnamon date cake. A copper cezve for Turkish coffee sat next to an ornate silver teapot. A golden table runner with an intricate geometric design lay on top of the white linen tablecloth.
“You look so different in Western clothes,” Inas told Lacey as she nibbled on a fried pastry ball that was dipped in a thick syrup. “I hardly recognized you.”
“I feel different,” Lacey admitted as she self-consciously tucked her hair behind her ear. She felt undressed wearing a simple green dress with long sleeves and a high neckline. Her makeup was minimal, and her shoes had a low heel. She was covered, but it didn’t feel as if it was enough. “It’s strange not wearing a caftan.”
“Why the sudden change?” Janet, an ambassador’s wife, asked as she patted a linen napkin to her bright red lips. Tall, blond and willowy, Janet had lived in the sultanate for years but chose not to wear the native clothes, no matter how warm the weather turned. “We’re still in Rudaynah.”
“I’m trying to get used to my old clothes,” Lacey explained, but it wasn’t the whole truth. When she’d first moved here, Lacey had originally chosen to wear the scarves and caftans, believing it was the first step to enter this world. Now she realized it had been a waste of time. “Although I really didn’t fit in here.”
“Nonsense.” Inas flipped her long black braid over her shoulder. “You were one of my hardest-working students. So determined. If you had stayed here a little longer, I’m sure you would have become proficient in Arabic.”
“Thank you.” She had wanted to surprise Hafiz with her grasp of the language. One of her goals had been to watch his face soften when she declared her love in his native tongue.
“I don’t know what our charity is going to do without you,” Janet said with a sigh. “We made great strides once you joined. Are you sure you have to leave right away?”
“Yes, we need to move. It’s urgent for my...uncle to get to his next work project.” Part of her wished she could have left on the first flight out, but she was finding the idea of permanently leaving Hafiz very difficult. “We’re just waiting for the exit visas.”
“Those are just a formality,” Inas insisted. “But if you’re still going to be here this weekend, you must attend my daughter’s wedding reception. The marriage contract ceremony is for family only, but the reception is going to be here for all of our friends. Oh, and you should see the dancers we hired for the zaffa procession!”
“I would like that.” She had heard every detail about the upcoming wedding and wanted to be there to share her friend’s special moment. But her moments with Hafiz had come first, and she had reluctantly declined because it would have interfered with her time with him.
