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“I’m sorry,” El-Mudad quickly apologized. “Amal, let’s not fight in front of Neil and Sophie. We’re guests here.”
Neil waved everything away. “I had a daughter of my own. I remember the days of worrying about chasing men away.”
Yeah, like your son-in-law, I wanted to joke, but I couldn’t. We weren’t at the joking stage yet.
“Had?” Rashida asked curiously.
Neil nodded and kept his tone carefully neutral, probably so he wouldn’t scare her away from asking him things in the future. “She died three years ago.”
“I’m so sorry,” Amal said, and it was genuine, not some cool affectation.
“That’s why Sophie and Neil care for their granddaughter,” El-Mudad reminded them. “I’ve shown you pictures of Olivia.”
“You don’t look old enough to have a granddaughter,” Rashida said, eying me suspiciously.
“I’m thirty,” I said with a shrug. “Neil is older.”
“So, you’re thirty,” Amal began. “My father is thirty-nine. And Neil is...in his forties?”
“God bless you,” Neil said with a laugh. “I’m fifty-four.”
“How will those age gaps work between the three of you?” she asked, utterly nonplussed.
Me, however? I was plussed. I was plussed the entire fuck out. Neil was taken aback, too, his mouth opening to emit an uncharacteristic, “Uh...” sound.
Amal shrugged and accepted the glass that the staff member brought her. “We’re not sheltered. Please, don’t try to lie about the obvious.”
“No one was lying,” El-Mudad said gently. “I wanted to tell the two of you in our own time.”
Rashida slammed her palm on the table, seething. “I’m so angry at you, Baba!”
I wondered if I could make a break for the door and then later claim I’d gotten sick. The possibility of barfing was genuine, anyway. This was a disaster. It had started off okay, but it had become a horrific shipwreck out of a Greek tragedy.
“Come now. Why would you be so angry?” El-Mudad asked.
Rashida pointed at Amal, who crossed her arms smugly. “Because now I owe her ten-thousand dollars.”
If I’d been drinking anything, I would have done a spit-take. Ten-thousand dollars was the going rate for a bet between siblings?
“You placed a wager on this?” El-Mudad asked, relaxing slightly in his amusement.
“Apparently, they don’t need to be in Monaco to gamble,” Neil laughed.
“As long as you’re not upset by all of this,” El-Mudad said gently.
Rashida shook her head. “I’m mad about losing my allowance. I’m not mad that you’re in love with them.”
“We’ve been through this before.” Amal lifted her flute of champagne to her lips. “Of course, that went so well...”
“The last thing we want to do is hurt your father,” I rushed to reassure her. The cat was out of the bag, so there was no point in trying to stuff it back in. The better course of action would be to try and gain the cat’s trust.
They’re not cats. They’re girls, I reminded myself. You’re not going to be able to lure them in with treats and stuffed mice.
Neil nodded in agreement. “And this isn’t a new relationship. We’ve known each other for...oh, at least six years now.”
Despite his calm and reasonable demeanor, I knew Neil had to have been freaking out in his head. He was sexually adventurous and socially open-minded—when it came to himself. There was still a streak of posh, uptight conservatism in him when it came to dealing with his family.
“And you’re just telling us about it now?” Rashida asked her father, her brow creasing with hurt.
“I don’t have to explain my dating life to you,” he said, slightly scolding. “But it was important that you meet them now. Because I’m going to be living with them.”
“What?” Amal shrieked, echoed by Rashida’s, “You’re moving to England?”
“Not England.” El-Mudad glanced at us uncomfortably. “We can discuss this in private.”
“We can discuss it now.” In that moment of firm, mature defiance, I saw Emma. Without knowing her, without ever having met her, Amal was the very spirit of Neil’s daughter. She wouldn’t be steamrolled or brushed aside. “Where are you moving?”
“America. New York.”
“Baba, no!” Rashida protested. “It’s really dangerous there!”
Dangerous there? For a moment, I wondered if she’d misheard her father. Then I remembered what the United States looked like from the outside. To girls raised in France, the idea of school shootings and men brandishing guns in Panera Bread was undoubtedly horrific. It shouldn’t have been so thoughtlessly common place to me as it was.
“It is,” Neil agreed. “But we have security.”
“And I have my bodyguards,” El-Mudad said.
I’d never realized that. It hadn’t ever come up. To my knowledge, he’d never brought them along.
Of course, that was to my knowledge. Maybe they’d been with him all along at our house, mingled in with our regular security guys. Shamefully, I had no idea who all worked for us.
“And you never have to come to America to see your father or us,” Neil went on. “I have homes in London and Iceland. Your father has his properties. There’s no reason we couldn’t spend time with you there.”
