by Ally Blake
Amal grimaced, and Manny’s mother sucked in a sharp, warning breath.
Manny forced a smile, making a second attempt at polite conversation. He could be civil. “How have your brothers been, Amal?”
“Good.”
His smile slipped at Amal’s curt response. Curiosity thrumming through him, he wondered aloud, “That’s all?”
Amal’s sculpted brows swooped down, and her mouth was a long line of displeasure.
This questioning was bothering her. It shouldn’t. He wasn’t asking anything private. In fact, Manny had kept it light and impersonal on purpose. There was his heart to consider, and he wasn’t allowing it to guide him this time. Not again.
Not ever again, he vowed.
Still, his curiosity wouldn’t let this go. Amal was hiding something. And, judging by his mother’s pinched expression, she knew exactly what. He highly suspected that she wouldn’t tell him, though. Both women shared a rapid look, and if he’d been only lightly suspicious before, it only intensified after their furtive glances.
“Is Abdulkadir still working at the travel agency?” Manny queried, tilting his head. He stared hard at Amal, willing her to crack. “What of Bashir? Is he still out of the city at university?”
At the mention of her brothers Amal’s gaze flicked to Manny’s mother. He didn’t miss the panic softening her mouth, parting her lips and widening her eyes.
“Yes, Abdulkadir and Bashir are where you left them,” said his mother.
“I didn’t ask you, Mother.”
Manny’s jaw clenched. He paid no heed to his mother’s cool regard. Later, she could scold him all she wanted. For now, he wanted answers. And he wanted them from Amal.
When Amal didn’t speak, he turned for the door leading out to the veranda. “Follow me,” he told Amal. She visibly bristled, her frown intensifying. But Manny needed some explanation, and he had a sense that Amal would follow him if he started forward.
Knowing his mother meant to trail them, he said over his shoulder, “I’d like to speak to Amal alone.”
Something was definitely going on. He needed to find out why he had come to Somaliland again, a year after his promise to return home only on his own terms.
These weren’t his terms. They weren’t even close.
Out on the narrow veranda, Amal sidled past him, her eyes squinting and shifty with suspicion, acting as though he meant her harm.
Stifling his hurt at her reaction, he arranged his mouth into a semblance of a smile. Amal wasn’t buying it. She narrowed her eyes, hugging her arms about her middle.
“Is there something you’d like to tell me?” he asked.
“There’s nothing.” She lifted her small chin, staring at him down her pert nose as best as she could when she stood a head shorter.
Manny might have believed her response, too, if he hadn’t noted the trembling of her bottom lip. She was shaking like a leaf out here, and he guessed only some of it was due to the chill clinging to the late spring morning air.
“You’re cold,” he observed, unbuttoning his suit jacket.
He cornered her then, and saw her lips tightening as she peered up at him, all fierce defiance. The parts of Amal’s personality he recognized seemed to be mixed with bits of the new person she’d become in his absence.
Draping the jacket on her, he smoothed the charcoal-gray herringbone wool over her shoulders. The need to touch her was strong. After all, he’d denied himself for so long. How could one moment of indulgence undo the steel encasing his heart? And they had been friends once. Good friends.
But you ruined that, didn’t you?
The thought provoked a sneer from him. If only it were that easy. If only he hadn’t tried to see her as more. It wasn’t enough that he’d lost a whole lot; he had also obliterated their long-standing friendship.
His comfort now was that he wasn’t alone in wanting this. Right in that moment she mirrored the same stabbing, hot attraction unfolding in him. It knifed him in the gut. Over and over. Exacting and brutal. Leaving him breathless.
His adrenaline was at a shaky high and his head was full of cotton, so that he almost forgot why he’d risked exposing his still pathetically weak heart by invading her space.
The truth, he reminded himself. Amal was hiding something. And whatever the secret was, it had inspired his mother to say just enough to bring him home again.
He had to know what the reason for them wanting his return was if he stood any chance of regaining the fragile and temporary peace of mind he’d had before reuniting with the one woman who truly battered through his defenses.
The woman he’d once loved with the whole of his being. Amal.
Apparently she still had some hold on him. Otherwise he wouldn’t be demonstrating nearly as much patience with her.
Amal arched her back, her smooth neck bared to him where her veil’s silky material was slack. Her chest rose and fell fast, and he felt tiny puffs of warm air brushing his tense jaw, his face having pushed closer of its own accord.
His body was running the show. That couldn’t be a good thing.
But he needed his answer. And he needed it now. Before he did something he’d seriously regret.
Like kissing her.
“Amal.” He gritted her name, hating how the syllables still warmed his blood. “What’s wrong?”
Amal’s mouth parted, but no sound slipped free. Her eyes shimmered with fear.
Concerned, he cupped her chin and kept their eyes level. She was going to tell him what had frightened her—because he sensed it had nothing to do with him.
“It’s her brain.”
Manny snapped his head to the side, hissing sharply at the sound of his mother’s voice. He’d told her to stay out of it.
He made an effort to give Amal space now they weren’t alone. They were single adults locked in what might be misconstrued as a lovers’ embrace. Maybe one time he wouldn’t have cared... But now? Now, he most definitely cared.
Dropping his hand from Amal’s chin as if he were scalded, he gave her space and scrutinized his mother more fully. “What does that mean?”
“She hurt her head.” His mother continued with her explanation. “It was an accident at one of her worksites a month ago.”
“This is why you called me?” Soaking this new information in and pushing down the useless anxiety prickling over his skin and churning his gut, Manny asked the next logical question. “Is she unwell?”
“She’s healed nicely. The wound itself wasn’t life-threatening.”
Manny’s relief lasted for only a few seconds.
His mother had said a prayer aloud. It had never boded well in his childhood when she did that.
“The doctors fixed her on the outside. But it’s her inside they can’t cure.”
“What do you mean?”
Manny looked at Amal, studying her. She appeared healthy. The veil had to be hiding a scar, but his mother had just assured him the doctors had treated her. A month, he thought, feeling the anguish settling into his bones. Why hadn’t anyone called him then?
The same reason you stayed away—they didn’t want to see you.
Manny clenched his teeth at the thought, annoyed by how much it stung to hear the truth ringing so clear in his mind. It would be easier to concentrate on what his mother and Amal had to say for themselves than to dissect his hurtful self-reflection.
“She’s forgotten things.” His mother shook her head, her brow pleating in sorrow, clearly too overcome with feeling to say any more on the matter.
Amal stared at him with those wild, wide eyes, her mouth set in that grim line again.
Of all the things he’d imagined facing on his return home—of all the things he’d feared—amnesia hadn’t been one of them.
* * *
Tired of how they spoke like she wasn
’t present, and shying away from their sympathetic looks, Amal hurried for the steps down from the veranda.
She didn’t so much hear Mansur as feel his hand circle her wrist, pulling her to a stop. She whirled to confront him, bracing herself to endure more of his sympathy—or was it pity?—head-on.
Amal tugged at his hand to no avail. His grasp was forged of steel. She sensed she’d tire out before he did.
Better that you find out what he wants.
As if peeking into her thoughts, Mansur said, “We’re not done talking.”
Of course. That was what it was. He hadn’t dismissed her, so he’d assumed they were still having this pointless conversation. She couldn’t hide or pretend everything was all right now Mansur knew about her affliction. About her amnesia.
“I don’t have anything else to say. You heard your mother. I’m not well.”
“Still, I’d like to talk,” he said. “But not here.”
He glanced around, forcing Amal to note the curious maids and the perplexed driver.
They must be making quite a scene, standing so close, their chests nearly brushing. It was scandalous.
“Show me my room.”
His husky voice stroked something unexplored and forbidden inside her. Unwilling to explore it out here in the open, Amal chose to entertain his request for privacy.
“It’s this way.” She gave his hand a pointed look.
Once he’d released her, Amal turned briskly, her skirt and robe swishing as she forged her path. She wasn’t going to overthink why she was missing the warm and welcoming pressure of his palm. It should be the last thing on her mind. She needed to be concerned about her fried brain and scattered memories.
Still, she hadn’t anticipated the force of attraction she’d feel for Mansur. She had hoped for a personal connection—hoped his face would free a more recent memory than the few childhood ones that were returning to her more rapidly. But the man before her was certainly not the gawky, grinning teenager she fuzzily recalled.
Amal hadn’t gotten the chance to ask Mama Halima much about who Mansur had grown to become, and his arrival had been more or less a surprise to her. It hadn’t been until only a couple hours earlier that his mother had pulled her aside and informed her of Mansur’s journeying home to them. For her.
She now knew he had no clue that he’d traveled because of her amnesia. Mama Halima had left that part out when she’d contacted him.
If she didn’t feel obliged to guide him to the guest room that had been prepared for him this morning, Amal would have scurried off to lock herself in the spare bedroom. Maybe even insisted that she move back next door, although Mama Halima wouldn’t have been too happy about that decision. With both her brothers having moved out of their late grandmother’s home, Amal lived alone. Mansur’s mother hadn’t liked to leave her alone after the accident. She had convinced Amal into temporarily moving in with her.
The new living arrangement had worked perfectly. The two women had each other for company. But now, with Mansur home to his mother, Amal felt as though she had overstayed her welcome. Also, it must appear like she couldn’t take care of herself.
But it’s true, isn’t it? You’re helpless, weak. You need someone to save you.
No! She didn’t need rescue. She was fine.
Forcing herself to concentrate on her steps, Amal closed in on Mansur’s bedroom.
“Over here,” she said, glancing back at him.
He’d paused at the wrong door, his hand on the brass handle.
“That isn’t your room,” she said.
Disregarding her, he opened the door and pushed inside.
Amal followed close at his heels. Frustrated that he hadn’t listened, and embarrassed by the sight of her messy room, she gestured for the door, hoping he’d grasp her cue.
“I told you—this isn’t your room,” she said.
“That’s where you’re wrong.” Mansur shifted his attention, his eyes scouring her face. “It used to be my room...long, long ago.”
Amal frowned. “Well, your mother didn’t tell me,” she muttered.
“She didn’t expect I’d return anytime soon.” Walking toward the bed at the far end of the room, he looked around. “Everything almost looks the same. Except this.” He gestured at the headscarves on the bed and the books on the floor.
Amal skirted past him and collected the headscarves. She walked with them to her temporary dresser, popped them in the first drawer. Then she moved to handle the scattered books, just as Mansur lifted a notebook that the scarves had hidden on the bed.
Her journal!
Mansur smoothed his palm over the spiral notebook’s cover. “You still journal, then?”
“I try,” she replied, accepting the book when he handed it to her. He hadn’t even made an attempt to read it.
“And you’re reading, too.”
He glanced down at her books. She had been in the middle of reorganizing her reading pile. Many of the book covers were worn, hinting at how loved they were. That had to be the only upside of amnesia. Reading the books that she’d enjoyed in the past and getting the ultra-rare chance of reading them like they were new.
So far, her skewed memory retrieval had worked strangely. She recalled some things more clearly now than she had right after her accident four weeks earlier, when she’d woken up in the hospital with stitches to her right temple. But the returning memories were further in her past, which frustrated her more now that she stood before Mansur. Amal had no recent memories of him. The glimpses of the childhood of this man standing with her were hardly enough to assume his personality now. For all she knew, he could have grown to be a terrible person.
Terrible, maybe. Yet still darkly gorgeous.
She wasn’t sure how to feel about her sudden and fierce attraction to him.
“It’s strange to be back.” He drilled his gaze into the side of her head, lips turning down. “I have to admit I hadn’t planned to be here.”
What he meant was, he’d come back because of her.
Reflexively Amal lifted a hand to her temple. Her scar was tingling and a conflux of noxious emotions was blending in her. She felt her stomach swooping, but she hadn’t eaten anything to heave up.
“There’s a scar, then?” he asked.
She nodded, felt her mouth refusing to open and answer him.
“Does it hurt still?”
She shook her head.
He scowled, but it didn’t detract from his good looks.
“I’m just glad your brothers and my mother were here.” The sincerity in his tone softened his eyes and face. “You have to be more careful. I know first-hand how dire accidents on construction sites can be.”
“Have you had an accident before?” Amal stared at him, forgetting that she should not be seeing him in her private space. Suddenly she was gripped by a new worry. For him.
“Not me, personally. Employees. Contractors. Coworkers. When it’s bad, it becomes devastating pretty quickly.”
Amal should’ve left it there, but she heard herself wondering aloud, “But you’re alone in America. Who watches out for you?”
Without missing a beat, he said, “No one.”
“And you’re not lonely, Mansur?” Her heart felt pain at the thought of his having no one.
“It’s Manny. You used to call me Manny,” he replied, after what felt like the longest silence. “Now I should probably head to my room.”
He smiled then, and she was surprised to see it. Mansur didn’t seem like a man who smiled a lot.
Amal basked in that smile, with a niggling feeling reassuring her that his happiness was due to her. Aware of how crazy the thought was, she shrugged his jacket off and held it out for him to take, careful that their hands didn’t touch when he took it back.
“Lead the way,” he said, trailing h
er out of her room.
Luckily, she didn’t have to spend any more time with him. She saw Manny to the guest room and left him to freshen up and change. Meanwhile, it was Amal’s turn to help the kitchen maid. Since temporarily moving in, she had become used to relieving Mama Halima of that duty. And today, especially, she anticipated mother and son wanting time alone.
“What’s he like?” the kitchen maid, Safia, wondered aloud. “Nima said he is a gentleman. He didn’t yell when she almost washed his shoes.”
Safia snickered then, her hand poised over the pot of simmering ground beef as she expertly poured chopped onions in. “I think she’s already in love with him. Don’t leave Nima alone with him when she’s cleaning the rooms.”
The housemaid peeked in, hearing her name. “It’s not like I’m going to be in the room while he’s there.” She gave them a scandalized look.
“Amal was alone with him.”
Safia’s arch remark suggested she’d been spying again. She was the youngest and newest member of the household staff. She still had a lot to learn. But Mama Halima had cautioned Safia about snooping before.
Amal was about to remind her when Nima breezed into the small kitchen, setting down the large metal tub of laundry she’d been planning to soap and rinse by hand.
“What were you doing with him, Amal?” Nima asked.
Safia grinned. “Flirting with him, of course.”
The girls gossiped as if Amal wasn’t there, spinning stories about what had happened between her and Manny. And Amal didn’t say anything to correct them. She ducked her head, her eyes blurring from the onions she hastily peeled and diced into a bowl.
She didn’t glance up until Nima asked, “You’ve known each other for a while, haven’t you, Amal?”
Mama Halima must have told her. Nima hadn’t been in her employ for that long.
The housemaid sighed and eyed her with such longing Amal’s chest panged for her. “That’s why I’m sure you two will be married.”
“Nima...” Amal scolded, but too lightly to convince the girls to cease their gossip.