by Jane Toombs
Talal tried to put his arm around her but she resisted, saying, “There’s more to the story.”
He nodded. “Three years later, when the king demanded Malik’s daughter be brought to him, Basheem panicked. With Malik and the other cousin both dead, he feared the king’s wrath would fall on him if Malik’s daughter couldn’t be produced. King Hakeem wouldn’t take kindly to the truth, and there was no one left to punish except Basheem. So he searched orphanages until he found a child of the right age whose eyes matched Malik’s description of his daughter’s eye color. With the real birth certificate and the baby ring that had been among Malik’s belongings inherited by him when Malik was killed, he arranged to have the child sent to the king. You know the rest.”
“Widad’s daughter,” she said brokenly. “He hunted Widad down and forced her to do his bidding. How could he be so cruel?”
“When you arrived in Kholi and Basheem heard the rumor that the king had sent me to find the man who was guilty of the hoax, he lost his head completely. That’s why he tried to get rid of you.”
“Involving Widad in his schemes. I feel so sorry for her.” She laid a hand on his arm. “Please intercede—”
“I can’t. Widad is dead.”
Linnea gaped at him. “The king?” she cried in dismay. “Did he have her killed?”
“Widad escaped from the palace and found her way to the hospital, bursting into Basheem’s room and stabbed him even as he lay dying. She was killed by the men guarding him.”
Remembering Widad’s sinister smile, Linnea said sadly, “How she hated him, that poor abused woman. Oh, Talal...” She flung herself into his arms, sobbing.
In bed that night Talal held his wife close, experiencing her sorrow as his own. Linnea was inconsolable, feeling bad about Widad’s death as well as trying to cope with the grief of knowing she’d never hold her daughter in her arms again.
He understood. Hadn’t he lost his own newborn son? But he realized there was nothing he could say now that would ease her suffering, so he tried to show how he felt by holding her in his arms, offering her the dubious comfort of his presence. Or maybe not so dubious. By the way she nestled against him, he knew she needed him there and that meant more to him than anything else in the world.
Love was more than the fondness he’d felt for his first wife, more than the lust a pretty woman evoked. Lust could be a part of love, but love, he was learning, involved so much more. Among other things, love meant the beloved was so important to you that you put her before yourself.
He loved Linnea. And he meant to keep her with him no matter how many problems remained to be solved.
Chapter Sixteen
The room was still dark when Linnea awoke. For a moment or two she relished Talal’s warmth next to her, then she remembered. Her daughter, her baby Yasmin was dead. Though grief rose to clog her throat, she’d gone beyond tears.
She tried to ease away from Talal without waking him but failed as his arms tightened around her. “Linnea,” he murmured.
Comfort lay in his embrace but she didn’t want to be comforted. The ache in her throat eased as she remembered her chosen daughter waiting for her in Nevada. She pictured her changeling’s smiling face, her sweet voice saying “Mama.” She was Yasmin’s mother, the only mother the girl had really ever had. And Talal—Linnea blinked at the realization their marriage made Talal Yasmin’s father. They’d care for her together.
“Dawn comes swiftly in the desert,” he said. “We will dress and meet the sunrise.” He kissed her forehead, released her and slid from the bed.
Linnea rose, belatedly remembering they’d be leaving Kholi today. She was going home to America. With Talal. But the elation she’d expected to feel at leaving this country that had brought her such grief was muted. Though she looked forward to being in her own country again, how did Talal feel about being exiled from his? She knew he loved Kholi.
In the relative cool before the sun rose, they walked hand in hand away from the oasis of the house into the barren sands on the other side of the walls. The sky had lightened enough so Linnea could see the vastness stretching before her, seemingly endless, majestic in its own way but frightening, too.
When the first streak of rose tinted the eastern sky, Talal stopped and put his arm around her shoulders while they both stared up at the first sign of the coming day.
“Because of the stars, my favorite time is night,” he said. “Dawn is a close second.”
The pink intensified, joined by reds and oranges, colors across the entire red spectrum. The sand beneath their feet no longer seemed inert, lifeless, as the increasing light picked out different shades of warm browns and tans.
When the red edge of the sun moved above the horizon, scattering light over this desert world, Linnea drew in her breath, awed, understanding at this moment why primitive people had greeted each sunrise with incantations. In modern times it was easy to forget that the sun brought life to every living creature on earth.
Talal drew her closer, gesturing toward the vast desert with his free hand. “My son was born and died out there in the midst of the sandstorm that killed his mother as she tried to flee to her people because she misconstrued my actions. I was never unfaithful to her but she couldn’t believe that.
“I’ve been a long time in forgiving her, but now, I see, she did what she had to do, misguided though it might have been.”
He turned to look at her, his dark eyes luminous with love. “Omar’s lines remind us we’re not the first to suffer loss. ‘For some we loved, the loveliest and the best...one by one crept silently to rest.’
“My son, like your baby daughter, lies underneath these sands, at peace, a part of the earth as we all are.”
She heard his love for her in his voice as well as seeing it in his eyes. She felt his love in the tender way he held her. The ache in her throat vanished as did her resentment of his country. Kholi had taken her baby but had also given her Talal to love, as well as one of its own children, little Yasmin, to nurture and cherish. Talal, she’d come to realize, needed her love as much as Yasmin.
She’d never forget her baby daughter, but the past was beyond change. Ahead lay a future full of love and happiness. Without pausing to realize what she meant to do, Linnea freed herself from Talal and raised her arms to the sun, embracing life.
And then she turned and flung her arms around the man she’d married, the man she’d love forever. “Did I ever tell you how much I love you?” she whispered.
He bent his head to kiss her, and as their lips met, the sun rose completely above the horizon, flooding the desert, flooding them with light.
Epilogue
“And so the brave mother faced the Ghoul.” Bemusedly, Linnea listened to Talal’s deep voice telling Yasmin the rest of the story he’d begun before they left her in Nevada. How happy she was to be back here again!
“‘You can’t have my daughter,’ the mother said,” Talal continued. “‘I love her and will never give her up. Begone! Go back to your evil dwelling and don’t bother us again.’ The Ghoul howled in rage, but he was no match for her bravery and her love. So he disappeared in a puff of smoke, and the mother and the daughter lived happily ever after.”
“With a father,” Linnea added. “With the daddy.”
Yasmin, sitting between them on the couch in Zed’s living room, looked at Linnea, then at Talal for confirmation. “Daddy?” she said tentatively.
He picked her up and hugged her. “Daddy,” he repeated.
“My daddy?”
“Yours. Otherwise how can we three live happily ever after?” He gazed over Yasmin’s head at Linnea, his eyes promising her all the happiness he could give.
Danny squirmed down from Zed’s knee and walked to the couch. “My Daddy T,” he exclaimed, laying a possessive hand on Talal’s knee.
Karen sighed but Zed chuckled. “Let’s see you get out of this one,” he said to his twin.
“I’m Yasmin’s daddy, too,” Talal sa
id, tousling Danny’s hair. “Just like Zed is your Daddy Z and Erin’s daddy at the same time.”
Linnea smiled, admiring Talal’s explanation. Eventually Danny would be old enough to understand the complicated relationships but, for now, this was a happy solution.
Danny’s scowl lightened. He reached up and tugged at Yasmin’s shirt. “My Yasmin,” he said, looking around as if daring anyone to oppose him.
“Aiwa,” Yasmin said, wriggling down from Talal’s lap until she stood on the floor beside the boy. “My Danny,” she said, taking his hand.
Listening to the grown-up’s laughter, both children smiled and Linnea’s heart overflowed with her sense of belonging. Like the mother in Talal’s story, she’d banished the Ghoul. The bad times were behind her, now she was part of this wonderful family, she had her beloved chosen daughter and. she was loved by the only man she could ever want. Maybe living happily ever after wasn’t a fairy tale, after all.
ISBN : 978-1-4592-6684-1
BABY OF MINE
Copyright © 1998 by Jane Toombs
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 300 East 42nd Street, New York, NY 10017 U.S.A.
All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Table of Contents
Table of Contents
“I’ve brought your daughter,.”
Letter to Reader
Books by Jane Toombs
About the Author
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Epilogue
Copyright