by Leslie North
“Well, I don’t think he’ll step all the way up. Not that I’d want him to. He’s a nice man, yes, but he doesn’t want a family. He doesn’t even want to be with me.” Emotion swelled and she paused, letting it subside. “I won’t tell him until someday down the road. Maybe then he’ll be ready for a family. The last thing I want to do is start a family with someone by accident, and then trap him into the obligation. I won’t do it like that. Not when he doesn’t want it in the first place.”
“Maybe he should have wrapped it up then,” Aubrey pointed out, lifting a brow.
Elena grinned, tossing a pillow at her. “Thanks for that.”
“I’m here to keep it real.”
“Well, I think I’m keeping it pretty real too. I might tell him once the baby is born. But not now. I already know what the outcome would be, and honestly, it would hurt too much.”
Aubrey frowned. “You know, you don’t have to raise this baby alone. I’m gonna be here to help you. Hell, I can be the second mom if you want!”
Elena smirked, scrolling through the action-adventure section. Still no good options. Why did it take a year and a day to find something good? “Oh, come on.”
“No, I’m serious!” Aubrey set her plate of food on her lap, leaning forward with serious eyes. “Look at me. I’m here for you, girl. We can even get married if you want.”
Elena snorted. “Oh yeah? You’d turn for me?”
“I mean, you’d have to be okay with me having a guy on the side. I’d be okay if you have a guy on the side. But would you be okay if Nasir was my side dude? He’d be my first pick.”
“You think you’ll ever see him again?”
“Eh, you’re probably right. Who knows where his LA house is. As long as we’re faithful to our sacred womanhood vows, that’s all I want.”
“That sounds a lot like what we already have going on,” Elena said, laughing.
“Yeah, I couldn’t go full lesbian,” Aubrey said, stabbing some chopsticks into the Chinese box. “We’ll have our own rooms. The kid will just think it’s normal. We’ll have to reveal to him when he’s eighteen that mommy and mommy have never even kissed.”
Elena laughed, the remote slipping from her hand. “What a confused child we’d have.”
They finally settled on a rom-com, one that made her laugh and cry in equal measure. Once Aubrey retired to the guest room to sleep, Elena made her way to her own bedroom, heart heavy with longing.
How can you miss him already? Each passing hour made her regret a little bit more how she’d slipped away without any word, without even saying goodbye. Even just snagging one more kiss would have been nice. Settling into bed, pulling her cold, familiar covers over her body, she curled into a ball, wishing his weight and heat were behind her.
A hand drifted to her belly, as she was sure it would many times in the coming months. Oh, little one, what will I tell you someday about your father? She could make up a story about his death…leave it vague and sad, but full of distant heroism. Or maybe she’d tell her future child the truth, however sordid—that their father fake-proposed to her on a whim, to further his own agenda, and then Elena slunk away to her homeland, scarred and heartbroken.
But that didn’t seem quite right either.
Maybe all she’d say was simply that she’d met their father in a faraway land…and that she’d loved him very, very much.
That, at least, contained part of the truth.
14
ONE MONTH LATER
Asim flipped through the folder the investigator had brought to his office. Half of the pages contained various Elenas scattered throughout California, and the other half Aubreys. Without any last names to go on, the results were overwhelming. And incredibly disheartening. The first ten pages alone were all duds. Elderly women, small girls, college students who studied business. None of them were his Elena.
“To be honest, sir,” the investigator began, adjusting his tie, “I’m thinking that most of these are dead ends. There are several thousand more entries that weren’t included in this batch, and without any additional information to go on…we just can’t be sure that she’s really included here.”
Asim sighed, shutting the heavy folder, his gaze skating over the dark-haired man before him. “Can’t you work harder at this? Hire more people? I’ll spend whatever amount of money it takes. Just—”
“I need more concrete information,” he insisted. “A last name, at least. A maiden name. Whatever you have.”
“She’s between the ages of twenty-one and twenty-five. She had just graduated from…” he searched his brain for the name but nothing came up. “Fuck. I don’t know where. She’s a painter. I—I don’t know if her degree was in art, or painting, or whatever, but it was related. I’m positive of that. And she’s from northern California. Not LA.”
The investigator grimaced. “While good details, they are unfortunately not very helpful in the initial search process. You see—”
“I don’t care,” Asim snapped, shoving the folder toward him over the smooth mahogany surface of his desk. Evening sun streamed through the wall of windows at the far edge of the office; beyond, the sea glimmered like a mirage. Like the hope he refused to relinquish. “I’ll pay you to look for her for the next five years if that’s what it takes.” The last month alone had been impossible without her. He hadn’t realized just how deep she’d burrowed inside him in three weeks’ time. And now, a month out, he was aching for her. Desperate to lay eyes on her, smell the scent of her hair, brush his lips to hers. Most nights he dreamed of her, and some nights he couldn’t sleep for wondering.
His own anxiety and persistence shocked even him, but it was the only thing that felt right.
“Very well,” the investigator responded, collecting his folder. He stood and bowed slightly. “I’ll update you as soon as I have more information.”
Asim scowled once the door shut behind him, turning back to his computer. It couldn’t be this hard to find her—not in this day and age. Not with all the technology available to the world.
A few moments later his office door swung open, and he sighed without turning to face the newcomers. “What?”
“Brother.” Nasir’s smooth voice made him jerk. Asim straightened, swiveling to face the door. Both Nasir and their younger brother Basri stood in front of his desk.
“To what do I owe such an honor?” He gestured toward the open seats in front of his desk, and his two brothers sat, adjusting their suit coats.
“Informal family meeting,” Basri said, his dark eyes skating over Asim. He tensed—whenever Basri mentioned meetings, it meant something bad was coming. Basri was the infamously reckless and short-tempered brother of the family; his serious tone made Asim want to respond with knives out.
“It’s about the business,” Nasir said, clearing his throat. “It’s come to our attention that your VP thinks you’ve been a little preoccupied lately. We told him we’d talk to you directly.”
Annoyance surged. Preoccupied was an understatement, but he didn’t like being called on it—especially by his brothers. “So? I’ve been dealing with a lot, but my work hasn’t suffered.”
Nasir leaned forward, steepling his fingers. “Brother, it’s time to give up the search.”
Asim scowled. “What are you talking about? I’m never giving it up. Not until I find her.”
Basri smirked. “Asim, if you haven’t found her by now, you’re not going to. You’re just wasting resources at this point.”
Asim scoffed. “Oh, please. What do you care about resources?” He narrowed his eyes at Basri. “You never even met her. You don’t even understand what you’re talking about.”
“Well, he’s right about one thing,” Nasir quipped. “If you haven’t found her by now, it’s highly unlikely you will. And why keep chasing a ghost? If she wanted to be found, she would have left something for you to find.”
“Her decision was hasty, and we were in the middle of a tense time,” Asim explain
ed, holding his hand out as though it would warn his brothers not to tread further. “I can’t expect either of you to understand. So I won’t bother explaining. But I know she would have wanted me to find her.”
Nasir sighed, rubbing his face with his hands. “This search is stealing all your focus. Don’t you get it? We have bigger things to worry about now. With the new administration in the States and the crisis right here in our own backyard, we can’t afford to miss international cues. You have to step up. I’m telling you as your brother first and your partner second.”
“You’ll meet someone else,” Basri said, shrugging. Asim glared at him—sometimes Basri seemed so young that it was laughable. At only twenty-three, he was the baby of the brothers, but at moments like this, he might as well have been fifteen. He didn’t understand the stinging bite of true love, the way it could caress and consume. The way it changed a man.
“I appreciate your concern,” Asim said slowly, enunciating each word, “But I have work to do and leads to follow up on. So if you’d please see yourselves out…”
Basri and Nasir shared worried looks but stood, leaving the office in a tense silence.
FOUR MONTHS LATER
Asim’s meeting with the new private investigator was a dead-end from the start. The man was the fifth investigator he’d hired in as many months, and this guy was the least promising of them all.
“I thought you said you had CIA contacts?” Asim scoffed, tossing his folder of results over the desk. “This is a joke. There’s nothing new here. You didn’t even spell Aubrey’s name right.”
The man scrambled to peer inside the folder, brows knit together. “Sir, I—I assure you—“
“You’re fired. Just get out. I don’t have time to waste.”
Asim sat rigidly in his desk chair until the man let himself out of his office. In the quiet of the workday, he let out a frustrated groan. His entire life since Elena’s departure five months prior had been work, search, and repeat. Sleep was a coveted rarity, and even he was surprised by how the knot in his stomach continued to grow and fester.
Because maybe even he, at this point, was hoping that the intensity would lessen, that maybe some forgetfulness would wipe at the slate, dull down the edges, allow him to resume a normal life pre-Elena.
A soft knock sounded on his door. “What?”
The door opened a crack, and his dark-haired secretary Haida poked her head in. “Sir? I have a few items.”
He nodded, and she slipped inside, rustling through papers in her arms. She ran through a list of his appointments and meetings for the rest of the week; when she reached the bottom of the list, she paused.
“What else is there?” Asim typed furiously on the computer.
“Some of the senior executives would like to schedule a meeting with you,” she said quietly. Asim turned to look at her.
“About what?”
“About your…well…your appearance of late.” She shrank a little as he leaned back in his chair, balling his fists. “They’ve been worried. We’ve all been worried. They just want to sit down with you and find out what’s going on and what we can do to help.”
He shook his head, scoffing. “Help? I don’t need help. I just need to find her.”
Haida nodded, clutching her papers to her chest. “Yes. And one more thing—your brother left a message for you.”
“Which one?”
“Nasir. He says it’s urgent that you call him back.”
Asim shook his head, turning back to his computer. “No. He only wants to give me grief. That’s all any of them want.” He resumed typing an e-mail. “Anything else?”
“No, sir. That’s all.” Haida excused herself and shut the office door quietly behind her. Asim tensed in the silence, letting doubt wash over him. Nearly every day, sick possibilities plagued him—maybe he’d never find her. Maybe once he did, he’d find out that she’d moved on. Or maybe worse yet, she’d been hurt somehow. He was desperate to protect her, to be by her side. The constant pit in his stomach urged him onward, though he couldn’t for the life of him figure out why the knot only grew in intensity instead of dwindling.
She needs you. You have to find her. It was the only thought that returned to him, the only thing that made sense.
He reached for a pad of paper stashed in the top drawer. Scribbles of poetry lined the pages. He flipped to the first clean page at the back of it and paused, pen hovering over the sheet. What had started as a desperate search for an outlet in the beginning, right after Elena’s sudden departure, had now blossomed into a habitual release. Something he did daily, like others might sit in prayer or visit a mosque. He scratched down a few new lines that occurred to him and when the feeling passed, he could focus again. He turned back to his computer.
After an hour of work, Haida called in to his office. “Sir? Your brother is on the line.”
He shook his head, even though she couldn’t see it. “I told you. I’m not going to take his call today. Just tell him I’m busy.”
Haida sighed a little and hung up. Asim replaced the phone, struggling to refocus on his work. No doubt Nasir just wanted to ream him for handing off more of his workload to the senior executives so that he could focus more fully on finding Elena. And he didn’t need to hear more of what he already knew. If they had scheduled a meeting with him later this week, no doubt Nasir was calling to confirm their decision. And he didn’t need more of that negativity in his life. It was all he could do to hang on and stay afloat, while his weight plummeted and anxiety consumed him. Couldn’t they see that?
A few moments later, Haida rang again. “Sir. There’s a call for you on line one.”
“Who is it?”
“I don’t know,” she said, and then switched the line quickly. Irritation sparked—and his brothers complained about his job performance. Wasn’t it her job to know who called in?
“Don’t hang up,” the voice on the line said.
Asim sighed, rubbing at his face. “Nasir. You had my secretary lie to me.”
“It was the only way.”
“Listen, if this is about the senior executives, I don’t want to—”
“No.” Nasir’s voice was firm, and it made his mouth clamp shut. “I need you to listen to me. I sent you a package a few days ago. Did you get it?”
Asim straightened, his brother’s tone echoing strangely through him. “Uh…no. I don’t think I did.” He racked his brain trying to think back to any arrivals; maybe Haida had mentioned something. And if she’d told him it was from Nasir, no doubt he would have told her to put it on hold indefinitely.
“I sent it to Haida. She must have it. You need to open this package immediately. Please, brother. I want you to be happy. I love you.”
Asim furrowed his brow, unnerved by the strange display of emotion. The brothers said their goodbyes, and Asim stumbled over himself to open the door to his office. He poked his head out, searching for Haida.
“There you are. Did my brother send a package?”
She nodded, eyes wide. “Yes. You told me to put it in the mailroom.”
“Go get it.”
She leapt to her feet and scurried away. He paced the threshold of his office while he waited, an unsettling cocktail of emotions coursing through him. The only question in his mind blasted through his limbs, over and over again: What is this about? The severity in Nasir’s voice warned him it could be very bad—but something deep inside prayed it was good. Or at least promising.
Haida returned with a large, flat, rectangular package, wrapped in brown paper. She passed it to him, and he took it to his desk, surprised by the weight of it, the solidness. He set it down gently and opened a corner of the paper, peeling it back.
He revealed a gilded frame wrapped around a large painting. His eyes skated over the details before he became aware of the overall picture. Haunting ochre, vibrant crimson, breathtaking saffron. A lush property awash in the aching glow of sunset, tendrils of color and longing encompassing every
square inch of the landscape.
He stared at it, mouth parted, for what felt like an hour.
It was his family’s estate. A heartbreakingly beautiful rendition, more vivid and emotional than he’d ever seen in his entire twenty-eight years of living there, like the artist had hunched over the canvas and simply cried paint onto it.
His gaze slid to the bottom left corner, leaning forward to read the small script of the signature.
He read it once and then again and again. Each time his heart climbing higher into his throat.
Elena Saint-Cyr. 2017.
15
Elena set her paintbrush down, resting her palms on her hips as she stretched out her lower back. Standing for so long in front of her easel was getting harder the further she progressed in the pregnancy, but it had to be done. It seemed this baby was kicking all the inspiration free inside of her—some days like shaking a wispy tree trunk and other days like kicking a beehive—and she was struggling to keep up with the ideas and colors swarming her.
Her phone rang, and she reached for it, leaning against the side of the couch. “Hello?”
“Elena.” It was Aubrey, and she sounded very serious. Elena’s stomach plummeted. “I have news.”
“Okay. Good news?”
“No, incredible news.” Aubrey squealed a little, and then laughed. “One of your paintings sold.”
Elena’s eyebrows shot up. Aubrey had a connection in LA with an art gallery, and the owner agreed to show some of Elena’s work there soon after they’d returned from their trip abroad. Elena sent over the new pieces as she finished them, and by now she had six on display. They’d been sitting with no movement for months, but she hadn’t given up hope. All it would take was one to really get the ball rolling. “Really? Which one?”
Aubrey paused. “It was The One. The one I told you not to sell. It was part of a silent auction.”
Elena grinned, but a pang of sadness shuddered through her. That painting of Asim’s family’s estate at sunset was one of her personal favorites. And looking at it evoked so many conflicting emotions from her time there. Maybe she’d put it up for sale specifically for that reason—to lay that chapter of her life to rest. Despite Asim’s child growing within her and her own impossible longing.