Every third Wednesday night, Adnan arrives at the discreet high-end hotel. He bangs one of the many women on a call-girl roster. He gives them a few hours, hard cash, and an overnight stay while he heads home.
Today, I’ve arrived a few minutes before the call girl in question, dressed in a silky black-trench coat. The faux designer scarf and sunglasses cover my face, so management doesn’t recognize one of their maids.
A sense of anxious anticipation overwhelms me as I approach the closed door of the hotel suite. Heart in my throat, I soundlessly pray for protection then briskly knock.
“You’re early . . .” The double doors to Adnan’s suite open. Donning a tailored, gray suit, Adnan is my nightmare materialized in the flesh. He’s dark with silky smooth skin and hair. Adnan runs a hand over his goatee, drinking me in. “You look like Arika.”
“May I come in?” I clip the words.
“Of course. You dressed like you came to fuck, Ava. Pray tell, is it my lucky day?”
The surface of my skin tightens. Throat constricting, I stalk past him.
Hitching on air, Adnan retorts, “It’s safe to assume you’re playing the seductress per the norm. Don’t forget weweremarried. Under the eyes ofyourGod, insinuating copulation isn’t a sin.”
Black-out blinds are drawn. A posh, purple loveseat faces a built-in console with a sleek television. To the farthest side are another set of double doors leading to a bedroom. I stop at the wet bar, positioned near floor-to-ceiling windows.
I need a stiff drink. I require answers before I spill his blood and various floors in the hotel report the sounds of gunshots. While I pore over the bottles, I close my eyes for a moment, tempering another inhale. He’s leaning on the edge of the loveseat.
“That suit becomes you, but you’ll always be amonster.” I retort, unscrewing a tiny shot-bottle of Jack Daniels as he moves into a standing position. “A newly married monster.”
“Where I’m from, you’re still myfirstwife. Divorces aren’t an option,” he grits out, stalking closer. “Did I not consent to the nonsense you instigated!”
He stops a fraction away from my nose, and I’m peering into the utter darkness of his eyes. I thought Kieran had the coldest gaze ever. Idiota, you compared them to no end.
Adnan’s whiskey-laced breath causes the tiny vertebrae of my spine to squirm.Great, my nerves are showing.
I open my mouth to ask him about Arika, but he’s still got his head in his ass. “I’m the destiny you can’t escape, Ava. I’m irresistible. The manifestation of everything you desire. Hence your return. Where’d you run off to after my wedding? I missed your mouth.”
“I hate everything you are, Adnan.”I throwback a shooter. Ferocious liquid sears down my throat.
“You ungrateful, bitc—”
I pull the gun from beneath my trench. “I can’t hear you,puta.”
Adnan grits his bleach-stained teeth.Oye,he’s afraid. Much better at appearing composed. “Isavedyou, Ava. Gave you citizenship. A place of belonging.”
My stomach bottoms out. ‘A place of belonging’rings in my ear. I had that with Kieran and his little sister. I had beautiful, lush green land, the stars, afamily. The presence of God!Yet, guilt riddles me. Misery tightens my throat. How could I leave them? No!How couldhedo this to our daughter?
“How . . . could . . . you?” I croak.
A smile manifests across Adnan’s lips. “Citizens have a legal expectation to privacy; therefore, I must ask, are you recording me?”
I shake my head.
“I’m finding it difficult to trust my disobedient wife.” Adnan licks the snarl from his lips. “Let’s pin this discussion until you undress. Show me you’re not wearing a wire.”
Furious tears boil my eye ducts, assaulting my cheeks, chin, and neck. “She isyourdaughter.Yourchild.”
“Shewas.” Indifference masks Adnan’s face.
“Tell the truth for once in your life.” I shake the gun fisted in my hands.
Despair etches his face. “I was distraught that day. Exhausted from so many years where my wife drowned her depression in—”
“Stop!” I scream, cutting through his lies. Adnan built an entire defense around my parent’s deaths. He’d said I wasn’t always abad wife.We had good years. Then he fabricated an entire story. He argued that postpartum depression exacerbated by no maternal grandparents to our baby created this pathetic thing—a hollow vessel of a mother. I’d already heard this story before. I didn’t need to listen to it again.
Holding the gun toward him with one hand, I curl the fingers of my opposite hand over the soft collar of my coat, pulling it off. “Here. I’m undressing. Just say it. All you have to say is you murdered Arika, then you die.You aredying tonight, Adnan!”