Captive- Veiled Desires (10 page)

Her legs quivered and she quickly sat down, filled with self-disgust. The women fussed about her, completely oblivious of the pain she was going through.

Once notified that the mullah was arriving to conduct the
nikkah
ceremony, the women quickly covered her head with her bridal veil

Nora closed her eyes, wishing they would fade away back into her nightmares. She swallowed with nervousness.

Just play with it, Nora. This is only a farce. It’s only a play; a drama. And you’re the main star in it. The curtains will call. The audience will clap. And then you can go back home, to your life.

The mullah walked in and as Husna had told her, recited the vows.

“Do you accept?” the mullah asked her again, glancing worriedly at the women when she didn’t reply the first time.

She bit her lips. “I… do.” She forced the words out of her mouth.

Her head spin from the noisy claps of the women. She heard the cheering from across the courtyard as the news was delivered to them. Her dress began to suffocate her. She wanted to tear it off her. She clenched her fists in case she gave into her rage.

I need to hold on for Amy. She’s my only hope… She will find me. She has to.

“Can I take this dress off now?” she asked Husna.

The young woman laughed. “No. We have to go there.” She pointed at the common room.

To that bastard?
She gulped. Why were they taking her there?

She kept her gaze lowered to the floor as the women guided her through the door and towards the room. She didn’t want to see the people celebrating the loss of her freedom. She hated it all! She hated them all! How could anyone not stand up for her in that entire crowd? Surely, they knew that this marriage was forced. Why won’t someone stop this?

When they neared the door, they told her Adam would arrive to escort her down the aisle. Her heart almost stopped.
Don’t bolt, Nora. This isn’t real. He’s only playing a role... For Amy… for Amy.

She caught sight of his shoes as he came to stand beside her and she cringed. She didn’t want him to touch her.

“Give me your hand,” he whispered into her ear.

She stubbornly clenched her fingers into her palm tightly.

“Nora,” he said. “Your hand.”

She released her clenching palm, letting her arm dangle by her side. He didn’t push her any further, willingly leaning forward to clasp it. His long lean fingers wrapped neatly around her hand. They felt warm and strangely tingly.

He moved forward, and she obediently stepped in tune with his footings. He smelled clean and refreshing. She suddenly was curious about him and raised her head to look up at him.

He was dashingly handsome in his designer-cut tuxedo. His thick dark hair was gelled back with little curls locking at his nape. He smiled widely at his audience as they walked down the aisle and towards the bridal table.

Her heart beat rapidly with confusion. How was she going to detest the guy properly if he turned up at their wedding the way he just did?

They sat at the centre of the table and she shifted uncomfortably, trying not to look at the small group of joyous people gathered in their honor.

Keep it together, Nora. Just a little while longer and it will soon be over.

“Nora, turn towards me,” he said.

“Why?”

“I need to lift your veil.”

She turned towards him in surprise. “What?”

He took advantage of the opportunity and lifted the veil off her face.

He won’t kiss me. He can’t kiss me.

“I won’t kiss you,” he whispered as if he had read her mind. “It’s not how we do things here.” Instead, he spooned into a dish of finely, crumbled bread. “You need to eat this.”

“Why?”

“I’m not trying to poison you. It’s a dessert called maleeda.”

She opened her mouth reluctantly and he let him feed her.

“My turn.” He smiled.

Her hand trembled as she obediently reached out for the spoon. She scooped a little and lifted it to his lips.

His eyes roamed over her face and she froze. Her mind told her to hate the man but her body told her otherwise.

Be reasonable, Nora. You’re being married against your will. The guy maybe drop-dead gorgeous. But that didn’t make him any less of an ass than he was this morning.

He wrapped his lips around the bowl of the spoon, his eyes never shifting once from hers.

Her heart pounded. She had certainly lost her senses. How could she even remotely find this man attractive?

A woman brought them a mirror and he held it before them. She turned with curiosity, wondering what he was doing now. She caught sight of them together. Their first reflection as a married couple. They looked beautiful.

Her tears sprung into her eyes. “Put it away,” she whispered harshly.

“Nora…”

“Enough. I can’t take it anymore. I’d rather you kill me. Or would you prefer I do it myself?” She pulled in a deep shaky breath, her hand gripping tightly onto the handle of her steak knife.

He handed the mirror back to the woman.

She released the knife, clattering it against her plate. Her face grew ashen, her body growing limp and faint.
Please, God. Enough. Let it be enough, enough, enough…

He indicated for a woman to escort her back to the bedroom.

She pushed back her chair to stand up, filled with urgency to race through the crowd and up to Adam’s bedroom. Instead, her legs wobbled and Adam quickly caught her before she could fall.

He frowned. “Are you okay?”

She didn’t answer, pushing him away instead. She didn’t like that he touched her. She hated that he was even this close to her.

She turned away, trying to blink away her tears as she made it back up to the bedroom that would serve as her prison. Ironically, it was also the only place in this goddamned hell-hole that made her feel safe.

She marched into the room with Husna close behind her.

“You sit,” Husna said. “I help take out dress.”

“Thanks, Husna.” She rubbed her pounding temples. “But do you mind if you left me alone?”

The woman looked at her, slightly perplexed and then translated the request to the other women in the room.

The women scurried out through the door. The door slammed, the lock turned and her tears rolled down her eyes. This was normal. This was good.

She raced to the windows and began slamming them shut, trying to drown out the joyous cheering coming from the common room. She stepped back in a daze and caught her reflection in the long mirror again.

She moved closer to it. She was married. She was fucking married!

She began rubbing her lipstick away with the back of her hand. She cried when it wouldn’t come off easily. She screamed, tearing at her gown in frustration. She ran towards the bathroom and dunked her head into a bucket of water, scratching her make-up away with her nails. Her skin grew sore from her scraping and grazing. Her flesh burned.

Finally exhausted from her self-afflictions, she sat on the cold, wet floor of the bathroom, her eyes sunken in as she mindlessly stared down at her rippled reflection in the bucket of water.

This can’t be my life. I won’t let it be. There must be a way out. There will be. If not today, then tomorrow, the next day, the next month… But I won’t die here. I
will not
be buried here.

HAPTER
8

She had ripped herself out of her wedding dress and pulled back on her
perahaan
. She stayed awake for a long time, pacing the floor, sitting and gazing blankly out the window. Finally, when her body tired out even though her mind persevered, she submitted to her exhaustion and lay on the bed, staring into the darkness.

What next? Would he come for me? Was he going to…

She couldn’t bear to utter the words. Not even silently.
Rape. Rape. Rape…
The words ran through her mind, echoing relentlessly inside her.

She muffled her ears with her pillows, hoping to drown out the tormenting visions.
No, no
. “No!” she cried aloud, in an attempt to convince herself.

She pulled the covers over her, every part of her alert to the noises in her bedroom.
If he comes for me, I will know. I must know.

He stood for a long time, leaning against the wall of the common room, staring at his bedroom. He was married and she was his wife. What was he doing standing there?

Because she doesn’t want me
. He sighed, running a palm over his face. He had seen her hatred for him in her eyes. And why not? He was forcing her into this marriage. But what choice did he have?

He shuffled the dirt under his feet, rewinding the events of the evening through his mind. A small smile pulled at his lips as he recalled the first moment he saw her at the door of the common room, looking amazingly beautiful in her wedding gown. He had ordered for the best and he wasn’t disappointed at all to see her in it. Her skin glistened, her face was radiantly gorgeous and her figure and walk, graceful.

He ran a hand through his hair. He must be crazy. The woman was a temporary charge. Why the heck was he infatuated with her? She didn’t even like him. And for what he did to her, he’d bet she never would.

“If you don’t intend to join us anymore, you might as well go up to her.” Basel broke through his thoughts.

Adam smiled, shaking his head. “She’ll always be my wife. I won’t get this again.” He pointed at the men joking and chatting aloud in the room.

“You’re not gonna get married again?” Basel dropped his jaw open in feigned shock.

“If it was so easy, why hadn’t you?”

Basel grinned.  “It is hard when you’re still in love with the first one.”

And was I?
He glanced back at the window. She had turned out the lights. She must be exhausted from being put through something like a marriage. It was never how she had probably imagined it.

“How long are you going to stand here looking at her window?” Basil frowned. “I swear you look like a man totally in love.”

Adam snorted, brushing his remark away.

“What else would you call a man standing in the dark, at about one in the morning, looking up at his bride’s window?” Basel insisted.

“A man in deep thought as to whether he’d done the right thing,” Adam replied. “Let’s get back inside before the rest start questioning my sanity as well.”

He slept with the rest of the men in the common room again. He didn’t want to bother her. But did he want her? He craved her more than he had wanted any woman before.

He didn’t get much sleep either. He had laid there on his mat, thinking about her for a very long time, imagining unbuttoning her out of her dress, kissing her soft skin, taking her nipples in his mouth, entering her, making love to her.

He rolled to his side. His cock had hardened at the mere thought of her. He needed to stop tormenting himself if he wanted some decent shut-eye. The wedding was done. Now, the work began. And his first task was to address the matter of the Zawahiris.

Adam rose tiredly off his mat. The rest of the men had slept well into the morning due to their late night chatter. He glanced down at his wrinkled tux. It hadn’t been comfortable sleeping in one as much as it was strutting in it. He felt the need to get washed and dressed into cleaner clothes. While he’d rather not disturb her, his clothes were still in his bedroom.

He strolled up reluctantly to his room and stood outside wondering what he should say when he walked in. His hands sweated slightly. He was nervous? He was being ridiculous. She was only a woman and he had bedded many. Why then did his body react differently to this particular one?

He turned the knob of the door and stepped in. She was dressed in her
perahaan
again as she sat on a chair by the window, staring blankly out of it. Her bridal dress lay torn on the floor. He instinctively walked up to collect it. She may not have thought much of it but he had taken great lengths to get it.

His fingers ran over the torn seams. Could they be mended? He hung it over a chair, taking a mental note to get it washed and repaired.

“Have you eaten?” he asked.

She didn’t reply, not bothering to pay him any attention at all.

“I thought we could eat together,” he continued. When she didn’t reply again, he coughed and started towards the door. “I’ll get someone to bring us our breakfast.”

“Why?” she muttered, stopping him short. “Why would you want to eat with me?”

“You’re my wife. People expect me to have my first meal as a married man with you.”

“Marriage? Is this what you people call a marriage?”

“As far as I know, yes.”

She let out a little mocking laugh. “I suppose. What would you know of love? What would you know of the importance of a woman’s consent?”

He continued on towards the door. She was angry. She had every right to vent. Unfortunately, she was the only one he had managed to restrain his rage with, barking his order angrily instead at the man standing guard outside his door. The guard scurried out in fear.

He slammed the door behind him again, pocketing the key.  He began pulling out his shirt and she crouched back apprehensively when he started unbuttoning his pants also.

“I need a bath,” he grumbled. “And it so happens, my clothes are here.”

He grabbed a clean towel from the wardrobe and headed towards the bathroom. He emptied a bucket of water into his bucket shower and then raised it back up again. Tap water was just a few of the many luxuries he had to sacrifice in order to retain the little freedom he had from spies and enemies.

He had been satisfied with his life, but only until Nora turned up in it. Suddenly, he was more concerned about her than he was of his own safety. There were people who targeted him every day. He slept with one eye open, his senses always alert. He trusted no one. In the business he was, anyone could turn against him and at anytime. Now that he was married, he had become vulnerable. They would learn of his weakness. They would learn of Nora.

He wrapped a towel around his waist and stepped back into his bedroom.

She jumped on seeing him and clutched onto a crystal candle holder.

“I’m only going to get my clothes,” he assured her. He opened the door to his wardrobe, muttering to himself. Surely she wouldn’t hit him with that blasted candle holder? Who the heck was smart enough to leave one there?

Shielding himself behind the door of the wardrobe, he quickly changed into a pair of chinos and a white shirt. Someone knocked on the door and he hastened over to it.

“Breakfast is here,” he announced, laying the tray of piping hot food on the table. “Let’s eat.”

She glanced at the food and then turned away to gaze at the sky again.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“Wrong?” she asked back with disbelief. “Everything is wrong. This is wrong. Our marriage was wrong. And you having a meal here with me, pretending that everything is fucking right, is fucking wrong!”

He leaned back on his chair and sighed. “Eat and then we can talk.”

“Eat with you? A criminal, a warlord? A kidnapper? For godsakes, what in the fuck are you? What do you want from me? What in the fuck do you want from me?” she sobbed aloud. She covered her face into her knees, trembling from her sobs. “Let… me…go. Please… let… me… go.”