To that Abram simply had to laugh. “And what blood do I share with Paige, Khalid?” he questioned him. “She is the daughter of your mother, while I am the son of your father. Where do you believe we share blood?”
Khalid could be amazingly stubborn, and attempted to arrange reality to suit him rather than arranging himself to suit reality. It was a fault of his, and one Abram had learned over the years to ignore. Because no matter how Khalid tried, he had yet to force the winds of fate to turn to his hand.
“Both of you need to stop arguing over this. Your main audience has left, so there’s no longer anyone to impress or posture to.” Marty shot them both a disgusted look. She was definitely a woman that believed in speaking her mind.
And she was right. In ways, they had been playing to a perfect audience for years. But as Abram realized now, Paige rarely stayed to listen to the arguments or paid any attention to the undercurrents of tension that existed between himself and Khalid whenever she was around.
Paige had grown tired of the game, though he and Khalid still played it. It gave Abram something to focus on rather than his desire for Paige during those odd times when he could no longer avoid her.
Abram finally sighed wearily. “I didn’t come here to lose my control with Paige, or to argue with you,” he told his brother. “I’m returning in a few hours for Saudi.”
The shock was palpable. Marty’s gaze widened and Khalid’s expression suddenly turned icy. He understood the quick anger, the disbelief. They had planned his move from Saudi Arabia for years. To have Abram back out now, at the last moment so to speak, was little more than an insult.
“You only just arrived,” Khalid finally stated. “You’re not giving Immigration enough time to examine your mother’s birth records as well as your own. Give it time.”
Abram gave his head a quick shake. “There is something I must do first, Khalid.”
He had known his brother would never understand this move he was being forced to make.
“And what the fuck could be more important than your life?” Khalid suddenly snarled, the fury cracking past the ice. “Azir Mustafa will never let you live now. Goddammit, Abram, we just killed two of his sons. The black-hearted little bastards he risked everything to protect over the years.”
“Abram, my father is certain that your citizenship will be accepted within days,” Marty stated from her fiancé’s side. “There’s no question of it. But if you return, there’s nothing he can do.”
He shook his head quickly, tightly. “I have to go back.”
“Why, damned you?!” Khalid yelled back at him furiously as rage lit his black gaze once again.
“Because Paige’s picture was found in the possession of a dead terrorist known to be a part of the cell Ayid and Aman commanded, just hours ago as he attempted to board a plane in Jordan. Your suspicions were right. She’s in danger. And I’m going back to stop it, Khalid, one way or another. I’ve already lost two wives to those bastards. I won’t lose my soul to their ghosts.”
Paige. His soul. He’d lost his youth and his heart when his first wife, Lessa had been murdered. His second wife had been forced on him, and losing her and their child had taken the last bit of hope inside him. Their deaths had nearly finished him off. The thought of that innocent life, not yet born, taken so cruelly, had nearly cost him his sanity.
That child had been his daughter. The daughter he had planned to secretly smuggle out of Saudi Arabia after her birth and send to his brother’s parents. Pavlos and Marilyn Galbraithe would have raised and protected his child as they had their own precious daughter.
But Paige, God help him, there was no way he would survive her death. It would destroy him. For some reason she had begun to represent something wild and innocent inside him eight years ago. When the future had appeared to be nothing but bleak, furious pain, it was always the image of her that brought him comfort. Her laughter, the sweet warmth that burned in her emerald eyes.
And from the looks of Khalid’s expression, the complete disbelief and horror burning in his gaze assured Abram that it would destroy him as well. They had both schemed, plotted, and run interference with Azir Mustafa since the day the red-haired little beauty had been born. The birth of the child to his escaped forced bride had sent Azir into a rage that had torn through the Mustafa stronghold like a demon.
That day, two servants had died, and a third had fled into the desert in fear. The insanity that had begun infecting Azir had only grown since that day, as though it were a trigger of some sort that he had been unable to fight.
“I was going to send her home in the morning,” Khalid finally stated, his voice a low, rough rasp. “God help me, Abram. I was going to allow her to leave when Abdul’s cousin was unable to learn anything else.”
Abdul, Khalid’s manservant, had several cousins that worked within the castle and managed to send along information whenever they heard it. The threats against Paige, in retaliation for Khalid’s killing of Ayid and Aman Mustafa, had begun the moment Azir learned of their deaths.
He knew Khalid’s weakness, just as he knew those of his other sons. Somehow, Azir had learned years before that Abram had formed a soft spot for Khalid’s little sister. A place inside his heart thathe’d believed was hidden from even the most astute gaze.
“You can’t allow her to go.” He’d kidnap her and have her locked up somewhere safe himself if Khalid dared to allow her to leave. “I’ve fought to stay away from her, Khalid, as you ordered. But if you allow her to return to her home, then I promise you, all bets will be off.”
He didn’t wait to argue. He turned and walked away. His control was too shaky, he was too frightened for her, too certain that if she was unprotected for even a second, then his father, Azir el Hamid Mustafa would exact his vengeance in the worst way.
Abram now had no choice but to return. No one yet knew he’d left Saudi to defect from his homeland and to refuse the legacy so tainted by blood, death, and nightmares. Azir Mustafa had become a scourge that even the Saudi government wanted to be rid of. Unfortunately, until Azir revealed the blood on his hands, there was nothing they could do to step in and deflect the misery he created.
Abram had given up on saving his father light years before. The day he found his wife in a desert shack, bloody, tortured, her face frozen into an expression of such abject pain and horror that it had taken him to his knees. He had known the rapists, the inhuman scourge that had taken her life were the half-brothers he had taught to ride horseback when they were boys. The same that had been such sweet, laughter-filled children before Azir had taken them to his wing of the castle to raise them himself.
From that day, the change had been overwhelming. As though Azir had known what to do to release the soulless cruelty that existed within them.
Entering the garage Abram strode for the limo as Tariq, his cousin and coconspirator, stepped from the shadows to open the door for him.
“It’s time to go now, Tariq,” he stated as he stepped into the back of the limo. “He’ll make certain she’s protected.”
“Azir has called the Saudi ambassador several times and he’s demanding they search Khalid’s home for you immediately.” Disgust filled the man’s voice. “I contacted him after the ambassador contacted me, just after you entered the house. I’ve assured him you’re here to investigate the reasons for your brothers’ deaths and that you are returning soon. He’s certain you’re here to help Khalid escape justice instead.”
Tariq didn’t give Abram a chance to comment. He slammed the door shut with latent violence then stalked around the limo to the driver’s side door.
Abram watched as he slid behind the wheel, his gaze meeting Tariq’s dark tobacco brown eyes in the mirror.