“I beg your finest pardon.” He stopped dead in his tracks and looked directly at her.
“Listen, you and Jasiri spend a whole lot of time taking on the weight of the world and thinking that the women in your lives can’t handle it. Everything is on you. News flash. You are a king, not a god. You have no more control over the weather than I do my bladder at night when your kid is tap-dancing on that organ like it’s Savion Glover, Gregory Hines and Sammy Davis Jr. all wrapped into one.”
He stood with his mouth hung open, and she figured he was either too shocked to speak or having some sort of brain aneurysm. Either way, she figured since she’d already pressed her luck this far, she might as well keep going.
“It was a tragedy, Aléx. There was nothing you could’ve done to save them.”
She walked over to him, poking her finger in his chest in hopes the discomfort might bring him out of his apparent stupor, because he still hadn’t responded to her.
“You had every right to demand Farah bring your daughter home. I don’t care what her issues were with being at court. Thatdid not give her the right to rob you of being a father. Her dying doesn’t absolve her of that.”
She put one hand on her hip and jabbed the air with her finger as she spoke. She was so damn pissed. This man, this kind and caring man had wallowed in pain for five years because of someone else’s action.
“There is no one to blame for their deaths, Aléx. It was a terrible, terrible accident. But that’s not what all this guilt is really about, because you know there is nothing you or anyone else, including Farah, could’ve done to stop this.”
His shoulders stiffened as he asked, “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying you don’t blame yourself for their deaths. You blame yourself because you can’t find it in your heart to be angry with a dead woman, so you’d sacrifice your own soul to avoid the truth. You’re mad as hell at Farah for keeping your daughter from you. Had she not died, I have no doubt you would’ve made her very aware of that fact.”
She threw up her hands, hoping the gesture would help her message break through to him.
“Here’s another news flash, Aléx. You have every right to lay that particular blame at Farah’s feet for lying to you all those years.”
He stood there just watching her, taking in her heaving chest as if he couldn’t recognize her in this moment. That’s because he hadn’t had the opportunity to meet protective Regina. This was who’d threatened Jasiri, warning him not to hurt her sister or his ass was hers. And she didn’t care that Farah was dead. She wasn’t letting her slide after watching her husband suffer so much guilt that he couldn’t sleep at night.
“You’re out of line, Regina. What the hell do you expect me to do? Just forget them and move on with my life as if they never existed, never mattered? I’m grieving, Regina.”
His pain reddened his tanned skin, making him look like he was burning from the inside out. He was in a hell of his own creation, one he had no clue how to leave.
“You’re no longer grieving, Aléx. You’re punishing yourself because you lived. You are allowing your past guilt to rob you of joy in the present. I would never ask you to forget them. They are part of you. The problem is, you’re making them all of you, leaving no room for yourself, me, or this baby.”
She grabbed his hand and laid it on her stomach, holding it there, hoping it would be enough to bring him in from the cold.
“I need you, and this baby needs you, and I’ll be damned if we lose you because of your misplaced guilt. I love you too damn much for that. So, here’s how this is going to go down.”
She stepped around him, walking toward the door before she looked over her shoulder at him.
“I’m tired. I’m tired of holding back, and I’m tired of pretending that I don’t love you. I have more than enough love to keep the three of us afloat while you dig your way out of this abyss. But I’ve got to know you are trying to free yourself of this. Now that I’ve said my piece, I’m going to put on some comfy fuzzy pajamas, eat some butter pecan ice cream, send off some emails to my team to firm up the launch of my hair care line, and take myself to that ridiculously big bed of ours and go to sleep. Do whatever you need to grab hold of the truth, and if I find you in bed with me tomorrow morning when I wake up, I’ll know that you’ve chosen to live in joy with me rather than suffocate in guilt.”
She turned, her shoulders drawn back as she waddled down the hall. The ball was in his court now. She’d laid everything on the line. He knew where she stood, and she knew she couldn’t allow herself to watch Aléx be consumed by his guilt any longer. It would kill her. For her sake and their baby’s sake, she had to force his hand. He had to make a choice. Settled in herconviction, she refused to acknowledge the twinge of worry that asked,What if he doesn’t choose you?
She knew the answer. She’d hurt like hell. It was as simple as that.
Chapter Twenty
Aléx stood inthe graveyard as his eyes scanned the cold double headstone that read, “Farah & Charlie, Together in Eternity.”
By rights, Charlie should have been laid to rest in the royal mausoleum. Though she would never have been able to rule because of legitimacy laws, her parentage meant she should have rested beneath the palace where all the monarchs and their children were interred.
When Farah’s family requested they be buried together, Aléx had not been able to deny them. The thought of his daughter alone, without the one person she depended on her entire life, seemed unnecessarily cruel.
Since their burial five years ago, he’d not been able to visit this space. It was too strong a reminder of what he’d lost. It augmented his self-recrimination and made it impossible for him to function on the most basic levels. But today, he had to be here. For once in his life, the cost of his guilt was too high a price to pay.
“Farah and Charlie, I must apologize to you. I have allowed my remorse to twist your lives and your deaths into something ugly that neither of you deserved. You deserved to rest in peace and not have my pain poison your memories. You deserved loving and happy thoughts that would’ve tied your legacies to love instead of pain. I wronged you so terribly, and I hope that you can find some way to forgive me.”
The wind whistled lightly through the air, and Aléx had to wonder if it was just nature, or the two souls he was talking to letting him know they could hear him.
“I too must find my way to forgiveness. I need to forgive myself for taking on the blame of your deaths.” He turned his head to the left, looking specifically at Farah’s name chiseled into the ornate concrete slab. “And Farah, I need to forgive you too. All these years, I blamed myself for your deaths so I wouldn’t let my anger toward you rise. You stole the most precious thing in the world from me. You made a selfish decision without consulting me, and as a result, I never had the chance to meet my child. I couldn’t admit that until a very blunt woman made me face that fact last night.”
