“Because Sienna doesn’t act like she knows what their situation is. She is acting attached. And Reek is still Reek. That man is a hoe. He is not about to settle down because some girl started playing house in her head.”
My attraction to Reek checked itself right then. A little part of me had been entertaining the thought of Reek too much. Hearing Zahra say it out loud snapped me back to the reality I knew in the back of my mind. Reek was fun to look at. Reekwas fun to flirt with. But Reek was not a man to build a future around.
I turned back to my mirror and picked up my powder brush.
Zahra watched me for a second, then changed the subject. “You still thinking about going abroad for a while?”
I nodded, and she got quiet.
I set the brush down and met her eyes in the mirror. “I need space, Zahra. I need to figure out what I want without everybody around me pulling me in a direction. I want to get back to me. School. Travel. Something that feels like my life again.” I swallowed and looked down at my vanity. “In Daddy’s house, I was the princess and you were the problem. I hated that. Even while I was benefiting from it, I hated it.”
I looked through the mirror at Zahra’s expression saddening. Then she shook it off.
“I used to think if I stayed good, quiet, and perfect, he would always protect me. I really believed that. The night he tried to trade me, something in me broke and I still haven’t put it back together. If the man who said he loved me the most could do that, then what does that say about me? What does that say about what I’m worth?” My eyes filled before I could stop them. “I’m scared of ever needing a man that much again. I’m scared of being that dependent on anybody.” I scoffed while saying, “And now look at me. I’m living in another powerful man’s house, protected, guarded, and still depending on other people.”
Zahra stood up and came to me. “Our father was sick, Ava. The way he was soft with you and cruel to me was the same sickness. It was not love in one hand and hate in the other. It was control in both.”
I started crying for real then.
She took my hand and kept going. “You were not loved better. You were groomed to be useful in a different way. And what Saint is doing is not the same. This protection does not costyou pieces of yourself. He is not trying to own you. He is making sure nobody else gets to hurt you while you figure your life out.”
I covered my mouth and nodded, crying harder. “I know I know. But I feel guilty all the time. I feel like I’m a walking reminder of everything Daddy did to you. I feel like every time you look at me, you see favoritism.”
Zahra’s expression turned sympathetic, and she hugged me. “I don’t. I seemy sister.”
I held on to her and cried on her shoulder.
When I could talk again, I pulled back and wiped my face. “I don’t want to leave you. Ineedto leave. It’s not because of you. I just need to go.”
Zahra looked at me for a long second, then she sat back down on the bed and pressed her lips together like she was trying not to say something.
“What?” I pressed.
She looked up at me and said, “I don’t want you to leave.”
I sighed. “I know.”
“No, Ireallydon’t want you to leave.”
The way she said it made me stop moving.
Then she smiled, and she grew teary eyed. “I’m pregnant.”
I gasped as the biggest smile spread on my face. “What?!”
She nodded, crying and laughing at the same time. “Yep, I’m pregnant.”
I screamed so loud I scared my own self, then I dropped to my knees in front of her and grabbed her hands. “Shut up. Zahra!”
She laughed through her tears. “I’m serious.”
I started crying again and hugged her around her waist. “Oh my God. Oh my God.”
“I thought you wanted to wait a while and just enjoy your honeymoon phase.”
“I was okay with waiting. We didn’t plan to get pregnant, but I’m not surprised, since Saint won’t stop cumming in me and I’m not the best at taking my birth control every day.”
“What did Saint say? I know he was so excited.”
