Arranged(72)

It was a sweet moment, the kind that stays in your mouth for a long time, counteracting some of the bitter flavors that come after.

My trainer pushed Jovie and me through a strenuous and satisfying workout.

“Will you be home in time for dinner tonight?” I asked her on her way out.

“I should be,” she replied.

“Well, call if you’re not, and don’t forget to eat a decent meal. Humans need food to survive,” I reminded her. She was like me, constantly monitoring her food.

She rolled her eyes like the teenager she was but rarely acted like. “Okaaaay, Mooom,” she mocked with a smile. She softened it all by kissing me goodbye on both cheeks.

I was still smiling as I walked into the locker room. I changed into a serviceable black two-piece swimsuit and went to do my laps. The gym boasted a good-sized lap pool, but the whole room was rented out for my personal use for this slot of the morning. It was still one of my very favorite perks of becoming a Castelo.

Chester waited just outside the room’s only door to the rest of the gym while I swam. There was another door into the cavernous room, but it was Employees Only and locked at all times. Chester still double-checked it every time before he left me to my swim.

It was a nice balance where Chester could do his job, and I could enjoy one of my favorite activities in absolute peace.

It was the time of day I used to clear my head, swimming mindlessly, letting my body and mind float free of care. I didn’t count laps. Most of the time I didn’t even set a timer for myself. I simply swam until I’d reached my limit.

That day my mind wouldn’t go blank, and I didn’t mind. It was too full of Banks, and in a good way. I swam with a light, and admittedly, besotted heart.

I remember the heat of the room, the delicious feel of the cool water sliding over my skin. I remember the irritating but familiar smell of chlorine.

And then it all came screeching to a halt.

My hand touched the side of the pool, my body curling, feet purchasing a good grip for the return push. I propelled myself forward.

And stopped with a wrenching pain. What the hell?

At first I thought my long hair had caught on something. And in a way it had, but it was not something. It was someone. Someone’s fist.

I’d gone still at the pain, confused but not alarmed, not yet. I was raised from out of the water. For a split second, I caught a glimpse of a man, more his figure than his face, but before I could react, I was thrust down again, not into the water but against the side of the pool, the rounded edge. I had time to turn my head so most of my face was preserved, but that did nothing to protect the side of my head, which made heavy, solid contact with the concrete once. Pound. Once. It hurt so much. Pound. Twice. I tasted blood. Pound. Again. My brain was muddled. Pound. Again. I tried to struggle. All I managed to accomplish was a futile squirm mid-water. My feet found no purchase. I was too disoriented to place which way the ground was. Pound. Again. I reached up, scratching at the wrist that held my hair. There. The ball of my foot made contact with something, and I pushed with all my might up. I gasped in a blessed shock of air. I tried to scream, but it was only a piteous sob before my head was shoved back under. Pound. The world went black.





CHAPTER





THIRTY-TWO





I came to in a wash of unpleasant sensations.

The slow scrape in and out of air squeezing through a raw throat. My mind was filled with a wealth of disconnected nightmares that I couldn’t remember, but I could still taste like copper at the base of my throat.

My whole body hurt, but nothing throbbed so badly as my head. It was a pulsing agony, and I wanted instantly to be unconscious again.

I was assaulted with beeping, buzzing sounds in my ears, and the astringent smells of a health clinic. I’d never been hospitalized before, but I’d spent more than my fair share in them, and I knew instantly where I was. I hated hospitals. They always made me think of my mother, dying in one while I was hundreds of miles away.

It was a struggle to pry my eyes open, and I instantly flinched, closing them again. I took a few more breaths and tried again. All I could see once the initial brightness passed were a pair of tormented silver eyes.

“Noura,” my husband breathed, squeezing my hand. His gaze was blaring into mine with utmost relief. Like he’d been worried he wouldn’t get the chance again.

I squeezed faintly back and let my eyes fall shut again. It was all too much. The pain, the confusion, the rush of powerful emotions that punched through me in a jumble.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Like I shouldn’t have woken up,” I replied truthfully, the words coming out in a croak through my tortured throat. I heard him suck in a sharp breath.

Little details were already floating to the front of my brain. The pool. The struggle. The certainty that I was going to die. Someone had tried to kill me.

“How long have I been out?” The words scraped out of me, and I instantly decided it was my last question. Speaking wasn’t worth the pain.

“Four days.” He said the words with a desperate kind of pain. Like four days was an eternity. It kind of felt like it had been from my end, too.

“Pain meds,” I rasped.

“Of course,” he replied instantly. “I’ve rung for the nurse.”

There was a rustle of noises. The nurse sweeping in, a murmur of talk, the sounds of buttons being pushed. All the while I felt Banks’ stroking my hand comfortingly. Vaguely I mused that it was the only thing I felt that wasn’t pure pain. The drugs must have been fast-acting because I felt myself slipping away again shortly.