LITMIR.BIZ

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your birthdays. You’ll grow up. You’ll marry. What will Emily have? How long does she have?

      They’d been right. And whatever she’d been feeling... She hadn’t had any right. And as isolated as she’d felt before she’d poured her emotions out in front of her mother and father, she’d felt even more so after.

      Because when they looked at her after that, all they saw was her selfishness. They had an ill daughter. They’d needed her to carry the weight. To be as happy and self-contained as she could be, and she’d failed.

      She’d stepped outside her position, and after that had found no place at all.

      Olivia swallowed hard.

      She faced a room empty of her own connections. The only person there she knew would be the man she was pledging her life to, and as she had only just been thinking, she barely knew him.

      The ornate doors to the sanctuary were closed, and Olivia paused in front of them, waiting for them to swing open, as she knew they would. She had discussed this briefly with the wedding coordinator. She knew already there would be very few people in attendance. Nobility, members of the Bedouin tribes, a few approved members of the press and palace staff. It would be nothing like that first wedding with thousands of attendees, where the world had been watching.

      But there had been something insulating about that. So many people it had seemed surreal. They had all blended into one.

      She had been floating on a cloud that day, insulated by her happiness. There was no insulation today. Only the stark reality of the cold stone walls around her and the imposing doors in front of her.

      Doors that suddenly parted, revealing the small crowd, and the man that she was meant to bind herself to.

      What surprised her was how immediately everyone else faded. Her eyes were locked on Tarek. He owned her focus, her attention. He was the reason she took that first step forward, and the next. She was certain of this, she realized, looking at him. But this wasn’t the giddy certainty of a girl imagining she had finally found that sense of love and belonging she had always fantasized about. This was different.

      He was different.

      She locked eyes with him, drawn ever nearer by the black flame burning there. He was magnificent. A modern-day warrior born of the desert sand. He was strength personified. And yet again, he was in one of those maddening, perfectly tailored suits that made a mockery of the entire concept of civility. Showed it for what it was. A cloak, a weakness. A construct used by those too frightened to reveal their true selves.

      That was, she realized in that moment, one of the things she admired most about Tarek. He did not hide himself. She doubted he even knew how.

      She arrived at the front of the room, and the clergyman presiding over the ceremony began to speak in Arabic. She had only a base understanding of the language, allowing the words to wash over her in a wave, the gist of them penetrating, but not the fine meaning. She had read a transcript of what would be said today, so she had a fair idea of what would be asked of her in terms of vows, of what those in attendance were hearing now.

      She would have to learn her new language. Would have to become a part of this nation as she had become part of Alansund.

      In many ways, she felt it had already become a part of her. She felt the change.

      She repeated her vows slowly, in the phonetic Arabic she had memorized while reading the ceremony, with help from Melia. She kept her eyes focused on the ground as she did, her lungs tight, growing tighter still whenever she looked up and met Tarek’s gaze.

      When she finished speaking, it was his turn.

      But he did not repeat the vows they had learned. And he did not speak in Arabic.

      “I am a man of the sword,” he said slowly, the grave intent in his words drawing her focus upward. “And I now pledge this blade to you. I will empty my veins before I allow one drop of your blood to be spilled. You are one of mine now, as this country is mine. And I will give all to defend and protect, and to destroy any who should seek to destroy you. Just as you belong to me, now I belong to you. I pledge my loyalty, my body, to yours. And never will I share what is meant to belong to us with any other. I shall honor your gift, the gift you give of yourself, and never misuse it. I have sworn to protect, to uphold the honor this country was founded on. Thus, I shall protect you. Thus, shall I treat you with the highest honor.”

      He reached out and took her hand in his. She was conscious of how small, how pale it looked, concealed entirely by his. He held her tightly, his black eyes never leaving hers, cementing the vow, one she felt all the way down to her soul.

      Suddenly her promises seemed so shallow. So empty. What had she done but repeat words spoken to her? Words she barely understood.

      That was very like her first marriage.

      A marriage where she had chosen the thinnest facade of connection over any sort of true intimacy and all the deep, exposing terror that came with it.

      So she’d stayed on the surface. And she was ashamed now in the face of his sincerity.

      What Tarek had said, those were vows. A pledge from the depth of his being.

      She was honored. She was not worthy.

      But she wanted it. Wanted it with a ferocity that shocked her.

      Maybe it was time to stop being shocked by how many feelings Tarek seemed to call out of her with effortless ease.

      Then he released her, and as a blessing was pronounced on them she found herself being led back down the aisle she had just come up, all eyes in the room on them, somber expressions all around. She’d been told to expect that, too. The reception would be the place for festivities. This ceremony was treated with all seriousness.

      When they exited the sanctuary, Melia was waiting for them.

      “The feast will be served in the grand hall,” she said. “If you go there now, you can take your seats and await the celebrations.”

      Olivia took hold of Tarek’s hand and they started to walk down the corridor together. A sense of belonging filled her. She looked to the side, at the man who had become her husband, and her heart felt as if it had grown two sizes. This was something deeper. Something more.

      The sort of thing she’d been afraid to reach for all these years. Right here. Right beside her.

      He looked at her, his brow raised. “Yes?”

      “Just letting it sink in.”

      “That we are married?”

      “Yes. That this is my home. That you’re my husband. All of it.”

      He stopped, taking hold of her other hand and turning her so that she was standing facing him, his expression fierce. “Why? What is it you want? I spent the past two weeks looking at pictures of your old life and Alansund.”

      Her stomach tightened. “Why?”

      “To understand you.”

      “You could have spoken to me.”

      He lifted a shoulder, dismissing her words. “The photographs I looked at conveyed much. And so I’m curious, why would you leave all of that to come here?”

      Her throat constricted, making words all but impossible. “Because it isn’t there anymore. There is no place for me. I know we haven’t had a chance to talk about this. I don’t...I don’t like to talk about the past. I don’t have a lot of happy things there.”

      He raised his brows, his dark eyes full of something...understanding, maybe? Which was so strange she could hardly stand it. “I have some idea of what that might be like. Will you tell me?”

      “My sister was ill. She is ill. She’s had a terrible autoimmune disease since we were children. My parents spent years of their lives in hospitals. Even now, she’s very fragile. Truthfully, she’s lucky to have lived as long as she has. But that meant that my

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