The Husband She Never Knew(17)
Author: Kate Hewitt

In a distant, hazy part of her brain a voice reminded her that the door wasn’t locked and people could stroll by the shop, or even come in. It didn’t matter. All she could feel and think and know was Ammar. Ammar’s hands on her skin, his lips on hers. Ammar inside her, loving her, knowing her.

Afterwards, she sagged against the wall, Ammar still holding her, her legs trembling, her heart pounding. She wiped a strand of hair from her face.

‘Wow,’ she said shakily, and Ammar grinned.

‘Wow, indeed,’ he murmured.

By the time she returned to her apartment, the dress had been delivered. She unwrapped it and gazed at the pink flounces in a sort of dazed joy, because the dress was ridiculous and yet she loved it. She loved that Ammar had chosen it for her, loved that she was becoming the woman she’d always meant to be with him.

And tonight she’d be Cinderella.

Two hours later, she entered the opulent ballroom of one of Paris’s best hotels on Ammar’s arm. She felt as if she stood out like a vibrant flower in a stark winter garden, her pink dress the only splash of colour in a sea of black.

Ammar slipped his arm around her waist. ‘You’re gorgeous,’ he whispered, ‘and every woman here is wishing she could pull off a pink dress.’

Noelle let out a little bubble of laughter. She felt light and free and so, so happy; she felt as if she could float right up to the ceiling. Ammar squeezed her hand, and she squeezed his back.

They moved among the glittering guests and Noelle made introductions when necessary, her heart swelling with pride at being on his arm, by his side. She was so lost in her own haze of happiness that she didn’t notice at first the way some people greeted Ammar with terse nods, their gazes speculative or sliding away.

Yet after a while she did notice, and she saw the grim cast of Ammar’s face, the rigid set of his shoulders. The way people looked as if they were almost afraid of him. The thought seemed ridiculous, and yet with an icy pang she realised it wasn’t. Ammar was a powerful man, yet what did she really know about that power? She knew he was trying to legitimise Tannous Enterprises, but she still didn’t understand what that meant. What had happened in the past.

What Ammar had done.

She’d heard enough whispers over the years, scanned the articles on websites and in newspapers. She’d avoided most of it because she’d never wanted even to hear the name Tannous again, but she couldn’t ignore it completely. Could not forget what Ammar himself had said, when she’d first seen him. When he’d kidnapped her.

I’ve done too many things already I could be arrested for. One more won’t matter.

Impatient with herself, Noelle pushed the thoughts away. Why was she thinking of this now? Ammar was different now. She was different. She wanted to enjoy this evening, to remain in her haze of happiness. Yet every guarded sideways look, every sudden silence pierced that protective bubble and brought the old memories and fears slinking back. Reminded her of how much she still didn’t know.

She glanced at him, her arm still laced with his; he looked magnificent in his tuxedo, a tall, imposing figure, every inch of him exuding power. And yet she found herself looking at him as she would someone she didn’t know.

Who is this man?

He turned to her, his eyes narrowed with concern. ‘Are you cold?’

She realised she’d shivered. She shook her head. Even so, Ammar put his arm around her shoulders, pulled her closer to him. Noelle closed her eyes briefly, savouring the contact. The comfort and the reassurance.

I love this man.

Surely that was all that mattered.

Midway through the evening, Amelie found her. ‘You’re here with Mr Scary, aren’t you?’ she crowed in delight, and Noelle shook her head.

‘Don’t call him that.’

‘He’s too, too sexy,’ Amelie said, turning to gaze at Ammar from across the room. ‘I heard he survived a helicopter crash.’

‘Where did you hear that?’

‘Gossip.’ Amelie shrugged. ‘Everyone’s curious, you know.’ She glanced at Noelle, her expression shrewdly speculative. ‘Is that why you missed work last week? A dirty weekend?’

‘No.’ Not exactly. She swallowed, wishing she could ease the tightness in her chest. In her heart.

‘Aren’t you Little Miss Coy?’ Amelie gave a salacious smile. ‘Well, I’d do him. He’s gorgeous.’

Jealousy flared through her, even though she knew it was absurd. ‘He’s off-limits, Amelie.’

‘Not to you, obviously.’

Yes, to me. The thought caught her on the raw. Ammar had been so open with her about so many things. How could she demand more? And yet she knew there were things he wasn’t telling her. Things she needed—and yet was afraid—to know. ‘I think I’ll use the Ladies,’ she said, and she slipped past Amelie to the sumptuous powder room off the foyer of the hotel.

Alone, she stared at her reflection in the mirror. Her face was pale, her eyes huge, her mouth a thin, pressed line. She glanced down at her pink dress, remembered how happy Ammar had been to see her in it. How happy she’d felt wearing it. Like Cinderella, only now the clock had struck midnight and it felt as if it had all turned to pumpkins and rags.

She gripped the scalloped edge of the washbasin and closed her eyes, willing to feel just a little bit of that joy. I love him. He loves me. When I’m with him, I’m the woman I want to be.

She needed to be that woman now.

She sucked in a desperate breath, let it out slowly. She knew Ammar would be wondering where she was. She needed to find him, to be with him. Just be.

She ran water into the basin and wet her wrists, dabbed her eyes and took a deep breath. Resolutely, she turned towards the door.

She’d only taken a few steps out into the deserted foyer when a voice, strained and high-pitched, stopped her in her stilettos.

‘You’re with him, aren’t you?’

Slowly Noelle turned around, saw a young woman with a pale face and angry eyes glaring at her. Her mind and body felt frozen, so she could barely form a coherent thought.

‘Who are you talking about?’ she asked, even though she knew all too well just who the woman was talking about.

‘Tannous.’ She spat his name, made it sound like a curse. ‘He ruined my father.’

Noelle stared, everything inside her still frozen. She knew, in a distant part of her brain, that she should walk away. She surely didn’t want to hear this, not from some angry stranger. Whatever truth needed telling should come from Ammar. Yet somehow she found her mouth opening, her lips forming one word. ‘How?’

‘Tannous Enterprises bought the company my father worked for,’ the woman said, every word punctuated with pain. ‘They transferred all the employees’ pensions to life insurance policies.’

Noelle shook her head, not understanding. She even felt the first flicker of relief, the realisation that the secrets she knew Ammar must be hiding might not be so bad after all.

‘The life insurance policies were worthless,’ the woman explained bitterly. ‘The company went bust, just as Tannous knew it would all along, since he’d sold it. And meanwhile he drained the pension funds. Every single employee was left with nothing, not even a legal leg to stand on.’

Noelle shook her head again. ‘But—’

‘Tannous got away with it, of course. He always does. He has a smarmy lawyer who keeps him out of trouble. And my father had nothing. He died two months ago from a heart attack, a broken man.’

Noelle closed her eyes briefly. ‘I’m very sorry for your loss,’ she whispered.

‘Are you?’ the woman challenged. ‘Ammar Tannous is completely immoral, totally corrupt, and Tannous Enterprises is rotten to the core. If he weren’t so damn rich he’d be in jail. So why are you with him?’ The question rang out through the foyer, both demand and challenge, and Noelle froze. Said nothing. The woman waited, clearly expecting an answer. Why are you with him? Noelle just shook her head. Slowly, every part of her leaden, she walked away.

The rest of the evening passed in a fog. She saw Ammar give her a sharp glance when she returned and knew she must look … something. Pale. Tired. Devastated.

Who are you? What things have you done?

Somehow she dragged herself through the endless rounds of chit-chat, meaningless conversations and laughter and gossip. She wasn’t even aware of what she was saying, much less what came out of anyone’s mouth.

I love you. I still love you.

Her heart cried out, but everything in her resisted. I can’t do this. I don’t even know this man. I don’t know what he’s done, what he’s capable of.

She told herself she’d known this, some part of her had understood, on a basic, vague level, that Ammar had done things like this. Immoral, illegal, criminal things. And she knew he was different now, wanted to be different, and yet she had never imagined how it would feel. To know, and yet not to know at the same time, just what he’d done. Who he was.

She didn’t actually speak to Ammar until they were speeding away from the hotel in his blacked-out limousine, Youssef at the wheel.

Ammar stared out of the window, every angle of his body hard and uncompromising, his face turned away from her. ‘Someone said something to you, didn’t they?’

And the fact that he knew, that there even was something to be said, made everything inside her curl into a tight, protective ball. Her vision blurred and she swallowed hard. ‘Yes.’ He didn’t answer, and Noelle forced out, ‘Don’t you want to know what it was?’

Ammar did not move his gaze from the window. ‘Not particularly.’

She looked away. The tension in the car felt thick, choking. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to think. She closed her eyes, willed Ammar to say something, anything to make it OK again. If he just touched her, turned his face towards her—

The car pulled up to her building. Ammar had spent most nights here and, although he’d never said it, Noelle thought he preferred her cosy home to the sterile luxury of his corporate penthouse. Now she slid out of the car on leaden legs, felt Ammar’s presence heavy behind her as they took the old lift with its wrought iron grille up to the sixth floor. She tried to unlock her door, but her fingers trembled around the key and it clattered to the floor.

Ammar picked it up. ‘Let me,’ he said, and unlocked the door, ushering her in first before he came in and closed it behind him. Neither of them spoke.

Noelle wished he would say something. Anything. Anything to break this terrible silence that grew worse with every endless moment it stretched on. Finally she managed to whisper, ‘Why don’t you want to know?’

Ammar stared at her impassively. ‘Why don’t I want to know what?’

‘What … what was said to me.’ His face remained expressionless and she knew he was blanking her out again, and she couldn’t bear it. ‘Aren’t you the tiniest bit curious, Ammar? Obviously it affected me. Upset me.’

‘I can see that.’

‘And so?’

‘And so what?’ He flexed one hand, the gesture dismissive. ‘Something was said, you were upset. Why do I need to know what it was?’

‘Because … because then you could explain it to me!’

‘You didn’t understand?’

She let out a choked breath. She didn’t think she’d ever seen Ammar seem so … indifferent. Even when he’d been rejecting her, there had been a storm in his eyes. Torment. She only realised now how conflicted he must have been then. He hadn’t been as coldly certain as this.

‘I did understand,’ she whispered. ‘At least, I think I did. But I just didn’t … I didn’t think …’

‘You didn’t think I’d done it?’

Miserably she stared at him. ‘I don’t know.’

Ammar stared back, his expression an assessment as his gaze roved coldly over her. ‘Well, I did do it,’ he said and she blinked.

‘I didn’t even tell you what it was.’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘How can you say that?’

He shrugged. ‘Because whatever someone’s accused me of, it’s likely I did it. And if I didn’t, then I did enough and worse. So it really doesn’t matter what it was, Noelle, because it always would have been something.’

She sank down heavily onto a chair; she felt as if her legs wouldn’t support her anymore. ‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’

‘What do you want, a laundry list?’ His breath came out in an impatient hiss. ‘In any case, I did tell you. I told you my father was a criminal; you knew I worked for him. I worked for him for nearly twenty years, Noelle. Do you really think, in all that time, I never got my hands dirty?’

She closed her eyes. ‘No.’ She didn’t think that, not any more. And she recognised that she’d let herself not think it, not think of anything about Ammar’s work, because it was easier to pretend it didn’t matter. It didn’t exist. It was at least partly her fault that it had come to this.

Ammar didn’t speak, and she opened her eyes. He still looked impassive, almost bored, and she could not escape the terrible fear that she really didn’t know him at all—because she hadn’t wanted to know.

She wished he would take her in his arms, tell her how much he’d changed. She wished that would make a difference.

All she could think now was that there was twenty years of history between them, and it felt as if it had been completely rewritten. While she’d been a doe-eyed teen, dreaming of him, he’d been out in the world, going about his business, committing God only knew what kind of crimes. Even when they’d been dating—he’d been working then, his father’s office in London. She remembered him saying something, changing the subject and she hadn’t cared. She hadn’t given it even a second of her thought.