An Illusion of Trust (Sequel to The Brevity of Roses) (2 page)

Aza ignores him. "Nice way to steal Jalal and Renee's thunder tonight, Shadi."

Nasrin stands. "No more talk about my family moving away," she says. "I want to celebrate the
good
news. Who would like a cup of tea?" She heads toward the kitchen, a clear signal she expects us all to follow. And we do.

Jalal winks at me and then leans close. "Just one cup," he whispers.

Wrapped in the warmth of afterglow, we lay on our sides, skin against skin. I stare at the monitor as though I'm watching Adam rather than listening for him. Jalal plays with my hair, smoothing it down over my shoulder, measuring it against the length of my arm. It's my best feature, he told me once. I think he would take it as a personal offense if I ever cut off more than an inch.

So, I guess we're moving to Coelho—and not just the three of us. Shadi jumped in with the offer for Aza to move with us so quickly I'm wondering if that's why only she and Aza hung around. Was this move something they were going to propose anyway? That would explain Shadi's told-you-so look. When Aza lived in Meredith's house two summers ago, while she went through her divorce, she loved taking care of Meredith's rose garden. She'll be happy there again.

I love Azadeh. How could I not? For the first few weeks after I met Jalal and Aza, I thought they were twins because they were so close, so much alike. Dreading the separation, Aza confided her apprehension about Ryan going to school in San Luis Obispo with his cousin Jason, but she's said nothing to me about a problem with Kristen serious enough to cause her to move to California too. I'm surprised Jalal doesn't know what's up, though. "What do you think Shadi meant about Kristen?"

"Aza has mentioned only normal teenage problems with Kristen." He brushes my hair off my shoulder and caresses the bare skin with his lips. "I will ask her more tomorrow," he says between kisses.

"Well, it must be serious, if she needs to move her daughter out of state." Though I'm concerned about Aza and Kristen, I'm also trying to ease into asking Jalal about his decision to move back to Meredith's house.

"How would you feel about living there?" he asks.

My mouth drops open. Again with the sixth sense. "The house in Coelho?"

"Yes."

I don't really know how I feel. I never thought he'd want to live there again. "It's a beautiful place, Jalal … but I worry about the pool … with Adam."

"We can do something about that." He cups my breast, brushing his thumb against my nipple, and my body responds, low and deep.

"How—" I gasp and then still the distraction of his hand's exploration. "How do
you
feel about living there again?"

"I feel good. It feels right. It is just a house, not a monument." He nuzzles my hair further aside and kisses the back of my neck. "What I said tonight was not spontaneous. I have been thinking about moving for a few months. I have changed."
Kiss
. "You strengthen me, sweet love."
Kiss
. "You make me whole."

I turn to face him. "Oh yes. I feel that … again."

"Why, Mrs. Vaziri, you have a dirty mind. I said whole, not hard, but now that you mention it …" He rolls to his back, pulling me on top of him.

Adam fell asleep while we waited to board the plane for the flight home. As we walk down the jetway and enter the plane, Jalal continues the near silence he kept during the ride to the airport and check-in. He motions for me to take the window seat and hands me the baby's bag but keeps the baby. Jalal's preoccupation makes me nervous. Maybe he's upset with me. Every time we visit his family I worry that I'll do or say something to embarrass him. They all loved Meredith. It's not easy following in her wake.

Jalal sits down beside me, holding a limp Adam in the air where he hangs for the few seconds it takes me to fasten Jalal's seat belt. While I push the bag and my purse under the seat and secure my seat belt, he settles the baby back against his left shoulder. I can't stand his silence any longer. "What are you thinking about?"

"Are you honestly in agreement with Aza moving in with us?" he asks without hesitation, as though we're continuing a briefly interrupted conversation. "She could still move to Coelho and buy a house of her own."

"Of course I don't mind. You know I love her and I'll be glad to have the extra help when the baby comes." I punctuate my statement by kissing Adam's head. "Besides, the house is huge. It's not like we'll be living on top of each other."

"I am not convinced she told us the whole story about Kristen," he says. "I understand Aza wants to get her away from the 'gang kids', but moving out of state seems a drastic solution."

"Maybe that's the point. Maybe Kristen was too involved with one particular boy."

"Oh." He's quiet for a moment. "Man, she is only fifteen."

I lay my hand on his. "She'll get a new start in Coelho."

Jalal nods. For a couple of minutes, he casts vacant eyes in the direction of his knees while he draws circles on Adam's back with his fingertips. I watch the fuel truck pull away below us. I fear Jalal is slipping into one of his black moods. As a distraction, though I already know his answer, I open my mouth to ask if he thinks we should just drive on home after we land at LAX tonight, but he speaks first.

"I think we should renovate the apartment above the garage for them."

I could play it straight, but sometimes it's just too much fun to mess with him. "The servant's quarters, you mean?" There it is: the little quirk of his mouth that tells me I've temporarily dispelled any darkness.

"I believe a remark like that qualifies you as an anti-snob, Renee."

"And a remark like that qualifies you as a smartass."

He shakes his head, sighing. "Right in your innocent son's ear." He makes a show of shifting Adam to his right shoulder, away from me. "You are determined to corrupt this child."

"Like I corrupted you?"

"Yes, you evil bitch."

"Excuse me?"

The woman's voice startles Jalal. I smother a laugh as he apologizes to the offended flight attendant standing beside him. With Adam blocking his peripheral vision, he hadn't noticed her approach to take our drink orders. He orders a scotch for himself but only water for me.

"I want a Coke," I tell him.

"She will have a Perrier," he says to the attendant, who now looks confused but nods and moves on. He flashes me a triumphant grin.

"Are you
kidding
me?"

He cocks a brow. "Serves you right for not telling me she was there."

"How was I supposed to know you were going to call me such a thing? Isn't that one of the words on your forbidden list?"

"Whatever happened to wives who honor their husbands with silence?"

"Misogynist judges sentenced them to prison for murdering their prick husbands."

His other brow rises to join the first. "I love you," he says quickly.

"Damn right you do."

"Your language is hopeless."

"Yeah, but you love me anyway." I take the baby, so Jalal can calm his flight jitters with his drink. Adam's eyelids flutter during the transfer. As I rock him back to sleep, I resume the conversation about the proposed renovation. "I think giving Aza and Kristen their own space is best. How much will that cost, do you think?"

"That is not something you need to be concerned with. I will call tomorrow for new estimates."

"Call who? And what do you mean
new
estimates?"

"I already have a few for remodel—" He grimaces and then sighs. "Estimates for remodeling the master suite. It was going to be a surprise, a gift to you."

A gift for me or so nothing in that room will remind him of Meredith? I hide my suspicion behind a smile. "Well then, thank you." I crook my arm through his and lean my head against his shoulder. "But you should start work on Aza's apartment first. We'll be fine in Bahía for a while longer."

A
dam is overly tired when Jalal brings him back from their beach walk, so it takes me longer than usual to settle him down for his nap. When he finally falls asleep, I turn on the monitor and creep out of his room. Jalal, having already cleaned up from lunch, sits at the kitchen table with the blueprints to the Coelho house spread out before him. In the two weeks since we got back from Seattle, he's decided to do more than just remodel our bedroom and renovate the apartment for Aza and Kristen. I listen to his plans and try not to think about how much it will cost. That's a habit I can't break even though Jalal's inheritance and investments make money worries a thing of my past.

I open the fridge and reach for a Coke before remembering I've already drunk my one-a-day allotment. "Crap." I glance at Jalal. He pretends he wasn't watching me, but the pursing of his mouth is a dead giveaway he's holding back a smile.

"Problem?" he asks.

I grab a bottle of water and slump down at the table. He's only reinforcing the obstetrician's restrictions. It pisses me off anyway. "Why is it I'm allowed to drink all the tea I want, but you limit my coffee and Coke? Tea has caffeine too."

"My mother drank tea through seven pregnancies and we all turned out fine."

"You think so?"

"Well … true, some of us are superior to the others."

"Yeah, it's unfortunate she didn't cut down when she was pregnant with you." I emphasize the last word with a kick to his shin, but as usual my feet are bare, so I'm sure it hurts me more than him.

Jalal shakes his head wearily, but again he's trying not to smile. Good to know my sacrifice is a source of amusement to him. We sit in silence for a few minutes while I grumpily sip water and he looks at the plans. He pulls out another blueprint from the pile and studies it for a moment before he frowns. "Interesting," he says.

"What is?"

"According to these old blueprints, the house originally had a small, one-room building behind it."

"Where the swimming pool is now?"

"Yes. Well, a few feet further back. STUDIO is how it's labeled here."

"An artist's studio?"

"I suppose."

"Did Meredith tear it down?"

"No, the pool was there when she bought the house."

"How do you know?"

He picks up my bottle and takes a drink. "Because the pool was Stephen's deciding factor on buying the house."

Stephen, Meredith's first husband, a man neither of us ever met, is a part of our life because he was part of Meredith's life. Talking about her is always a risk. I no longer worry about Jalal drowning in those dark waters. Still, sometimes just a stray comment sparks a memory and he drifts away from me for a while. True, those drifts have decreased, in both length and frequency, during the two years I've known him. But what if that's only because we've built a new life together here in Bahía de Sueños? What if, by moving into the Coelho house, the place he most associates with Meredith, he heads straight back into the undertow? "Speaking of the pool …"

Jalal stretches and leans back in his chair. "The stone wall will be finished before we move in. Adam would have to fly to get to the pool on his own and the last time I checked, he was still wingless."

I force a smile. "I know you think I worry too much."

"No." He reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze. "I shared your concern about the pool. But
some
of your worries … this thing about Adam sleeping with us—"

"Oh," I say. "Show me again. Which will be Adam's room?"

"Renee …"

I press my finger on the blueprints. "Is it this one?"

He sighs. "Yes."

I look closer. "Where will you put the door?"

"The door is there." Jalal slides my finger an inch to the right.

"No, not the door to the hallway. Where will the door from his room to ours be?"

"Renee, I promise we will have a state of the art monitoring system. If Adam wiggles a toe, you will hear it. If he so much as blinks, probably."

I jab at the blueprints. "There has to be a door between our rooms. No. Wait. Which room will be the baby's?"

"Well, we both know the baby will
sleep
in our room for a year—at least. But you could decorate the room next to Adam's as the nursery."

For a moment, I stare at the blueprints and then fear slams me. "This won't work. That house is too big. The rooms are too far apart. We can't live there, Jalal."

He looks at the ceiling and blows out a breath.

"I'm sorry," I say. "I should have paid closer attention before you started—"

"We
are
moving, Renee." He stands and pulls me into his arms. "Beginning tomorrow, you will go with me every day to the house and practice sprinting down the hall from our bedroom to the nursery, so when I finally convince you to let the baby sleep there, you can break the sound barrier every time you hear a peep on the monitor." He tilts my chin up so our eyes meet. "Or … I will tell Ben to install a doorway from our room to Adam's. The nursery is already connected to his through their bathroom. Straight shot."

I hug him. He tries so hard to allay my fears. "Thank you for putting up with my craziness."

"I love your craziness." He slides his hands down to cup my ass and presses me closer. "How long do we have before Adam wakes up, Mrs. Vaziri?"