For a moment she didn’t answer me—it felt like an eternity. I’d blown it, I got that. But she had to forgive me. Maybe I didn’t deserve it, but I needed her forgiveness. I needed her, however I could get her.
Finally she nodded. “Okay.”
I clung to that word like a lifeline.
I reached down between us, grabbing her hand. She flinched against me, but didn’t move away. We stood there for a moment, frozen. It felt strange holding her hand again after all this time. Strange, yet right.
I led her through the club, my hand pulling her along like a magnet. The crowd was thick tonight, especially for a Sunday, but I elbowed my way through.
I stopped in front of the girls’ bathroom, hesitating for a moment. Then I pushed open the door.
Behind me, Maggie protested, but I ignored her. The words had been inside of me, pushing to get out, for months now. I needed this chance to explain. Hurting her was inevitable, always had been. Hadn’t I known, even the morning after, that I couldn’t keep her?
It didn’t matter how much I wanted to.
The startled bathroom attendant gaped at us—specifically, me. “You can’t be in here.”
Despite her protests, I doubted this was the first time something like this had happened here.
Two girls washed their hands in the sink, their faces avid with interest, but besides them, the bathroom was empty. I pulled out my wallet, peeling off some cash and handing it to the attendant.
“Can you give us five minutes? Please.”
She hesitated for a moment before glancing down at the money, and then back at me. Her gaze drifted behind me, focusing on Maggie.
“Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine,” Maggie answered, her voice unusually quiet.
Something tumbled in my gut.
The woman looked back at me before nodding. “Fine. Five minutes.” She ushered the other two girls out, leaving Maggie and me alone.
Five minutes. It was a safe amount of time. Short enough to ensure I kept my hands where they belonged—off of her. Long enough for me to explain why things were the way they were.
But the second the room emptied, my words dried up. I was finally alone with her, and I didn’t have a thought in my head. Not in English, at least. French, Arabic—those words filled my head, desperate and pleading. But as hard as I tried to formulate what I wanted to say, my tongue felt thick and useless.
“You wanted your chance. You got it. Talk.” Maggie’s voice trembled slightly. “You have five minutes, and then I’m gone.”
That was the part that scared me the most. I didn’t want her to leave, but I wasn’t capable of giving her enough to make her stay.
Story of my life. Always close, but never quite good enough. Definitely not good enough for her.
It made sense to start with the most important thing I had to say.
“I fucked up. I’m sorry.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Maggie
NO SHIT.
“That’s what you have to say to me? You fucked up?” He didn’t respond. He just stood there, staring at me, his expression blank. “Seriously. That’s the best you can do?”
“Look, I know this is coming out all wrong. And I’m sorry. I know you deserve better than this. I’m trying to tell you I’m sorry. For all of it.”
“What do you mean ‘all of it?’”
“I should never have let things get out of control with you. I should have known better. You’re you and I’m me, and I should have known better.”
I didn’t even know what that meant. We were both speaking English, and yet I needed a dictionary to understand what he was saying.
“So you regret having sex with me?”
I pushed away the slice of hurt that knifed through my heart. I’d deal with that later.
Samir closed his eyes. I waited, staring at him, wishing he would just end this. It was like there was still a cord linking us, a tether tying me to him, and if I couldn’t have him, then I wanted nothing between us. I’d rather have nothing than live with the memories that made me crazy, gave me hope. They made everything worse.
“Just say it. Say you’re sorry we had sex. Say you regret it. Say you wish it never happened. Just say it and let me go.” My voice rose with each word, tears filling my eyes. I spun away from him. There was no way I was going to let Samir see me cry. No way I ever wanted him to know I was tangled up inside, that just standing here with him was gutting me.
“I can’t.”
I turned again. Samir stared back at me.
“I can’t say I’m sorry. I’m not sorry, okay? I’m not sorry I kissed you. I’m not sorry I had you in my bed. I’m not sorry that some nights I wake up from a dream of how fucking good it felt to be inside of you. I’m not sorry that every time I look at you, all I can think about is how badly I want to be inside of you again. I’m not sorry I cheated on my girlfriend. And as much as I know it makes me the biggest bastard on the planet, I’m not even sorry that I was your first. I fucking love that I was your first. The idea of someone else inside of you, of someone else getting to see your face when you come, makes me want to put my fist through a wall.”
I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t think.
“But I am sorry. I’m so sorry. Because I can’t be what you want or what you need.”
I just stared at him.
“I don’t want to hurt you. I know—I should have told you I was still with her. I should have explained it to you.”
“Why?” It was the only word that filled my head, the only word that escaped from my lips. But there were other words there, too, stuck in between my head and my heart. Words I could never say.
Why her and not me?
Story of my life.
Samir
I TENSED. “I don’t want to talk about Layla.” I hated even saying her name in Maggie’s presence.
“Why?” Maggie repeated.
Why? Because I felt like a pussy admitting my parents had picked her out for me. Because I didn’t know how to make her understand what it was like.
The American kids didn’t get it. They thought arranged relationships and family pressure were things from another century. They lived their lives like the world was theirs for the taking, like they could do anything, be anything. Sure, most of them didn’t live like we lived—they didn’t drop thousands of dollars in a nightclub or drive a Range Rover. But they chose their own majors, and they dated who they wanted to date. Their lives were their own; their futures weren’t built on a legacy that threatened to drag them down.
I was a Khouri. In Lebanon and the Middle East, that meant something. Centuries of history. I was the only child—a son. My father’s legacy would pass down to me one day, just like mine would pass down to my son. Our family’s honor rested in my hands. To have the political career they expected me to have, I had to have a political wife.
Layla was perfect. Maggie was not.
Maggie was the kind of girl my parents would grudgingly accept me screwing around with, but would never accept as my girlfriend. Maggie deserved more, and I was running out of time.
“I have responsibilities. To my family. To my country. Layla’s father and mine have been political allies for a long time. It’s a good match.”
Maggie was silent for a moment. I desperately wished I could read the emotions brewing in her beautiful brown eyes. She looked down at the floor, and I couldn’t see anything anymore.
“Do you love her?” she finally asked.
A pounding noise sounded on the other end of the door.
“Just a minute,” we shouted in unison.
Maggie looked up at me. “Well. Do you love her?” Her voice cracked a bit. “Are you happy with her?”
She asked the question like my answer mattered. But I didn’t know how to answer that one.
“No. I don’t love her.” I hesitated, torn between needing to be open with her and not wanting to be so honest that she thought I was completely irredeem
able.
“I like you, Maggie.” She flushed. “But you need to know, what you see with me is pretty much what you get. I can’t walk away from my life. I can’t promise anything other than a good time. I don’t have anything else; everything else isn’t mine to give.”
Maggie
HE WAS WARNING me off. I got it.
I didn’t know what to say anymore, didn’t know what to make of him. I couldn’t spend the whole year like this. We had the same group of friends, the same major. We went to a really small school. Even London felt small when you considered that we frequented the same places, liked the same restaurants. I couldn’t avoid him even if I wanted to.
“Okay. Let’s just forget this all happened. No one knows about it. It was a one-time thing. We feel awkward now, but I’m sure if we just give each other space, that feeling will eventually go away.”
Samir was silent for a moment. “That’s what you want?”
No. “Yeah. That’s what I want.”
“Okay.” He hesitated for a moment. “Friends?”
I wasn’t sure. Friends seemed a bit optimistic. Right now I just didn’t want to feel like I was dying inside every time I saw him.
“Something like that.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Samir
I LEANED BACK in my chair while the professor droned on. I hated the first day of school. In theory, I didn’t hate the material. I actually didn’t mind my major. I just hated the inevitability of it all.
This—me being here—was all a big joke. My grades didn’t matter. The material didn’t matter. None of it mattered. I was here for one reason—so my parents would have something to brag about to their friends. I was here because Khouris went to university. It didn’t matter how we did there, because we all joined one of the family businesses eventually. In my case, politics.
When I was a kid in Beirut, I’d told my mother I wanted to be a policeman. It wasn’t a well-thought-out career plan, but I was six and there was a TV show I really liked with a cool cop. She’d laughed and looked vaguely horrified.
That was when I’d learned I was meant to be a clone of my father.
Today, the first day of classes, felt like the start of a ticking time bomb.
“Enjoy your last summer of freedom,” my father had announced when I’d come home in May. “After graduation next summer, you’ll be married.”
I’d just turned twenty-three. I wasn’t ready to be much of a boyfriend to anyone, let alone a husband. But with Layla it wouldn’t matter. We both knew what we were getting into, understood the rules. We’d have a marriage just like our parents had—cold, indifferent, all flash and no substance.
It wasn’t Layla’s fault. She was pretty enough, nice enough. She was elegant and lovely, really. But I couldn’t talk to her like I talked to Maggie. She didn’t challenge me, didn’t fight with me. She didn’t make me laugh. She didn’t drive me crazy. She didn’t haunt my dreams or my every waking thought.
It wasn’t Layla’s fault; it was mine. I didn’t have the balls to stop this, even though I knew how wrong it was. Layla didn’t deserve to be saddled with someone like me; she just didn’t know to expect any better. She’d been raised the same way I had—we were both fulfilling the roles we’d been given despite the small, temporary reprieve.
It was a tradition of sorts. They gave you a limited amount of time. Time to go to some fancy Western university to get a piece of paper that was basically worthless for all we needed it. In my case, I got a little extra time—time to make sure my English was where my father wanted it to be. A year of studying in Boston before I went to the International School.
Every guy I knew from my world had a job waiting for him when he got back home. We had a few years to blow off steam, to party, to see the world, but when time was up, we were expected to go back to being the person they wanted us to be, to thinking the way they wanted us to think, to playing by their rules. On graduation day, we were supposed to flip a switch and forget everything, leaving the lives we’d built behind us like they were nothing.
Maybe I should have been grateful for the time I’d had. Maybe I was lucky I’d gotten that at all. But now, selfishly, impossibly, I wanted more. I had nine months of freedom left, and there was only one person I wanted to spend them with.
Maggie
“HOW WAS YOUR first day?” Michael asked. He sat down across from me at the dinner table, tray in hand. He was one of my closest friends—and my only American friend in London.
“It was good. Classes were interesting. No major disasters. You?”
“Boring as hell.” He grimaced, poking at his food. “What is this? Is it just me, or has the food gotten even worse this year?”
I stared at the lumpy mess on my plate. It was supposed to be some kind of Indian food. Not so much. The cafeteria food was a huge disappointment for a school as fancy as the International School.
“It’s definitely worse,” Fleur announced, sinking down into the seat next to mine.
“Did you manage to make it to any of your classes today?” I teased. When I’d left for mine this morning, she’d been curled up in bed, fast asleep.
Fleur rolled her eyes. “Yes, Mom. I went to half of them.”
“Didn’t you only have two?” Michael interjected.
“Yes. So what?”
I shook my head, affection and exasperation filling me. “So technically you only made it to one class.”
“Or I only skipped one,” Fleur countered. “I’m improving.”
I laughed. “True. I guess it’s a matter of perspective.”
“What’s a matter of perspective?”
Heat rolled over me. Do not look up. Do not look up.
Samir stood over me, a smile on his face. Our gazes held for a moment before he sat down next to Michael, directly across from me. I stared down at my plate like it was the most interesting thing in the world.
Do not look up.
I hated my reaction to him, hated that he made me this uncomfortable. I was entirely too self-aware, hyper-conscious of the fact that all of my lipstick had rubbed off and my hair was frizzing. I felt hot and edgy and flustered and off-balance.
“What did I miss?”
Thankfully Fleur answered for all of us. “Maggie and Michael giving me shit over my attendance—or lack thereof—for the first day of classes.”
Samir laughed. “Nice to see little has changed since last year.”
Bad choice of words. This time I did look at him. And glare. Apparently he was right. Little had changed. He still had a girlfriend. In the light of sobriety, I was still kind of pissed. I might have agreed to put things behind us, but that didn’t mean I had to like it. Or him.
“How was your day?”
I mean, why did he have to sit with us? Didn’t he have other friends? Where was Omar? Where was the rest of his Arab posse? If we were going to do “just friends,” I needed a break. He needed to disappear, just for a little while, long enough for me to get my head on straight.
“Maggie?”
My head jerked up. Samir shot me a quizzical look. “I asked how your day was.”
I blinked. Why didn’t he just announce to the entire table that we’d boned? Samir didn’t ask people how their day was, and everyone knew it.
“Fine.” My voice came back as an awkward squeak. “It was fine.”
“Any hot guys in your classes?” Fleur asked, thankfully oblivious to the undercurrent of nerves and awkwardness swirling around the table.
My face heated. “Not really. There aren’t exactly any hot guys in the International Relations department.”
“Really? Not a single one?” Samir drawled.
We had the same major. It was petty of me, but I couldn’t resist the urge to take a jab at him.
“Nope. None whatsoever.” I took a sip from my drink, annoyance filling me. Fuck him. “It’s a shame, really. I’ve heard the finance guys are pretty hot. Maybe I should take some finance classes.” I flashed a s
mile that was all teeth and no joy.
Fleur grinned. “The finance guys are pretty fine.”
I leaned forward, some perverse part of me wanting to screw with Samir. “Have you seen Alessandro Marin yet? He looks amazing this year. I saw him in the hall and he was wearing this gray shirt and jeans. His body—”
Samir stood up, pushing back from the table and lifting his tray. A scowl marred his handsome face.
Fleur frowned. “Where are you going?”
“Out. The food sucks tonight.” He shot me a look that said everything. He was pissed, and he definitely knew what I was doing.
I flinched, staring after his retreating back, a sinking feeling in my gut. I hadn’t lied when I’d said I wanted things to be normal between us. But everything felt so messed up. I was angry, and I’d never had much success resisting the urge to screw with him. But I also missed him. I couldn’t imagine my sophomore year without Samir in it. Somehow we needed to find a way to get past this thing between us. I needed to get to a point where we could be in the same room together without driving each other nuts.
“Speaking of guys—what’s the deal with George?” Fleur asked.
I blinked, tearing my gaze away from Samir. “Excuse me?”
“George. The residence life guy. The one who brought me flowers in the hospital. Aren’t you friends with him?”
I felt like my brain was struggling to keep up with the conversation. “Yeah. He’s nice. Why?”
“I don’t think he likes me very much,” Fleur announced.
I’d seen the way George looked at Fleur, so I wasn’t so sure about that. “Why?”
“I ran into him today and I said hi. He looked at me like I had two heads. It was totally weird.”
Michael snorted. “At least one guy is immune to your charms.”
“Only you, baby, and that’s because you play for the other team.”
Michael laughed. “True. But if I were straight, I’d definitely try to get in your pants.”
Fleur blew him a kiss. “That’s because you have exquisite taste.” She turned her attention back to me. “Seriously though, what do you think his problem is? It was kind of rude.”
London Falling Page 3
