The Italian restaurant was brightly lit, furbished with a lot of red fabrics, gold ornaments, and art on the wall had a distinct grape motif. The entire place, though in the middle of what would be considered rush hour, was completely empty. Walid suspected the man sitting across from him had paid the owner to keep it that way for the duration of their meeting. No noise would be the excuse. No witnesses would be the truth. Walid’s men were told to wait outside, as were Mr. Michaels.
During the course of the meal, however, three of Michaels’ men wandered in as causal as anything. They sat at tables, ate some pasta and bread, and seemed to have no interest whatsoever in what was going on. This, of course, was all a terrible ruse. These men either assumed Walid to be a complete idiot, or they were terrible tacticians. The truth, Walid suspected, was somewhere in the middle.
As Jacob Michaels paused in his current rant about the troubles with the American economy and how times were tough on everyone, Walid took it upon himself to make his position known. All of this was meant to intimidate him, to make him feel as though he existed on this planet under their permission. Permission which, at the snap of a finger, could be revoked. It was meant to fill him with fear.
“My father felt that for his children to take on his dynasty,” Walid said as he lifted his wine glass and took a sip, “it would be prudent to teach them in the ways of economy, customs, and war.”
“A wise man,” Michaels said, interlocking his fingers atop his impressive gut.
“Indeed. In this pursuit, we were taught from some of the finest tutors around the world. You may not know this, but I am fluent, spoken and written, in Russian, Mandarin as well as Cantonese, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and of course English.”
“Is your accent this bad in all those languages, too?” one of the thugs asked from his table. The other two henchmen chuckled, but went back to their meal.
Walid made no outward show that he had heard them, though mentally noted which had spoken, and went on. “In all of those languages, in all of my schooling, I had never realized that you Americans had so many ways to say the word bribe.”
This ruffled feathers. The henchmen shot their heads up and looked to their boss. The fat man’s lips curled and he hunched his shoulders as if trying to adjust his jacket without grabbing the lapel.
“Look here Mr., uh…”
“Sheikh,” Walid said and stood. The men all around him stood as well, drawing their guns but keeping them pointed down. “I am a sheikh. I am your sheikh. You’ll receive no such donations from me. No fines. No permits. I know the law of your country. My lawyer assists me in this. You and your partners stick to the business you know best, allow me to do mine without interference, and I promise you all will go smoothly for everyone.”
Michaels looked amused. He had the smirk of a man who sat in a seat with three guns pointed at his enemy. It would be the look he died wearing. “This lawyer, a Miss Lacey. Nice lady. Saw her on TV once. She, uh, she’s got a real fire in her gut, eh? How’d you like it if we set an actual fire to that pretty little gut of hers?”
“I was willing to let you live despite your insults,” Walid said. “But you threatened a woman with which I’ve become particularly fond. This I cannot forgive.”
Michaels’ smirk grew wider. “You, uh, you talk as though you’ve got a dog in this fight. The way I seein’ it, you got nothin’, and I got uh, well, one, two, three guns.”
“Two,” Walid said.
“Huh?”
“You have two guns.”
Michaels looked over, and saw one of his men missing.
“Now it’s one.”
Another man gone.
Michaels panted as he shot up from his seat, backing away from Walid, his head swiveling all around him. Walid stepped onto the table, crushing a wine glass under the soul of his leather loafer.
“Your men outside have also been removed.” The third henchman disappeared, all without a shot being fired. “Your men inside are now gone.”
Michaels continued to back away, trying to push chairs in Walid’s way as he dropped from the table and continued to approach him. “How are you doing this? How is this possible?”
Walid cracked his knuckles menacingly. “As I said, I am your sheikh. All is within my control.”
Michaels shook his head and held a hand out in front of him. It was clear this was a man that always had others do his dirty work for him. Such clean hands were useless for defense.
“You’ll only piss him off. He doesn’t care if I die, he only cares that business is conducted according to his wishes, eh? He’ll kill everyone you care about before taking you out.”
“Piss off whom?” Walid asked.
“The Sheikh.”
Walid narrowed his eyes, intrigued. This would need further investigation. He was interested, but not enough to let Michaels live unscathed.
ELEVEN
Lacy took a deep breath as another wave of nausea swept over her. She hated coming in to work when she was sick, but this wasn’t going away and she had too much to do. Of course, she suspected that was the problem.
All her life she always held her stress in her gut. Some people had tight shoulders, some developed pressure headaches. For Lacy, it was always her stomach. When she was too stressed with life, it always hit her right away.
Nausea, vomiting, it was never a happy time. After her night with Walid, things were good for a little bit. He took her to dinner, and always seemed happy to see her. Then after some business meeting he started growing distant. She remembered that one meeting because when she asked about it, he had become evasive with his answers. Walid was not a man to lie, so instead he simply didn’t answer.
That had been the first time she had become truly worried for him since the attack on his hotel room that one day. Her worry for his safety had haunted her all night until he called her the next day regarding some paperwork. It had been a sleepless night, and instead of being reassured by his call, his cool tone had only made her more concerned. It was the day everything changed with them.
She’d been scorned by exes before. Harsh words, irreverent treatment, cold-shoulders were all the norm. Not Walid. He was too classy for that. He was as polite as ever, and when they spoke she never felt that he didn’t like her. Not exactly. There was definitely a shut-off for him, though. She’d lost guys before, but nothing like Walid. He had touched some nerve inside of her, treated her too well to be easily forgotten.
With her head in a tailspin from their sudden and inexplicable break-up, her workload seemed to double almost overnight. Try as she would to throw herself into her work, she found it harder and harder to focus with every passing day.
Then, just like clockwork, her stomach started to bother her. All she wanted was to go home, slip into her pjs and watch TV on her comfy couch. But that wouldn’t solve anything. If she wanted to feel better, she had to tough it out and get through it.
“You okay?” Linda asked.
Lacy blinked her eyes to try and clear her vision. “Not feeling the best.”
“You’ve been sick for a little bit now, huh?”
Linda came and set down Lacy’s afternoon coffee. The smell of it struck like a chemical weapon, and Lacy clapped a hand over her face both to block the smell and to try to keep from vomiting everywhere. Unable to speak, she frantically waved a hand at the cup, as if shooing away a yapping dog. Linda, startled, jumped into action and snatched the cup away. She took it out of the office and came back in empty handed. Lacy picked up a manila folder and started fanning the air with gusto.
It took a few minutes for the coffee smell to dissipate enough for Lacy to breathe again. Linda held a hand to her chest, and the other out to Lacy.
“Are you good? Can I get you anything? Water?”
Lacy shook her head quickly and took another cleansing breath to calm her stomach. It wasn’t wanting to listen.
“I have never seen you react like that to coffee.”
“T
hat’s because I’ve never had a reaction like that to coffee. I skipped this morning’s because I just wasn’t feeling like it.”
“For the longest time I thought your blood was made up of coffee.” Linda said. Then sitting in Lacy’s spare office chair, she gave a small laugh and jokingly said, “Maybe you’re pregnant.”
Lacy gave Linda a polite smile and a look that said all on its own “That’s not funny.” Then she stopped and thought about it. She must’ve had an expression on her face she wasn’t aware of, because Linda perked up.
“Are you serious?”
Lacy shook her head. “I don’t know. I mean, I don’t think so?”
“You don’t think so? So there’s a chance?”
“Stop. You’re freaking me out.”
Linda shot up from the chair. “I’m freaking you out?”
Lacy bit down on her thumbnail and frantically started trying to do math from when she’d last had sex. Three weeks. His name popped into her mind and she recalled that they hadn’t used a condom. She squeezed her eyes closed.
“Oh no,” Linda said.
“Do you know who?”
“Linda!”
“Oh my God, I’m so sorry. That’s rude to ask. Of course you know.”
Lacy looked up to see Linda looking at her dubiously. “Yes, Linda, I know who the father is.”
Lacy immediately waved her hands in front of her as if she could take back those words. “Would be! Not is. I don’t know if I am.”
“What are you going to do if you are?”
“Linda, go away. You have work to do. DO it.”
Linda jumped at Lacy’s tone and ran from the room. As the long, silent seconds ticked by, Lacy’s initial panic settled. Linda’s reaction had fed into Lacy’s paranoid flames, but the truth settled in as the haze faded. Lacy smiled.
If she was pregnant, it could only be Walid’s. He was the only man she’d been with in the last year and a half. If she was to have a baby, she was glad it would be by a man that was as kind and powerful as him. That would mean the baby would have a great start in life, and she knew he’d want to be a part of their lives.
He wasn’t the kind of man to desert family. A small, hopeful voice suggested that maybe, just maybe this would even bring him back around.
TWELVE
The old bar was the worst thing Walid had seen since arriving in America. The support beams above were cracked, two of them having broken entirely and now sat as 45 degree ramps from the floor up to the ceiling. The smell of mold and rot filled the stale air. The traditional mirror behind the bar where the liquor is normally displayed was nothing but a foggy, cracked mockery. The wood of the bar itself was warped and covered in a thick, sticky layer of dust. It had been condemned years ago, but the price point was too expensive for anyone to come in and fix it up.
The foundation was shot, the walls were useless. Walid wasn’t even sure walking through the building was safe as the gentle steps might have been enough to bring the whole thing down. Still, to demolish a building required permits, money, paperwork, and time. Resources no casual business owner had.
For Walid and his current venture, however, the location was prime. It was directly in the center of his target demographic. The cost to demolish and build a new structure would have been prohibitive were he any other person. Fortunately, he wasn’t anyone else. He was Walid, Sheikh of New York.
“You can see where they tried to put in a wider dining area, over there,” their guide said as he stepped over a toppled chair. The lights didn’t work, and only bars of sun streaked across the inside from the broken slats and open windows.
“Yes, I see,” Walid said.
The smell of this place was surely in the fabrics of his suit already. It would never wash out. He’d have to burn his clothes after. The saturation of the building’s rot was finally breaking through Walid’s mental barrier.
“I believe I’ve seen enough. I’ll have my lawyer draw up the necessary paperwork.”
The man paused, confused. “Don’t you want to see the dry storage?”
“I have no wish to be rude, and you have my sincerest apologies if I seem in any way dismissive. Truthfully, though, I see not how it matters as I am to bring the entire building down. Bathrooms, dry storage, it will all be rubble.”
“Yeah,” the man said, his eyes flickering toward the back, then to Walid again. “I suppose.”
“You seem ill at ease.”
“What?” The man’s tongue flicked out over his lips like a snake. “No, I just haven’t—“
Walid held up a hand. “If this is an attempt on my life, I assure you that you will be the first to die. Your only escape is honesty.”
The man’s jaw worked side to side as he fought his emotions. After only a moment’s indecision, tears welled in his eyes and his hands clasped together. “Please, they have my wife.”
Walid’s men had weapons in hand in a heartbeat, and the man flinched at the speed of it. Walid held up his hand “I said honesty would be your salvation. I meant it. Leave.”
“But, my wife…”
Walid looked the man in the eye. “She is your concern. Not mine. See to it.”
The man looked stricken and lost, but started to move away from what he was sure to be the fight. Rage at the man’s betrayal warred with his pity over his plight. Not everyone was a warrior. Not every man was raised to be a killer.
“Wait,” he said softly.
In the deathly silence of that place, his voice carried as far as it needed to. The man turned, almost hopeful.
“Wait for me outside. I will take your information and attempt to find your wife.”
The purest joy filled the man’s face, but before he could say anything, Walid held a hand up to silence him and turned back toward dry storage.
Walid’s guard drew close to him. “What shall we do?” one whispered.
“There is a trap, of this we can be sure, but of what nature there is no way to know.” Walid narrowed his eyes in thought.
The boldest of his guards rolled his shoulders. “Sometimes the best way to defeat a trap is to trip it.”
“Or,” Walid said and smiled, “encase it in a trap of your own.”
Silent as death, Walid and his men snuck out of the building, barred every door shut save one. Then, with the would-be assailants inside, they lit it aflame.
The man was dutifully waiting for him on the sidewalk, staring in shock at the black plume of smoke rising from his establishment.
“Those who took your wife,” Walid said, calling the man’s attention to him. “Who is it?”
“I don’t know,” the man said. “I never spoke with him. His men only ever called him The Sheikh.”
Walid sneered and looked away. This Sheikh was becoming quite the thorn. Walid’s phone rang in his pocket. He checked the display and saw it was Lacy. A splinter in his heart stung at the sight of her name, especially on the cusp of hearing how this Sheikh took the man’s wife to use him.
He knew that just by speaking with her he put her in danger. Yet, even as he knew it, he couldn’t stop himself from answering the call. The man’s worry for his wife only fanned Walid’s own wild concerns for the woman that had won his heart.
“Hi,” she said, her voice honey to his ears. She sounded happy. “Are you busy?”
“I…” Walid looked up as the building fire grew quickly, the rotten wood flashing up on the far side. “Just got out of a meeting. I have a moment.”
“Great. I wanted to talk. Where are you right now? There’s a lot of background noise.”
The men inside panicked, trying every door, desperate to find some way to escape. The windows were boarded up. Only one option was left, and that was the front door. As they charged out, looking to save their lives, Walid’s men pounced on them like wild dogs, beating them senseless. Walid looked around as the faint cries of the men reached him. Walid went to his car and climbed inside. The doors closed, the roar of the fire was muted.
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br /> “Oh,” she said, ”that’s better. So, what’s up?”
Walid bit his upper lip for a moment. “You called me.”
“I know, but we haven’t really talked. I just wanted to say hi, ya know, before just diving into—“
“Lacy, I appreciate what you’re saying, but I only have a few minutes. I’d prefer not to waste them if there was something you wanted to discuss.”
Walid’s men climbed into their cars. As his man started the car, he looked back to Walid and gave a nod. Walid gave a small nod back and motioned for him to drive.
“I gotcha,” Lacy said on the other end, and he could tell she was disappointed that he wasn’t willing to chitchat. “Okay, fine. You don’t want to talk. Well, I’ll just tell you then. So, okay, well…” He heard her sigh. “Damnit.”
“What is it?” he asked.
“It would’ve been easier if you were nice.”
“It was not my intention to be rude. I’m just short on time. Perhaps we can speak later.”
“We both know later won’t happen.”
Walid closed his eyes and was grateful she couldn’t see his expression. She wasn’t wrong.
“I’m pregnant.”
SHEIKH'S SURPRISE BABY: A Sheikh Romance Page 75
