You call this fate?

Chapter 49

I looked beautiful. I felt like a dream.

And I was hyperventilating.

Having had sent Tasha away on the pretext of getting me something to eat, I now placed my arms on my stomach and bent forward, breathing through my nose.

What was I doing? What if this was not the right thing to do? What if it doesn’t work? What if this was too soon—which it was! What if he came to this realisation moments before the ceremony and left me standing in the middle of the room, a bride with no groom to wed?

I knew Alexander wouldn’t do it. I knew he did in fact—astonishing as it was—love me. He had done nothing but show me that the last couple of months. We connected. We were two extensions of the same thing. I knew him.

And yet the doubts wouldn’t go away. I couldn’t even comprehend as to why I doubted anything in the first place; the arguments and counterarguments seemed to be in my head just for the sake of being there.

Something creaked behind me.

I closed my eyes and proceeded to exhale through my mouth.

Cool air touched my heated skin. Thud.

My eyes flew open.

There was a window in the room, directly behind me and facing the darkened front yard of Clara’s house. With the advance of night—I wanted my wedding to be under the stars—Tasha had closed it so as not to let the chill air in. It was fastened by a simple latch, nothing too complex. Very easy to be tampered with from the inside…or outside.

I lifted my head. The mirror showed bellowing velvet curtain. And an open window.

I shot off the stool, turning just in time to see the dark figure crouching on the balcony step on the windowsill. Before my mouth could open and a shout emerge, a smooth barrelled gun was pointed right at my head.

“Now, now, darling, don’t do that,” the man said, clicking his tongue as he dropped onto the blood red carpet. “Is that any way to greet an old friend?”  

His face was a mess, a collection of dirt and bruises. The injuries looked new, as if he had been through hell itself to get here. The previously beautiful dark brown hair lay in a tattered mess, a bird’s nest left too long untouched and uncared for. His clothes hung in rags over thin shoulders and frail hips, their make and design almost cartoonish-ly different from what I had last seen him in.

“Zayn,” I said, heart in my throat. I couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe. “You haven’t been taking care of yourself.”

My former captor grinned, eyes flashing, showing teeth yellowed at the roots. “Zara,” he said, cupping his right hand and bringing the fingers lightly to his forehead—the greeting of nawabs. “It’s been a rough few months, that’s all.”

The back of my thighs smacked against the dressing table—I hadn’t even realised I was stepping back. “I see.”  

Zayn’s face, the beautiful angelic face of a demon, contorted in a manic grin. “You are getting married, I see.” He inclined the gun. “My invitation must have gotten lost in the mail.”

“Most likely.” I swallowed. “We didn’t know you were still in the country.”

He took a step forward. “But where was I going to go, my sweet dear?” His eyes hardened with so much hatred I felt bile rise in my throat. “The two of you did everything to humiliate me. Left me tied up like a sack of potatoes. You think Frank was going to just bring me back into the fold? He would have killed me the moment he saw me. I had nowhere else to go.”