32. Chapter 32
Had my head not been spinning with the events of the last ten minutes, I would have thoroughly enjoyed this walk-in closet. Filled with dresses, pants, blouses, shirts, shoes, handbags, whatever a girl's heart desired or a girl needed to dress was here. And of the finest designer quality. As it was, though, my head swam with words and emotions, and I barely noticed the Gucci tag on the dress I threw over myself. For a moment there, I had feared he didn't want me anymore, but with his next words, he made me sure again why I had fallen so fast and hard for him. This man would sacrifice himself for my happiness. He would rather suffer without me than watch me make a wrong decision.
What kind of man did that?
A khadahr , my mind provided, and I sighed. I would be a fool not to choose him. Besides the little fact that I didn't think my heart could bear a separation from him. Even now, knowing I would go meet my family alone made me feel anxious, especially after what we had just talked about.
"You're not going to do anything foolish while I'm gone, are you?" I asked him while brushing my hair, carefully watching his expression in the mirror.
"What do you mean?" He looked confused.
"Like going through the portal without me," I accused.
He shook his head. "I would never do that to you, Rachel."
I wagged the brush at him. "You better not because otherwise, I'm just gonna follow you with this…" I wagged the brush some more.
"A fearsome weapon," he agreed with a slight smile, curving his lips in a way that made my heart stumble.
I pinned my still-wet hair into a ponytail, and foregoing the makeup, I slipped into a pair of low heels.
"You look stunning," Ghan-Zahr said. "My Carama."
I pressed myself against him in near desperation. "Don't leave me."
He lifted my chin with his thumb, his dark eyes smoldered. "Never. I will never leave you, Rachel. I love you."
This was all so new to me. I had never loved a man before like I did him. The need to cling to him, to not let him out of my sight, was nearly crushing me.
"Your family is waiting," he whispered, reminding me. "I'll be here, Rachel. I swear on Koronae, I won't leave you."
I had to believe him. Had to trust him. He had never given me a reason not to. I was just being a silly nilly. That was all.
I didn't even know where this new insecurity came from. I had never experienced anything like this before. I had always been a very confident person. I really needed to get a grip here. I took a deep, shuddering breath and started feeling a little better.
"I love you too." I kissed him one last time, and he took me to the elevator. We stood there, holding hands, staring at each other like the love-besotted fools we were until the elevator dinged.
Gently, he pushed me in. "I'm looking forward to meeting your family later."
"I love you," I called as the doors closed.
"I love you too," came the muted answer, and the cab began taking me down. I shook my head to get it to change gears. My family. My family was here. Excitement grew inside me and slowly pushed all my dark forebodings down.
They were here, and I was eager to see them. I was probably not as eager as they were to see me, but still. I allowed myself to speculate what it would have been like for them. Watching me being abducted by an alien, taken to an alien planet? They must have feared the worst. Ghan-Zahr was right, though. My father would have probably tried to kill him on sight. It was better for me to talk to them first.
Men with guns stood by the elevator doors. They should have worried me, but I was starting to get used to armed men. Swords or guns.
The doors opened, and there they sat. My brother Brian and his wife, Cara, and my sisters, Nat and Pattie. My parents stood by a window; my mom was wringing her hands, and my father had his arms around her.
"Mom, Dad," I cried, flying forward into their outstretched arms.
"Sis," my sisters were on their feet in an instant while Brian and Cara stood back to give the others time to greet me first.
I hadn't realized how much I had missed them until I felt my dad's strong arms around me and my mother's warm lips on my cheek. "Sweetheart, we missed you so much!"
"Wow, what an adventure"." Brian and Cara finally moved in. I let go of my parents and sisters to embrace them, one unit as usual. They had been like this since kindergarten. Inseparable. At times, I had been jealous of their love for each other, wishing I would find something like what they had, but that feeling was gone, I realized.
I didn't have time to dwell on it as my family peppered me with questions.
"Are you all right?"
"Did they hurt you?"
"What happened?"
"When we watched you taken away like that, we didn't think we would ever see you again," my mom sniffed, and I hugged her to dispel the threatening tears.
"It was very scary at first," I amended.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I have prepared a room for you that will offer more privacy," Cheryl interrupted. "Please, it's right this way." She held out one arm, pointing to a set of doors.
Dad put his arm around me, and Mom took my hand. Amused, I watched Brian and Cara walk hand in hand ahead of us.
When Cheryl closed the doors behind us, my sisters still chattered, calling out questions. She had been right. This was a much nicer room. Cushioned seats and couches stood around a low coffee table bearing trays of decanters, filled, I assumed, with coffee, tea, water, and maybe some juice.
Small finger sandwiches were arranged on a platter, desserts looking like tiny pies and cakes had been arranged on another. It was all accompanied by a fruit platter with meats and cheese.
"That looks delicious. Are you guys hungry?" I asked my family.
"Famished," Nat said, falling into one of the cushioned chairs after grabbing a handful of small sandwiches. "Make me a coffee, Pattie, will you?"
Pattie rolled her eyes at me, and I snickered; not much seemed to have changed in the week I was gone. A week, I marveled. It had only taken a week to turn my entire world upside down and change me into a completely different person.
"How did you guys get here?" I asked while fixing my favorite coffee concoction, which contained several spoonfuls of sugar and a generous amount of creamer. With a start, I realized that I hadn't really missed it. At all. Before, I had several of those a day, and now I hadn't even thought about it. It was strange, but Vandruk truly made up for many things.
"On a private jet, can you believe it?" Nat gushed.
"And a limousine," Pattie added, nibbling on one of the miniature pies.
I didn't hesitate to grab one that looked like apple pie and bit into it, rolling my eyes. "So good. Who would have thought you'd miss sugar that much."
That was the statement that opened my family's floodgates of questions again. I tried my best to answer each one while sipping coffee that tasted like ambrosia and eating my way through the assortment of cakes.
"So where is the brute who took you? I would like to have a word with him," my dad said about thirty minutes into the interrogation.
"Uhm, Dad," I hesitated. "It's kind of complicated."
"What's complicated? The man abducted you, and he needs to be held accountable. What is the FBI going to do about that?"
"Well, nothing, I hope."
"Nothing? You hope?" my mom screeched. I had forgotten how she could do that, nearly shattering my eardrums.
"Ouch, Mom," Nat complained.
"All right, here is the gist," I filled them in on IC's crimes. The quake that caused the cave-in, killing all the Vandruk's' women, or so they had thought…
And so much more. I realized that every other sentence out of my mouth started with Ghan-Zahr.
Nat snickered. "Has my sister fallen in love with that handsome barbarian who abducted her?"
"Natalie!" my father chided.
"Well, have you?" Pattie followed up.
I licked my lips, pulled my lower lip between my teeth, and bit down. "I may have," I acknowledged.
"Rachel James!" my father thundered.
"Oh my God, my child has been brainwashed"," Mom wailed.
"Don't be so dramatic," Nat chided. "He did look pretty handsome."
I grinned at her, moving my head agreeingly.
"All right, remember what I told you?" I asked my mom, hugging her.
"About IC?" She sniffed.
"Yes. This is like the biggest story of my life, and I'm not angry at the Vandruks for taking me. They didn't have much of a choice and—"
"And you fell for him"." Pattie snickered.
I sighed. "Yes."
"I want to meet him." Brian surprised me.
"You will," I promised.
"I want to look him in the eyes and judge for myself, but, Rachel, I swear to God, if that man has brainwashed you like Mom thinks…" he drifted off, and Cara placed her delicate hand on his arm.
"It's okay, Brian," she soothed.
It always astonished me how she could do that. Her parents forced her to go to Africa for a year with them when she was a teenager, and Brian nearly lost it. Hung with the wrong crowd, drank, smoked, got into fights, the whole nine yards. It took Cara two days to get him straightened out after she returned. She might have only been five feet tall and weighed barely a hundred pounds, but she frightened Brian's so-called friends off and him straight. Needless to say, afterward, Cara moved in with us, cutting all contact with her parents. They had never been much around for her anyway. They only showed interest in her when things with Brian got more intense, threatening all the grand plans they had made for her, starting with marrying one of their rich friends' son. Never once asking what their daughter wanted.
Brian still had the ability to show off an evil temper now and then, but with one touch from Cara and one look, he calmed down. Not quite this time, though.
Brian was a bear of a man, over six feet tall. He had played football in high school and college, done a four-year stint in the Marines, and worked now as a fitness trainer. Despite that, I didn't think he would pose much of a challenge to Ghan-Zahr. I would be lying, though, if I said that the prospect of my brother going to bat for me didn't tickle me. It was good to see that he was still capable of feelings for others besides Cara.
"Trust me. You'll like him"," I promised. Just thinking about him made me all tingly.
"Have you seen your rooms yet?" I changed the subject.
"No, but everything here looks so nice"." Mom's eyes darted to the wallpapered walls, the scones in between oil paintings.
My family was fairly simple. My dad used to run a small ranch that did well enough to get all of us kids through college. When we were done and moved out, he sold the property, and he and Mom retired to Florida. My twin sisters had both taken off a year after college and backpacked through Europe with no real idea what they wanted to do with their lives. Now at twenty-three, with no jobs, they were currently crashing at Brian's house, and I was sure after a month of this, he was probably ready to kick them out.
This hotel was nothing either of them would have ever been able to afford—including me—I doubted if any of them had even ever set foot into an establishment like this. I had been taken to some expensive restaurants in New York, but they weren't on par with this place either.
"The rooms are amazing. We're all on the same floor. Come, let me show you. Did they give you keys?"
They each held out their little cards, and we made our way back to the elevator.
"Are we really going to eat dinner with the President?" Mom asked.
"Yes, from what I've heard," I confirmed.
"I didn't vote for him," Mom whispered.
Dad bristled. "What? But you said—"
"Let it rest, Dad"." Brian clapped him on the chest. "I didn't vote for him either. No worries, Mom, I don't think they'll check."
Mom's smile at her son was sweet, while my father grumbled something about a traitorous wife and family.
"How's Florida?" I asked to change the mood.
"Your father is about to have a heart attack from boredom," Mom filled me in.
"Yeah, I was afraid of that"." Nat nodded.
"It's just not a life sitting on your duff all day and watching the birds fly by," Dad mumbled as the elevator dinged to announce that we had arrived at our floor.
"I thought you were going to pick up golf"." I stepped out first.
My mom shook her head. "It wasn't good for him. He gets too aggravated when he can't get under a hundred."
"Fishing?" I asked.
"Your mom doesn't like fish"." He gave Mom a sideward glance.
"He filled the freezer full of fish within a week. Who is going to eat all that?" Mom protested.
The door to Ghan-Zahr's and my suite opened, and out strode my barbarian, making my heart flutter and raising all kinds of havoc inside my belly. My family behind me stopped dead.
"Is that him?" Nat wanted to know in her typical undiplomatic way.
"Ghan-Zahr," I breathed.
He looked shocked for a moment, obviously not expecting us. But his expression changed when he laid eyes on my mom.
"This must be your mother, Rachel. You two look so much alike."
"Mom, Dad, this is Ghan-Zahr. My mom and dad, Patrick and Susan, and these are my sisters, Nat and Pattie, and that guy over there is my brother Brian and his wife, Cara."
"Very nice to meet you." Determined, my sister-in-law shook Brian's arm off her and marched her full five-foot frame over to my giant, holding out her hand.
Ghan-Zahr didn't hesitate; carefully, he took her hand and shook it, the way he must have learned while being Carl's guest.
"It's a pleasure to meet you"," she said, throwing a warning glare over her shoulder at Brian and my dad.
"The pleasure is all mine," Ghan-Zahr replied.
"He speaks English?" my father asked, making it clear where my sister got her diplomatic skills from.
Hands were shaken, Brian and Dad distrustfully locked eyes with Ghan-Zahr, but they behaved themselves for the most part.
Dad did say, "I should shoot you for abducting my daughter and scaring my family. Do you know how much fear and anguish you caused?"
Ghan-Zahr's face turned stricken. "I deeply apologize for that, sir. It was never my intention to cause Rachel harm or frighten her family." He turned to Mom. "I'm deeply sorry for the grief I caused you, ma'am."
"Oh, that's… that's all right, right, Pat?" Mom stuttered, looking up in obvious awe at Ghan-Zahr.
"So you have any brothers?" Pattie wanted to know.
Ghan-Zahr inclined his head. "I do, three."
"Patricia James," Dad chided.
"What? Just asking." My sister pouted.
"All right, this has been fun. Why don't you go to your rooms, refresh, and then we'll all meet back up again downstairs in an hour or two?" I suggested, tugging on Ghan-Zahr's hand.
"Don't be rude, Rach, share your boyfriend"." Pattie pouted.
"Let's check out the rooms, Pats. Those two are making googly eyes, just like that other couple…" Nat jerked her chin at Brian and Cara. Brian was absentmindedly caressing Cara's upper arm while glaring at Ghan-Zahr.
"Better make it two hours"." Cara winked at me in the same conspiratorial way I had noticed between people who were in serious relationships before as if they had their own private club. Strangely, it only seemed to affect people who were in serious relationships because nobody had ever winked at me like this before when I had shown up with Trevor.