Chapter Forty
HOURS LATER, WHEN I finally made it home, the sun had already folded itself beneath the horizon. The city was loud, the world unaware that mine had fallen apart somewhere between my office floor and Sarah’s leaving.
My body felt hollowed out, scraped clean of anger.
I’d left it all in that wrecked room—splintered across walls, soaked into carpet fibers, hidden in the shards of what used to be my favorite mug.
All that remained now was sadness and love—both untamed, both unwilling to die.
They pulsed in me like something alive, ancient and stubborn.
Khalifa was pacing the living room when I opened the door. His clothes were wrinkled, his hair disheveled, and there was a wildness in his eyes that almost broke me. He stopped mid-step when he saw me, like he’d been holding his breath for hours.
“Lillian,” he said in relief. “You’re here. You came back.”
I didn’t reply. Words felt too heavy, too expensive. I brushed past him and slumped onto the couch, my limbs surrendering to exhaustion. The cushions caught me softly, like they knew I couldn’t take one more hard landing today.
He dropped to his knees in front of me. His hands trembled as he reached for me, then stopped, unsure if he still had permission to touch. He bowed his head into my lap, his breath shaking.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice cracking open. “I’m so sorry, Lillian, but I’m going to explain everything—”
“Dalal told me,” I interrupted.
He lifted his head but kept his gaze down. “She did? You...you know?”
I nodded. For a beat, he stayed there, shoulders caved with heavy shame. I slipped two fingers under his chin and tilted his face upward. Only then did he let his eyes meet mine—wide, wrecked, brimming with a hurt he clearly wished he could hide.
My hand answered something in him before my mind could weigh in, cupping his cheek. His skin was warm, too warm, as though grief itself had fevered him. He leaned into my grip like a man starving for comfort, and I hated how much that single gesture made my heart ache.
“I’m sorry, Khalifa,” I whispered. “What she did to you was terrible.”
His hand found mine before I could pull away. He brought it to his lips, pressed a kiss to my palm, then another to each finger, his breath catching between them. When his lips brushed my wrist, my pulse stuttered beneath his mouth, traitorous and alive.
I tore my hand free, clutching it to my chest like it burned. The tears I’d been holding back all day finally betrayed me, sliding hot and silent down my face.
He saw them and brushed one away before another took its place. “No,” he murmured. “Don’t cry over me. Yell at me, hit me, break my heart if you have to—but don’t shed a single tear. I’m not worth it.”
“You lied to me,” I breathed. The words shook, more fragile than I wanted them to be.
“I know,” he said. “But in the beginning...I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it.
I thought it would be easier if you didn’t know.
” He paused, his voice thinning to a thread.
“And later—after I fell in love with you—I thought if you knew, you’d leave me, and I can’t—I can’t lose you.
” He lifted his gaze to mine, eyes red-rimmed and anguished.
“I hate that I hurt you, but it gave me you. It gave me the chance to love you, to have you, even for a moment. How can I regret that?”
Even though I wanted to scream, to throw his confession back in his face, all I could do was sit there, heart splintering, because part of me understood exactly what he meant.
“I thought I knew you,” I whispered. “I thought I knew everything about you. I told you things that I have never told anyone, Khalifa—every shameful secret, every regret, every heartbreak, every fear—” My voice broke, collapsing under the weight of it.
“You do know me,” he insisted. “This is the only thing I ever kept from you. You know me better than anyone. You’re the only person that I want to know me.”
I could hear it—the truth, the despair, the love he didn’t know what to do with.
The thought escaped me before I could think better of it. “You slept with someone else.”
He froze, panic blooming behind his eyes.
I hated that it mattered, hated that I cared.
But it wasn’t just the act—it was the intimacy of it.
The thought of another woman’s hands on him, another body tangled with his, another heartbeat pressed to his chest where I’d believed only mine belonged.
Someone else had known him like that, seen him like that, felt him like that.
For everything new I’d experienced with him, it was something old he’d already lived through. ..with her.
He shook his head, his hands reaching for mine again.
“Just once,” he said quickly. “They were getting worried that we still didn’t have a child.
But it didn’t mean anything.” His voice wavered, the admission pulling something raw from him.
“You have to understand,” he went on, gaze flicking to mine, desperately sincere.
“I never thought I’d be with anyone else.
I thought that was it for me—a marriage without love, a life already decided.
I didn’t think I’d get a second chance. But you were my first, Lillian. In every way that matters.”
I stared at him, at this man I loved so much it felt like he’d healed every shattered part of me without even knowing it, and wondered how love could feel like both salvation and slow poison.
“Can you forgive me?” he whispered. “I don’t deserve your forgiveness, Lillian, but I need it.
I need you. You make everything better, you make me better.
” He cupped my face, his thumb tracing the dip in my chin.
I hated how I leaned into it, how I still longed for him despite everything.
He kissed my cheek, my jaw, the space just beneath my ear.
“Can you, Lillian?” he murmured. “I love you, only you. Do you still love me?”
Of course I did. That was the curse of it. If only I could stop, everything would be simpler, less excruciating. But I’d never been good at half-measures. My heart always insisted on throwing itself into the fire.
His lips grazed the corner of my mouth, and I turned—just slightly—and caught them with mine, kissing him softly. He pulled back a little, his breath warm against my skin. “Is that a yes?” he asked. “Do you forgive me?”
I knew what he wanted to hear, what he needed to hear, and I was too tired to fight anymore.
“Yes. I forgive you.”
He let out a shuddering breath and pulled me into his arms with tender relief. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m so sorry. But I’m already in the process of divorcing her, and then she’ll be gone and—”
I silenced him with another kiss, pressing my mouth to his before the words could finish breaking me apart. I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t want to talk. I just wanted, for one last moment, to forget.
KHALIFA HAD FALLEN asleep hours ago, every inch of him fused to me like he was afraid I might vanish if he loosened his hold. Maybe some part of him already knew. Maybe I did, too.
He’d whispered I love you a hundred times—after every kiss, every sigh, every heartbeat that collided between us. I never said it back. I couldn’t. Not because it wasn’t true, but because it was too true. Because if I said it out loud, I’d never find the strength to leave.
I lay still for a long time, staring at the ceiling as his chest rose and fell against me.
My fingers found their way to his face, tracing him quietly—his eyelids, soft and heavy with sleep; the slope of his nose; the faint curve of his lips.
I memorized him in pieces, the map of a man I’d once believed would lead me home.
Then, bit by bit, I began to untangle myself from him. Each limb felt weighted, each centimetre of distance a betrayal.
He stirred almost immediately, his body instinctively searching for mine. “Lillian?” His voice was gravel, thick with worry. “What’s wrong? Where are you going?”
I bent down, picking my clothes up off the floor one by one, mechanically, as though detachment were a muscle I could train if I moved slowly enough.
Sheets rustled behind me; his footsteps followed. “Hey,” he said, “talk to me. What’s wrong?”
I pulled my shirt over my head and straightened, still refusing to face him. If I looked at him, I’d break. If I saw his face—those eyes that had the power to undo every wall I’d ever built—I’d lose my nerve. So I kept my gaze fixed on the door and said, “I’m leaving.”
“What? Leaving where?”
The silence stretched thin until it hurt to stand inside it. Slowly, I turned to face him. That was all it took—just one look. I watched it happen in real time, the realization settling across his face like a shadow.
“I don’t get it,” he said. “You said you forgave me.”
“I lied.”
His eyes widened, his mouth parting as if to speak, but no words came. Then, “What do you mean you lied?”
I swallowed, but my throat felt raw. “I mean...I lied. I don’t know if I can—”
I stopped, watching the panic spread across his features, erasing every layer of calm.
“Lillian,” he breathed, “I am so sorry. I thought you understood why I—”
“I do understand,” I said, cutting him off.
“But it still hurts, Khalifa. You can’t expect me to move past it overnight just because you have an explanation.
” I swallowed, my vision clouding over. “If you had just been honest with me,” I continued quietly, “if you’d told me what was really going on.
..we could’ve talked about it. I could’ve helped you figure a way out, I mean—” My voice cracked before I could stop it.
“I really think I could’ve handled the truth. ”
The words hung there, fragile and trembling.
“But finding out like this,” I went on, “with her showing up here, blindsiding me—having to stand there and watch you with the woman who had you first, who still has you—”
“She doesn’t have me,” he said desperately. “Lillian, I am yours.”
“It doesn’t matter.”