45. Christian
FORTY-FIVE
CHRISTIAN
“You bastard!”
Freezing cold water poured down my back.
“What the fuck?”
I turned around only to be met with a furious Umaima behind her was a panicked Hasan and behind him was Osama looking like a lost puppy.
Shit, she knows.
Everyone’s eyes were on us.
“Let’s talk somewhere private so I can explain.”
“You better explain the fuck out of this or else I’ll cut your dick off and feed it to wolves and make you watch.”
I winced at that.
Hasan’s rumbling voice intervened. “Behave yourself, Umaima.”
“Don’t talk to me, Hasan bhai.” She said with venom I’d never seen from her.
Chin jutted upwards, reddened cheeks. Umaima was true to her words, and I knew she’d fucking end me if I didn’t explain myself.
We scurried into my office.
Osama shut the door and all of us stood in front of Umaima while she had her hands on her hips.
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t cut your balls off,” her brow twitched with unfathomable petulance. A fucking tsunami waiting to unleash its wrath upon the three of us.
“Umaima—”
“No,” she raised a finger. “You know what? I actually don’t give a fuck. Move out of the way.”
She bulldozed straight for us, but I blocked her path with a stop. “Please don’t tell her.”
“Are you fucking kidding me, Christian?” Umaima clasped her hands over her head. “The three of you have been lying to her and you expect me to just sit here and watch you lie even more? Fuck no.”
“Maybe if you just listened?—”
“Who told you to talk?” She glared in Osama’s direction who clenched his jaw.
Fuck, this wasn’t going well.
How the hell did she find out?
“Let me tell her,” I pleaded. “She deserves to know from me.”
Umaima visibly tensed. “You had more than enough time to tell her about your petty revenge.”
“It’s not petty revenge,” my voice hardened.
“Do you think your mom would’ve truly wanted you to avenge her—or whatever the hell you’re doing—if she knew you were using Adelaide for it?”
Sinking back against the door, Umaima was right. “I’m too close to step back now.”
A nod. “Okay, then that settles it. You’re telling her. Today.”
“I’ll tell her today.”
“About everything— even Eda.”
“I will.”
“And you’ll stop your revenge.”
The three of us froze. “Umaima, we can’t?—”
“ You can ,” she demanded. “You can because you love Adelaide. You can because you know your mother wouldn’t have wanted this. You can because if you continue, all it’ll do is break Adelaide’s heart.”
“Adelaide will understand,” desperation leaked from my throat in liquified contractions.
“She would have understood if you told her before your wedding.” Her eyes traced over each of us. Shaking her head like she couldn’t believe the three of us were involved in this. “To think that both of us blindly trusted you guys, only for you to make fools of us.”
Staring at me dead in the eye, she cleared her expression of any disbelief. All hard and no-nonsense. “You’ll tell her today and if you don’t, I will. Now get the fuck out of my way.”
When the door slammed behind her, I slumped onto the couch of my dark office. “How did she find out?”
“She’d been searching through my folders without me knowing,” Osama looked away from me—guilt written all over his face. If Umaima got access to his folders that meant she was on his level and as awing as that was, why the hell did she have to open it now?
“What did she find?”
“Everything,” Hasan grumbled. “She found out about our friendship through group chat. She knows about Eda, your dad, the board members, and your mom.”
“You had all of that in the folder?” Hasan asked.
“Rowlen asked me to compile evidence together as backup. I didn’t think she was digging into me otherwise I would’ve saved it on a hard drive.”
“Fuck,” my head fell back against the couch. “Anything else I should know?”
“Other than we’re fucked, no clue.”
“Where are you going?”
Hasan scowled when I got up.
“To tell her the truth.”
Courage was a hard feat to gain. I learned from Adelaide that you can gain it with simple moments. For the past seven years, I was confident this plan would work. But when the moment finally arrived, I didn’t have the courage to go through with it without Adelaide by my side.
She might hate me for a while.
But I’d rather her hate me than love me obliviously.