The Sheikh's Secret Love Child

  ***

  Rosie met Amy after work a few hours later. They changed into street clothes, removing their stinking white tennis shoes and tossing them into Amy’s car, which she needed now that she lived in the suburbs. Rosie hopped in, and Amy started the engine as rain continued to splatter on the windows.

  “It’s not supposed to stop till next weekend,” Amy sighed.

  “What a bummer,” Rosie agreed.

  Amy drove down the street where Hakan had crashed his vehicle. All that was left, Rosie noted, was a slight dent in the telephone pole, and a splatter of red paint. The car had been taken away, and the place felt almost like a ghost town, even with the cars whizzing past. Don’t they know what happened here? she thought. But she knew she was being childish.

  Amy pulled into the salad place, and they sat down across from each other, in two linoleum seats, studying the menu. Famished, they ordered two large salads and an eggroll appetizer, along with two hefty glasses of red wine.

  “To you,” Amy said, clinking her glass with her friend.

  “Thanks for coming out. I’m feeling a bit vulnerable at the minute,” Rosie murmured. “I think I really fell for this one.”

  “You can’t fall for someone after one date, Rosie,” Amy said, raising her eyebrows. “And didn’t he say that he had to move away after a few days, anyway? So it wasn’t going to be long before this happened.”

  Rosie had filled Amy in on the details in the break room. She’d had to calm herself inwardly, afraid she was going to break down.

  “But you weren’t there,” Rosie shrugged. “The way it was between us. It was like a movie or something. The chemistry was electric. I could have laid with him in that bed for days and days. If he hadn’t left, I would probably still be there.”

  “You’d have abandoned your entire life for this guy?” Amy asked, scoffing.

  “He had this whole spiel about fate,” Rosie continued. “About how it was fate that I had walked across the street in front of him; that it was fate that he would meet me, and that we would have something—something special together.”

  Amy was rolling her eyes. “You’re too smart to believe in fate, Rosie. I know you thought this guy was special, but let’s look at the facts. He abandoned you and went to a different country. Despite everything else, you have to realize: you aren’t in his life now. He’s not thinking about your fate. He’s thinking about how you were his last lay before he was crowned king or—or whatever he is.”

  Rosie eyed her salad. The leaves were sopped in dressing. She’d overdone it. “I know you’re right, I do, I’m just struggling to get him out of my head,” she whispered. She tapped at her eyebrow with her fingers, as if trying to shove him out of her thoughts.

  “I know what could help,” Amy said then, snapping her fingers. “Maybe you could come to my place this weekend, on your day off. Play with the kids, hang out with me. Nobody could feel upset playing with Marco.”

  Rosie reluctantly agreed, knowing that sitting in her best friend’s house, listening to her baby scream, wasn’t exactly what she needed on her day off. But she didn’t have anything else.