What if she didn’t even remember him?
The anxious questions hammered in his head, blending with the inevitable roar of the approaching train. Suddenly she started to jog. So did he. They entered the station at the same moment as the thundering train.
“Wait. Stop.”
The train screeched to a halt, the racket obliterating his call. The doors jerked open, and she was getting on. For a split second, he paused in his pursuit, uncertain. Was he wrong? Was he crazy, chasing after a stranger because of a vague suspicion, an intensely erotic dream . . . an unexpected, bittersweet memory of an infatuation that he would have sworn he’d abandoned years ago?
A slender hand grasped at the metal rail just inside the doors. His heart slammed against his breastbone in recognition.
“Laila.”
Her head snapped around at his call.
He stared into a pair of startled-looking, almond-shaped green eyes. He lunged toward the entrance, shock vibrating in his flesh. The train doors slammed shut between them.
“No,” he bit out, furious. Desperate. She stepped closer, her eyes wide. For a charged moment, they stared at one another through the glass. Asher soaked in every detail like a parched sponge would water. He saw shocked recognition on her face, and that made desperation redouble inside him. He slammed his palm against the glass.
“Laila,” he repeated, his fingers clawing at the rubber-lined seal between the doors. The train began to move. He saw her mouth form his name, and she was sliding away from him.
Again.
He jogged down the platform, keeping pace with her, not knowing what the hell he was doing for a frenzied moment. He only knew he couldn’t take his eyes off her rigid, disbelieving face.
The face of his dreams. The face at the center of a stupid young man’s anguish. Her face. Unscarred. Unchanged.
Perfect.
“Laila.”
His shout mingled with the metallic rumble of the train exiting the station. He stood there panting as the sound faded; his brain tried to catch up with his heart, shaken by the impact of his past slamming so jarringly into his present.
Did he understand why Laila Barek had decided never to see him again, never correspond with him, to deny everything that had happened that summer in Crescent Bay eight years ago? Rationally, he did. With the benefit of maturity, and after spending time in various Arab countries, that logic had become clearer. She’d been nineteen years old. She’d been in college, yes, but she was still dependent on her parents’ wishes, expectations and demands. A Moroccan-American female might seem a lot like any typical American girl much of the time, but the ties to tradition and family were strong.
Those ties of love and loyalty had been enough for her to walk away when she’d been nineteen and he’d been nearly twenty-two, despite what they’d shared . . . despite the fact that she’d told him she loved him and always would.
He shook his head like a wet dog, trying to diminish the immensity of the moment. He hadn’t been prepared. Yes, the thought had been there, but it had been vague, the tiniest suspicion . . . too incredible to be real. Of course, she had the talent. There had never been any doubt of that. Still, he couldn’t believe it was really her: her staring at him through the glass, her putting on that evocative, sexy performance in that club . . .
All behind a veil.
He blinked and started, the veil suddenly taking on a whole new meaning for him. The barrier hadn’t been there to hide any scars. The veil had been set to protect something else. And Laila had been the one to erect it.
Maybe she hadn’t changed that much, after all.
He turned and walked alone down the empty platform.
You’re not a naïve, idealistic kid anymore. Some people just aren’t made to be together. Your worlds are way too different.
He didn’t think he could survive watching Laila move away from him another time. That first time had hurt more than he’d allow himself to admit.
And everything that had come before Laila walking away? Well, that had been something so rare and beautiful, the loss of it had changed him forever.
Chapter Three
Eight years ago
Crescent Bay, Michigan
Her mother, Amira Barek, had left the patio doors and windows open wide to the beach as she cooked. Laila inhaled the divine scent of fresh lake air mixing with the date cake cooling on the counter. Her khal-ti Nora had brought the cake over minutes ago along with a fresh batch of almond cookies and taknetta—Moroccan butter cookies. The family would gather on the terrace this evening for supper.