Nadeena answered with a litany of ga-ga noises and upended a box of shoes. Saving the shoes and confiscating the tissue paper, Imogen let her have the empty box, which she immediately started banging on the floor.
Feeling suddenly weary and lost, she changed Nadeena into a soft cotton sleeping suit and fed her. Then she laid her in the cot and grimaced when she saw how wired she was. Sleep looked like a long time coming. Deciding it would be a waste of energy to try to sing her to sleep, she rang Minh instead.
‘I was beginning to get worried when I didn’t hear from you after your brief text. How are you? How’s our darling girl?’ he asked.
‘Nadeena is fine.’ She’d particularly enjoyed Nadir’s private jet. ‘And I feel like I’ve been put through a spin dryer ten times. He wants to see her,’ she added softly.
She heard Minh settle into his leather sofa and wished she was there with him with a nice bottle of red between them and a rom com on the TV.
‘I’ve already guessed he’s the father or you wouldn’t be in Bakaan so you know, he does have a right to see her,’ he said.
‘I know that.’ Imogen watched Nadeena stuff the ear of a soft teddy bear into her mouth and chew. ‘At least logically I know that.’ Emotionally, she wasn’t ready to concede the parenting of Nadeena to anyone else but herself and a couple of trusted friends. ‘I just never thought he’d be interested in her.’
‘Well, he clearly is. And maybe that’s a good thing.’
Imogen pulled a face. ‘I don’t see how.’
‘He’s a very powerful man. He can provide for her, you know.’ Minh’s voice grew soft down the end of the phone. ‘And no doubt for you as well.’
‘I don’t want his money.’
‘I know that. But you could use someone to take care of you.’
That had been her mother’s mistake. It wouldn’t be hers. ‘And what about love?’ She picked Nadeena up when she saw her yawn and laid her head on her shoulder.
‘Are we talking about for Nadeena or for you?’
‘Nadeena. The way he looked at me today...’ She felt heaviness inside her chest and it was hard to get the words out. ‘Believe me, there’s no love lost between us.’ And she would never want Nadir’s love for herself again. She’d got over that unrealistic desire a long time ago.
‘Try to look on the bright side,’ he said. ‘It might not be so bad.’
Imogen released a pent-up breath. Looking on the bright side wasn’t exactly her forte. She was more a planning for the worst case scenario kind of girl. It was her safety blanket. It kept her from making mistakes—or being surprised by things. If her own mother had crossed every t and dotted every i maybe she wouldn’t have been so shocked when her father had left them and never came back. Maybe she would have been more prepared.
‘He left me when I needed him the most,’ she said, wondering why that still had the capacity to hurt. She’d got over that as well, hadn’t she? ‘How could I ever trust him with Nadeena? With me?’
‘That’s definitely a black mark against him. But you have to think of what’s best for Nadeena now.’
Imogen chewed on her lower lip so hard she tasted blood. ‘I’m what is best for Nadeena. He’s nothing more than a playboy prince who comes and goes as he pleases and gets whatever he wants.’ Imogen steeled her heart, more resolved than ever to resist him. ‘I won’t let Nadeena have my childhood and that’s all Nadir can offer.’
They talked for a few minutes more, with Minh promising to call her boss and tell him that she wouldn’t be in over the next couple of days, and then Imogen focused on getting Nadeena to sleep.
Her conversation with Minh had unsettled her. She’d wanted him to tell her that Nadir was a rat bastard but all he’d done was say things that had flashed across her own mind, which left her more conflicted than ever.
She knew giving in to his demand that she marry him would ultimately end in tears. Most likely Nadeena’s. And quite possibly her own. In frustration, if nothing else!
CHAPTER SIX
IN THE END it took her an hour to put Nadeena to sleep and when she went looking for Nadir she wasn’t expecting to find him barefoot and shirtless with a dark-haired woman bending over his lap.
The sight shocked her and suddenly a long-lost memory of her fifteen-year-old self flew into her mind. She’d been with a bunch of friends on a school excursion when they had come across her father in a passionate embrace with a woman who wasn’t her mother. The woman’s hands had been in her father’s hair, his hand close to her breast, his mouth devouring hers. Imogen had been stunned. Sickened. The girls with her had giggled nervously and her father hadn’t even looked contrite. He’d scowled at her and asked her why she wasn’t in school. God, she hadn’t remembered that in years.