Rasheed raised an eyebrow at the hardness in my voice.
“There’s more. They’ve been trying to contact the American embassy, claiming their mother is missing and they need help finding her. They seem quite desperate.”
I laughed, but there was no humor in it.
“Now they want to find me. How convenient.”
“What would you like me to do?” Rasheed asked quietly. “I could have my people let them know you’re safe. Or…”
“Or what?”
“Or we could let them worry a little longer while we decide what comes next. The choice is yours, Gretchen. For the first time in 40 years, you have all the power.”
Three days passed like a dream. Rashid showed me his world, his hospitals, his charitable foundations, the medical schools he’d built.
Everywhere we went, people treated him with deep respect. And by extension, they treated me like royalty.
It was overwhelming and wonderful at the same time. But it was the quiet moments that meant the most.
Our morning conversations over tea, the way he listened when I talked about my work as a nurse, how he remembered tiny details from 40 years ago.
He told me about his mother who’d passed away 5 years earlier, and how she’d always wondered why he never brought a woman home to meet her.
“I told her once that my heart lived in America,” he said as we walked through the pediatric wing of his newest hospital. “She said that was the most romantic and most tragic thing she’d ever heard.”
On the third evening, as we sat on his terrace watching the sunset paint the Dubai skyline in shades of gold and pink, Rasheed grew quiet and serious.
“I have something to ask you,” he said, turning to face me. “And I want you to know there’s no pressure, no expectation. If you say no, I’ll arrange for your flight home tomorrow and you’ll never have to see me again.”
My heart started racing.
“What is it?”
He took my hands in his and I could feel them trembling slightly. This powerful man, this shake who commanded respect from everyone around him, was nervous talking to me.
“Stay here,” he said simply. “Stay in Dubai. Stay with me.”
I opened my mouth to speak, but he held up a hand.
“Please let me finish. I know it sounds crazy. I know we’ve only just found each other again after 40 years, but Gretchen, I never stopped loving you. I never stopped hoping that somehow someday fate would bring you back to me. Rasheed, I’m not asking you to marry me tomorrow, though I’d be honored if someday you’d consider it. I’m asking you to give us a chance. Give yourself a chance to be loved the way you deserve. You’ve spent your entire adult life taking care of everyone else. Let me take care of you for a while.”
Tears spilled down my cheeks.
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’ll think about it. Stay another week, another month. Let me show you what life could be like here. You could work at the hospital if you wanted, though you’d never have to work again if you chose not to. You could travel, study, pursue all those dreams you put on hold. Or you could simply rest and let someone else worry about everything for a change.”
Before I could answer, his phone rang. He glanced at it and sighed.
“It’s my head of security. I should take this.”
He stepped away to answer and I heard him speaking in rapid Arabic, his tone growing increasingly sharp. When he returned, his expression was grim.
“Your son is at the embassy again. This time, he brought reporters with him. He’s claiming you’ve been kidnapped by terrorists and demanding the American government intervene to find you.”
I felt my blood pressure spike.
“He what?”
“He’s telling them his elderly mother disappeared from their hotel and he believes she’s been taken by extremists. The story is gaining traction on social media. The hashtagfind Gretchen is trending.”
I stood up so fast I knocked over my teacup.
“That manipulative little bastard.”
Rasheed’s eyebrows shot up at my language, but he didn’t comment.
“There’s more. He set up a GoFundMe page asking for donations to help rescue you. He’s already raised over $15,000.”
“Of course he has,” I said bitterly. “Even my disappearance becomes a way for him to make money.”
“My security team says the embassy is starting to ask questions. Soon they’ll want to involve local authorities. If this continues, it could become an international incident.”
I paced across the terrace, my mind racing.
Quincy wasn’t just trying to find me now. He was building a public narrative that painted him as the devoted son desperately searching for his missing mother.
If I surfaced now, would anyone believe the truth? Or would they see an old woman who’d been brainwashed by her capttors?
“We need to end this before it goes any further,” I said finally. “But I want to do it on my terms.”
“What do you have in mind?”
I turned to look at him. This man who’d loved me faithfully for 40 years while I’d wasted my devotion on someone who saw me as nothing more than a resource to be exploited.
“First, I want to see him. I want to look Quincy in the eye and tell him exactly what I think of him and his pathetic wife. And then…”
I paused, meeting Rashid’s hopeful gaze.
“And then I want to accept your proposal.”