CH010

Was he developing an interest in Zara that was beyond his initial obligations?

Ayman didn't know the answer to that as he walked out of the door he had been standing at awaiting the perfect time to knock.

It didn't come. And perhaps it hadn't been willed by the heavens to.

A week ago,he has heard from his father that he would be getting married to the last family of one of the wealthy men that died in the Subomi Wildfire.

A fire that had broken out at his father's political rival's mansion and had spread to other houses in the vicinity before it got controlled.

The family of the woman he was to marry had been said to have died in the fire outbreak, leaving their daughter behind. The daughter his father had heard about and had wanted to marry, to increase his political exposure as well as harnwe support from the masses in the upcoming elections.

But he hadn't imagined that the lady would be Aziza, his favorite writer.

Looking at it now and at how things turned out, he had grown suspicious of his father and his actions.

Had the Subomi Wildfire truly been an accident like the media was portraying it as? And had his father's visit to condole with his rival from his heart? Like it was all over the media? He had announced his withdrawal from the upcoming elections and it was pointing at one direction.

Would Aziza be able to forgive his father when she finds out that he might have had a hand in the wildfire that claimed her parents lives? And then tricked her into marrying him? Would he be able to forgive himself and be at peace with his conscience if his intuitions happen to be true at the end?

"The food is for you, Yarrah"

The voice kept echoing in his head. Zara was far too nice. A very pleasant girl.

He had lived home for decades and had seen the injustice in statuses but hadn't concerned himself with it as he saw them as none of his business, her a stranger who had just moved into his house had reakized and had shown him how he should have treated the weakest worker of their house.

Alot of dynamics were going to change at their home in the coming days and he could already feel it. Zara was going to come with a change.

**************************

Yarrah could not sleep. Aziza was on the bed whereas she was lying on the sofa in the middle of the room,a few centimeters away from the bed.

She had insisted on staying there regardless of how Zara commanded her to lie on the bed with her. She couldn't just bring herself to do it. Lying on the luxurious bed with her master. She considered her skin too inferior to lay on the bedding.

So instead of forcing her, Aziza has given her the blanket and a pillow from the two she had, and had instructed her to make herself comfortable on the sofa.

Just like she was doing but this was by far too comfortable for what Yarrah was used to.

The tatched mat at Nana's house that she usually slept on had the perfect feel for her hardened skin. This soft and squishy things she was one just didn't come close to what she had been used to.

"Are you sleeping, Aziza?"

It was midnight when Zara heard that. She also felt a finger tapping on her body, trying to wake her up.

She opened her eyes and groggily tried to take in her surroundings and the person that had awoken her up.

"Yarrah?" She muttered surprisingly, oblivious to the reason why she was waking her up at such odd hour.

"Shhhhhhhhhh, just follow me and do so quietly" she instructed, feeling the need to tell her what burdened her mind.

Zara did as she had been told and followed her, but cautiously as she was still doubtful of her and her intentions.

They walked outside the house doors until Yarrah stopped and Zara observed her new surrounding through the tiny lightening that came from the little lantern Yarrah held.

"Where are we?" She asked, unsure of why Yarrah had brought her to the garden.

"This is the garden, Aziza"

" I can see that it is" Zara lashed out immediately, almost pissed off by the fact that she had been awoken by her for her to see the garden.

"Does nothing look odd here?" Yarrah asked her but Zara's peering eyes at her suggested that she considered nothing odd.

"It happened years ago. There was a case of a missing woman,or don't you read the news, Aziza?"

Zara still stood dumbfounded. First she woke her at this time of the night, next she brought her to a garden and now she's asking her weird questions.

What does the news of a missing woman have to do with her garden she had brought her at?

Yarrah noticed the look on her eyes. It had the same coulor of hers most times she was disinterested in what Nana had to tell her, and she could tell why.

" Years ago, the prime minister had wanted to marry a younger and more beautiful woman but not a few months after she came to the house, she was reported to be missing by the news" Yarrah began.

Zara shaked off every remaining element of sleep that remained in her body as she listened with rapt attention to what Yarrah had to say now. And Yarrah haven confirmed that she had total attention, continued with her tale.

"At first,I thought the first madam had something to do with her disappearance because she was jealous of her husband taking a new wife, younger than she was by years"

" And?" Zara's voice carried a hint of urgency in them as she questioned to know whether she was to avoid the first wife from the tale she was about to be told.

"No, the first madam didn't have a hand in her disappearance and it's only of recent that I found out the entire truth"

" She had been harassed to d-eath" Yarrah told and her words stuck like a chord in Zara's mind.

"Who had had harrased her?" she asked wanting to know because it was definitely not going to be the prime minister, as he had no reasons to, considering the fact that had come to his mansion to be married to him.

"Tariq Fahad"

" Ta...?" Zar's voice trailed off. There had been something unsettling about him at the dining and of his wife who didn't even speak throughout the meal, was Yarrah sure of what she was saying? He looked like a mean person but not to the point of the crime Yarrah was saying he committed. He was way too cute for that.

"Does this garden look odd to you now Aziza?" Yarrah questioned again wanting her to figure out the rest by herself before she would continue with her story.

Zara inspected the garden's floor through the little reflection she saw from the lantern, as well as the lights by the sides of the wall which had been covered by petals of the roses.

It was then that the sweet scent of some of the roses began to sip slowly into her nose, making her nostrils receptive to their smell.

The floor hadn't been tiled due to some of the flowers that took root from the floor and not flower pots, so it was easy for Zara to do as she had instructed.

She stared and stares at the floor for minutes until her eyes caught on to something.

There was a bump somewhere,though it had been covered with flowers that were planted on the floor, but it didn't entirely hide the bump, but it did for strangers who haven't heard this story Zara did for them to suspect.

Zara could guess what had happened with ease. After Tariq had committed the crime, his father had buried it with claims of the woman missing,while protecting his son and his image as well from the public.

"But she wasn't the only woman that went through that in his hands"

Zara turned when she heard that. Who else did? Who else had gone through such a similar fate?