Chapter 2 - THE WEDDING THAT NEVER HAPPENED
My grandmother had been engaged to the most feared Arab mafia boss in New York.
The thought was so absurd that I almost laughed.
Except Kareem Rahal wasn't smiling.
Neither was his wife.
"That's impossible," I whispered. "Grandma was married to my grandfather, James Brooks."
Kareem nodded.
"I know."
"You knew him?"
"Not personally. But I knew she eventually married someone else."
Layla pulled out a chair.
"Nia, please sit down."
I sat because my knees no longer seemed reliable.
Kareem remained standing.
"Samira and I grew up in neighboring families in Beirut. We were young. Poor. And convinced love could survive anything."
He gave a humorless smile.
"I was twenty-one. She was twenty."
"Then what happened?"
His expression darkened.
"My older brother, Farid, became involved with dangerous men who used our family's shipping business to move illegal goods."
I stared at him.
"Your brother?"
Kareem nodded.
"Samira discovered financial records proving Farid had betrayed several business partners. She intended to report him."
"What did you do?"
"I tried to protect her."
His voice became rough.
"She believed I had chosen my brother over her."
"Had you?"
He looked at me.
"For one terrible night, yes."
Silence filled the room.
"Samira disappeared the following morning. I spent years searching."
I thought about the woman who had raised me.
Grandma never spoke much about Lebanon.
She told stories about the sea.
Her mother's cooking.
Music floating through open windows.
But whenever I asked why she left, she answered the same way.
"Sometimes home becomes a place you have to survive."
I had never understood.
Now I was beginning to.
Kareem sat across from me.
"Did Samira ever mention a man named Farid Rahal?"
The name stirred something.
A memory.
Grandma sitting at the kitchen table late one night.
An old letter in her hands.
Tears on her cheeks.
She'd whispered:
"Farid never stopped looking."
I slowly nodded.
"Once."
Kareem leaned forward.
"What did she say?"
"She said Farid never stopped looking."
His face changed.
Layla looked at him.
"Kareem?"
He stood abruptly.
"That's impossible."
"Why?"
He stared at me.
"Because my brother died thirty-eight years ago."
My skin prickled.
"Maybe Grandma meant someone else."
Kareem shook his head.
"Farid died in a warehouse explosion. I saw the wreckage."
Then he looked at the photograph again.
"Unless..."
He stopped.
"Unless what?"
Kareem approached the window.
Outside, Manhattan traffic moved beneath the winter lights.
"My brother disappeared with documents connected to a fortune stolen from our family."
I swallowed.
"How much money?"
"More than ninety million dollars."
I stared.
Kareem turned toward me.
"Miss Brooks, did your grandmother leave you anything unusual?"
I thought about her tiny apartment.
Her recipe cards.
Her old sewing box.
And the brass key she made me promise never to lose.
"A key," I whispered.
Kareem froze.
"What kind of key?"
"Small. Brass. With an engraving."
"What engraving?"
I remembered it perfectly.
Two letters.
FR.
Kareem's face went white.
He whispered:
"Those were my brother's initials."
May you like
Then he looked directly at me.
"And if Samira gave you that key, she may have left you the only evidence proving Farid was never dead."
