Page 63 of The Marriage Negotiation

My mother frowned. "Then what do you do?"

"He's a doctor," Zaq said as he walked into the room with a tray of coffee. "We just opened our own private practice here in the city."

Zaq set the tray down on the coffee table and began pouring cups of coffee for everyone. He doctored mine and his and handed a cup to me before sitting down in the seat next to me.

My mother gasped. "You're a doctor?"

"I am," I replied. "I was a doctor for several years while I was living in Texas. I even became a hospital administrator for a few years, but I wanted to go back into practicing medicine so I came here with Zaq and we opened our own private practice."

"Why did you never tell us?" she asked.

"Because you would have told Peter." I clenched my hands, digging my fingernails into my palms to remind myself not to shout at my parents. "You tell him everything, and I didn't want him to know."

"Why wouldn't we tell him? He's your brother."

"Not anymore he's not."

"Patrick!" my mother gasped.

I leveled my gaze at her. "Do you really think I want to have a brother that stalks my husband, harasses him, and tried to stab him with a knife?"

My mother rung her hands together, her eyes darting around the room. "Peter is just confused."

"Peter is a psycho!"

Yeah, I snapped.

"Peter has been a psycho his entire life, but you're too blind to see it. He put a tracking app on Zaq's phone right after they started dating so he could keep track of him."

"Lovers do that," my father insisted as he glanced away, telling me he didn't believe a word of what he was saying.

"We were never lovers." Zaq smirked. "Hard to be lovers with someone that isn't even gay."

We got a blank look from both my parents.

"Oh, you didn't know about the girl he's been living with for the last three years? You should. She's the one he ran away with when he left Zaq standing at the altar. He took her to Hawaii using the honeymoon Zaq had planned and paid for."

"He's been living with someone?"

"Yes, Mother. Your golden boy has been living with someone for the last three years, even during the time he was engaged to Zaq and supposed to marry him."

My father jumped to his feet, his face going stiff with anger. "Don't talk to your mother like that."

When I went to get to my feet, Zaq grabbed my hand. When I glanced at him, he shook his head. I slowly sat back down, but refused to release Zaq's hand.

"Two weeks ago, Peter showed up in the lobby and started demanding to see us. No matter how many times we told him we were married, he refused to believe it. He was insistent that I was his fiancé and we were in love." Zaq snorted. "We were never in love."

"Then why did you agree to marry him?" my mother asked.

"Because you all insisted," Zaq said. "It was some great business merger. Peter marries me, your companies merge to become one, and he takes over. It had nothing to do with love. It was a business deal. Peter knew and I knew it, which is why his behavior is so odd."

"Maybe you saw it as a business merger, but Peter obviously loves you."

I grunted at my mother's words. "Oh yeah, Peter loves him. Sure." I sat forward in my chair. "The day after Peter showed up in the lobby, Zaq and I decided to have lunch in the park. While we were there, Peter came out of nowhere and confronted us. He started demanding that Zaq go home with him because Zaq belonged to him. When Zaq refused, Peter pulled out a knife and tried to kill him. That's love to you?"

My mother's lips pressed thin and she glanced away.

"Look, whatever, Zaq and I just started a new life here and we just want to live it in peace and quiet. We are happy together and we love each other. Whatever business merger crap you've got going on is your business. It has nothing to do with us."

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