Chapter 674: How?

It was days later when Mina actually felt well enough to get off the couch, but her stomach was still badly cramping, and it was disrupting her ability to concentrate on things she promised she would do around the suite. Leal had been extremely attentive to her, and he was honest about why. He needed her help, and unlike his brother, he was choosing to treat her as an ally, despite his mistrust. As he put it, everyone had something to hide, and she had at least been honest that she was not telling them everything. That, he said, was at least worth a little recognition.

With nothing else to do, Mina opened Nael's laptop and checked his earnings. She had managed to balance both accounts but saw that the small surge was beginning to stagnate. She sold off what she believed would nosedive in value and reinvested a lot of the earnings into companies she was familiar with; including 'Ela's Fish Market', which was how she planned to launder Nael and Leal's money.

Other than that, Leading was by far the most lucrative company to invest in, and they were on the uptrend since they had entered a deal with Ubi. She knew because she had facilitated it before her death, and if President Lee were smart, he would keep the connection going.

Thinking about the man, Mina found herself typing his name into a search bar. As she thought, there was lots of speculation about the man's marriage to Miss Lisa, but the most hurtful thing was a photo in which they appeared happy together. She stared at the screen, feeling all sorts of complex emotions swirl through her, but before her tears could spill, she was startled by Nael and Leal who were arguing about something.

Mina closed the window and weakly made her way toward her room. She had not really interacted with Nael since he had thoroughly disrespected her in front of his friends, and to avoid having to talk to the man, she left anytime he was around.

"Look who's out of bed," the man teased, and Mina rolled her eyes at him. She could hear his footsteps quicken but she rushed into her room and locked the door behind her.

"Please leave me alone," she whispered. She knew she only had seven minutes before she would have a panic attack and so did Nael. The man was patient enough to wait her out, and cruel enough to enact further punishment for running away. "Just leave me alone," she repeated, feeling hot tears roll down her cheeks and sting the corners of her mouth.

"Ami, I'm giving you thirty seconds to open this door, or I'll break it down." Mina struggled within herself, but just as her hand rested on the knob, she could hear Leal calling his brother dad. It was obviously enough to take the man's attention away from her, so when she unlocked the door, he was too distracted to barge in.

After staring at the entrance for what felt like forever, the door swung open, but it was not Nael, it was Leal who Mina found herself running to. His face was clearly injured, but he did not seem to notice or care.

"Please don't fight for me," she said, inspecting the man's cheek which looked like it was going to bruise.

"I'm not fighting for you," he replied. "I'm fighting for him; he just doesn't see it yet." Mina's lip began to quiver, but before she could break down, the most intense cramp rocked her body, and with it she felt a large gush between her legs. Leal's eyes went wide, and he instinctively pulled her into the shower room, where she laid on the floor in pain.

It had been some time since her cycle had last visited her, but she had not been eating well, she was constantly stressed, then she had gotten extremely sick. Something mildly similar had happened to her in the past, but it passed within a day and the pain was not nearing unbearable. Then again, at that time she was in the comfort of her apartment, where she had mild luxuries at her fingertips. She also was not worried about being randomly berated or beaten. She was not recovering from a broken heart and hiding from the man who broke it, and she certainly was not on a ship in the middle of the ocean.

The pain Mina was feeling did not immediately pass, but Leal stayed with her, gripping her hand tightly as she shook from the sensation that was close to crippling.

Leal hated to see her in pain because for some reason, it reminded him of his mother. He might have forgiven his brother for shooting their mom, but it did not make the memories any less painful or easy to forget.

"Is this normal for you?" Leal asked, and Mina shook her head, but she explained her theory to the man, who nodded in understanding. "Stay here; I'll go get your things." Mina clutched at the man's hand. She did not want him to leave her because she was afraid of his brother. "Ami, Nael won't touch you again. If he does, I will leave this ship with you."

"How can you be sure?" Mina questioned, earning her a smile from the cold, yet kind man.

"I'm not; I just wanted to make you feel better." Giggling could be heard from the shower room, and Nael who was standing outside of it crushed his hands into fists. He was losing his mind, and he was losing his brother in the process.

Since Ami had boarded their ship, he had been consumed with thoughts of Mills. He loved the woman; genuinely loved her, and she cared for him, only, not in the way he wanted her to. Then, like a true idiot, he drunkenly tried to force himself on her. If Leal were not around, he probably would have gone through with it, but his brother stopped him, and the woman fled. No matter where he looked or for how long, he never found her. It had been years since then and Nael thought he was over the woman, but clearly, he was not.

----

Mina was in the kitchen making breakfast when Nael stood so close behind her that her body went rigid. She was so weak that she did not want to set the man off by moving away or pushing him away, so she stayed quiet. She did not even need to turn to look at him because Leal would never do anything like that to her.

"Ami, please look at me." Not wanting to draw out the inevitable Mina faced the man, who lifted her chin to meet her eyes.

"I'm a d*ck. I say and do things I do not mean to, and Leal usually helps me understand where I went wrong. You are a nice person, and I should be more patient with you, but I do not regret any of my words. In my mind they are the truth."

"I am paying you for safety; nothing more. The only thing I have ever wanted from you was for you to leave me alone." Nael snorted. It was the truth, but hearing it made him feel more like an as*hole and less like a man who was trying to protect himself and his reputation.

"Don't pretend to be innocent. I've heard you talking to Leal, so I know you've committed crimes, and there's no way the scars you carry weren't put there intentionally."

"They were," Mina admitted. "But I made them myself." Nael's expression became pensive, and Mina realized that she had said a little too much.

"Like I told you, I trusted the wrong person."

"Trust doesn't scar faces Ami."

"But going through a windshield at fifty miles per hour does." Nael blanched. He studied the woman closely, wondering if she was saying what he thought she was saying, and she clarified for him just before he could ask. "Everyone thinks I'm dead as a result of that accident."

"Was it worth it?" the man asked, wondering if she regretted her choice to disappear.

"Every time that I open my eyes, I wonder why I didn't just go through with it." Pain seared through Nael's heart. He had heard similar words from his mother, only she had a reason to live. He and his brother would always ask her why she stayed with their father even though it was clear she was miserable, and she told them that every time she woke up their smiling faces would remind her of how much she had. Ami clearly had nothing, not even her health.

"Then why don't you end it now? The ocean is waiting for you."

"There are times when I consider it, but at the end of the day, I'm a coward." Nael was stricken by the woman's admission, and when she pushed past him, he found himself glued to the spot she had left him in.

"Listen, this rift between us. It's putting pressure on my relationship with Leal. Can we just put it behind us?" He finally asked. Ami had gone back to preparing her meal, so she was once again turned away from him, just in another part of the room.

"I have nothing to do with what's happening. The truth is that you are hurt, angry, and confused and you are taking it out on the wrong person. Like me, you thought you had a future with someone only to find out that the person you saw forever with, is building your dream life without you." Nael stared at the woman, who was calmly cutting various vegetables that she was trying to make use of before they went bad.

"How do you deal with it?" He suddenly asked, sitting on the ground as he allowed himself to be vulnerable, just in that moment.

"I haven't figured it out yet. Sometimes, I want to go out and become successful. I want to reemerge as a new creature and show him what he walked away from. I want him to see what he lost out on, and I want him to suffer, knowing that he threw me away."

"Then why not do that?" Mina shrugged, turning around to face the man who she could tell was also asking for himself.

"Because I am terrified that if I do, he might not even care. He might see me in all my glory and look the other way. That would be much worse than knowing that the woman he walked away from, the woman who I am and will always be, was just an insignificant little bump in life to him."

It was weird to Mina, for as much as she had missed President Lee in the past, she now hated him. If he had truly been drugged, he would have told her, and if he had to marry Miss Lisa because of it, she would have understood. Yes, it would have hurt, but at least she would have known that he was left without options. However, that was not what the man had done. He had sent his sister, who was no fan of hers to break the news, and she was anything but gentle about it.

"What if we do it for ourselves?" Mina heard in the distance. Both she and Nael turned to see Leal who was listening to them speak. "What if we do everything you said but not to prove anything to anyone. What if we did it to find peace?"

"How do you heal without closure?" Mina asked, looking down at the ground to prevent the men from seeing the water that had pooled in her eyes.

"We can start by making a lot of money," Nael suggested, and Mina chuckled at his attempt to lighten the mood.

"Now, that; can be arranged," Mina replied.