Chapter 83

The moon was lighting Egypt, filling two hearts with sadness.

A pair of blue eyes were lost in the immensity of the Nile, as some tears fogged them up. This was beyond him. How could he feel such a strong love? How could he still have all these feelings for someone he had not met in years? How could he have such a strong feeling for someone he had barely just met?

Samanta looked into the horizon, too. From her bedroom balcony, she could see the huge sky, who had witnessed such a sweet love, which, in time, turned to nothing but memories.

Samanta shed a few tears.

“You better get some sleep, honey” said Amir, walking up to her, hugging her from behind.

“I'll be there in a minute, love.”

“By the way, I forgot to tell you I can't come with you. Father asked to meet me early. I can't miss it.”

“Don't worry.”

Amir, then, walked back into their room, leaving Samanta very anxious. Not only did she have to bring her daughter to prove her father was a different man, not whom she had grown up loving during all these years, but she would have to face Dominik on her own.

*****

One more sleepless night, Dominik was starting to feel drained. He was sitting in a large couch in the waiting room at the Genetics Laboratory of the As Salam International Hospital, and he was nearly falling asleep. He was so anxiously expecting Samanta, ten minutes before the stipulated time. Dominik was so nervous he broke a sweat. He kept toying with the ring around his finger, his wedding ring. He set his eyes on the floor, thinking about Dihanna, his wife. The thought about Abraham, his five year old son. He thought of so many family celebrations he attended with the mother of his son, family vacation, the trip to Hawaii last year, when they swam with dolphins. He remembered the funny dance of the Hoola kahiko…

…and a smile lit up his face as he imagined Samanta in Dihanna's place.

He shook his head. What was wrong with him? It was like so many years of marriage were worthless. He felt awful and despicable for being so selfish. He was like an angsty teenager. He wanted to hold Samanta, feel like they were together again.

He looked up and the silhouette of the woman, the object of his desire, was coming. Next to her, her gorgeous daughter. Dominik jumped off his seat and came up to them.

“Samanta” he whispered, as his eyes lit up.

She had adopted a rigid, indifferent posture.

“Let's finish this once and for all” she sentenced.

“Sam, I…” Dominik's soft voice sounded almost like begging.

“I don't want to talk to you. Let's just get this over with, please” Sam was rude.

Dominik felt as if somebody was shoving their hand inside his chest and squeezed his heart mercilessly. Seeing Sam so resentful, made his feeling of guilt, although he was innocent, take over him, again. That nasty feeling of being a cruel man with no scruples.

But… What's wrong with trying to be a father to this girl? Why was it so bad wanting to hear the word daddy from those little lips? All Dominik could be blamed for, was loving immeasurably those two souls before him.

Samanta tried to remain indifferent, but, deep inside, she was terrified of the possibility that her tough exterior would crumble, exposing her. She still sighed for him, her legs still shook in his presence, her heart is still pounding in her chest for him.

“Hello, little girl” Dominik kneeled down to Aháva's level, who looked away and into the floor. “How are you?” He stretched his hand out to pet her curly hair, but the girl avoided his touch, rejecting the gestures from the biological father she now knew. “It's ok, love. I will not hurt you.”

“You already did” murmured Aháva.

Once again, that evil hand got into his chest, tearing his heart brutally, slamming it on the ground and stomping it without mercy. His daughter's words deeply hurt him. A few tears threatened to leave his eyes. He stood up and looked straight into Sam's eyes …

“I am so sorry” he whispered.

“Mrs. Weigand” a woman's voice indicated their turn.

Dominik turned around, quickly, with his hand in the air.

“Here” replied Dominik with a smirk.

“Ha! Mrs. Weigand. So funny” said Sam with sarcasm, as she walked into the office holding Aháva's hand.

Dominik followed them, Samanta's sarcasm had, once again, way beyond him. The doctor's remark was not funny. At all. Actually, he was about to say something to the woman, tell her they were not together, but he chose not to.

Once inside the doctor's office, a middle-aged woman gave them a series of indications. She explained both parties needed to provide a tissue sample, from the child as well as from the father. By unanimous decision, they decided on hair, the woman, then cut some hairs from the child's immaculate brown mane and a blonde lock from the father. Once the tissue had been obtained, the doctor let them know the results would be out in two weeks time and they would be sent to the court house, in order to avoid any risk of tampering.

After the process, Samanta took the child in her arms and rushed out of the office. Dominik caught right up to them and stood in their way.

“Samanta, please, listen to me” he begged. Sam tried avoiding him without even looking at him. “Please, Sam” he insisted.

Samanta looked up and her tough, cold woman mask fell off, exposing her to those blue eyes. A few tears were shed, who held the child's supple frame tightly.

“Why?” Sam tried to hold back her tears. “Why are you doing this, Dominik?” her voice cracked and tears started pouring. “Why do you want to take my baby?”

“No, Samanta. I don’t wish to take her. I asked you for a chance to explain, and you refused. I only want my rights as her father, which I was denied. You cannot expect me to make up for someone else's mistakes. I only wish you would let me see my daughter, earn her love. Is it too much to ask?”

Dominik stroked Samanta's soft cheek with his hand and she closed her eyes as he dried her tears. Aháva laid her head on her mother's shoulder, trying to get some sleep. Their eyes, both Sam and Dominik's met and connected for a brief instant, enough to feel the blazing fire of the passion they thought was dead.

»For all these years I have tried living on with the echo of your voice rumbling in my mind. I refused to let go. And I will not, now that I know there is a real bond between us, be separated from you” Dominik got closer to her. “I refuse to keep living with the ghost of what could have been. I refuse to give you up” he held her hand so softly. “I refuse to forget you. I refuse to not love you and I will fight for the single reason that binds me to you. I will not conform to be away from you. I have not conformed after all these years, even when another woman's love warmed my heart, when her womb hosted my seed, when I thought I had found love again” a knot tied itself in his throat, threatening not to let him talk. “No, no, no, and a thousand times, NO” Dominik shook his head hard. “Samanta Andrade, I have always loved you like I had never loved anyone else, you have no idea how I have suffered the past week, knowing I had a daughter with you and, because of someone I thought was my friend, I never found out” he stopped for air, tears started to fog his eyes, “I missed all these wonderful years of her life” he signaled his daughter and dried his tears. “I was not there at the delivery room to hold her little body between my arms and tell her: Welcome to the world, my little one. I could not be there that one night when she cried and you couldn't sleep, I wasn't there to tell you: It is okay, love. I will get it. Sleep tight. I was not there the day she said daddy for the first time. It was not me who she called daddy” his eyes shed more tears. “I was not there to take her to her first day at school. I was not there when she woke up, scared from that awful dream. I was not there to look under her bed and tell her: No monsters, love. Daddy is here. I missed all of that, Samanta. Not because I wanted to, but because I was denied it. Do not deny me the pleasure of taking her to school some days, watch her grow up, to comfort her in my arms when her heart is broken. Let me be the one to face that guy wooing her, let him know my baby girl is to be respected. Please, so not deny me the chance to walk her down the aisle and have her call me daddy one day. Let me earn her love... Please.”

He could not take it anymore.

He hugged her. Her. Both of them.

Aháva was sleeping on her mother's shoulder.

Samanta was crying on Dominik and he buried his face in between Samanta's neck and their daughter's brown hair.

An impulse pulled him towards those lips, begging him to kiss them, and, with the greatest sweetness in the world, he brushed her lips. His perdition.