When Heaven, a registered nurse falls in love with Hamid despite religious and cultural differences she knows there will be problems. When her business takes off, fulfilling her dreams of financial independence she's not so ready to give it up.
Hamid has given a vow to his family that he will not do as so many have done. He has come to America to become a doctor but his pledge to return to Pakistan and give back was not taken lightly. Falling in love with Heaven has brought its own set of problems.
In spite of the problems the couple marries and set about to compromise. Hamid returns to Pakistan to begin work in the clinic and Heaven remains in America to manage her business. After a year of this the constant separation isn’t working. When it looks as if their fighting will eventually tear away at the seam of their love they realize something drastic must be done.
Hamid is tied to his vow to his father. Heaven is tied to a vow to herself. Will they find a way to bridge the continental divide and save their love or will they allow vows to keep them apart?
Excerpt
When Heaven meets Hamid their are plenty of fireworks. This couple overcomes many obstcles to be together but the biggest hurdel of all is getting married and having hamid return to Pakistan to be a doctor in a local clinc there and th have Heaven remain in the states as a registered nurse running here onw business. it's hard for their marriage not to break under the strain.
That’s going to kill you.”
For the space of a breath, Heaven pretended that the voice was not talking to her.
“Excuse me Miss, perhaps you didn’t hear me?”
Oh, she’d heard him alright, and had hoped that perhaps he’d get the message and know she didn’t give a care about his opinion of what she was eating.
“It will kill you,” the voice said again.
Heaven rolled her eyes and turned to answer. Her eyes traveled up, and up, and up, and her first thought was wow. She swallowed. “Why do you care what I eat? It’s my body and I’m the one paying for it.”
“I care because you’re beautiful, and if it will prevent you from doing harm to your body, I will gladly treat you to breakfast.”
Heaven glanced behind her at the tray the man had his breakfast on. A box of raisins, a banana, and an apple. Yes, it was healthier than what she had on her tray, but so what. She was in the mood for bacon, eggs, and hash brown potatoes, and even if she wasn’t, she wasn’t in the mood to hear lectures on eating swine.
She pushed her tray along the conveyer ignoring the man behind her, when she felt a tug on her tray and stopped, startled at the man’s actions. This was gall. He was trying physically to take her breakfast.
Heaven pulled back. “Stop that! What do you think you’re doing?”
“I offered to buy you a healthy breakfast.”
Hamid looked down at the scowling black woman with the strange hair wondering why he was getting involved. Fate, he decided but wasn’t sure. He’d stood behind many Americans at the hospital and had always wanted to say something, but this was the first time the words came out.
Now Hamid found himself ensued in a battle with this diminutive female. He looked her over, as she roughly pulled her tray from him. She was no more than five feet tall if that and dark chocolate skin, smooth and unblemished. Her head had, it must have been a thousand of these little prickly things in them. From where he stood, she smelled deliciously of lemons. He’d meant it when he’d said she was beautiful. She was ravishing, but the unpleasant look on her face had him wondering why he would take the time to inventory her.
“I wish to buy your breakfast, take my tray.” Hamid tried again.
“Leave me alone, I didn’t ask you to buy my breakfast and evidently I am happy with my choices, or I wouldn’t have put them on my tray.”
One last tug and Heaven had her tray in front of her. She placed her body in such a way that there was no denying she was serious. If the man touched it again he would deserve a karate chop, or her heel ground into his foot.
Heaven angrily peeled off the bills and took her tray while looking hurriedly around the room for an empty table. Finding one, she walked in that direction. When she heard footsteps behind her, she stopped abruptly and turned.
She tilted her head to look skyward wanting to make sure the man knew she was not interested. She was frowning for all she was worth. Her eyes felt as thought fire were shooting from them, but the man merely gave her an amused look and walked ahead of her to the only empty table in the hospital cafeteria, the table she’d been heading for.
For a moment, Heaven stood and watched him as he wiped the apple with a napkin and bit it. She blinked as apple juice squirted from the fruit and onto his chin. When his hand wiped it away, his eyes locked with hers.
“Are you going to stand there to eat?” he asked before returning his attention to his meal.
A low growl filled her but she sat at the opposite end of the table and begin digging into her food. When she reached for the salt, a brown hand covered hers and she pulled back. “May I have the salt when you’re done, please?” She narrowed her eyes knowing he was not putting salt on fruit.
“Salt is bad for you.”
“Who are you?”
“My name is Hamid.”
“Okay, Hamid, why are you all up in my business?”
“I don’t know really,” he smiled, “I just felt compelled to say these things to you.”
He stared at her, his head moving a little to the side making Heaven feel as if she were some type of specimen he was looking at.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Your hair.”
“What about my hair?”
“What do you call it?” he started to point then stopped. “Why do you wear it like that?”
Another growl formed in Heaven’s throat, this one louder than the first. She deliberately picked up the bacon that had until this moment lain dormant on her plate. She bit into it with gusto before holding it in Hamid’s direction. “Excuse me, I forgot my manners. Would you care for some of my breakfast?” She shook the bacon then brought it to her lips and bit down again. “It’s very good.”
“Yes and filled with worms.”
“So is your apple, matter of fact if I were you I would check that hole, it looks like it might contain live worms, at least mine are cooked.”
Heaven turned away wanting to spit the bacon into a napkin. The thought of worms making her nauseous, she wanted to smack Hamid’s smug face, but her offering him the bacon had made him as ill as he’d made her, at least he’d stopped talking.
When Heaven dumped her breakfast tray it still contained two uneaten slices of bacon, and for the first time the hospital had gotten them crispy, just the way she liked.
***
Hamid sat at the table watching the woman walk away. He’d made her angry; actually, he couldn’t much blame her. He had no right to stick his nose in her affairs. If she wanted to kill herself, it was her right. He finished the last bite of the banana and pocketed the raisins for later smiling to himself, pleased that she’d not been able to finish eating the bacon. At least for today he’d saved her from putting more of the poison into her body. His good deed was done.
***
Heaven finished her shift and gave her report to the oncoming private duty nurse. She liked being a nurse and liked even better that she worked through a registry going to different hospitals and the occasional home. It allowed freedom and a lot more money, something that she needed. And she didn’t have to put up with the infighting that sometimes went on behind the scenes. She was never at one place long enough to become involved. And after running into the man in the hospital cafeteria, she was definitely glad she was off for the next several days
She was used to having Moslem men try to tell her what she should eat, especially at Rush Presbyterian St Luke Hospital. She didn’t know why they felt compelled, as though they had a right. Maybe it had something to do with their chauvinistic attitude toward the women in their country. She wanted to shout, ‘you’re in America now bub, get used to it, you do not tell women here what to do.’ He was lucky that her mind was preoccupied with other things or she would have gone off on him.
***
“Miss, Miss!”
Heaven groaned. She didn’t believe it. There was Mr. tall, dark, and handsome yelling at her. She kept walking, pretending that she hadn’t heard him.
“My car won’t start.” he offered and she stopped in her tracks and let out a sigh. What did she look like, triple A?
She stomped two rows over to where Hamid was parked. “What’s wrong?” she asked her senses on the alert. The hospital staff wasn’t off duty, only the private duty help was. “Are you following me?”
“If I am I’m doing a poor job of it. I didn’t know it was you until I saw the little things on your head.”
“Twists,” Heaven replied angrily, “they’re called twists. Now, what do you want me to do?”
“Do you have a cell phone?”
“No.”
He frowned, “Thank you for coming over, maybe I’ll just go inside the hospital and ask the security guard for help.”
“Does your dome light come on?” Heaven asked ignoring the way he was looking at her. “Move,” she ordered nudging him aside as she opened his door. “Give me your keys.”
She snatched them from his outstretched palm and attempted to turn the ignition.
“Are you a nurse or a mechanic?”
She didn’t answer but found the lever and popped his hood. “Do you have jumper cables? Never mind,” she said and walked away.
“Where are you going?”
“To get my car, your battery is dead. You didn’t expect me to give you a jump with the power of my mind did you?”
Heaven was being deliberately rude. She would give him a jump but she definitely didn’t want him getting the wrong idea. She was not into dating anything but black men and since Brandon, she wasn’t much into them either.
For once luck was on her side, she pulled into the slot directly in front of Hamid’s car, any other position, and she would not have been able to help him. For a moment, she wished the car had been arranged differently. She popped her hood and got out her cables before going back to look at Hamid’s car. She noticed right away the build up of corrosion around his battery terminals, sighed again and went for the toolbox she kept in her truck.
“What are you doing?”
“Helping.”
“I meant specifically.”
“Your terminals are dirty. I need to clean them first.” She showed him the wrench for his inspection. “This is an open-end wrench. I have to loosen the cables.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?”
“If I didn’t, would you be able to tell the difference?”
Heaven watched the expression in his eyes change from curiosity to embarrassment. “I know what I’m doing,” she answered.
She cleaned the terminals with the battery post cleaner then brushed out the connector and reattached them, she handed the cables to Hamid. “Give me a moment to connect from my end then you can connect those.” She attached the cable and walked back to Hamid. “Go ahead,” she said. He was paused over the post when she slapped his hand away.
“Sorry,” she murmured, “You were doing it wrong. You put positive to positive and negative to negative or you blow out the computer on both cars.” She took the cable from him and connected them herself.
“Go give it a try, turn the key,” Heaven ordered. The second she heard the car start, she unhooked the cables, slammed Hamid’s hood down, and then her own.
“You should be fine now,” she said and got in her truck and waved her hand for him to take off. She drove behind him for a minute or two just in case. When she was assured that his car was not going to stop, Heaven made a left hand turn at Ashland and drove away before Hamid could do anything else. She was more than happy to see this day end. She was going the wrong way deliberately, ‘never can be too cautious,’ her sensei always taught them. Sure, the man’s car didn’t start and she knew he had not tampered with it. Still she wanted that measure of protection. She didn’t want him to know what direction she lived.
As she bumped over one pothole after the other on Ashland, she cringed at her reasons for doing it. She decided to hop on the Stevenson expressway. A lot of driving, just to throw off someone who wasn’t following her. This was ridiculous, but she couldn’t seem to stop the action.
By the time Heaven had done all of her unnecessary backtracking and reached her home she was royally ticked. For a nanosecond, she thought of not going to her karate class but it was the one thing that would allow her to let off some steam in a safe manner.
***
“Heaven, may I have a word with you?”
Heaven dropped her leg only an inch from her opponent’s face, wondering why the sensei would stop her in the middle of a fight. She glanced toward the floor before walking into the office.
“What was all of that?”
She frowned, “I don’t know what you’re asking me.”
“The way you were fighting, you were not in the dojo. It was more as if you were a thug, a street fighter, that’s not you, Heaven. What’s wrong?”
Heaven sawed her teeth back and forth across her top lip. She didn’t want to tell the sensei what pettiness she was indulging in, besides he would think she was saying things she wasn’t.
“I’m sorry, I was a little distracted. It was a hard day at the hospital.”
“Did one of your patients die?”
“No.” Heaven tilted her head and stared at the sensei. “But it doesn’t look good.” She lowered her eyes. Her statement was true but that wasn’t the reason she was behaving irrationally or fighting in that manner, it was meeting Hamid.
“For the rest of the evening I want you to practice on your katas.” The sensei smiled, “and if you have frustration over my words you may kick the punching bag.”
Chastised, Heaven walked back into the dojo. She didn’t look at any of the other students even though she knew that they had not heard the conversation. She knew they were thinking it had to be something awful for the sensei to call her into the office. Generally he would reprimand right then and there, she shuddered, glad that he hadn’t.
Her eyes flicked over the punching bag and she immediately placed Hamid’s face there. He was the reason for her bad mood, him and his comments about her being beautiful, then his staring at her as though she were.
She wondered why he’d even bothered to call her beautiful. She wasn’t the sort of woman that a man preferred. She was short, dark complexioned with short hair, no breasts to speak of, and very little booty. And for the past year, she’d worn a perpetual scowl. Since Brandon had dumped her for that white girl, Heaven no longer remembered how to smile.
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Reviews for "Let's Get It On"
Reviewed by meka johnson
1/21/2010
I JUST RECEIVED LETS GET IT ON DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY AND I FINSHED IT LAST NIGHT. A BEAUTIFUL STORY. IT WAS AN AWESOME READ AND THANKS FOR THE SIGNED COPY OF THE WEDDING GOWN I JUST STARTED IT THIS MORNING. I CAN NOT WAITTO SEE WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN.
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