Pardon me, Highness, but there is a man from Botswana who is rather insistent that you meet his daughter,” Likotsi said in a low voice. “I told him you were occupied but I’m not certain he won’t creep under the table during dinner and pop up from beside your seat.”
Thabiso closed his eyes against the annoyance. The music provided by the live band was delightful, the food exquisite, but it was so much drone in his ear and ash on his tongue because Naledi wasn’t there with him.
He still had to reveal his true self to her, although that wasn’t entirely right. He’d never felt more like himself than in the time he’d spent with Naledi. The adulation and coy glances from women, the hearty handshakes and admiration from the men, the way everyone treated him like royalty—it grated on him. He wished he were back at the building uptown, on an uncomfortable futon or in a tiny kitchen or on a plastic-wrapped couch, as long as Ledi was there with him.
“You can tell him I’m not available to meet eligible young women right now,” he said, pressing back against the wall of the alcove he was tucked into. He’d have to socialize at some point, but no one had recognized him just yet. “My parents finding me a bride has taken care of that annoyance at the very least.”
“Yes, sire.”
As Likotsi strode away, Thabiso noticed a young woman hovering nearby. He almost dismissed her, but then he saw the tray in her hand. She was a server, like he’d been for those fateful few hours when he worked with Naledi.
“Um, would you like more sparkling water, Prince, sir?”
“Yes,” he said, holding out his empty glass, then added, “Thank you.”
Her hand shook as she poured his water, and a bit splashed onto his shoe. “Oh, I’m sorry! I usually never spill.”
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I know this job is difficult. It’s not as if you set me on fire or anything. Then we would have a problem.” He smiled, hoping that set her at ease, and was pleased when she returned it.
“Thank you, sir. And congratulations.”
“I’m at this fund-raiser on behalf of my people, not myself, but thank you.”
“Oh, congrats for that, too!” she said, and walked away grinning. Thabiso was slightly confused, but people often said strange thing when they realized they were talking to royalty.
A flash of purple fabric hugging a familiar hip in his peripheral vision caught his attention, but when Thabiso turned to investigate, all he saw was the wide, wax print skirt of a ball gown in the space where the purple apparition had been.
Perhaps he was still so enraptured with Naledi that he’d begun conjuring her up? It wouldn’t be the first time; he’d done the same when he was a child, after all. It would certainly be disquieting if that were the case, but that didn’t stop his sudden sense of unease. He needed to see her. Needed to tell her. He’d created a ridiculous set of preconditions in his head, when in reality there was no good moment other than as soon as possible, you cowering hyena.
Likotsi returned, chewing something and brushing crumbs off of her lapels. “These stuffed plantains are addictive,” she said. “Do you want one before you’re announced?”
“No,” he said, his voice rough from nerves that had nothing to do with speaking in front of a group of people. “What is the earliest time I can leave here?”
“Customarily, the guest of honor stays for at least two-thirds of an event,” Likotsi said, disapproval icing over her words. “Don’t tell me that you’re considering leaving to see her. Do you really think she’s sitting around waiting for you? She said she had plans. She could be out with another man—one who isn’t lying to her.”
The thought of it made Thabiso’s fists clench. A crown of icy panic settled on his head at the thought of some other man, perhaps the one who’d comfort her when she found out Jamal was really Thabiso.
“She didn’t mention any other man,” he said defensively.
“And you didn’t mention living in a palace,” Likotsi said with a Cheshire cat grin. “Funny, the things people omit during love’s first bloom.”
Love? Could that be the ridiculous happiness that settled over him at the mere thought of Naledi, that made him sick with anger at the suggestion of her being with someone else?
Impossible.
Or inevitable, if the priestesses had been correct in their assessment.
The music quieted and the roar of the crowd grew louder for a moment before the shushing began. The MC took to the mike and began joking with the attendees.
“You’re right,” Thabiso said. “I have an obligation here and I can’t go running off because I didn’t tell her when I should have. But tonight—”
“I believe you once told me that your love life was not my purview,” Likotsi said. “Shall we keep it that way until after you’ve told her? I’m not feeling very charitable this evening.”
“Do you want to talk, Kotsi?” Thabiso was worried by the dullness in his assistant’s eyes. When he looked closer now, he noticed the wrinkles that marred her shirt, and that the edges of her short hair were slightly overgrown. She’d had time to get a shape-up before the event, and she hadn’t. In the world of Likotsi, this was catastrophic.
“If Naledi throws you out on your buttocks, as she has every right to, then perhaps we can commiserate about our failed American conquests one day,” she said. “But not yet. I’m still a bit tender, you see.”
Thabiso placed a hand on her shoulder. “You’re a good woman. I don’t know what happened, but I know she’s a fool to have hurt you.”
“I seem to be surrounded by fools, lately,” she said, but her smile was affectionate. “For your sake, I hope Naledi is as fond of them as I am.”
The MC’s voice boomed out. “Dinner will be served shortly, but before that, allow me to introduce tonight’s guest of honor. Voted Africa’s most powerful man, and formerly known as one of the world’s most eligible bachelors, His Royal Highness, Bringer of Light and Love, Prince Thabiso Moshoeshoe of Thesolo!”
Thabiso wanted to roll his eyes at the honorific, but the man was just reading from a card. Besides, the title had served as a great icebreaker with women in the past. The not-so-distant past, in fact, but the thought of it seemed gauche to him at the moment. Anything but returning to Ledi and telling her the truth, and then getting to his people, seemed unimportant.
“And it seems that we’ll also be the first to congratulate the prince on his impending marriage! Congratulations!”
What? Word spread fast. He couldn’t very well deny it—that would cause a scandal. Thabiso gritted his teeth. Yet another thing he’d have to pretend for the moment.
He strode toward the stage and had taken his first step up onto it when there was that purple flash just out of view again, this time accompanied by a commotion. He turned, and his gaze met familiar brown eyes that were wide with disbelief. His stomach gave a sick jolt and tumble, as if he’d just gone over the side of Thesolo’s highest waterfall in a barrel.
Ledi. With her friend Portia from the other day seated beside her. Ledi was standing, fists clenched at her sides and fury scrawled into her features. She knew he was a prince now. She thought he was an engaged-to-be-married one. He prepared himself for her to scream and shout and make a scene, but she turned from him and glared at her friend.
“You knew,” she said quietly, but the words carried.
“No! Yes. I suspected.” Portia’s shoulder hunched guiltily.
“You suspected and you brought me here to humiliate me?” Ledi asked.
“What are you talking about?” Portia’s voice rose in a panic. “He’s the one who lied! He should be the one humiliated.”
“Tell that to everyone watching,” Ledi growled, then walked around her friend and through the now-buzzing crowd. Thabiso felt as if his feet were glued to the ground, as if he were in a silent film watching the leading lady make her escape, but then the noise of the crowd filled his ears and his legs began to move, carrying him through the slim paths between tables toward the door Ledi had just marched through.
He was about to break into a full-out run when a wheelchair pushed back and blocked his path. The short-haired woman seated in it gave him a smug look as she pushed a button on her chair.
“Oracle, text Kelly. Kelly pick up a friend named Ledi in front of the Waldorf, right now, and take her wherever she wants to go,” she said, then released the button and smiled at Thabiso. “You’ll have to go around. I hope she’s long gone when you get down there.”
Thabiso didn’t know who the woman was or why she was blocking his route to the one thing that was important to him, but he scrambled around the table. The spaces between the seats was tight, and he pushed his way past shocked guests who were starting to stand in their seats and demand to know what was happening.
He reached the elevator bank just as the door was closing and shoved his hand into the slim opening, hoping the sensors weren’t faulty but deciding it was a risk worth taking. The doors stopped and reversed their course, opening to reveal Ledi, pressed against the back of the elevator car. Her expression was one of terror—was she afraid of him?—and she was shaking her head.
“Let me explain,” he said.
“What are you going to explain first? The crazy emails? How you showed up at my job? How you ended up in the apartment across the hall from me? How you lied to me about everything? Everything!”
She shut her eyes and her nostrils flared; she was fighting against pain, and he was the cause of it. Thabiso wanted to pull her into his arms, but that would assuage his hurt, not hers.
“Listen, Naledi—”
“Don’t,” she said, the croak in her voice a shock to him. “Please. Just . . . don’t. Nothing you say can make this right.”
Tears began slipping down her cheeks, and Thabiso knew then that it was over. He could admit that he didn’t know everything about her after so short a period, but he knew she valued her pride and resilience. He had hurt her, and worse, he’d witnessed those tears break free against her will. That may just have been worse than causing them. He released the elevator door, flinching at the ding that announced the door was closing. Naledi’s eyes opened just before the doors slid together, the pain in them driving home just how ridiculous and selfish he had been.
He leaned his forehead against the cool metal framing the elevator doors.
“Sire?”
“I’ll be back inside in a moment, Kotsi,” he said. It didn’t matter where he was, really. He felt an odd numbness, but he was a prince. Feelings would wait. “I know I have obligations to uphold.”
“I was going to suggest we leave, actually,” she said. “Heartbreak and scandal are sufficient reason for the guest of honor to leave an event, customarily. But perhaps we should wait a moment.”
She was giving Naledi time to make her escape; however nice she was being to him, she’d warned him that he’d hurt the woman from the beginning, and Likotsi was always right.
“Okay,” he said. “Do you think the bodega sells Macallan?”
“No, but this is New York,” she said. “You can get anything you want.”
“Almost anything,” Thabiso corrected. Likotsi nodded grimly.
He could hear people milling about and voices coming toward the elevator bank. “Let’s take the stairs, shall we?”
Forty-seven flights of stairs later, Thabiso had almost convinced himself things were better this way.