Later that evening, Ledi awoke under a warm quilt, wanting nothing more than to snuggle down and sleep for a hundred years. Was there an internship in sleep studies? She should have looked into that.
“Are you feeling better, my cousin?” Nya was at her side, and that was when she remembered that Alehk had showed up at the hospital just as she had wrapped up the morning’s tiring work. Her uncle had invited her and Thabiso to lunch at his home. Ledi had asked to take a short nap and had been asleep before she hit the sheets.
“Still a bit groggy, but better,” she said. “I guess my brain still hasn’t caught up with the time zone. Did I miss lunch?”
Nya smiled indulgently. “Lunchtime has passed, cousin, and teatime. It is almost time for supper.”
Ledi bolted up.
“What? How come no one woke me?” She scrambled for the boots she didn’t remember taking off.
“Because Prince Thabiso said that you must sleep as long as necessary, and that you were not to be disturbed.” Nya smiled and lowered her gaze. “He is very protective of you. And he cares enough to stay and be civil with my father, even after the castigation he received yesterday.”
Ledi’s brain was still halfway in the clouds, but she latched onto a fragment of the conversation she’d had with Thabiso that morning. “Alehk is a finance minister?”
“He is the finance minister, and he often doesn’t see eye to eye with the royal family. Sometimes I think it’s because . . .” Nya’s cheeks showed just the slightest tinge of blush. “You see, after your parents left, he assumed that I would be chosen to be Thabiso’s bride. Our mothers were the best of friends, and it was seen as a good omen when they all conceived during the same period.”
Ledi processed that new information. “Wait, what? They were best friends?”
“Oh yes,” Nya said. “One second.”
She rushed across the room and came back with a framed photo. Three beautiful dark-skinned women—Ledi’s mother, Queen Ramatla, and a woman she assumed to be Nya’s mother. Three wide smiles, and three large bellies.
“They were devastated when my mother died, and when the priestesses chose you as Thabiso’s betrothed, it made the bond between Libiko and Her Highness even stronger. When your family left without saying a word, the queen went into a state of shock. She wasn’t the same after that.” Nya shook her head. “This is all rumor, of course. But my father thought it went without saying that I would take your place as the prince’s betrothed. After I fell ill, he became even more adamant, filling my head with all kinds of nonsense about the future, as though choosing a bride for a prince was as simple as transferring a property deed.”
Ledi mentally sorted all of the information Nya had just provided her. There really was no replacement for boots on the ground investigation, because she’d yet to come across any of this in the emails Likotsi had sent her. Friendship, betrayal, and now a possible love triangle.
“Do you . . . do you love Thabiso?” Ledi asked carefully. Her chest went tight at just the possibility.
“Oh! No, of course not. I never wanted to marry Thabiso,” Nya said with a shocked laugh. “Dealing with one spoiled, demanding man my entire life has quite cured me of any desire for another one. Although seeing how Thabiso treats you makes me believe that I misjudged him. Or perhaps the priestesses were right when they chose you as his betrothed, for you seem to be the one who brings out the best in him.”
Ledi pulled on her boots. “He’s okay, I guess.”
“Mm-hmm,” Nya said. “You know, when I watch television shows about New York, the women are always so cynical about love. I see this is one thing that is not false.”
“That’s the only thing those shows get right.” Ledi laughed. “You can see for yourself when you come visit me. My apartment is the size of the bathroom in Friends.”
Nya grew suddenly sober, and Ledi startled at just how frail her cousin was. “Yes, it would be quite lovely to leave Thesolo someday. Even if just for a little while.”
“Hey, my niece, you are awake!” Alehk’s voice carried into the room before he strode in with a steaming mug of tea, Thabiso trailing behind him. “Here, here, have something to warm you up before you leave.”
“Night will fall soon,” Thabiso explained as Alehk thrust the tea into her face. “If we want to make it back to the palace, we should go. Unless you want to stay.”
“Oh, don’t be silly,” Nya said, rising to her feet and helping Ledi to hers. “Our accommodations are in no way fit for a prince and his future bride, family or not. Go, and I shall see you tomorrow.”
Her cousin moved quickly, wrapping Ledi up in her blanket cloak and scarf and hat, slipping her gloves onto Ledi’s hands, as her first set of foster parents had when she was a child. Alehk disappeared for a moment and returned with a large thermos. “For the cold road, then, where warmth is even more important.”
Ledi tucked the thermos into her bag. “Thank you, Uncle.”
She had always resisted being looked after and fretted over, always eager to show that she was an asset and not a burden, but she had to admit that it was surprisingly nice to have people who cared about your well-being, even if Alehk was kind of a jerk. Wasn’t that how most people felt about their families?
She was soon atop D’artagnan, waving farewell to her family as Thabiso directed their not so valiant steed through the quiet streets of the town toward the trail that would lead them to the pickup point.
“Thanks for letting me sleep,” she said eventually. “I feel a lot better. I’ve only worked in labs before, not in a clinical setting, so all of the interacting with patients wore me out. I’m glad none of them were actually sick, though.”
“It’s I who should be thanking you for working so hard today,” he replied. “You know, I looked up epidemiology back in New York after I found out your field of study. And I didn’t quite understand all the hard work that went into it. I remember once I asked you why you didn’t remain a waitress, as you should perform the job you are best at. After seeing you today, I understand why.”
Ledi grew a bit warmer under her layers of wool.
“I really want to understand what’s happening here,” she said. “I hate mysteries. I hate not knowing the ‘why’ behind things, and epidemiology is very much about answering that question.”
“I’m sure there’s good reason for that type of curiosity,” Thabiso said.
“Can it, Freud.” She felt his quiet laugh reverberate against her back.
They traveled in silence for a while, the sky darkening at a rapid rate as D’artagnan clomped his way down the trail. She shivered against the biting wind, which was no longer being filtered through the warming afternoon rays of the sun. “Do you think we’ll make it back before the sun sets?”
“We could have, but it seems nature is having a bit of a laugh at our expense right now.” He held out a hand in front of her and she watched a snowflake slowly drift down to his palm, only to be immediately whipped away by an icy gust of wind.
Annoyance ricocheted through her body. “Please don’t tell me I’m gonna be the first Black person who went on a voyage to the motherland and froze to death,” she gritted out through chattering teeth. “Social media would have a field day and I don’t want to live on as a meme. Did you know it might snow?”
“This storm was not forecast,” he said. “But the snow is coming down harder, so we should take shelter until we know how bad it will be.”
Ledi looked around, then threw her hands up in the air, the only expression of her annoyance she was sure Thabiso would be able to see from behind. “Shelter? We’re on the side of a mountain.”
“I’ve heard that if you’re going to be trapped in a snowstorm, it’s useful to have a Saint Bernard with you,” he said calmly.
“Thabiso—”
“I told you Naledi, what I know, I know well. Trust me.”
And since she had no other choice in the matter, she did.
LESS THAN AN hour later, Ledi sat in front of the fire that Thabiso had made toward the back of a cave that wasn’t exactly large but would have gone for two grand at least in New York. D’artagnan stood around the corner in the L-shaped entryway, tied near a weighted flap of fabric that dampened the strength of the wind.
“The goatherds need to take cover sometimes,” Thabiso explained as he threw a tuft of fibrous dried grass into the fire. “This cave has been here for generations. I vexed many a nanny by running off to come here without their knowledge.”
“Scaring your caretakers half to death by making them think they’d lost the prince? How cute,” Ledi said. She was not pleased with their sudden camping excursion. Being stuck on a donkey had been adventure enough; sleeping in a rocky cave with no hot water or soft bed was cruel and unusual punishment. But there was something else stoking her impatience: another f word feeling that wouldn’t let her be. Fear.
“There was no other place I could go in the kingdom to be alone,” Thabiso said as he worked. “There was always someone trying to placate me, or reminding me of the responsibilities I would hold one day. Here, there was occasionally a lost goat or a herdsman on the outs with his partner.”
Ledi took a deep breath. “I’m sorry for snapping at you. I don’t like feeling like this.”
“Like what?” Thabiso asked.
“Freaked out,” she admitted. Their impromptu camping trip wasn’t the only thing bothering her.
“Snow freaks you out?” he asked.
“My parents died in a car accident. Maybe you know that. I don’t remember much, but I know there was a storm and the roads were icy, and then the car skidded. Was it a taxi? I think I was calling for them and getting no response. Even that might be a false memory, though. But this kind of storm feels bad.”
She wrapped her arms around herself. She’d always told herself the nightmare was just a nightmare, but it was the closest thing to a memory she had.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you don’t like to talk about what happened, but I was wondering if being back has brought any memories up to the surface?”
“No. I feel pretty silly, to be honest. How do you just forget a whole chunk of your life?”
“Sometimes it’s easier to forget, I imagine.” He stopped talking and Ledi did, too. She stretched her hands out toward the fire instead.
Thabiso went around the corner to give D’artagnan some feed from the supply of hay the goatherds had left in a corner of the cave. Wind rushed in, and then he called out. “We won’t be able to go back tonight, and I don’t want to risk anyone coming up to get us. It’s really coming down out there. I sent a message to Likotsi; hopefully she got it.”
Ledi ignored the little thrill that sneaked in behind her frustration, like those jerks who rushed through the subway turnstiles with strangers rather than pay. She ignored the fluidity of his walk as he returned, rubbing his hands together, and the way his body was put together so damn well beneath his sweater and jeans. None of that mattered. They’d sleep, get rescued at some point, and then she’d go back to her practicum and he’d go about his royal business. If she held out just a bit longer she’d be done with him for good. That was what she wanted. Totally.
“Does this place have reception?” she asked, pulling out the phone she’d been given.
“No. You’d have to go stand out in the snow,” Thabiso said. “Me and my sparkling wit are your only form of entertainment for the foreseeable future.”
He looked away quickly and she knew he’d had the same thought she’d had. There were many ways he could entertain her . . .
“I wish I had eaten lunch,” she said, suddenly realizing that the prospect of an entire night without food lay ahead of her. Food talk was safer than thinking of the ways Thabiso could keep her preoccupied.
He grinned and dragged his travel pack closer to him, then dug inside and began pulling out aluminum foil–wrapped packets. He glanced up at her, his eyes bright. “You may detest me, but you can never say that I’ve let you go hungry.”
He handed her one, and she tore it open and bit into a savory pastry stuffed with delicately spiced goat. “Oh my god. The goats walking around are cute and everything, but I can’t feel an ounce of guilt about this.”
She tried to eat with some decorum, finishing two pastries, and then making it through about half a serving of spicy rice before wisely cutting herself off. She had no idea how long they’d be in the cave.
“I’ll save these for round two,” Thabiso said, retrieving the unopened packages and placing them back inside his bag. “Nya is an excellent cook. Her mother, your aunt through marriage, passed away when she was born, so she’s always had a lot of responsibility.”
“She told me. And that our mothers were all best friends. How they were all pregnant at the same time.” She kept any comments about the queen’s behavior to her best friend’s child to herself.
Ledi had spread her blanket out on one side of the fire, and Thabiso had done the same on the other. She rolled to her side and looked at him. “Is there a reason why you never replaced me when my family left? Like, with Nya, for example? She understands your people, and she knows what it’s like to have unwanted responsibility.”
Thabiso lay on his back with his hands beneath his head. He shrugged, and she could see his lips purse in thought despite the obstruction of his beard. “It is not wise to second-guess the priestesses,” he said, then turned his head toward her. “Besides, I always hoped you’d come back. I believe in fairy tales, remember?”
He was looking at her with those Disney eyes again, this time with firelight dancing in their depths. The wind howled outside and the flames flickered as the cold air swept through the cave. Ledi remembered the story he’d told about his imaginary soul mate; she’d never forgotten it, but only now did she really connect the fact that he’d been talking about her. While she’d been alone in New York, Thabiso had held out hope. Saving her food, talking to her, keeping her company . . .
I stopped believing for a while there.
Did that mean he’d started believing again?
She’d grown up thinking that she wasn’t wanted anywhere, but there had been a prince a world away who had been waiting for her and had apparently never stopped.
The emotion descended on her like the storm that had driven them into the cave. She held back the tears but she couldn’t hide the way she shook thinking of the fact that he’d waited. He’d waited and wanted, and when she’d never returned, he had come looking for her. It was silly—she was romanticizing things—and yet . . .
“Are you cold?” he asked, his voice low.
Ledi stared into his fire-filled eyes and nodded. She was actually warm; her body had heated under his gaze. She should have said no, she was fine. She had always been fine. But she was tired of always being fine when fine meant alone, so this lie was okay.
She wasn’t cold; she was hungry. Hungry for his touch and his soft smile that let her know she had never been alone. Or rather, that she had been, but he had been alone, too, because maybe Ingoka really didn’t make mistakes, as the locals were fond of saying.
Thabiso eased himself up in one fluid motion and pulled his blanket after him. Ledi felt the puff of air displaced by the blanket as he flopped it onto the ground behind her. She felt his movements as he stretched out, and then scooted closer and closer.
“Is this okay?” he asked when there was a drafty couple of inches left between them.
“You can come closer,” she said.
He did. Slowly.
His knees notched into the space created by hers as they bent. His shins pressed into the boots that covered her calves, and the muscles of his thighs rubbed over her glutes. Each new impression of his body against hers made it harder to breathe, harder to think of anything but how good he’d felt inside of her their one time together. Did it really only have to be once? Her body was presenting a serious rebuttal to that conclusion.
His muscled torso pressed against her back, and then his arms went around her to secure her.
“Warm now?” he asked. His voice was low, and just a bit cocky. He knew the answer.
She was. Everywhere. Her skin felt too tight and sensitive. Her nipples were pressing at the cups of her bra, just above where his arm rested. If he moved a bit he’d feel the hard peaks right through the fabric of her shirt. He could brush over them and drive her wild, like he had the last time he’d touched her. Ledi gasped at the thought, shifted the tiniest amount.
“I—I am.”
That small, scared part of her mind tried to dredge up the feelings of humiliation to deter her, and that was when it hit her: she felt no shame about sleeping with him. She’d been pissed about his lie, hurt and angry and betrayed, but she also remembered the laughter they had shared and the way he’d made her feel. That part had been true. If that was true, and the fact that he had always wanted her was true, she wasn’t sure what she was fighting against. She leaned back into him.
“Can you tell me about what you remember from when we were children?” she asked.
He pulled her closer. “I remember a bit of the betrothal ceremony. I remember thinking that you were very pretty, that you had happy eyes, and that you were a good friend so you would likely make a good wife. I don’t know what I thought a wife was, though. Probably someone who played video games with me and shared her crayons.”
Ledi laughed and he held her tighter.
“I was sad when you left, you know,” he continued. “That was the first time I realized sometimes you could cry and scream and flail and it would do nothing to bring a person back.”
“I learned that very soon after you, if it makes you feel any better,” she said quietly. He just held her then, and it was exactly the thing she wanted in that moment. The synchronized rise and fall of their chests. Being held by a man who had presented her with two separate identities and seemed to care for her regardless of which he inhabited.
“This makes me feel better, actually,” he said. “Having you here with me. I’ve always thought that the betrothal thing, especially of children, was outdated, but this feels right.”
“You know it pains me to admit this, but it feels right to me, too.” Ledi took a deep breath, then shifted in his hold and turned so that she faced him. In the firelight she could see the rounded sharpness of his cheekbones, the deep, dark brown of his perfect skin, and those eyes that stared at her as if she were both goddess and pilgrim.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she whispered.
“Do what?” he asked, whispering, too.
“Be with someone. I’ve only ever been alone, and that’s worked pretty well for me.”
“You had friends,” he replied, not whispering anymore. “Portia was as protective of you as my Royal Guard.”
Ledi shook her head and tears filled her eyes. “She hurt me, too.”
Thabiso’s hand moved to her face, and his fingertips brushed over her cheeks, traced the shell of her ear, and sent a shiver of want through her.
“That’s the thing, Naledi. That the people who love you will hurt you the most is one of the great conundrums of the human condition. My philosophy tutor said so, and he had about five degrees on the subject, so I guess it holds some water.”
She giggled despite the tears burning her eyes, then squeezed her eyes shut and finally said aloud the questions that had been trying to force their way out since she’d discovered Thabiso’s identity and, as a result, her own. “How could my parents take me away from here and not leave me any connection to people who would have loved me? How could they have left me alone?”
She felt the press of his warm palm between her shoulder blades as he pulled her close and rubbed comforting circles down her back. His beard brushed against her face as she nestled into the comfort of the space between his neck and shoulder. It still smelled like happiness.
“I’ve been asking myself this, too. For years I’d thought it was greed, or pride, or insolence, but I cannot believe your parents would make such a rash decision without reason. I cannot believe that your mother would wound her best friend without reason. One thing is certain, though, Naledi.”
She opened her eyes and looked up into his.
“You’re not alone anymore.” His lips pressed into hers then, warm and silky, and while his hands offered comfort, his kiss was pure desire.
Naledi closed her eyes and fell into the kiss. His familiar floral musk surrounded her, and she pressed fluttering kisses down his jaw to his neck to inhale it again. She retraced the path to his mouth and covered it with hers, relearning the taste and feel of a man she’d thought might be right for her, and was now turning out to be even better than she’d previously imagined.
“Goddess, I thought I’d never taste you again,” Thabiso rasped against her lips. “I don’t think I could live without this sweetness.”
She pushed against his shoulder to press him back to the ground, and then straddled him.
“You’d live. Fuckboyitis isn’t a terminal illness,” she reminded him.
“But chronic lack of Naledi is,” he said simply. “Leads to brittle bones.”
She snorted, which wasn’t very sexy, but she was glad that she wasn’t the only one who turned into a complete cornball before sex. He leaned up on his elbows and nipped at her mouth before kissing her, hard. Her skin buzzed from the roughness of his beard, heightening the sensation.
She leaned back and pulled her sweater off. While the fabric was still over her head she felt his palms pass over her breasts and then a tug at the chain that hung around her neck.
“You still wear my gift,” he said as she felt her bra pulled down and the caress of smooth, warm metal and glass over one of her nipples in contrast to the cool air of the cave. She shuddered and rocked against him, finally working her way out of the ridiculous cowl neck just as his mouth replaced the inorganic material against her skin.
His hands were at the buttons of her stretchy jeans as he sucked and nipped at the stiff peaks of her breasts.
Yes, there we go, she thought as his short, rough hair brushed her areola, making her jump from the shock before he soothed her with his tongue. She stood to shimmy out of her pants and underwear, so preoccupied with the heat in his gaze as he watched her that she almost threw her jeans into the fire.
She bent over to retrieve them and heard him groan. “Stop teasing me, Naledi.” She threw them a safe distance from the flames and crawled back onto his lap. The bulge at his groin jumped invitingly as he thickened, pressing up against her as she moved to settle against his cock. He stopped her midkneel.
“Wrong seat,” he said, then his strong hands were at the backs of her thighs, urging her up his torso and toward his face.
“Um—” That syllable was the only one she was able to emit before his hands clenched her ass and his beard nestled between her thighs.
“Holy shit,” she gasped. His tongue pressed hard against her clit as he lapped and sucked and nibbled, pleasure dispersing through her body like a substance that would expand until it filled every part of its container.
Her knees pressed into the rocky ground that was barely softened by the blanket, but the nerve receptors there were dampened by the work being put in by Thabiso’s tongue. Ledi ground into his face, crying out at the scrape of his beard against sensitive skin, at his fingers pressed hard into her thighs, but above all, at his tongue. That tongue alone made Thesolo one of the wonders of the modern world.
“Thabiso, fuck,” she whimpered, and his name on her lips seemed to flip the switch on the tornado feature of his tongue. Thabiso swirled the hard warmth against her clit without mercy, and Ledi’s arms flailed wildly in the air as she reached for something, anything, to keep her from being knocked over by the sensation. Finally, just as the orgasm curled her toes and bent her back, she grabbed his head and rode it out. At her abrupt cries, Thabiso slowed down, slackened his hold on her, and licked more softly. Her thighs trembled and she felt him smile against her, a shockingly intimate sensation.
She crawled down his body, and he sat up so that his face was level with hers when her ass came into contact with his still-clothed erection. He looped his arms around her and kissed her. “Are you okay, goddess of fire?”
She almost laughed at the ridiculous moniker, but then she stopped herself. She was feeling pretty powerful with all the good, postorgasmic bliss zinging through her.
“No,” she said, then kissed him, tasting her own essence. “You’re not inside of me.”
Thabiso leaned over to reach into his bag and pulled out a sleeve of condoms. “I’m dating a public health student,” he said by way of explanation, and she laughed, even though the word dating did send the tiniest amount of fear through her. Were people who everyone thought to be engaged allowed to date?
Then he kissed her and she closed her eyes and the only thought in her head was wondering how long it would take him to get the condom packet open.
She moved into a crouching position as he sheathed himself, and then sank down onto him when his hands moved to her hips. She was slick and pliable and there was no resistance, just a sweet friction and fullness as she took him in completely.
“Oh, sweet, sweet, Naledi,” he groaned. His head dropped back and his nostrils flared and Ledi was emboldened by his reaction just to being held within her.
Her hands went to his shoulders as she slowly raised and lowered herself on his cock, moaning as he filled her again and again. Thabiso gritted his teeth and hissed, the sounds making her feel like the goddess he’d taken to calling her.
His arms moved behind him to brace himself as he began to pump up into her, meeting her downward stroke, and then Ledi was lost. She leaned forward and he met her halfway. Their foreheads were touching and their gazes were locked as they both worked their hips in a mad frenzy to see who could drive the other crazier. She reached between her legs and pressed her fingers there.
“Dammit, ah, Naledi.” Thabiso jerked and his cock thickened inside of her, and then Ledi was gone, too, pulsing around him as their firelit shadows throbbed against the walls of the cave behind him.
Thabiso dropped back against the blanket and carefully withdrew from inside of her, and Naledi rolled off of him.
“Ouch! I forgot we weren’t on a bed,” she said, rubbing at her shoulder.
“My tailbone didn’t have the luxury of forgetting, but it was well worth it.” He kissed her, then got up to gather some napkins.
“Are you hungry again?” he asked.
“For food?” She watched the play of light against his body as he leaned over his bag.
She saw his cock jump again and he dropped the flap of the bag and began stalking toward her, a definitely non-Disney look in his eye.
“Food can wait,” he said as he settled in beside her. “Warmth is the number one priority in surviving a storm.”