by Alyssa Cole
“Motherfucker,” she growled.
This time she didn’t delete the email. They wanted a response? She’d comply.
Sender: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Time is of the essence
FUCK. OFF.
Chapter 3
Your Highness—”
Thabiso opened his eyes, his position on the massage table ensuring that his personal assistant’s Italian leather loafers were in his direct line of sight. They were hours into the flight to New York City, but he was sure that if he looked up, Likotsi would still be sporting her tailored suit jacket, vest, and tie, and her shirt would still be as crisp as if it had been freshly ironed. He had long ago resigned himself to never being best dressed in the palace.
He didn’t look up, though. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the masseuse’s nimble hands working his body. Her fingertips pressed into his muscles, which were still tight after three days of stressful trade meetings in Liechtenbourg. Her work was an exercise in futility, given the additional meetings that awaited him in New York, but Thabiso took pleasure where he could. The tabloids that conjectured on the daily lives of royalty would be sorely disappointed if they knew that Africa’s most eligible bachelor spent most of his time stressed about work and trying to get a quick dose of relief, like most mere mortals.
“Sire?” Likotsi pressed.
Thabiso sniffed in aggravation. He had wanted just this brief moment of repose before their wheels touched the ground and the onslaught resumed. He was tempted to press his hands against his ears and scream like he had when he was a child—his tantrums had been legendary, and the king and queen had often remarked that he was lucky he was the sole heir to the crown with the way he tried their patience.
They remarked on his being the sole heir often.
No pressure.
The sound of one loafer tapping against the carpeted floor added an agitating backbeat to the relaxing music the masseuse was playing. Thabiso knew what that tap meant: Likotsi had something important to tell him. Perhaps something to do with the African Union trade agreement.
“They make fools of us with this offer, Prince Thabiso. We must decline it!”
Or maybe there had been another skirmish with the South African farmers who had been encroaching on Thesoloian lands.
“If the crown will not protect our lands, we’ll be forced to protect ourselves, Your Highness.”
There was also the corporation that wanted to mine Thesolo for the rare earth minerals needed for their cell phone screens and hybrid cars. With the way they pressed, one might think those items were more important than the ecological future of a small African kingdom.
“This will be very lucrative for Thesolo’s coffers, Your Highness. I am the finance minister and I know more of these matters than you. Trust me.”
Or, most worryingly, perhaps his parents had finally made good on the threat to find him a bride since he wasn’t taking serious measures to further the Moshoeshoe royal line.
“Son, you have put off this duty for far too long. Our subjects are worried about the future of the kingdom and there are whispers of bad omens.”
It seemed that everyone wanted or needed something from him, and the number of people who saw him as both provider And protector was ever increasing. It was like quicksand, his responsibility; it had been sucking him down bit by bit from the moment he was born. Sometimes Thabiso was certain the pressure would crush him. He was a prince who would be a king, and there was no retiring, no respite, from his duty to his people.
He so badly wanted a respite. That option wasn’t available to only sons, though. Thabiso pushed against the resentment that had started to grow like an insidious weed in the more shadowy corners of his mind. Resentment of his parents for not bearing more children, of his people for expecting him to be more like a mythical prince than a flesh and blood one. Everyone had forgotten there was a Thabiso following the word Prince, so much so that sometimes he forgot, too.
“My prince?”
He could evade his responsibilities no longer.
He lifted his head from the massage table to meet Likotsi’s eyes. Instead of being dimmed with worry, they were wide and bright. In her hands, she clutched the sleek tablet she used to coordinate every aspect of Thabiso’s life, from dental appointments to dating to drafting political accords.
“There is news,” she said. She tugged at her tie, a cardinal sin and a tic that showed just how excited she was.
His curiosity was piqued.
“That’s quite enough, Trudy,” he barked over his shoulder to the masseuse. She bowed and slipped away to the service area of the private jet, likely to gossip with the steward.
“That was Melinda,” Likotsi corrected. “Trudy was fired two weeks ago after you had an unfortunate reaction to her massage oil mix en route to Kenya. You nearly had her banished from the kingdom, if you’ll recall.”
“What I recall is the rash that plagued me throughout the meetings in Nairobi,” Thabiso said irritably. “I had to have make-or-break policy discussions with the heads of major nations while trying not to rub my buttocks against my seat for relief. Trudy was lucky I didn’t have her thrown into a dungeon.”
Likotsi waved her tablet back and forth. “I have important news to share, unless you wish to continue discussing this grave injustice?”
Thabiso scowled at her mockery but deigned to let it pass. Likotsi knew very well just how much she could push him, and it was further than most. In part because he admired her, but also because he wouldn’t survive a week without her and they both knew it.
“Your grandfather fought off colonizers with his bare hands and you can’t function without an assistant, Ingoka wept.”
“What is it? More directives from the finance ministers? More unrest from my subjects about whether I dress too much like a Westerner or smile too little or smile too much?” Thabiso swung his legs over the edge of the massage table and sat upright, trying to look dignified while wearing nothing but his boxer briefs and scented oil. Complaining about what was part and parcel of his exalted position wasn’t exactly dignified either, but he was exhausted.
Likotsi glanced up at him, concern in her eyes. “Are you quite sure you’re all right?”
“Yes.” He was a prince. Of course he was all right. He had to be. “Get on with it.”
Likotsi nodded, and her worried expression quickly changed to one of self-satisfaction. “The palace department of culture and international relations recently told me that they’d received a hit from that genetics testing site, one of the few off-Continent matches, and I grew suspicious. Using my formidable internet skills, I was able to narrow down the area to North America.” Likotsi paused a moment, as if to bask in incoming praise. Thabiso stared at her, and she sighed and continued. “Two countries out of the entire world made my search much easier, sire. And, perhaps it wasn’t entirely aboveboard, but I obtained the user’s log-in name for the genetics site and found a match on a web forum for nerds. HeLaHoop is quite active on a site called GirlsWithGlasses. HeLaHoop, aka Naledi Smith, née Naledi Ajoua, has an IP address in New York City . . .”
Naledi Ajoua.
He was starting to feel something other than agitation: Excitement. He hadn’t felt that emotion in some time. Being groomed to lead a kingdom generally lent itself to emotions like frustration, anger, and panic, if one really cared for one’s subjects.
Thabiso cared quite a bit.
His fingertips pressed into the underside of the massage table. “You told me you had some information, but you hadn’t updated me about this development.”
“Well, I didn’t want to get your hopes up. And until . . . five minutes ago, there was nothing new to report.” With a click of her heels and nod of her closely shaved head, Likotsi began to crow as if she were announcing before the Thesoloian court. “She has finally responded, Your Majesty! Your missing matrimonial match! Your beleaguered betrothed beauty—”
Thabiso grabbed
the tablet before Likotsi could continue with her horrific attempts at alliteration.
“Prince—”
“Shh!” Thabiso made a shooing gesture in Likotsi’s direction. His head was suddenly strangely light and his body heavy.
Since he was a boy, he’d heard tales of his bride-to-be and the wicked, selfish parents who had stolen her away. Each nanny had placed his or her own twist on the tale, and some had even conjectured about their inevitable reconciliation.
“The will of the Goddess cannot be denied, my Prince! Do not fret!”
A photo of their betrothal ceremony had hung in the palace living quarters, two chubby-cheeked toddlers dressed in brightly patterned garments, flowered garlands crowning their heads. Her eyes radiated with happiness as she played with the petals surrounding them, and he gazed at her with earnest adoration. Unfortunately, he hadn’t mustered that emotion for any of the other women who had come into his life since then. He’d had friends, and he’d had lovers, but no one who’d made him feel like that besotted younger version of himself, preserved for posterity.
Their story had become his own personal fairy tale, or like the Mills & Boons romances he’d sneaked from the queen’s library as a teen. And like those fairy tales, he’d put Naledi out of his head as the realities of adulthood had set in. And then a few weeks ago, he had come across that photo again, and in the midst of budget planning, wheeling and dealing ministers, and pressure from his parents, a longing had opened in him like a fissure. It had surprised him—the desperate, childish hope that was unbecoming of any man descended of the Moshoeshoe warriors. But it had been there all the same. And the only way to get rid of such a foolish hope was to snuff it out. He’d needed to find her before he could achieve that goal, and now Likotsi had.
Would she be like one of the silly girls his parents kept presenting him with, women programmed like automatons eager to prove how subservient they could be? Or like the women he wined and dined while traveling, so blinded by proximity to power that they never noticed there was a prince beneath the crown?
Your objective was to rid yourself of this weakness, not indulge it. If she’s a twit, all the better.
“Your Highness,” Likotsi said, hand moving toward the tablet as if she wanted to snatch it away. “I’m sorry, but in my excitement I failed to relay that her response was less than optimal. I believe that her parents have poisoned her against you. There can be no other explanation for this crass response to my perfectly polite messages.”
“Hmm.” Thabiso scrubbed his thumb over the screen, and his betrothed’s words slid into sight.
FUCK. OFF.
The smile that tugged his cheeks upward wasn’t controllable, and the laugh that followed was ridiculous. Royalty shouldn’t laugh like a hyena from a bush story; his deportment teacher would reprimand him. But he read the two words out loud and laughed until tears streamed from his eyes and caught in his beard.
As a child, he’d imagined Naledi in some tower far away, being held by an evil sorcerer. He’d imagined she’d needed saving and he would be the one to do it.
FUCK. OFF.
Oh no, Naledi didn’t need his help at all.
“Prince?” Likotsi’s loafer was tapping again. “I don’t know what spurred this attempt to find your betrothed, but now that she has responded, how would you like to proceed in light of this . . . unsavoriness?”
Likotsi’s nose scrunched as if she smelled burned mealie pap. That was okay because Thabiso had always liked the burned part of the corn meal porridge; perhaps because it was one of the few imperfections that made it through the many quality filters surrounding a prince who was the sole heir to a kingdom.
“It seems that this Naledi may have been worth the wait. I would like to meet her. Now.”
Likotsi glanced pointedly out the window of the jet, then back at Thabiso.
“Well, I don’t expect you to summon her thirty thousand feet into the sky,” Thabiso said. “When we land in New York City, have her brought to me immediately.”
Likotsi raised her brows. “Well, that would be considered kidnapping in the US, Highness. You are protected by diplomatic immunity, but perhaps we could save that perk for a more important matter. We can ask her to come to you, but given her response I’m not sure that she will.”
An unfamiliar annoyance pulsed through Thabiso. He wanted something, and it wasn’t guaranteed he would have it. That was rare, indeed, and it whet his desire to a sharp edge.
“Fine. Then I will go to her.”
Likotsi gasped, but when Thabiso looked at her she had schooled her face back to bland acceptance.
“Whatever you think is appropriate,” she said. “I don’t have a home address yet, but I believe I’ve located her place of employ. It seems that she might be”—another wrinkle of the nose—“a waitress. What a life her parents’ thoughtlessness has condemned her to! In Thesolo, she would have lived a life of luxury! Her hands would be as smooth and soft as—”
“Likotsi!”
She flinched and straightened her tie. “My apologies.”
“You said you could locate her—get on with it. I could use a diversion on this trip, and I believe I’ve found it.”
“Yes, sire.”
Thabiso sat still on the massage table, any relaxation Melinda’s work had provided forgotten. His muscles were taut with excitement—and fear? No, that wasn’t it. It was the same sensation he got before making an important speech or having to make a decision that would impact his people for generations.
“I’m nervous,” he muttered to himself.
Life had been nothing but a series of mundane duties for so long—even the occasional trip to a hot new club or date with a Nollywood starlet had become just another part of his job. He hadn’t been this nervous about a woman since his first time making love, but he’d had some idea of what to expect then. Naledi was a mystery, and perhaps a mistake. Part of being a good prince meant he avoided mistakes at all cost, but this time . . .
He didn’t expect a happily ever after like in the slim white romance books of his youth. He expected excitement, and it looked like Naledi could provide just that.
Chapter 4
Ledi, I know you’re busy but—”
She whipped around and glared at Dan, also affectionately known as “fuck-my-life Dan” and “Shit-I-have-a-shift-with-that-asshole-Dan Dan” to her and her coworkers at the Institute’s dining hall. Ledi was regretting having agreed to work in the weeks leading up to finals, and his presence wasn’t helping.
When she’d walked into the Institute’s kitchen, he’d been dramatically scribbling in his Moleskine with his shiny Montblanc. Of course, he’d had to share the profound spoken word poem he’d written, entitled “Macchiato Mama.” And now he wanted more of her attention.
“I. Am. Busy.”
Her words came out sharp as the steak knives on the plates she balanced on her forearms.
She was already covering four tables to his one. The group of astrophysicists was keeping her on her toes with their requests for detailed explanations of every dish on next week’s special tasting menu. The mathematicians lingering across the dining room kept forgetting to eat their food as they debated some theorem or another—Ledi had already been chewed out by Yves, the Swiss chef, for bringing their meals back to be reheated twice. As if she wanted to destroy the textural integrity of his precious swordfish.
Even better, all of the guests had to be out of the dining room within the next half hour so she could finish prepping for a VIP event that night. A new employee was supposed to come in and shadow her, which would have been great if she had been working with someone besides Dan. Dan, who couldn’t manage the simplest task without having to come back for reinstruction several times.
“I was setting up for the event and I think I’m having a quarter-life crisis,” he said. She thought he was joking until she saw his expression. He was completely earnest and also looking at her as if she was his therapist instead of hi
s coworker.
Fuck my life.
“Dan.” She exhaled slowly and tried to think of a response to this bullshit. “The life expectancy of the average American male is seventy-eight, and you’re thirty something, so this would be closer to a midlife crisis.”
“Shit.” Dan’s eyes went wide. “You’re absolutely right.”
Ledi’s forearms were strong, but the large cuts of fish and fine dining ware were heavy. She hadn’t dropped a plate since she’d first started waitressing in high school, and if Dan made her break her streak she’d significantly reduce his life span.
“Is there anything else?” she asked, voice strained. Her arms were beginning to feel shaky.
“It’s just . . . I didn’t think this would be so hard,” he said, plucking at the wrinkled tuxedo shirt that all servers at the Institute dining hall had to wear. “Unfolding tables, carrying trays of dishes, cleaning up after these people. I mean, aren’t they supposed to be geniuses? They’re slobs. I thought this job would be easy.”
This motherfucker, she thought.
“This job is easy, actually,” she said, trying to not to let her frustration show. She needed to manage whatever meltdown he was having and get through the rest of the night. “It’s physically demanding, and sometimes emotionally, but unlike the work they’re doing out there, it’s not rocket science.”
Dan’s mouth sagged into a grimace. “I thought this gig would really help me get into the mindset of the hero of my novel. You know, getting my hands dirty. But everyone is always expecting me to do something for them.” He glanced at her, as if he pitied her. “I know you wouldn’t understand anything about creativity, but this place is killing my muse.”
Only the knowledge that Yves would fillet her if she asked him to make another swordfish steak prevented her from flinging one of her plates into his face. She was used to people thinking she wasn’t capable of comprehending things, but it was the pity in Dan’s voice that grated on her. She didn’t need anyone’s pity. And the patrons could be a bit odd, but they were actually changing the world, while Dan scribbled lines about “eyes like spots of caramel.”
