—From Phokojoe the Trickster God

After a day spent making the rounds with journalists to explain his fight and an evening in meetings with Greta and the royal security team, Johan showered and collapsed into bed. His public displays of Jo-Jo-ness were usually short-lived, but he’d been on a charm offensive for days, and his outburst and scuffle had taken more out of him than he’d realized—and so had not spending time with Nya. He’d felt off all day, and then he’d received an ominous email from Portia.

Hey!

Glad to hear Nya is being treated well. Keep it up! You seem a decent friend, and I’d hate to kill you. I checked out this FloupGelee person and the IP address is coming from Lukas’s school. I’m guessing it’s some kid he doesn’t get along with? Maybe the kid he got into a fight with? I guess you can look into it more, but that’s as much info as I could get. A few of the other accounts had the same IP address, so they were probably sock puppets for this same loser.

That comforted Johan a bit, knowing it was just some teenage brat, but something about it still bothered him.

There was a knock at the door connecting his and Nya’s rooms and he rolled onto his back, trying to muster up another burst of suave playboy prince.

He came up empty.

“Come in,” he croaked. He’d been planning on going to her, but frankly, his head was a mess and he’d been worried what he’d say, since the only thing he could think of when it came to her was I want you so badly it hurts, which for him could easily turn into I want you so badly but I won’t be hurt again. Not exactly casual and low-key to match the current tone of their fake engagement with benefits. He’d also wondered if maybe she wouldn’t want to see him; she’d stayed in her room the past two nights, the chimes of her phone going off.

The door swung open harder than usual, slamming into the wall.

“Sorry,” she said, cringing a bit as she closed it slowly, as if to compensate for her entrance. And what an entrance; instead of her usual T-shirt and shorts, she was wearing a silky knee-length black negligee with lacy bits at the décolletage.

She stood against the door after shutting it, apprehensive.

Johan brushed his hair from his eyes, the better to see what she needed from him. Her chin was up and her hands were on her hips, as if she were presenting herself to him for inspection, the desire for validation as transparent as the lace on her lingerie. He ran his gaze over her body appreciatively before letting out a low whistle.

“Madame Flemard?” he asked.

“Ouay,” she replied with a curtsy, and Johan grinned.

She came to the side of his bed, holding on to one of the wooden posts instead of sliding under the sheets.

“How was your day?” he asked.

“It was good. I talked to my grandparents. Got in contact with some people about jobs.”

Something inside of him crumpled, but he flashed her a blinding smile. “Oh. Good! Good. Jah.”

“I’m tired of things being weird,” she said. “I don’t like being mad at you.”

“I don’t like it either,” he said. “So I’ll stop acting like an ass and making you mad. Problem solved.”

She smiled, a tentative tilt of her mouth that wasn’t what he’d grown accustomed to, but was a start.

“Do you want company tonight?” she asked.

Johan lay back on the bed. “Well, that depends. Is it you, or is a reporter waiting on the other side of the door to ask me about the fight for the hundredth time?”

“Silly. It’s me. Just me.” The soft lamplight cupped the curves of her body, and the curve of her shy smile, and Johan felt that lurching pain in his chest once again. For an instant he considered telling her no, telling her this was all over.

He didn’t bother. He was already going to be hurt; anything that he told himself otherwise was simply damage control, an inability to comprehend the depth of the hole she would leave in his life.

Ridiculous. He’d spent so long running from love at full tilt that when he’d finally tripped and fell, his momentum made it swift and unstoppable. She was right. It was her. Just her.

“I’ll go,” Nya said and began to turn away from the bed. Johan had been so caught up in his thoughts he’d never responded to her.

“Wait!” He sat up and held his arms out to her. “Sorry, I’m a bit out of it. I want your company tonight and I wanted it the last two nights, too. Come here.”

He beckoned with both of his hands.

Her teeth showed as relief shaped her mouth into a smile, and then her knees were on the mattress, then her hands, that lacy décolletage cupping her swaying breasts and reminding Johan that he should have moved closer to her instead of making her crawl across the bed to him.

There was a particularly determined look on her face as she approached, and finally the negligee and her shyness and her heated looks clicked for him.

Oh là là.

“Are you here to seduce me, Nya?”

She gave him the look she’d practiced in the back of the car in Njaza, the one that meant I want to climb you like a redwood. “Ouay.”

Johan was only able to get out a deep “hrim,” and then she sat up quickly and tugged down the top of her negligee, revealing the beautiful globes of her breasts.

He swallowed hard. “Nya?”