summits, he’d kept an eye on her and her lovely, shy smile. Her curves, more luscious each time he’d glimpsed her during visits chez Thabiso over the past year and a half. Her quiet amusement with the small things other people didn’t pay attention to.
Somewhere along the line, discreetly watching her out of prudence had changed to discreetly lusting after her. He’d thirsted, he’d considered risking it all, and then he’d done what any intelligent person would do—he’d ignored her with a strength matched only by Europe ignoring migrants and America ignoring creeping fascism.
When she’d glance at him, as if considering starting a conversation, he’d spot someone he desperately needed to talk to across the room. When Portia tried to draw her into their jokes, he’d combat roll away. When Thabiso had told him they’d be sharing a flight, Johan snuck into the private jet’s bedroom and cowered in the dark.
Control.
But when he’d asked her to come to bed, his joke had been a need beyond his control, and it hadn’t been funny. It had been ungentlemanly, rude, and if another man had done the same in his presence Johan would have decked him, or at least embarrassed the hell out of him. He was left feeling a bit disoriented. Bad Boy Jo-Jo was a persona that he used to protect himself and those he loved; he didn’t like how easily he had slipped on that mask with Nya, how reflexively he’d reached for crassness and ended up hurting her.
Maybe it was the stress. Or maybe he’d really needed a cuddle right then, and Bulgom Pamplemousse von Bearstein simply hadn’t been enough.
It was that day. D-day, and not the Normandy one. Death Day.
He grabbed a lock of hair and twisted, the movement a tic he’d never outgrown but had learned to mask with a seductive sweep of his fingers through his carefully tousled mane.
There were few things that upset him—or rather, there were few things he allowed himself to be upset about—but even he couldn’t fake cool detachment from something as brutal as this.
Back home, the news would be replaying snippets from his mother’s funeral, and ten years wasn’t nearly enough time to make reliving that bearable. When, at seventeen, his life had fallen apart—and the adhesive that had joined him to his blended family had been suddenly ripped away—he’d been told that it would hurt less with time. Even then he’d known it was a lie. You couldn’t love someone as much as he’d loved his mother—you couldn’t be loved by someone as much as he’d been loved by her—and ever stop hurting at their loss. He managed, but he never moved on.
He’d usually spend this day distracting his brother, Lukas, the actual heir to the Liechtienbourgian crown, who had been only seven when their mother passed away. Johan had dedicated his life to making sure that Lukas was loved as Johan had been loved and was protected how Johan hadn’t been. He’d taught Lukas all the ways to be liked and accepted by his peers, how to be the right kind of boy, one who didn’t cry and prefer books to people. He’d pushed Lukas from under the constant burden of the spotlight shone by voracious royal watchers, taking it onto himself. But Lukas was seventeen now, old enough to make his own plans, and had decided he wanted to hold a memorial for their mother.
Johan wasn’t going to display his pain for public consumption ever again, and he couldn’t put on his Bad Boy Jo-Jo act at his mother’s memorial, so he’d been relieved when Thabiso’s wedding festivities had provided him with an out.
In the plane’s bedroom, when he’d awoken with the ragged wound of loss gaping within him and the woman he desired in his arms, that infuriatingly needy part of him had decided to shoot its shot in the worst way possible.
He groaned and sank deeper into his seat.
All for the best. He could certainly avoid her over the next few days, but ignoring her would be next to impossible. Repelling her would have to suffice. She’d lashed out at him in anger, but she’d been ready to forgive him, by the end. He’d watched her for long enough to know that she was too good, too gentle, for a man like him.
He knew what could happen to women like that.
I’ll be okay, Jo-Jo. It’s just a bit of fatigue. All I need is some vitamin C, ja?
He pulled his tablet from the travel bag