King of Khumkani
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Marilie Reynolds
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450K
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47
1: Chapter 1
JOOKE
“Ladies and gentlemen, Flight 268 to London is now boarding. All passengers, please proceed to Gate 7.”
Another announcement echoes through the airport, and still, there’s no sign of Jack’s brother.
Tapping her fingers on the table, she checks her phone again, but her notification bar still sits empty, just like her cup of decaf coffee she finished a half hour ago.
“Your daddy better not go incommunicado on me again, or I might just excommunicado him,” she murmurs, pressing a hand to her stomach before scanning the crowd once more. “And your brother better be here soon, Jack.” She shifts in her seat, her bladder losing another battle in the water balloon war with her hormones.
“Can I get you anything else?” the waiter asks with a bright grin, taking her empty cup before wiping the few sugar kernels that didn’t make it into the coffee.
“No, thank you.” She smiles, his carefree disposition reminding her so much of Jack.
Their romance has been a bit of a whirlwind. A month—that’s how quickly Jack proposed after they started dating—but not long after, he announced he needed to go home, to some private island named Khumkani.
Then he left her a week later, promising to contact her as soon as he could.
What followed was radio silence for almost four weeks, until a week ago when he told her to pack up her life and come to Khumkani. His brother, Ben, will be in Cape Town for business and will meet her at the airport.
She doesn’t even know what his brother looks like. All Jack said was that Ben is an older, more mature version of himself.
A couple of mints spill out of the plastic-wrapped folder as the waiter sets down her bill. She hands him the pink and purple note, then glances at her phone again.
Still nothing. No missed calls, no indicator dots signaling that he’s busy typing, nothing. And it has been hours since she last heard from him.
Since she told Jack she’s pregnant, not a day has gone by that he hasn’t emailed her or talked via text. Writing about subjects they never even touched on when he was physically here, talking about things she thought he wouldn’t have any interest in.
It made him even more intriguing, more charming than when they first met, and when she asked him about the month of radio silence, which was a bit of a worry for her, he didn’t waver in his explanation.
Ugh, her dad is probably turning in his grave at this very moment. She can almost hear him say: “Jooke, ek het jou nie so groot gemaak nie!” (Jooke, I didn’t raise you like that!)
Well, he didn’t raise her that way, but here she is, sitting at Cape Town International Airport, pregnant and ready to uproot her whole life for a man, without a wedding ring on her finger.
At least she has the engagement part down—now she only needs her fiancé to actually show up.
Her fingers find the delicate chain around her wrist, warm and familiar against her skin. Goodness, she misses him, her dad. He was her only constant, her biggest champion, and he would have loved being a grandfather.
A clamor echoing through the crowd draws her attention to a lady struggling to push a baby carriage while holding onto a toddler who is crying and stomping his little feet.
The poor woman seems to be at her wits’ end, especially when the baby also makes its presence known.
She doesn’t hesitate. Full bladder momentarily forgotten, she straightens from her seat and approaches the family. She’s a kindergarten teacher, after all—dealing with difficult kids is her specialty.
When the mother lets go of the little boy’s hand to pick up the baby from the stroller, he takes off, luckily in her direction.
“Hey there, little man,” she calls out gently, scooping him up in her arms as he aims to run past her. “Where are you off to in such a hurry, hmm?”
“Anton!” Frantically, the mother rushes after him, the baby clutched to her chest and the stroller forgotten in the middle of the airport. “Don’t ever do that again!”
The woman turns to her and sighs. “Thank you for stopping him. His father just got on a plane for work, and he isn’t taking it very well.”
“No problem,” she says before turning her attention back to the little boy in her arms, his cheeks wet with tears. She takes out a tissue from her handbag, wipes his tears and his nose, then says, “My name is Jooke, it’s very nice to meet you, Anton.”
When he doesn’t respond, continuing to cry, she sets him down, tucks her baby-blue dress into the back of her knees, and lowers herself to her haunches in front of him. “You know, I have something very special here in my bag. Do you want to see what it is?”
He sniffles, trying to stem his tears as he nods his head.
She opens her bag and lets him peek inside, his face lighting up despite the little sobs still racking his small body.
“Tell you what,” she continues, brushing the hair from his forehead, “if you stop crying and Mommy says it’s okay, you can hold him.”
He immediately looks at his mom, forcing his consequent sob into more of a suppressed hiccup before his mom nods her consent while rocking the fussy pink bundle in her arms.
She takes out the white stuffed toy from her bag, handing him the little lamb plushie. “Now, I bet you can’t tell me how old you are!”
Anton nods, clutching the toy to his chest as he holds out his one hand with three little fingers pointing in the air.
“Three years old!” she says. “Wow, you’re a big boy!” The praise makes him smile through the residual tears. “Well, because you’re such a big boy, I want to make you a deal.”
He nods again, a bit more enthusiastically this time.
“With your dad gone, it means that you are the man of the house, and if you promise me that you’ll be a big boy for your mom and help her with your baby sister, you can keep the toy.”
“Rea…really?” he hiccups, his eyes wide.
“Really.” She smiles. “But remember, you won’t be able to do that if you’re crying!” She takes his small hand in hers and asks, “So, do we have a deal?” Again, he nods, shaking her hand.
“What do we say, Anton?” his mother chimes in, the little girl peaceful at last.
“Thank…thank you.”
“No problem, little man.” She ruffles his hair before straightening. “Now, go be a big boy for your mom.”
Turning to go back to her table, she collides with a wall. A wall made of flesh and bone and apparently a chest made of stone. The man is striking, and even dressed in his casual light gray slacks and crisp white shirt, he radiates power.
He doesn’t show the slightest inkling of moving out of her way. He just stares at her with his piercing steel-blue gaze, a slight frown between his brows, and a muscle twitching in his jaw.
She opens her mouth to apologize, but he doesn’t give her a chance, speaking before she can. “You are Jack’s fiancée.” It’s a statement, not a question, and that’s when she sees it—the resemblance.
“And you are Jack’s brother,” she counters, her voice seemingly snapping him out of whatever frown-inducing daze he is in.
He holds out his hand, big, manicured but manly. “Ben.”
“Jooke,” she replies with a smile, his palm solid and warm as she accepts his offered hand.
He hasn’t moved, still staring at her as if she’s a calculus equation and he can’t figure out the answer. Then he tilts his head toward Anton and his mom. “You were very good with him.”
Following his gaze, her smile turns a little warmer watching Anton show his baby sister the little lamb. “Comes with the territory, I suppose.”
“You must be one hell of a teacher.” He chuckles, drawing her gaze to him once more.
“I am,” she agrees with a laugh of her own. “And only because I absolutely love what I do.”
His chuckle fades to a hum, and for a heartbeat, silence stretches between them, the artificial light inside the building playing with the shades of blue in his gaze.
For a moment, he just stares, and then the steel seems to turn darker. “We have to go. Where are your things?” His tone matches his deeper gaze, sounding more like the business-Ben Jack described.
She nods, forcing air into her lungs. This is it. She turns to her table, the beat of her heart drowning out the crackle of another announcement that breaks through the continuous thrum of the crowd. This is her taking the first step toward her new life.
She slips her phone into her handbag, ignoring the mints still scattered on the table, her hormones protesting the flavor. Slinging the bag over her shoulder, she turns back to Ben. “I’m ready.”
When she reaches for her suitcase, he grabs the handle before she can, frowning. “Is this all you have? Only one suitcase?”
“Well, yeah.” She shrugs. “I’m not big on material things.”
He doesn’t respond, only places his palm on her lower back, guiding her toward the restaurant’s exit.
As they near Anton and his mom’s table, Anton jumps up onto his seat, plushie in hand. Walking past them, she reaches out to ruffle his hair, but instead, he throws himself into her arms.
“Hey, little man.” She laughs, losing her balance from the sudden action. For the second time since meeting Ben, she finds herself colliding with him, the hand on her back coming around her waist to help steady her.
“I’m so sorry!” The mother straightens from her seat to help, sending both her and Ben an apologetic smile.
“It’s all good.” She chuckles, soothing Anton’s hair before setting him down on his seat once more.
“He can’t stop talking about you since you gave him that teddy,” his mother continues. “He calls you the pretty lady.”
“Ah, that’s sweet.” She smiles, very aware of Ben’s arm still around her waist. She tries to step away, but he doesn’t budge. Instead, he only tightens his hold—not controlling, but uncompromising, sure.
Anton’s mother’s gaze flicks to Ben. “I don’t know if you have any children yet, but your wife is going to be a wonderful mother.”
She opens her mouth to explain that she is engaged to his brother and not married to him, but Ben beats her to it. “Thank you,” he says calmly.
Thank you? Really? That’s his explanation?
Before she can react, he presses a kiss to the top of her head, a smile on his face which she cannot see but rather senses, judging by the blushing smile on Anton’s mother’s face.
“My wife does have a way with children,” he adds.
