Chapter Three #2
His brows rise. ‘She’s part of my past. One you rightly pointed out I don’t intend to revisit.’
‘She didn’t seem to think that,’ I snap.
He peers at me, an enigmatic look in his eyes. ‘That’s her problem not mine. And is that jealousy I hear?’
Hot and cold waters of chagrin rush through me. ‘Don’t flatter yourself.’
His nostrils flares. ‘She’s nothing to me. Hasn’t been in years. She showed me her true colours and I took note.’
‘And yet you didn’t exactly shut her down.’
He shoots me a look. ‘You really want me to start publicly defending my fake fiancée from my ex-girlfriend? That’s the circus you want?’
I press my lips together. The silence stretches.
Then his voice hardens. ‘Delphine doesn’t matter. But you however… I’m not sure whether to applaud how you’re playing this part or be intensely wary with the way you’re messing with my focus in a way that seems…far too effective for our purposes.’
My heart skips, just once. Then races. God help me—I think I like it that way.
I snap. ‘I’m not even going to bother asking if that’s a compliment or an insult. Look, I’m just doing my job. Smiling, charming Nana, pretending this circus isn’t slowly driving me insane while your ex tries to eye-fuck you across the room. Just let me be.’
He doesn’t answer but the silence weighs heavier and my insides clench, wondering if like the champagne from before, I’m risking exposure.
‘What are you not telling me?’ His voice is rougher now. Sharper. Deadlier.
I close my eyes, then rush to open them again when the image of myself in the ladies room mirror invades my brain.
I might be pregnant. I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m scared out of my mind because it’ll change everything. Or nothing.
Thankfully, the words stick in my throat. ‘Not everything is about you, Ashon.’
One brow arches and I feel the full power of his regard. ‘Is it not? Because I was of the opinion that that was exactly what the next few months of our lives are about.’
I grit my teeth, let the silence spell out my displeasure. Luckily, he takes the hint or, more likely, doesn’t feel the need to respond because he’s said his piece.
When we arrive, I don’t wait for him. My heels echo down the marble corridor as I head towards the east wing. But instead of going to my bedroom, I slip into the guest bathroom and shut the door behind me, fighting another bout of nausea and the mocking voice now screeching in my head.
One missed period, I could blame on stress. Losing my job. Getting blacklisted by a man who’s now pretending to be my fiancé.
But two?
Two periods late, and not a single cramp. No sore breasts, no moods swings fully-funded by PMS. And I almost slipped up on the terrace, turning down the champagne too fast, too pointedly.
I sink onto the bench and drop my head into my hands. I can’t pretend any more. I can’t keep brushing it off like I have time.
My hand drifts to my belly before I realise what I’m doing. I catch myself just in time.
But the thought takes deeper root, as does the possibility that my entire life might be about to implode.
The Accra sun is merciless.
It presses down from a cloudless sky, a molten weight that turns the red Ghanaian earth into a clay furnace.
The scent of dust, shea butter, diesel fumes, and roasting peanuts from roadside vendors hangs heavy in the air, clinging to my skin like a film of anxiety.
My dress—a sleek, designer take on an Ankara silhouette with a cinched waist and exaggerated sleeves—is stunning, camera-ready.
And sticking to my back in all the worst places.
We’re here for a Biney Foundation outreach day—some long-standing charity Nana supports that partners with local NGOs to offer maternal health checkups, micro-loans for market women, and food programs for underfed schoolchildren.
The whole thing has been carefully curated for maximum press coverage and minimum sincerity.
Still, some of the volunteers are kind. Most of the women shake my hand and stare like I’m something foreign, distant, unreal.
I want to scream that I’m one of them, but I don’t.
A child presses a wilted hibiscus flower into my palm. I crouch and murmur something gentle—about how pretty it is, how grateful I am—but the words scrape like gravel. My heels sink into the dirt and my smile stays plastered on like a shield.
All morning I’ve been thinking about the box hidden under the sink in our shared suite. Two slim white sticks. One pink-wrapped test. I bought it early, before sunrise, at a pharmacy far from the estate under the pretext of going for a walk. I’ve yet to take it.
I don’t know what I want it to say.
Positive means everything changes. Every lie gets heavier.
It means facing the one truth I’ve buried the deepest—that part of me doesn’t absolutely recoil in horror of piling one night of misjudgement with a life-long consequence.
That part of me wonders what it would be like to carry a child—Ashon Biney’s child.
And then there’s my mother, who still hasn’t forgiven me for that hasty phone call I made to her three nights ago, after accepting Ashon’s deal. For the not-fully-thought-through-in-hindsight plan of inveigling my way into a housekeeping position and getting close to a Biney in the first place.
How on earth would I explain this?
I force another smile as the camera shutters click and a journalist barks questions I don’t bother registering.
Ashon is beside me, cool as ever in an ivory linen suit, holding court with donors and grinning for the press. He looks composed, aristocratic, annoyingly unruffled. Like he was born to wear this life. And maybe he was.
I want to resent him for dragging me into this charade. For being the reason I’m suffocating in fakery, ignoring my body and another bout of rising nausea, and smiling when I want to scream. But mostly, I want to sit. Or cry. Or run.
The nausea hits suddenly, sharp and merciless.
I grip the edge of a vendor’s table, swaying slightly as an older woman explains something about the logistics of food deliveries. I nod blindly, her voice slipping over me like heat haze.
Ashon turns towards me, sensing the shift.
‘Cilla?’ he asks, deep voice low but alert.
I open my mouth to respond, but no words come. The sun pulses behind my eyes. My heart thunders in my ears. The air thickens, and I can’t seem to draw breath.
Then a wave of vertigo slams into me.
The drums distort. Faces blur. Ashon’s voice stretches, urgent and far away.
‘Cilla!’
And then—everything goes black.
I wake to the hiss of air-conditioning and the dull throb of pain blooming behind my eyes. The white ceiling above me is blinding. There’s a faint antiseptic sting in the air, and the soft click of machines nearby. An IV drips into my arm, cool and slow.
My mouth is dry, my skin clammy.
I don’t even need to open my eyes to know I’m not alone. That my formidable fake fiancé is very much present. No doubt tracking my every breath because my very skin feels the force of his undivided attention.
And he’s pacing.
Back and forth across the room like a caged lion in one of those gilded zoos rich people pretend is natural. Except there’s nothing natural about the charged emotion radiating off him in waves.
He stops the second I move. I pry my eyes open.
‘Cilla.’ My name is a clipped acknowledgement as he closes the distance to my side in three long strides.
He’s shed his jacket and his sleeves are rolled up on brawny arms. It truly is unspeakably unfair how hot he looks, even playing the role of worried fiancé.
‘What happened?’ I ask, even though I knew this was coming. That my head-in-the-sand moments were numbered.
‘You fainted. At the charity event. You scared the hell out of everyone.’
Including you? I want to ask, but I don’t. ‘I—’ My throat sticks. ‘I don’t remember.’
‘You dropped like a stone in front of three cameras. Do you have any idea how that looked?’
It sounds very much like an admonition but there’s something almost…shaken behind the words. And that watchfulness is back. The one I feel I could never hide from even at the farthest corner of the galaxy.
‘I didn’t do it for the publicity,’ I rasp. ‘It was the heat.’
His eyes narrow. ‘The heat is oppressive, I’ll accept that but was it just the heat?’
I lick my bottom lip to buy time I might not be able to afford. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
His gaze scours me from head to toe and back again. ‘You’ve lost weight and call it wild instincts blurring but you’re withholding something. I think it’s in your best interest to tell me now rather than later,’ he says with chilling insistence.
Before I can summon heat and outrage or scramble for a pithy response to hide the dread crawling through me, the door swings open and a doctor in a crisp white coat breezes in, flipping through a chart with the practiced ease of someone used to delivering all kinds of news.
‘Ah, Miss Rockson. Good to see you’re awake. I’m happy to report there’s nothing untoward to worry about. Your vitals are stable,’ she says brightly, giving me a quick once-over. ‘Your blood sugar dipped—likely due to the heat, dehydration and…’ Her gaze flicks down to the chart again. ‘Pregnancy.’
The word hangs in the air like a flare.
She looks up with a too-cheerful smile. ‘You’ll need plenty of rest. Light meals, fluids every hour and absolutely no prolonged exposure to this Accra sun. And no stress if you can help it.’ Her eyes twinkle, as if that last part is a joke only I can’t laugh at. ‘Congratulations, by the way.’
I blink. ‘Sorry—umm, what?’ I stammer, but she’s already gone.