"Nat, do you have a minute?" Zaria asked Natalie as soon as the banquet ended. The latter was trying to take flight when she had the chance.

She turned doubtfully. "Sure. But why don't we go somewhere else? Let's not disrupt the cleaning staff."

They went to the end of a hallway where there was no one else before Natalie looked at her with probing eyes.

Zaria suddenly felt too nervous to speak. She had called Natalie on a whim but now that it was time to ask what she wanted to ask, she wondered whether the other would see it as an intrusion of privacy. She battled between bringing it up and brushing it off with a general question or some random topic. Someone exited the restrooms nearby and that snapped Zaria out of her thoughts.

"Are you having trouble with anything?" She asked and almost bit her tongue when Natalie looked shocked.

"Why would you think that?" She laughed exaggeratedly.

It made Zaria even more worried. Just how bad was it? She stopped caring about intrusion of privacy. Natalie had the right to decide whether or not she wanted to share. "You don't look happy."

Natalie was surprised, as though wondering how anyone was able to see through her smiles. After a few heartbeats, her eyes drooped as she played with her fingers. "Devonte and I called it quits."

"What?" Zaria's face scrunched in shock and confusion. "How could that be? Why?"

"I heard that there is a swing nearby." Natalie pointed in the direction of the back of the hotel, and Zaria knew what she meant. The hallway was not a place to talk about such a thing.

Hence they went to the back and sat on the swings without pushing them, so they could only sway slightly.

Natalie smiled, yet another fake smile but this time the sadness was obvious. She let slip how she was really feeling.

"We've been together for so long. A decade. Not many marriages last that long, let alone unwed relationships."

Zaria had the urge to laugh at how short marriages usually lasted these days even though it was nothing funny. It was sad.

"Did you hear what happened to Luxenville's mayor's daughter?" Natalie went into gossip mode. Zaria tilted her head to look at her as she rambled on. "She got married in the most expensive wedding of the century, complete with hot air balloons, a private cruise…and a myriad of phone calls from his mistress on their wedding night. They had a divorce within twenty-four hours of their wedding."

Zaria shook her head at the thought. It had been a scandal, but that was not the point. Natalie was stalling.

"If you feel uncomfortable…"

"No, let me get it off." Natalie interrupted her and placed her hand on hers. "The point is, we had been together for too long to still be dating. I know it's because we had to keep our relationship a secret for years but not anymore. So I did what I thought women in my shoes should do but it is probably the worst thing to do. I pulled up my big girl panties and bought a ring, the sexiest lingerie I could find and ingredients for the best dinner I'd ever cooked.

I tied the ring onto the side of my thong—yeah, that was uncomfortable as shit—and had it on my waist until he undressed me. He went crazy for my body in my lingerie and froze stiff when he saw the ring. Then I proposed. How romantic, right?"

Zaria didn't dare to ask about Devonte's response, seeing as they had broken up.

"He said that he was sorry. That he had lost too many fans when they learnt that he was dating and it would be much worse if he got married."

"That jerk!" Zaria cursed, feeling the heartbreak although she was not the one who had been rejected. Her view of Devonte had shattered.

Natalie couldn't hold her tears anymore. "I wanted to marry him but it turns out he is married to those innumerable women who have him in their fantasies." She wanted to bang her head for her idiocy. "He always said that he was working hard for me and it wasn't the fame that mattered, and I believed him like a fool."

Zaria pulled her into a hug. "I'm sorry."

Natalie nodded against her chest but cried harder.

When she looked up, she wiped her tears with a handkerchief and blinked the rest of them away. "Don't tell Desmond about this, okay?"

"Of course not. It's your personal matter. I'm glad you shared it with me and I respect whatever else you decide to do." She helped smooth her hair.

Natalie was back to laughing. "No, really. Desmond is like a brother to me in every way and that does not exclude beating the hell out of the man who broke my heart."

Zaria bit her lip. She was still worried that Devonte would be beaten up. What was a little physical pain, compared to what she felt? Ten years of her life had been wasted on a scumbag.

How she wished she could gather Desmond, Ryan and Ximena to wait for the jerk at a dark alley. The thought of those three in the same frame was more terrifying than what would happen to Devonte if they did unite.

"There you are." A familiar deep voice made them almost fall off the swings in horror.

"If you are going to speak out the blue, then make some damn sounds when you walk!" Zaria chided him when she was finally able to swallow her heart that had leapt to her throat.

He laughed and hugged her from behind to soothe her. "I was looking for you."

"I'll join you in a minute." She promised, but he did not budge. She turned to find that he was staring at Natalie skeptically. The latter was looking away so he wouldn't see her red eyes but he still knew that she was not alright.

"Did something happen?"

"The English have landed." She lied. [1]

He saw through her but didn't want to make her uncomfortable so he didn't probe.

He kissed Zaria's cheek. "Don't take too long."

_____

[1]....That time of the month.