Page 3 of The Princess and the P.I.

Maurice saw him out of the corner of his eye, just a flash of color at first, a deep, regal blue embroidered with gold. It took a moment for the rest to come into focus: a broad man in traditional African dress, shoulders squared, chin high. A pride that could never be broken.

This man with the vaguely familiar face looked like—

Wait.

Maurice’s stomach clenched.

At first, Maurice thought his mind was playing tricks on him again, conjuring ghosts like it sometimes did when he was in need of sleep. But no—this was no ghost.

It was him. Kofi Addai. The pastor from that church. Maurice felt the old familiar sensation start to creep up his spine. The Tameka case wouldn’t let him go.

Maurice sidled closer, slow and sure. Kofi didn’t flinch, though Maurice saw his sharp, subtle glance—the man had clocked him long before.

Together, they faced the stage. iVest was poised to wow the crowd with a demonstration.

The crowd murmured in anticipation, and Maurice bit his lip to hold back the flood of questions rising in his throat.

There was something tense about the pastor, something drawn too tight.

“Where do you find the time, Pastor? I thought you’d be too busy marrying young girls off to old men.”

The corner of Kofi’s jaw tightened, but his expression didn’t change. The man was a fortress. “Father, not Pastor. And I am no longer the head of that church,” he said. His accent curled around his words.

The man radiated tension, but Maurice had dealt with this kind of deflection before. He leaned in just enough to make Kofi uncomfortable, then smiled in that way he knew would needle.

“That’s not what I hear. Word around the pastor pickup basketball tournament is that you’re still running the place with an iron fist. Just on the Q.T.”

“Remind me, son .” The word “son” fell from his mouth like an insult. “Ah! Because my memory runs away from me. Did you ever find Tameka’s abuser?”

“I did not.” The words stank in his mouth.

He heard her laugh—soft, distant, and wrong—a memory out of place. He shook his head to clear it.

“Was the perpetrator brought to justice?” Kofi asked, snapping his attention back.

“You and the elders of your little cult protected the perpetrator,” Maurice said flatly.

Kofi leaned back slightly as if the accusation hadn’t struck its intended target. “We don’t protect sinners here. Has it ever dawned on you that maybe you’re not the brightest when it comes to solving things, eh?”

Maurice didn’t answer, refusing to give Kofi the satisfaction.

“No one in this church will give you what you want,” Kofi continued, and the smugness in his tone genuinely pissed Maurice off. “You should’ve finished your degree. Maybe become an engineer. Something your—probably single—mother could be proud of.”

“Careful now, a lot of young women left your church as single mothers. And someday, tomorrow or twenty years from now, I’m going to see you in cuffs, Papa Kofi.”

“You sound like a prophet. Maybe you are holier than you think,” Kofi said, his warm accent making the words sound friendly.

They were not friendly.

Maurice let the silence stretch. He studied Kofi with the same clinical detachment he used to catalog evidence.

The pastor’s face was impassive, but his hands were clenched at his sides, veins pulsing under his skin like rope.

Pockets bulging with keys or wallets or whatever.

Before Maurice could press further, the sound of footsteps onstage drew their attention.

He turned just in time to see a woman wobble into view, teetering out hesitant and awkward like she’d been shoved out there at gunpoint.

The stage lights caught her face, and Maurice gripped the back of a chair like a gust of wind had blown through. He reached for his beanie, a reflex, like something had been knocked loose.

Maurice caught the old man’s reaction out of the corner of his eye, the way Kofi’s entire body seemed to tense like someone had punched him in the gut.

Maurice let out a low, teasing whistle. “All curves no brakes…damn.”

Kofi’s head snapped around—his glare could have given him a haircut. “Don’t you dare fix your eyes to look upon my child,” he said, low and furious.

Maurice blinked, his mind working quickly to piece it together.

His child? That young woman onstage was Kofi Addai’s daughter.

That a man this lean and austere could produce something so…

not was frankly shocking. Maurice didn’t know what she was doing up there, but it didn’t sit right. Nothing about this man ever did.

He glanced back at Kofi, noting the rigidity in his posture, the barely concealed fury in his expression.

Maurice had seen it before—the way powerful men tried to protect their fragile illusions of control.

Kofi’s power had been diminished after the church scandal, but it hadn’t disappeared.

Men like him always found ways to wield influence, even in the shadows.

He leaned in, just enough to press at the edges of that tight composure, like a knifepoint.

“Excuse me for saying, Pastor.” Maurice’s eyes flicked up at the woman’s dress again, so tight it looked soaking wet on her.

Breasts bursting out of the bodice like a can of biscuits.

“But this don’t look like church business. ”

The old man didn’t respond—didn’t even bother correcting him for intentionally calling him “pastor” again.

But Maurice didn’t need a big reaction. Kofi’s small, almost imperceptible response was enough.

The way he refused to glance back at the stage, refused to even acknowledge the woman up there.

Baby girl was clearly off script. Maybe she’d told him she was here to save lives, to spread the good word.

Maybe he’d come to check on her, expecting some righteous mission, only to find her dressed to spread her legs instead.

Trouble in Pastor Kofi’s holy home? The Tameka case had taught him that everyone lied.

Lying didn’t make you a killer, but killers were always liars.

He remembered every lie. Every interview dead-ended.

Every person tied to the case seemed complicit in his torment, in the endless, gnawing loop of faces that kept him up at night.

When Maurice looked over again, Kofi Addai was gone, replaced by a similar-framed man with vaguely similar clothing. Maurice blinked, scanning the crowd, but there was no sign of him.

Had Kofi been here at all?