Chapter 419: Friday. Soweto, South Africa.

LUKE STARED AT the offering fate had brought him. Maybe his luck was turning around?

He'd come here to see about making a penny and found the other De Jong.

She'd changed for the better since their high school days. Gone was the scrawny girl and in her place was a shapely woman with shoulders that would carry the world.

Back then, he'd first noticed Coco in a science class. It was impossible not to notice her with the way the teachers always called on her to give the correct answers, and she never failed. With his grades slipping, he'd sought her out, trading snacks for tutoring. He'd liked her, but at that early age he'd let the social opinion of her cloud his advances.

Except for their last year. He'd given in and asked her out. But like so many other parents, hers had intervened, telling him to stay away because his last name was Nodorf.

And his parents thought he could escape that? That if he worked hard enough, studied enough he'd be able to be his own man?

That was the lie.