Excerpt from Daughter in Exile by Bisi Adjapon, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Right now? Isn't it dangerous to exercise after a meal?"

"You call a croissant and coffee a meal?" He pushed to his feet and held out his hand. "Come on, let's go. By the time you go home and get changed, what you ate will be long gone."

I allowed him to take me by the elbow. He ushered me into a white VW Beetle and zoomed away to my apartment building, which was only minutes away.

"Wow," he said, swiveling, taking in the gray three-story building. "So, this is where you live? Not bad at all. Wow, Plateau. Are you rich or something?"

That made me giggle. "No, I'm not. Ours is the plebian dwelling of the neighborhood." I pointed to a tall, aloof building in the distance. "Look at Immeuble Kébé, with its uniformed doormen and garbage chutes. That's where Mr. Koranteng lives. His son Kwaku, too, when he comes to Senegal. We don't even have an elevator. I have to climb to the third floor."

"Still. You're right across from the American Embassy. Wow."

"I'm within shouting distance. What of it?"

"I mean, I could stop by and say hello anytime I'm in the neighborhood. Pick you up for tennis. Whatever. Wow, Plateau. The neighborhood of the rich. You live alone?"

"No, I live with my friend Joana, also from Ghana."

"Awesome. Wow, you Ghanaians are something else." I felt suddenly shy and hoped he wouldn't follow me up to the flat. It was nothing unusual for married men to befriend single women and visit them. Sometimes the visit was innocent, sometimes not. It was important for me not to give him the wrong impression. As if guessing my thoughts, he leaned his elbows on the hood of the car. "I'll wait here while you get ready. You've got sneakers?"

"Yes."

I darted upstairs to get changed, feeling the budding of a friendship.

We had fun. He showed me how to hold a racket. He pulled two cans of yellow balls out of his bag and said, "These are yours. You're gonna hit them. Don't worry if they fly into the trees." He bounced the balls in front of me and showed me how to step, pivot, and swing the racquet to my shoulder. I kept hitting the ball out of the court, over the cage, but he never lost patience. "Keep trying. Just hit it over the net. There you go! You're a natural. Come on, hit it."

I loved the way the ball and racket connected with a resounding thwack. When I figured out how to hit the ball over the net without it sailing into the sky, he trotted to the opposite side and fed me more balls. I chased them down, laughing and swinging away, thrilled at my power.

An hour later, I couldn't believe how quickly I had gone from disliking him to sitting beside him on a bench, our sweaty skins touching, expelling air into the Senegalese breeze. It was the easy air of friendship. I wanted nothing more from a married man.

Excerpted from Daughter in Exile by Bisi Adjapon. Copyright © 2023 by Bisi Adjapon. Excerpted by permission of HarperVia. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.