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“You didn’t answer my question,” he reminded her, smirking. “Did you miss your phone?”
“Wouldn’t you miss yours if it was taken from you for four days?”
“No, I don’t think I would.” He shrugged and took the bottle back, frowning down at it. “Truth be told, I’d love for someone to take my phone from me for that long. To have some peace and quiet. But…”
She stared at him, and for the first time since he’d revealed his identity to her, she wasn’t looking at him with anger. Reaching forward, she took the bottle right back out of his hand and took a healthy swallow of the amber liquid. Coughing, she pounded her chest and rasped, “But sometimes you just wish you could escape, even for a short time?”
“Yes.” He turned to her. “Very much so.”
“I get that.” She broke off their eye contact and looked out the window, clutching the bottle so hard her knuckles whitened. “I think everyone, at one time or another, wishes that they could run away.”
He didn’t say anything to that because from what he could piece together from her life, she’d done that. She ran, and something told him she hadn’t stopped yet. “In New York, with you, I kind of got to feel anonymous.”
She took another drink, not even wincing this time, and offered him the bottle. At this rate, she’d be sloppy drunk well before they arrived at their destination, and he’d be carrying her over his shoulder, caveman style. The idea had some merit.
“Because you lied about who you were?” she asked.
“No. Because I was with you.” He lifted a shoulder, taking the bottle and putting the cap back on. She stared at his fingers, her lips parted. “With you, I was someone else. The same thing happened in that nightclub, and I feel it now, too. You bring out something in me that no one else does. I don’t know why, or what it is, but with you, I can just…be me, and I don’t have to pretend to be anything but that.”
Slowly, she met his gaze again, her soft blue eyes softer than ever before. Her pupils were a little dilated, and her cheeks more than a little flushed. “And that’s not something you get to do a lot?” she asked quietly.
“No,” he said simply.
Shaking her head, she clucked her tongue and lowered her lids. “Well, that’s just sad. You should be able to be yourself around anyone.”
“Guys like me, we can’t let our guard down unless it’s with someone we trust. A spouse, a child, a father, or a sibling…only one of which I have.”
She licked her lips and gripped her knees, eying the bottle of alcohol in his hand. “You don’t have any brothers or sisters?”
“I told you in New York I didn’t.”
Shrugging, she avoided his eyes. “I didn’t know if that was true.”
“I didn’t tell you any lies. I just didn’t tell you my real identity. If you’d asked me back then if I was a prince, I would have told you the truth. But I liked that you didn’t know. That you treated me like a regular guy.” He rested a hand on his knee, tapping his fingers. “Everything we had was real.”
After a moment of silence, she nodded. “Okay.”
They were almost at their destination. Uncapping the bottle again, he took a drink and handed it off to her. She took it readily. “It’s just me and Dad, so he’s the only one I can talk to freely, which is probably why he wants me married off as soon as possible.”
She winced. “To that princess he likes.”
Was it just him, or was that jealousy tingeing her tone? “Yeah.” He rubbed his jaw, watching her closely. “I get it. He’s worried that after he succumbs to his illness, I’ll be alone and that I’ll stay that way.”
“What’s wrong with him?” she asked, her grip tightening on the bottle.
“His heart. The doctors say he has a year, maybe two, left.” He swallowed hard, because the idea of losing his father hurt. It always did. He couldn’t imagine a world without him in it. “It’s not something I like to dwell on, but it has forced me to realize that eventually I’ll need to make some changes in my life for the good of the country—but mostly for him.” Hell, he owed it to him.
To be the best man he could be.
The best ruler.
She hesitated, her brow crinkling, and took a long drink. After she lowered the bottle, she handed it back, wiping her mouth again. “Such as…?”
“Marriage. Babies. Princesses.” He gave her a level look. “I’ve been avoiding it until now, but once we know what’s going on with us…”
She pressed a hand to her stomach, looking more than a little queasy at the reminder of why she was here, with him, in his town car, drinking tequila, when they both knew she wasn’t going to be pregnant. Yes, protection failed sometimes. But the chance of that happening to them was literally somewhere between zero and seven percent.
