Page 17 of The Harvest Homecoming

“I was teasing. We won’t make out. Will we?”

“No! No, Harold, we will not be making out. I’m not sure we should even be seen holding hands. What will the bishop think? What does the king think? He did not give us a blessing of any kind and—”

“Rani, you’re overthinking things.” I took his hands in mine. He shook free. I took them again, holding them more tightly. “You’re sending very mixed signals. You’re upset that I hid us from the world, then when I make amends to rectify it so we can be seen as a couple, you’re mad about that. What exactly is it that you’re so flustered about?”

He stared at me for a long, long time. Then the air left his sails in a shaky exhalation.

“I’m scared of being…I’m just scared,” he whispered as a gust blew an errant orange leaf across the drive. The groundskeeper would be on that like a cat on a mouse. “My parents are not wholly behind me being gay.” I knew that. Rani and his parents had been on shaky ground when we’d been an item before. They were older Indians who were very set in their thinking about traditional marriages, caste, and maintaining a pure Indian bloodline. Rani was their only child, so his being queer had not been accepted with open arms. Much like my father, they were struggling with a changing world.

“I understand, trust me, I do, but you can’t have it both ways, sweet. Either you want to be out, or you don’t, and either is fine with me. No, hey, it is.” He shook his head. “I want you to be happy. If this is a step too far, then things will stay as they are with us—”

“Sneaking. Sneaking and hiding. No, I don’t want that either. I’m sorry. I’m all over the place. I think that…yes, I think that I want to be out with you in public but discreetly. And I will need to let my parents know.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, gripping his clammy hands. “I’m not going to push.” He raised a brow. “Fine. I may have already pushed, but I can pedal in reverse. We can hold off on any PDAs until you speak to your parents. Let’s just spend the day together on a first date sort of thing, and if it goes well, then I’ll kiss you goodnight at your door tonight.”

“Thank you. Yes, let’s take the public side slowly, but the private side can be a little fast.”

“I love a little fast. Now, let’s get in the car. I can feel my brothers glaring at me.”

Rani gave my hands a squeeze before opening the front door to discover Vetra now seated there.

“I found the backseat too confining,” she said as if she’d not just clambered to the front from the back like a monkey. “Please get in. The king’s driver is texting me that his majesty is asking him to use the horn.”

A sharp horn blast startled us. “The king needs to chill the hell out,” I mumbled and ushered Rani into the back before closing the door for him. Walking around the car, I stuck my tongue out at the cars waiting behind us. My brothers poked their middle fingers out of their windows.

I could just hear my mother in the last car bitching about their nonsense as my father rubbed his temples. That made me smile. As did the knowledge that Rani and I were going to have our first date. Nothing spelled romance like judging a duck’s flat feet.

Chapter Twelve

October rushed by in a crisp whirlwind of falling leaves, warm mugs of Glögg during the day, and heated kisses at night. I rarely found myself cold or lonely. What I did find was a glowing appreciation of being in love. Rani was my everything. Even when he was fidgeting about the press catching us holding hands—which they did a week into the festival—or making that tough video call to his parents, or working tirelessly with an exhausted princess, he was the sun and moon in my universe. The time raced by with the smell of freshly brewed coffee on windy streets, the sound of our native songs being performed at the bandstand in the center of town, or the soft bleat of sheep at the fairgrounds. Autumn was surely my favorite time of year now, for it had brought Rani back to me. Over thirty days, he began to trust, to open up, to see that we could be an us. A good us. An us that would stand tall against whatever may be tossed our way, and a lot of vitriol had been flung at us.

The bishop had not been thrilled to see yet another royal son turn queer. His sentiment, not mine. But he was willing to overlook my homosexual ways if I behaved in a regal manner. Which I did. Not so much for the church or even for my father, but for Rani. He’d wanted time to move into our kindling at a torpid pace. I’d given him that and more. Time was something I had plenty of, and no one was more deserving of it than he.

We clicked now. Like we hadn’t before. Each day when out and about, I was patient, reserved, and polite. I drank little, sang loudly, and snuggled up close to his side whenever possible. Not in a randy look at me way, but in a refined manner. Once I looped my arm over his shoulder, nary a word was spoken. The world didn’t fall off its axis, the king didn’t lock us up for villainy, and the bishop didn’t say anything about lewd acts at the lingonberry goods stall. The most obscene thing anyone saw from us was the way Rani devoured lingonkaka squares at a baked good stall.

I’d never been jealous of a lingonberry before.

The festival was nearing its end. My birthday—and my father’s—was tomorrow. I would be thirty-five and Papa seventy.

Coming awake on the day before my birthday, I patted blindly under the covers until I felt a tight little buttock. Warm as French toast that taut cheek was. A naughty idea popped into my head. I could wiggle under the covers to nibble that fleshy orb until my tongue delved into a cleft that led to a not-as-tight-as-it-was-two-months-ago hole where I would find a treasure of the most delicious—

A loud bang on my bedroom door shattered my fantasy like a hammer to glass. Sitting up as Rani mumbled to me to stop being so loud, I muttered under my breath as I stepped into some fleece joggers. The new staff who had recently been hired really needed to be taught how to rouse a prince and his lover. Hammering on the door was not at all acceptable.

Yanking the door open, I sucked in a breath in preparation to berate whatever servant dared to be so uncouth when my sight landed on Anders.

“Good morning!” Anders crowed, pulling a snort snarl from the man in my bed. He peeked around my stunned form with a most wicked grin. “Oh, is that Rani I hear being a bear to his former employer?”

“Bloody fucking hell,” Rani said behind me, followed by a thud and several properly British cusses. Soon he’d be singing “Hail Britannia” in the shower.

I threw myself at my little brother. We hugged for the longest time. When I finally pulled back, Anders gave my face a firm pat.

“You look amazing. Did Rani put this glow in your cheeks?” Anders asked just as Rani appeared at my side, looking incredibly rumpled and edible. Damn my brother for interrupting what was going to be a fine feast.

“Your Highness, I am so sorry that you found me in this state,” Rani said with a low bow, one shoulder of one of my robes slipping off his shoulder. “I don’t usually sleep so late, but your brother and I were up late discussing protocol procedures for the birthday supper tomorrow night.”

“Protocol procedures,” Anders teased. “Is that what the kids are calling it now? And when did I become a highness again? I renounced all of that shit.”

“Yes, of course, Sir, I was just…it was a…I wasn’t prepared for your arrival. Did Vetra and I miss an email with a travel itinerary?”