“I don’t know the difference,” he admitted.
“For the purposes of this exercise, there’s no difference. There’s nothing left between us. You can’t be friends with someone like me. You can’t be . . .” More than friends. “I work for you. I’m not high born or even adequately born—and you’re literally going to be king.”
He raised a shoulder. “Yeah?”
“Not yeah,” she said, resisting the urge to cuff him around the head. “Yes. You are.”
“Yes, I am,” he said dutifully, coming infuriatingly close to smiling.
“For the love of God.” She sat back, pressing her fingers to her temple. “This is why I didn’t tell you I was here. I knew you’d do this. I knew you wouldn’t get it. But I get it. I live in the servants’ quarters—you own the palace. I work for the crown—you’ll wear the crown. We’re incompatibility’s greatest achievement.”
He looked unfazed. “All I’m hearing is antiquated classism.”
Frankie grasped either side of her head. “I can’t do this now. I can’t think clearly enough to argue.”
“Then don’t.” Kris leaned back, withdrawing his legs, his body. “We both need to sleep.”
Groaning, she nodded.
“A full night. Deep and proper,” he said, and paused before he said, “Camping.”
She snapped her attention to him.
“Tomorrow night.” Kris rose to his feet, dropping the paper bag on the table and brushing his hands together. “You finish those.”
“Camping?” She stood and swiftly put distance between them. “That’s hardly at the top of your priority list.”
“I don’t have a priority list. Philip does. You sleep well outdoors. You’ve told me. Fresh air and silence.” He raised a shoulder. “It’s what I’m going to do. You don’t have to come.”
She took in a slow, steadying breath. “Will you go beyond the palace grounds?”
“I said camping, didn’t I?”
As his bodyguard, she’d have to go. And the glimmer in his eyes knew it.
“I’ll walk you to your room,” she muttered, pushing herself in the direction of the freestanding closet beside the bed.
“I can walk myself. It’ll be a twenty-minute round trip for you.”
“Gosh, Your Highness, how thoughtful of you to consider that after you turned up at my door uninvited in the middle of the night,” she said, and gave the closet two quick jabs to get the right-hand door to unstick. “And don’t insult me by suggesting that I take a nap instead of do my job.”
He raised a hand, palm up.
“While I’m at it, don’t ever treat Hanna like that again.” Her burgundy jeans were on top of her clothes pile. She tugged them free, shoving the closet door shut before everything else could fall out.
“I won’t.” His gaze was on her legs. Probably wondering whether she was about to change in front of him. “I shouldn’t have made her do that. I was angry.”
“Is anger an excuse?”
“No,” he said. “I’ll apologize.”
“With beer?” She snorted, holding her jeans up by the waist. “Here’s the part where you turn your back like a gentleman.”
Weary and wild-haired, he hesitated as his gaze grew heavy. A light furrow formed between his brows. “A what?”
“Gentleman. Honor, decency, courtesy—you’ve heard of it?”
He hummed, a gravelly sound, as he slowly turned away. “I’m afraid not.”
God. She knew him in this mood.
She changed fast.
“Let’s go,” she said, swiping up her essentials from the table and jamming them in her pockets.
He cut to the door, laying his hand on the knob. “Frankie,” he said quietly, half-turning his face to where she stood right behind him. “Did you really get Ava out?”
Her gut clenched—at the fact that he knew and his soft tone. “Don’t tell a soul.”
His eyes met hers over his shoulder. “What other secrets are you keeping?”
“If I told you, they wouldn’t be secrets.”
“A secret can be kept between two people.”
A shiver ran between her shoulder blades. We’ve proven that, she wanted to say. We’ve kept this secret between us so tightly we can’t even speak it to each other.
No, that wasn’t right. She couldn’t speak it—and her silence muted him.
He was watching her. “Promise not to lie to me again.”
“Fine.” Heart thundering, she cocked a brow and made a get on with it gesture for him to open the door. “Let us out.”
“I’m trying to,” he murmured before turning the handle.
She’d forgotten never to put Kris in charge of opening doors. That something so simple could turn into an opportunity to hold her attention. Mostly her fault—he wouldn’t resort to blocking if she’d just have an open conversation with him. She’d been in Sage Haven for almost eighteen months the first time it happened. In hindsight, she should have expected it sooner. He’d waited a long time.
She remembered him driving her home from the weekly trivia night at the local pub.
“Would you rather go to jail for a year,” he’d asked, playing their go-to game as he guided his truck down main street. “Or lose ten years off your life?”
“Ten years,” she’d said without hesitation.
He had been incredulous. “A decade instead of one year? Come on.”
“Two decades, same answer. I’m not going to jail.” She’d twisted her lips, thinking. “Would you rather move to a new town every month or never leave the place you were born?”
“Easy,” he’d said, pulling over in front of the diner. “Never leave. You?”
“Every month,” she’d said. “No risk of seeing my prick dad ever again.”
“Or your friends,” he’d pointed out, his glance tipped with challenge.
“Don’t get sour; I wasn’t born here. If I go with the first option, I’d never have met you at all,” she’d said, and quickly hurled herself out of the truck and away from his grin.
He’d held open the door to the diner for her, no harm done, until she’d passed him and he’d asked a bit too quietly, “Would you rather muck out the stables every time you see your best friend—or make out with them every Christmas?”
Yeah. Kris really didn’t have his head around subtlety.
“Stables,” she’d said. “Nothing wrong with getting dirty.”
He’d made a swift choking sound. In denying her preference to make out with him, she’d thrown his imagination something way more suggestive.
Face flaming, she’d asked, “Would you rather never see Mark or Tommy again?”
“Hey!” He’d knocked her with his elbow as the door closed behind them. “Unfair question.”
Hideously unfair, but she’d panicked. “Choose one or it’s the water jug, my friend.”
Their punishment for refusing to pick an option had sprung from the first time they’d played the game. Frankie had asked, “Would you rather have wet socks on your feet for a year or dry socks on your hands for a year?” They’d both opted for dry socks on hands because they truly hated wet socks—which quickly set up wet socks as the consequence for avoiding an answer.