“In any case, if you were my fiancée, everything would be much smoother. People wouldn’t question your presence here or the time we spend together. We’re much freer this way. I am sorry that I didn’t bring it up to you before now. I wasn’t certain how to do it or how you might take it.”
Caitlyn lifted her chin. “What do you mean?”
Emrys put his hands on his hips. “It would be very beneficial for me to marry. My trust fund doesn’t release until I’m forty. I’m not hurting for money, but at the same time, it’s galling to be held back in this way. My father is very controlling.”
“I can see that. But you’re not actually marrying me. Won’t that put a kink in the plan?”
“It would. But would you like to?”
Caitlyn thought her heart might have actually stopped. “L-like to? What, marry you?”
“If you go along with the plan—” Emrys came to her side again and put his hand on the small of her back. “We could make our engagement real. If you want to.”
“We’re not getting married!” Caitlyn laughed before she could think about it. Emrys’s lips twisted in displeasure and she grabbed his lapels before he could pull away from her. “I’m begging you to be serious here, Emrys. I care about you a lot. But I’m not going to marry someone just to help out with his trust fund! And we’ve just barely reconnected.”
“Well. I suppose that much is true.”
“We work well together,” she admitted. “Better than I’ve ever worked with anyone else. But we can’t do it like this. I’ll play along. It’s fun, being the fiancée of a prince, and I wouldn’t want to make anyone’s family drama worse.”
“Fair enough.” Emrys leaned forward and kissed her lips lightly, to avoid mussing her lipstick. “Play along this week, while my father is here, because I cannot smooth anything over with my mother while that man is at the palace. And then what?”
Caitlyn shrugged and pressed her palm to his chest. “If you fall in love with me, we can make our engagement real.”
“You don’t ask much, do you?”
“More than you do, apparently. Why would you ever marry anyone other than the woman you loved, after everything you went through with Miranda?” Caitlyn shook a finger at him.
“I’m not much of a reasonable man within these walls,” Emrys admitted.
“Let’s get back.”
“Will you dance with me?”
Caitlyn considered it as she took his arm. “Only if you go slow and don’t mind my heels digging into your feet.”
“I’ll instruct the orchestra to play us a sonata. Everyone else will fall asleep, so no one will see you dancing.”
Caitlyn laughed and rested her head against his arm. The things she did for this man.
Chapter Nine
In the end, the king elected to stay longer than he’d originally indicated, and as that was his prerogative, Emrys and Caitlyn could do nothing about it. Their “trial run” week passed, and then another, and during that time, Emrys was wound so tightly that Caitlyn thought he might snap in his father’s presence any moment. And the king had still not offered his official blessing on their union , even if it was now common knowledge in the kingdom and beyond that the prince was engaged. Even the queen encouraged him, subtly and very politely, to make an explicit statement about it. As September drew to a close, Caitlyn got on the travel forums that she frequented for planning trips—usually with a much smaller budget—to ask about good places to visit in October.
When Emrys started talking about a new movie he would have to shoot soon, Caitlyn pulled him into her rooms the moment no one was looking and sat in a large chair with him, discussing the possible places they could go out of sight of the royal family’s judging eyes. He seemed delighted by the idea and told her to leave it all to him.
Within a week, they were off to Greece.
It was a point of pride, Emrys had said, to spend several days in Athens, and there they took in the museums and went to the Parthenon. For Caitlyn, the highlight of this trip happened on the street, where buskers stood playing guitars, lyres, organs, and drums. One day, the buskers were playing, and a man walked into the street to begin a dance. After a bit of encouragement, two tourists had joined him, and then several more. Within a few moments, all kinds of people filled the street to dance together. After watching Caitlyn clapping and laughing, Emrys had bounded off to join them, and he’d done remarkably well beside the others. An older woman patted his arm and smiled to him.