There were a lot going on in his mind, but none of it had to do with his position, the amount of work he left behind, or that he had been ignoring calls for the past few hours. Without precedence, his day doing manual labor had taken most of the worries about trade relations, global concerns, and security. In its place bloomed his curiosity about crops propagated in the different topographies of his mother’s kingdom. He had eaten tomatoes harvested from different regions and he knew that each had its own unique characteristic, as if coming from different species entirely, but that day was the first time he picked one from its shrub. 

Needless to say, he had almost forgotten the reason he insisted to visit the farm in the first place. Luke paced to the bed then back to Rhiane’s door to come after Sebastian, but then decided that discussing their secret arrangement around the other men might not be for the best of all concerned. He sat on the bed, feeling the cold metal of the drive deposited inside his pocket. One reason why he could not allow himself to explore the limits of his alcohol tolerance that night.

“Thank you for not letting her win.” He pushed his hair out of his eyes. “I’m a bit frightened to find out what else she knew about me that I myself had no idea about. Makes me wonder if you would still have joined the contest if you had the knowledge that this third placer had.” That he had never really fallen in love – except maybe with Sophia even though it was still a debatable subject – or that he had no respect whatsoever to women, or that he was arguably the rudest elitist of all the elitists in the land, were but two reasons for any sane common woman to run the other direction. It was his power, his position, his looks that blinded his paramours and made his previous relations superficial. None had cared to dig deeper to really get to know the person behind the mask. None but the woman he was not meant to be with at least for the next decade. 

A forlorn smile graced his features while his mind wandered outside the farm and into memories he created with someone else. Good thing Rhiane had her back on him, laughing a little as she pulled on her jeans. “Why should you remain sober?” He absently asked the most obvious question in a voice that was uncharacteristically his, then lifted his gaze from the floral bedspread and into that spot that the sweater’s neckline emphasized. “But it doesn’t matter. Drunk or not, you take advantage of me and my weakness.” He arched a royal brow and cocked his head to the side, imitating her. “Undressing in front of me, joining me in the shower, jumping in the same bath that I am in. What else must I believe other my fiancee getting out of her way to seduce me?”

He pushed himself to his still bare feet, past her only to open the closet full of her clothes. There was a variety of colors and styles. Most were not suited for the season’s favorite fashion, though most were wearable. The prince scanned the collection of clothes until he found a cotton scarf that he felt complemented the color of her sweater. It was also of decent size that she could drape it over her shoulder to compensate for the lack of cloth of her v-neck sweater. He handed the material to her.

“I will do that later.” He unraveled the scarf himself then draped it around her. “Wouldn’t want you to catch colds tonight.” Wouldn’t want men looking at her chest more than the colds thing. “The bodyguards can stay and guard the perimeter if you’re not happy to be in their company tonight. Did you mean Tobias too?” Luke teased. He had expressed how he suspected the bodyguard saw the princess elect as more than his charge. Rhiane was not unfriendly towards the man. “Though we must not be spotted coming into the bar with your family, else everybody will instantly know and our disguises will be pointless. Remember our first date?” His lips stretched to a genuine smile. “How you mutinied against me and made us both starve? Well, we’re doing this undercover dinner for real this time, and I honestly do not want any paparazzi photographs or videos circulating the internet. No picture taking with the locals as well, let’s just enjoy the night as normal people. You think it’s possible?”