Ordinarily, since she had grown up in the town, she would have been ready to make a recommendation the second one was requested. Luke's spontaneous desire to visit a sweets shop caught her by such surprise that she was still blinking in co-mingled shock and confusion when he posed the question to the nearby press. As far as she was aware such a stop was neither on the itinerary nor was it something that he would seek out typically. During their outings he had alluded to not having quite the same addiction to sweets as she did. She shared in the stupefied newscaster's bafflement; surely the bodyguards were similarly perplexed even if they did not display as much on their features. From day one of the tour it had been drilled into her repeatedly that they had to stay on schedule. Going to the spa had been a deviation, but arguably just as much for Luke's benefit as her own, she she did not attribute the oddity to pure benevolence. This wayward excursion felt jarringly out of place for the heir to the throne.

Before she had grasped what the hell possessed her fiance to behave so bizarrely, he was nudging her down the road towards the store insistently. Rhiane bit the inside of her cheek as she inwardly lamented that the circumstances prevented her from asking questions. Words could all too easily drift through the air and be overheard by their audience in such an open space, a risk she could not take, and there was nowhere to drag him aside between where they had exited the vehicle and where the business was located. Doing her best to maintain her composure, she tossed a few smiles here and there as they passed clusters of people, some adoring fans and others bystanders that were waiting for the royalty to get out of their way so they could make a few purchases for their home. The former farmer wasn't certain if the hand at her elbow was meant to guide her, stabilize her in the tall heels she wore unsuited for a brisk pace, or keep her from fleeing.

Belatedly, when she was ushered inside the establishment and Luke remarked she was angry, she recalled complaining that her bold insult of Anelle (which she did not regret in the least) had doomed any chance she had to stop by a bakery for sweets. A nice middle-aged lady and her daughter both stared at the prince as did his betrothed. Everything with him was a game of push and pull. One minute he was furious, indifferent, or arrogant, and the next he was attentive, empathetic, thoughtful. Desperately she wanted to believe that the latter set of emotions were reflective of how he truly felt about her, but she couldn't be sure, because he stopped short of revealing himself. In the SUV she had been sure that he was telling her the lie he knew she wanted to hear since the success of his PR stunt relied on her performance. As she was tugged towards the clean display filled with the morning's offering she wondered if trying to fool her he was unintentionally honest and the only person being deceived was himself.

Quietly listening to the cannoli issue being sorted out, she couldn't help but raise a brow at his determination as her eyes wandered over the treats. Soon she was absorbed in the descriptions written on tiny little cards naming each confection and the ingredients contained therein. Like most of New Rome's restaurants, it had a mixture of traditional pastries, cakes and cookies popular across the globe, and a few unique creations. The careful little script took her on a culinary adventure that was not stressful, not complicated, not gut-wrenching, not mentally taxing. Here there was no chance of cruel rejection or assassination.

Rhiane visibly startled when Luke spoke to her since she had been so engrossed with feasting with her gaze. "Sorry," she said as she flashed a genuinely sheepish grin at the proprietor, "I was lost in my own little world there for a moment. Could we have a couple pieces of torrone and a few zeppole?" There was a wide variety of international delights she could have selected, but she had been to the bakery a few times as an adolescent and adult, and true Italian fare appealed to her more. She would have devoured anything and everything in the bakery given to her, yet when required to state a preference, it had to be the recipes that were handed down for generations through the people native to this area of the country. The young girl hurried to fill the order immediately as her mother jotted down ingredients for the cannoli.

"You should get something as well," she told him matter-of-factly. "I bet you worked through breakfast and haven't had anything substantial to eat." The neighbor's chickens ate more than Luke in a foul mood and she was quite aware that she had soured his attitude when she had yelled at him earlier that morning. If he went on a passive hunger strike due to loss of appetite she'd have the whole damn world after her from the red-haired witch, to the queen, to the rabid fans that were beginning to cluster outside the windows, hoping to catch a glimpse of their supposed golden-haired angel. There were less of them in her hometown than in other provinces they had visited, but they were here nonetheless, undoubtedly picking fights with her fans as to which member of the couple was more unworthy of the other. If she had to be honest, that she had fans was still an unsettling concept. When she had entered the contest she had planned for and anticipated having the support of the masses. What she had failed to account for was the insanity that was how many legitimately overly-fixated individuals could be in the populace.