Page 27 of In A Faraway Land

So damn trashy and sexy.

Flicka set one fist on her hip and leaned to the side, glaring up at him. “You were saying?”

He snapped his mouth closed and reached for her, gathering her inside so he could slam the door and lock it up tightly.

Flicka walked through the little entryway and dropped her purse on a table. “Did you get Alina?”

“Yes—” he stammered. “I—” What the hell was she wearing?“Where were you?”

“Work,” Flicka said.

“What job could you possibly have?”

Oh, that had slipped out wrong, and thePrinzessinwho might have ruled a kingdom wouldn’t let it pass, he knew.

Flicka’s chin bobbed up, and her slim jaw clenched. “I made five hundred dollars today, thank you very much.”

“Doingwhat?”

Yeah, that had come outwrong, too, and Dieter considered banging his head on the door to stop himself from saying stupid things.

Anger lit Flicka’s emerald eyes, and she started picking pins out of the blond twist of her hair. “I’m a waitress at the Monaco Casino, and I made great tips today.”

“You can’t be a waitress,” he said.

What the hell waswrongwith him? He needed to crack his skull on the wall to get himselfout of this mess. If he were unconscious, he would stop talking.

She said, “I can, and I am, and I made good tips. Not great tips because I couldn’t remember all the drinks that people were ordering. I don’t know what the English nicknames are, and there’s a sea of tables in the gaming room. I can’t tell one from another. But I did well enough. I can survive if I need to. If I make these kindsof tips for three days, I’ll have enough for rent for this apartment for the month.I can do this.”

Such resourcefulness might be important if he were killed and she needed to live off the land for a few weeks until Wulfram or a Rogue Security operator could reach her. It might keep her alive.

But walking around a crowd would allow her to be kidnapped or killed.

He said, “I forbid you to gooutside again. You must quit this job.”

Her head bobbed up higher, and her green eyes caught fire.“Youwork forme,Dieter.”

“Iwork for yourbrother.You are the principal target, not my boss.”

“You’re notmyboss. I am Her Serene Highness Friederike Marie Louise Victoria Caroline Amalie Alexandra Augusta,Prinzessin von Hannover und Cumberland,Princess of Great Britain and Ireland, Duchessof Brunswick-Lüneburg—”

“Thenactlike it!”

“Iam!”

“If you were acting like it, you would let your security do their job, not go running off every damn time I turn my back.”

His phone buzzed in his pants pocket, shivering against his nuts. The pattern was that stutter-step that meant a text. It could wait.

“You didn’t turn your back. Youleft.”

With that, Dieter knew what this fight wasreally about, and he had been right to do it. “Leaving London was the only ethical thing I’ve ever done around you. I should have done it the first night you made a pass at me.”

“Imade a pass atyou!”she gasped. “That isnotwhat happened.”

“What else would you call—”

“You’d been touching me, stroking my neck or shoulder, and staring at me like you were about to pounce for a year at thatpoint.”