My last stop in Drieden was a long shot. A strange spot for my brother, this bar in the theater district didn’t seem like it was his kind of place. From what I could tell, Christian had preferred exclusive clubs and expensive steaks in the last decade but the information my team had gathered from his phone said he’d come to this place semi-regularly.

I hated it.

But I hated most bars these days.

Better to drink at home. In the dark. With a football match on.

This place had too many neon signs, too much music and too many tourists.

I had just finished one beer and was ready to call this surveillance a complete waste of time when I saw her walk in.

It was her posture, the way she held her head. The way her legs glided across the room.

I shook my head. It was uncanny, seeing Princess Theodora in the flesh. I recognized the way she moved because I’d studied her, films of her, photos of her, for weeks after that damn wedding was called off and I was called in to headquarters.

“Your brother.” “International incident.” “Disappeared.”

Words I’d never considered being strung together before. Christian was…well, I’ll be brutally honest. He’s a fuckup. I knew he’d screw up a royal marriage – that was inevitable for all of those sorts, wasn’t it – but to screw up the royal wedding? When all he had to do was stand on an X taped on the floor and repeat a few fucking lines the fucking archbishop is fucking saying right in front of him?

Yeah. My brother managed to fuck that up.

And now I was here. In this terrible cheap bar, scouting the worst parts of this city for clues to where he might have gone off to and here was the biggest, most ridiculous clue of all; his royal bride.

Cheekily sneaking in here. In public.

She’s an idiot.

That was my first response.

My second: She’s meeting him here.

I watched her find a seat. I scanned the room. Waited for someone to approach her. Christian. A friend. Why the fuck else would she be here?

And then I moved.

Because…

Christ.

All those hours of footage of this woman and…yeah. Maybe I felt like I knew her. Strange.

She was a terrible person, I knew that, of course. A princess. Who would have voluntarily married the fuckup I once called my brother.

How could she not be terrible on every possible level?

I felt a bit sorry for her then, though. I’m not heartless. She was trying so hard to be anonymous with a sweatshirt and glasses. Pathetic. As if anyone with two functioning retinas couldn’t see that this woman was the infamous Princess Theodora of the Driedish royal family.

She closed her eyes. She probably thought no one could see her if she couldn’t see them. Like a bunny or some wild creature. If people saw her, recognized her. My God, we didn’t need more public attention on this case. Another international incident, in my presence, no less. I didn’t need that. There was only one thing to do.

I took a seat across from her. The table had chipped red paint. If she noticed how shabby it was, would she throw a fit? Ask for a proper table, befitting someone of her grand stature?

"Excuse me. Is this seat taken?" I asked, trying to get her to pay attention to her surroundings. She could be eaten alive at any moment in a place like this.

"No," she said, blinking rapidly. “Hello." She greeted me like we were about to have goddamn tea with the queen. Living in a fantasy world, clearly. Maybe she’d gone mad on that island retreat they’d sent her on. I had to get her gone.

I leered like I wanted to pick her up. Easiest way to scare off a woman, I’ve found. "Hallo there. What brings a beauty like you out on a night like tonight?"

I wasn’t wrong. Look, she was beautiful. I definitely noticed that in all those hours of research. It made me hate my brother even more. A fuckup like him does not deserve a woman like this, even if she was clearly not very bright.

"I'm meeting someone." The answer came quick. Quick enough to be truth. Could I have possibly been this lucky? Stumbled into Thea and Christian’s rendezvous?

"A boyfriend someone?"

I leaned back in my chair and crossed my arms, to encourage her to start talking. The faster the better. That waitress over there was definitely looking at us too closely for my liking.

"No, A coworker."

Lie. Princesses didn’t meet coworkers at bars like this.

"At this hour? Here? What kind of a job are you working?" I decided to turn up the obnoxious factor. "You're not... picking up anyone?"

The princess paused, pursed her pretty lips and then said, oh so properly. "Are you insinuating that I'm a prostitute?"

I could barely stop myself from laughing. She looked nothing like a prostitute in her messy hair, glasses and hoodie, I had to admit. "Well, if you are, you’re a badly dressed one."

"What, are you an expert?"

 "Not regarding fashion, no."

Her eyes flashed in the bar’s neon light. A little fight from the baby rabbit. Interesting.

"I'm actually a historian."

"Are you now? How fascinating." I remembered the file I had memorized on Her Royal Highness Theodora Laurent. She had never worked as a historian. Why would she tell this specific lie to me, a stranger in a bar?

She nodded. "I specialize in Driedish rural agrarian history. Specifically the congruence between animal husbandry, agricultural economics, and women's health."

Those were awfully big words for a silly, pretty princess. Especially since she seemed to just pull them out, off the cuff, with no cue cards or anything. God help me. This I had to hear more about.

"Ah. Farming. A noble profession, indeed, although given to long days, uncertain futures, and way too much drink." Speaking of. The waitress was still staring and we weren’t going anywhere fast, not unless I threw the princess over my shoulder and hauled her back behind her palace gates where she should be. I waved a hand and the waitress was there in two steps. "Two whiskeys, please."

"I couldn't-" Thea started to object.

"But my lady, you already have."

Before either of us could re-think this path we were on, two glasses of whiskey were slapped down on the table, droplets of amber liquid splashing out onto the chipped red paint.

To her credit, she didn’t turn her nose up at the smudged glass. She quickly picked it up and lifted it to her full mouth.

"What are you doing? It's customary in my country to toast before a drink." I said it to tease her.

Strange impulse. For one brief moment it was almost as if…

We weren’t…

But if we were…

This is what it would be like, I suppose. To share a drink with a mysterious, beautiful woman in a sketchy bar.

It had been so long. I couldn’t quite remember what it was like.

"What would you like to toast to?" she asked, curious.

 To us. That’s what I would have said, before I was this person. Back in the day when I had the title that my fuckup brother had somehow used to snare the woman in front of me.  I thought quickly. "To the Queen's health."

"Which one?"

"What do you mean, which one?"

"You've got a queen. So do I. Which one are we toasting to?"

Fuck me. I smiled, despite myself. "To yours, of course. As a Scot, I've always had a wee problem with Queen Liz."

Then, to remind myself of my job, that I was supposed to be repelling this woman to the point of making her leave a public space, I lifted my glass and said "To Queen Aurelia” like the drunken fool she should think I was.

"To the Queen," she said before we both drank the cheap whiskey that I had just ordered.

“Jesus, what is this?"

"Something cheap," she said with a face that was… real. Not a face of a princess. It was the face of a real woman who had just sipped the piss of Satan and…

I laughed. She made me laugh for some goddamn reason.

"What's your name?" she asked.

And just like that, reality hit. My training took over.

We were not two people having a drink. I was a man who didn’t exist, spying on her and her country and she was a royal princess who had been five minutes away from marrying my fuckup brother.

"Nick. Nick Cameron.” I used the name that was on all the papers that I had used to enter Drieden. “Yours?"

Damn. I shouldn’t have asked her.

But I was so fucking curious as to how far she was going to take this night.

"Thea," she said.

She used her real name. Stupid, stupid princess.

The hood of her sweatshirt fell off her head as she took another sip of the third-rate whiskey, and goddamn it, it wasn’t dark enough in here and someone was going to take a photo of us and then I’d have to break into the offices of multiple tabloids to erase everyone’s files.

But it also wasn’t dark enough to hide the way her hand clenched her drink, how frown lines popped up between her eyes. "You all right?"  I had to ask, even as she decided another two gulps of demonic drink was a good idea.

"I have an interview tomorrow," she said.

"For a job?" I asked.

"No. For work," she explained.

This could be a clue. Something that would lead us to someone who might know where my small-dicked brother had gone off to. But what sort of job was she even talking about? Nothing in the reconnaissance had said anything about Princess Thea working recently.

"It's a big one then?” I asked, to gently prod more information out. “You worried about your boss breathing down your neck?"

She made a funny expression. "Yeah, she's a hard ass."

I reverted back to my character. "Me? I'd skip out. Let someone else take it on."

"Why does that not surprise me?"

"I'm not a highly respected historian, though." Another poke, another prod. My God, woman, just tell me what you’re going on about.

"I'm not that respected," she said sharply. "Hardly anyone listens to me."

It should have sounded pathetic. Or as if she was fishing for compliments. Out of the mouth of a princess, it would.

But tonight. Fuck. Thea wasn’t a princess right then, was she?

I mean, of course she was. But she thought her secret was safe.

I leaned over the table and through the haze of cigarette smoke and cheap whiskey, I saw those sad eyes that had been on the cover of every magazine in every country for the past year.

"I'm sure that's not true. I'd love to listen to you." I sounded like a bloody idiot. Had to recover, quick. So I grinned, like Nick Cameron would do. "Besides, I’m somewhat of an expert on the connection between husbandry and women’s… health.”

That did the trick. The spark came back. The sad disappeared.

"Does this work with women, usually? This..." She gave an elegant wave in my direction. "This roguish scoundrel act?"

"You're having a drink with me, you tell me."

Thea took her glass up, appraised the remaining liquid. I knew that expression well, from my randy days in military training.

"People would stare," I said in a low voice.

She pulled her gaze back to me. Careful.

"If you threw the drink in my face,” I explained. “You don't seem like a woman who wants that kind of attention."

Please God, don’t give us that sort of attention.

And with that, she finished the rest of her drink.

I had to give the princess some credit. It took a tough woman who could handle the cheap shit.

"Another round?" I drawled, calculating that if she drank a second glass as fast as the first, maybe I would just carry her back up the hill to the palace. She’d be too drunk to put up a fight.

But no. She wanted to talk more. "What are you in Drieden for?” she asked.

Christ. What was Nick Cameron here for? Did it matter? "Family business."

"What sort of family business?" she sounded suspicious.

Best to keep it to as much of the truth as I could. "There was a will. Some property was left to a relation who had emigrated here. We're just trying to track them down."

Thea put her chin in hand. "Who is the relative? An uncle? Cousin?” So many fucking questions. “Were they working here? Did they fall in love with a Driedener? Did they get citizenship?" She took a breath. “And what's the bequest?"

She was a curious one. Truly. Wouldn’t have thought that such a lofty royal would give much of a shit about a nobody like me and my nobody family. "So many questions. I suppose this is how you write your history books or papers or whatever you do?"

Her eyebrows lifted, a picture of innocence. "I'm known as a very diligent researcher."

Yeah right. "Spend all your time with your nose in books, I suppose."

"Oh yes, I'm just so excited to learn about a live person. It's quite a change from the all the dead people I usually talk to."

Little did she know she was talking to someone whose original name was on a death certificate, somewhere. "Dead people are easier to deal with, I suppose."

She sat back in her chair. "I apologize, I didn't mean-"

We were interrupted by the arrival of three denim-clad young women with cell phones in their hands.

"Oh my God," one breathed.

"It's her!" Another squealed in an American accent.

"I'm sorry, we don't want to interrupt, but you look so much like..."

"Are you, like, related to Princess Theodora?"

FUCK FUCK FUCK.

The FUCKING woman couldn’t have just run off like a scared little bunny, could she?

Now I had to deal with this lot and save her royal ass.

"What, all Driedeners look alike to you?" I asked the girls, quickly adopting a Driedish accent. It was a talent of mine, adopting accents, helpful to blend into a crowd quickly.

"Oh no..." One of the Americans nervously said. "But she looks exactly like her."

I looked over at Thea. She had frozen. Her eyes were wide. She looked just like a princess caught in the act would.

FUCK.

"Her? In those sloppy clothes and that greasy hair? You think our very own princess would be in a dump like this?"

A beat. The girls looked confused. And then Thea spoke.

"Americans, they think we're all blond and stone-faced.”

Not sure insulting the tourists was the best way to go. "She's not as beautiful as her highness," I said, as I stared at Thea, hoping she would just stay quiet and let me handle this.  "But I can see a slight resemblance. Maybe you ladies have a point."

The three girls were in their early twenties, with rain jackets and backpacks and high tech sneakers, probably from California or Florida, someplace warm because they were overdressed for a Drieden summer. They shot each other dubious, embarrassed looks, and they should have been embarrassed. Leave people alone in public. Never mind how famous they are.

I had to keep going and get these fools moving. "Maybe we've got ourselves a new business venture, love,” I said to Thea. “You could be one of them- whatsitcalled –“

"Impersonators!" One of the blond Americans supplied.

"That's it," I agreed. "You could impersonate Princess Theodora for parties and such. We could make a killing."

"Too bad you don't have a friend who looks like Prince Christian," one of them said.

"He wasn't a prince.”

"Not yet. He would have been if he hadn't totally skipped out on her."

"Ohmigod, I am still so mad at him."

"Poor thing..."

"Who runs out on a princess?"

"Yeah!" Her friend said enthusiastically. "A fucking princess!"

Sounded like the Americans had been served cheap whiskey as well.

Alright, I’ll admit I enjoyed their remarks. If it wasn’t such a goddamn precarious moment, I would have encouraged them to continue calling Christian names, just to see what they could come up with.

Finally, Thea had enough. "Can we stop talking about it?" she snapped. "I'm not going to dress up like her."

That was when I knew the wool had successfully been pulled over the tourist girls’ eyes. Thea’s irritation was very convincing.

"You could make a lot of money," one of the girls told her.

"Just get your hair done..."

"And maybe your eyebrows..."

"And your nose..."

Thea’s mouth dropped open. She was cute when she was angry.

"How much do you think people would pay in America?" I asked them. "For someone to dress up like Theodora?"

"Like, a hundred?"

"Fifty?"

"Twenty?"

"Really? Twenty euros?" Thea exclaimed, offended.

"Twenty dollars," an American clarified. I bit my tongue not to laugh at the fire in Thea’s eyes at that.

Then one of the girls got excited and reached into the purse she had strapped across her chest. "I'll give you twenty euros right now if you pose with me."

"Jenni!" One of her friends squealed. "It's not even Theodora!"

"Oh come on, everyone back home will shit themselves."

Thea stood suddenly. I wasn’t sure if she was going to march out or subject the Americans to some sort of princessy putdown.

We already had them convinced that Thea wasn’t… Thea so I stood and waved at the irritated Princess.

"So sorry, ladies, I've got to get my friend home. She has a big work event tomorrow and she's had a bit too much fun tonight, if you know what I mean." I pretended to drink out of a bottle, just to drive the point home.

The woman who was now dangling a twenty euro bill in the air between us waggled her eyebrows at Thea. "Come on, one quick pose for my Instagram."

Oh hell no. "She doesn't look anything like a princess. You're wasting your money," I told them.

The American didn't pay attention to me and the crisp bill fresh from an airport ATM still waved in front of Thea. "My friends back home are going to die. Please?"

Jesus. Could these people get the hint. "Are all Americans this dumb?" I waved at Thea’s sloppy outfit. "A Driedish princess wouldn't be caught dead in these rags."

But for some reason that only made sense in a dumb as rocks royal lineage, all of a sudden Thea said, "Sure," and she stepped forward towards the Americans. And their cellphones.

God save me from irrational princesses.

There was a lot of squealing and giggling and Thea pulled up her hood and – I swear to Christ- she made those ridiculous duck lips in front of a strange American girl’s phone camera in the dim light of a dive bar in the theater district.

The girl laughed, handed Thea a twenty Euro note, and the group went back to their table as Thea acted like she was going to walk straight out the front door.

I’m not sure why, but I grabbed her and said, "Not that way." My instincts took over and I pushed her through a corner door and into the bar's office, with a desk overflowing with papers, receipts, and a laptop. She nearly stepped into a liquor crate when I closed the door behind us and I chuckled, mostly at myself, because I had inadvertently gotten the second in line to the Driedish throne tipsy and what the fuck did I think was doing with her, anyway?

She looked at the clock on the wall. "I have to go,"  she said as she moved back to the office door to leave like she was Cinderella and if that made me a fairytale prince then fairytales are all giant piles of horse shit.

Because, if anyone is paying attention? I’m no goddamned prince.

But I am a man. And the question was lodged solidly in the back of my head - in another land, another time, if I had been the Duke of Brisbane properly, would I have had the fucking nerve, the fucking audacity to ask this woman - a bloody princess -  to marry me?

Like my fuckup brother had?

Maybe that’s why I asked her. "So soon, Thea?"

As if she’d give me – the real me – another look.

Not in this lifetime.

“It's late." Her voice was soft but certain.

I exhaled. Right. This would have never happened. None of this should have happened. I had to give the point to her. Grant her the story she’d worked admirably to maintain. "And you have a historian job interview in the morning."

"Yes."

"Driedish agrarian animal husbandry."

"Exactly.”

"Tell me something, Thea."

Her eyes widened slightly at the sound of her name.

"Tell me something about Driedish agrarian history." One more lie. One more moment.

There. That real-life flash in her eyes. The one I never expected, never saw, in all those hours of footage. She lifted her chin and looked straight into my face and said, "In 1732, a Driedener named Halper Malzen invented an H-shaped plow that revolutionized wheat farming in the Demble province, because of the rocky, granite soil there."

My breath caught. I felt strangled somehow. But I had asked for this, hadn’t I?

"My paper about the effects of his invention will be in the next University of Drieden Journal of History."

"Fascinating," I managed to say.

A smile played on her lips. "It is, isn't?"

"I was talking about you."  Finally, a truth embedded in an evening of lies. Lies that I had somehow thoroughly enjoyed. For the first time in … well, it had been a long time.

She shook her head. "I'm just a girl who likes history with a crappy job who drinks too much."

I had to let her go. Because it was late, because she wasn’t safe here, because we were in this life and she was a princess and I was a dead man and our paths never, ever, ever, should have crossed.

She went out the back door. I counted to three then stepped out, saw her get into a small car.

I got into mine and followed her to the palace gates.

And that was the end of that.