Free The Star Princess by Susan Grant Page A

last person in the universe I expected to see tonight, but pretty damn close."
    "Slow… " He held up one hand. "Fast words I cannot follow."
    "I'll try." She blew her nose. "This has been a horrible day."
    "Ian told me the approximate time of your arrival home," he explained. "When you did not answer your door, I returned to the ground car. I waited for many standard hours. I was nearly ready to seek temporary quarters on my own when you arrived."
    She peered into the darkness. "So, where's your entourage?"
    It pricked his pride to see that even the crown prince's independent sister assumed he needed handlers to make his way. "I left them behind," he answered crisply. "I'm here alone, on my own."
    "Is that your Porsche?"
    "It belongs to Hollywood Luxury Auto Leasing." He stumbled over the pronunciation, but assumed he got it right when she nodded. "While still home, I studied the procedures with which I'd need to… hire— yes, hire a vehicle."
    She appeared impressed by the feat. "Rom doesn't know how to drive, so I didn't expect you to. I thought you guys flew everywhere."
    "We do." He puzzled over the brief tightening of her mouth. Wouldn't she prefer to fly everywhere, as well? "But the ground cars we use to maintain our gardens are not all that different from yours here on Earth."
    "You. In the garden." She looked him up and down. "Somehow I can't picture you weeding."
    "I did not perform garden chores. But"— a corner of his mouth edged up with a surge of memories— "the vehicles were irresistible to a young boy and were easily commandeered." He shrugged.
    Delight lit Ilana's face. "So, you were a hell-raiser as a kid. A troublemaker."
    He gazed down at her. Light from above illuminated her face. Tell me more, her eyes pleaded, as if she were more interested in the man inside than his face or imminent crown. That searching gaze jolted Che's senses like a bracing dive into cold seawater.
    Past or present, he couldn't recall a woman who'd observed him so brashly. The others hadn't dared to, or hadn't cared to, he supposed. It was clear that Ilana fit neither category.
    "My childhood years were happy," he revealed, spurred on by her curiosity. In his new English, he tried not to mangle the explanation. "But strictly supervised, as I had to be prepared to take my father's place on the throne. The Treatise of Trade dictated everything my family did, that I did or did not do. But no matter how thorough the supervision, no matter how loving, a child will always find ways to outwit it. He would have chuckled, had the situation been appropriate. Instead, he allowed himself a small smile. "I will say only that my siblings and I were creative in seeking out mischievous diversions."
    Ilana tipped her head to the side. "Are you still as creative?"
    He opened his mouth to deny it— roguery wasn't a trait the Vedla clan cultivated— but he'd come to Earth, had he not? What did that say about the rebel in him?
    He clamped his mouth shut. By the heavens, what was he thinking, telling Ilana Hamilton about his boyhood exploits? No one outside his immediate family and the palace staff knew of those escapades, which had earned him many a scolding. The Vedlas were a disciplined breed. It would not do to have Ilana Hamilton think otherwise. He must act with dignity befitting his class.
    His tone turned formal. "On the matter of my driving the Porsche— the markings, the language, and the mechanisms with which one controls the car are primitive, but not difficult to learn."
    Ilana drew back, as if his abrupt change in manner chilled her. "Primitive," she muttered. "Not difficult to learn. Give me a break, it was all those garden carts you hijacked."
    He swallowed a groan.
    She walked to where her can of pepper spray lay on the pavement. She retrieved it, then brandished it as a wand as she spoke. "You're pretty humble. When my stepfather's people came here for the first time, they had trouble."
    He shrugged. "They were B'kahs."
    That won