Page 31 of Tempted By the Princess

“It won’t fade,” she said stubbornly. “I love you, Carrie. I know I’ve only known you for less than a week, but…”

“You don’t love me,” I denied, even as I felt the truth of her words in my chest, right where my own feelings of love burned for her, bright and strong. “It’s just infatuation.”

“I may be younger than you, but I’m old enough to know how I feel,” she said, anger threading between her words. “Don’t tell me I don’t know when I do.”

“I’m sorry Genny, honestly I am, but it’s going to be easier on both of us if we can just make a clean break.” My stomach twinged painfully.

“So this is it?” she asked incredulously. “We eat waffles and say goodbye? You’re not willing to try dating, try being out together in the real world, openly?”

“You won’t be here to date,” I reminded her. “Who knows how long you’ll be gone?”

“We can talk while I’m gone,” she said. “And if we still feel the same when I get back to Seattle…”

I shook my head. “There’s no way this is ever going to work. We need to say goodbye.”

“We can’t even be friends?”

“No.”

I made my voice firm, the only way I could protect myself, the only way I could keep from saying what I really wanted to say… that I wanted to be friends, that I wanted to try a relationship, that I wanted to see her when she got back. I couldn’t say any of it because I knew it was never going to work. She was young enough to believe it would be okay, but I’d never seen a long-distance relationship work out. And while none of my friends had ever dated an actual princess, I’d seen how it went when they dated women out of their league. Genny was as out of my league as she could be.

The best thing was to rip off the band-aid. It hurt now, but I was saving us both a much worse hurt later on.

Genny got up so fast her chair fell over. “Okay fine, I can tell when I’m not wanted.”

I couldn’t let her think that. I jumped up, grabbing her elbows, holding her close.

“You’re wanted Genny, but one of us has to be sensible. I’m a middle aged caterer who holds her breath at the end of every month, hoping I’m going to have enough money to cover everything. You’re a young and vibrant princess who lives in a goddamned castle. We just don’t fit.”

“We fit just fine when I’ve got my head between your legs.” She was crying now, thick tears that tracked down her cheeks and dropped off her jaw. “We fit fine when we’re cuddling on the couch or taking a bath together.”

“None of this is real,” I protested weakly. “We were thrown together and everything feels intense, even for me, but this isn’t a relationship. It was… I don’t know, a fun fling. A diversion.”

She took a deep, heaving breath. “Okay then, I guess I should go.”

“Stay a little while longer,” I said without thinking. “We can have one last night together before you go.”

She shook her head sadly. “I can’t spend more time with you, knowing that I love you, and you don’t feel the same.”

“I never said I didn’t feel the same,” I said softly.

“You love me?” she asked.

I nodded.

“But you said it’s not real.”

“It’s not,” I protested, even though I didn’t fully believe it myself. “This doesn’t happen in real life. People don’t fall in love in the space of a few days. And even if they do, we’re not all princesses. We don’t get happily ever afters.”

She studied me for several seconds before she pulled back.

“You might not believe in happily ever afters Carrie, but I do. And you and I are going to have ours, I’m sure of it. I’m going to prove it to you eventually.”

She stepped away, then took a few more steps before lifting her chin and meeting my eyes.

“I’m going to grab my stuff and go. But mark my words Carrie Owens, you haven’t seen the last of me.”

She jogged down the hallway, returning a few minutes later with her purse. I was still standing exactly where I’d been when she walked away. Setting her purse on the ground, she stalked towards me, grabbing me by the shoulders and pulling me towards her.