A son! The reality of it sat up in the front of his mind as he figured out what to do with it. On the one hand, it was a complication, and for most of his life, he had done the best he could to avoid complication as much as he possibly could. He had worked hard to establish a career, and to put off all of the familial obligations he could as much as he could.

But on the other hand, maybe it was time for a little complication. Maybe a little complication would do him some good, to save him from the stark realities of the conflict he was in with his own family. What he had told Paige was absolutely the truth—he’d always loved kids, and he’d always pictured having them. He’d just never met a woman who intrigued him the way Paige did, enough to make it seem possible that they would fit into his unusual life.

His unusual life that he still hadn’t come clean to her about entirely.

Now, with her letting him into the truth about what she had been holding back all afternoon, the truth of his family’s status felt less like a necessarily avoided distraction and more like a lie of omission, and the mounting guilt of it overwhelmed everything he said and did.

It struck Kehlan as Paige showed him around her house that he had never actually been inside a home like this. He’d seen versions of them on TV shows, and he’d seen the outside of them, driving by. Growing up as he had, precious few of his friends could be termed middle-class. Even in college, any parties he attended were parties he threw, and those were few and far between. His need to prove his seriousness about his profession had always driven him to excel far beyond what was expected, and that left less time for socializing than he wished it had, looking back.

Paige’s home wasn’t that different in the basics, just more condensed. It was notable how run-down things were. In his life, all the basic amenities tended to be replaced by newer, more innovative models before they showed any real signs of wear. But here, there was only room for what needed to be here. And what was here was imperfect.

There was a ding in the side of the stove, and the refrigerator hummed a bit more loudly than Kehlan suspected it was supposed to. There was an area rug rather oddly placed, which he suspected was there to cover up some defect in the floor of the dining area, and the carpet in the living room had discernable areas where it was more worn than others.

The couch and the love seat coordinated well, be clearly hadn’t been sold as a set, and the television was small and out of date. Mail was stacked on the table by the door, along with a few spare keys, which Kehlan suspected must be to neighbor’s houses. He’d heard of that practice, and was delighted to see it might actually exist.

But, beyond anything else, the biggest difference between this house and anywhere Kehlan had ever lived was the pictures. The frames weren’t well matched, but they were coordinated. He’d never met Dylan, or even heard of him before ten minutes ago, but here he found himself standing in front of his whole young life so far, displayed up on these walls, along with the friends and the family that surrounded him. He recognized Alvin in a couple of them, although most had people with a clear family resemblance to Paige.

“It’s not much, but it’s home,” Paige said, smiling, and Kehlan realized that he was smiling, too.

“If you want to have a seat,” she went on, “I’ve got a bottle of wine. And I should have something to eat too…we never got a chance to have dinner, so hopefully you’re as hungry as I am.”

As soon as she said it, he realized that he was. Hours and hours of physical exertion after a long flight had left him ravenous. Their meal at the restaurant on the slopes had been substantial, but it also hadn’t been nearly enough under the circumstances. Kehlan wasn’t usually the kind of man to put off eating for forgetting—he had always enjoyed it too much. Another little oddity of how distracting he found Paige, he thought, as he heard her shuffling around in the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets and moving things around in a clearly overcrowded fridge.

“It’s not much,” Paige said when she returned to the living room, setting down a tray on the coffee table after moving aside some coloring books. “But it’ll get us fed.”

Looking at the food while Paige sat down and poured the wine, he had to disagree. There were a variety of pieces of cakes, quiches, and sweet and savory pastries. They were all fairly small, but delicious-looking all the same. And they were surrounded by a huge variety of cheeses and crackers and meats.

“What is all of this?” he asked, accepting a glass of wine that he’d barely noticed her pouring. “How do you just have all of this lying around?”

Paige shrugged.

“Oh, it’s just this and that. Some of these are things that Alvin is experimenting with for the diner and he wants my opinion on, but I’m never in a state of mind to try it and tell him at the end of a shift, so I take it home and tell him later. Some of them are samples from various venders in the region that I’m considering integrating into the menu at the Coffee Cup. So, I guess I should have warned you, it’s a condition of eating all of this that you tell me what you think.”

Kehlan chuckled.

“For this, I think I can manage that. Seems like a fair deal to me.”

The general quality of the samples was much higher than Kehlan had expected. When he told Paige this, she simply answered off-handedly that she made sure to do her research before she even bothered with samples, and Kehlan was struck again by the skills she’d developed in this field without seeming to realize she was doing anything more than waitressing and chipping in a bit now and then with logistics.

As they ate, and drank, Kehlan turned the conversation towards Dylan. He had a feeling it might set Paige off on the same kind of flowing description that she had gone off on at the restaurant on the slopes and at the overlook. She wanted to talk about him, Kehlan could tell, and he was gratified when his questions unleashed exactly the tide of effusive discussion he was hoping for.

Her face lit up, and the love she had for her son shone through in the little details about him she talked about, even as she complained about the annoyances and frustrations he brought into her life, along with the love and joy. She was easy and relaxed, and Kehlan found that he loved seeing her that way. He hadn’t realized she’d been on edge for much of the day, but now that she no longer was, he saw the difference and he treasured it. She settled back into the couch, and her head rested gently against his arm that he had draped behind her.

Aside from Dylan, they also talked more about Stockton and what Paige loved about it. It seemed she never tired of talking about it, and he felt that he’d never get tired of hearing her.

“I wish I lived somewhere like this,” he said, when the samples on the tray were sparse and the wine in the bottle was gone. “Somewhere with rivers and lakes and mountains. Don’t get me wrong, the desert is beautiful in its own way. But it’s not what I want.”

By this point, Paige had so settled into him that he could feel the vibration of her voice physically in his body when she answered.

“Then why don’t you? Why go back there after medical school at all? There are plenty of places with rivers and mountains and valleys and lakes.”

The drawback of her being so close was that she must have felt the increase in his heart rate as he responded.

“I wouldn’t have. I didn’t want to. But I have…obligations.”

He loved the feel of her body moving as she chuckled.

“Believe me, I know a thing or two about obligations. But what obligations did you have? You don’t have children. You were young, with a medical license and…you know, the way you are. You could have gone anywhere.”

Was she pretending she didn’t notice that his heart was racing now? Or was she just so exhausted that she genuinely didn’t notice?

“My family comes with more obligations than most.”

“Oh?” she asked, her voice muffled as she turned to him. She must have been exhausted. “Is that a cultural thing, or…?”

She was drifting off as they spoke. He almost decided not to tell her, since he couldn’t be sure she’d even remember this fully in the morning, close as she was to sleep. But he pressed on. He needed to tell her, even if he ended up having to tell her twice. Maybe it would be easier with practice.

“Sort of. A…royal family…culture thing.”

This opened her eyes.

“Royal family? You’re the prince of Al-Derra?”

“I’m a prince of Al-Derra. My cousins are the ones who will one day rule. I’m just…the supporting role.”

Her eyes fluttered closed again.

“I spent the day with a prince,” she murmured softly.

And with that, she was gone. He was still amped up from the revelation, and wishing he hadn’t left it so late. But he didn’t dare move and risk disturbing her, not with how perfect it felt to have her sleeping body nestled into his.

Instead, he sat and listened to her gentle breathing, searching her face now and then for hints at what might be happening in her dreams, while taking his time to really look at the glorious array of pictures he’d noticed around the living room earlier. He did this until he too felt the day catching up to him, and joined her in slumber.