Dinner with Nico, Penny, and Blake was… different. At first, I couldn’t put my finger on why. We were in the same place where we always ate—Nico said the formal dining room was far too large for just four people. So the room was familiar, but everything else wasn’t.

For one thing, we were all dressed up. Penny had on a beautiful dress that was made of a deep purple silk. It looked amazing on her—she was a very pretty woman. Nico and Blake had shown up in dark suits though both had taken off their jackets before sitting down to dinner. Blake was a handsome man who couldn’t seem to take his eyes off his wife. She was a very lucky woman.

Nico looked so good that I had to curb the urge to keep peeking over at him. He hadn’t bothered with a tie—his white dress shirt was unbuttoned at the top. That triangle of tan skin at the top of his chest kept catching my eye. Once his black suit coat was off, I kept noticing how the muscles rippled under the fabric of the white shirt.

As my concession to the occasion, I’d put on my best dress and not immediately covered it with scarves and sweaters. Yes, I was cold, but I’d wanted to look my best. My dress was made of a soft black fabric that that nipped in at my waist and flared out below my hips. Instead of tights, I’d put on black stockings and worn my tallest heels. I couldn’t run marathons in them, but I managed. Sometimes it was fun to see the world from three inches higher.

I’d also taken care with my makeup and worn my diamond earrings.

Dinner was served in courses, with plenty of time for drinks and conversation between. It was a fun evening.

It wasn’t until the second course that I realized what felt different about tonight. Nico had requested French cuisine and the servers had just cleared away the ratatouille. Blake was giving Nico a hard time—they seemed to do that a lot.

“So, do you eat this way every night, Exalted Heir to Throne?”

Nico rolled his eyes at his old friend. Then he flexed his muscles, patting his abdomen. “This is not the body of a man who eats five-course dinners every night.”

Looking at the flat expanse of abs under his large hand, I had to agree. I glanced up to see Penny watching me. Dammit… she’d caught me checking Nico out. She winked at me, and then, fortunately, changed the subject. “Speaking of the crown, will we get to see the queen tonight?”

Nico shook his head. “She usually dines in her quarters.”

“Have you met her, Cara?”

“Just once,” I replied, taking another sip of wine.

“Wow,” Penny said. “I can’t imagine meeting an actual queen. Sounds like the experience of a lifetime.”

“Umm… yes. Something like that.” I couldn’t help glancing over at Nico as I spoke. He had a smirk on his face that widened into a grin.

“Cara made quite the impression on my mother.” He elbowed my arm gently as he said it, and the others laughed, unsure of what had happened, but picking up on the amusement in his tone.

And then I realized what felt so different about this dinner.

Penny and Blake sat across from me. Nico was next to me, his arm occasionally brushing against mine. We were all laughing, drinking, and having fun.

It felt like a double date.

Once the thought took hold, it made my breath catch, but I couldn’t shake that impression. It should have felt like three old friends plus me sharing dinner. Or a married couple plus Nico and me. But it didn’t feel like that—it felt like two couples sharing an intimate meal together.

How could that be? Nico was my employer. And okay, maybe he was softening up enough to almost count as a friend. But he wasn’t my boyfriend and we definitely weren’t a couple.

Yet somehow, it felt as if we shared a new connection this evening. I couldn’t really explain it, but I felt it at a deep, instinctual level.

As the meal progressed, Blake and Nico reminisced about their college days. Blake made sure to fill me in on embarrassing things Nico had done during at their university. Nico dished it out as good as he got it, sharing hilarious tales of Blake’s exploits.

To my surprise, he even told Blake and Penny some stuff about me, and insisted that I tell them about climbing from the balcony to the roof when I’d seen Derrick go up there.

“Wow, Cara, that’s some full-service nannying.” Blake said, giving me the full-force of his megawatt smile. Were Nico not in the room, I’d probably have spent far more time staring at the gorgeous visitor. But all my senses had been hijacked by the prince. I craved the touch of his arm as it bumped against mine. When he leaned over to explain an inside joke he and Blake shared, I could smell his aftershave—something spicy and woodsy at the same time. And his warm breath on my ear made me forget I’d ever been cold.

God, what was happening? He was my very unavailable employer. One whom I wasn’t even sure liked me. It seemed to change day by day. But he’d invited me here to spend the evening with his dear friends. And for some reason, he was treating me as if I were a dear friend, too.

A server brought yet another bottle of wine, and the two men were rapidly regressing to the frat boys they once were. “Remember that girl, Vicki?” Blake was saying. “Remember how she slept with Tyler and then couldn’t find her panties the next morning?”

Nico took up the story. “And the house got so bad that we had to hire a cleaning woman, and when she asked if we had any rags, you found that box in the closet—”

“—and the first things she pulled out was Vicki’s panties!” Blake joined Nico in the punch line of the story.

Penny laughed too, but not as much as the men were. She glanced at me. “I bet that Vicki doesn’t remember that as a particularly hilarious story.”

Blake was off on another tale with Nico chiming in. Penny leaned across the table. “I’m going to go check on the kids. Do you want to come?” Gretchen was keeping an eye on them, but it would be good to get on my feet. I hadn’t had as much wine as the others, but I was feeling it. I was a lightweight when it came to drinking.

“Sure.” We stood up together, and to my surprise, Blake and Nico did, too. Penny explained where we were going, and Nico smiled at me as I left.

My face flushed as I reached the hallway. The guys I’d dated in college had never stood when I left the table. I’d forgotten that that was even a thing. And the smile on Nico’s face… it hadn’t been a half-smile. It hadn’t been a smirk. It had been a real smile. He was having a good time.

That was good. He deserved it. “I’m so glad you both came to visit,” I said to Penny. “I’ve never seen Nico this relaxed.”

“I haven’t seen him like this in a long time,” Penny agreed as we walked down a hallway past portraits of previous kings and queens.

“But I thought you hadn’t seen him since he left the US?”

“I haven’t, not in person, but Blake talks to him quite a bit. Sometimes when they’re on Skype, I’ll pop in and speak with him. He always seems so serious. I haven’t seen this laughing, joking side of him in quite a while.”

“I think it’s good for him to see Blake.”

“Actually, I was thinking that it had something to do with you.”

“Me?”

“Even before the wine and the tales of their supposed glory days, he seemed more relaxed. A bit more like his old self. I think he likes having you here. And aren’t you going the wrong way?”

Astonished by Penny’s words, I’d made a wrong turn. Blushing, I caught up with her. “I just… I mean, when I first got here, he didn’t even like me. I half thought he was going to fire me those first few days.”

“There doesn’t seem much danger of that now.”

“No, I know there isn’t, but still… sometimes he gets so exasperated with me.”

“You’re in a hard situation,” Penny observed. “Nico has been the biggest influence on the twins’ lives for two years. Now he’s handed over some of the authority to you. That’s bound to put the two of you at odds for from time to time.”

“It has.”

“The way I see it, you had several strikes against you coming into this, and you seem to have overcome them.”

“Like what?” I asked, eager to hear her opinion. She’d known Nico for far longer than I had.

We were near the children’s rooms, so we stopped a few doors down. Penny lowered her voice. “You’re American, first of all.”

“He wanted a native English speaker to work with his kids,” I explained.

“Yes, but surely it hasn’t escaped your notice that he’s not the biggest fan of the US right now.”

“But he lived there for so long.”

“He hasn’t set foot there in over two years. For a while after the accident, he wouldn’t even talk to Blake. We figured that he didn’t want any reminders of his time in the US.”

“But he didn’t know me before, so how could I remind him of that?”

Penny laughed and reached out, lifting a strand of my blonde hair. “Honey, you look as American as apple pie.”

I couldn’t help grinning. Penny was a nice woman.

“Anyway, he’s surrounded all day by staff and employees. I think it’s good for him to have someone like you whom he can see as a peer. You’re good together.”

“We…” For a moment, I felt dizzy. The wine in my stomach and the jumbled thoughts in my head were not playing well together. Placing my hand on the wall to steady myself, I said, “We’re not together.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I work for him,” I protested. “I’m his employee.”

She raised an eyebrow. “I’ve seen drivers, cooks, guards, and housekeepers today. You’re the only one who calls him Nico.”

“Yeah, but…” I didn’t know how to finish. In a way, Penny’s words thrilled me. It did feel like Nico had been opening up a bit toward me lately, and I hoped he continued to do so. But… it was also a little upsetting, too. She shouldn’t get my hopes up. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

“It might mean something to him.”

“It can’t,” I whispered. “He’s a European prince. I’m an American. Just getting this position was a dream come true. If we became friends—true friends—that would be an absolute miracle. I…I wouldn’t dare wish for anything beyond that.”

Penny tilted her head to the side and gave a soft smile. “That’s your choice, but there’s nothing wrong with reaching for the stars. The odds were just as insurmountable—if not more—that Blake and I would ever get together, but that worked out… eventually.”

“Wow… sounds like that’s quite the story.”

“It is,” Penny said, “But not for tonight. I’ll tell it to you next time we visit.”

She smiled and ducked into the room where Zoe and Christopher were sleeping, leaving me staring after her.

There wouldn’t be a next time. Or at least not with me. In five months, I’d be back in the US starting graduate school. If Penny and Blake came back next year, they’d find Nico and the twins, but not me.

I wouldn’t be a part of their lives anymore.

That thought hurt more than I ever would have guessed.