Page 35 of Royal Caleva: Luis

It looked manageable. Both the vets and the other techs on duty for the day were competent. With a little help from her colleagues, she might swing an hour and ten minutes with Luis. Less than that might seem insulting to royalty.

Pulling her phone out of her pocket, she typed, Thank you for the invitation. I will be outside the clinic entrance at noon.

She stared at the barebones message before adding, I look forward to lunch.

Uninspired but polite.

His response was immediate.

Thank you for meeting me. I understand that I am disrupting your day, so I am grateful for your willingness to accommodate me.

That was ironic since he must have a much busier schedule than she did. How the heck did she respond to that?

I am happy to do so, she typed before she headed back toward the stairs. She didn’t have time to trade inane messages, even with a king.

“Hey, Mom.” Grace emerged from her room, yawning, her loose braid partially unraveled from sleep.

“Morning, sweetheart.” Eve gave her daughter a hug. “Sleep well?”

“Not really. I kept thinking about Luis and Caleva and…everything.” She yawned again.

“I had the same problem,” Eve confessed. “It’s a lot to wrap your mind around.”

“I wish I could take the day off, but”—Grace shrugged—“at least I get to see my father at dinner.”

Grace had called Luis her father.

Eve made a snap decision not to tell Grace she was meeting him for lunch until after the fact. She didn’t want Grace worrying about what was being said while she was trying to focus on her rotation.

Her daughter shuffled toward the bathroom. “See you downstairs, Mom.”

Eve had taken three steps down the staircase when she realized she was wearing scrubs. They happened to be her favorite purple ones, but she couldn’t eat lunch with a king in scrubs, especially not ones that might be stained with blood and who knew what else once lunchtime rolled around.

She bolted back to her bedroom to shove her black heels and a lint roller into a small duffel bag. On top of those, she placed navy trousers and a carefully rolled ivory silk blouse. Swapping out her gold pawprint earrings for classic pearls, she decided that was the best she could manage. Luis knew what she did for a living.

At ten minutes before noon, Eve was in the clinic’s restroom, ripping off the bloodstained scrubs as she toed off her sneakers. She yanked on the navy trousers and shoved her feet into the pumps. After buttoning the blouse, she unclipped her hair, ran a brush through it, and decided she looked respectable enough.

“Enjoy your date!” Her friend Pam Baker called out with a smile as Eve jogged past the break room where the veterinarian was eating.

Eve had decided it was easiest to explain her extended lunch hour by saying it was a date. When she came back, she would tell Pam it hadn’t gone well and that she was swearing off men again. She hoped that would be the end of it. Since Eve hadn’t been on a date in years, Pam still might see this an opening to try to fix her up with someone else.

She burst through the exit to find a long black limousine parked under the canopy. Ivan stood waiting and opened the rear door for her. As Eve bent to scoot inside, she hoped like heck no one from the clinic saw her get into the ostentatious vehicle, or there would be far too many questions to evade.

As she settled on the seat, she gasped. Luis sat in the limo facing her, his long legs in navy trousers stretched out diagonally so his polished black loafers almost touched the bench seat where she was perched.

“I’m sorry to startle you,” he said with a contrite smile. “My rental house is so far from your clinic that it would take most of your lunch hour to get there and back. Instead, I thought we would have a light lunch in the car.” He gestured to two green coolers sitting on the floor.

“That’s fine with me.” She could hardly confess that being alone with him in this small space was already sending an unsettling slide of heat deep inside her.

“I would prefer to sit outside on this beautiful day.” Luis gave a shrug of apology. “Mikel did not feel comfortable with that, though, so we are going to park in some hidden corner nearby.”

He leaned down to flip one cooler open, his head so close she could easily reach out to stroke his gleaming silver-gray hair.

Oh no! No touching this man!

“Would you like some sangria?” he asked, pulling out an insulated beverage flask with a built-in straw. “I know you have to return to work, so I wasn’t sure you would drink at lunchtime.”

She would love to gulp down some sangria to ease the tension in her shoulders, but she needed to stay sober for the job…and to keep her brain out of the gutter it kept jumping into. Meeting his eyes, she felt the sizzle of his blue gaze. “I have to keep my reflexes sharp so I don’t get bitten. But please feel free to have some yourself.”

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