Page 47 of Fake Dating the Prince

“Unless you want to?” he asked as he dangled the keys in front of Brayden’s face. “What’s the point of having expensive cars if you don’t get to be the one to drive them?”

“Oh, uh.” Brayden hadn’t anticipated needing to confess something to Flip’s dad before he mentioned it to Flip. “I actually don’t have a driver’s license.”

Irfan accepted this without explanation. “Oh well. More fun for me. Come on, get in. The front has massaging seats.”

Brayden was tempted to look to Irfan’s bodyguards for guidance, if only because this seemed like a safety issue. But ultimately he decided they were probably used to going along with Irfan’s whims, whatever they happened to be. One of them got in the back seat, and two more got in the SUVs parked in front of and behind Irfan’s. “What is this, anyway?” Brayden boggled at the array of seat controls.

“Fun,” Irfan answered, and revved the engine.

Unfortunately for Irfan, the security team boxed him in and never let him get more than ten kilometers above the posted speed limit, a fact Irfan lamented at length as he drove.

Brayden missed sitting in the back with Flip. Since Thomas’s accident, he mostly avoided sitting in the front seat.

Perhaps Irfan noticed he was nervous, because after a few moments, he slowed down and seemed to at least pretend to pay more attention to his surroundings. “So, Christmas shopping, yes?”

“I mean, obviously it’s last-minute, which isn’t ideal.” Shit, how was he going to explain he hadn’t brought gifts for Flip’s family? They were supposed to be dating.

“Flip says you were nervous about meeting us,” Irfan prompted, as though offering Brayden a lifeline out of his own lies.

“Yeah. Uh, it’s not every day you not only have to meet your boyfriend’s parents, you have to meet your boyfriend’s parents, who govern a small European nation.”

“We do okay.” Irfan preened.

Brayden held back a smile. “Sorry, that should be ‘your boyfriend’s mother, who governs a small European nation, and her husband, who used to be a movie star.’”

“I’m like Grace Kelly.”

Why had Brayden been nervous about this outing, again? “Exactly.”

Lyngria didn’t have much in the way of shopping malls, having escaped the widespread damage of World War II that paved the way for such developments in neighboring countries. Instead, Irfan parked in an underground lot, and their security detail led them to a set of pedestrian-only streets with small shops lining each side.

“First stop,” Irfan said with his characteristic cheer. But instead of entering one of the shops, he walked up to a small newspaper stand run by a smiling woman with a bindi.

Oh God, Brayden realized as Irfan and the woman exchanged words in Hindi. Irfan had come to collect gossip rags and newspapers. The racks at the stand were full of them—English, German, French, Polish, even a couple with writing systems Brayden couldn’t identify. He ran his fingers over the covers and front pages of a few and marveled at the absurdity of it all while Irfan talked to his friend. UFOs on this one. Bigfoot on that one. Speculation as to the true parentage of some Greek aristocrat. The next rack over was a bit more tame, featuring nonbonkers headlines about the financial market, a jewelry heist that got busted, the latest of various political goings-on.

And then he saw his own face. He tilted his head, and his heart sank as he read the headline.

Glass Houses—Inside Prince Flip’s Secret World

With a sick feeling in his stomach, Brayden hastily looked around, but the street seemed miraculously empty. Maybe Irfan’s guards had cleared it out prior to their trip, or maybe people had deduced that the thick gray clouds overhead portended a thick, fierce snowstorm. Either way, Irfan was busy, and there was no one else to watch him as he discreetly reached for the tabloid and flipped through it so he could read the article.

Could Prince Flip’s new suitor be offering a window into the private life of Lyngria’s most (in)eligible bachelor?

It certainly seems that way. Savvy Instagram users have ferreted out the secret handle of Brayden Wood, Flip’s brand-new beau—so new, in fact, that as recently as October, Wood tagged a picture of a drink at a Paris establishment well-known for its hookup culture with #noboyfriendnoproblems.

Brayden’s stomach dropped. How had they found him? He didn’t use his real name on Instagram, and he certainly hadn’t taken any pictures of the royal family or used them in hashtags. His handle was @whatwoodbdo. A little corny, maybe a bit suggestive… but not something that should’ve been picked up unless someone was specifically looking for it.

Of course someone went looking for it.

Since his arrival in Lyngria, Wood has treated his followers to a unique glance inside the world of our future monarch—and it looks a lot more familiar than one might think. The collection of Lyngria-based photographs includes a shot of poutine ice cream from Virejas’s own Temmel Eis (aptly captioned “lunch fit for a king”), one of Wood’s ensemble for the Night of a Thousand Lights Ball (“#notasugardaddy”), and a set of wineglasses from what seems to be a surprise romantic getaway.

Brayden felt sick. On the one hand, he hadn’t posted anything damning. On the other, the idea that he might have inadvertently allowed the whole world to spy on their intimate stay in Finland made him want to throw up and then toss his phone in the canal.

The tabloid had run a few of the pictures as well and included a note that it had archived them on its own site in case he locked down his Instagram. Which he should have done two weeks ago, clearly.

While little is known about Brayden Wood aside from his occupation and his skill on the dance floor, it seems his social media may have much to tell us. We can only hope that his future posts will be as enlightening as these.

Brayden put the newspaper down, his ears hot with shame and his stomach a burbling mess. The tabloids they’d read the day after the ball had made him laugh. But back then there’d been no stakes. Now?

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