Christmas with the Prince: Christmas with the Prince. Michelle Celmer

of the collision probably would have knocked her on her butt.

      He righted and swiftly released her.

      “Sorry,” she apologized, wondering how many more royal employees she would collide with while she was here. “It was my fault. I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

      “Miss Montgomery, I presume?” he said in a slightly annoyed tone, looking, of all places, at her chest. Then she looked down and realized she’d forgotten to pin on her ID badge. She pulled it from the outer pocket of her backpack and handed it to him. “Yeah, sorry.”

      His badge identified him as Flynn, and she couldn’t help thinking that he looked more like a Bruno or a Bruiser.

      He looked at the photo on her badge, then back at her, one brow raised slightly higher than the other. He didn’t say, You don’t look like a scientist, but she could tell he was thinking it.

      He handed it back to her. “You should wear this at all times.”

      “I know. I forgot.” She hooked it on her sweater, managing not to skewer her skin as she had yesterday. “Maybe you can help me. I’m trying to get to the dining room,” she told him. “I’ve lost my way.”

      “Would you like me to show you the way?”

      She sighed with relief. “That would be wonderful. I’m about three minutes from being late for dinner, and I’m already in the doghouse with Geoffrey.”

      “We can’t have that,” he said, gesturing in the direction she’d just come from. “This way, miss.”

      This time she paid attention as he led her downstairs to the dining room and she was pretty sure that she would be able to find her way back to her room. But she would keep the map with her at all times, just in case.

      Prince Aaron was sitting in the dining room waiting for her, nursing a drink, when they walked in.

      “I found her, Your Highness,” Flynn told him.

      “Thank you, Flynn,” the prince said.

      He nodded and left, and Liv realized it was no accident that she’d encountered him in the hallway.

      “How did you know I would get lost?” she asked him.

      He grinned. “Call it a hunch.”

      He rose from his chair and pulled out the adjacent chair for her, and as she sat, his fingers brushed the backs of her shoulders. Was he doing it on purpose? And if so, why did he feel the need to touch her all the time? Did he get some morbid kick out of making her nervous?

      The only other time she’d had an experience with a touchy-feely person was back in graduate school. Professor Green had had a serious case of inappropriately wandering hands that, on a scale of one to ten, had an ick factor of fifteen. All of his female students fell victim to his occasional groping.

      But unlike her professor, when Aaron touched her, she liked the way it felt. The shiver of awareness and swift zing of sexual attraction. She just wished she knew what it meant.

      He eased her chair in and sat back down, lounging casually, drink in hand. “Would you like a drink? A glass of wine?”

      “No, thank you. I have to stay sharp.”

      “What for?”

      “Work.”

      He frowned. “You’re working tonight?”

      “Of course.”

      “But by the time we finish dinner, it will be after eight o’clock.”

      She shrugged. “So?”

      “So, I have an idea. Why don’t you take a night off?”

      “Take a night off?”

      “Instead of locking yourself in the lab, why don’t you spend the evening with me?”

      Chapter Six

      The confused look on Liv’s face was as amusing as it was endearing. She was as far from his type as a woman could be, yet Aaron wanted inside her head, wanted to know what made her tick.

      Geoffrey appeared with the first course of their dinner, a mouthwatering lobster bisque. He knew this because he’d managed to sneak a taste before the chef had chased him out of the kitchen.

      “How about that drink?” he asked Liv.

      “Just water, please. Bottled, if you have it.”

      Geoffrey nodded and left to fetch it.

      “You never answered my question,” he said.

      She fidgeted with her napkin. “I’m here to work, Your Highness.”

      “Aaron,” he reminded her. “And you just worked a twenty-four-hour shift. Everyone needs a break every now and then.”

      “I had a break. I slept all day.”

      He could see he was getting nowhere, so he tried a different angle: the guilt card. He frowned and said, “Is the idea of spending time with me really so repulsive?”

      Her eyes widened and she vigorously shook her head. “No! Of course not! I didn’t mean to imply…” She frowned and bit her lip.

      He could see that she was this close to giving in, so he made the decision for her. “It’s settled, then. You’ll spend the evening with me.”

      She looked hesitant, but seemed to realize that she had little choice in the matter. “I guess one night off wouldn’t kill me.”

      “Excellent. What do you do for fun?”

      She stared blankly.

      “You do have fun occasionally, right?”

      “When I’m not working I read a lot to catch up on the latest scientific discoveries and theories.”

      He shot her a skeptical look.

      “That’s fun.”

      “I’m talking social interaction. Being with other human beings.”

      He got a blank look from Liv.

      “What about sports?” he asked.

      She shrugged. “I’m not exactly athletic.”

      A person would never know it by her figure. She looked very fit. He knew women who spent hours in the gym to look like Liv, and would kill to have a figure like that naturally.

      “Do you go to movies?” he asked. “Watch television?”

      “I don’t get to the movies very often, and I don’t own a television.”

      This time his eyes widened. “How can you not own a television?”

      “What’s the point? I’m never home to watch it.”

      “Music? Theater?”

      She shook her head.

      “There must be something you like to do besides work and read about work.”

      She thought about it for a moment, chewing her lip in concentration, then she finally said, “There is one thing I’ve always wanted to try.”

      “What’s that?”

      “Billiards.”

      Her answer surprised him. “Seriously?”

      She nodded. “It’s actually very scientific.”

      He grinned. “Well, then, you’re in luck. We have a billiards table in the game room, and I happen to be an excellent teacher.”

      Ten minutes into her first billiards lesson, Liv began to suspect that choosing this particular game had been a bad idea. Right about the time that Aaron handed her a cue