To Wed a Princess

Brian kicked his shoes off towards the corner of his new apartment – courtesy of Matt for accepting the job. It was a nice one too, on his insistence, he couldn't exactly entertain nobility in a crap-hole, could he? That was what he'd told Matt, anyway. In any case, entertaining nobility was more difficult than he'd anticipated.

The friend, Charlotte, was easy. She believed anything she was told and was so determined to set up the princess that he wasn't even the one who had to suggest introducing him to her – she'd suggested it within in hour of meeting him and he'd had to put a lot of effort into not laughing out loud at his sheer luck. At first he viewed all these things about the brunette as a blessing, but he was quickly noticing the downfalls. The fact that she was so determined to set the princess up immediately put him at a disadvantage with the woman herself. Then there was having to tolerate Charlotte in general. He had to admit, she was a generally okay girl, but her constant nattering and attempts at being subtle when it came to getting him close to Eloise was almost painful to witness – and probably undoing any progress he may have been making with the royal.

The princess was proving to be a surprise, and he couldn't decide if she was a pleasant one or not. Before meeting her he'd assumed she'd either be a complete airhead or an insufferable snob, and whilst she was a snob (but most members of the upper class were), she certainly wasn't an airhead. When he'd first seen her at the garden party, he'd been pleased. She was small chested, which was quite a disappointment to him, but on closer observation her legs more than made up for it.

It was her personality that caused him problems. He'd had two vague ideas of what she might be like before he met her – both complete stereotypes. The first was the least accurate. The airhead. If there was one thing Eloise definitely wasn't, it was stupid. He couldn't decide if this disappointed him or pleased him. In the short run, it was inconvenient – it ruined his usual methods of seducing girls, which he was beginning to realise was frustratingly simple and did seem to rely on their lack of intelligence. He'd find out the basics about them, their hobbies, their likes and dislikes, and pretend his were the same. It gave them something to talk about and laid some kind of foundation for a relationship, it gave them some kind of initial interest in him besides physical attraction. However, it seemed that this had been tried on Eloise before – successfully or not, he had no idea – which meant she expected it, as she had the day of the garden party, and changed her interests out of the blue. He had no idea what she truly liked – if she really was a fan of the Nutcracker Ballet and had lied to him, or if she wasn't and had lied in the interview he'd read whilst telling him the truth at the garden party. Either way, it didn't matter. He'd abandoned that method and decided to tell her his true hobbies. The look on her face when he told her he liked smoking, drinking and playing guitar had been priceless, and he was sure it had gained him some kind of favour for telling the truth – after all, she'd switched to using his first name when he'd become more brutally honest.

In the long run, perhaps her intelligence would be a blessing in disguise. Yes, the fact that she suspected he was trying to seduce her made it all the more challenging for him, but if he did succeed, it would make her more bearable to be around if they did end up married – maybe he wouldn't need to arrange for her to have an “accident” after all. He never could stand stupid people – Charlotte irritated him to no end with her constant chattering – and so maybe Eloise would provide good conversation if nothing else. He didn't really know why he'd suspected she might be stupid. Sure, she was rich like all the other girls and had everything she wanted with a click of her fingers, but in her life more importance had been placed on education than with any of the others who'd simply paid their way through school and left to spend daddy's money ASAP. She'd been well educated, it was one of the first things he learned during his research, and so he had just assumed that she'd gotten by purely because of her status. He'd been wrong. It would definitely make things more interesting for him, but he had to remind himself that Matt didn't care if he was being entertained or not – he wanted it done and done fast, and so Brian had to work out how he'd seduce an intelligent woman who not only seemed to have no interest in him, but from what Charlotte had told him, no interest in relationships in general.

He was still trying to work out if he was right or not about his second assumption – the snobby bitch. He was leaning towards “no”. Sure, she'd been less than truly friendly to him, and on occasion to Charlotte, but he'd noticed a pattern with it. She was the fake kind of friendly to him – one he knew well – but an insolent kind of enjoyment sparkled in her eyes during their exchanges, as though she was very aware of who he was, what he wanted and had no intention of giving him it, but did intend to enjoy watching him try. In that regard, he might consider her a bitch if he himself was less intelligent, but he knew his intentions very well and so couldn't blame her for behaving as she had towards him. The kindness she seemed to show towards Charlotte was infinitely more genuine...except for when Charlotte tried to push her in his direction. That was when Eloise's lips would purse and she'd be ready to make snarky comments. On the snobby count, sure she was rich and definitely dressed like it, but she never seemed to flaunt it or talk about it – probably due to upbringing – and so whilst she was a snob purely by birth, she wasn't an insufferable one.

He unbuttoned the dress shirt and sighed before falling back onto the couch, shirtless. He needed a new plan of action, and he needed one fast.