Driving Miss Catherine

Prince Charming pt. 2

For the first time since he started his new job, Sebastian felt like a chauffeur. He was the invisible person who got the occupant of the car from one place to another. He sat in the Phantom, with the engine off, absently sliding his gloved hands over the smooth leather steering wheel. He pictured them over and over, walking up those marble steps. ‘I don’t even want to know what they’re doing right now,’ he said to himself and closed his eyes, letting his head tilt back against the head rest. Sudden images from that frightful race several months ago flashed through his brain, and his eyes shot open. He blinked a few times to clear his memory of the flames and pieces of burning car. ‘I need to go fast, I need to race,’ he said irritably as he sat up and started the Phantom. ‘But not in this car,’ he thought as he drove off into the night.

After the formal introductions were over, the rest of the night could begin. The ‘fun part,’ as Cat’s date called it. They were seated at a table far away from her father, which Cat enjoyed, but very close to the bar, which her date enjoyed. She had yet to see him without a glass of scotch in his hand, his perfectly gloved hand. As she admired his white gloves, she had a faint glimpse of a memory from that evening of a black gloved hand helping her out of the car, but other than that she had no thoughts of her driver at all. And how could she, with an actual prince charming next to her all night. She glanced back up him in his impeccable white uniform.

“Would you like anything else to drink?” He asked and she politely declined. She looked down at her untouched glass of champagne and decided to take a sip, even though she didn’t like it. She scrunched up her nose as the bubbles tickled her throat.

“You don’t like champagne much?” her date laughed as he sat down next to her. “Why don’t I get you something else?”

Cat thought about it before declining again. “I really shouldn’t, I’m supposed to be on my best behavior for my dad’s colleagues, impress them or something…” Cat trailed off and changed the subject before he could try to offer her any more alcohol. “So, Heikki, you’re a Lieutenant in the Finnish Navy? What’s that like; do you get to fight pirates or anything exciting?” Cat laughed in a girly/polite kind of way and smiled.

“No, no pirates,” he laughed and set his glass down for the first time that night. “It’s a nice job. I rose through the ranks fast probably because my mother is a diplomat, not because I’m particularly fantastic at being a sailor, or had high scores at university,” he sighed, and sounded slightly resentful of that fact, “but I get to go to fun events like this, and meet beautiful American heiress’s like you.”

He smiled, and his prefect, white, shining teeth almost dazzled Cat into forgetting that he had just called her an heiress. She wasn’t really an heiress, not yet at least. She still lived at home and had everything paid for with ‘daddy’s credit card.’ She hated being one of those girls, getting labeled as ‘the rich girl’ before she even had a chance to prove herself, and now her prince charming had just done the same thing. Her face must have been showing all of these feelings, because he instantly tried to retract his statement.

“I mean you’re like, um, American royalty or something, you’re upper class, and smart, and educated- you said you were studying something like science, what was it…” he was frantically trying to cover his tracks, prove he had actually been listening to her and not just admiring the way her low-cut, periwinkle dress clung to her midsection.

“Environmental engineering.” Cat replied in a flat tone.

“Exactly. Environmental engineering; it was on the tip of my tongue, I just couldn’t quite remember. So how did you get into that field?” he asked, and Cat dove into the usual explanation she gives everyone who asks.  No, she was not pushed into it by her father. Yes, she was aware that there were not many girls in engineering. Yes, the environment had been a huge passion of hers since she was young. And no, she didn’t just do it because caring for the environment was ‘popular’ and ‘trendy’ or anything else like that.