Samuel was in the kitchen with Ryan working on the desert he wanted to surprise the little queen with when the ringing of the kitchen suddenly interrupted them.
"Don't worry about." Ryan told the other as he moved to wash his hands. "I've got the call, you just focus continue putting that together." Samuel just nodded his head as he tried to regain his focus so he didn't mess anything up. He never knew before now that making sweets could turn out to be such a delicate process.
The call was a quick one as Ryan only replied with an 'Right, I understand.' after picking up the phone and listening for only a moment or two.
"Well it seems like we're going to have to cut this cooking lesson short. The Princess is back and would like her lunch sooner rather than later. She's also requesting for your presence in the dining room." Ryan told the younger boy as he came over to both see how the other was doing and take over the job from him.
"Will that be alright, she doesn't want me to take care of cooking for her today?" Samuel asked feeling a little nervous. It felt like the situation was perhaps not a positive one that she was requesting to see his presence after being away to do some job or other.
"Don't worry so much. I'm sure she'll be fine with you once you tell that you made her a treat for latter." Ryan waved him off as he motioned for him to leave the kitchen. "I'll finish up here and make her lunch."
"Thanks." Samuel replied as he left the kitchen. Despite Ryan's attempt he didn't feel any less anxious over why the Princess was requesting his presence.
Upon entering the dinning room, he could tell by the look on her face that she wasn't in a good mood. He also noticed that she must not have changed her clothes after her meeting as she was still dressed in a rather fancy looking dress suit and pants. Her eyes were half closed, but by the way her hand was resting against the side of her face, Samuel could tell that her mind was focused on something she must've deemed important.
"You asked to see me?" Samuel asked, his voice came out smaller than he had meant it to as he waited on the opposite side of the table for Lena to acknowledge him.
"Sit, I asked for you because my father said there was something you wanted to talk with me about." Lena mentioned to the chair that was set right near here at the table, a little closer than he would've liked for it to be, but he took the seat nonetheless as he didn't want to risk making her bad mood worse. "What did you want?" The fingers on the hand that wasn't supporting her face were tapping on the table as she glanced at him expectantly with her eyes still half closed.
"I was wondering if you would maybe have some free time tomorrow or the next to go and do something with me?"
"Why?" Samuel had hardly finished spoken before Lena had already asked this question, it caught him a bit off guard.
"I was hoping if it was just the two of us, maybe we could take some time to get to know each other better since half a week has already gone by." He replied, offering her smile in hopes that she would be more inclined to agree if he was being more polite than usual.
"Just us? What do you expect us to do that we couldn't do here?" his smile faltered a little bit when she asked this question. He was hoping that she would say yes without him having to tell her what he wanted to do.
"Paintball. So technically there would be a few of my friends with us as well once we got to the field, but your father agreed that no one needed to follow along if I stayed in touch and he knew where we were going to be."
"Paintball?" The little queen narrowed her eyes when she repeated the word while looking at him. "I thought I told you last night that I wasn't interested in such a thing. Real guns are better."
"I do remember that, but I was hoping maybe you would change your mind. I even made somethin I thought you would like?" The last part of Samuel's sentence appeared to have caught Lena's attention because her eyes were more open as she spoke.
"What did you make?" She demanded. The conversation came to a pause for a few seconds as one of the house servants came into the dinning room to give Lena lunch. She offered them a quick 'thanks' before they left.
"It's a sweet that I thought you would like. I thought it would be a fair trade if you agreed to this one thing I am asking." Samuel replied, not missing the way that the Princess's eyes light up when he said this.
"I want to see it first." She told him as she began to eat her lunch. The talk of food was making her more hungry and she didn't want to wait any longer to eat incase food started to get cold.
"Is this a trick where you get me to show you and you end up taking it without agreeing to my request?" Samuel asked feeling doubtful over her demanding. He hissed when without warning, Lena flicked his forehead and non-too lightly at that.
"Who do you take me for? Of course not, I just want to see what is at stake here before I agree before seeing what I will be getting in returned." Lena huffed obviously offended over his question. Samuel rubbed his forehead as he frowned at the other. He still wasn't able to get over how quickly she shifted between blowing hot and cold towards him.
"They're chilling right now, but I can show you a picture I took. I didn't make it entirely on my own, Ryan had to help as I haven't had much experience with baking at this level." Samuel explained as he pulled his phone out of his pocket.
"Fine." Lena replied, feeling a little impatient to see what he was attempting to bribe her with. Even though he didn't use the word 'bribe' himself, she knew that was exactly what he was trying to do.
Samuel didn't make her wait long as he pulled the picture up on her phone. It was a butterscotch pudding torte, the Princess didn't have to look at the picture long before she knew what it was. She was certain that Samuel was unaware that she loved butterscotch, yet he somehow made this which did create a really tempting offer for her. She was quiet for longer than he was comfortable, and was thinking that she was going to say no once she actually responded.
"Fine, I'll agree to this. We can go tomorrow. But, if this turns out to be a bad time, I am going to expect more than just sweets in return for my time." Lena's response made Samuel feel a set of mixed feelings. He was happy she agreed to him, but was now worried that if she didn't have a good time, what else was she going to ask for in return for the time that she gave to him?
"I can't make any promises, but I think you'll find it more fun than you giving it credit for." Samuel replied as he returned his phone to his pocket.
"You know that I am going to hold you to that." She assured him as he finished eating her lunch. "I have other things to do now, so go find some way to entertain yourself until dinner." Lena waved him off as she began to stand up.
"You're not going to change your mind tomorrow?" Samuel clarified as he too stood up. He took a step back though when Lena turned to him with an annoyed look.
"If I say I am going to do something, I do it unless there is a good reason not to." She replied. "As long as you're good Sammy-boy, I won't change my mind. " She told him once more before she walked away after pulling her phone out of her pocket with a tsk.
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