After being abused by Trina's hands, which happened to be cheered by the Princess' attendants, fuelled by Peabody by passing the message to Afef, Eve's at her wits end.
She admit her skin softened, and even though she's using a long extension, her hair felt like natural. Wearing loose, satin dresses was like wearing pjs, so she finds it acceptable. Not only that, she'll be wearing flats so it's convenient if there would be some chase-down incidents.
Roarke felt worst.
He's always supporting Eve in all of her case, and with her current op, he's glad to be his Expert, Civilian Consultant for EDD affairs. He understood, really understood, but this time he's starting to doubt himself if he's a martyr for love.
For days Eve will going to act as Princess Petun - that includes living outside their house, sleeping outside their bed, and staying away from him.
When she arrived home, she gave him a surprise treat, and had seduced him in a unique level that ended up making love for hours. She seems to be happy, and when he asked her about her day and the request he made, she only said she's fine. After another passionate moment, she dropped the bomb.
"The Lieutenant is in the Princess' suite.", Afef said. The butler was with him the whole time, observing his actions and movements as he double-checked the surveillance cameras around the building for the last time.
"I see.", he replied.
He knew the location but he's allowing himself to be led by this butler who was wearing a discern look.
"Did I do something that rubbed you off?", Roarke asked.
"You're just imagining things.", he scoffed, then paused on the hallway. "Here we are now. I reckon both of you wanted to have some privacy, so I'll just stay downstairs. You can ring the intercom if you wanted some assistance."
If Summerset was acting like this towards Eve, then it's no wonder why she was pissed with him.
When Roarke opened the large door, he saw Eve in a Harmin traditional dress, with a satin material clung on her slim body like a lover's hungry hands. Her long hair was waved gracefully on her framed face, and when her large, doll-like eyes looked at him with surprise glee, his heart skipped a beat, like a stab in the heart. He's in love with this woman ridiculously it hurts.
"Hi." Eve greeted.
"Darling, you look...very delicious."
"Hold your reins Pal. You've got 20 minutes left until the op starts and all the corners of this hotel are wired. All the guests and the media will be here afterwards."
"So why don't we provide them some short entertainment for 20 minutes?", he teased as he deepened his kiss.
It took her courage to break the contact. "Cut it out, Ace. You got your share last night, and you'll he having lots after this for three weeks."
"That's so unromantic, Darling.", he sighed.
Their anniversary was just days away, and Eve had filed her leave in advance for three weeks, which was very unlikely for her. She's not well for the last couple of days, but last night there's something different.
"Are you keeping something from me, Eve?"
"Hmm.", she hummed, evading his questioning stares. She moved towards the corner table and retrieved a small box. "I want you to keep something for me."
Roarke opened the lid and saw the diamond tear necklace, St. Jude's medal, her badge and her band ring. These were all Eve's symbols, he thought, items that physically resembled her character.
"You told me that what's inside me defines myself, and nobody can take it away. So keep my symbols for me.", she said as she clasped his hands with hers.
He clipped the box in his arms, took her hand and kissed her knuckles. He rubbed his thumb on her finger wherein a ring mark embedded a pale color contrasting her tanned skin.
"You're my one and only, Agrah. I love you."
She kissed him and smiled, "Aren't we sappy today?"
"You started it."
"So back to the business.", she said as she regained her composure, "How's everything outside?"
"All good and clear, Lieutenant. Peabody was managing her tasks well, and Feeney was good at becoming your proxy as Primary. McNab blended himself as one of your assistant, which was a good choice because he can do the IT stuffs internally while we manage the externals."
McNab had done major transformation by dyeing his blonde hair to black, and toned himself into brownish skin with the aid of Trina. Peabody was highly against it, but she swallowed her words afterwards.
"And because you'll be playing a foreign princess who can speak ten different languages and some dialects, and you obviously can't pull it off in one sitting, I have these.", he said, pulling a long box. It was a ruby choker and a pair of ruby dangles.
He assisted her in attaching the choker on her neck while she clipped the earrings on her ear. "I have the R&D assembled this speech translator, designed it like a replica of the heirloom the real Princess Petun wore. Its operation was like the holo games you played before, you think English but your speech will be Harmin. You can try."
She found an embedded button at the back of the necklace, clicked it, and spoke:
"Summerset is a one hell of an asshole that lived as a scarecrow in his past life. How's that?"
"Except for a certain word, which gave me an idea what you just said, the device works well. Even your accent was been altered. I must give some praises to the team."
"So I'm a lab rat here?", she pouted, something she rarely do, which made Roarke laughed, "And how about these earrings?"
"This left one", he said as he touched the stone, "Is a communicator and a tracker, wherein you can talk to anyone of us if you want some personal updates. And this right one,", he touched the other earring, "Is my exclusive communicator."
Damn her if she did not felt her ears reddened. "You'll do sex calls every night."
"You just gave me an idea.", he grinned.
Since they couldn't stay at the Skyline, the team assembled their workstation at the opposite building of the hotel, which happened to be purchased by Roarke as part of the set-up.
Each monitor screens showed every angles of the hotel suite, especially the royal chambers where Eve would spend her rest of the days. Peabody, Baxter and Trueheart were doing onfield undercover while Roarke, Feeney, and Callendar - who became McNab's back-up - did the monitoring.
"Have you bid goodbye to our Queen?", Feeney asked while munching his candied nuts.
"No way.", he replied, pulling a chair and settled in another monitor.
Several guests have arrived for the welcoming ceremony and most of them were prominent businessmen he knew and met for several times. News and gossip reporters were assembling their tripods and cameras on the red carpet laid outside the hotel.
It was a new feeling for Roarke, seeing his wife mingling with these socialite people she despised with by herself, and he's not beside her. Whenever she attended social gatherings like these, she's always with him and played as a corporate wife. Now, she's doing it as a prominent figure of the society alone, something he had once done before.
He had primed and influenced her to the high society, but it's his first time to observe her afar.
"She's good.", he murmured, unaware that both Callendar and Feeney heard him.
"Are you jealous, boyo?"
"Jealous? Me, I'm...I - ", he trailed off.
He's a brutally honest man, even to himself, but for the first time, he wanted to lie to himself.
He wanted to deny that Eve can socialize and be a good hostess without his help. He wanted to deny that someone like Afef and other household servants can aid her and she's accepting their offer despite they're strangers to her. He wanted to deny that anybody can admire and be attracted to his wife with or without knowing her, or with or without masking her.
Then his gut tightened when he realized his wife had played to be somebody's bride to someone he hated most, and a bait to a political assassination - and all he could do was observe and trust the system that once failed to protect her.