I look up at Forsythe, waiting for him to give the order, but he just meets my questioning gaze with a small smile curling his lips, waiting.
Oh. He wants me to give the order. This is him giving me… power. Telling the world that he trusts me with not just my own safety, but his as well. Oh, dear lord. I’m not sure a declaration of his love right here on the steps would have been more romantic than this.
Sythe arches a brow as if to say, ‘well?’
My lips part but no sound comes out. I clear my throat and try again. “You can let him through please.”
Immediately the guards part and Tristan gives them a disdainful look as he slips through the gap, taking the steps two at a time to crush me to his chest in a hug. “Missed you, Ren,”he murmurs. Dark chocolate and chili surround me, warm and decadent.
The prince lets out a low warning growl, that the omega ignores, holding me tighter for one moment before releasing me, gripping my shoulders and stepping back to look down at me. “God, you look bloody divine. Is this one of your designs?”
I finger the flowy fabric. “It is. I wasn’t planning on making it for myself, but…”
“But then you realized you were going to marry a prince and thought, why not me?”
My cheeks flare pink and I shake my head. “We’re not… That isn’t… We’re just watching a ballet together.”
Tristan pats my hand. “Of course you are, dear.” He turns and scans the crowd. “Petal is here somewhere…”
“Here!” A bright voice calls as a hand waves in the air. She’s so short that I can’t make her out beyond that slim hand. “I’m here.”
“Ah, yes, there’s our intrepid poblano.” I watch as Petal pushes her way through the crowd of theater goers and journalists, a trail of apologies and ‘excuse me’s flowing in her wake. She emerges from the crowd pink cheeked and pink haired at the base of the stairs and this time, the guards part immediately to let her through.
Tristan makes a scoffing sound, and Petal twinkles up at him. “What, they can tell I’m not a threat, while you are all chaos demon energy. Of course they won’t let you near the prince without permission.” She bobs into a quick curtsey and tips her head. “Your Highness.” And then she throws herself at me to wrap me in a cherry blossom and strawberry shortcake scented hug. “I’m so mad at you!”
“Yes, I am as well,” Tristan sniffs. “I just forgot momentarily in the thrill of seeing you again.”
I frown, pulling away from Petal. “You are? Why? What did I do?” I’m already mentally scanning over what I said in every confessional I ever gave for the show, wondering if I said something about either of them that would make them upset at me.
“You’ve apparently been in Bravonne for weeks, and we had no idea.”Oh, is that all?
“Well, I wouldn’t sayweeks.”
“More thanoneisweeks, jalapeno.”
I nod. “You’re right, I’m sorry.”
“It's our fault,” Piers quickly steps in to try to ease the situation. “We were trying to keep-”
“Her hidden?” Tristan asks with an arched brow and his arms folded over his chest.
“No!” Court protests. “No, of course not.”
“Safe,” Grieves finishes. “We were trying to keep her safe. We weren’t sure how people were going to react to her presence here and were taking it slower introducing her to them.”
They both blink at him, likely because he never actually says this much to… well, anyone but me and his pack. “So you do talk in more than grunts,” Tristan says eventually.
“She would have been safe with us,” Petal tells my bruiser earnestly. “We would never let anything happen to her. We adore her, you know.”
The look Grieves gives her is a cross between amused and incredulous. “I believe you would have tried to keep her safe, but there’s no guarantee you would have been successful.”
Petal harumphs and crosses her arms over her chest in a mimic of Tristan. “Yes, well, at least she wouldn’t have been cooped up in that stuffy palace all alone.”
“Hey, what are we? Chopped liver?” Court protests.
“We weren’t at the palace,” I tell them, wanting to reassure them, but instead they let out outraged noise.
“Not at the palace! It's worse than I thought,” Tristan wails dramatically, a hand pressed to his forehead. “They really were keeping you a secret!”
