18. Henri

All of the official stuff was starting to get to me. I was used to being hidden away, and now all of a sudden, I was expected to be front and center for an entire population. I was ready to get off of the political train. Not that I could tell my father-in-law that. There was no way he'd understand. To him, my entire purpose had to do with optics. That and assuring power. Gods, I still disliked the man.

Cole must have figured out that something was wrong because he wrapped his arms around me as I looked out our window. "Do you want to go to bed early?"

I shook my head. I didn't hate sleep and going to bed early was better than a lot of options—a ton better if we were to do so naked. That wasn't what I needed today. I needed out of the palace and to have some fun.

"What do I want to do? I want to go bowling. Is there a bowling alley in here somewhere?" It had been called a "boring" activity to all of my friends growing up. Only, they were less my friends and more my staff. I just hadn't seen it at the time. I'd always loved it though, even if I was horrible at it.

"We're supposed to have one here somewhere. Let me check."

I appreciated what he was trying to do. He just hadn't realized that bowling was only half of it. I also wanted to get away from here.

"No, don't do that. That's not the kind of bowling I want to do."

"There are multiple kinds of bowling?"

There were, but that wasn't what I meant either.

"I want to go to a bowling alley where half the people are drinking pitchers of beer and still somehow hitting the pins. And other parts of the alley are filled with kids with the bumpers up, wearing ugly birthday hats, and they're still not even getting one pin with said bumpers.They don't care, though, because they are having the time of their lives. And I want that really crappy pizza they make there that probably doesn't fit the actual definition of pizza. I wanna go on a date."

"I've never had a date like this," he said softly.

I knew that. We'd talked about that part of our lives before we mated.

"Me neither." But still, I longed for something so ordinary. "What do you think?"

"I bet we can find a place." He started tapping away on his phone. "Right. Get dressed. I've made a reservation."

I hadn't known that bowling alleys needed reservations, but I wasn't going to argue with a date night. Just like the day we went shifting, we got ready, wove through the castle, and ended up at the garage. Only this time we had a driver. His father hadn't been too pleased when security had told him we left that day. It was creepy to think his father knew our comings and goings, but such was the price of his princehood.

We didn't take one of the fancy cars, instead shuffling into the back of a beat-up old SUV. I didn't ask where it came from. I didn't really care. The only thing that mattered was that we were doing this.

We weren't going as royalty, we were going as us. I'd dressed down. Being incognito for me was far easier than it was for my mate. Everyone had seen images of him from the time he was born. I was still relatively a nobody.

Cole made his hair all tousled with product and wore some big oversized glasses. He was trying to look like a joe schmo to avoid being caught as the prince. I wasn't sure how much that would work, but he seemed to feel good about it. And we did have security if it came down to it.

When we arrived, the alley was packed. On one side was a huge birthday party with about 50 kids all there to celebrate one of their own, just like I'd said I wanted. It was a pretty sure bet that there would be a party happening, but this one was different than my initial vision. It was fancy. My father hadn't been one to have big lavish birthday parties unless it benefited him. So, oftentimes, when he thought he needed to, he would do something like that for my sister. Never for me. Not once.

I tore myself from watching them. Tonight wasn't about the party, and it sure wasn't about my father. It was about my mate and me having fun. We rented the stinky shoes and found our lane.

"What do you want for your name?" Cole asked, setting up the scoreboard.

"I mean, I don't really have a say in that." I came with no silly nickname to put up there. How shortsighted of me. "Maybe something like ‘Glitterific.'"

"Yeah, that sounds good." He typed it in.

"How about you?" If I was going to have one, he was too.

"Oh, I don't know." He tapped his chin with his fingers.

When he put his name up, it ended up being something cute too, and I couldn't help but make an awww sound.

"Fox Lover." To anyone seeing it, they probably thought one of us collected toy foxes or something. But I saw it for the sweetness that it was.

We bowled, and he showed me how to hit more pins than gutters. For someone who wasn't a bowler, he did really well. I still wasn't any good at it by the end, and he won by a landslide. But it didn't matter because we had a blast.

And I did get one strike, which was pretty fun too.

Then we went to the bar and ate what was objectively the worst pizza known to man. And as bad as it was, I'd never tasted anything better. Because this pizza meant that I was here on a date with my mate. I was going to have the human experience of marriage and date night. It was the bond that only came with a mating. And I had my fated mate. I had everything and more.

I reached across the table and took his hand. "Thank you. This was the perfect date."