Chapter 71: 72: The Party

ARIEL

I need to redeem myself as maid of honor.

The evening is young, and I’ve decided that by the end of it, none of us will remember that there was ever a plan for afternoon tea.

~Amy is going to have the bachelorette party she deserves.~

Maria and my mother have hesitantly agreed to join our revised event, and Vivian seems to be all in. And inviting Natalia was…unavoidable.

The ambassador needed some encouragement to feel like she wouldn’t be imposing. Still, I could tell she wanted to be convinced.

~Amy did a hell of a job making her welcome.~

My guess is she hasn’t let loose in a while.

~Join the club.~

Amy and I are doing the finishing touches on our makeup in the royal suite’s bathroom now. We’ll join the others downstairs at the palace bar once the bachelorette is satisfied with her appearance.

“Be honest,” Amy says. “How do I look?”

I scrutinize my best friend.

She looks stunning in a formfitting black dress and six-inch heels. Her blonde hair is piled high on her head in an elaborate twist, her false lashes accentuating her beautiful blue eyes.

“Hmm,” I say. “Something’s missing…”

“What?!” Amy looks horrified.

“I’ll be right back. I have just the thing.”

I race out of the bathroom and return in less than a minute.

“Close your eyes,” I say.

Amy sighs dramatically. “Fine.”

“This,” I say, “was intended for the original bachelorette, before I enlisted help…”

I fix something into her hair.

“Okay, open up.”

Amy opens her eyes and appraises herself in the mirror. “Perfect!” she says, admiring the tiara placed neatly on top of her hairdo. “Now, everyone will know it’s ~my~ night.”

As she’s smiling at herself in the mirror, her eyes narrow and she reaches up to touch the sparkling tiara. She lifts it gently, and when she feels its weight, her jaw drops open.

“This is a real tiara! Like…a royal luna tiara!”

“Only the best for the bride,” I say with a smile.

~And anything to repair the tension created by my lack of planning.~

“Shall we join the others?” I say, taking Amy’s hand.

Helena has to stay in tonight with her daughter Camelia. And Louisa canceled at the last minute because Steve is sick with the flu.

I almost shiver at the idea of having ~this~ type of party with Natalia, my mother, and my mother-in-law, but I have faith in Vivian’s almost magical power to mediate arguments.

“I was born ready,” Amy says.

ALEX

“To the happy couple,” I say. “May they find joy in mated life.”

“Oh, blech,” Dom says. “That’s not a toast.”

We’re celebrating Marius’s bachelor party at the White Fang with him and his brother Lucius.

“To Marius, and…” Dom raises his pint. “Fucking… Goddess-damnit, what’s her name?”

“Good job, buddy,” I say, patting Dom on the back. “You won.”

Dom makes a sour face.

I turn to Lucius. “How’s the Scripture Pack?”

“Putting out fire after fire, it feels like,” he says.

“The life of an alpha,” I sigh.

“It’s exhausting. I have two warring families who argue over who cuts the grass in front of their houses. This argument has been going on for three generations!”

“The job never ends. Meeting every pack member’s expectations—”

“It’s impossible!” Lucius says.

“No one gets that. They think we can please everyone, even when their wishes contradict each other…”

Lucius gives me a look.

“Why do I feel this is building to something?”

I have to come clean. No use beating around the bush.

“Xavier. Ariel’s sister wants him released—that can’t happen, but I found myself telling her I’d try to get him transferred. Who’d take the kingdom’s most dangerous criminal?”

“Why’s she want him released?”

“Something about it not being good for her son, growing up with his father imprisoned below his feet. I get it…”

Lucius takes a long gulp of beer and swallows it deliberately. “Maybe I could take him… We do have a secure facility. And we might even be able to…rehabilitate him.”

The Scripture Pack doesn’t recognize me as their king. I’m touched that Lucius is offering his help without any sense of obligation.

“I’ll throw in a couple of sweet deals for you: something to smooth over any bumps from your pack.”

Lucius holds up a hand, but shakes his head.

“You’ve done more than enough by helping Marius. Having my brother back is all the incentive I need.”

“What are we talkin’ ’bout over here?” Dom says, getting up and leaning in between us. “No more business talk! This is supposed to be a party!”

“Fine, we’ll talk about terms later,” I say to Dom. “What do you suggest?”

“Oh, I know…what this party needs…”

“What’s that?” I say.

“It’s not a bach party without strippers. To the Full Moooon!”

“I don’t know… You’re so wasted I can barely understand you.”

“What d’you think?” Lucius says, turning to Marius.

Marius places his pint glass on the bar. “It’s not a bachelor party without strippers.”

I can disagree with my beta, but even the king has no authority over a groom at his bachelor party.

~This is going to be a disaster.~

VIVIAN

As a busty woman gives me a lap dance, I can’t help but laugh at myself.

This is not where I expected to be when I accepted this assignment from the president.

This job hasn’t been at all like I anticipated, though.

I admire the ass grinding against me.

As soon as we got to the Full Moon, Ariel immediately pulled rank as the royal luna and got the hostess to find us the sexiest she-wolf stripper they had, especially for me.

The stripper clocked I was a human straight away and gave the performance a distinctly werewolf vibe—elongating her pearly white fangs and making her golden eyes burn with feral energy.

“Have a thing for she-wolves, honey?” she whispered into my ear, sending shivers up my spine.

“When one is as pretty as you,” I say back.

The slew of drinks I’ve imbibed has my ears buzzing.

On the other side of the stripper, Amy and Ariel are arguing almost tearfully over which best friend loves the other more.

~Werewolves are all right.~

I turn my attention back to the curvy stripper as she shimmies up my body.

~More than all right.~

I’m thoroughly enjoying myself.

Amy is a delight—the sort of girl whose high energy rubs off on you, giving you a confidence you didn’t know you had.

After about six shots of an unfamiliar local drink, any worries about being an exemplary human ambassador have washed away.

I tip the stripper as she finishes.

“If you’re in town again, don’t be a stranger,” she whispers, sashaying away.

As I’m standing up to rejoin the group, my phone starts buzzing in my pocket.

It’s a call from my father, so I ignore it.

~Best not to talk to him in this state.~

My phone buzzes again.

I have to hold the phone close to my face for my vision to clear enough to read the texts.

Dad

What the fuck, Vivian! You don’t take my calls now?

Dad

Where are you, and what are you doing that could be more important than answering me?

Dad

You know what? I don’t care what you’re doing.

Dad

If you’re not taking care of things, if you’re not doing what I’ve asked, you have no excuse.

Dad

You need to tie up those loose ends, now.

Dad

You should have no other priority.

Dad

Goddamnit, you worthless girl. I see you’re reading these texts! Why aren’t you fucking answering me?

Dad

You’re disappointing me. As usual.

Dad

ANSWER THE FUCKING PHONE.

I look up at the women surrounding me.

I never would have imagined any of them would accept me, yet they’ve welcomed me with open arms and hearts.

A werewolf bachelorette party is a big occasion to be invited to—and is arguably the last occasion at which I should let myself be pushed around by a man.

~Even my dad.~

I hold down the power button, switching my phone off for good, before heading over to the bar and ordering seven vodka shots…just for myself.

~I can’t follow through with his plan if I’m too drunk to even remember it.~

ARIEL

The Full Moon is exactly what we needed.

~No wonder Dom used to love this place!~

~It has…everything.~

Including men so ripped, I wonder if they’re partially shifted. But then they strip down, and there’s no question about it. They’re one-hundred-percent man.

But I have to admit that all these toned men just make me think of Alex and his perfectly sculpted body.

“Damn,” Amy says. “This is just what I wanted!”

She’s been saying that since we arrived.

Vivian’s been loosening up too. That lap dance from the she-wolf got her ~real~ loose.

I’m glad to see her relax, but I wish there was someone to keep everyone in check.

~Tensions are tighter than a G-string.~

I laugh out loud at my internal joke, but no one seems to notice.

“Don’t be so sure about what you want,” my mother says. “Once you’re mated… All this…,” she gestures at the dancers, “is over.”

“What?” Amy says.

“Yeah, what?” I say.

Dianne sloshes her drink as she continues: “I wanted things. I wanted to see the world and meet new people.

“Maybe even stay in the human world for a bit and see how they live… Not to get pregnant and have Ariel so soon…”

“You’re embarrassing yourself,” Maria says. “We’re here to celebrate Amy’s upcoming ceremony.”

“When did you have Alex?” Dianne asks, precariously wobbling back and forth.

“When I was twenty-nine,” Maria replies. “The best decision of my life.”

“I had Ariel at twenty-one! All I’ve ever known was being a mom!” Dianne drunkenly shouts. “I had plans before she ruined them.”

~Damn, Dianne…~

Natalia takes this opportunity to voice her opinion: “They call it an ‘unplanned’ pregnancy because it ruins all your plans. That’s why I’m so glad I waited—”

“To have a pup with your sister’s mate?” my mother says.

Vivian, heading back to the lounge with a tray of drinks, hears the conversation getting heated, and turns right back around.

Maria seems to be the only one willing to take on my mother. “You should be ashamed. Playing your daughters against each other the way you do.”

“I don’t do that,” my mother says. “Ariel mated with a king and Natalia with a ~criminal~. She should have chosen a better mate or found her own!”

“And would you have been fine for Ariel to mate with Xavier?” Maria retorts.

“At least the Moon Goddess would have willed it, instead of her sister getting her sloppy seconds!”

At this point, it’s a miracle of the Moon Goddess that Dianne can even stand upright. “Not to mention Natalia not being able to keep Xavier on a tighter leash, letting him spend the night with every she-wolf from here to Crescent Moon!”

I just want my mother to stop talking. I glance around, but Natalia responds before I can find a suitable distraction.

“It’s not my fault, Mom! Ariel’s the one who tried to steal my mate. She’s the one who has him locked in prison.” She turns to me. “You ruined my relationship with him!”

“I’m pretty sure his cheating did that, Nat…” Amy can never hold back a snide remark.

Before I can glance around again, a distraction finds me.

An arm snakes around my waist and pulls me to my feet. I’m jerked onto the dance floor, from one tense situation into another.

My reactions feel delayed. I’m dizzy, and it takes a second for my eyes to adjust after the motion.

I gasp as I meet an unfamiliar man’s eyes: one of the ripped strippers we were drooling over before.

He’s wearing a pair of shiny vinyl briefs—nothing else.

He hoists me into his arms and lays me down on the leather-upholstered sofa behind me.

“It looked like you were on the hunt for a real man,” he says in what he must think is a seductive voice.

I hear Amy holler and whoop in the distance.

“That’s it my luna. Get some real action!”

“~Luna~, eh?” the stripper says with a smile. “I’ve never met someone so high profile! Looking for a new alpha?”

~Alex would eat you for breakfast if he heard you say that!~

My heart races as I find myself underneath his muscular body. His arms on either side of my head seem to cage me in, allowing his body to just graze mine.

I wish I hadn’t had so much to drink as I find my brain responding so slowly to what’s happening.

I’m on edge, my warrior instincts not knowing whether or not to kick in. Through my drunken haze, my body doesn’t know if this is a friend or foe.

He writhes against me now, and I can feel his bulge through the vinyl. He’s now stepping well over any acceptable boundaries. This is way beyond a lap dance!

I’m frozen against his body in fear—or something…

~Excitement?~

I suddenly catch a scent: one that I adore.

One I associate with ~sex~.

“Does the queen want a private show?” he asks as I try to squirm out from under him.

Before I have a chance to respond, a stern voice answers for me: “Only if it’s from the ~king~.”

Even in the red, pulsing lights, I can see the stripper’s face drain of blood.

We both look up to see the man who spoke the words towering over us.

~Alex?!~