Chapter 10
Nolan
I’m parked in one of the egg-shaped bucket chairs in the back corner of Reverie Rest’s main recording studio, right next to the glass wall that separates the sound engineer from the music magicians.
I’ve made a sport out of counting the panic attacks Raelynn Roberts has over the course of a standard Piper Sumner session.
So far, we’re up to three, and it’s not even lunch.
Nearing a record.
Piper’s in the booth with headphones on prepping the next bit to record.
Her hair is shoved up into a messy bun with pink-dyed streaks fighting to stand out against the floodlights.
Piper’s voice floats through the studio like a sunbeam through stained glass, each note impossibly clear yet warm enough to make the hair on my arms stand up.
Even the sound engineer—a guy who’s worked with every A-lister from here to Tokyo—closes his eyes for a moment, forgetting to fiddle with his precious levels.
She’s doing a stripped-down run of the new “love song” Raelynn commissioned a few days ago to hammer home the idea of Piper + Kellen = Epic Love Story.
Piper’s trying not to laugh as she sings it.
I can tell because every time she gets to the chorus, her eyes flick to me, searching for backup, and I have to suck my lips in and stare at my phone like the world’s worst bouncer.
But she’s not laughing because she doesn’t feel at least something for Kellen. I think it’s because she does. For all of us. Yet here we are, meant to put on this charade as if we’re not a slowly forming pack.
Pack. Yeah, I’m still processing that.
Raelynn’s moved to her office, visible through the glass wall, but everyone in the building can sense when she’s paying attention.
The song ends and Piper yanks her headphones off. “I need a break before I go crazy trying to work this out.”
The sound engineer leans into his mic. “All right, let’s take five. I’ll have playback up when you’re ready.”
Piper steps out of the booth and stretches her arms overhead before walking straight toward me like a bee to honey. I stand and meet her halfway as her cherries and vanilla scent hits me like a wall.
I gladly let it envelop me.
Piper grins. A soft purr begins in her throat before she speaks. “How bad was it on a scale of one to ‘someone dig me an early grave?’”
“Three shovels, tops,” I offer dryly. “The harmony’s nice. The lyrics are just…” I fish for a word and come up with, “optimistic.”
Piper snorts and collapses into the egg chair next to the one I just vacated.
I retake my seat, too, mirroring her. Always mirroring her.
“Optimistic is polite. I think I’ve lost a year of life every time I rhyme ‘devotion’ with ‘potion.’ Raelynn’s going to have me doing infomercials for literal love potions by August.”
“Not if she kills you with a motivational retreat first.”
Piper barks a laugh but sticks her finger out at me.
“Don’t speak that into existence. I think this situation is enough machinations from Raelynn.
” She leans back into the seat and smiles up at the ceiling.
“Like, I don’t hate the song, don’t get me wrong.
I just don’t know how to force it out of me.
I’m not one of those artists who can just write what they’re told to write, you know?
Even the poppiest tracks of my catalog have something of me in them. ”
I nod. I’ve not written music but I’ve always been able to tell what parts of the real Piper Sumner end up in her music and to what degree.
Piper opens her mouth to speak again but she shuts it and suddenly looks down the hallway toward the security desk. Her pupils dilate and her soft purr returns.
I go to ask what’s caught her attention but there’s really only one obvious answer given her reaction.
An answer confirmed when the studio door opens and in walk Prince Kellen Hale and Elliot, trailing him like a ghost. Elliot’s eyes are particularly dark today, like storm clouds on a collision course.
It sets me on edge because if he’s nervous about Kellen being here, then I may need to be worried similarly for Piper.
Piper leaps to her feet, not even pretending to contain the glee. And it is real glee now. Something’s shifted between all of us over the last week. Like this situation has gone from PR stunt to the foundation of something more. Even I can’t deny it. “You made it!”
Kellen offers her a devastating smile. He’s fantastic at playing the “prince in love” role, I’ll give him that. Helps that a lot of this fake-dating act is starting to become real. But right now, the show is all for the sound engineers and other record label staff inside the studio.
Kellen opens his arms, and Piper charges in for a hug. They do the whole slow-motion, twirl-you-off-your-feet thing. Raelynn’s voice crackles over the studio intercom: “Let’s keep the PDA family-friendly, please.”
Piper breaks away, flashing the window an obscene finger gun, and then half-drags Kellen over to the chairs. Elliot posts himself up against the wall near the exit, arms folded. His eyes never stop moving.
The sound engineer remains professional but the grin on his face tells me he buys everything about this fake romance.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Elliot knows something I don’t. We meet gazes over Piper and Kellen, and he flicks his eyes pointedly back toward the entrance to the studio.
There must be a crowd outside. My jaw locks tight. I pull out my phone and start swiping through security camera footage.
“We left early,” Kellen says. He’s soft-spoken in a way that’s certainly more prince than alpha, I’d argue, but I like that about him. He doesn’t have to throw his weight around to be heard or seen.
The security camera footage loads and, sure enough, there’s a massive crowd outside.
Some of them are in costume. Several are holding up poster boards with Piper’s face taped over royalty wedding memes.
I flip through the available views and see the record label security staff trying to corral them away.
My phone pings. This one’s a notification from the Hale PR account about a photo of Piper and Kellen holding hands going viral.
Fuel to the fucking fire.
Piper brings Kellen into the actual recording booth and shows him around.
The sound engineer working with Piper all morning just smiles and shakes his head. “They’re really in it, huh?”
“Yeah,” I reply while reading the full Hale PR message.
Piper starts to sing some of what she’s already written this morning.
Elliot and I watch as in awe as Kellen of Piper at work.
But it’s quickly dissipated by a second ping from Hale PR.
This one is a viral live-stream from someone outside Reverie Rest with the title “Prince Kellen visits his girlfriend while she records new album!”
Piper’s entire career boiled down to being the prince’s girlfriend.
Heat spreads up my neck, and I grip my phone until the case creaks in protest. I stand from the chair. “Are they here for an autograph or do we need to call in riot shields?”
Elliot pushes off the wall at the same time. “Undetermined. But they’re not leaving.”
“Why force this then?”
Elliot’s jaw turns to stone. “Not my call.”
The queen’s. And Raelynn’s, probably. This entire fucking fate-dating situation is their call.
I pocket my phone. “We need to move them.” That’s the only real conclusion.
“Agreed.” Elliot moves to grab Kellen, but there’s suddenly a commotion in the hallway, followed by a low rumble, like distant thunder. Elliot’s hand goes to his earpiece, then to his hip.
I move my hand toward my own gun holster as the studio doors burst open at the end of the hallway.
The security desk is a minor barrier to fans hell-bent on meeting their idols.
Twenty superfans charge forward and all them look like they’ve been training for this exact moment their entire lives. Phones whip out and flashes start.
Kellen is caught off guard for half a second, but then his royal training kicks in—he ushers Piper behind him, already waving and smiling like this is just another day in the palace. Piper grabs his hand, but her gaze seeks out mine. Wild crowds aren’t new, but crowds here at Reverie Rest are.
I break for Piper, but one of the fans grabs my shirt, shrieking, “Is it TRUE? Are they MATES?!”
I shoulder them away as another tries to get past me to Piper. I muscle my way through the mass, plant myself between her and the onslaught.
“Show’s over,” I snarl. “Everyone back up.”
They do not back up.
The next sixty seconds is a blur of bodies and camera flashes. Kellen disappears from my view and the crowd cuts me off from Piper.
I feel Piper’s hand slip from mine and my heart spikes into my throat.
I’ve never lost Piper.
Ever.
Reverie Rest is such a small space that the crowd’s overwhelming number is impossible to maneuver around without seriously injuring people.
I’m starting to not care.
“Piper!” I yell. I see her, twenty feet away, getting pushed toward the studio exit by Elliot. For one white-hot second, I lose all the years of bodyguard training and just bull-rush the crowd, shoving, barking, doing whatever it takes to close the distance to my omega.
Not just my client. Not anymore.
She’s my omega.
And Elliot’s—and he has her.
I blink and scan the crowd for the prince I lost sight of. Does Elliot have them both?
My heart sinks as I find Kellen twenty feet away posing for selfies with superfans that have him basically pushed back against a wall. I force my way through the few people between he and I.
“Enough,” I growl and draw my weapon. I won’t fire. Not here. But this crowd needs to disperse.
Kellen meets my gaze with gratitude brightly shining in his eyes. I put myself between Kellen and the crowd and bark at them again. “Get back.”
Elliot’s voice is in my earpiece. “North exit. Go now.”