Page 34 of Promised to the Alpha Prince

I think it was my fault that Gina and I grew apart.

After I presented, after Corentin left, after all of that…

She tried to reach out to me a few times, but there was nothing in me at the time, and I didn’t reach back.

I don’t blame her for giving up.

Maybe because I was feeling so guilty about all of that, I felt bold enough to just text Ilse without thinking that I was probably bothering her.

But whatever the case, she was there in less than five minutes, still in her pajamas, which were pink with little white kittens on them—a shorts set with a tank top. She bounced in, tossing herself on my still-unmade bed and propping herself up on pillows. “What are our options? Show me!”

“Um…” I giggled, happy to see her. “Well, he didn’t give me many details. Should I text him to ask? I’m thinking a dress, though, just not a fancy one.”

She nodded. “Yup, I’m with you.”

“Okay, then,” I said, and went to my closet to get the options. I held up a little blue sundress and a striped maxi dress and a strappy thing that was green and purple.

“You have to try them on, I think,” said Ilse, getting comfy on the pillows. “Omega fashion show!”

I snorted. “Seriously?”

“There aren’t nearly enough women with designations, you know?”

“There were women at the luncheon,” I said.

“Betas,” she said. “Married to alpha princes for status and money while all the while knowing he’s guaranteed to never be faithful.”

“Well…” I lifted my shoulders. “I mean, that’s these kinds of marriages anyway, isn’t it? It’s not about real feelings.”

“Which is why you’re obsessing over the right thing to wear to see Dmitri today.”

I sighed. “Good point.”

She sat up straight. “Oh, hey, that reminds me. Johannes last night? Saying he didn’t want you with Dmitri? That threw me for a loop.”

I wrinkled my nose. Did I remember that? Oh, maybe I did. I hadn’t been so drunk to black out or anything, but I had been very sleepy and things had gotten dreamlike later on. “I forgot he said that,” I whispered. Then, abruptly, taking the dresses, I headed for the bathroom to change into one of them.

“Wait, where are you going?”

“To put these on for this fashion show you want,” I called.

“Okay,” she said.

I went into the bathroom and began tugging on the strappy dress. I wouldn’t be able to wear a bra with it. It was backless. I wouldn’t be able to make my boobs look as perky, of course, but I could pull it off, I thought.

I emerged, and Ilse was off the bed now.

Ilse raised her eyebrows. “That one. Definitely that one.”

“You haven’t even seen the other ones.” I looked in the mirror in my closet. “I’m just thinking it was probably a bad call for me to tell Johannes to stay the night with me after he said that.”

“What?”

“Oh, nothing happened. We just snuggled. He didn’t even try anything,” I said. “Plus, I was exhausted. I went right to sleep. But I think that probably is confusing for him.”

“I don’t even understand,” said Ilse. “I mean, with Cole, it’s different, obviously, because so many of his other alpha options are male, and I suppose it’s easy to feel significant to him, because literally no one else has an internal knot to grip him, and I suppose, there must be some sense of security in it for me in that way. I must think, well, I’m irreplaceable. And it’s only me and the King who’ve bitten him, though I think both the King and I are amenable if and when Cole needs more. We’ve already talked about how that’ll probably become necessary when I get pregnant.”

This surprised me. For some reason, I’d latched onto her designation and forgotten that she was a woman, totally capable of having babies. I felt embarrassed.

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