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parents all before you could find out your true nature and choose this path.  If he’d stolen you and hid you, your parents would not know where you were, and neither would we.”
    “So what happened?”
    “Danella caught him standing over you, I was there within seconds, and Pike and I dragged him out.  Nothing else to it except that he has been in your house.  Now that he can return, and has, Pike wants to be sure of his agenda.”
    “How did he get in? I don’t remember letting him in, not ever seeing him at my house.  You said the Fey have to be invited.”
    “Apparently, your dad was home alone when Kinsler took it upon himself to knock and lie to your father about being there to take you on a date.  He acted as if he was embarrassed like he had the wrong day, but not before your dad invited him in first.  Danella showed up as he stepped in the doorway.  Remember, I told you that salt keeps us out. That’s why your mom never had it on the front when I came over.  He should not be able to get in now.  She has salted everything but the floor they walk on.”  He laughed and brushed the hair that had fallen in his eyes from the wind.
    I loved his laugh and didn’t hear it nearly enough.  “Okay, so he got in, didn’t get me, and that’s a good thing!” I smiled.  “And you two dragged him out, how?  Pike couldn’t come in, could he?  I mean, I didn’t even really know him till I moved here. Wait, you said he helped you!”
    Another secret.  “I made you let him in.  When Kinsler was standing over you, I was desperate.  Danella and I couldn’t take him alone.  Pike was forced to stand on your balcony and watch so I forced your mind to think it and you told him to come in.”
    I was furious he would do that and wanted to scream, but realized just how far he would go to protect me.  They all would.  What would I have done?
    “Saved again as you say!”  This time I said it for the first time like it was a bad taste in my mouth.  I didn’t mean it to.  I just couldn’t help but notice the tally chart for saving me was horrendously long and perfect reminders to my weaknesses.
    “I won’t apologize.”
    “I’m not asking you to.  You did the right thing.  And remember, Kin is the bad guy here!  When Pike knows more, we’ll talk then.”  That was an invitation to change the subject.
    “And us?  Are we real, or are you motivated by prophecies only?”
    “Grace, we’ve had this talk.  The prophecy doesn’t make me do anything.”
    “Then stop saving me all the time and just be with me.  I am not exactly the queen type, nor am I performing much in the way of duties.  I'd like some normish, regular boring kind of days back to back where we just hang out all day, just us.”
    “A queen’s duties are not to be defined by out of court relations alone.  I will not have you running to their every need when much of it can be taken care of as it always has before.  Recent events related to our courts are all related to your arrival, not your public relation attempts.  I consider you my queen in every sense and will not have you overwhelmed with frivolity.  Your body—“
    “Is safe with you.  I got that.”
    He wouldn’t just stop protecting me. Of that I was sure.  Knowing him, he would offshoot danger around every corner to make me think I’m safe.  I knew enough to realize his fear of what surrounded the court was related to Kin and the Nyms even if I denied it in front of him.  “I will give it my best to stop taxing over your body and the imminent danger it stays in.  You deserve that.”  He chuckled aloud.  It was false and meant only to appease me because in his eyes, the dangers were still there.
    Not exactly what I wanted, but compromising he was, so I would too. “And the claiming thing.  And don’t say you can’t tell me anything, and then say because I’d have to kill you...blah, blah, blah.  Does it really matter, or is Pike just hopeful?