Sighing dramatically, Alric pinned Ravi with an irritated glare that only made him grin broadly at the man, who was more an older brother to him than king most days. “I will ask Cameron to place more salve on my shoulder this evening before we go down to dinner.”
Ravi flopped down in one of the chairs in front of Alric’s desk. “I’ve also talked Sora into having a look at your shoulder. The Abe Clan are renowned healers. I bet he’ll think of something we haven’t.”
Alric quickly shook his head. “Please, don’t trouble him.”
“Don’t trouble—” he started to repeat in disbelief. He leaned forward, shifting to the edge of his seat. “You’re lucky I don’t tell Sora’s parents. I bet they’d have your shirt off and a bunch of weird creams smeared on you before you can say zippity-do-da.”
Alric’s head jumped up again, his mouth falling open in shock for only a second before it snapped shut again. He tried to glare, but Ravi could see the first teasing of a smile at the corner of his mouth.
“Did you want something other than to threaten me with Sora and his parents?”
There was no stopping his smug smile. He really did love being his king’s keeper. It was more than just protecting him from harm. Ravi also kept him from harming himself by pushing too hard.
“I came to remind you of the time and that you need to start closing down your computer.”
“I’m aware of the time.” He paused, eyes darting to the computer screen to his left. “I’ve still got an hour before I need to dress for dinner and meet Cameron in the hall.”
“Uh-huh. Which means you haven’t checked your phone in at least an hour.”
“What?”
“Cameron texted you to request a private dinner, which is supposed to be in thirty minutes.”
Alric jerked and grabbed at his phone, which was set far to the side, under a stack of papers, completely forgotten. As Alric scrolled through the missed messages, Ravi smiled at him.
“He’s currently in a meeting with Lisette, Ryu, and Gunter, so he texted me to check on you since you weren’t responding to his texts.”
Alric swore softly to himself as he quickly tapped out a response to his mate.
“Thank you, Ravi. Your timing is perfect as always.” Putting the phone on the desk again, Alric leaned back in his chair with a heavy sigh. He gave Ravi one of his rare crooked smiles. “Crisis averted. I am meeting my mate for dinner in our chambers this evening.”
“Good. You’ve both been too busy recently and could use some time alone. I’ve already wrangled Warin, North, Cassie, and Sasha into entertaining all of our guests without you for one night. I was thinking after dinner we could move all the tables and do charades in the middle of the hall. Losers have to do shots of Burkhard Fire Wine.”
Ravi waggled his eyebrows at Alric, earning the amused groan he’d expected.
“Thanks for the warning. I’ll be sure to reschedule any of my early morning meetings tomorrow.”
“If we get everyone drunk enough, we can pull out the Twister mats and—”
“I thought I ordered the Twister mats destroyed!”
Ravi shrugged. “They were, but Cassie has been working on these dragon-sized mats.”
Alric shook his head. “You’re making it so I’m afraid of leaving you without supervision tonight. Please, no drunk dragon Twister in the castle.”
Ravi huffed out a sigh, jutting out his bottom lip in a good facsimile of a pout. He pushed to his feet again so he was looking down on Alric. “Fine, but we are doing dragon Twister while all dragon kings are in town.”
“Let’s take care of the Jaeggi before we break the older dragons, please.”
Ravi bowed extravagantly to Alric as he took a backward step toward the door. “I promise to take excellent care of our guests. No one will be broken during tonight’s entertainment.”
“Speaking of guests…” Alric drawled. Ravi froze as his king’s smile grew a little devious. “How are things progressing with you and Sora?”
Ravi’s heart fluttered at his name, and he could feel the goofy smile spreading across his lips before he could stop it. He bit his tongue, for just a breath thinking he might be able to play it cool. But really, that was never his style, and why try now?
With a laugh, he lunged forward and grabbed the back of the chair. His mouth opened, and the torrent of words poured out.
“He’s amazing. You think he’s amazing, right? Just amazing.