wishing, wanting

Ella let out a long, slow sigh as she was pulled to Cad’s chest. He was right; there was no sense in worrying about the personal aftermath of the judge’s decision. Instead, she had to think ahead — to picking up her life, to moving around the globe, to ruling a country. She didn’t have time to be afraid, she just had to roll with the punches and take this transition one step at a time. Before Cad could even finish his last sentence, the girl tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled his lips to hers. “I love you, Cad. Thank you for always knowing what to say, even in the most outlandish situations like these. You’ve been my rock through it all — the one person I knew I could always rely on. And I know I couldn’t have gotten this far without you.” She smiled, brushing her thumb against his cheek. “But I’ll really have to give that ‘making you my husband’ thing some thought. That’s a pretty huge step, ya know?” Ella laughed, a playful twinkle in her eye. 

Cad kissed the blonde’s forehead before sprawling out on the bed beside her. “Tomorrow is the last day of the trial.” He stared at the ceiling of their hotel room, stating the obvious as he didn’t know much else of what to say. “We’ll find out what happens and either way you won’t have to see your step-mother or step-sisters again.” Slowly, Cad moved to find her hand with his, intertwining their fingers and giving her hand a gentle squeeze. “It’s almost over, sweetheart. It’s almost over.”

Ella smiled softly to herself, giving Cad a nod. The blonde had been through the wringer over the past several months, giving testimony after testimony on just how horrid of a person her step-mother was; reliving memories she had shoved to the farthest corner of her mind. “The last day.” She echoed quietly, her eyes flickering across the hotel’s popcorn ceiling. “I don’t know if I want to be there tomorrow. I don’t know if I want to find out. And I definitely don’t want to see her reaction to the judge’s ruling.” The blonde admitted with a sigh, giving his hand a gentle squeeze right back. “She’s a powerful woman — hated by many, but powerful. Even if this case falls in my favor... What if she never truly stays away?”

“But this isn’t all happening because we want to get married. We were engaged -- well, pseudo-engaged -- before any of this news even surfaced. We made plans, Cad. And that doesn’t just change because surprise, I’m some queen-princess-duchess-whatever.” Ella’s expression sunk into a pouty frown. “Okay, but what if we keep our relationship under wraps and some snotty royal advisor says I have to get married before taking the throne and they try to set me up with some other royal figure? Or they're suspicious that I totally coincidentally fell for the bodyguard I insisted on bringing on staff?” She arched a brow at him. “It would be better for us to be forthcoming than to hide our intentions and have everything backfire.”

“Wait, what?” Ella’s expression faded when Cad referred to himself as her lowly bodyguard, her brows scrunching together. “No. I don’t want you to just be a member of my staff, Cad. I want you. Us. This.” She gestured to the apartment, to the way they were relaxing on the couch, so comfortable with each other. “As soon as we convince the Clubhouse of my case, I want to make your position in my life abundantly clear to everybody involved. The courts, the media, whatever and whoever. We’re getting married, and a stipulation of my taking any role is that our plans go on, well, as planned.”

Ella looked up from the page to Cad, her eyes tired. It was late, well past midnight, but her mind was clear. “I have to do this.” She said affirmatively, her brows furrowed. “That woman -- she’s caused too much harm to too many people. We have to appeal her claims of my incapacitation. We have to take this to The Clubhouse, the royal courts, the media -- whatever it takes.”

Ella shrugged slowly, chewing on the inside of her lower lip. “I think I’d like to see the papers, actually. I never really read them.” She admitted softly, propping herself up on her elbows. “Then we can start filling in the blanks together. And maybe we could make some sort of plan. Or an outline of a plan. Or even like the initial bullet points of a plan. I don’t know. I just can’t relax while all of this is going on around us.”

Ella smirked, squirming just a little as his lips brushed against her neck. Although she was tempted to tell him to turn off the television and take her to bed, the blonde hesitated as he pulled away, her teeth grazing her lower lip anxiously. “Do you think we could maybe discuss the details of all of this, um, news we found out earlier?” She asked meekly, drumming her fingers against the couch. “I know I said I wanted a weekend away from it all, but... I can’t stop thinking about it. I want to know everything, to hear it all again. I want to know what I’m going to do.”

“Sorry.” Ella smiled sheepishly, stretching out along the length of the couch as he disappeared into the kitchen. “I’m sure I’d like it too, but do you maybe want to do something else? I’d hate to keep you trapped on the couch and re-watching movies you’ve already seen all night.”

“You’re shocked that the girl who practically lived under a rock has never seen Pulp Fiction?” Ella chuckled, nudging him. “Now be quiet and let me find out what I’ve been missing.” She smirked, watching the film intently. Before long, the end credits were rolling and Ella was beaming, enthralled by this new story. “....And the part with the shootout! Could you believe that?! And the guy -- what was his name? Samuel somethin’? His lines! They were so well-written! Everything was. God, it’s no wonder you love this movie so much. What was the name of the director again? Does he have anything else on Netflix?”