Choosing Home

Chapter Thirty Six

Estelle grinned as he hopped onto the sofa. Sure it might have been a beautiful day and any other dog would have preferred being outside, running around. But Estelle was happy doing anything as long as he was with Mali!

"Comfortable?" Mal chuckled as she looked over at her dog, who was now resting his heads on her leg; his body taking up the rest of the sofa. "You know Ben was going to sit there right?"

"That's okay Mal, I can grab another chair," Ben said and Estelle looked over at Mali's mate, the doggy grin never leaving his faces.

Mal shook her head. "You're going to spoil him you know?"

"Well I get to plan my wedding with you," Ben said with a grin. "I'd be happy to do that standing on my head."

Mal chuckled before sighing slightly at the stack of paperwork in front of her. Security alone was about half that stack—thank Gods for Dean coming up with a system for Ben's regular paperwork. Otherwise Mal was convinced her workaholic fiancé would never sleep! "Ben, are you sure we can't just elope?"

"If that was an option, I'd have suggested it ages ago," Ben told her. "Unfortunately I'm pretty sure both of our mothers would kill us if we deprived them of a wedding."

"Hey, I didn't say we wouldn't invite our parents. But do we really need press at our wedding? Why can't it be a smaller affair?"

Ben sighed as he sat on the arm of the sofa; chuckling as Estelle wagged his tail before taking some of the paperwork, a notebook in his hand before Mal could blink. "Mal, nothing would make me happier than having a small wedding with you and our family."

"I'm sensing a but," Mal said.

"But realistically, the wedding between the Daughter of Hades and the King of Auradon would never be a small affair," Ben told her.

"Sometimes I really hate the fact that you're right."

"Trust me, I hate it too."

Mal groaned and flopped back against the sofa. "It just doesn't make sense Ben! I mean look at all the royals we have to invite! Plus there's the security, wedding party, choosing the dress! Something tells me I won't be able to wear anything purple to my wedding after all."

"Well what about this one?" Ben suggested, looking through Evie's designs and coming across one where Evie had noted the possibility of having an almost mesh like fabric over the traditional white gown. As well, the veil seemed to be about a pale lavender that would match well with Mal's hair.

Mal chuckled as she took the sketch from Ben. "Where'd you even find this? I swear I've gone through those one thousand designs about five times."

"It was on the table," Ben said with a slight shrug. "Do you like it?"

"I do," Mal said with a nod of her head. "I mean, I think we're going to get a lot of chatter about my dress but I do like it."

"Well it doesn't matter what anyone says considering it's your wedding," Ben said, gently taking the sketch and going over to a bulletin board they'd brought into the office for the purpose of organizing all the wedding prep info. "At least that's one thing we can check off."

"What about you?" Mal asked. "Suits and stuff?"

Ben gave her a small smile. "Evie showed me her design for my suit a couple of days ago. She's modeling it after my suit I wore at my coronation. Speaking of which, we need to set up a time for your coronation."

"As excited as I am to officially become your Queen, Ben, can we focus on one major event at a time?" Mal asked. She honestly didn't care about that title—she cared more about getting the title of Ben's wife than his Queen.