Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 154: I can save you

Dax stilled for a beat as he crossed the threshold into their suite. Then he let out a soft, dry sound that might have been a laugh.

"That’s something even I don’t get away with all the time."

"She’s not even your grandmother," Chris murmured, his eyes half-closed now, the exhaustion pulling at him more than any emotion did.

"She’s not my blood grandmother," Dax said, shifting Chris slightly so he could reach the bedroom door. "But otherwise, she is."

Chris let his head rest fully against Dax’s shoulder. "She has opinions about everything."

"She has expertise," Dax corrected. "Opinions are what she leaves to people who haven’t lived long enough to earn them."

Chris huffed. It became a sigh halfway through.

"So if I ’talk back,’ she’s going to bury me under those heels."

Dax laughed and lowered himself to the bed, still holding him in his arms. He did not want to let him down just yet. His pheromones, spice, and rum wrapped around Chris, calming him. "You can try; at worst you will have to call me to save you."

Chris didn’t open his eyes, but his mouth curved, faint and tired. "You’d actually step into that?"

"I have," Dax said simply. The way he spoke made it clear this wasn’t hypothetical. "And I will again, if needed."

Chris’s fingers curled into the front of Dax’s shirt. Dax adjusted his hold automatically, one arm supporting Chris’s back and the other beneath his knees, the same way one would settle someone precious and exhausted rather than breakable.

"She scares everyone," Chris murmured, voice muffled into Dax’s collarbone.

"She scares the weak," Dax corrected. "And the inexperienced. You are neither."

Chris exhaled a soft, worn sound that was almost like a laugh but lacked the necessary air.

Dax lowered himself fully to the bed, but he didn’t release Chris. He sat with Chris in his lap, legs bracketing Dax’s hips, forehead resting against the warm line of Dax’s jaw. The room was dim, lit only by the amber wash of the bedside lamp. The scent of Dax’s pheromones, warm, spiced, something like rum and something like heat after rain, filled the air in slow, grounding waves.

Chris’s shoulders loosened by degrees.

"You are not meant to bend for them," Dax said. His hand drew slow lines down Chris’s spine. "Not Cressida nor the council. Not any of them."

Chris let his weight settle more fully. "Then what am I supposed to do?"

Dax’s thumb brushed the curve of Chris’s ribs. "Predictability is how the court grows, and sometimes cannibalizes itself." You have to know how it works to do what you want. And when that doesn’t work, you call me."

Dax eased back enough that Chris could tuck himself closer without thinking about it. The bed was warm under them, the sheets cool, and the air quiet in the way only private rooms in palaces could be. Chris’s breathing began to slow, even though his mind was still turning.

"So," Chris said, voice muffled where his face was buried near Dax’s throat, "I can challenge the entire aristocracy... but I can’t say "fuck" or curse."

"That is the arrangement," Dax replied.

Chris made a low, unimpressed sound. "Stupid arrangement."

"Yes," Dax agreed, without the slightest hesitation.

Chris huffed, something lazy and small, and Dax felt it against his skin. He let one hand move into Chris’s hair, fingertips massaging the base of his skull in a way that always unraveled tension first in the neck, then the shoulders, then everything else.

"Tomorrow," Chris said. The word dragged like it weighed more than it should. "I’ll try again."

"You will not try," Dax answered. "You will just be. They can adjust to you."

Chris didn’t speak right away. His breath settled into a quieter rhythm. He shifted once, just a slight movement of his head, pressing his forehead against Dax’s collar like he was choosing where to rest.

"Can you stay?" he asked.

Dax didn’t say anything at first; he just shifted them both down into the bed, laying Chris completely against him without breaking contact. The comforter was pulled over them with little sound. Chris didn’t move to help because Dax did it as naturally as breathing for both of them.

"I am here," Dax said finally.

Chris’s fingers loosened in Dax’s shirt. The last bit of tension in his jaw eased.

The room went still again, but not like the beginning of their conversation.

Chris’s eyes closed completely. His breathing deepened. The day, the court, the lessons slipped away one breath at a time.

Dax stayed awake a few minutes longer, just watching the way Chris’s hair fell against his cheek, the way his shoulders finally rested without force behind them.

He pressed his lips, once, to Chris’s temple.

—

The palace was quiet at this hour, quiet in the way buildings become when power is sleeping inside them.

The curtains in the sitting room were half-drawn, letting in the soft blue light of early morning. Dax sat on the low couch, one leg crossed over the other, a cup of coffee cooling beside his hand. He wasn’t reading, though his open tablet lay on the table. He wasn’t doing anything at all.

He was waiting.

When Dax waited like this, patient, composed, and expressionless, it meant that the world should take care not to make any mistakes. He was most dangerous when he was relaxed.

Chris was still asleep in the bedroom behind him, curled into the blankets, breathing steadily. He hadn’t stirred once since collapsing the night prior. Dax had checked twice, making sure exhaustion hadn’t slipped into something else. Both times, Chris’s body reacted to his presence with unconscious trust. The tension in his jaw eased; his breathing deepened.

It was the only reason Dax’s patience had taken shape. It was close for them to fight again for other motives than them. If Chris wanted to fight Dax because he had hurt him, he would understand and accept it, but this was something he couldn’t look away from. Not again.

The palace hallways outside were waking. Soft footsteps, distant conversation, and the quiet hum of early staff movement. Dax didn’t look toward the door when it opened. He didn’t need to. He knew their pace.

Cressida entered first: fitted coat, heels measured against marble, expression composed into the polite neutrality of a woman who could dismantle heads of state with a raised brow. Serathine followed, no less sharp in presentation. Both stopped when they saw Dax sitting alone.

That was not part of the schedule.

"Majesty," Serathine greeted, careful, respectful, and reading the room before committing to an approach.

Cressida didn’t use a greeting. She watched him. She had known him longer.

"You are early," Dax said. "Or perhaps I am simply awake before I am expected to be. Either interpretation works."

Serathine’s gaze flicked, just once, toward the bedroom door, still closed. "Christopher is resting?"

"He is sleeping," Dax corrected. "And will continue to do so."

Cressida’s chin angled a fraction. "There are obligations..."