Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 274: The audacity.

Dax’s office in Parliament was more of an entire department than the room Chris expected. The main office was considered the king’s private room, where people like Sahir, Killian, and Chris could enter. The rest would have hearings with the king in different conference rooms.

In the private office, papers lay neatly arranged on the desk. The mantle of gold and royal embroidery rested across the back of a chair. The city hummed faintly through thick windows. Beyond the door, people were already moving on to the next logistical stage of the day.

Inside, nothing moved.

Chris stood near the desk. Dax stood a few steps away, his back half-turned like he had meant to walk, stopped midway, and never quite remembered how to finish the motion.

"Are you really all right with it?" Dax asked at last.

Chris blinked at him. "With what?"

Dax gave him a look that made the question unnecessary.

"The timing," he said, lower now. "You didn’t need to bend to them. I don’t care how politely they phrased it, Parliament applying pressure is still Parliament applying pressure. If you weren’t ready, I would have pushed back harder than they could ever comprehend. I don’t mind tearing them apart for you."

Chris exhaled slowly and leaned his palms against the cool edge of the desk, the black robe with gold embroidery he chose to wear today slipping from his shoulders.

"They didn’t push me," he said, perfectly calm. "I’m the one who moved."

Dax’s suspicions were clear, but he didn’t interrupt; he just listened.

"I’ve been doing the work for months," Chris continued. "Running departments, negotiating, representing, smoothing your sharp edges, and occasionally stopping you from scaring foreign diplomats into early graves. Calling it unofficial doesn’t make it any less real. It just keeps me suspended between being and becoming." His voice softened. "And I’m tired of being suspended."

He met Dax’s eyes.

"And let’s not pretend," he added, calm but not unkind, "that five months was about statecraft. That was you doing it for me."

Dax didn’t deny it.

"Of course it was," he said quietly. "I’d delay it a year if you asked. Two. Three. I don’t care how long the world waits when it comes to you adjusting."

"I know," Chris replied, and something in his chest eased. "But this time isn’t about adjusting anymore. It’s about finishing what we already started. I don’t want to hover between titles and who I was and who I am now. If I’m going to do this, I want to do it properly."

Dax stepped closer and reached out, fingers curling gently around Chris’s jaw, thumb brushing over his cheek like he was memorizing him again.

"Three months," he murmured. "You’re certain?"

"Yes," Chris replied, without wavering. "And don’t look at me like that. If it goes terribly, I’m blaming you."

Dax’s mouth curved, soft and devastating the way it always was when he forgot how terrifying he could be and turned human instead.

"I am proud of you," he said, like a confession.

"I know," Chris muttered, which was safer than admitting what that did to him.

Dax kissed him.

Chris’s hands curled lightly into his coat when the knock came.

They separated instantly.

Dax straightened. Authority returned to his posture like metal locking into place. Chris inhaled and stitched composure back across his expression out of habit and necessity.

"Enter," Dax called.

The door opened and Sahir stepped inside with an expression that promised problems before a single word left his mouth.

"Your Majesties." He inclined his head with proper respect, then exhaled like a man who had accepted his doomed fate but still resented the journey toward it. "We... have troubles."

Dax raised a blond brow, voice dry. "Surprise me."

Sahir didn’t smile. "Rohan has finally decided on their diplomatic envoy regarding the incident with Christopher."

Chris scoffed, shoulders loosening now that it was Sahir and not a literal war announcement. "Let me guess. They’re done pretending the diplomat that soup-bathed me didn’t exist and have decided to be dramatic about it."

Sahir’s lips thinned. "Something like that."

Dax tilted his head, waiting.

"Two of the members selected for the envoy," Sahir continued, choosing his words carefully, "are Marianne Lancaster... and Princess Heather."

There was a heartbeat of silence.

Then Dax rolled his eyes.

Chris actually blinked. Dax did not roll his eyes often. When he did, something was either ridiculous, catastrophic, or both.

"What?" Chris asked, because clearly context was important here and apparently he’d missed a Chapter.

Sahir looked at him like a teacher bracing emotionally before explaining something deeply stupid that he did not personally approve of.

"Marianne Lancaster," he said patiently, "is a dominant alpha. Like His Majesty. Extremely competitive. Extremely stubborn. And has... unresolved feelings regarding His Majesty that she has refused to bury for the last decade."

Chris slowly turned his head toward Dax.

Dax stared straight ahead, jaw flexing, the universal expression for ’I regret the life I lived before you, please ignore it.’

Sahir continued mercilessly.

"And Princess Heather," he added, voice very calm because calm made this worse, "is the fourteen-year-old the King of Rohan proposed His Majesty marry about... six months ago?" He paused. "Well... seven, if adding the extra month helps."

"It doesn’t," Chris replied flatly, then he remembered a call he had with Dax while the king was in Rohan for a diplomatic event. "That child bride?"

"That would be the one," Sahir confirmed, resignation wrapped in courtesy. "She is, unfortunately, still very real."

Chris stared at him.

Then at Dax.

Then back at Sahir.

"Is this a diplomatic discussion," he asked slowly, "or an intervention for your questionable past decisions?"

"It wasn’t my decision," Dax muttered, finally abandoning dignity enough to look mildly offended at reality. "Her father thought ’marry my underage daughter and our nations will bond’ was a reasonable suggestion. I said no. Loudly. The only thing that kept me from burning that palace down was you waiting for me here."

"He did," Sahir agreed. "The palace staff was still finding fragments of that ’no’ echoing in the diplomatic hall three hours later."

Chris rubbed a hand down his face.

"So now," he said, working through it with forced patience, "Rohan is sending the alpha woman who used to have a crush on you and the literal child they tried to trade you to negotiate an incident where someone tried to humiliate me."

"Yes," Sahir said.

"As a gesture of good faith?" Chris asked, voice dangerously calm.

Sahir smiled without warmth. "As a gesture of we are still testing boundaries and a new consort won’t hurt." 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

"Dax... Let’s entertain them."