Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 390: Eight Hours

Chris walked into his room like a man trying to outrun his own nerves.

Not running, he refused to give the palace the satisfaction of seeing him run, but the door shut behind him a little harder than it needed to, and the air he dragged in with him felt sharper, colder, as if the corridor’s tension had followed him on his shoes.

Tania was on the rug, immediately lifting her head, ears flicking once in that feline way that pretended indifference while cataloguing everything. She rose, stretched with exaggerated luxury, and then, because she was a traitor who had chosen her loyalties, she followed Chris with purposeful little steps and stationed herself directly in front of him like a barrier.

Rowan was already there.

Not lounging. Not ’keeping an eye’ in the casual way palace guards tried to sell to make people feel safe. Rowan sat with the contained stillness of a man whose job was to measure threat in heartbeats and angles, his suit still neat, earpiece in, tablet on his knee, the chief of security even in a private room because privacy didn’t erase risk when the main predator wasn’t in the room.

Chris stopped at the table, set down the folder in his hand, and then picked it back up, flipped it open, shut it, and set it down again.

Rowan did not say anything right away, he just watched the omega.

Chris turned, paced to the window, stared out without seeing anything, then turned back - two steps, three - back to the table again. He wasn’t walking.

He was digging trenches into the carpet with the sheer force of his stubbornness.

"Your Highness," Rowan said finally, tone careful, "you have recommendations."

Chris didn’t look at him. "I’m aware."

"Strong ones," Rowan added, because he valued living, but he valued Chris not collapsing even more. "From the medical team."

Chris’s jaw flexed. "I’m not doing anything."

Rowan’s gaze dropped meaningfully to the carpet. To the path Chris had walked so many times it could probably be mapped.

Tania sat down with a soft thump directly in the middle of it.

Chris halted abruptly and stared at her.

Tania stared back.

It was an old argument between them, conducted entirely through stubborn silence: ’You will stop.’

’No, I won’t.’

’Yes, you will. I am small, but I am persistent.’

Chris exhaled through his nose and stepped around her.

Tania, without moving fast, simply shifted again to block him.

Rowan watched this with the resigned expression of a man who had witnessed assassinations, coup attempts, and parliamentary meltdowns and still considered a cat’s willpower the most terrifying thing in the palace.

Chris crossed his arms and leaned his shoulder against the wall, as if that counted as rest.

It didn’t, but it was a compromise.

He had no business being this tense. He knew that. Dax was Dax. You didn’t hurt Dax. You didn’t even meaningfully inconvenience him unless he allowed it.

And yet the worry lived in Chris like a second heartbeat, irrational and relentless, because love was not logical and pregnancy made his instincts louder, uglier, and more protective than he wanted to admit.

The bond under his ribs was quiet and steady, the constant pulse that told him what mattered most: Dax was fine.

Still.

Chris’s mind painted images anyway. Politics turning sharp. Old enemies with new budgets. A moment of bad luck that shouldn’t exist and did.

Rowan’s voice softened a fraction. "His Majesty is safe. He’s on the jet."

Chris looked at him. "I know."

"You know because the bond is telling you," Rowan said, not as a challenge, but as a fact that should have soothed him.

Chris’s gaze flickered down, involuntarily, to his own chest, as if he could see the thread.

"Yes," he admitted.

Then, quieter, honest against his will, "It doesn’t stop me from wanting him here."

Tania made a small sound that might have been approval.

Rowan leaned back carefully. "Wanting him here is fine. Turning your room into a tactical exercise because of it is less fine."

Chris huffed a humorless laugh. "I’m not turning it into anything."

Rowan’s eyes drifted to the carved path in the carpet again.

Chris was about to respond - something sharp, something defensive, something that would make Rowan regret breathing - when the phone on the table lit up.

The sound was soft.

It still snapped through the room like a thread pulled tight.

Chris crossed the space in one step and grabbed it.

He answered without greeting. "Talk."

Dax’s voice slid into his ear like warmth disguised as calm, and for a second Chris hated how much his body eased at the sound alone. "Hello to you too."

Chris closed his eyes for half a heartbeat, just to feel the steadiness through the bond. The absolute absence of danger.

"You’re fine," Chris said, accusation and relief woven into one.

"I’m fine," Dax agreed, unbothered. "I’m also already on the jet."

Chris’s fingers tightened around the phone. "When are you landing?"

"In eight hours."

Chris’s breath left him with a release of tension that he had not allowed himself to name.

Rowan’s attention sharpened automatically, listening without listening, ready to coordinate security the moment Dax gave a time stamp.

Tania padded closer, tail swaying with slow satisfaction, as if she’d arranged the call.

Dax continued, unhurried. "And before you pretend you’re not worried, you are." 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Chris’s mouth tightened. "You can hear whatever you want. It doesn’t make it polite."

A soft sound from Dax - almost a laugh. "Be polite to me later. Right now I’m bribing you."

Chris blinked. "What?"

"I have gifts," Dax said, tone perfectly reasonable, as if this was standard protocol. "Consider them a peace offering. And a bribe to keep you from stressing yourself the way the doctors told you not to."

Rowan’s mouth twitched despite himself.

Chris shot him a glare that promised consequences.

Chris lowered his voice anyway, because he refused to have this conversation on speaker in front of the chief of security. "You don’t have to bribe me."

"I do," Dax replied simply. "Because you’re stubborn and pregnant, and you’ll try to carry anxiety like it’s a weapon."

Chris’s stomach tightened at the reminder.

He glanced down at Tania, who pressed against his shin like an anchor.

Chris exhaled. "Rowan is bullying me."

There was a pause.

Then Dax said, calm in a way that meant trouble, "Is he?"

Rowan’s eyes widened slightly. "Sire—"

Chris cut him off, sweetness weaponized. "He said I’m carving trenches into the carpet."

Rowan’s expression went flat with dignified suffering. "Your Highness—"

"You’re doing your job," Dax said, and there was approval in it that made Rowan’s shoulders ease a fraction.

Chris’s throat tightened unexpectedly. He looked away, annoyed at himself for it.

Dax’s voice softened again, aimed back at Chris. "Eight hours. Eat something. Sit down. Pet Tania until she believes she owns you."

Tania blinked, as if she already did.

Chris swallowed. "Okay."

"Good," Dax said. "And if you behave, you get your gifts."

Chris rolled his eyes even though Dax couldn’t see. "What are they?"

"A secret," Dax replied, smug enough to be infuriating. "But they’re good."