Caught by the Mad Alpha King-Chapter 435: Vibration

Chris worked the way he always did when he was cornered by duty: with immaculate posture, sharp focus, and an expression that suggested paperwork was a personal insult he would defeat out of spite. He sat at the desk Dax usually occupied like it belonged to him too - because it did, because the crown was not one person and because Saha didn’t get to collapse just because Dax had temporarily relocated his violence to Alamina.

By late afternoon, the sunlight had thinned into autumn gold.

The windows looked colder.

The air in the corridors smelled faintly of polished wood and distant rain, a clean, crisp scent that sharpened everything around it. The palace staff moved a little more quietly than usual, even the guards, as if everyone had collectively decided that the Queen running the country while the King fought pheromone beasts was not the moment to test fate.

Chris read reports until his eyes started to blur.

He signed. He corrected. He rewrote three statements because they sounded too kind and Saha’s parliament didn’t deserve kindness.

He ate because Nadia made sure he did, appearing at his elbow with the calm persistence of a professional threat.

He smiled at Nero when Nero was brought in for a brief visit because even rulers had to have limits, and apparently Chris’s limit was a baby who had recently learned the power of the word ’mama’ and intended to weaponize it.

By evening, Nero was supposed to be in his nursery.

That was how it worked.

Nero had his own warm safe, which was staffed like a small military unit. He had nannies. He had nurses. He had security protocols that made visiting dignitaries look under-protected.

And most nights, Chris followed the rules.

Most nights, Chris was reasonable.

Tonight, Chris had been reasonable all day.

That was enough.

He dismissed half the staff with a look. He allowed the remaining nanny to hover in the doorway for exactly three minutes before Chris’s expression made her remember she had other tasks in other wings.

When the door finally clicked shut, quiet settled into the room like a blanket.

Chris’s private suite was dim, lit by low lamps and the last of the fading autumn light. The curtains were half-drawn. The bed was already turned down.

Nero was placed in the center like he was the most valuable thing in the kingdom.

He was, unfortunately, also the loudest.

Chris lay beside him anyway, on his side, one arm loosely curved around Nero’s body.

Nero’s scent was soft, warm, and clean in the way that babies were, as if comfort had become physical. Nero’s little fingers kept patting at Chris’s shirt as if confirming Chris was still there.

Close.

Real.

Chris stared at the ceiling for a few long minutes, the day still running through his mind in clipped lists - parliament, budgets, security briefings, foreign correspondence - until Nero shifted, made a tiny sound, and pressed his face into Chris’s chest like he’d chosen his favorite place in the world.

Chris’s breath eased out slowly.

On the foot of the bed, Tania lay curled like a pale shadow.

The albino tiger was massive, her coat white as frost, her purple eyes open and intelligent in the dim. She was too large to be called a pet without tempting fate, and everyone in the palace knew it. Tania belonged to Chris in the way dangerous things belonged to rulers: not because they were tame, but because they were loyal.

Tonight, she didn’t sleep.

She watched.

Tail flicking occasionally. Ears shifting toward the door at the faintest corridor sound.

A guardian. A threat. A comfort, in her own terrifying way.

Chris’s hand slid down, fingers lightly brushing the tiger’s fur - one slow stroke, familiar, absent-minded.

Tania’s eyes half-lidded.

Nero yawned.

Chris finally let his eyelids fall.

He went under the way exhaustion always caught up to people who refused to admit they had limits: quietly, all at once, breath slowing, the tightness in his shoulders loosening by degrees.

Autumn night deepened around them.

The palace outside the suite continued breathing - guards rotating, distant doors opening and closing, muted footsteps, and the soft hum of security systems. A country held together by routines and vigilance.

In the bed, the world narrowed to warmth and weight and quiet.

Chris slept with his baby tucked against him and a tiger at his feet because Dax was gone and Chris didn’t like being alone.

The phone vibrated.

Not a ring - Chris wasn’t suicidal.

Just that low, insistent buzz against the nightstand that cut cleanly through sleep.

Tania’s head lifted instantly, eyes bright, ears forward.

Chris stirred, blinking slowly, disoriented for a breath.

The vibration happened again.

Chris reached out without sitting up, hand searching the nightstand by memory, fingers closing around the phone.

The screen lit the room faintly, pale and cold.

CALLING: DAX.

Chris stared at it for half a second, like he was offended Dax had dared to exist so far away.

Then he swiped to answer.

He brought the phone to his ear, voice rough with sleep and entirely unimpressed.

"You have this strange fascination with calling me at four a.m."

"I love you too, my moon."

Chris made a sound that could have been a laugh if he weren’t committed to suffering. "Where are you?"

"Alamina," Dax said. "I arrived."

"I assumed so," Chris replied, voice dry, "but exactly where?" He barely stopped himself from rolling his eyes. "Try giving me coordinates next. I like details. It’s one of my many charming flaws."

Dax’s breath on the line sounded like a smile.

"The palace," he said. "We’re using it as a temporary command point. Otto met us at the gates. We depart in a few hours for the border with the contained area."

Chris’s eyes opened fully.

Not anxious, just sharp and alert, because this was the point at which the words became logistics, and logistics became reality.

"You’re calling from the palace," Chris repeated softly, as if testing the image in his head.

"Yes."

"And you’re leaving in a few hours," Chris added, because he liked having the full shape of the thing.

"Yes."

Dax’s voice stayed calm, infuriatingly normal. "Once we cross into the operational zone, I might be unavailable for the rest of the time here."

Chris didn’t speak for a beat.

In the quiet, Nero breathed against his chest, warm and steady. Tania’s head remained lifted at the foot of the bed, ears pointed forward as if she could hear the distance itself.

Chris’s fingers stroked Nero’s back once, slow and automatic.

Then he said, carefully, "Unavailable."

Dax didn’t soften the truth. "Signal is restricted. Comms are controlled. We don’t transmit unless we have to."

Chris exhaled through his nose, unimpressed by the universe. "So you’re telling me this now because you enjoy torment."

"I’m telling you now," Dax corrected, "because you would be more irritated if I vanished without warning."

Chris’s mouth tightened, because that was true, and Dax knew it.

"You’re learning," Chris muttered.

Dax hummed. "I learn quickly."