Marked By The Mad King Alpha (Phoebe and Perry) novel Chapter 62

Standard POV Format

“By the way, I was looking for you last night. Where’d you disappear to?” Flynn’s voice cut into the study. He’d wanted my report by sundown; I’d been nowhere to be found.

“What did you dig up?” I snapped instead of answering his jab. “Did anyone see him?”

“Not one.” Flynn rubbed his jaw, annoyed. “Questioned two hundred people. None of them saw Reginald.”

Two hundred. No way a man could walk through that many faces and be invisible. I swallowed the twitch of unease and called for the warrior who’d been posted outside Phoebe’s door the other day.

Flynn folded his arms, irritation etched in every line of his face. Timothy listened with a kind of careful curiosity. If I had to pick one of my inner circle likely to trust Phoebe’s claim, it would be him. He’d seen Reginald once and had not liked the look of the man.

The warrior arrived, bowing, all practiced deference. “You called, my king?”

“Yes.” I leaned across the desk so the room felt smaller, the space between predator and prey. “Did Reginald enter my mate’s bedroom?”

“No, my king. Nobody entered. She trashed the place herself.”

Too clean, too detailed—the exact sort of answer fed to a man who’d been coached. Timothy and I both caught a flicker in the warrior’s face Flynn didn’t seem to notice.

“You absolutely certain?” I asked, voice low.

“Yes.” The warrior swallowed. “I stood watch hours on end. No one came or went. Only the lady was there.”

“Then why did I pick up another scent in that room?” I pushed, though the thought that Reginald had somehow masked himself sounded ridiculous, even to me.

The warrior’s eyes avoided mine. “That is the truth, my king.” He sounded practiced as a lute player.

“Tell me the truth and I’ll let you live,” I said, quieter than a threat should be but heavy enough. “Keep lying and I’ll throw you to the wild wolves.”

He still stuck to his story.

Something in the room shifted—Timothy sat tighter in his seat, Flynn’s face drained of color. I tightened my grip on the warrior’s throat. It was easy. Too easy. The rush of it tightened my jaw.

“No one… no one entered,” he choked.

“Someone in the palace is,” Timothy finished. “Not this guard alone.”

I sat back hard enough to dent the leather of my chair. The bruising quiet in the room felt heavier than before. If the palace sheltered traitors, then my throne was bleeding out from within—and every friendly face could be a dagger.

“Find him,” I said finally, voice flat. “Quietly. No alarms. I want his trail followed until it’s wet with evidence, not rumor.”

Flynn bowed once, the official mask slipping back into place. Timothy moved to carry out the order, already calculating the best routes and the men who wouldn’t fold under pressure.

When they were gone, I stayed in the study a long time, staring at the space where the warrior had been. My hands still tingled from my own strength. The name Reginald had lodged somewhere like a burr beneath my skin—an irritant I would pull out, no matter who it cut.

Because truth here cost silence. And silence had a price I would not let anyone, traitor or liar, write for me.