The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate novel Chapter 184

Chapter 184: Agnes Clapped In Horse-Face’s FACE

"You again."

Serena recognized the voice before she turned, and the familiarity wasn’t the good kind. The dark-haired woman from the courtyard.

"I was hoping you’d moved on by now," she said, rounding the corner like she owned the corridor and the air in it. Her eyes dropped to Serena’s dress then climbed back up slowly. "But here you are. Still lingering."

Serena turned to face her. "I’m just passing through."

"You’re always just passing through. Just happening to be wherever Finnick is." She stopped two feet away, close enough that Serena could smell her perfume. "Do you rehearse that? The doe-eyed virgin routine?"

Serena held her look. "I don’t know what you think is happening, but you’re mistaken."

The woman laughed. Short, sharp, no humor in it.

"Oh, sweetheart. I’m never mistaken." She tilted her head as if the conversation was merely a formality before the verdict. "You spread your legs for the most powerful man in Skardos because your bloodline couldn’t open a broom closet and that’s the only card girls like you know how to play."

Serena went very still. She said nothing.

There was no version of this conversation where talking made it better. She’d learned that from every woman who’d ever hated her on sight. The list was long. The lesson was consistent.

"It’s not even original. Women cycle through this castle constantly. They last a season, maybe two. And then they leave, because Finnick doesn’t keep anyone."

She paused, letting that land. It crash-landed actually. So did the overwhelming urge to tell this woman to go fuck herself, but Serena’s manners had survived worse provocations than this, and they weren’t dying today.

"His real mate was beloved by this entire pack, and he buried her in the ground. He will never love you the way he loved her. That’s just the truth no one else will say to your face."

The silence that followed was worse than anything she’d said. Because Serena couldn’t argue with grief. Or the quiet fear she carried in her chest that she was a placeholder in a story that had already ended.

"You’re not the first girl to mistake proximity for permanence. You won’t be the last. Shadowclaw is not a charity, and Finnick is not a rehabilitation project for women who’ve run out of options. Whatever you think is happening here, it isn’t."

Serena swallowed the twelve things she wanted to say, most of which would’ve made a sailor flinch, and settled for the thirteenth, which was nothing. Her eyes burned, and she hated that they burned, because she had survived worse than this and she knew it. But knowing it didn’t stop the sting. It never had.

"So do yourself a kindness," the woman said softly, almost gently, as if she were offering genuine advice. "Leave before he has to ask you to."

"Understood. Please excuse me."

Serena dipped her head, a reflex so ingrained it happened before she could decide whether this woman deserved it, and walked away. Measured. Unhurried. Spine straight, chin level.

She made it around two corners before the composure buckled.

She pressed herself into an alcove between a stone column and a tapestry. Her hand found her neck, fingers curling around the side of her throat where her pulse thudded against her skin. She pressed her palm flat and held it there.

She breathed and swallowed hard. The second breath came slower, steadier.

Serena wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, then again faster, as if speed could erase the evidence.

She refused to cry over a woman she didn’t even know the name of. Nameless bitches didn’t get tears.

"Serena?"

Serena flinched so hard her shoulder blades hit the stone behind her. She thought she’d tucked herself deep enough into the alcove that no one would find her.

Serena turned, expecting an omega, a guard, Aeron, anyone but the woman standing three feet away.

Agnes Viremont, now Darkhowler, stood in a gown that cost more than most villages, looking at Serena with an expression that didn’t match a single interaction they’d ever had.

Concern.

Serena cursed herself. She’d once told herself she preferred Agnes to that woman. The universe rewarded her for the thought. Fantastic.

"Are you alright?"

Serena opened her mouth, but nothing came out. Her throat was raw and tight, and the heat crawling up her neck had turned into a visible rash. And she had no excuse to be upset because Fin wasn’t her mate, and she’d been sad about Dexmon all morning.

She swallowed.

"Allergies."

"And it has nothing to do with that horse-face woman saying cunty things?"

Serena didn’t know if she wanted to laugh or cry.

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