The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate novel Chapter 201

Chapter 201: The Worst Pitch In Drakenfell History

It took her forty minutes to work up to it.

Forty minutes of sitting across from Fin while he worked through reports and she pretended to read a briefing Tiberon had given her. Forty minutes of rehearsing in her head, rearranging words, discarding entire approaches, and generally behaving like a woman about to defuse an explosive device with a set of instructions written in a language she was blood-bound not to translate.

Because that was functionally what this was.

Tiberon had pulled her aside that morning, and handed her an impossible task.

She was going to figure it out. She just needed another forty minutes. Maybe fifty.

The blood oath sat in her chest like a closed fist. She could feel it, the way you feel a muscle you’ve pulled but can’t stretch. Every time she got close to the words, her throat tightened and her pulse kicked, the magic reminding her that it was there and it was watching and it would stop her heart if she crossed the line.

She put the briefing down.

"Fin."

He looked up. Something in her tone must have registered, because his pen stopped moving and his full attention shifted to her with the speed of a man who had been half-listening to her heartbeat the entire time and had just noticed it change.

"I need to ask you something."

"Go ahead."

She opened her mouth. Closed it. The blood oath squeezed, a preemptive warning, and heat crept into her cheeks.

"There is something I’m part of," she began carefully, each word measured, tested against the boundary before she committed to it. "In Drakenfell. I can’t tell you what it is."

Fin set his pen down.

"I can’t tell you when it started, or who else is involved, or what it requires." She swallowed. "I can’t explain the nature of it, the history of it, or the reason it exists."

Fin leaned back in his chair. His expression was unreadable.

"I also can’t tell you why I can’t tell you any of those things." Her face was fully red now, the flush climbing from her neck to her jaw to her cheekbones. "Because the reason I can’t tell you is also something I can’t discuss."

The silence that followed was excruciating.

"There is an event. Tomorrow at dawn. In a location. I am unable to elaborate on the event, the location, or why I’m unable to elaborate."

"I’ve received ransom notes with more information." Fin studied her. His arms crossed slowly over his chest. The posture of a man settling in. "So to summarize. You’re part of something you can’t name, for reasons you can’t explain, involving people you can’t identify, and you’re telling me this because..."

"Because I need you and Aeron to come with me at dawn."

"To the thing you can’t discuss."

"Yes."

"In the place you can’t describe."

"Correct."

"And if I ask what’s going to happen when we get there?"

"I can’t tell you that either."

Fin stared at her for a very long time. Long enough that she considered the possibility that she had finally, after everything, found the one thing that made Finnick Shadowclaw speechless.

She had not.

"That," he said, one side of his mouth pulling up, "is the worst pitch I’ve ever heard. And I’ve sat through trade negotiations with Bloodmoon."

Her face burned hotter. "I’m aware it’s not ideal."

"Not ideal is an interesting way to describe asking me to follow you into an undisclosed location for an undisclosed purpose with undisclosed participants based on zero information."

"You would be agreeing on trust."

"I’d be agreeing on you," he corrected. The distinction landed heavier than she expected.

Through their matebond, she felt his amusement. Warm, steady, tinged with something sharper underneath. Curiosity, but not the idle kind. The kind that came from a man who had already pieced together more than she realized.

Because Fin could feel the blood oath. He also knew she didn’t know he knew. And he found that, privately, very entertaining.

Xeon: She thinks we don’t know.

Fin: I’m aware.

Xeon: Her face is very red. This is enjoyable.

Fin: Behave.

Xeon: I am behaving. I am simply observing that our mate is trying to invite us to a secret blood ritual and is doing it with the subtlety of a woman returning a stolen horse.

"I’ll talk to Aeron," Fin said. "He’ll agree."

Xeon: The mage is outside the door.

Fin: I know.

Xeon: He has been there for four minutes. He is vibrating.

Fin: I said I know.

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