The Alpha's Unclaimed Mate novel Chapter 590

Chapter 590: Hush, Little Alpha, Don’t You Growl

Three stabbing victims had independently decided that comfort was for quitters and spinal health was a suggestion.

Serena was going to correct that shit immediately. Entire body shaking, still dehydrated, zero excuses. She could do this.

All three would rather be caught dead than have their unrecovered mate tuck them in. But she was vertical and they weren’t, which made her the ranking officer in this room and this a more dangerous mission than the goddamn volcano.

Order of difficulty, not alphabetical. Alphabetical would have started with Dexmon. She went with difficulty because she was an overachiever and also because Fin’s spine was committing the most urgent crime.

Fin had somehow found the one position in the room that was worse than the chairs, which was impressive in a way she refused to admire. His legs were still hanging off the bed, boots on the floor, his spine torqued at an angle that made her wince.

Gently, she lifted his legs onto the mattress, one at a time, careful, quiet, rotating his body until he was lying flat. His face turned towards the pillow she hadn’t placed yet, searching for comfort that wasn’t there.

Even unconscious, the man was looking for something to take care of and finding nothing, and the nothing was bothering his face.

She grabbed the pillow she had been lying on and slid it beneath his head. He inhaled deeply, and the tension in his shoulders released by a fraction, his body recognizing horizontal the way a man recognizes home.

She covered him with a blanket. Tucked the edge at his shoulder. Her fingers lingered there for one second because one second was all she could afford without waking him, and the second was enough.

She kissed him on the forehead softly.

His hand shot out from under the blanket and hooked her waist. She went down instantly because her legs were in no condition to argue and Fin’s unconscious reflexes didn’t take no for an answer.

Her face hit his chest. His chin settled on top of her head.

"Mine," he mumbled.

She was trapped. By a sleeping man. Who was winning.

Serena tried pulling Fin’s arm. It didn’t move. She tried wiggling sideways. He adjusted. She tried going limp, hoping dead weight would slide free. He compensated like a man whose subconscious had trained for exactly this scenario. Every escape route she attempted, his body countered.

She had the upper body strength of a wet napkin on her best day, and today was not her best day. She reached behind her, grabbed the pillow from the other side of the bed, and wedged it against his chest as she extracted herself inch by inch, swapping her body for stuffing like a heist movie replacing a jewel with a sandbag.

The extraction took two full minutes. It was the most undignified thing she had done this week, and this week had included a squid.

Fin’s arms tightened around the pillow. His face buried into it. Accepted.

She stood there, free, victorious, watching Finnick Shadowclaw teddy-bear-hug a pillow with the same intensity he usually did with her.

Onyx cracked one eye open. Watched her stand there, breathing hard, trembling, triumphant.

The eye traveled from Serena, upright and victorious, to Fin, unconscious and spooning a pillow with full commitment, and back to Serena.

His tail flicked once. The dragon equivalent of slow applause.

He closed the eye, tucked his snout under his wing, and went back to sleep with the energy of a creature who had just witnessed the most pathetic jailbreak in recorded history and chosen to let it slide.

Dexmon was next.

She pulled a pillow from the closet and eased it behind his head, wedging it between his skull and the chair back so his neck would stop doing whatever crime against anatomy it was currently committing. His head settled into it seamlessly before he exhaled and said, clear as day: "Denied."

Serena blinked down at him.

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