Chapter 70: Four Days

Merrick sat on the edge of his narrow cot and could not stop smiling.

The servants’ quarters were the same as they had been for five years, but the air inside the small room felt different. He had been noticed. Not by a senior maid. Not by a guard telling him to move faster. But by the third prince, Dexter.

Two days earlier the silver-haired Alpha had caught the change in his scent in a side corridor near the laundry. Merrick had frozen, expecting punishment. Instead Dexter had only looked at him for a long, assessing moment and said, quietly, that skipping suppressants was a dangerous habit for a household omega. The caution had been real. The interest underneath it had been something else.

The next evening Dexter had called him aside again, this time into an empty storage room with no witnesses. He had asked a single question: What do you actually want?

Merrick had told the truth. He wanted Aaron, he had wanted him for years. He had watched the second prince from doorways and training yards and the edges of rooms, made himself small and useful and chemically silent, and still been invisible. Levi’s arrival had only made the wanting worse. When Merrick finished speaking, Dexter had smiled, a small, cold, and almost pleased smile, and told him to keep skipping the doses. When the time was right, he would help Merrick get a mark from Aaron.

Merrick still did not fully understand why the third prince would offer such a thing. But he did not care, he was only interested in Dexter keeping to his promise.

Four day, that was the timeline Dexter had given him this morning in the hallway. In four days they would carry out the plan. Merrick did not care that Aaron had already marked Levi, he did not care about the public story or the private bonds or the way the whole house seemed to orbit the Hill omega. He wanted the second prince. He had always wanted the second prince. If the only way to get him required another man’s scent and a carefully arranged night, then that was the way he would take.

He checked the small cracked mirror above his washbasin, smoothed his hair, and tried to make his expression less obvious. Excitement still leaked through. He had a meeting in Dexter’s study in five minutes, it was the final discussion before they got their plan in motion. ℯℯ𝘭.

Merrick couldn’t wait. He wiped his damp palms on his trousers, straightened his plain black uniform, and left the servants’ wing before he could talk himself into trembling.

***

Dexter’s study was quiet and ordered, the same way the third prince himself always seemed ordered. Shelves, wide desks, a single lamp already lit against the early evening. Dexter sat behind the desk with a book open in front of him, silver hair tied back, posture relaxed in a way that still managed to feel deliberate. He looked up when Merrick entered and, to Merrick’s surprise, gestured toward the chair opposite the desk.

"Sit."

Merrick sat. He could not remember the last time a prince had offered him a chair, in fact he didn’t think he’d ever been offered one before by a prince. It didn’t matter, very soon it won’t be just princes offering him seats when he becomes Aaron’s mate.

Dexter closed the book and set it aside, stared at Merrick for a second, and then got straight to it.

"The plan is simple," he said without preamble. "In four days, Aaron will celebrate his birthday. He’s a party animal, so I’m certain he’d love to have a little fun. I will make sure he is properly drunk, not unconscious, but just far enough that his usual control slips."

Merrick nodded, not trusting his voice yet.

"You will be coated in Levi’s scent beforehand," Dexter continued. "Clothing, skin, whatever is required. Aaron still reacts to that omega even when he pretends otherwise. With enough alcohol and the right scent, he will not look too closely at who is actually in front of him. Your task is to take everything he is willing to give. Do not stop at a mark if more is possible. I want you pregnant."

The last word made Dexter physically shudder. Had he heard correctly? Or had he somehow misheard the third prince.

Merrick’s mouth went dry. "Pregnant."

"Yes." Dexter’s pale eyes did not blink. "A child ties things down in ways a simple claim does not. Just getting a claim from him might not be enough, it can still be starved out using suppressants. However, a baby is a whole new discussion, and I’m certain it should benefit you better."

Merrick swallowed. The excitement from earlier had not left, but it now sat beside a sharper, colder understanding of what he was being asked to do. "Isn’t it risky? If we’re caught—if he realizes it wasn’t—"

"You will not get caught if you do exactly as I say." Dexter leaned back in his chair, fingers steepled. "I will handle the timing, the drink, and the aftermath. Your only job is to be present, smell like the right person, and take what is offered. If you hesitate, if you grow a conscience in the middle of it, the entire arrangement fails and you return to being a servant with a suppressed scent and no future. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Say it clearly."

"I understand." Merrick’s hands were tight on his knees. "I’ll do it. I’ll take everything. I’ll get pregnant if I can."

Dexter studied him for another long moment, as if weighing whether the desperation in front of him was reliable enough. Then he gave a small, satisfied nod.

"Good. Return to your duties. Keep skipping the suppressants. Avoid unnecessary attention. In four days I will send for you with final instructions. Until then, you speak of this to no one."

Merrick stood on legs that felt slightly unsteady. He bowed out of habit, then stopped himself halfway through the motion, unsure whether the old servant’s gesture still applied. Dexter had already opened the book again and was no longer looking at him.

"Go," the third prince said.

Merrick obeyed and walked towards the door, his heart racing wildly, and his thoughts running amok. It was finally happening, he was finally going to be with Aaron. He stopped for a second, why was Dexter helping him? Does it really matter? His less rational side yelled at him. That was right, it shouldn’t matter, whatever the third prince was scheming should be of no concern to him when at the end of the day, he would be getting claimed by Aaron.