Chapter 74: The Morning

Levi had not slept.

He had sat in the low chair near the cold hearth through the entire night with his hands resting loose on his thighs and his eyes fixed on the shape of Aaron on the bed. The wrapped gift stayed on the table where he had set it after Merrick fled. The tooth stayed on the floorboards near the leg of the chair. The smell of wine, sex, and a claim that should never have happened slowly thinned with the hours but never fully left the room.

His thoughts moved in tight, repeating circles and refused to settle.

He replayed the moment he opened the door, and what he had seen. Aaron collapsed and unaware, the fresh mark shining on Merrick’s throat, his clothes. And then, the fact that Merrick now knew an important secret of his also haunted his memory.

Anger sat under every loop of memory, steady and unwilling to die. Most of it belonged to the servant who had worn his clothes and his scent, and some of it belonged to the simple fact that Aaron had been too far gone on wine to tell the difference when the wrong omega climbed into his bed smelling like the right one.

Gray light finally pushed through the gap in the curtains and crossed the floor in a thin, pale line.

Aaron stirred. It was not a clean waking. He made a rough sound in his throat, turned onto his side, and pressed the heel of one hand hard against his eyes as if ordinary morning light hurt. For several seconds he only breathed, surface still heavy with the last of the alcohol. Then his head turned on the pillow and he found Levi sitting in the chair.

A smile started on his mouth but died the moment he properly saw Levi’s face.

Aaron pushed himself up on one elbow. His gaze moved past Levi and took in the rest of the room with growing attention—the disordered bedclothes, the empty bottle on the side table, the dark spots of dried blood on the floorboards, the small white shape of a tooth near the chair leg. The last of the drink fog retreated under that inventory. What replaced it was simple, cold alertness and the beginning of a headache that would only get worse.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood. He was steadier than he had any right to be, sober enough now to realize that something was terribly wrong.

"What happened?"

Levi did not answer, he only looked at the prince and another wave of rage moved through his chest.

Aaron took a step closer, mouth already opening on a second question, and then stopped dead. His eyes dropped to Levi’s throat, and he realized something. The two marks that had been there for weeks were still there, there was no third mark. No fresh bite. No evidence of the claim Aaron’s body still carried the memory of giving.

A visible chill went through the second prince.

"I marked you," he said. The words came out low and certain, more statement than question. "I felt it. Even drunk, the bond— I know what that feels like. Where did it go?"

He closed the remaining distance in two strides, hands rising toward Levi’s neck as if touch could locate what his eyes refused to find. Levi shoved him back hard enough that Aaron had to catch his balance against the edge of the mattress.

"You marked the wrong omega," Levi said. His voice was flat, scraped raw by a full night without sleep. "It was Merrick."

Aaron’s face emptied of color.

Denial arrived first, immediate, almost automatic. "No. I remember. You came after Dexter left the room. You said you brought a gift. You were wearing— I smelled you. I—"

He stopped, and only then did the sequence of the previous evening rearrange itself behind his eyes with brutal, sober clarity.

Dexter at the door with a bottle of wine and an unusual smile. Dexter saying someone in the family ought to remember a birthday even if the rest of the house was occupied with the northern guests and mating preparations. The surprise of it—because they usually forgot, even Kai had forgotten in years past.

He remembered the way the drinks had kept arriving. The way his control had slipped faster and more completely than it should have with ordinary wine. Then the soft voice in the doorway after Dexter was gone. The familiar scent layered so thick it left no room for doubt. And the body he had been certain he knew.

Dexter had brought the wine on purpose. Dexter had kept him drinking on purpose. Dexter had arranged for someone else to walk into the room coated in Levi’s scent and take a claim that was never meant for him.

Aaron’s hands curled into fists at his sides until the knuckles went white. The headache and the residual alcohol became suddenly secondary to a single, clean, murderous understanding.

"I’m going to kill him," he said.

The sentence was quiet. It carried no performance and no heat for show. It was a decision already finished and settled.

Levi remained in the chair. The night’s exhaustion and the morning’s rage sat together in his silence. He watched Aaron without offering agreement or restraint.

Aaron turned toward the door. Every line of his body said he was already calculating where Dexter would be at this hour and how many doors stood between this room and the third prince’s throat.

Levi did not try to stop him, he only sat in the chair, hands still loose on his thighs, and listened to the sound of Aaron’s footsteps leave the room and start down the corridor.

He stared at the empty hallway for a minute, then he leaned forward, rested his elbows on his knees, and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes until colors bloomed behind the lids. He had not cried in the night, and he would not cry now.

Levi lowered his hands and stared at the tooth on the floor.

He did not know yet whether he would follow Aaron or stay where he was. He only knew that the soft three days of birthday promises and quiet kisses in the new rooms were finished, and whatever came next would not be gentle.