Chapter 108: Chapter 108: Group Chat Warfare

Dean awoke from a long day of sleep to the familiar ceiling of Arion’s bedroom… the man himself glued onto him once again.

Arion was sleeping.

Of course the Crown Prince of Alamina, who could track beasts by pheromone residue and intimidate a council into silence with a single look, had apparently decided that the best place to recover from a near-rut spiral was pressed against Dean like a heat-seeking barnacle with royal titles.

Dean lay still for a moment, blinking slowly, letting his body inventory itself.

No fever. No sharp ache. No heat. Thank every god that still tolerated him.

Just the dull, deep exhaustion of someone who had wrestled his own pheromones into a leash for hours and then paid for it in a coma that felt medically illegal.

The sheets smelled like clean linen, faint antiseptic from whatever Seven had done, and under it all… Arion. Vetiver, calmer now, softened into a scent lingering in the background of every other sense.

Dean’s gaze shifted.

Arion had one arm around his waist. His forehead was near Dean’s shoulder, his mouth angled toward Dean’s throat in sleep with the kind of unconscious intimacy that would have made Dean combust yesterday and now only made him feel… resigned.

Resigning was dangerous.

Dean tried to move his hand.

Arion’s hold tightened immediately, instinctive, not painful, but firm enough to tell Dean exactly what kind of sleep this was.

Possessive sleep.

Dean stared at the ceiling again.

“Unbelievable,” he whispered.

Arion didn’t wake.

He breathed out, slow and even, like a man who had finally stopped bracing for war.

Dean swallowed, stared at the crown prince’s sleeping face for one long beat, and then made the mistake of thinking he could shift without consequences.

He moved his knee a fraction.

Arion followed.

Not fully waking, not opening his eyes – just adjusting like his body had been trained to track Dean’s location in the dark. His hand slid slightly higher on Dean’s waist, fingers splaying there like an anchor.

Dean froze.

Arion’s breath puffed warm against his collarbone.

Dean’s ears warmed on reflex.

He hated himself. He hated the fact that he didn’t hate the warmth.

He was halfway through silently composing an apology to his own dignity when a vibration started.

Then another.

Then a sustained, malicious buzzing, like an insect had crawled into the room and decided to reproduce.

Dean’s eyes flicked to the nightstand.

His phone was there

It was face down, but the screen kept flashing on and off with the bright aggression of incoming notifications.

The buzzing escalated, and Dean stared at it like it had personally disappointed him.

Arion didn’t wake.

Of course Arion didn’t wake.

Arion could sleep through gunfire, apparently, as long as Dean was breathing in his arms.

Dean shifted his arm toward the nightstand as carefully as if he were disarming a bomb.

The phone buzzed again.

Arion’s arm tightened.

Dean stopped.

For a second, he considered the possibility that he might die here: suffocated by royal affection while his phone vibrated itself into the next century.

He tried again, slower.

Arion’s fingers flexed, then loosened slightly – as if his body, even asleep, had decided Dean reaching for something was acceptable so long as Dean didn’t leave.

Dean snatched the phone the moment he had clearance.

The screen lit up.

His eyes narrowed immediately.

Group chat.

Of course it was a group chat.

And the name of the chat – set by Nero, because Nero was a menace – was glowing at the top like a curse:

ALAMINA SUMMIT (NOT A DATE)

Dean closed his eyes for half a second.

The phone vibrated again.

He opened them and looked at the message flood.

Nero: WE ARE EN ROUTE 🚁

Nero: ETA: SOONISH

Nero: define “soonish”: when the pilot stops crying

Sebastian: Nero, stop harassing the pilot.

Sebastian:

Dean, are you alive?

Sebastian: Blink twice if you’ve been kidnapped by a crown prince again.

Zion: Officially, this is a diplomatic visit.

Zion: Unofficially, Nero will be banned from three facilities within the first hour.

Nero: UNTRUE

Nero: I will be banned from six facilities. I have ambition.

Dean stared at the screen, expression blank.

The phone buzzed again.

Sebastian: I brought gifts.

Sebastian: If Arion bites you, I will sue Alamina.

Zion: That is not how international law works.

Sebastian: It is how I work.

Nero: DEAN

Nero: IMPORTANT QUESTION

Nero: ARE YOU STILL ALIVE OR DID YOU DIE OF SECONDHAND EMBARRASSMENT???

Dean let out a silent exhale through his nose.

He typed with one hand, because the other was still trapped under Arion’s arm like it belonged there.

Dean: I’m alive. Unfortunately.

The typing bubble appeared immediately.

Nero:

😍

Nero: PERFECT

Nero: THEN YOU CAN RECEIVE US

Nero: Also, are you engaged engaged or “Palatine engaged,” because I need to pack accordingly

Dean’s thumb hovered over the keyboard, murder rising in his blood in a calm, familiar line.

He typed anyway.

Dean: If you say “pack accordingly” again, I will throw you off the aircraft.

Sebastian: That’s not possible.

Sebastian: But please do it in spirit.

Zion: Dean, confirm security protocols in Alamina.

Zion: We were told the engagement celebration is in two days.

Zion: Are we arriving too early?

Nero: there is no such thing as too early

Nero: there is only “early enough to cause trouble.”

Dean’s eyes narrowed. He started to type… and Arion shifted behind him, a slow, sleepy movement. His forehead nudged into Dean’s shoulder. His mouth brushed skin, just seeking warmth like a creature that had found its favorite place and didn’t want the world to exist outside it.

Dean went still.

The phone buzzed again.

Arion’s arm tightened, and this time Dean felt that Arion’s body was waking up.

What are you doing?” Arion asked, voice low and raw from sleep.

Dean closed his eyes for a minute, because that rasp did obscene things to his nervous system. Absolutely inappropriate things. Things that made his body to react before his brain could complain.

He forced a slow breath in through his nose before Arion would see the rise in his pants.

He did not let his pheromones answer.

He was not doing that today. He had survived yesterday. He was not starting a sequel.

“I’m,” Dean said, voice carefully level, “being harassed.”

Arion’s arm tightened again in immediate, sleepy possessiveness. “By whom?”

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