All Chapters of The Deaf Alpha’s Unexpected Mate : Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

SERAPHINEThe launch event drew nearly every orphan in Riverside into the courtyard, benches arranged in neat rows facing a small stage the workmen had built from leftover renovation lumber, banners strung between the new boreholes reading words I couldn't fully read from where I stood. It was the first formal thing Kael had ever done for the orphanage in daylight, in public, with his name attached, and the Matron had spent the entire morning fussing over every detail like her life depended on it.I understood, watching the crowd gather, exactly why. An Alpha who ruled twelve territories did not typically stand in an orphanage courtyard and cut a ribbon.Isolde arrived early, seated in the front row beside the Matron with the easy, gracious smile of a woman who'd never once threatened to strike anyone in this building. Calista stood near the stage in a new dress I didn't recognize, her posture straighter than usual, her chin lifted with a confidence that made my stomach turn the momen

SERAPHINE"Get in the car," Kael said, holding the door open himself, something almost gentle in the gesture. "The stylist is waiting for you at the manor. Banquet fitting."I got in without a word.He settled across from me, and I watched him glance my way twice, three times, before the car had even cleared the orphanage gates, his brow drawing tighter with every mile of silence I refused to fill. I stared out the window instead, at the road blurring past, at the fields going gold in the afternoon light, at anything that wasn't the man who'd just told an entire courtyard I was his mate without once actually claiming me, probably because I wasn't the daughter of an Alpha, or a royal house, or old money, just an orphan with paint under her nails who happened to be useful to him.By the time we reached the manor, the silence had teeth.He tried again in the entry hall, his voice carrying an edge of confusion he wasn't used to feeling. "Seraphine. The fitting is upstairs."I walked past

KAELI paced my study like something caged, boots wearing a slow, useless groove into the same stretch of carpet I'd been crossing for the better part of an hour, and the worst part, the part that gnawed at something deep and unfamiliar in my chest, was that my world had gone silent again. Fully. Completely. The way it hadn't in nearly a month. I couldn't hear a pin drop against these floorboards. I couldn't hear my own heartbeat, let alone hers, and if this wasn't torture, some fresh, more refined variety of it than the curse had originally handed me, I didn't know what deserved the word."These are the final documents for the shipping partnership." Mohan set the folder on my desk without ceremony, his hands moving efficiently and briskly, entirely unbothered by the storm visibly building behind my eyes. "Please review carefully before signing. The investors are expecting confirmation by week's end."I signalled for him to leave, barely glancing at the folder. He turned toward the do

KAELDraven struck at dawn, while the sky still held that thin, uncertain grey that hadn't decided yet whether it belonged to night or morning.The first sign was chaos on the training grounds, the low, familiar rhythm of drills shattering apart into something violent and wrong, Betas and Omegas caught mid-formation when his men broke through the eastern tree line in a wave of teeth and steel, no warning, no formal challenge issued through the council the way honour demanded. Just an ambush, exactly the kind he'd threatened without ever quite saying the words outright.Mohan burst into the manor before I'd fully processed the shift in the air, his whole frame taut with an urgency I hadn't seen from him in months, his hands cutting fast and sharp through the space between us.Draven's men, Alpha, they've breached the training grounds. It's already turned into a full engagement.I was up and moving before he'd finished the last sign, adrenaline sharpening every sense I still had left, m

SERAPHINEI didn't move.I'd always been naturally terrified of rats, some old childhood dread I'd never fully outgrown, born the year a whole nest of them had gotten into the pantry and Ma Agatha had found me standing on a chair screaming for a full ten minutes before anyone came to rescue me. The moment I caught sight of two of them scurrying along the base of the wall, moving straight toward where I stood pressed flat against the cold stone, sweat broke out across my back despite the chill of the night air, a fresh, prickling heat spreading beneath the heavy coat I'd wrapped myself in.But I didn't dare shift. Didn't dare so much as breathe too loudly. I couldn't begin to imagine what Calista and her friends would do to me if they turned that corner and found me crouched here in the dark, having overheard every word of a conversation that had my own name sitting right at the center of it, my own future being carved up and handed off to Isolde like a favor traded between old friend