skzhotpot

Ellie. A fic rec blog.

[skzhotpot]

Hi! You can call me Ellie 🥰

30s, INFJ, Leo sun, Scorpio moon

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[kloversung]

jackhammered

𝓼eo 𝓬hangbin x 𝓰𝒻.ᐟreader wc: 3.4k ˎˊ˗ ᵎᵎ smut ᵎᵎ ꒰ 18+ ꒱ « soft dom bin » ⸝⸝⸝ pinned down 𝄃𝄃𝄂𝄂𝄀𝄁𝄃𝄂𝄂𝄃 kysa's catalogue

changbin was the sweetest boyfriend you've ever had. his love for you spoke in more ways than one, woven effortlessly into the quiet spaces of your everyday life.

he was the kind of partner who showered you with sudden hugs from behind and soft, lingering kisses on your temple, as if loving you came to him as naturally as breathing.

he possessed an innate ability to make you laugh, a deep, rumbling chuckle of his own pulling you back to earth whenever sadness became too heavy a weight to bear.

he took pride in pampering you, routinely standing over the stove to cook your absolute favorite meals from scratch, and always surprising you with the little things you loved just to see your eyes light up.

so when your best friend called after what felt like an absolute eternity, you naturally had to fill her in on every single detail of your life. she had only ever met him once, a brief and slightly chaotic introduction right after the two of you had officially started going out together, and she’d been practically begging for a proper update ever since.

the conversation started off normal enough, a flurry of catching up and exchanging casual life updates, but the comfortable rhythm didn't last long before she slyly guided the topic exactly where you knew it would inevitably go.

"so... what about... you know... " your friend said, trailing off suggestively as her voice dropped into a whisper. you could practically imagine her smirking behind the screen.

"what about what ?" you asked, a small smile already tugging at your lips as you settled yourself into the quiet corner of the hallway.

your best friend heaved a sigh, knowing very well that she would have to spell it out for you.

"what about his dick game, babes ? i mean, let's be real — the man literally looked like he'd fuck the living daylight out of you." she giggling slyly.

oh god, this woman —

a fierce, instant blush creeped up your neck as you recalled your first time with changbin. your mind immediately drifted back to that night — the soft glow of the lamp, the quiet hum of the room, and the way his massive, heavily muscled frame had hovered over yours with an almost impossible lightness. he was so soft, treating you as if you were precious, handling you with utmost care, with all the gentleness you deserved.

you remembered his large, calloused hands tracking down your sides with a touch so gentle it made you ache, his deep voice whispering sweet, reverent promises against your skin as he slowly made love to you.

and that's how it had been every single time since. changbin made soft love with you, anchoring you with his affection, and you loved him for it.

"honestly ? it's not like that at all," you laughed softly, leaning your head back against the wall as the warmth in your cheeks deepened. "he’s actually incredibly sweet with me. so gentle and attentive. he treats me like i'm the most precious thing in the world, always taking his sweet time."

"seriously ?" she gasped, a playful, high-pitched laugh filtering through the line. "i mean, that's adorable and you totally deserve it." then she sing songed "but look at the size of him. he looks like the type who would just completely pin you down, lock you in place, and take absolute control, and you're telling me he's just a big softie ?"

your throat suddenly went completely dry.

you had always adored how tenderly he handled you, but her unfiltered words instantly sparked a vivid, flashing image in your mind that you had genuinely never considered before.

changbin... using his actual strength.

changbin... totally dominating the space

changbin... letting go of his tight restraint, and locking you down helplessly under his heavy weight.

a sudden, heavy wave of heat pooled low in your stomach, making your thighs press together instinctively.

"i mean — yeah, he really is a softie," you murmured, your voice dropping a little as your eyes drifted toward the kitchen doorway.

you bit your lower lip, watching his massive silhouette through the frame. "i never really thought about him like that. he’s just always so careful because he loves me. but — hearing you say it, god — that actually sounds... really good."

"right ? trust me, there is no way a guy built like that doesn't know exactly how to take charge," she teased, clearly enjoying the breathless hitch in your reaction.

"anyway, babes, i've gotta run — let's catch up in person soon ! i'll get you those chocolates you love."

"i'll hold you onto that ! " you giggled, "let's meet soon, babes." you spoke, lowering the phone but keeping it pressed tight against your chest as you hung up.

your heart was hammering a frantic, erratic rhythm against your ribs. you adored his sweetness — it was your favorite thing about him — but now that the image of a dominant, unyielding changbin was planted in your head, it refused to leave.

it was hot, intoxicating, and it made you crave something you hadn't even realized you were missing. you wanted to see that side of him. you wanted to know what it felt like to completely lose control to him.

you slowly walked over to the kitchen threshold, leaning your shoulder against the wooden frame to watch him finish up dinner.

changbin was standing by the stove, his back completely turned to you. he was wearing a simple, fitted black tank top — an absolute crime of a shirt that did nothing to hide the sheer breadth of his shoulders, or the thick heavy taper of his waist.

every time he moved, the dense muscle of his back shifted beautifully under the fabric, his heavy biceps flexing with the slightest movement. he was pure, raw power, built like a brick wall and capable of easily lifting you with a single hand.

but as you stood there taking him in, you noticed the rhythm of his cooking had completely stopped.

his large hands were resting flat on the counter, and those wide shoulders were locked tight. a sharp, undeniable line of tension ran straight down his spine.

the warm, crinkling smile that always softened his fierce silhouette was completely missing. instead, his jaw was set so hard a muscle ticked in his cheek, and his dark eyes were hooded, fixed entirely on yours with a heavy, dangerous intensity you had never seen directed at you before. it made your chest tighten instantly, your breath catching in your throat.

"binnie ?" you asked softly, a sudden flutter of nerves mixing with the deep, heavy ache in your belly. "is everything okay ?"

slowly, deliberately, he turned around.

he didn't say a word. he just reached down and slowly clicked the stove knob off, cutting the low hum of the flame. the sudden silence in the apartment made your pulse spike.

he took one slow, heavy step toward you, then another, his massive frame completely crowding your vision as he shut down the remaining distance between you until he was looming over you.

"who was that on the phone baby ?" his voice dropped an octave, a low, gravelly rumble so deep it vibrated straight against your ribs.

"just... my best friend," you breathed, your spine pressing flush against the doorframe as he stepped directly into your personal space, his heat radiating off him in waves.

"and what exactly is it that sounds so good ?" changbin didn't touch you yet, but his massive shadow completely buried you against the wall.

his gaze dropped to your lips, tracking the way they parted as you gasped, then locked back onto your eyes, fierce and unblinking. "something about me pinning you down ? wanting to see me take control ?"

a fierce rush of blood turned your cheeks completely crimson. he had heard every single word.

"i was just talking to her, i didn't think —"

"you think i don't want to ?" he cut you off, his voice dropping even lower, rough, dominant, and commanding. he finally reached out, his thick, calloused fingers gripping your chin with an absolute authority that forced your head back, making you look directly into his dark gaze.

"i spend every single second with you keeping my hands light because i love you so much. i play nice and hold myself back because you're the most precious thing in the world to me. but if you're standing out there admitting that you want me to take charge..."

his thumb pressed firmly against your lower lip, forcing your mouth open slightly as his eyes darkened completely, stripping away the gentle boyfriend act entirely. "if you're ready to see that side of me, princess, you better be ready for the weight of it."

before you could even draw a breath to reply, changbin’s hands slid down, locking like iron bands right beneath your thighs. with one sharp, effortless pull, he hoisted you completely off the kitchen floor. you gasped, your hands flying to his broad shoulders as your legs instinctively caught around his thick waist.

he slammed your back hard against the hallway wall, his dense chest pressing you so hard into the plaster you could feel the heavy, erratic thud of his heart matching your own.

"changbin—"

"quiet," he muttered, nipping fiercely at your bottom lip, a sharp, possessive bite that had you whining against his mouth. his large fingers dug deep into the flesh of your thighs, anchoring you firmly against his hips so you could feel the rigid proof of how much he wanted you.

"you wanted to see what it's like when i take control. you got it. from right now, you don't get to ask me to slow down, and you don't get a break. you're entirely mine tonight. understand ?"

you could only nod, your fingers clutching blindly at the fabric of his tank top, completely consumed by the heavy, dominant heat radiating off him. a slow, satisfied smirk broke the hard line of his face as he carried you effortlessly down the dark hall toward the bedroom.

changbin placed you on the bed, the mattress bouncing under you as you found him looking at you. his eyes still carried the same love for you, just dipped in a need that had surfaced after hearing those words falling from your lips.

he had heard you whispering under your breath, as if the mere thought had your brain reeling.

"pin m-me down.... t-take absolute control ?"

and hearing you say those words ? it had already altered his brain chemistry.

his pretty pillow princess wanted to be pinned down ? wanted to be dominated ? wanted to be controlled ?

oh, he could absolutely do that for you.

before you could process any movement, your legs are splayed wide open and in between them, sat kneeling your boyfriend.

"you wanted to be controlled ? you'll get what you ask for princess."

as your dress got hiked up, changbin pulled your panties aside and in an instant, two thick fingers filled your pussy. a loud, broken gasp tore from your throat, your back instantly arching off the sheets.

it was so sudden. so thick.

you weren't used to him being this blunt, this heavy, and the sheer fullness of him stretching you open made your mind go completely blank. your hands flew straight to his chest, fingers twisting into his black tank top just to stay grounded.

"changbin, h-ha..." you breathed out, your hips shuddering completely against his knuckles.

"fuck — soaking f'me baby ? didn't know princess wanted to lose control that bad — just lay pretty for me now hm ? i'm gonna take so good care of you."

he didn't even give you time to answer. his other hand came down flat against your stomach, his heavy palm anchoring you down into the mattress. he didn't lean away — he loomed right over you, his broad chest blocking out the entire bedroom, trapping you completely under his massive frame.

then, he started to move.

he pushed his fingers in deep, curling them hard against your sweet spot with a relentless, heavy rhythm. you let out a high whine, your heels digging into the mattress as you tried to move with him, but his grip on your waist tightened, locking you completely in place. he was a literal wall of muscle between your thighs, utterly unbothered by how much you were trembling beneath him.

"look at you," changbin rumbled, his voice dropping into that dark, gravelly register that made your core clench. his eyes were hooded, fixed entirely on your face as he watched your cheeks flush, your lips part, and your eyes flutter shut. "so tight for me. you love this, don't you ?"

"y-yes... bin, please," you whimpered, completely helpless against the friction, the heavy ache inside you building so fast it was making your vision blur.

"i'm not letting you go yet," he whispered, leaning down until his lips brushed the sensitive skin of your neck, his fingers driving into you faster, harder, completely overriding your senses. "you wanted absolute control, princess. now just stay still and take it for me."

you clawed onto his thick biceps, completely drunk on the pleasure of this new persona of his. but there was one thing you were still craving. his cock.

"bin — fuck please — nghhh"

changbin curled his fingers deep, his fingertips directly kissing the spongy part in your sopping pussy, cupping it in place making you squirm helplessly against his heavy hand.

"what princess ? you saying something ?"

"mmmpf fuck bin — n-need your cock — p-please baby"

"as you wish princess," he said.

his clothes were quickly forgotten, discarded blindly in the dark room until he stood between your legs again. the thick mushroom tip of his cock slightly nestled between your puffy folds, twitching against your heat.

"you wanted to be pinned, princess ? now take it like a good girl, hm ?"

changbin's hands came down, locking like iron bands around your wrists and pinning them securely above your head, completely trapping you beneath him. before you could even catch your breath, he thrust his cock into you in one full go.

jesus fucking christ.

you were so full, every single nerve of yours screaming his name. the feeling was entirely too overwhelming, a pure, stretching ache that completely shattered your mind. he was buried right up to the hilt, the blunt tip kissing your cervix as you arching your back off the sheets.

"ahhh! f-fuck, bin—ngh-ahhh... yes, right there!" you screamed out, a loud, breathless moan tearing from your throat, your toes curling tight into the mattress.

"fuck, you're so warm," changbin groaned, his voice dropping into a rough, feral rumble as he held your wrists down harder, his massive frame heaving against yours.

the heavy, unyielding weight of him came down fully, burying you beneath his chest as he began to move. there was no hesitation this time, no holding back. changbin held your wrists pinned tight above your head, his thick fingers locking you down effortlessly as he pulled back and drove right back into you, hard and deep.

the bed frame groaned against the wall with the sudden, bruising force of his first real thrust.

he was absolutely railing you into the mattress, a relentless, heavy rhythm that had your hips shaking and your head banging back into the pillows with every single strike. he was pure, dense power, his massive thighs crashing against yours with a loud, wet smack that echoed through the quiet bedroom.

his cock drove into you again.

and again.

and again.

it was a brutal, unyielding pace, stretching you out completely until each of his thick veins was deeply imprinted on your gummy walls. the friction was intense, a white-hot spark traveling straight from your core to your brain.

"oh fuck... mmmh, b-bin —" you broke apart under him, your head tossing wildly on the pillow as you tried to swallow the thick wave of heat rolling over you. "too much, it's — nghh — too good..."

"look at me," changbin growled, a low, demanding rumble against your ear that had your eyes flying open. his face was flushed, his jaw tight, but his gaze was still dripping with that same fierce affection. he leaned down, pressing a hard, possessive kiss to your lips before drawing back to look deep into your eyes. "look at me, princess. you are whose tonight, hm ? tell me."

"y-yours... ah ! fuck, i'm yours !"

"damn right," he groaned, his eyes darkening as he gripped your wrists even tighter, pinning them flush against the headboard while he threw his weight into another brutal, deep thrust that hit your sweet spot perfectly.

you let out a loud, shattered moan, your entire body trembling as he completely took over your senses, driving you straight to heaven.

he was fucking you so well, so incredibly hard, but even in the middle of the rough, bruising pace, his touch carried that undeniable soft-dom care. his chest rubbed against yours, his large body completely enveloping you, protecting you from the very pace he was creating between your legs.

"you're mine, yea ? my pretty princess," changbin whispered roughly, his breath hot and ragged against your neck as he nipped at your pulse point, his hips never slowing down for a single second. "i've wanted you like this for so long. take it all for me, baby. just take it."

he didn't give you a single second to recover. his hips kept pounding into yours, a steady, punishing heat that had your inner muscles clamping around him in tight, desperate waves. he kept your arms locked up high, using his absolute physical dominance to set the pace, making sure you felt every single ounce of his massive frame.

he was completely taking control, pinning you down so hard you couldn't move an inch, forcing you to just lay pretty and absorb the sheer size of him. you were right on the edge, your whole body wound up so tight it ached, completely helpless under the weight of his relentless thrusts.

"bin — i'm gonna... f'fuck, i'm crashing," you sobbed out, your fingers clutching blindly at the sheets as your hips tilted up instinctively, begging for that final push.

"cum for me, princess, drench my cock." he commanded, his voice raw and completely frayed.

he picked up the pace, his thick thighs slamming into yours even harder, driving deep and fast into your slick heat. that was the breaking point. your core clenched around him violently as a massive, blinding orgasm tore through you. you screamed his name, your eyes rolling back as your entire body shook with the release, your inner walls squeezing him in tight, rhythmic spasms.

hearing you shatter under him was exactly what pushed him over. changbin let out a deep, guttural growl, his muscles locking tight as he drove inside you one last time, burying himself to the absolute hilt. his head buried into the crook of your neck, his chest heaving violently as he filled you completely, his own release hitting him so hard his whole massive frame trembled against yours.

he stayed there for a long moment, buried deep inside you, his heartbeat hammering a frantic rhythm right against your chest as the aftershocks slowly rippled through both of you.

finally, he let out a long, ragged breath and eased himself down, pulling out of you with a soft grunt and collapsing onto the mattress right beside you. the heavy, intense friction was gone, leaving your body tingling and completely spent as you both tried to catch your breath in the quiet room.

changbin rolled onto his side, tugging you close until your back was flush against his chest. his big arms wrapped tightly around your waist, pulling you into his warmth as he pressed a soft, lingering kiss to the back of your neck. all that heavy, dominant energy had completely vanished, replaced by the familiar, sweet boyfriend who just wanted to hold you.

he rubbed his hand up and down your side, his touch gentle as he looked down at your dazed face. a lazy, playful smirk tugged at his lips.

"so what next ? you want to be manhandled ?"

well, that does sound nice, doesn't it ?

kysa's note: here with the first bin fic and i became very passionate about this (edited this too many times so i'm just finally putting it out) lemme know what you think about it, xoxo !

klover's club:

@binniebb @joyracha @b4echo @lynnslibrary @zosauce @pineapple-in-a-burgah @starlostjisung @hanjinology @hyunniexmixx @bi-and-panicking @spiidergirlsworld @jiaaabbahng @avchannie @cchapssaltteok @unemployedcarat @hannavkk @selfproclaimedpabo @hyunjinxxs @babythisisourcinema @moch3rii @persassyismysecrettwin @0felixsfreckles0 @mxmx09 @foxiebread @embobema @iownachihuahua @mylovchris @rockstarkkami @pinkyrec @pbynsstuff @gloomydietitian @leeshoeknows @mysticetti @fweakygyatt @rylea08 @mikashisus @matzduo @barbie-girl84 @soldantae @jeekiis @sssoulesss @stryscribbles @minniebitesfr @channlust @hyvnesangel @hanjisdoll @warped-rabbithole @viisstrayy @myen2rude @pineapple-burgah

© kloversung tumblr

[skzhotpot]

My HEART was jackhammering AAAAAAHHHHH

Another birthday present for me!!!

💜 more → Seo Changbin · Stray Kids · Fic Rec Library 💜

[skzhotpot]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELLIE!! ♥️

you are the sweetest and i know i say it all the time, and i will continue to glaze the hell out of you, but you are an integral part of how writers’ work reaches others, and i am eternally grateful <3 i hope your special is full of happiness and joy! how lucky is seo changbin to share a birthday with you :3 love you hun! thank you for being you and always showing support! enjoy your day, your week, your month!

You know what he IS lucky to share MY birthday 🤣🤣

Love you so much, I treasure the shit out of you 🥰

[skzhotpot]

OH HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!!

Thank you Thea!!!!! I’m about to go get my free Starbucks coffee 🤪🤪

[binniebb]

within reach ⟢ seo changbin

── .✦ You move in expecting only a quiet beginning, you never expect Changbin, the neighbor next door who doesn’t believe in love. He’s kind, generous, and carefully distant, someone who doesn’t date and doesn’t do relationships, as if keeping his heart untouched will keep everything simple. And yet, through shared walls and passing moments, his presence becomes impossible to ignore. Laughter lingers, silences soften, and despite every rule he’s set for himself, falling in love with him feels inevitable.

pairing: neighbor!changbin × afab!reader genre: friends → lovers; hurt/comfort; slice of life rating: smut, mature 18+ wc: 16k tw: [themes of casual sex and family trauma, mentions of divorce, alcohol use, heavy themes of jealousy, strong language] warnings: [explicit and detailed smut, unprotected sex, creampie, insecure reader, softdom!binnie, sub!binnie, angst, fluff, slowwwww burn]

ᝰ.ᐟ Holy crap, y'all. Happy New Year! Lowkey I have been gatekeeping this one for a bit, but I'm so excited for you guys to read it. It's been a while since I wrote for Binnie; Emergency Contact was my baby, but I'm so in love with this Changbin. As always, let me know what you think. Tysm everyone for supporting! See you on the next one, dolls.

: ̗̀➛ masterlist  ੈ✩‧₊˚ message me!  ੈ✩‧₊˚

You meet Changbin on a terrible day. Your arms are loaded, sweat sticks to your forehead, and the cardboard digs into your palms as you struggle with a box up the narrow stairs of your new Seoul apartment. You already wish you’d paid for movers as the box starts to tip.

“Careful—”

The warning comes too late—the box slips, bumping into the railing with a dull thud. You gasp and scramble to save it, but then steady, warm hands catch the bottom before everything falls out.

“I got it,” he says easily.

You look up, your breath stuck between panic and surprise, and that’s when you really see him.

He’s obviously attractive. Broad shoulders fill out a plain black T-shirt, sleeves pushed up his forearms, hair a little damp like he’s been working or running. His eyes crinkle when he smiles at you, as if he already knows this will be a story you’ll laugh about later.

“Wow,” he adds, glancing at the box. “You moving in or fleeing the country?”

You laugh before you can stop yourself. It comes out lighter than you feel. “Moving in. Unfortunately.”

“Unfortunate for the box,” he says. “Great for the building. I’m Changbin. You want help before gravity wins?”

You pause for just a moment before nodding. He lifts the box easily, holding it at his hip. You follow him up the stairs, trying not to stare but failing right away. He asks which floor, jokes about how stairs build character, and somehow makes the whole thing feel less miserable.

“Yah! We’re neighbors! I live next door,” he says, pointing to the front door one down from yours.

He greets neighbors by name and waves as they pass.

Halfway through unloading, a group of kids comes barreling down the hall, sneakers squeaking.

“Changbin hyung!” one of them yells. “Are you playing soccer today?”

Changbin lights up instantly. “Later,” he promises. “After I help our new neighbor. Same time as yesterday.”

They cheer and run off, and you’re left blinking at him.

“You’re popular,” you say.

He shrugs, a little bashful. “They’re good kids. Way better at soccer than me, honestly.”

You don’t believe him for a second.

Inside your apartment, he stacks the boxes neatly, asks where things should go, and jokes about labeling and how everyone promises to unpack right away but never does. You notice his hands again and the way he laughs with his whole chest. You realize you’re already in trouble—instant crush. No warning.

As he lifts the last box inside, footsteps echo in the hallway. A woman’s voice follows, light and familiar.

“Changbin?”

You freeze.

He turns, smiling softly as a girl steps into your doorway. She’s pretty, relaxed, and clearly comfortable enough to come looking for him. She glances at you, then back at him.

“Oh,” she says. “You’re helping someone move?”

“Yeah,” he replies easily. “She just moved in.”

Something in your chest sinks before you can stop it. Girlfriend, your brain supplies immediately. Of course.

They talk quietly as he sets the box down, and then, without any awkwardness, they step into the apartment next door together. The door closes gently behind them.

Changbin gives you one last wave before disappearing.

You stand alone in your half-unpacked apartment, surrounded by boxes and the echo of his laughter, trying to ignore the tight, unexpected disappointment in your stomach. You tell yourself it’s ridiculous—you just met him.

A few weeks go by, and Changbin stops being just the hot neighbor who helped you move in. He becomes something more dangerous: familiar.

You see him in pieces at first. In the mornings, when you’re rushing out with coffee balanced precariously in one hand and your phone in the other, he’s usually just coming back from a run, hair damp, breathing easy like it didn’t nearly kill you to climb the stairs. He always says hi. Always smiles and waves. Sometimes he asks where you’re sending people this week, like being a travel agent is the most interesting thing in the world.

With your busy schedules, you talk in short bursts. Five minutes in the hallway. A quick chat by the mailboxes. A laugh when the elevator breaks again. It all feels easy. Maybe too easy.

In the afternoons, you see him outside with the neighborhood kids. At first, you just watch from your balcony as he kicks a soccer ball with them, laughing when they gang up on him and pretending to lose. Then one day, he notices you.

“Y/N-ah,” he shouts, pointing up at you. “Come here. We need teams.”

You try to protest. You really do.

It doesn’t work.

Soon you’re out there too, your shoes scuffing the pavement while the kids shout rules that change every half minute. When one of them calls your name without the honorifics, Changbin stops playing.

“Yah,” he says gently but firmly, crouching down. “What do we call her?”

The kid groans. “Noonaaa.”

“Exactly,” Changbin says, grinning at you with pride. You feel something warm twist in your chest.

You start to notice a pattern. Different women come and go, sometimes the same ones. You hear laughter through the walls at night, then see polite distance the next morning. There’s no hand-holding or lingering kisses in the hallway.

The only red flag about him.

You tell yourself you’re fine with that. After all, you’re just neighbors. Friends, maybe. Still, every time he smiles at you, every time he chooses to sit next to you on the steps while the kids play, every time he casually exists in your orbit, you feel it settle deeper.

The first time it happens, you think you’re imagining it.

It’s late, Seoul humming softly outside, when a sound slips through the shared wall—laughter first, then a voice that obviously isn’t his. You freeze in bed, staring at the ceiling, heart stuttering. The walls are thin. You knew that. Still, your face burns as the sounds shift, quieter but unmistakable. You turn the volume up on the YouTube video you’re watching, willing it to disappear.

The second time, you recognize the pattern.

Laughing. Then later, the low moans bleeding through the drywall, followed by breathy noises you absolutely do not want to be hearing from your neighbor’s lovers. You shove a pillow over your head, mortified, annoyed at yourself for feeling annoyed. You tell yourself it’s none of your business. You tell yourself you don’t care.

Weeks go by, turning it into a montage you never wanted. Some nights it’s brief. Other nights it drags on, the rhythm so familiar your stomach twists before you realize it. You lie there, jaw clenched, feeling ridiculous—jealous of someone you never had, embarrassed for listening even though you tell yourself you’re not.

The worst part isn’t the noise.

It’s the mornings after. Changbin in the hallway, with a soft smile, and his hood pulled up. Joking like nothing echoed through your wall hours ago. Like you didn’t lie awake, annoyed now—not at him, not really, but at yourself for letting it get under your skin.

By the time it happens again, you don’t blush.

You sigh, roll over, and think, irritated and sharp:

Yeah. I get it.

You’re awake before it starts. 

You hear the familiar sound of his bedroom door closing, the soft murmur of voices, and instead of heat creeping up your neck, you feel resigned. You turn onto your side, pulling the blanket higher, and listen. It’s rhythmic, consistent, unmistakable. You count the beats, your heart beating in time with the headboard thumping against the wall.

Then you hear high-pitched moans. You wonder if she’s faking it or if he’s really that good. You sigh and turn onto your other side.

The moans keep going, getting louder and more dramatic. You roll your eyes and pull the pillow over your head, hoping it will block out the noise.

Suddenly, there’s a pause. Silence. Then you hear a muffled, "Changbin, oh my god" and you wince. He answers, his voice low: "Shh." The moans start again, even louder. You throw your pillow across the room in frustration. "Seriously?"

By the time you hear it again, you’ve had enough.

It’s 11:30 on a Wednesday, your alarm is set obscenely early, and your patience is already worn thin by weeks of this. You stare at the clock, then the wall, then sit up with a sharp exhale.

Another thump. Another moan.

That’s it.

You shove your feet into slippers, throw on a hoodie, and march out of your apartment before you can overthink it. You stop in front of his door, hesitate for half a second, then knock. Harder than you mean to.

The door opens a few moments later, and your brain immediately short-circuits.

Changbin stands there, shirtless, hair messy, in baggy sweats. Your eyes betray you, flicking once—chest, collarbones, the faint sheen of sweat—before you snap them back up to his face, mortified.

“Oh,” he says, blinking in surprise. “Hey.”

You swallow. “Hi. Sorry. I—I really hate to do this, but…” Once you start, the words just come out. “The walls are really thin, and it’s late, and I’ve been hearing…everything. For weeks. Could you maybe keep it down?”

Your face is on fire. You can’t believe this is your life.

Changbin’s expression shifts immediately. His eyes widen slightly.

“Oh,” he says again, softer this time. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t realize it was carrying that much.”

He glances back over his shoulder, then back at you. “That’s on me. I’ll fix it. Promise.”

Relief washes over you so quickly that it almost makes you dizzy. “Thank you,” you say right away. “I’m really not trying to be—”

“No, you’re totally right,” he interrupts gently. “I should’ve been more aware. Thanks for telling me.”

He smiles at you and steps back. “Get some sleep, yeah?”

You nod, mumble a goodnight, and turn to leave before your heart can embarrass you further. As you walk back to your apartment, the hallway feels quieter. Lighter.

Changbin watches you before closing his door softly.

The wall stays silent.

You think it’s finished.

The next morning, you step into the hallway with your bag over your shoulder, still tired but relieved. The silence lasted. You slept. You’re almost over it.

“Hey.”

The voice is sharp and accusing.

You turn, and there she is—the girl from last night. One you’d seen before. Up close, she looks irritated more than intimidating, arms crossed tight against her chest, eyes already narrowed at you.

“You,” she says, pointing like she’s confirming something she already decided. “You’re the one who knocked.”

Your stomach drops. “I—”

“You ruined my night,” she cuts in, words tumbling fast now. “Do you know we didn’t even finish because of you? He completely lost the mood. I mean, who does that? It was so embarrassing.”

You stare at her, stunned. Heat crawls up your neck, your brain scrambling for something—anything—to say. “I just asked him to keep it down,” you manage weakly. “The walls are—”

“Oh, please,” she scoffs. “It’s an apartment building. What did you expect—silence?”

Before you can respond, the door opens.

Changbin steps out of his apartment, now fully dressed, hair still a little messy, but his expression immediately sharpens when he takes in the scene. His eyes flick to you first, then back to her.

“What are you doing? Stop,” he says, calm but unmistakably firm.

She whirls on him. “Are you serious right now? She embarrassed me—”

“No,” he interrupts, voice steady. “You’re embarrassing yourself.”

He doesn’t sound angry, but there’s a clear line in his voice. You can feel it between them.

“She didn’t do anything wrong,” he continues. “We were too loud. She asked politely. End of story.”

The girl splutters, clearly not used to this. “So you’re just kicking me out?”

“I’m asking you to stop,” Changbin corrects, stepping closer to her—not aggressive, just unmovable. “And don’t talk to my neighbor like that.”

The hallway goes quiet. After a beat, she huffs, bag swinging, and storms past you without another word.

Changbin watches her go, then exhales softly and turns to you. His expression gentles immediately.

“I’m really sorry,” he says. “You didn’t deserve that.”

You shake your head, still a little stunned. “I didn’t mean to cause problems.”

“You didn’t,” he says firmly. “I did.”

There’s a pause. The air between you feels heavier now—not uncomfortable, just real. He gives you a small, apologetic smile.

“…You okay?”

You nod, even though your heart is still racing.

Changbin hesitates instead of immediately going back inside.

He rubs a hand over the back of his neck, gaze drifting down the hallway like he’s making sure she’s really gone. When he looks back at you, there’s something more serious in his expression than you’ve ever seen before.

“I should probably explain,” he says quietly.

You blink. “You don’t have to. Really. It’s not my business.”

“I know,” he replies right away. “But…I consider you a friend. And I don’t want you thinking I’m just an asshole.”

That makes you laugh softly despite yourself. “I wasn’t.”

He leans against the wall, arms loosely crossed, posture relaxed, but his voice thoughtful. “I don’t do relationships,” he says again, like he’s testing the words. “Not because I don’t like people. Or because I’m scared of commitment in the cliché way.”

You stay quiet, giving him space.

“My parents divorced when I was younger,” he continues. “Bad one. Lots of promises, lots of love talk, and then suddenly they couldn’t even be in the same room. Watching that mess up two people who were so sure…it broke the illusion for me.”

You open your mouth, instinctively wanting to soften it for him. “Changbin—”

“I know,” he says gently, shaking his head. “People fall in love and stay together. I’m not saying it never works.” He pauses. “I just don’t think romantic love is what people think it is. I think it’s something they confuse with comfort, or habit, or timing.”

His eyes flick to you, careful. “And I don’t want to promise something I don’t believe in.”

The hallway is quiet again, but this silence feels different. It feels intentional.

You nod slowly. “That actually makes sense.”

He smiles a little, relieved. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you say. “Still not my business, though.”

He chuckles at that, tension easing. “Fair.”

For a moment, neither of you moves. Then Changbin straightens, giving you that familiar, easy smile again.

“Thanks for listening,” he says. “And, uh…thanks for being cool about last night. Seriously.”

You watch him head back into his apartment, the door closing quietly behind him.

This time, your chest feels tight for a different reason. Knowing him better somehow makes wanting him both harder and riskier than before.

For the next few days, Changbin’s words sit with you like something unfinished.

They follow you on the subway, pressed between strangers, replay in your head while you answer emails and build itineraries for honeymoons and anniversaries. You keep thinking about the way he said it—not bitter, not angry. Just…resolved. Like he’d already closed a door and learned how to live comfortably without ever checking if it might open again.

You believe in love. You always have.

Not in the fairytale way, not in destiny or soulmates written in the stars, but in the weight of it. The way it settles in your chest. The way it’s emotional and physical all at once, tangled and messy and real. If love were just a chemical cocktail, you think, then heartbreak wouldn’t feel like grief. It wouldn’t hollow people out. It wouldn’t linger the way it does.

You know heartbreak because you loved.

That’s the part Changbin is missing.

You catch yourself watching him differently now: how patient he is with the kids, how he listens when you talk, how careful he is with other people’s feelings, even when he refuses to offer them more. Someone like that doesn’t lack depth. He lacks belief.

Belief can be challenged.

The idea forms slowly, then all at once: not a confession, not a grand gesture. You’re not going to corner him or try to change him overnight. You’re smarter than that. This isn’t about proving him wrong. It’s about showing him what love looks like when it’s quiet, consistent, and chosen.

You’ll start small. Conversations. Time. Moments that aren’t charged, just honest. Let him see that love isn’t confusion or habit. It’s showing up. It’s care without expectation.

You’re not trying to make him fall in love with you.

You’re trying to make him believe it exists.

And if your heart has to be involved for that to happen, well—

You already knew this wasn’t going to be safe.

You show up at Changbin’s door on a Saturday morning armed like you’re about to defend a thesis.

Binder tucked under one arm. Loose papers threatening to escape. A tote bag bulging suspiciously. You knock once, then adjust your grip, already rehearsing your opening line.

The door opens.

Changbin blinks at you. “Hey—”

You immediately hold up the binder. “I have a plan.”

He looks from your face to the binder, then down at the tote bag. “Should I be scared?”

“No,” you say quickly. “Actually, yes. But in a good way.”

That makes him laugh, the soft, surprised kind. He steps aside automatically. “Do you want to come in, or are you staging some kind of intervention in the hallway?”

You march past him, already unzipping the tote bag and spreading its contents across his kitchen counter like you’re revealing evidence in court.

“Okay,” you say, breathless. “So. You said you don’t believe in romantic love. I’ve thought about it extensively, and you’re wrong.”

Changbin leans against the counter, arms crossed, thoroughly entertained. “Wow. Not even easing into it.”

You flip open the binder. It’s color-coded.

“This,” you say, tapping the first tab, “is a structured itinerary designed to prove that love is not just chemical confusion. Section one: experiences. Museums, long walks, shared meals—”

He peers over. “Is this a flyer for the National Museum of Korea?”

“Yes.”

“And is it laminated?”

“Yes,” you repeat firmly. “Because love is about preservation.”

He snorts. “I like that you committed to the bit.”

You wave him off. “Please focus.”

You flip to another page. “Section two: media. Movies. Carefully curated. No toxic romances, no tragic misunderstandings that could reinforce your point. Emotional intimacy. Growth arcs.”

He reads a title. “You put Pride & Prejudice on here.”

“Obviously.”

“That movie ruins people.”

“Exactly,” you say triumphantly. “Why would it ruin people if love wasn’t real?”

Changbin laughs again, shaking his head. “Is this a debate or a hostage situation?”

“Both,” you say. “But friendly.”

You’re too excited to notice the way his teasing slowly softens into something quieter, more attentive. He lets you talk about emotional permanence, about heartbreak, about how love is an action, not a promise. He makes small jokes, tries to derail you, but you just barrel forward, glowing with purpose.

When you finally stop, breathless, he’s smiling—not amused now, just thoughtful.

“So,” he says gently. “You made all this for me?”

You blink, suddenly aware of how ridiculous you look standing in his kitchen with a binder full of feelings disguised as logic.

“…Yes.”

Changbin exhales a soft laugh. “You’re incredible,” he says, and this time there’s no joke attached.

The moment doesn’t last forever.

Changbin’s smile fades just a little, twisting into something gentler. Careful. Skeptical, but kind. Like he’s choosing his words so they won’t bruise.

“This is…a lot,” he says softly, tapping the edge of the binder. “And it’s sweet. Really. But I still don’t think—”

“Changbin,” you interrupt, already shaking your head. “You think too much. That’s the problem.”

He laughs under his breath. “You’re saying that to a man?”

“Forget about gender,” you shoot back.

He raises his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay. But believing in love because of museums and movies feels optimistic.”

“It’s not about the museums,” you argue, stepping closer, animated. “It’s about shared experiences. About choosing to care. You already do that—you just refuse to call it love.”

“That’s different,” he says gently. “I care about people. Kids. I just don’t think romance is anything more than—”

“—chemicals,” you finish for him, rolling your eyes.

You go back and forth like this, voices calm but insistent, neither of you angry. He’s respectful, thoughtful, and frustratingly reasonable. And you can feel him slipping back into that emotional distance you hate—the polite wall he keeps up so no one gets hurt.

So you sigh and pull out the final card.

“Fine,” you say, flipping to the very last page in the binder. “Do it as a favor.”

He blinks. “A favor.”

“Yes,” you say, nodding seriously. “For me. For the weeks I had to lie in bed, listening to your…escapades. For my trauma.”

His mouth opens. Closes.

“That’s—” He laughs, incredulous. “That’s not fair.”

“Oh, it absolutely is,” you say sweetly. “I’m not asking you to change your worldview. I’m asking you to follow an itinerary. Museums. Movies. Conversations. That’s it.”

He studies you for a long moment, searching your face for something—pressure, expectation, a trap. You give him none of it. Just hopeful stubbornness.

Finally, he exhales, rubbing his jaw.

“You’re impossible.”

You grin. “You already knew that.”

He glances at the binder again, then back at you. “If I do this,” he says carefully, “it doesn’t mean I’ll believe in love at the end.”

“I know,” you say, softer now. “I just want you to try.”

Another pause. Then, reluctantly, fondly, Changbin nods.

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll do it. For you.”

Your heart leaps, ridiculous and triumphant.

You don’t notice it yet—but that’s already the most dangerous thing he’s said.

You’re sprawled on Changbin’s living room floor with your binder open between you like it’s sacred text.

“This,” you say, pointing dramatically, “is where you confuse lust with love.”

Changbin snorts from the couch. “Already accusing me. We’re five minutes in.”

“You said romantic love is just chemicals,” you continue, undeterred. “Lust is chemicals. Dopamine. Adrenaline. That whole mess.”

“And love isn’t?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. “Oxytocin doesn’t exist now?”

“It exists,” you say, sitting up straighter. “But love stays. Lust shows up, wrecks your sleep schedule, and leaves through the fire exit.”

He laughs. “Wow. That’s harsh.”

“You’ve literally demonstrated this for weeks,” you say, gesturing vaguely toward the shared wall.

“Ouch,” he says, hand to his chest. “Attacked in my own home.”

You grin. “See? Lust jokes don’t hurt. Love arguments do.”

He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “Okay, then explain heartbreak. If love is so real, why does it end so badly so often?”

You don’t hesitate. “Because it mattered.”

He pauses. You see it land.

“If it was just chemicals,” you go on, softer now, “people wouldn’t grieve it like a death. You don’t mourn caffeine withdrawal for years.”

“That depends,” he mutters. “Have you talked to me before coffee?”

You throw a pillow at him. He catches it easily, laughing, but his expression shifts to thoughtful again.

“So you’re saying,” he says slowly, “lust is instinct, love is choice?”

“Yes,” you say immediately. “Choice. Action. Staying when it’s inconvenient. You already do that with everyone who lives here except yourself.”

He looks at you for a long moment. “That’s unfair.”

You shrug. “Truth usually is.”

Silence settles—not awkward, just full. Then he smiles, small and genuine.

“You know,” he says, “for someone arguing for love, you’re very aggressive about it.”

“Passion,” you correct. “Another thing you confuse.”

He laughs, shaking his head, and for a second it feels easy. Too easy. Like something is quietly shifting under the jokes.

Changbin flips the binder closed with one finger, like he’s drawing a line in the sand.

“Okay,” he says, sitting back. “My turn.”

You narrow your eyes. “I knew this was coming.”

He smiles, slow and thoughtful. “If love is real—if it’s more than chemicals and habit—why does it fade? Why do people wake up one day and feel nothing? My parents didn’t stop choosing each other all at once. It just drained out.”

The room goes quiet.

For the first time tonight, you don’t immediately answer. You blink, mouth opening, then closing again. He watches you carefully—not smug, not triumphant. Just curious. Waiting.

You exhale, then sit cross-legged, grounding yourself.

“Okay,” you say slowly. “That’s a good question.”

He lifts an eyebrow. “High praise.”

You ignore that. “Love doesn’t fade because it was fake. It fades when people stop protecting it.”

He waits for you to continue.

“It’s like language,” you say, seeing him not immediately rejecting the idea. “If you grow up bilingual and stop speaking one language, it doesn’t mean it never existed. It just means you stopped practicing. Love needs attention. Maintenance. Effort. When people assume it should survive on memory alone, it starves.”

Changbin doesn’t interrupt.

“Your parents didn’t fall out of love,” you finish quietly. “They stopped feeding it.”

Silence stretches.

Changbin looks away, jaw tight, eyes unfocused like he’s somewhere else entirely. When he looks back at you, his teasing is gone.

“That’s not fair,” he says again, but this time it’s softer. “You’re not supposed to have an answer for that.”

You shrug, gentler now. “You asked.”

He lets out a slow breath, leaning back against the couch. “I hate that that makes sense.”

You smile faintly. “You don’t hate it. You’re scared of it.”

He doesn’t deny it.

The moment lingers—quiet, heavy, unfinished—until a knock cuts through it.

Changbin glances at the door, then at his phone on the table. He taps the screen, and the time lights up.

“Oh,” he says. “…Right.”

You don’t need him to explain. You’re already reaching for your binder, stacking papers with exaggerated calm.

“It’s fine,” you say lightly. “Your chemistry experiment has arrived.”

He winces. “You don’t have to—”

“I absolutely do,” you reply, sliding everything back into your tote. “Can’t interrupt your ongoing research.”

He laughs, rubbing the back of his neck. “I swear the timing just—”

“—is impeccable?” you finish, grinning. “Tragic, really.”

The knock comes again. You’re already on your feet.

“I’ll get it,” you say, breezing past him before he can stop you.

You open the door to find her standing there—one you haven’t seen before. Pretty, put together, clearly expecting a very different scene. Her eyes flick past you, confused.

“Oh—” she starts.

You smile warmly. “Hi! I’m his neighbor.”

Her confusion deepens. “Neighbor?”

“Yep,” you say cheerfully. “We were just…debating.”

Changbin groans softly behind you. “Please don’t say it like that.”

You glance back at him, amused. “Love versus lust. Very academic.”

The girl blinks.

You step aside, grabbing your bag. “Anyway, have fun. Walls are thin,” you add, sing-song sweet, then look at Changbin. “Remember—moderate volume. For science.”

He laughs despite himself. “You’re evil.”

“Convincingly loving,” you correct.

As you pass him, your fingers brush his arm—unintentional, fleeting. His smile falters for just a second.

You don’t look back as you head down the hall, heart doing something inconvenient in your chest.

Behind you, the door closes.

Movie night turns out to be a terrible idea.

Not because the rom-com is bad—honestly, it’s doing its job just fine—but because Changbin cannot shut up.

Five minutes in, he leans over and whispers, “Statistically, there’s no way she trips into his arms again.”

You shove popcorn into his mouth without looking. “Chew. Quietly.”

He chews loudly on purpose.

On screen, the leads make eye contact in the rain.

“Oh come on,” Changbin mutters. “If that were real life, someone would be getting pneumonia.”

You hiss his name. He grins.

Another dramatic pause. Swelling music. The almost-kiss.

He gasps dramatically. “Wait, is this the scene where they misunderstand each other because no one communicates like an adult?”

You grab a fistful of popcorn and stuff it into his mouth harder this time. “If you ruin this for me—”

He muffles, “Mmph. Aggressive affection. Interesting love language.”

An elderly woman in front of you slowly turns around. Her glare could curdle milk.

“Shhh,” she says, deadly serious.

Changbin straightens instantly. “Sorry, ma’am.”

She turns back.

He leans toward you again, whispering, “See? Even she believes in love. That look was passion.”

You snort despite yourself. “You’re impossible.”

He steals popcorn from your bucket. “Yet here I am. On a date.”

“This is not a date.”

“Sure,” he says lightly, eyes on the screen. “Then stop smiling.”

You do. Immediately. Obviously.

Ten seconds later, you’re smiling again.

While you’re focused on the screen, Changbin isn’t.

He tells himself he is. He tells himself he’s watching the plot unravel, the predictable arc, the inevitable confession he’s already complained about twice. But his eyes keep drifting sideways, betraying him.

You’re leaning forward slightly, chin resting on your knuckles, eyes bright with focus. The glow from the screen softens your face, catches on your lashes. You smile at something small and earnest on-screen, like you believe in it completely.

Something twists in his chest.

It’s brief. Sharp enough that he notices, but quiet enough that he can dismiss it just as fast. He exhales through his nose and leans back, crossing his arms like that might contain it.

Friendly affection, he tells himself.

That’s all this is.

You’re his neighbor. His debate opponent. The only person who’s ever brought a binder into his apartment with the sole purpose of dismantling his worldview. Of course, he likes you. Anyone would. You’re funny. Passionate. Annoyingly convincing.

That doesn’t mean anything.

Still, his gaze flicks back to you when you laugh softly at a joke in the movie, unguarded and warm. He notices the way you tuck your hair behind your ear without thinking. The way your mouth curves when you’re fully absorbed in something you love.

He swallows.

You’re pretty, he thinks, then immediately corrects himself.

No. You’re beautiful.

The realization lands heavier than he expects. He shifts in his seat, jaw tightening, forcing his eyes back to the screen just as the characters on-screen finally kiss.

“Unrealistic,” he mutters automatically, more to ground himself than to tease.

You don’t hear him. You’re too busy smiling.

And that feeling in his chest—he doesn’t name it. He presses it down, buries it under logic and habit and old conclusions.

But it lingers anyway.

Quiet. Stubborn.

Waiting for him to slip up.

The museum trip is your idea. Obviously.

You march Changbin through the entrance like you’re leading a field trip, pamphlets already in hand. “Okay,” you announce, “today’s theme is Love as Artistic Motivation.”

He squints at the banner overhead. “I thought today’s theme was ‘I get dragged places against my will.’”

“Same thing,” you say brightly.

You start with classical paintings: lovers frozen mid-glance, tragic embraces, dramatic yearning. Changbin tilts his head at one canvas, arms crossed.

“See,” he says, “this guy looks miserable. That’s not love. That’s bad communication.”

“That,” you reply, pointing, “is devotion.”

“That,” he counters, pointing right back, “is neck pain.”

You move on to sculptures. Marble bodies leaning into each other, hands eternally inches apart.

“Explain this,” you say triumphantly.

He circles one slowly. “Okay, but imagine holding that pose forever. My arms would fall off. Romance ruined.”

You groan. “You’re impossible.”

He grins. “You love it.”

You pause. “Don’t say that.”

He raises his hands. “Friendly affection.”

In the modern art wing, you stop in front of an abstract piece—chaotic colors, overlapping shapes.

Changbin studies it. “This looks like what you described heartbreak feels like.”

You blink. “Okay, rude, but also accurate. I’ll be sure to tell my therapist you’re available for guest lectures.”

You read plaques aloud with dramatic flair. He pretends to yawn. You threaten him with the pamphlet. At one point, he catches you staring a little too long at a painting of two people dancing, faces soft, unaware of the world.

“You’re imagining us in that one, aren’t you?” he teases.

You scoff. “Please. That guy’s posture is terrible.”

But you don’t move on right away.

By the time you exit through the gift shop—him holding a postcard you forced on him “for reference,” you buzzing with victory—he sighs.

“I still don’t believe in romantic love,” he says.

You smile, satisfied anyway. “You don’t have to. Art already does.”

He doesn’t argue.

You’re still basking in your artistic victory lap when it happens.

You’re standing a little too close to Changbin, both of you arguing about whether a painting is “yearning” or “emotional constipation”, when an elderly couple shuffles up beside you. They’re holding hands, matching hats, the whole lethal combo.

“So sweet,” the old woman says warmly. “Young love.”

You and Changbin freeze.

“Oh—no,” you say at the exact same time he says, “We’re not—”

“—together,” you both finish, overlapping again.

The couple beams harder.

“Oh, you remind us of us,” the old man says, squeezing his wife’s hand. “Always bickering.”

“We fought all the time,” the woman adds cheerfully. “Still do.”

“Sixty years,” the man says proudly.

Changbin chokes. “Sixty?”

“Married at twenty-two,” she continues. “Everyone said love wouldn’t last. Look at us now.”

You and Changbin exchange a look—pure panic, mirrored perfectly.

“That’s amazing,” you manage.

“You’ll see,” she says knowingly, patting your arm. “You’re already halfway there.”

Changbin bows so fast he nearly throws his back out. “Thank you, but we’re really just friends.”

“Yes, yes,” the woman says, waving him off. “That’s how it starts.”

They shuffle away, still cooing.

The silence afterward is deafening.

You bow politely in their direction, then turn to Changbin, eyes gleaming. “Sixty years.”

He groans. “Absolutely not.”

“Exhibit A,” you say, pointing after the couple. “Love. Real. Durable.”

“That’s survivor bias,” he mutters.

“You’re just scared,” you sing.

He sighs, rubbing his face. “Why are strangers emotionally attacking me today?”

You grin as you walk on. “Because love is persistent.”

Behind you, Changbin shakes his head, but he doesn’t argue.

And you count that as another win.

You’re still mid-argument by the time you reach the apartment complex.

“Sixty years,” you repeat, jabbing the elevator button like it personally offended you. “That’s not a fluke. That’s commitment.”

“That’s endurance,” Changbin counters, stepping in beside you. “Very different skill set.”

The elevator dings, mercifully saving you from yourselves. You’re both grinning now, the fight purely recreational.

His phone rings halfway down the hall.

Changbin checks the screen. “Tattoo shop.”

You gesture grandly. “Put it on speaker. Let me hear more evidence that I’m right. If someone’s getting their ex’s name covered, that’s not heartbreak—it’s asset protection.”

He answers anyway. “Yeah?”

A pause. Then his mouth twists.

“…A name?” He exhales. “How big?” Another pause. “Mm. Yeah. Classic.”

He hangs up and looks at you like he’s been handed a winning argument.

“You called it,” he says. “Someone wants their ex’s name covered up. Love isn’t real. It’s a bad decision with a budget.”

You scoff. “Wrong.”

“Oh?” He crosses his arms. “Convince me.”

“They loved hard,” you say immediately. “Hard enough to put it on their body. You don’t permanently mark yourself over something fake.”

“Or,” he says, “they were young and impulsive.”

“And now they’re hurting,” you shoot back. “Because it mattered. If love wasn’t real, breakups wouldn’t cost money.”

He laughs despite himself. “That’s the worst argument you’ve made.”

“It’s also flawless,” you insist. “No one gets a cover-up for a casual crush.”

Changbin slows outside his door, considering it. “Still seems inefficient.”

“Love isn’t efficient,” you say. “It’s meaningful.”

He opens his door, shaking his head. “You’re exhausting.”

“You’re welcome.”

He pauses before stepping inside. “Same time tomorrow?”

Your heart jumps, but you keep your tone light. “Obviously. You still owe me movie number three.”

He smiles, easy and warm, and disappears into his apartment.

You linger in the hallway a second longer than necessary, keys cold in your hand, watching Changbin disappear into his apartment.

The door closes with a soft click.

And that’s when it hits you.

This isn’t just a crush anymore. It’s not just banter, stubborn debates, or proving a point. It’s the way you look for him without meaning to. The way your chest feels lighter when he laughs and heavier when he doesn’t. The way you keep building arguments for love that sound suspiciously like confessions.

That realization scares you enough that you finally turn away.

Inside your apartment, the silence greets you like an accusation. You lean back against the door, eyes shut, heart doing something reckless.

Don’t, you tell yourself.

He warned you. He drew the line. You’re the one choosing to walk closer.

Next door, Changbin drops onto his couch like gravity finally remembered him.

He stares at the ceiling for a beat, exhales, then pulls out his phone—meaning to distract himself, to scroll, to reset. Instead, he opens his camera roll.

Museum photos. Abstract art. Sculptures. A blurry shot of a plaque he definitely doesn’t remember reading. He swipes idly, then stops.

There you are.

Laughing mid-argument, eyes bright, hand frozen in a dramatic gesture. Another one: you squinting at a painting, head tilted, completely absorbed. He doesn’t remember taking them. He remembers wanting to.

Changbin swallows.

He tells himself it’s nothing. Familiarity. Comfort. He tells himself a lot of things.

Still, his thumb hovers, then goes back. Lingers. Zooms in without permission.

“Idiot,” he mutters, locking the phone and tossing it aside.

He stares at the ceiling again, chest tight in a way that feels suspiciously like the thing he doesn’t believe in.

That night, on either side of the wall, you both lie awake longer than usual.

And neither of you is ready to admit that something has already started.

And then things change.

A text pushed back an hour. Then another one canceled entirely.

Sorry—shop’s busy.

Rain check?

Next week for sure.

Next week never comes.

You still see him, technically. In passing. A flash of a black T-shirt on the stairwell. The sound of his door opening and closing at odd hours. Laughter bleeds through the wall again. Different voices. Familiar pattern.

Changbin buries himself.

In work first. You hear about it from neighbors before you hear it from him—late nights at the tattoo shop, double bookings, cover-ups stacked back to back. He looks more tired when you do catch a glimpse, shadows under his eyes, smile still there but thinner. Polite. Distant.

The women come back.

You don’t need proof. You recognize the cadence now. You sit on your bed staring at the wall, jaw tight, heart doing something stupid and bruised.

You tell yourself it’s fine. This is exactly what you knew would happen. He said he doesn’t do relationships. He didn’t promise you anything. You were the one who brought binders and belief into his apartment like a fool.

Still, it hurts.

And next door, Changbin knows exactly what he’s doing.

He stays late on purpose. Says yes when he should say no. Lets distraction pile up until there’s no room left to think. When he’s alone, the photos on his phone feel too loud. When he’s not, the silence afterward feels worse.

He calls it coping.

He calls it habits.

He calls it anything but what it is.

Avoidance.

Because every time he thinks about you—laughing in the museum, arguing on his floor, looking at him like love is something he could still learn—his chest tightens in a way that scares him more than loneliness ever has.

So he runs.

The problem starts with one drink.

Then another.

Then the third, which you absolutely did not need but finished anyway because your thoughts were loud and your apartment was too quiet. The wall stays silent tonight.

You check your phone.

Working late, he’d said earlier.

You hear a thud from next door.

You laugh into your glass, humorless. “Liar,” you tell the room.

By the time you slip on your shoes, you’ve decided this is less a bad idea and more a necessary confrontation. Liquid courage counts as courage. Probably.

You knock on his door harder than you mean to.

Nothing.

You knock again, swaying slightly. “Changbin,” you call, muffled by the wood. “Open up. I know you’re in there.”

There’s a pause. Then the door opens.

Changbin blinks at you, startled. He’s fully dressed, hair soft and undone, the glow of the TV spilling out behind him. The sound is low—some late-night documentary murmuring calmly about marine life or history or anything other than a rom-com.

“Oh,” he says. “Hey.”

You stare at him, then past him. At the couch. The blanket.

“You’re not at work,” you say flatly.

He hesitates just long enough. “I got home early.”

You laugh, sharp and tipsy. “Funny. You couldn’t come over early. Or text. Or—” You gesture vaguely between your apartments. “Exist.”

Changbin’s expression tightens, guilt flashing before he smooths it away. “You’ve been drinking.”

“Congratulations,” you say. “You still have eyes.”

He steps aside automatically. “Come in before you fall over.”

“I’m not—” You stumble slightly. “Fine. Maybe I am.”

You walk past him, pointing accusingly as you go. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

He closes the door softly, like volume control matters. “I haven’t.”

“Oh, please,” you scoff, turning on him. “You canceled movies. Museums. Arguments. Lunch. You disappeared into work and random women like it’s a full-time job.”

He winces. “That’s not fair.”

You laugh again, voice wobbling now. “Neither is ghosting your friend.”

Silence.

The TV hums quietly behind you.

Changbin exhales slowly, rubbing his face. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

“But you did,” you say, quieter now. “So congrats. Very efficient.”

He runs a hand through his hair, pacing once like he’s trying to bleed the tension out of his body.

“I didn’t ask for this,” he says carefully at first. Too carefully. “I didn’t ask you to insert yourself into my life and start trying to fix me.”

The word lands harder than anything he’s said tonight.

You straighten, blinking. “I wasn’t fixing you. I was helping.”

He lets out a short laugh, incredulous. “By what? Giving me homework? Debates? A syllabus on how to feel?”

“Yes,” you snap back, stepping closer. “Because you shut yourself off, Changbin. You pretend you’re fine, but you’re terrified of wanting something real.”

“That’s not true,” he says quickly.

“It is,” you insist. “And I didn’t do it for fun. I did it because I care about you.”

Something in his face shifts at that—panic, maybe—but it hardens just as fast.

“I don’t need help,” he says, louder now. “I didn’t ask to be your project.”

Your chest tightens. “You think this was a project?”

“What else was it?” he fires back. “You deciding I’m broken because I don’t want the same things you do?”

“I never said you were broken,” you say, voice shaking now. “I said you were scared.”

He stops pacing and looks at you, jaw clenched.

“I’m happy,” he says, voice rising despite himself. “I like my life. I like my work. I like not promising things I can’t keep. I like not waking up one day and realizing I ruined someone because I tried to believe in something I don’t.”

The words hit like glass.

“Then why run?” you ask softly. “Why avoid me?”

He opens his mouth, then closes it.

Because the answer is standing right in front of him, eyes too bright, heart too open. Because you make things feel real in a way he doesn’t know how to control.

Instead, he says, “Because you don’t listen.”

You laugh, hollow. “I listened to everything you said. I just didn’t agree.”

Silence crashes between you, heavy and messy and full of everything neither of you wants to admit.

The TV keeps murmuring uselessly in the background.

His frustration finally snaps.

“Maybe this isn’t about love at all,” Changbin says, voice sharper now, words coming faster. “Maybe you’re just…jealous.”

It’s tossed out casually at first like a theory, like he’s testing it in the air between you.

“Because it kind of feels like you like me,” he adds, shrugging like it’s no big deal. “And you don’t like that I don’t—”

The room goes silent.

Your breath catches so hard it’s embarrassing. You stare at him, and whatever expression crosses your face gives you away instantly. There’s no covering it. No joke. No argument ready.

Changbin freezes. “Oh,” he says quietly.

The realization hits him all at once, crashing straight through his defenses. His jaw slackens, chest tight, eyes searching your face like he’s hoping he’s wrong.

“Wait,” he says, panic creeping in. “I didn’t mean it like that. I shouldn’t have—”

You step back. “Don’t,” you say, voice trembling but firm. “Don’t try to take it back now.”

“I’m sorry,” he rushes out. “I didn’t think—I wasn’t trying to hurt you—”

“You did,” you cut in. The words sting your throat on the way out. “And you’re right. I do like you. Which is exactly why I shouldn’t be here.”

He takes a step toward you instinctively. “You don’t have to go—”

“Yes,” you say, already reaching for the door. “I do.”

Your hand shakes as you open it. You don’t look at him again.

“Leave me alone, Changbin,” you say softly. “You’re good at that anyway.”

The door closes behind you before he can answer.

Changbin stands there in the quiet, heart pounding, the weight of what he said echoing louder than any argument—knowing, too late, that calling it jealousy was the first honest thing he’s admitted in years.

The first text comes an hour later.

Bin: Did you make it home okay?

You see it light up your phone while you’re brushing your teeth. You flip the screen face down and don’t answer.

The next day, he tries again. Casual. Safe.

Bin: So when’s the next “love seminar”? Museum round two?

Nothing.

That evening, a joke.

Bin: I just walked past a flower shop and thought, “wow, she’d definitely use this as evidence.”

Three dots never appear.

Changbin stares at the screen longer than he should, thumb hovering, then drops the phone onto the couch like it burned him. He tells himself you’re busy. You’ll cool off. You always bounce back. You’re stubborn, not gone.

Except you are.

You rearrange your life with surgical precision. Longer hours at work. Extra clients. You say yes to things you used to put off. You come home late, leave early, and if you hear his door open, you turn the other way. When you pass him once in the stairwell, you nod politely like he’s just another neighbor.

That hurts more than yelling would have.

Three days later, his resolve cracks.

Bin: I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.

The next day.

Bin: I shouldn’t have said that.

And then the day after.

Bin: I miss you.

You read them over and over, chest tight, fingers numb.

You don’t reply. You archive the conversation like it’s a closed chapter, even though it feels unfinished.

Changbin throws himself into work again. Late nights. Ink-stained hands. Clients who tell him their worst stories and leave pieces of themselves behind. He listens. He’s good at that.

But when he’s alone, his phone always ends up in his hand.

Museum photos. You laughing. You arguing. You looking at art like it’s speaking directly to you. He tells himself he’s just deleting clutter.

He never does.

Instead, he scrolls back. Lingers. Zooms in. Then locks the screen and stares at the ceiling, jaw tight, heart heavy.

On either side of the wall, life goes on.

Just not together.

At first, Changbin does what he always does.

He fills the space.

A text sent. A door opened. Someone new stepping into his apartment with an easy smile and expectations he knows how to meet. It should work. It used to work. Familiar motions. Familiar laughter. A practiced version of himself that never asks for more.

But it’s different now.

The moment they sit on his couch, he’s aware of the wall.

Of you on the other side of it.

Every laugh feels too loud. Every touch feels misplaced. When someone leans into him, his chest tightens—not with excitement, but with a strange, creeping discomfort. He finds himself listening instead of participating, mind drifting to whether you can hear this, whether you’re awake, whether this is hurting you.

It ruins everything.

One night, in the middle of a kiss, he pulls back without thinking.

“Sorry,” he says quickly, already standing. “I—this isn’t a good time.”

She looks confused. Hurt. He apologizes, because he always does. He lets her leave with grace, with kindness, with no explanation that would make sense.

After that, he tries again. Once more. Just to be sure. Same result.

The wall feels louder than any sound ever did before.

Eventually, he stops answering messages. Stops inviting people over. Stops pretending that distraction feels like freedom. The quiet settles in—not peaceful, but honest.

He lies on his couch at night, staring at the ceiling, phone in his hand, your photos open again without him remembering how he got there. You smiling. You arguing. You looking at him like he was something worth fighting for.

His chest aches now when he thinks of you.

And there’s no one left to blame for it but himself.

Changbin doesn’t numb it.

He lets it hurt.

You’re not doing any better.

It hits you at the most inconvenient times—standing in line for coffee, halfway through answering an email, brushing your teeth before bed. Something small reminds you of him, and suddenly your chest aches so sharply you have to stop what you’re doing.

You cry quietly when you think about how close you got. Every “lesson” you dragged him into hadn’t felt like a project at all. It felt like dates. Like choosing each other, even if neither of you ever said the word out loud.

That’s what hurts the most. Because it was real to you.

You fell in love somewhere between banter and honesty, between shared popcorn and quiet glances. You fell in love with the way he listened, the way he cared without realizing it, the way he tried to protect himself so hard it broke something anyway.

And now you hate yourself for it. You hate that you started it. That you knocked on his door with a binder and belief and hope like you weren’t walking straight toward a cliff. You tell yourself you should’ve listened when he said he didn’t do relationships. You should’ve stayed just neighbors. Just friendly. Just safe.

Instead, you wanted more.

You curl up in bed, wishing you could go back to when the silence didn’t hurt. When wanting him felt harmless.

Now it feels like grief. And the worst part—the part you don’t say out loud—is that even if you could do it over again, you’re not sure you’d choose differently.

Two months is supposed to be enough time to move on.

That’s what you tell yourself as you walk back to the apartment complex, heels clicking, arm loosely trapped in Eunwoo’s grasp. He’s handsome in a way that feels rehearsed: perfect smile, perfect hair, and perfectly aware of it. Dinner had been fine. Conversation less so. He talked about himself like he was pitching a brand.

You’re tired. More than tired. You’re done.

At your door, you fish for your keys, already planning your polite goodbye. Eunwoo steps closer instead, crowding your space, smile turning confident.

“So,” he says, leaning in, “should we keep the night going?”

“No,” you reply lightly, stepping back.

He follows.

“I had a really good time,” he insists, hand brushing your wrist, then your waist.

“I didn’t say I didn’t,” you say, firmer now. “But I’m going inside.”

He laughs like you’re joking and leans in again, clearly expecting compliance.

“Hey,” you snap, pushing his chest. “Get off.”

Your voice echoes down the hallway, sharp and unmistakable.

The door next door opens immediately.

He’d been listening since he heard your soft voice travel down the hallway.

Changbin steps out of his apartment, eyes immediately locking onto the scene—Eunwoo too close, your posture rigid, your hand still braced against his chest. The shift in Changbin’s expression is instant. Gone is hesitation. Gone is distance.

“Is everything okay?” he asks, voice calm but edged with something dangerous.

Eunwoo scoffs, straightening. “We’re fine, man. Just saying goodnight.”

You don’t hesitate. “I told him to stop.”

That’s all it takes.

Changbin steps fully into the hallway, placing himself just slightly between you and Eunwoo. He doesn’t touch you, just makes himself unmistakably present.

“She said stop,” Changbin says evenly. “So stop.”

Eunwoo bristles. “This is between us.”

Changbin meets his gaze without blinking. “Not anymore.”

The silence stretches. Finally, Eunwoo throws his hands up. “Whatever. Didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”

“I don’t,” you say flatly.

Changbin doesn’t correct him.

Eunwoo mutters something under his breath and storms off, footsteps fading fast.

The hallway goes quiet, and you’re suddenly very aware of your breathing. Of Changbin standing close. Of how familiar and unfamiliar that feels all at once.

“You okay?” he asks, softer now, turning to you.

You nod, swallowing. “Yeah. I am now. Thank you.”

He hesitates, like there are a hundred things he wants to say and none of them feel safe. Finally, he nods.

“Good,” he says. “If you ever—” He stops himself, then exhales. “Just knock. Okay?”

Your chest tightens, but you don’t respond.

As you turn back to your door, fingers fumbling with your keys, Changbin doesn’t move away.

“So,” he says, quieter now. “Have you been going on dates?”

The question makes your shoulders tense. “Yes,” you answer shortly, metal clinking as you miss the lock the first time.

He hesitates, then asks, “Do you—are they…good?”

That does it.

You stop trying to unlock the door and turn on him, frustration sharp and sudden. “What do you want, Changbin?”

He looks startled by the directness, like he didn’t expect to be called out so plainly. For a second, he says nothing. Then his voice drops.

“I’ve missed you,” he admits. “The past two months. I think about you. A lot.”

Your chest tightens, anger flaring hot enough to burn through the ache. “You don’t get to say that now.”

“I’m just being honest—”

“No,” you cut in. “You were honest when you avoided me. When you canceled. When you disappeared.”

He winces. “You didn’t text back.”

You laugh, bitter. “Because you made it very clear where I stood.”

“That’s not—”

“You don’t do relationships,” you remind him. “You don’t need help. You’re happy. Remember?”

He opens his mouth, then closes it.

You turn back to your door, finally finding the lock. “I’m your neighbor, Changbin. That’s it. That’s all I ever was.”

The words land between you, heavy and final.

As the door closes, he stands there in the hallway, realizing too late that distance was the one thing he asked for—and now it’s the only thing you’re willing to give.

You don’t even make it halfway to your bedroom before there’s a knock.

You freeze, hand still on the strap of your bag. For a moment, you consider pretending you didn’t hear it. Then it comes again.

You open the door just enough to glare at him. “Changbin, go home.”

“I can’t,” he says quietly.

“That’s not my problem.”

You try to shut the door, but he steps forward, determined. His hand braces the doorframe, and slips inside with an apology already on his lips.

“I’m sorry,” he says quickly. “I just—please. I need to say this.”

“Changbin,” you warn, heart pounding. “You can’t just—”

“I know,” he interrupts, gentle but urgent. “I know. And if you tell me to leave again, I will. I swear. Just…let me say it first.”

You stand there, torn between anger and exhaustion, before opening the door wider, letting him in. You watch him take in your apartment like it’s something fragile. He doesn’t touch anything. Doesn’t move closer. He just looks at you like he’s been carrying a thought for two months and it’s finally gotten too heavy.

“I messed up,” he says. No jokes this time. No deflection. “I thought distance would fix it. I thought if I buried it long enough, it would go away.”

You cross your arms. “And?”

“And it didn’t,” he admits. “It got louder.”

The silence stretches.

“You told me to leave you alone,” he continues softly. “I tried. But seeing you tonight—someone else touching you like that—” He swallows. “I realized I don’t get to pretend anymore.”

Your voice shakes despite yourself. “Pretend what?”

“That I don’t feel anything,” he says.

The word hangs there, fragile.

You look away, jaw tight. “You don’t get to decide this now.”

“I know,” he says immediately. “I’m not asking you to forgive me. Or to believe me. I just needed you to know.”

You finally meet his eyes. They’re earnest. Unarmed. Terrified.

“Know what?” you ask.

“I was wrong,” Changbin says.

The words come out steady, but his hands give him away—fists opening and closing at his sides like he’s bracing for impact.

“I know I said I didn’t believe in love,” he continues, voice low. “I know I said it was confusion, chemistry, convenience. I was wrong.” He swallows. “Because whatever this is—what I feel when I think about you—it’s not any of that.”

You don’t move. You don’t trust yourself to.

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” he says, the admission raw. “Everything reminds me of you. Movies. Shows. Something I see on my way home. Music. Arguments I rehearse in my head like you’re still there to interrupt me.” A breath, shaky. “I tried to bury it. Work. Women. Silence. None of it worked.”

He takes a step closer, careful, like he’s approaching something fragile.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “For everything. For making you feel small that night. For acting like you were a problem I needed distance from. For pushing you away because I was scared of wanting something I couldn’t control.”

Your chest tightens; your eyes burn.

“I know I hurt you,” he goes on. “And I know apologies don’t erase that. But I need you to know I see it now. I see you.” His voice cracks, just barely. “And I can’t spend another day pretending I don’t.”

He stops in front of you.

“I don’t want to not talk to you,” Changbin says softly. “I don’t want to not see you. I don’t want another day where you’re just a wall away, and I act like that’s enough.”

The room is quiet except for your breathing—uneven and unsteady.

“I’m in love with you,” he says. “And that scares me. But losing you scares me more.”

You swallow, arms crossing tighter over your chest like you’re holding yourself together.

“What about the women?” you ask quietly. “The ones you buried yourself in.”

Changbin doesn’t flinch. If anything, he looks relieved you asked.

“I stopped,” he says immediately. “After the first week you stopped answering me.” He shakes his head. “It felt wrong. Every time. I couldn’t do it knowing you were on the other side of the wall, not talking to me.”

You hesitate. “You expect me to just believe that?”

“No,” he says quickly. “I don’t.”

He pulls his phone out of his pocket like it’s been waiting there for this moment. Unlocks it. Opens his messages. Then, almost too fast, he presses it into your hand.

“Look,” he says. “I deleted the contacts. I stopped replying. I stopped inviting anyone over. I didn’t do it for points. I did it because it made me feel sick.”

You scroll despite yourself. Empty threads. Names erased. Unanswered messages left on read weeks ago.

His voice is tight now. “I know this doesn’t erase anything. And I know you don’t owe me trust just because I say I changed.”

You hand the phone back slowly, skepticism still buzzing in your chest. “People say things when they’re scared of losing someone.”

“I know,” he says. “That’s why I’m not asking you to take my word for it.”

He looks at you—really looks at you—eyes open, unguarded in a way you’ve never seen before.

“Tell me what to do,” Changbin says softly. “Not grand gestures. Not promises I don’t understand yet.” A breath. “What can I do to show you I’m in love with you?”

There’s no confidence in the question. No charm. Just honesty. And fear. And hope tangled together.

You stand there, heart racing, realizing this is the part where belief becomes terrifying. Because whether you do or don’t answer, things have already changed.

You take a breath, steadying yourself.

“Consistency,” you say finally. “That’s what I need.”

Changbin stills, listening like every word matters.

“I don’t need promises about forever,” you continue. “I don’t need labels or grand declarations. I need you to show up the same way tomorrow as you are right now. I need you to respect my boundaries. To be okay if I’m not ready. To not disappear the moment things get uncomfortable.”

He nods immediately. “Okay.”

“You don’t get to rush me,” you add. “And you don’t get to punish me if I need space.”

“I won’t,” he says, voice firm. “I swear.”

You search his face, looking for cracks, for hesitation. There isn’t any, just resolve.

“I’m not saying yes to anything,” you clarify. “Not yet.”

“I know,” Changbin says gently. “And I’m okay with that.”

He steps back, deliberately giving you space. “I’ll be consistent. I’ll be here. And if you tell me to stop, I will. No arguments.”

Something in your chest loosens—not trust yet, but the possibility of it.

You nod slowly. “That’s all I’m asking.”

Changbin exhales, like he’s been holding his breath for months.

“Then that’s what I’ll do,” he says quietly. “As long as it takes.”

He does exactly what he promises.

It starts small. A good-morning text before you even open your eyes. A good night one when you’re half asleep, no pressure attached. It’s him letting you know he’s thinking of you. He never misses a day. Not once.

Every week, without fail, there are flowers. Always fresh. Sometimes sunflowers. Sometimes something soft and pastel. Once, something wild and imperfect that makes you laugh because it’s so Changbin. He never asks if you like them. He just leaves them on your doormat when he knows they’re probably starting to wilt.

On nights you come home late—exhausted, shoes kicked off by the door—there’s a text sent right away.

Bin: I made too much. You hungry?

He hands you containers like it’s the most natural thing in the world. No expectations. No hovering. Just food made with care, still warm, still yours even if you don’t eat it until midnight.

And when you allow him into your home again, he tells you he loves you in a hundred quiet ways.

By asking how your day actually went and listening. By remembering things you said weeks ago. By showing up when he says he will. By never disappearing again.

You still live in your apartment. He still lives in his. The wall remains, but it doesn’t feel like distance anymore.

Some nights, when you’re brushing your teeth or lying in bed, music seeps through the wall. Love songs. Old ones. Soft ones. Sometimes embarrassingly earnest ones. Just loud enough for you to hear.

You smile every time.

He doesn’t rush you. He gives you consistency like it’s sacred. Like it’s the proof you asked for.

And slowly and carefully, you start to believe him. Because love doesn’t have to be loud to be real, sometimes, it just has to keep showing up.

A few weeks into this—into flowers and food and songs through the wall—Changbin finally asks.

It’s not dramatic. No big speech. Just him standing in your doorway, hands a little nervous at his sides.

“Would you…go on a real date with me?” he asks. “No binder this time.”

You don’t even pretend to think about it. “Yes.”

The relief on his face is instant and breathtaking, like he’s been holding his breath since the moment he first knocked on your door months ago.

And then the dates. So many of them.

Late-night street food runs where he insists you try everything and pretends not to notice when you steal bites off his plate. Long walks along the Han River, shoulders brushing, fingers brushing until he finally intertwines his with yours. Quiet cafés where he watches you talk like it’s his favorite pastime. Arcade nights where he’s ridiculously competitive and dramatically offended when you beat him.

They always end with him walking you to your door and lingering like he’s afraid to blink.

And then the kisses start.

The first one is soft, tentative—outside your apartment, his hand hovering at your waist like he’s asking permission even now. You say yes by leaning in.

After that, they happen more easily.

Before you part ways. In the quiet after laughter. Under streetlights. In doorways. Slow, warm, and certain.

And now, every date ends with his forehead pressed to yours, lips finding yours like it’s exactly where they belong. And every time, he pulls back just enough to smile at you like he still can’t believe this is real.

You don’t debate love anymore. You live it.

Date night this time is accidentally themed.

“You wore black,” Changbin says, eyeing your outfit as you step out of your apartment.

“You wore black,” you shoot back.

He looks down at himself, then grins. “We’re coordinated. This is basically destiny.”

“Don’t let it go to your head,” you say, locking the door. “I dressed like this because I was late.”

Dinner is easy. Comfortable. He tells a ridiculous story about a client who brought in three reference photos of completely different people. You laugh so hard you nearly knock over your drink. He dramatically saves it, bowing like he deserves applause.

Outside your apartment, you both linger.

“This was fun,” he says, then pauses, suddenly more serious. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” you say immediately, like you’ve been waiting to say it all night.

His smile is slow, stunned, like he still can’t believe he’s allowed to be this happy. He leans in and kisses you—soft at first, then deeper, laughter caught between breaths when you bump noses.

You pull back just long enough to tug him toward your door. “Do you want to come in?”

He raises an eyebrow, teasing. “Are you inviting me, or is this another experiment?”

You grin. “Strictly practical research.”

He laughs, steps inside with you, and the door clicks shut behind you.

Once inside, you both take your shoes off at the door, quietly and slightly nervous. You both know why you invited him in. 

You walk to the kitchen, feet padding softly against the hardwood floor. “You want something to drink, Bin?” You ask, hearing his own footsteps following.

He follows you, his heart pounding in his chest. The sight of you—your hair slightly disheveled from the walk, cheeks flushed from the cold—or maybe from the kiss outside—it does something to him. "Water is fine," he says softly, his voice slightly hoarse. He leans against the counter, watching you pour two glasses.

 His mind races with thoughts he usually suppresses around you. You hand him the glass, your fingers brushing briefly.

You both drink the water, eyes locked over the rim of the glass. He sets his down at the same time you do, clearing his throat before stepping forward. 

Your eyes stay firmly on his, heart racing.

He reaches out, his hand sliding around your waist, pulling you gently against him. There's no teasing in his touch now, only sincere intent. His other hand comes up to cup your face, thumb brushing your cheek as he leans in. The kiss starts slow—deep, lingering—like he's committing every sensation to memory. His fingers tighten on your waist as he walks you backward until you hit the counter, caging you in gently.

You breathe out a soft sigh when your lips connect, hands gliding up his clothed chest—firm and solid—to wrap around his neck, pulling his face closer to yours. Your fingers play with the hair at the nape of his neck, sending chills down his spine at the sensation.

He responds by pressing even closer, his mouth slanting over yours hungrily. His hands slide down to your hips, gripping hard enough to leave bruises, he hopes. He wants evidence of this on your skin, wants you to wake up tomorrow and remember exactly how he kissed and touched you as if his life depended on it. His tongue slides along your bottom lip, seeking permission and finding it instantly. You part your lips on a gasp, letting him deepen the kiss further.

And then he’s pushing you into the counter harder as he presses the evidence of his desire against your stomach, making you pull away. You try to catch your breath as he trails his lips along the heated skin of your neck. “Bin,” you breathe out, eyes closed and head tilting.

He freezes, listening and waiting. Your neck is bared to him, vulnerable and inviting. He tests it, kissing gently where your pulse point thrums wildly. Once. Twice.

"Yes?" He breathes against your skin, knowing exactly what he's doing. His hands on your hips squeeze possessively, pulling you even closer, your bodies aligned perfectly. "Too much?" He asks softly, nipping your earlobe gently. He knows it's not—your body language is screaming for more.

“Not enough. Need more,” you whisper, clinging to him.“Bedroom,” you manage to say.

He lifts you in his arms and carries you swiftly to the bedroom, his arms wrapped securely around you. The moment you hit the mattress, he follows you down, covering your body with his own. His kisses are frenzied now—mouth moving from your lips to your jaw, down your neck, to your collarbone. His hands are everywhere—roaming over your curves, pulling at your clothes with urgent need. "Too slow?" He pants between kisses, already shrugging off his own jacket and shirt. His abs flex with the movement, drawing your eyes momentarily.

You reach up and drag your fingers along the hard ridges and planes of his chest and abdomen, marveling at the sight of him. “Holy shit, you’re sexy.”

He freezes for a second, surprised and incredibly pleased by your words. Then he's grinning and leaning down against your neck, sucking gently at your pulse point. "You think so?" He murmurs, his hips pressing down against yours deliberately. He's hard and thick behind the fabric of his jeans, and the friction makes you gasp. He rocks against you slowly, torturously. "Or do you need more proof?" His voice is low and seductive, dripping with promise.

“Ugh, you’re annoying,” you say playfully, biting your lip and grinning up at him as he pulls your shirt up and over your head—your pretty lace bra deliberately chosen for this exact moment.

He throws the shirt aside carelessly, his gaze fixed on the delicate fabric covering your chest. His hands hover over the cups, fingers twitching with the urge to touch. "This is cute," he comments, running a finger along the lace edge. "Too cute." His eyes meet yours, dark and intense. "I'm going to ruin it." You nod eagerly, arching your back to give him better access. He unhooks the bra with ease and tosses it aside.

But you don’t give him time to look too long before you’re reaching to pop the button of his jeans open, pulling the zipper down, and palming him through his boxers.

He groans deeply, hips jerking into your touch. "Careful," he warns, but his words are breathless, lacking conviction. His own hands move to your jeans, unbuttoning them with shaking fingers. He hooks his thumbs into the waistband, slowly pulling them down your legs, revealing your matching lace panties. "Goddamn," he mutters, taking in the sight of you half-naked beneath him. He kicks off his own jeans and boxers in one smooth motion. "I'm trying to go slow here."

“I get it, babe. I really do, but you don’t understand how long I’ve needed this,” you say, pulling your panties down and throwing them to the side somewhere.

He watches them go with a hungry expression, his pupils dilated. "How long?" He asks hoarsely, ripping the rest of his clothes off before settling between your legs. His hardness rests against your wet heat, and you both groan at the contact. "Tell me how long you've been wanting this." He moves his hips slowly, sliding against your core. "Because I've been imagining it for a very long time." His confession sends a jolt of pleasure through you.

You pause, looking up at him, eyebrow raised. “Like how long?” You ask.

He pauses, his hips stuttering against yours. "Too long," he admits gruffly, his forehead resting against yours. "Since you smiled at me for the first time.” He kisses you roughly, his tongue sliding against yours. "Too fucking long." His hips move more deliberately now, the head of his cock teasing your entrance. "So if I'm not being gentle right now—"

It’s when he feels how wet you are that he remembers he doesn’t have a condom on, prompting him to pull back.

"Fuck," he curses, his face flushing red. "I'm not— I don't have a condom. Shit." He sits back on his haunches immediately, his breath ragged. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking—" He looks mortified, his hands shaking slightly as he runs them through his hair. "Just give me a second. I'll go get one—" He moves to get up, but you wrap your legs around his waist, stopping him. "What are you doing?" He asks breathlessly.

“Did you use condoms every time with them?” You ask, cheeks tinging red. It was awkward, but you had to know. The fact that he was on his way to get one clued you in, but hearing him say it would ease you.

He freezes completely, then exhales heavily. "Yes," he says immediately. "Always. Every single time.” His eyes soften. "I got tested after the last time. I'm clean." His eyes search yours seriously, seeing your hesitation but also understanding why you're asking.

You use your legs to push his hips forward, trapping his throbbing cock against your wet pussy, looking up at him and nodding.

"Are you...?" He starts, but then you move your hips deliberately, sliding against his length, coating him completely in your wetness, and he loses his train of thought entirely. "Fuck, baby, if we're doing this—" His voice cracks slightly as you lift your hips again, seeking friction.

“Unless you don’t want to…” You trail off, pulling back slightly.

He grabs your hips firmly, pulling you back against him with a sharp intake of breath. "No," he says firmly but gently. "I want this. I want you." His thumb presses against your clit as he positions himself at your entrance again. "Please," he whispers urgently. "Let me feel all of you." His cock head presses against your opening slightly without pushing in fully yet, waiting for permission or encouragement from you.

You reach down and wrap your hand around him, stroking him as you arch up, wanting his lips on yours. He leans down and groans against your mouth as you do, his lips crashing against yours in a desperate kiss. He breaks the kiss to murmur, "Guide me in," against your lips before capturing them again hungrily. His body shakes with restraint as he waits patiently for whatever signal tells him ‘go’.

You moan against his mouth as you tease him by holding him flush against your folds with your palm, rocking your hips up and down the length of him.

"Stop teasing me," he growls into the kiss, his hips jerking involuntarily as he tries to chase the sensation of your pussy sliding along his length. He breaks the kiss again, his forehead resting against yours, breathing heavily. "Fuck, baby—please—just—" He pauses, looking down between them, watching as you continue to torture him. "Put the tip inside. Just a little. Please." His voice cracks on the last word, revealing just how much he wants this—how much he needs you.

You smile, kissing his forehead as he looks down. “Maybe I like teasing you,” you say playfully, wrapping your legs around him tighter.

He groans deeply, his hips moving slightly to rub himself against your slick folds. "Then tease me properly," he retorts softly, his voice strained. "Because if you keep doing that, I'm gonna come just from this—without even being inside you." His tongue slides out to lick your bottom lip. "So if you're gonna torture me, do it right." His hips jerk again, the tip of his cock pressing against your entrance more firmly this time. "Put me inside you. Even if it's just the tip."

You kiss his lips, giving in and guiding the tip of his cock to your entrance. You let go and wrap your arms around him, hands resting on his shoulders. “No, baby. I want you inside me fully.”

He breaks the kiss with a shuddering breath, his hands gripping your hips tightly as he slowly pushes forward. The tip of his cock slips inside you easily due to your wetness and his pre-come coating him. He pauses there, giving you time to adjust before pushing deeper with a low groan. His forehead rests against yours again as he whispers hoarsely, "Is this okay?" His hips are trembling slightly with effort not to thrust fully into you, yet wanting desperately to feel all of yourself around him completely. "Please tell me if I'm hurting—"

“Binnie, please,” you whimper, arching, eyes closing. “I can take you.”

The nickname makes him groan deeply, his hips jerking forward instinctively at the sound. "Fuck," he breathes out, sinking deeper into you slowly but steadily now that you've given permission. He's bigger than anyone you've been with before, stretching you perfectly, but not painfully. 

"You feel so good," he pants against your mouth. "So tight and wet around me." He's finally fully seated inside you now, his hips flush against yours. "I'm not gonna last long like this."

“It’s okay,” you whisper, head pressed back into the pillows, breathing hard as you adjust to his size. “Jesus. No wonder,” you say, thinking back to how many girls he had over. A simple thought has now turned into overthinking. Is he comparing right now?

He notices your sudden stillness and the slight change in your expression. His hands cup your face gently, forcing you to look at him. "Hey," he says softly, kissing you deeply to distract you from whatever thoughts are creeping in.

His hips start moving slowly. Gentle thrusts designed to pleasure rather than going through the motions like he might have done with others. His focus is on you—the only person that matters.

“Stop thinking,” he murmurs against your lips. “Just feel me.”

You look into his eyes and see him staring back just as intensely. You crane your neck up and press your forehead to his. “I love you,” you whisper.

The declaration makes his heart swell in his chest. "I love you too," he says firmly, kissing you deeply before kissing along your neck and up to your ear. “You feel so good on my cock, baby,” he whispers. “Your pussy was made for me.”

And just like that, you’re back in the present with him. His filthy words remind you that he is yours. That he wanted you. 

You tilt your head back into the pillows—gripping the muscles of his back because they’re yours to grip. Kissing his lips because you can. Moaning his name as he hits that spot deep inside you because only you can say his name with that much passion now.

He groans into your kiss as you press your lips to his. Your words—your voice—it's the most erotic sound he's ever heard. He wraps his arms around you tightly, pulling you even closer as he thrusts deeper and slower into you. "Say it again," he demands between kisses, his hips moving in a steady rhythm now. "Say my name again." His voice is low and commanding, yet desperate for the sound. "Please." The word is softly whispered against your lips. "Baby—"

“Bin!” You cry out, head tilted back as he starts snapping his hips into yours. Your breasts bounce with his rhythm, distracting him. He leans down and latches onto your hard peaks, grunting into your sensitive skin. You arch at the feeling, hands flying everywhere on him, too lost in pleasure to know what you're doing.

He groans deeply against your breast, hips stuttering in their rhythm briefly before picking up again. He sucks and bites gently at the sensitive flesh, his hands reaching up to palm your other breast roughly. The sight of you—head thrown back in ecstasy, hands clawing at his skin, breasts bouncing with every thrust—it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. He releases your breast with a wet pop to look up at you, his mouth open and panting.

He watches you, eyes roaming your pretty face as he fucks into you, hips stuttering when your mouth parts erotically. He groans and buries his face in your neck, so close to coming. 

“I’m coming!” You say frantically, already feeling your pussy tightening, the pressure building between your thighs.

"Fuck," he curses against your neck, his arms wrapping around you tightly. He feels your pussy clamp down on him, the rhythmic contractions pulling him deeper. "Come on, baby," he whispers urgently into your ear, his hips moving faster now, chasing his own release as he feels yours building. His hand slides down between your bodies to rub circles over your clit desperately—wanting both of you there together. "Let me feel it," he begs hoarsely against your skin. "Come for me—"

You cut him off with a cry of his name and a high-pitched moan. Your body curls around him, seizing and writhing as you ride your orgasm, his hips never ceasing until you’re lying beneath him, limp and breathing hard.

He kisses you softly before pressing his mouth against your ear. “Can I keep going, baby?” He asks, patiently waiting for your permission to keep thrusting—needing to finish inside you.

You nod weakly, too sensitive to speak.

His hips start moving again immediately, almost apologetic for needing more. He reaches between your legs, gently pushing your knees up and out to give himself deeper access. The new angle hits you just right, causing you to whimper at the feeling of him sliding in and out of you deeper. "Too much?" He asks quietly, checking in despite his own desperate need to come. His hands gently squeeze your inner knees, keeping them open for him. "Want me to stop?"

You shake your head, still breathing hard. 

You can feel the mess between you, hear the steady thlump thlump thlump of his wet skin meeting yours.

The sound drives him absolutely wild, making him groan loudly. "God, listen to us," he pants against your neck, thrusting steadily into your soaked pussy. The wet sounds grow louder as he picks up speed slightly, your bodies sliding perfectly against each other. He buries his face in your neck to muffle his moans against your skin—not wanting to disturb the neighbors with how pornographic it sounds.

You hold him tight against you as his pace starts to get choppy and uneven. “Come inside me,” you whisper into his ear, kissing the side of his head repeatedly.

His entire body tenses at your words—your permission making him snap his hips forward sharply twice before holding deep inside you with a choked cry against your neck. He comes hard and long, filling you completely as his arms shake around you tightly.

The feeling of his release triggers another small orgasm in you unexpectedly—your pussy clamping down on him rhythmically as he empties himself into you completely. He kisses everywhere he can reach while riding out your highs together, deeply connected physically and emotionally, now more than ever before.

The aftermath is familiar.

You’re standing at the foot of the bed holding your end of the fitted sheet while Changbin wrestles with one of the corners, already laughing.

“Okay,” he says, pointing accusingly, “that mess was mostly you.”

You gasp. “Excuse me? You’re the one who—”

“I was responding,” he interrupts, smug. “Very generously.”

You smack his arm. “Unbelievable. Zero accountability.”

He laughs harder, completely unbothered, finally snapping the corner into place like it’s a personal victory. “I’m just saying, if we’re assigning blame—”

“We’re not,” you say firmly. “We’re moving on.”

You both end up tangled in the sheets together, collapsing into laughter that fades into something softer. Changbin reaches for you without thinking, pulling you close, forehead resting against yours.

“I love you,” he says quietly, like it still amazes him.

You smile, thumb tracing lazy patterns on his chest. “I love you too.”

The room settles. The city hums faintly outside.

You curl into him, his arm tightening around you instinctively—exactly where you both belong.

The tattoo shop smells like cleaning supplies, a faintly citrus scent, and freshly brewed coffee. There’s low music playing and a faint buzzing sound somewhere. You hover just inside the door for a second, suddenly aware of yourself, of how personal this space feels compared to the apartment hallways and shared walls you know so well.

You’re basically living together now. Your lease is almost up, which, according to Bin, means it’s a sign to move in officially.

He brings it up casually at first, like it’s just another shared fact of life. “By the way,” he says one night, scrolling on his phone, “you’re not renewing.”

You blink. “I—what?”

He looks up, confused by your confusion. “Your lease. You’re moving in with me.”

“That was not a conversation,” you say.

“It was,” he replies calmly. “You just weren’t present.”

You argue. He nods along, completely unbothered. He’s already made a list. Closet space is divided with alarming confidence. Your mug is already in his cabinet. Your side of the bed already decided.

“You share a wall with me,” he says. “This is the natural next step.”

You point out logistics. He counters with affection.

In the end, he grins, kisses your forehead, and seals it.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “You can still pretend you have your own place.”

You let him win.

Probably because you want that too.

Almost six months of feeling like accidentally winning an argument with the universe and having to live with being right every day.

Although he’s still chaotic and dramatic and loud and far too comfortable with you, he’s also the same gentle, kind, overly generous man you met the day you moved in. He still plays soccer with the neighborhood kids. Still carries groceries for the ajummas. Still fixes things without being asked. Still the greenest flag you’ve ever seen.

The difference now is the way he loves you.

The way his hand finds yours without thinking. The way he checks on you like it’s instinct. The way he looks at you like he can’t believe this is his life—and he somehow won it.

Changbin looks up.

His face lights up instantly, grin spreading. “Hey,” he says, voice softer than you expect in a place full of buzzing machines. “You came.”

“I said I would,” you reply, smiling back. “Took me long enough.”

He steps toward you, stopping short like he is remembering he is at work. “Give me two minutes. Jisung, I’m taking a break.”

“Wow,” a voice says from behind a divider. “Special treatment.”

Jisung emerges, tattoo gun in hand, hair pushed back, eyes immediately flicking to you. He freezes for half a beat, then brightens with interest. “Oh. Hi.”

You laugh politely. “Hi.”

Changbin is already watching this with narrowed eyes.

“I’m Jisung,” he says, flashing a charming smile. “You’re new. Changbin’s girlfriend, or are we still in the mysterious category?”

Before you can answer, Changbin speaks. “She’s my girlfriend.”

The certainty in his tone makes your chest warm.

Jisung blinks, then looks between the two of you. “Oh. Okay. Cool. Cool, cool, cool.” He recovers fast, grin returning. “Still though, you’re really pretty. Had to shoot my shot.”

Changbin steps closer to you without hesitation, one hand settling at your waist. “No need.”

“Wow,” Jisung mutters. “Crazy.”

Changbin does not respond. He just leans down and kisses you, slow and deliberate, enough to leave no room for interpretation.

When he pulls back, Jisung has his hands up in surrender. “I see it. I respect it. I will be over here minding my business.”

You laugh, cheeks warm. “Nice to meet you.”

Jisung grins. “Nice to almost meet you.”

He disappears back behind the divider, still muttering about audacity.

Changbin looks down at you, eyes dark. “I’m not sorry about that.”

“I know,” you say. “It was kind of hot.”

He chuckles, ducking his head. “Come on. I’ll show you around.”

He gives you a tour like he is proud of every corner. His station. His sketches. The way his voice changes when he talks about his work. You watch him talk to clients, gentle and attentive, all steady hands and careful smiles.

When you finally sit beside him, his knee brushing yours, he leans in and whispers, “I like you here.”

You smile. “I like you everywhere.”

He kisses your temple, quick and affectionate. Across the room, Jisung glances over, shakes his head, and goes back to tattooing.

Then you clear your throat. “There’s actually another reason I came,” you say.

He turns to you, curious. “Yeah?”

You take a breath. “I want a tattoo.”

He stares at you again, this time stunned. “From me?”

“Yes,” you say, giggling. “From you.”

His expression softens into something almost reverent. “Are you sure?”

You nod. “I trust you.”

Changbin exhales slowly, smiling like he has been given something precious. “I’d be honored,” he says. Then, quieter, just for you, “And just so you know, that was a trick question. I’ll be the only one touching you. Always.”

Your heart flips at the certainty in his voice.

Changbin is still smiling, still processing the idea of you wanting a tattoo from him, when you pull out a folded sheet of paper from your purse and hold it out.

“I already know what I want,” you say.

That gets his full attention.

He takes the paper carefully and opens it. His breath catches almost immediately.

On the page, the words 끝까지 are written cleanly and deliberately. Beneath the phrase is a small dot. From the dot, a single fine line extends outward.

Changbin stares at it in silence.

“끝까지,” he repeats softly.

Kkeutkkaji.

To the end.

You nod. “The dot is where it started. Where we fell in love. The line is everything after. The rest of it. Together.”

For a moment, he cannot speak. His throat works as he swallows, eyes flicking from the paper to you like he needs to confirm you are real.

“And I want it here,” you add quietly, touching your shoulder, just above your collarbone. “Right here.”

His gaze follows your fingers, and something in him softens completely.

“That’s my favorite place,” he says without thinking.

You smile. “I know.”

He steps closer, close enough that you can smell the cologne you bought him. Close enough that the rest of the shop fades away. His thumb brushes the spot gently, reverent, like he is already imagining the lines there.

“I kiss you there when I come home tired,” he murmurs. “When you fall asleep on the couch. When I hold you in my arms.”

You smile up at him.

He pauses, lowering his voice. “When you’re underneath me, and I’m inside you,” he says, your cheeks reddening. “When I can’t think of anything else to say because you render me speechless,” he continues.

Your chest tightens.

Changbin looks back down at the design, then back at you, eyes bright. “I’ll make it perfect,” he says. “I promise.”

You believe him.

Changbin finally breaks the heavy moment with a crooked smile.

“So,” he says, folding the paper carefully and setting it on his station, “you’re really getting a tattoo before me. From me.”

You laugh. “Someone has to break the curse.”

He clicks his tongue, stepping closer until you can feel his warmth. “Unbelievable. I’m a professional tattoo artist. Years of training. And my girlfriend gets inked first.”

You raise a brow. “Jealous?”

“Deeply,” he says, eyes flicking to your shoulder again. His voice drops, playful and warm. “Especially since it’s going right there. You know that’s unfair, right?”

Your stomach flips when his gaze lingers. “Changbin.”

He grins, clearly enjoying himself now. “I’m just saying. Sexy choice. Sexy meaning. Sexy girlfriend.”

You sputter a laugh and immediately shove him back by the chest, not hard, just enough to put space between you. “Stop. You’re at work.”

He stumbles back exaggeratedly, hands up. “What? I’m being supportive.”

“There are people here,” you hiss, glancing around. A couple of his coworkers pretend very badly not to be listening. One customer looks up, amused.

Changbin lowers his voice but not his grin. “I can still think you’re sexy professionally.”

You cover your face, giggling despite yourself. “You’re impossible.”

“And you love me,” he replies easily.

You peek at him between your fingers, smiling. “Unfortunately.”

He softens then, stepping closer again but keeping his hands to himself this time. “I’ll behave,” he promises. “Mostly.”

You shake your head, still laughing, heart full and fluttering.

He presses the paper to his chest for a moment, grounding himself, then leans down and kisses that exact spot on your shoulder, tender and unhurried, like a quiet vow.

“끝까지,” he whispers, and both of you pause, taking in the meaning.

He breaks the moment when he claps his hands, a grin on his handsome face, as he leads you to his station.

“Okay,” Changbin says, pulling on gloves with exaggerated seriousness. “From this point on, I’m Artist Changbin. Very calm. Very focused. Very not distracted by how good you look.”

You eye him skeptically as he cleans your skin. “You literally just called me sexy ten minutes ago.”

“That was before gloves,” he replies. “Different person.”

You laugh as he adjusts the chair. “You’re still flirting.”

“I’m reassuring the client,” he says smoothly. “Client morale is very important.”

Jisung passes by and stage-whispers, “You good over here, boss?”

Changbin doesn’t even look up. “Thriving. Don’t you have a stencil to mess up?”

Jisung gasps dramatically and walks away.

Bin leans in close to your ear as he positions your shoulder. “You nervous?”

“A little,” you admit. “You’re enjoying this way too much.”

He grins. “I’ve been waiting months to legally mark you.”

You shove his arm lightly. “Seo Changbin.”

“I’m kidding,” he says quickly, laughing. “Mostly. Hey—look at me.”

You do. His expression softens immediately.

“I’ve got you,” he says, quieter now. “Trust me.”

You nod, taking a deep breath as he positions the stencil, checks the placement one last time, then steps back.

“Okay,” he announces. “This is the dramatic part. Think powerful thoughts. Like…love. Or revenge. Or both.”

“I hate you,” you say, smiling.

“No, you don’t,” he replies, lifting the gun and checking to make sure everything was working properly.

No, you don’t. Not ever.

He presses the gun gently to your skin.

You inhale, eyes lifting to the ceiling, smiling through the nerves, heart full and steady.

The buzzing starts.

BINNIEBB 2025 ™ PLEASE DO NOT STEAL MY WORK ♡

[skzhotpot]

It seems appropriate for me to only review Changbin fics today since me and him are birthday twins and of course I had to start with something from Belen!

They were so soft for each other from minute one and I loved that there were so many elements of his actually personality…the insistence on honorifics…our Mr. Man of Principles…saying “yah!!”

Happy birthday to me 🤩

💜 more → Seo Changbin · Stray Kids · Fic Rec Library 💜

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

bullseye | got it bad, m | jjk, kth

pairing(s): jungkook x reader

summary: Kim Taehyung really regrets setting up his best friend with Jeon Jungkook, mostly because instead of dealing with one insufferable asshole, he now has to deal with two. He just wants you to come to his art exhibit and support him, and you show up looking like a pimp with Jungkook looking like your escort, sigh.

warnings: rated M (18+) for language; you’re a cocky asshole and so is Jungkook; schemes, please save Taehyung; graphic descriptions of various sex acts, smut (fem reader, making out / dry humping / fingering in a public bathroom, threesome smut, mild restraint, nipple play, m-receiving oral, ass / pussy spanking, double penetration / spit-roast, facial, mild dom/sub themes, so much kissing); non-idol!BTS; fuckboy!Jungkook x bisexual, fuckgirl!reader; ft artist, best friend!Taehyung

yup, it’s Butter purple-haired ponytail JK and orange suit Taehyung

--

"You have got to be kidding me!"

"Oh, hey, Tae. How's it going?"

"Hey, hyung."

The voices, one irritated, one pleased, one mischievous, all three looking like the epitome of trouble and the eventual subjects of someone's wet dream.

Kim Taehyung marched over to you, purely indignant, his previous honey-brown hair now dyed to the color of black coffee, the long curls pushed back to reveal his forehead. One stray lock brushed against his dark, sculpted brows that were currently furrowed in annoyance. He stopped in front of you and your boyfriend, hands on his hips. He looked handsome as hell in a tailored orange creamsicle suit and gold earrings, white dress shirt neatly pressed.

"Why are you dressed like a pimp?" Taehyung hissed, jabbing your left breast through your dress. "Why are you dressed like his pimp?!" he added, pointing at Jungkook's smirking face.

You blinked innocently at Taehyung, lifting your oversized black fur coat sleeve to place a delicate hand on your chest, completely unbothered by his harsh reaction to your appearance. Your nails were a gradient from black to white, ever-so-slightly pointed, but not too long to be inconvenient.

Just enough to show you meant business.

Oh, and also you were wearing mock-neck, halter-style minidress that faded from black to white, molded to your every curve. It perfectly matched Jungkook's gradient black-to-white suit. Every step was accented with a sharp click, you in sleek black high-heels and him in glossy black oxfords, dangerous from head-to-toe.

Yes, Jungkook and you were that couple.

"Is that a t-shirt?" Taehyung snapped, switching to prodding Jungkook’s pecs, who grinned in response. You shrugged, the shoulders of your fur coat sliding down so that it now rested on your elbows, exposing your shoulders.

"He thought about not coming with one, but I advised him the other visitors would be too distracted by his sexiness to view your art," you explained, bowing as if you had done a great service.

"And I told her they would be to distracted with her amazing legs, but it's better not to cover them because I like looking," Jungkook chuckled, placing an arm around your waist and pulling you to him possessively.

Taehyung facepalmed.

"I regret paying matchmaker to the two biggest egos I know," he mumbled through his fingers, glaring at the two of you.

"Hey, we kept it low profile. Neutrals."

Taehyung pointed to your boyfriend's hair, pulled back into a sleek ponytail. "Hello? His hair is fucking purple."

You waved his comment away dismissively. "Well, besides that."

"You're a class-A asshole."

"Still makes me high class," you replied with a wink.

"This is really nice, hyung," Jungkook cut in between your bickering. "There’s quite a lot of people here already. I didn't know you were so talented and popular. As expected from my girl's best friend, eh?"

Taehyung winced, rubbing the back of his neck, ears turning red. "Eh... it's not a big deal..." he muttered, but you could tell he was enjoying the praise.

"Of course, it is, Tae," you chuckled, pulling out of Jungkook's grasp to hug him, squeezing him between your fur-covered arms. "You've worked so hard to be able to display your paintings at such a nice venue. I'm proud of you."

Taehyung laughed shyly, hugging you back. "Ahaha... thanks, as usual." He planted a light kiss on the top of your head. "I'm happy you guys came."

You grinned. "Indeed. You needed visitors to match the space," you drawled, sweeping your arms in a grandiose gesture to the glass cases of Taehyung's paintings, crisp white walls, and black marble flooring.

Taehyung rolled his eyes, smiling despite being over your antics. "Not sure I need a high-end escort and his pimp sauntering around..."

"When are your parents arriving? I want to introduce them to Jungkook," you interrupted, tugging on Jungkook's arm and making his cheeks flush pink.

"Like this?! Are you serious, my parents are going to have a heart attack once they realize there's a male version of you!"

"Aw, come on, your dad loves seeing me!"

"That's because you both are always up to no good... fucking always pulling pranks on me... I'm actually glad they're stuck in traffic now..."

-

You slid your thumb into his mouth, smirking as you heard his muffled whine. He was trying to stay quiet, staring down at you with half-lidded eyes, whimpering as you rubbed his tongue with the pad of your finger. One of your legs was hooked around his waist and he was holding it up with one hand. His other between your legs, fingers hooking underneath your panties.

“Fuck, I love looking at you, Jungkook,” you whispered, leaning forward, shuddering at the feeling of his saliva pooling around your thumb, your own tongue snaking out and tracing the air right between his open lips.

Jungkook moaned softly and shoved two fingers inside your tight, wet pussy.

You pulled your thumb out and crashed your lips to his, letting your satisfied exhale into his throat, your name trapped between his lungs and your hungry mouth, kissing him deeply as he plunged his fingers in and out, pressing your body into the wall of the bathroom stall. Shivers up and down your spine, back arching to feel even more of his chest against yours, frustrated at the clothing between you and him, but still hot and exciting, your hands circling his head and playing with his ponytail, rolling your hips into his rough thrusts.

You tried to break free and moan, but Jungkook captured you with his lips, forcing your noises into his mouth to silence them, rubbing his erection against your hip and thigh, the sound between your legs getting louder because you were getting wetter, closer, your eyes cracking open and seeing his half-open too, staring at you with lust and love, determined to push you over the edge, even in the men’s bathroom where Kim Taehyung’s art exhibit was being held.

Hey, you both waited until you had a nice, long conversation with Taehyung’s parents where his mom drilled Jungkook with questions about what he did and what kind of person he was. His dad, in contrast, seemed to approve of Jungkook and gave him a hearty slap on the arm, telling him trouble and trouble often went well together. Then you and Taehyung’s dad had a praise fest about his son, which made Taehyung turn beet-red in embarrassment. Both of you meant it all, of course.

But, also, both of you enjoyed embarrassing Taehyung in public. It was fun.

Yeah, dads loved you.

You couldn’t imagine why that was.

All that aside, after Taehyung's parents bid their son goodbye, Jungkook dragged you into the men's bathroom and began to make out with your face.

He contained himself for a few hours. It was a valiant effort, living off only groping your ass a couple times, but a man can only take so much when you’re looking like a five-course meal and he’s aware that you’re willing to let him eat, you know?

No? Oh, well.

Maybe that’s just your problem.

Also, yes, maybe you discreetly teased him a couple times by rubbing your ass on his crotch and pressing your tits against his back. Maybe.

You lowered one of your hands, cupping your fingers around his length, sighing in his mouth, feeling how perfectly rock-hard he was, knowing you couldn’t have it and he couldn’t give it to you, not yet, but soon, his deep snarl at your touch, fuck, kisses intensifying, shoving his fingers into you all the way to the knuckle, the wet squish audible and obscene, the adrenaline of danger and satisfaction creeping you closer and closer to your high. His thumb came up and grazed your clit, making you close your eyes and rock your hips into his touch, moaning his name into his own mouth, his force of his fingers pushing his thumb against your throbbing clit hard and fast, the scent of black coffee and lush dragon fruit on his skin and yours, mixing with the sweetness of your orgasm as you wailed in glorious triumph, clutching his head with your hand and his waist with your leg, your other one shaking with strain as each pulse shook you, squeezing his clothed length in your hand, wanting it and pulling back to tell him just that in hot whispers, his soft moan against your mouth, whispering back, your name and his desire, his dark brown eyes nearly black with lust.

“Shit, you know how bad I want to fuck you, right now,” Jungkook panted.

“Please don’t.”

Huh?

You raised an eyebrow at the annoyed baritone voice. “Taehyung?”

“Do you know how long I’ve been standing here, knocking on this bathroom stall, you absolute horndogs?”

You heard him gritting his teeth, his voice nearly a deep growl. You did what any natural person would do.

Reached over and unlocked the door, letting it swing open to reveal your and Jungkook’s grinning faces.

His fingers remained very firmly inside your pussy, barely covered by the hem of your dress. You swept your arm back so your fur coat was out of the way. Always considerate. Taehyung stood at the opening of the door, hands on his hips, orange blazer flaring out with his posture, immediately throwing up his hands and jerking his head away once he realized that, yes, of course, you two would not bother covering up anything.

“Fucking – shit, get your hands off her, man, go home to do that–”

Jungkook began to slide his fingers out, scissoring them with a wet squish and you mewled, slightly exaggerated and performative.

“Oh my God, never mind, stop, leave them in there,” Taehyung snarled, realizing he was facing the mirror and therefore could still see both yours and Jungkook’s smug smirks. He abruptly turned ninety degrees, now facing the wall, giving you both the side eye. “The fuck is wrong with you people? Do you have any decency?”

“Sure, we do,” you chirped.

“Yeah, that’s why we’re in the bathroom,” Jungkook added, softly rubbing your clit and making you bite your lip, enjoying it very, very much.

A muscle in Taehyung’s eyebrow twitched. “Public bathroom,” he snapped, rubbing his forehead. “Fuck, what if it wasn’t me who walked in here? What if It was some goddamn stranger listening to this shit?”

“Speaking of which,” Jungkook mused, cocking a brow. “Normal people would just leave. Why did you stay and listen?”

You didn’t say anything. You were simply happily grinding on his hand, the gentle pressure creating a constant ecstasy that you were completely satisfied with, one hand hooked around Jungkook’s neck, waiting for Taehyung to answer with a huge, amused grin on your face. Taehyung knew everything about you.

It almost meant you knew everything about Taehyung.

He rolled his eyes. “You act like I’ve never heard her orgasm before. Big fucking deal.”

Jungkook gave him a pair of incredibly wide eyeballs that indicated that, yes, that was kind of a big deal.

“Tae was my first kiss.”

“What?’ Jungkook blurted, snapping his head back to you.

You shrugged. “We were, like, eight. Just wanted to know what kissing was.”

Jungkook blinked very rapidly, stunned.

His two fingers were still inside you.

You scrunched up your face, thinking. “We were also each other’s first head and fuck too. Although it wasn’t very good.”

“You were a bit shit,” Taehyung interjected.

“It took you five whole minutes to aim. Even a watermelon would be dry at that point.”

Jungkook was still trying to process that you were each other’s first kiss with his fingers knuckle deep in your pussy. “W… What? Why aren’t you guys dating?”

You snorted. “I can’t do that. He’s like my brother.”

Taehyung stuck his tongue out. “And she’s like my sister. That’s weird.”

Jungkook finally yanked his fingers out of you and threw out his hands in disbelief. “And being each other’s first times for – shit, basically everything – isn’t weird?”

Your eyes flickered to Jungkook’s soaked fingers, your cum stuck between them in viscous strings. Ooh, sexy. You licked your lips, breaking out in a pleased smirk. Taehyung spied what you were looking at and facepalmed. Jungkook seemed to notice too and turned to look at it, suddenly forgetting the whole discussion.

And put his cum-covered fingers into his mouth, moaning deliciously around them.

Taehyung made a horrified face in the mirror, making eye contact with you.

“Um, gross!”

“Eh, shut up, Tae, not like you haven’t done it in front of me before.”

“Well, I don’t wanna watch Jungkook do it,” he shot back, spinning around to glare at you. “He’s your boyfriend!”

You quirked an eyebrow. “You’ve seen other guys do it before when we’ve had threesomes. Plus, you’ve watched me open my mouth with other men’s cum in it so you could cum in my mouth too.”

Jungkook choked on his own fingers.

“WHAT?” he roared.

“You weren’t serious about them!” Taehyung flicked his hand, completely ignoring Jungkook. “And you’re my go-to when the girls I’m seeing want to experience a threesome, so I was just doing you a favor!”

Your boyfriend was having a mild heart attack and neither you nor Taehyung seemed to notice, too busy bickering about your strangely integrated sex lives.

“What’s the difference? It’s just Jungkook. You guys are friends.”

“Yeah, extra reason why I don’t want to sit around and imagine him slurping from your vagina. I gotta look into his eyes later!”

You raised your hands, shaking your head. “So what? You’ve seen my other sex partners in public and never said much about it. Why are you making such a fuss now?”

“Because!” Taehyung flung his hands, stamping a foot on the tile floor in frustration, his handsome features twisted into despair, hands on his head and messing up his dark brown hair. “Because you’re going to stop being my friend now that you’re serious about someone and I can’t do anything about it because that someone is Jungkook and I actually like the guy! I’m fucking happy for you and shit, but, fuck, fuck, what am I gonna do when you’re not in my corner anymore?”

Your jaw dropped, shocked.

“Tae, what are you talking about–?”

He spun around, about to run out, but you were faster, grabbing his arm and pulling him back, yanking him into a fierce hug. And, just like that, Taehyung was that awkward, weird kid in elementary school again, not wanting to admit he was scared and frightened of the big mean boys teasing him about his odd drawings and strange thought processes, calling him a dorky alien. He grabbed your shoulders, shivering, holding back tears.

“No one’s gonna protect me…” Taehyung sniffed, burying his face in your hair. “If you’re gone, I can’t be brave…”

“Hey, you know that’s not true,” you chastised lightly, squeezing him. “You’ve become strong, all on your own. You know that. That whole exhibit is filled with your art. You even got offers to buy some of your pieces. Isn’t that amazing?” You pulled back and placed your hands on Taehyung’s cheeks, smiling up at him kindly. He still looked gloomy and uneasy, lower lip sticking out. “Come on, you know I’m right, Van Gogh,” you teased, pinching his cheeks a little. He fidgeted, frown lessening. “I will always, always be in your corner. No matter what. No guy is going to make me stop being friends or supporting you. You need me to knock someone’s front teeth out, give me the time and place and I got your back.”

“That’s going to send you to jail,” he muttered, smiling slightly.

“Then I’ll go to jail. That’s just glorified detention because they give you free meals.”

He laughed, still with a tinge of anxiousness. “You promise you won’t stop being my best friend over some guy?”

You grinned. “You’ll always be my best friend, Tae. I just happen to really enjoy his company and his dick. You know, a girl has needs.”

He stuck his hand out childishly, pinky sticking out. “Pinky promise me.” Then he stuck his other hand out. “Actually, double pinky promise me.”

You crossed your wrists over each other and pressed your pinkies to his, squeezing his hands tightly.

“I promise I’ll always be your best friend.”

“Uh, guys, you’re kinda making me feel like a third wheel…”

Jungkook might as well have been a bathroom sink to Taehyung and you in this moment.

Taehyung nodded firmly to you. “Okay. You promised. You better keep it.”

You rolled your eyes. “When have I ever broken a promise to you?”

“Hmm, I guess you’re right…” All of a sudden, he looked down at your hands and wrenched his own out of them. “Oi! Where have those hands been, young lady?” He looked at his open hands with a repulsed scowl. “You better not have touched his dick and then my hands without washing yours! That’s disgusting!”

“Hey, I take offense to that,” Jungkook retorted heatedly. “My dick is perfectly clean and she didn’t get to touch me yet because you busted in and interrupted us–”

“What are you going on about, you’ve touched my hands after I’ve given handjobs! I didn’t hear you complaining!”

“He’s done what–?”

“I keep telling you that’s different, this is Jungkook, a man you actually love, and here I thought you were incapable of that.” Taehyung spoke over Jungkook, jabbing his finger into his palm to drive his point home. “You get that sparkly shit in your eyes when you talk about him and it makes me want to puke–”

“I do not get sparkly shit in my eyes, what the fuck does that even mean?”

“You literally will not shut up about how pretty he is!”

“He is pretty! Look at him!” You banished your arms in Jungkook’s direction like he was your first-place trophy on display, which he might as well be at this point with how much attention either of you were giving him. At least he looked the part.

Taehyung rolled his eyes exaggeratedly, throwing his whole head back. “I can give you pretty. You’ve been telling me I’m handsome all my life.”

“Why don’t we just have a threesome?”

Silence.

Both you and Taehyung jerked your heads to Jungkook, jaws dropped at his suggestion.

The door to the men’s bathroom opened and an old man bounced in, humming to himself.

He saw you.

He stopped, tilting his head. Then he looked from Jungkook to Taehyung and wiggled his eyebrows.

“Love triangle or sexy night, boys?”

Taehyung choked on air. “Not a love triangle.”

“Oooh, sexy night.” The old man gave you two thumbs up. “I’d love to join, but I’ll back out this time.”

You laughed heartily as Jungkook and Taehyung grabbed your arms, pulling you out of the men’s bathroom, not about to discuss a possible threesome in front of some old guy who vaguely offered to make it a foursome.

You made sure to give the old man a wink, sticking your head back in the open door to say, “Maybe next time, eh?”

The old man cackled and Taehyung slapped a hand over your mouth, dragging you out.

“Please shut up, I fucking swear…”

-

“So, why is it different?”

Somehow both you and Jungkook had dragged your best friend into your apartment and tied him to a chair. One of those nice wooden ones with plenty of openings to slip cotton rope through. Probably not what Kim Taehyung thought he was going to do right after his art exhibition, but judging by his peeved, unsurprised face, it wasn’t a completely unexpected result either.

You had pulled up another chair to sit in front of him, still wearing your fur coat, knees between his knees, mostly because Taehyung was forced to spread them because of how you tied the knots.

“I think I hate you,” Taehyung muttered.

“Nah.”

“At least a little bit.”

You slipped the shoulders of your coat down, exposing your skin, casually crossing your arms under your breasts and leaning forward, smiling sweetly at Taehyung. His dispassionate face basically said, ‘go-suck-your-own-dick’. He tried to pulled his arms free.

“Don’t rip your blazer.”

“Bite me.”

“You gonna answer my question?” you asked, redirecting the conversation.

Taehyung clicked his tongue. “I told you. It’s because I can tell you love him.”

You broke your playful demeanor for a second, smiling broadly. “Really?”

He chuckled. “Yeah, you dork.”

“I don’t know if I’ve ever felt like more of a third wheel in my entire life even though you’re talking about how much you love me,” Jungkook said behind you. He was sitting on the couch, as the chairs had been repositioned in the living room.

Taehyung pursed his lips. “That’s why I got scared, you know…” He leaned forward a bit, pouting. “What if you spend so much time with him that you forget about me? What if you guys break up and you blame me?” If he was untied, he would be nervously picking at his lower lip with his right hand right now. Instead, he chewed on it, worried expression clouding his strong features.

You shook your head, reaching out to fluff his brown hair. “You think too much. Why would I blame you over a breakup? If anything, I’d be dragging you out so you can help me keep a record of how many people I can fuck in a night.”

Taehyung made a face. “Why can’t you be normal and cry while eating chocolate?”

“You know I don’t like chocolate.”

“You don’t like chocolate?” Jungkook choked in disbelief.

“I have to fuck my problems away, Tae. That’s the best way to deal with them.”

He rolled his eyes. “You need to see a therapist.”

“Nah, I got you.”

Suddenly Jungkook’s face appeared because you two, sitting on the coffee table.

“How do you not like chocolate?” he pressed, staring at you.

You blinked at him. “I mean, I don’t hate it. I’m just not crazy about it like some people. Isn’t that better for you? I can give you all the chocolate that I receive.”

This thought didn’t seem to have crossed Jungkook’s mind. He grinned, highly pleased with this result.

“You’re even going to give him your chocolate?” Taehyung gasped, affronted. “That’s it, this friendship is over. I can’t believe you would betray me like this!”

You placed your hands on his knees. Taehyung huffed.

“You want me to untie you now?” you asked, patting his thigh and ignoring his dramatic outburst.

“Why? I thought we were going to have a threesome.”

Both you and Taehyung whipped your heads to blink at Jungkook. He smiled innocently, which did not look innocent at all with his sleek purple ponytail and mischievous eyes.

“Nobody agreed to that.”

“Yeah, Jungkook,” you sided with Taehyung. “Nobody agreed to that.”

“Aw, come on,” he nudged, grinning. “You guys have obviously touched each other before, right? And I can totally trust hyung not to fall in love with you.”

“Because my preferred type wouldn’t hump me in a public bathroom,” your best friend muttered.

“I’m sensing judgement here, Kim Taehyung. Watch your mouth,” you warned.

“Choke on my dick.”

“We can start with that,” Jungkook chirped cheerfully.

“Why do you want this, anyway?” You narrowed your eyes at your boyfriend. “You never expressed any interest in threesomes before. I assumed you were too selfish for that.”

“I am.”

You raised an eyebrow.

Jungkook grinned devilishly.

“But I also wanna see you get spit-roasted.”

“Don’t–” Taehyung began.

Jungkook spread his legs, revealing his erection straining in his slacks. Taehyung snapped his head away, groaning an annoyance, disappointed but not surprised that your boyfriend had zero shame. Jungkook bit his lower lip, tiny mole underneath quivering, excitement and lust in his dark brown eyes, looking right at you eagerly. He purred your name. Taehyung visibly cringed.

“You know I would…” you drawled softly, reaching over to squeeze Jungkook’s thigh. “But I don’t think Tae is into it right now.”

“Yeah, I’d only do it if I was horny and desperate.”

“Then why do you have a boner?”

Both you and Taehyung whipped your heads down to see his dick trying to bust out of his pants.

He glared at it. “You traitor.”

“Are you talking to your dick?”

“Look,” Taehyung snapped, letting out a puff of breath and frowning at Jungkook. “I’m not immune, okay? She’s hot, sure. Absolutely one of the sexiest, most beautiful women I know.”

“Aw, so sweet!” you interrupted, smacking his leg in mock bashfulness.

“And,” he gritted, shooting you a scowl. “I might be horny and desperate, sure.”

“So, what’s the problem?” Jungkook inquired, smug smirk on his face.

“Well, you’ll get jealous, for one.”

Jungkook blinked, confused. “What?”

“Taehyung has a big dick.”

You said it so nonchalantly that Jungkook was speechless.

“Mhm.”

“Not as nice as Jungkook’s dick though.”

“Excuse me? I am offended.”

“You honestly need to improve your technique. You think your size alone is all that matters? Jungkook’s the whole package, great dick, cute smile, diligence, strength, always up for anything, perfect duality–”

“Shit, shut up about him, I get it, he’s the hottest thing to walk on this earth, now stop verbally jerking him, he’s not gonna agree–”

“Kiss him.”

You and Taehyung froze.

Eyes flickering to Jungkook, who raised an eyebrow challengingly.

“Kiss him,” he repeated.

Eyes back to Taehyung, who was breathing hard.

“Only because I’m horny and desperate,” he growled.

The corner of your lips ticked upwards.

“Got it bad, eh, Tae?”

You placed your hands on his thighs, sliding down, rising off your chair. You felt Taehyung’s muscles tense, narrowing his eyes. He tried to keep up his severe front, borrowing your tendency to use arrogance to hide your true feelings.

“Isn’t that you?” he challenged. “Need me to satisfy you even though you have Jungkook now?”

You smirked, seeing right through him. “You always give me such blessed service though.”

Something flared in his brown orbs, pupils expanding as you neared. “Don’t.” Your head tilted at his tone, almost pleading, and still you advanced, your soft inhale ghosting his lips. His gaze was on your face the entire time, swallowing hard, anticipation creeping into his stern expression.

“Don’t what?” you whispered teasingly.

“Don’t say it in front of him.”

“But you like it.”

“Yeah, well, he doesn’t need to know my embarrassing turn-ons.”

“What if I slip?”

He clenched his jaw. “Fuck, fine, whatever.”

Your hand reached up to cup his cheek, licking your teeth slowly, maintaining eye contact. Your words a low hiss, laced with pure lust.

“My good little angel, let this devil corrupt you.”

Taehyung whimpered and you closed in on his lips, kissing him deeply, straddling his lap, rolling your hips into his, voracious, greedy kisses, Taehyung gasping in your mouth as you bounced on his crotch, your spread legs causing the hem of your dress to rise, popping over your ass, moaning into his mouth as you worked him under you, his body familiar and comforting. His tongue encircled yours, whining for more, and you mumbled sweet nothings to him, remembering all the things he loved to hear, and he gave you all the things you loved, the neediness in his kiss, the desperation of his hips rising to add more friction. You weren’t exactly immune to Taehyung either. You could control yourself, normally.

But Jungkook gave you the green light, so you went all in.

Your hands were in his hair, tangled in the strands of black coffee, murmuring in his lips, sweet angel, and Taehyung moaned, fiercely thrusting his hips up and you sitting down on it, already wet, sighing satisfyingly at the feeling of his impressive length straining to reach your dripping heat, too many layers of fabric between them.

“Such a good boy doing such bad things,” you purred against his lips, amused at seeing your lipstick all over his mouth.

Taehyung looked up at you with glazed brown eyes, a tinge of unease in them. Maybe he didn’t want to show Jungkook his vulnerable side. You could understand that. You didn’t mind playing your role but Taehyung was more guarded. He didn’t like to be criticized or judged for the things he liked. You noticed his gaze flicker to Jungkook and then back to you.

You tilted your head and cradled his, running your fingers through his hair. “You want me to stop, I’ll stop,” you cooed gently, kissing his ear.

“I don’t want you to stop,” he breathed, so quietly you barely heard it. “I don’t want him to judge me.”

You chuckled. “I wouldn’t worry about that.”

Taehyung made a disbelieving noise.

“Something wrong?” Jungkook asked behind you, sounding curious and confused that his show was paused.

“Mhm, need you to take my coat,” you replied, pulling back, lowering your arms so Jungkook could stand behind you and remove it. You slid your hands out elegantly, seeing Taehyung’s messy dark hair and lipstick-stained lips. You heard Jungkook back up and you reached into Taehyung’s blazer, pulling out his handkerchief and dabbing at his mouth, carefully wiping it off.

“We can stop,” your reminded him gently.

“No,” he growled, frowning. “I’ve got a massive boner and it’s all your fault. Get me off.”

You grinned. “Alright, angel.”

You saw Taehyung bite his lip, shivering at your words. You couldn’t remember how this started, but it always worked. The roleplaying helped with the whole ‘having-sex-with-your-best-friend’ thing ten times less awkward, and it made it much easier for him and you to get off.

Unfortunately, it also was starting to make both of you much hornier while having sex with each other.

Whoops.

He clicked his tongue, raising his head, eyebrow cocked.

“Dirty little devil.”

You smirked. Taehyung’s voice was always sexier when he was aroused, deep and sultry.

One by one, you undid the buttons of his dress shirt, kissing at his exposed chest, the deep rich tone of his tan skin standing out against the white, his eyes closing at your touch, running your tongue down his sternum and blowing on it.

He shuddered, moaning your name, long and sweet.

You shifted, intending to push the chair behind you back, but it was gone. Instead, your ass backed up into a pair of very muscular legs. You paused, turning your head to see behind you.

“Jungkook–”

A firm hand stopped you, forcefully jerking your head back to Taehyung’s chest.

“Look forward,” Jungkook commanded.

A shiver down your spine at his tone. You smirked, peering up at Taehyung, who smiled.

“He jealous?”

“I’m not,” Jungkook snapped, grabbing your ass.

“A little bit,” Taehyung chuckled, and now he was smirking too.

Eerily similar to you, because who else would he learn such a devious expression from? You taught him well. You hummed, yanking Taehyung’s shirt open and pushing it to his shoulders, his naked torso now exposed to your eyes and mouth.

“Can’t imagine why. This was his idea.”

Taehyung jerked his head to you as you lowered yours to his chest. “What?”

But your lips closed around his nipple and he gasped, sputtering, confused, and then moaning as you moaned, Jungkook yanking down your panties and slapping your ass with his open palm, the sting added to the disapproving hiss of your name.

“He’s not supposed to know. I didn’t do all that acting for nothing,” he snarled, and your response was wiggling your ass, nipping your teeth over Taehyung’s chest, his handsome features twisted in ecstasy and pleasure, the tip of your tongue teasing his other nipple, pushing it around with your strong, wet, warm muscle.

“Whoops.”

Taehyung narrowed his eyes at you and your not-so-innocent tone.

Jungkook clicked his tongue. “Such a bad little devil. You need some punishment.”

“He already knew?” Taehyung gritted, glaring daggers at your grinning face, saying nothing, your deft fingers undoing his pants. “Answer me, woman.”

Jungkook was positioning your lower half, ass up, legs spread, pussy exposed to his eyes and hand, your dripping core tense with anticipation. When he spoke, his voice was deep and silvery, laced with danger and desire.

“Answer him.”

And he spanked your pussy, making you cry out and leak between his fingers, the sudden sting of pain so nice, and you had the audacity to continue giving Taehyung that infuriatingly smug expression as you dragged his pants and underwear to his knees, freeing his stiff length that stuck straight up, your body repeatedly lurched forward by Jungkook’s open palm on your soaked slit, your juices splattering on his hand and the inside of your thighs. With a smirk, you lowered your head.

“Mhm, he knew… ah, fuck, yes, Jungkook, just like that…” you sighed in satisfaction, tongue snaking out and wrapping around the head of Taehyung’s cock, bobbing your mouth up and down like that, stimulating just the tip, paying extra attention to the underside of the head. “Sorry, Tae.”

“Swallow me whole,” he growled. “Now.”

You were ready to do it, of course, but you felt Jungkook’s hand clap onto your leaking, heated pussy lips, and the other danced up your back, so you waited, letting him grab your head and push you down, not quite as roughly as he would have if he was actually being mean, but with enough pressure that you knew he just wanted to do the physical action, wanted to feel the power even if there was no maliciousness behind it.

Your lips closed around Taehyung’s pulsing, hard length, taking it all, a familiar girth stretching out your jaw. You made a light gagging sound as the head hit the back of your throat, not quite suffocating, but enough to indicate, stop pushing me, and Jungkook lifted the weight off your head, still gripping your hair, messing up your perfected style of the night.

“That’s a good girl, swallowing all that dick,” he purred, sliding a finger into you.

You whined, clenching your walls around it, squeezing tight, wanting more.

“Suck.”

You did, obediently, looking up at Taehyung, his head tipping back, low moans escaping his throat as your tongue squirmed at the base of the head in your throat, muscles clinching around his cock, your lips around the base. You swiped your tongue down, stretching it out even farther, past your lips, slurping nosily at his balls, flicking them rapidly with the tip, feeling him get harder and harder, twitching against the roof of your mouth, bending a little due to the lack of space.

“Fuck, let go of her head, fuck!”

Jungkook released you and you grabbed Taehyung’s hips, starting a fast, intense pace, swirling your tongue around his cock, another long finger wiggling into your slick folds, thrusting into you from behind, your legs shaking with strain, Taehyung moaning louder and louder, filling up your apartment with his lust.

“Don’t fucking stop, fuck, you have the devil’s tongue, a-ah, it’s so fucking good…”

Jungkook scissored his fingers in you, the squelching sound loud and lewd, and you spied Taehyung tipping his head back, panting, watching Jungkook finger you from behind, his other hand smacking your ass periodically to watch it bounce and hear you moan, your hips bucking back into his hand every time you ascended from Taehyung’s cock.

“Give her another,” he gasped. “Stuff her more.”

Jungkook snickered. “For an angel, you’re all about the punishment, hm?”

But he did as he was told, shoving another finger in you and you whined, nearly popping your mouth off Taehyung’s thick length, stopping only because of imposing baritone.

“Don’t you fucking dare. Take it all. Or are you telling me you can’t? Telling me you’ve lost your touch?”

You went back down, narrowing your eyes, rising to his challenge. Your best friend knew everything about you and therefore he knew that the second he made it a question of your ability, well, that brought out the best in you.

“Fuck!”

Also made you almost vacuum his dick, but he asked for it.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuuuuuuuck!”

Tighter, faster, tongue all over, nearly forgetting Jungkook was touching you at all because Taehyung had doubted you and you weren’t having that shit, fuck no, not even with Jungkook’s free hand snaking between your legs and feeling for your clit, rubbing it at the same furious pace you were blowing Taehyung’s jerking cock, tipping your head back and angling it so the head scraped against the roof of your mouth, locking your knees to prevent the shudders of pleasure from ruining your rhythm, so good, fuck, feeling so good with the pumping of Jungkook’s powerful fingers, electric satisfaction radiating from your throbbing clit, clutching Taehyung’s hips so hard he was getting indents from your nails, determined to get him there before you, and, by the sound of his breathless cries of your name and the trembling of his impressive girth, he was there.

“Yes, a-ah, you’re so good, so fucking good, I’m gonna cum, oh, fuck!”

His orgasm exploded, flooding your mouth with a gush of saltness, thick strings of cum painting the back of your throat, and you gulped it all down greedily, eyes rolling back, the tense coil inside you snapping and drenching Jungkook’s hands with your own orgasm, your legs unlocking and giving out, shaking and flinching as wave after wave of vicious pleasure flooded through you, Jungkook’s strong arms holding you up, moaning at the feeling of your pussy convulsing around his fingers, still lightly rubbing your clit through your orgasm, whines and whimpers crammed in your throat due to Taehyung’s cock in your mouth, sliding all the way to the base and swallowing around it, because you knew he loved it, wanted it, craved it, groaning carnally, the head swelling and pulsing, nearly suffocating you.

“Feels so f-fucking good… a-ah, yeees…”

You stayed in the position for as long as you could, a good minute, before backing up with a choked gasp, clutching Taehyung’s thighs, eyes drifting up to his and he looked down at you, fucked-out, content, grateful, black-brown curls falling all over his forehead and cheeks, so casually sexy and perfect.

“Good angels always taste the best,” you rasped, licking your abused lips.

Taehyung grinned.

“Untie me, devil.”

“Damn, you do have a big dick.”

“… Stop looking.”

“Why? I wanna see what she put in her mouth.”

You teased the head with the tip of your tongue, smirking. Taehyung looked away, ears turning red.

“You two are shameless.”

“Yeah, but you like it,” you laughed, straddling his lap, casually leaning over him to untie him. You heard Jungkook make a clicking sound and you assumed he was making a frame with his hands and miming taking a photo.

“Stop that,” Taehyung muttered, face full of your covered breasts. “Oi, take your clothes off if you’re gonna squash my face with your tits.”

You rammed your chest into his face to muffle his protests.

-

“Mmm, yes, no faster way to make me limp than you sucking Jungkook’s face off.”

You were too busy grabbing Jungkook’s naked ass and moaning in his mouth, tongue on tongue, purple strands brushing against your forehand, his hands on your ass and squeezing it roughly, rutting his rapidly hardening cock against your thigh.

“You want me to leave you guys alone?”

You broke the kiss, snapping your head around to see Taehyung raising an eyebrow at you from the head of your bed, completely naked. Jungkook continued slowly humping your thigh, peaking pre-cum all over and adding to his own stimulation.

“Are you done being an insufferable shit or what?” you glowered.

“Mmm, no.”

“Hmph, fine, just fuck me from behind then if you’re so needy,” you sighed, turning back to Jungkook’s amused smirk.

“No. I want the mouth again.”

You and Jungkook shared a confused look. “Huh, why?” you both said at the same time, looking at him in unison.

Taehyung lifted his chin defiantly, pointing to you. “I wanna stuff my dick into your mouth and fuck your face because you tricked me.”

You gasped, feeling slighted. “I told you it was Jungkook’s idea, why am I getting punished? You schemed against me first!”

He shrugged. “You corrupted him so, technically, it’s all inherently your fault.”

You protested as Jungkook laughed, pushing you into position despite you verbally fighting back.

“What! All I did was exist! Is it my fault that Jungkook was thirsting after my ass and you decided it would a taste of my own medicine, only to have it backfire in your face? And what if I wanna look at his handsome face? Huh? Why am I not getting a say in – mhpf!”

You yelped as Jungkook and Taehyung shoved your face first into Taehyung’s crotch, his semi-hard cock smacking you in the cheek and getting a mouthful of his nuts.

“Lick.”

They both said it at the same time. You saw them share a look of surprise, shocked that they were thinking the same thing, ignoring you.

Hey, nobody ignores you.

You wrapped your lips around one of his balls and sucked, tongue surrounding it, causing Taehyung to squeal and spread his legs, his cock swelling instantly, especially as your tongue poked out and lapped at the other while sucking intently.

“Good little devil,” Jungkook praised, patting you on the head before backing up, leaving you to rearrange Taehyung’s nuts with your mouth, licking and sucking all over, him gasping and moaning above you, falling back against the headboard.

“You’re crazy, fucking crazy…”

You switched sides, pressing your lips into his crotch to stuff your mouth full before sticking your tongue out and wiggling it on the underside of the other, his thick length now hitting you in the nose, and you realized Taehyung wasn’t going to help you with this, so you internally sighed and reached up to grab his dick and stroke it slowly as you continued your make-out session with his nuts.

Taehyung was chanting your name over and over like it was a prayer, as if he was saying it in attempt to ask for his soul to be saved.

You felt the bed bow and you lifted your head as far as it could go, which wasn’t very far because you still had one of Taehyung’s balls still in your mouth. You were still sucking on it.

He moaned above you, clutching your pillows for dear life.

You heard a condom being opened and felt Jungkook’s knees spread yours, deep silvery voice purring your name.

“Wanna see you take two dicks at once, naughty devil,” he teased, pressing the head of his cock against your soaked opening.

You unlatched your mouth and Taehyung seemed to see stars for a hot second, reeling.

“Hope you’re prepared, sweet angel,” you taunted, and then you swallowed his dick.

“Fucking shit!”

You moaned around his cock, letting it fill you to the throat, Jungkook’s perfect length thrusting into you at the same time, stretching you out deliciously, his own moan adding to your pleasure. There was just something about Jungkook’s moan, the longing, the possessiveness, the love. It made you wetter every time, bringing newfound energy to your meticulous sucking of Taehyung’s cock, who finally seemed to get his bearings and remember what the fuck was going on and what he wanted to do in the first place, because he finally straightened, large hands fitting around your head, pushing your hair back.

“You know why you’re so good at sucking dick?”

You tried very hard not to roll your eyes, already knowing what was coming. You decided to focus on Jungkook’s cock instead, pumping in and out of you, powerful, deep strokes, his hands gripping your hips, trying so hard to please you, and he was good at it, hitting all your favorite spots that made you squirm back against him.

“Because I let you suck mine,” Taehyung growled, holding your head and thrusting into your throat.

Mmmhmm, you thought to yourself. Not that he was wrong, because he wasn’t, being your first and all, but, come on, you didn’t get all your skills from sucking one dick, no matter how amazing Taehyung’s was. Oh well, you let it slide, simply enjoying not having to do much as your best friend fucked your face and your boyfriend pounded your pussy.

Ah, bliss.

The feeling of your mouth being filled and used, stroking Taehyung’s hips with your fingertips, elbows on the bed, legs spread open for Jungkook to slap his crotch into your ass wetly, back to front, a constant encompassing ecstasy that you welcomed, letting them command the pace, hands on your head and hands on your ass, familiar hands, loving hands, because even if Taehyung didn’t want to take you on dates and wake up next to you every day, he still loved you, still made sure he didn’t actually hurt you, careful to thrust hard but not deep, or thrust deep but not hard.

Jungkook wanted to take you on dates and hold you on his arm like his trophy and be waltzed around as yours, so… romantic? It was your version of romance, anyway.

And sex.

Lots of sex.

Fuck, he was so good at fucking you, leaning down, giving you more, chuckling as he heard you moaning around Taehyung’s cock, faster, harder, yes, fuck, yes, so good, your noises trapped in your chest, Taehyung increasing the speed, breathing shallowing.

“Fuck, yes, tighter, give it to me, you dirty devil,” he growled and you obeyed, closing your lips and pressing your tongue against the bottom, sandwiching his length in your mouth, your pussy also squeezing Jungkook harder, basking in his sinful moan, enamored with his voice and the way he said your name, never getting enough.

“A-ah, you feel so good, your pussy is so fucking good, gonna make me cum…”

So rough, so intense, so full of cock, keeping your holes tight, relishing in the way they forced themselves into your mouth and pussy, heady and intoxicating pleasure, you tipping over the edge, wailing around Taehyung’s thick girth as you spilled onto Jungkook’s rock-hard length, mind-numbing satisfaction that spread all over, hot and melting into you. Your walls violently spasmed and caused Jungkook to gasp, cock twitching and jolting inside you, shooting thick spurts of cum that filled the condom, and he buried himself all the way in, a wanton moan of your name echoing off your bedroom walls, savoring the feeling of you milking him, gripping your sides and squeezing you lovingly.

Suddenly, Taehyung yanked his cock out of your mouth and you coughed, startled at the abrupt loss, only for him to orgasm all over your face, hot white strings shooting out of his glistening cock and his hand guiding them, painting your cheeks and open mouth, dripping onto your tongue and clinging onto your swollen lips.

“Tae! What the fuck?!”

He snickered, smearing the residual cum on the side of your frown, winking.

“Blessed service, eh, you devil?”

-

“Is it gonna be like this every time we hang out now?”

You climbed onto Jeon Jungkook’s lap, kissing him deeper, trapping his slim waist in between your thighs, his hands sliding up your skirt, moaning into your mouth as Kim Taehyung smacked you in the shoulder blades, the sound masked by the obscenely loud music of the club as onlookers watched you and Jungkook with increasing interest.

Probably all dreaming of threesomes with you two.

“Hello, you two are supposed to be helping me getting laid, not getting laid right in front of me!”

--

masterpost

[skzhotpot]

Jeon Jungkook got you and he got you good.

You gotta start with the first part (link at the top) but damnit if this wasn’t the most bizarrely arranged threesome 😂😂😂😂

💜 more → Kim Taehyung, Jeon Jungkook · BTS · Fic Rec Library 💜

[binniebb]

˗ˏˋ spoiled rotten ⨾ ─── 「 서창빈 」

⟶ ꉂ you’ve been hiding his present all night ⸝⸝⸝  ⤷ changbin x reader    2.5k    big boy!bin     dirty talk    spanking    blowjob   piv s*x    anal s*x    nasty shiet ⤷ hbd to my fave muscle man ;3 hope he's getting some tonight hehe

The bedroom door barely clicks shut before Changbin’s hands are on your shoulders, steering you backward toward the bed. His mouth finds your neck, hot and insistent, before he pulls back just enough to look at you.

“Been thinking about this all fucking night,” he murmurs, dark eyes catching the dim light from the hallway. His fingers work the button of his dress shirt, impatient, and you watch the fabric part to reveal the muscle beneath—chest, shoulders, that body that makes your mouth water. “All those people. Your family. My family. And all I could think about was getting you alone.”

You push him back until his knees hit the mattress. He sits, looking up at you with that grin—the one that says he knows exactly what’s coming and he’s been waiting for it since the candles were lit on his cake.

“Then let me give you your birthday present, big boy.”

Your knees find the floor before he can argue. The carpet is soft beneath you, and the position feels right, feels like where you’ve wanted to be all evening. His belt buckle is cool against your fingers, the leather stiff, and you work it open with practiced ease. The sound of it sliding free makes his stomach tense.

“Fuck,” he breathes, and you haven’t even touched him yet.

His pants come next, button and zipper, and you hook your fingers into the waistband of his boxer briefs. The cotton is black, stretched taut over the shape of him underneath, and when you pull everything down his cock springs free—already hard, already slick at the tip, curving up toward his belly.

Changbin’s cock is perfect. Thick enough to stretch your jaw, long enough to hit the back of your throat, with a vein running along the underside that you’ve traced with your tongue more times than you can count. The head is flushed, darker than the rest of him, and the bead of pre-cum gathered at the slit catches the light like something precious.

“You gonna stare at it all night or—“

You cut him off by wrapping your lips around the head.

His words dissolve into a groan, low and wrecked, and his hips jerk up before he can stop himself. You let him, taking him deeper, letting the weight of him settle on your tongue. The taste is salt and skin, and your mouth floods with saliva almost immediately.

“Oh, fuck, baby.” His hand finds the back of your head, fingers threading through your hair. “Your fucking mouth.”

You hollow your cheeks and pull back, slow, letting him feel every ridge of your palate, every millimeter of suction. When you reach the tip you swirl your tongue around it, lapping at the slit, tasting the bitter pre-cum that’s already leaking steadily. Then you sink back down, and this time you don’t stop until he nudges the entrance of your throat.

Changbin’s head falls back. His fingers tighten in your hair.

“That’s it. That’s fucking it.”

Spit is already gathering at the corners of your mouth, slicking his shaft, making the slide easier. You work him with one hand at the base, twisting on the upstroke, and your other hand cups his balls—heavy and tight, drawn up close to his body. They’re warm in your palm, the skin soft and loose, and when you gently roll them between your fingers he makes a sound you’ve never heard before. Something between a whimper and a curse.

“Christ. Christ.”

You pull off just long enough to catch your breath, a string of saliva connecting your bottom lip to his cock. “Like that?”

“You know I fucking like that.” His voice is ragged. His chest is flushed, color creeping up from his collar. “Don’t stop.”

You take him back into your mouth and you make it messy. Spit runs down his shaft, drips onto his balls, pools at the base where your hand is working what you can’t fit.

“Oh, fuck yeah.” His head drops back against the mattress. “Yeah, get me fucking soaked.”

The sounds are obscene—wet and slick and loud in the quiet bedroom—and you lean into them, let them fill the space between his heavy breathing and the creak of the mattress when he shifts his weight.

“Look at you,” he mutters, and when you glance up his eyes are fixed on your face. On your stretched lips. On the shine of spit smeared across your chin. “So fucking pretty with my cock in your mouth.”

You moan around him, and the vibration makes his hips buck.

“Yeah. Yeah, you like that.” His hand is still in your hair, and now he uses it—guides you down, holds you there, lets you feel the thickness of him filling your throat. Your eyes water. Your jaw aches. And you love it. You love the weight of him, the taste, the way his composure is crumbling with every stroke of your tongue.

Your free hand drops lower, past his balls, and your fingers graze the spot behind them. He twitches and swears, and his thighs tense on either side of your head.

“Fuck, you’re nasty tonight.”

You would smile if your mouth weren’t full. Instead you double down—bob your head faster, spit pooling and dripping, your hand twisting and stroking and your mouth working the top half of his cock while your spit slicks everything. His balls. Your fingers. The inside of his thighs where you’re braced.

“Baby.” His voice cracks. “Baby, I’m gonna—if you keep—“

You don’t let up. You hollow your cheeks and suck hard, your tongue pressing flat against that vein, your hand cupping his balls and squeezing just enough. His whole body goes rigid.

“Fuck, stop. Stop.”

You pull off immediately, a trail of spit snapping, and look up at him. His eyes are wild, his chest heaving, his cock slick and shiny and twitching against his stomach. He looks absolutely wrecked.

“Not yet,” he pants. “Not like this. I need to fuck you.”

He’s on his feet before you can respond, pulling you up, spinning you around. Your dress is still on—a little black thing you’d picked out specifically because it made his eyes go dark when you walked out of the bedroom hours ago—and he rucks it up around your hips with hands that aren’t gentle.

“Bend over. On the bed. Now.”

The mattress meets your palms, your knees. The sheets are cool and white and already rumpled from where he was sitting. Behind you, Changbin goes still.

So still.

“What,” he says, and his voice has dropped into something reverent. “What the fuck.”

His fingers find the base of the plug. The one you’d slipped in hours ago, before dinner, before the restaurant, before you’d sat across from his mother and made small talk about your job while wearing a silicone plug in your ass. It’s a small thing, jeweled at the base, and he traces around it with his thumb.

“You’ve been wearing this all night?”

“Happy birthday, baby.”

His groan is guttural. His hands are on your ass, spreading you open, and you feel his cock nudge against your thigh—harder than before, impossibly, like the sight of that plug has sent him into a different gear.

“You’re fucking unbelievable.” He taps the base of the plug, just lightly, and the vibration makes you clench. “Sitting there. Looking all innocent. Talking to my dad about fuck all. And you had this inside you the whole time.”

“Wanted to be ready for you.”

“Ready.” He laughs, but it’s breathless. “You’re gonna fucking kill me.”

He grips the plug and twists it, slow, and your arms nearly give out. The stretch is familiar but sharp, a reminder that it’s there, that you’ve been full all evening without anyone knowing. He pulls it out just enough to make you gasp, then pushes it back in.

“Bin,” you moan out.

“Fuck.” He pulls the plug out completely—slow, so slow, and you feel every ridge, every millimeter of silicone dragging against that sensitive ring of muscle—and sets it aside.

His thumb presses against you, slick with lube from the plug, and circles once before pushing inside. “Gotta make sure you’re ready,” he mutters, and you can hear the strain in his voice. “Gotta—fuck, you’re so fucking perfect, baby.”

His thumb slides out, and then two fingers are pressing in, and your forehead drops to the mattress. Your back arches. Your hips push back against his hand, greedy, and the word “please” slips out before you can stop it.

“Please what?”

“Please fuck me.”

“Where.” His fingers crook inside you, and your vision whites out for a second. “Where do you want me to fuck you.”

“My pussy first. Please. I need you in my pussy.”

He doesn’t make you wait. His fingers withdraw, and then the head of his cock is pressing against you, slick and hot. He drags the tip through your folds, coating himself, and when he pushes in you both make the same sound.

“Oh, fuck,” he grits out. “You’re so wet. You’re so fucking wet for me.”

He bottoms out and stays there, his hips flush against your ass, his hands gripping your waist hard enough to bruise. You can feel all of him—the length, the thickness, the way he’s throbbing inside you—and for a moment neither of you moves.

His body covers yours, his chest pressed to your back, his mouth at your ear. “I love you,” he says, and the words are so tender in contrast to everything else that your heart stutters. “I love you so fucking much. But right now I’m going to fuck you like I don’t.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

Then he pulls out and slams back in.

The bed frame rattles and thumps against the wall. You’re already babbling something, words that don’t make sense, just sounds and curses and his name. He fucks into you hard, relentless, and the angle has him hitting deep, deeper than you expected, and your fingers claw at the sheets.

“This what you wanted?” His voice is rough. “Wanted me to fuck you like this? Bent over on my birthday, still wearing your pretty little dress?”

“Yes. Fuck, yes.”

“You’re so fucking dirty,” he groans. “You like being my dirty little slut, hm?”

He lands a smack on your ass, sharp and hot, and the sting radiates outward. You cry out—half pain, half pleasure—and he does it again, harder this time, his rhythm never faltering.

“So fucking good.” His hips snap forward, and the wet sound of him fucking into you fills the room. “Your pussy’s so good. Taking me so fucking good, baby.”

The dress is bunched around your waist. Your thighs are slick with your own arousal, and you can feel it dripping, can feel how wet you are from sucking his cock and taking his fingers and now this—his cock pumping into you, his hand gripping your hip, his breathing ragged and loud.

You look over your shoulder, and the sight almost makes you come—Changbin, still half-dressed, his shirt hanging open, his muscles flexing with every thrust. His hair is falling into his eyes. His jaw is clenched. He’s looking down at where your bodies meet, watching himself disappear into you, and his expression is one of total, consuming want.

“Bin.”

“Yeah.” His eyes flick to yours. “Yeah, say my fucking name.”

“Bin, I want you in my ass.”

His rhythm stutters. His fingers dig into your flesh. “Fuck. Fuck.”

“Please, Binnie. Want you to fuck my ass.”

He pulls out, and the emptiness is back, but only for a moment. You hear him spit—hear the wet sound of it—and then his hand is on himself, slicking his cock, and the head is pressing against your asshole.

“Ready for me, sweetheart?”

“Yes.”

He pushes in. Slow. So slow. The stretch is different from the plug—hotter, thicker, longer—and your mouth opens on a sound that doesn’t quite come out. He stops halfway, his breathing ragged, his forehead pressed to your shoulder.

“Still okay, baby?”

“Don’t stop. Please don’t fucking stop.”

He sinks in, inch by agonizing inch, until he’s fully seated, and the fullness is indescribable. You feel stuffed, overwhelmed, and when he starts to move you think you might actually lose your mind.

“Your fucking—God, baby. So tight. So fucking tight around my cock.”

He fucks your ass the way he fucked your pussy—hard, deep, without mercy—and the sounds you’re making aren’t words anymore. They’re moans. Gasps. Broken versions of his name. The spit from earlier is still drying on your chin, and you’re still wearing your dress, and you’re being pounded and it’s everything you wanted.

“Knew you were saving it for tonight, didn’t you? Knew you wanted my cock in your ass.”

“Yes. Yes. Yes.”

He fucks you harder. The bed is slamming into the wall, and you don’t care if the neighbors hear, don’t care if the whole building knows what’s happening in this room. His hand slides up your back, pressing between your shoulder blades, and you sink deeper into the mattress, your ass higher, the angle even sharper.

“Touch yourself,” he commands. “Touch that pretty pussy while I fuck your tight, little ass.”

Your hand moves without thought, fingers finding your clit, and the double sensation makes you keen.

He’s babbling now, his words running together. “So good, so fucking good, best fucking present, your ass is so tight, gonna fuck it forever, never wanna stop—“

His rhythm falters. His hips stutter. You can feel him swelling, feel him getting even harder if that’s possible, and you know he’s close.

“Gonna come,” he gasps. “Gonna come in your ass. Fill you up. Fuck, fuck, fuck—“

He slams deep and holds there, and you feel it—the pulse, the heat, the wetness flooding inside you. His groan is long and broken, his body shaking, his fingers gripping your ass cheeks hard that the flesh bunches in his palms.

“Fuuuuuck.”

The sound stretches out, dissolves into breathless panting. He stays inside you for a long moment, his forehead pressed to your back, his chest heaving. When he finally pulls out, you feel his come trickle out after him, hot and slow.

For a long moment, neither of you speak. You can’t. You’re both too wrecked, too spent, your bodies slick with sweat and trembling with aftershocks.

“I can’t feel my legs,” he finally mumbles into your shoulder.

You laugh, and it comes out weak and breathless. “Happy birthday.”

He snorts. “Best birthday ever.” He shifts, and collapses beside you, his hand reaching over to run up and down your back. “We’re gonna have to change the sheets.”

“Worth it.”

“Yeah.” He rolls onto his side, pulls you with him so you’re face to face, his hand coming up to cup your jaw. “You’re fucking incredible. You know that, right?”

You smile, still a little hazy. “You might’ve mentioned it a few times.”

“I’m serious.” His dark eyes are soft now, his thumb tracing your cheekbone. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

“You were born. That’s worth celebrating.”

He breathes out a laugh and leans in for a kiss. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

TAGLIST—

@hanjinology @joyracha @unemployedcarat @joongsfantasy @mieuseum @let-me-be-feral @nyang3racha @peaches-creamxx @stryscribbles @twiddlehee @viisstrayy @bookswillfindyouaway @lilyxii @tboboee @fanficwriter5 @neosfam @yessirfelix @kloversung @ddearina @hnsbxby @fweakygyatt @rrhwang @xallyouneedislovexx @hanstattoos @carrotcakeesblog @avchannie @lilscast @deffnot-ramiyah @shadowrealm2010 @lostinmymind-daydreaming @skz-crumbs @elma3330 @hyunjinswife4ever @cr33d3ast @strawberristhings @chikmentendies

[skzhotpot]

HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHE absolutely gagged over this. You’ve done it again!!!!

💜 more → Seo Changbin · Stray Kids · Fic Rec Library 💜

[97luvz]

PLAY DIRTY

STARRING … FWB!M. YOONGI X READER

WORD COUNT … 11.2K

SUMMARY … you’re getting a bit tired of the incessant back and forth between you and yoongi. but since he wants to act childish, there’s no harm in stooping down to his level—you’re just finishing what he started.

NOTES / WARNINGS … NSFW, MDNI (18+). they spend this whole chapter trying to outdo each other by making the other more jealous. implied threesome w tae, jk and reader. sexting/phone sex. mutual masturbation. degrading dirty talk. oral (f + m receiving). unprotected p in v. cumplay. yoongi has a prince albert!!! bathroom sex. minor dubcon elements(? they’re both buzzed but consenting). excessive drinking. club setting. these two are both really fucking obsessed with each other but like to pretend they’re not. edited to include no aftercare but it is plot relevant!! and i thinkk that’s everything, but if i forgot anything let me know <33

playlist : von dutch (charli xcx). maneater (nelly furtado). if you seek amy (britney spears). telephone (lady gaga). single ladies (beyonce). don’t stop the music (rihanna). womaniser (britney spears). freak (doja cat). guess (charli xcx). give it to me (timbaland).

< prev. main masterlist. next. >

“we gonna talk about it?”

yoongi blinks at the sound of jin’s voice, fingers still hovering over the keys. the last chord he’d hit is long gone, swallowed by silence, but his hand stays where it is.

his head lifts, slow. “talk about what.”

he knows exactly what jin means.

jin raises a brow, unimpressed. “you and that girl.”

yoongi scoffs. his hand drops hard on the keyboard, a messy clash of sound ringing out before he pulls it back.

“nothing to talk about.”

jin snorts. “right. nothing to talk about.”

yoongi doesn’t look at him. his fingers drift back to the keys, pressing down soft this time. a few scattered, unfocused notes.

yoongi’s still pissed. it’s been two days and he can still feel it simmering in his chest, hot and ugly. because you’ve always had this way of looking at him like he was someone you could pick up and put down whenever it suited you, and he should be grateful you kept coming back at all.

and fine, maybe he let you. maybe he leaned into it a little too hard back then. skipped plans. answered texts at stupid hours. showed up when you said jump, just to prove he would.

but that was college, everyone was stupid in college. insecure and bored and convinced nothing mattered yet.

his jaw tightens.

you don’t get to look at him like that now. don’t get to act blindsided, like you weren’t the one with options first. as if you didn’t teach him exactly how replaceable people could be.

the keys go quiet.

jin watches him for a second, then sighs. “you know,” he says carefully, “you don’t look as unaffected as you’re pretending to be.”

yoongi exhales through his nose, fingers curling “yeah,” he mutters. “well. neither do you.”

jin scoffs with a playful raise of his brow, leaning back and crossing his arms. “that doesn’t even make sense.”

yoongi doesn’t bother looking up. his thumb drags over one of the keys, not pressing, just feeling the smooth plastic under his skin.

“drop it,” he says.

jin clicks his tongue. “nope.” a beat. “this about hoseok?”

that gets a reaction. yoongi’s fingers still, just for a second.

he laughs under his breath, sharp and humorless. “it’s not about hoseok.”

“uh-huh.”

yoongi finally looks at him then, eyes dark, annoyed. “it’s about the principle.”

jin blinks. “the principle of what, exactly?”

“her,” yoongi says, voice flat, “doing shit just because she knows it gets under my skin.”

jin’s brows knit together. “you’re saying—”

“she doesn’t want him,” yoongi cuts in, jaw tight. “she wants the reaction. always has.” his hand curls into a fist on his thigh. “hoseok’s just convenient. always around. easy to use.”

he looks back down at the keyboard, presses a single key harder than necessary. the sound rings too loud in the room.

“it’s not jealousy,” he adds, quick, defensive. “i don’t care who she fucks.”

jin hums, unconvinced.

“it’s the fact she only does it when she knows i’ll see,” yoongi says. “when she wants to remind me i’m not special. like she’s still got that leverage.”

silence stretches.

jin studies him, then sighs. “you know that still sounds like jealousy, right?”

yoongi’s mouth pulls into a thin line.

“no,” he says. “it sounds like me being sick of being played.”

jin exhales, rubbing a hand over his mouth. then he shrugs.

“then block her,” he says. “cut it off. move on.”

“what?” yoongi asks, flat.

jin tilts his head. “you heard me. you’re not kids anymore. if it’s that deep, just… stop.” a pause. “block her. stop answering. let it die.”

yoongi scoffs automatically, a reflex. “it’s not that simple.”

“why not?” jin asks. “because she might get mad?”

yoongi opens his mouth, then shuts it again. he considers it—no more late-night u up? whenever it’s convenient for you to remember he exists. no more watching you pretend he doesn’t get to matter unless you decide he does.

he imagines the silence, the space it would leave. imagines you checking your phone, frowning when nothing goes through and you realizing he’s not there to pull on anymore.

his fingers curl slowly, pulling back from the keys, and he can’t help but smile.

“yeah,” he mutters, more to himself than anyone else. “maybe.”

block you.

just to see what happens.

you like to think you handle things well. you always have.

you handled things well when your coordination partner quit the day before what could potentially have been the most important project presentation of your career. you even handled it well when jen told you she was getting engaged to her bum of a fiancé, despite your best advice.

so you really, really wanted to handle this well.

unfortunately, you are not.

and it’s not even that yoongi blocked you—who gives a fuck about that? not you, for one. good for him, growth.

no, it’s that he’s only blocked your number, but still has you added on social media. and while usually you can ignore his posts of his piano or hoseok’s bass or whatever gross venue they’re playing in, recently his content has taken a turn which you can only attribute to his recent desperation to spite you.

in short, yoongi is posting girls. lots and lots of them—mostly groupies, mostly backstage. all different fonts of the same type. short skirts, black lipstick, half torn gloss t-shirts.

still, you’re mature enough to not let it bother you. mature enough to even like a couple, although you’re not above leaving a couple of comments that are a little bit less than mature.

but what you can’t handle is that stupid green circle around his stupid ugly profile picture.

it shouldn’t mean anything. it’s just a handful of people he decided get to see a little more than the rest. nothing personal.

except it is. because it’s bodies.

not faces, usually. angles instead. bare skin caught in bad lighting, a thigh with a handprint here, a marked up neck there, the shadows of two bodies just out of frame.

you don’t linger. you never linger. you tap through it fast, detached, barely registering anything except the shape of it, the intent.

it’s deliberate, that much is obvious.

you tell yourself it’s sad, desperate even. a little embarrassing, honestly. all that effort just to provoke a reaction. not that you give him one.

and sure, you could block him. but that would look like him winning, as if you couldn’t handle it.

no. absolutely not.

“uh—hey. is this a bad time?”

the voice cuts in softer than it should, pulling you out of your spiral mid-thought. you blink, lifting your head from where you’ve been staring blankly at your phone.

jungkook stands a few steps away from your desk, file clutched to his chest, uncertainty written all over his face.

you straighten automatically, the practiced motion slipping back into place.

“no,” you say, smiling. it feels easy enough when you let it be. “absolutely not.”

his shoulders drop in relief. “oh. okay. good.” he hesitates, then steps closer. “i just wanted to check if you still needed the revised deck for the noon meeting. i can send it now if—”

“that’d be great,” you say, already nodding. already back in control. “thank you.”

he beams, clearly pleased to be useful. “yeah. of course.”

as he turns back toward his desk, you glance down at your phone one last time, sliding it facedown beneath a stack of papers.

“hey,” you call, quick to catch him before he can get too far.

jungkook pauses mid-step, turning back a little too fast. “yeah?”

you tilt your head, casual. “do you have any plans tonight?”

he blinks. once, twice. “uh—tonight?”

you nod. “yeah. i was thinking it might be nice to get to know each other better. outside of work.”

there it is.

the way his eyes light up before he can stop it and his posture straightens, hopeful and eager, like you just tossed something shiny at his feet. it’s almost sweet.

“i—no,” he says quickly. too quickly. “i mean, i don’t have plans. i’m free.”

you smile, soft and approving. “good.”

his grin spreads, unmistakable now. “yeah. yeah, that sounds great.”

“perfect,” you say. “we’ll figure something out later.”

“okay,” he says, already nodding. “yeah. definitely.”

he walks away this time with a little more bounce in his step, shoulders lighter, head already somewhere else entirely.

you watch him go, then turn back to your screen, fingers settling over the keys.

easy. harmless.

and if someone else happens to see it, well. that’s not your problem.

what is your problem is jen.

because jen notices things. and once she notices, she doesn’t shut up about it.

lunch has barely started before she’s already leaning across the table, salad untouched, eyes sharp and annoying in that way that says she’s been waiting.

“okay,” she says. “so we’re circling back to the rec.”

you don’t look up from your container. poke at something vaguely green with your fork. “we already circled back.”

she snorts. “don’t do that.”

“do what?”

that, she mouths silently, gesturing at your entire face. “we glossed over it. big difference.”

you stab a piece of chicken harder than necessary. “it was three weeks ago.”

“exactly,” she says. “plenty of time for you to stop being weird about it.”

you glance at her, flat. “i’m not being weird.”

she snorts. “you said you were leaving. then you disappeared. then you came back looking pissed off and told me we were leaving.” jen lifts a brow. “that not weird to you?”

you don’t miss a beat. “no.”

“wow.” she leans back, unimpressed. “bold.”

“i wasn’t having fun,” you say, shrugging. “it happens.”

jen studies you over the rim of her coffee. “you were having fun. you were glowing. then you weren’t.”

you poke at your food, suddenly very interested in rearranging it. “maybe i just sobered up.”

“you didn’t drink.”

“psychologically sobered up.”

she rolls her eyes. “you’re impossible.”

you glance up, faint smile in place. “you love me.”

“unfortunately,” jen sighs. then, softer, “you don’t usually bail like that.”

you pause, just a fraction, then you lift your shoulders again. “i didn’t feel like staying.”

jen’s gaze sharpens. “because of someone.”

“because of the night,” you correct.

she clicks her tongue. “same thing.”

you meet her eyes this time, cool and steady. “drop it.”

there’s a beat. the jen exhales, lifting her hands in surrender. “okay. okay.”

she reaches for her sandwich, but her eyes don’t leave you. “just saying,” she adds, casual but not fooled, “whatever crawled under your skin that night? it’s still there.”

you smile, polite and practiced. “you’re imagining things.”

jen snorts. “sure.”

you clear your throat, pushing your tray aside. “anyway,” you say lightly, “tonight’s gonna be a good night.”

jen pauses mid-bite, slowly lowering her fork. “oh?”

you nod. “yeah.”

her eyes narrow, interest sharpening. “why?”

you tilt your head, casual. “i’ve got plans.”

that does it. she straightens fully now, elbow planting on the table. “since when?”

“since today,” you say. “spontaneous.”

jen hums, suspicious. “with who?”

you shrug. “jungkook.”

the silence is immediate.

“jungkook?” she repeats. then, louder, “jungkook?”

you glance at her. “yeah.”

she blinks. once. twice. “as in jeon jungkook?”

you nod again, unfazed.

“intern jungkook?” she presses.

“that’s the one.”

jen stares at you like you just admitted to a felony. “you have a thing with that jungkook?”

you arch a brow. “thing’s a strong word.”

“you asked him out,” she says flatly.

“i asked if he had plans.”

“you’re going on a date with your intern,” she corrects.

“i’m getting a drink,” you say. “with a coworker.”

jen laughs, sharp and incredulous. “oh my god.”

you sip your water. “it’s not that dramatic.”

“it’s extremely dramatic,” she says. “he worships you.”

you smile faintly. “that’s not my problem.”

she stares at you a second longer, then shakes her head. “you’re dangerous.”

you hum. “i’ve been called worse.”

jen sighs, resigned but amused. “this is gonna end badly.”

you stand, gathering your things. “maybe.”

then you add, easy, certain: “but it’s still gonna be a good night.”

and, as chivalrous as you are, you offer to pick jungkook up.

you regret it a little when he opens the passenger door like he’s stepping into a museum exhibit, careful and reverent, smoothing his coat before he even sits. he smells good—cheap, definitely, but the effort is still there nonetheless.

you pull away from the curb, city lights smearing across the windshield as traffic hums around you.

“this is nice,” he says after a beat, earnest. “you didn’t have to do this.”

you glance over, amused. “it’s a car, jungkook. not a proposal.”

he laughs, breathy, shoulders loosening just a bit. “still.”

the bar comes into view a few minutes later—velour. smoked glass and gold lettering, the kind of place with a line even on weeknights and a dress code stricter than work.

his eyes flick to the sign. “oh.”

you smile. “problem?”

“no—no,” he says quickly. “just. wow.”

you park, cutting the engine before you turn to face him. “so,” you say, easy, “tell me something about you that isn’t on your resume.”

he blinks, caught off guard. “uh.”

you wait, patient, watching him think.

“i love olives,” he offers finally. “like, irrationally.”

you hum. “controversial. noted.”

he relaxes a little more, smiling now. “what about you?”

you consider it. then shrug. “i’m very good at pretending things don’t bother me.”

his smile falters, just a touch. “do they?”

you open your door. “come on. drinks first.”

inside, velour glows low and warm, the kind of place where everything feels intentional. you catch his reflection in the glass as you walk, wide-eyed and trying to keep up.

you let him talk. about music. about where he grew up. about how he still feels new to all of this.

you nod, ask questions, encourage.

you’re very good at that too.

you’re seated a minute later, tucked into a low leather booth near the back.

you watch jungkook settle in across from you, posture a little too straight, hands folded like he’s waiting for instructions.

you take him in slowly, deliberate. not subtle about it either.

his jaw tightens under your gaze, ears going pink. “what?”

you hum. “nothing. just—” you tilt your head. “you’re cute.”

he laughs, startled. “i am not.”

“you are,” you say easily. “but you carry it weird.”

his brows knit. “what does that mean?”

“means you don’t own it.” you shrug. “you should work on that.”

he shifts in his seat. “how?”

you smile, letting the silence stretch just long enough to make him squirm.

“you have a friend?” you ask.

your apartment is quiet. jungkook sits at the kitchen island, shoulders relaxed now, buzz softened into something calm. beside him is his friend, taehyung.

hot, objectively. subjectively, ridiculously sexy.

dark hair falling just so, one arm draped over the counter like he owns the place already. he looks amused, eyes flicking between you and jungkook as if he walked into something interesting and decided to stay.

you pour drinks without asking. water for jungkook, sliding the glass toward him with a pointed look. he opens his mouth to protest, then thinks better of it.

“thanks,” he says, sheepish.

taehyung arches a brow. “damn. i don’t get one?”

you glance at him. “you’re fine.”

he grins, unbothered.

jungkook clears his throat, suddenly very aware of his hands. “so—uh. this is tae.”

“i gathered,” you say, setting the bottle down. “nice to meet you.”

taehyung’s smile sharpens, slow and curious. “likewise.”

you lean back against the counter, watching the two of them side by side. the contrast. the potential. interesting.

you sip your drink, already thinking, plotting. you smile to yourself.

you’re about to handle this beautifully.

you set your glass down, leaning back against the counter like you’re just making conversation.

“i’ve got a bedroom,” you say casually. “great view. floor-to-ceiling windows. you can see the whole city when the lights are on.”

jungkook’s ears go pink immediately. he ducks his head, fingers curling around the condensation on his water glass.

taehyung, on the other hand, looks intrigued. “sounds fancy.”

“it is,” you say. “king bed, too.” a beat. “gets kind of lonely at night.”

the silence that follows is loud.

jungkook shifts on his stool, throat bobbing. “oh.”

taehyung glances sideways at him, smile slow, knowing. “lonely, huh?”

you shrug, unbothered. “just stating facts.”

you glance between them, letting the moment stretch just long enough to feel charged.

“i can show you,” you say, light and easy.

jungkook looks up at you, startled. “oh—i mean—only if—”

taehyung’s already sliding off his stool. “lead the way.”

you smile to yourself and turn, heels clicking softly as you head down the hall.

you think you’re cute. liking yoongi’s posts, leaving your stupid comments underneath like looks crowded back there, or wow, someone’s busy.

not that yoongi minds it. he likes to read through them, knowing the only reason you wrote them in the first place was because he was getting under your skin.

yoongi reads them every time. sometimes twice.

actually—he kind of loves it. the predictability of it, the way you can’t help yourself. because he knows exactly why you’re doing it, even if you won’t say it out loud.

you’re irritated.

you’re poking, testing. trying to remind him you’re still there without admitting you care enough to do anything louder than a comment and a like.

and you’re too proud to block him back. that’s the best part.

he pictures you hovering over the option, thumb hesitating, pride winning out in the end. figures you’d rather suffer quietly than give him the satisfaction of knowing he got to you that bad.

it’s been… satisfying. more than he expected, watching the balance shift, watching you scramble to stay on top of a game you’re not controlling anymore.

and then there was your close friends story.

uncute.

deeply, painfully uncute.

three’s a crowd, the caption reads, smug as hell.

the picture is neck down, no faces. your collarbone marked dark and messy, a bruise blooming where someone clearly didn’t hold back. two bodies pressed in close on either side of you, the touch familiar enough to make his jaw tighten.

yoongi exhales through his nose, slow.

so that’s what you’re doing now.

he locks his phone and sets it down beside him, fingers curling briefly into the fabric of his pants.

cute games. stupid games.

he wonders how long you think you can keep this up before it stops being fun for you.

and it’s not that yoongi cares. he doesn’t care who you’re with, what you’re doing, how many people you’re letting crowd your space just to make a point.

he just hates how shameless you are about it. like you need to prove something instead of just living your life. desperate, almost.

and that’s what gets under his skin. not the bodies, but the intention behind it. the performance. the way you’ve always needed to be seen winning, even when no one asked you to compete.

he scoffs quietly, thumb hovering over his phone again before he thinks better of it.

three’s a crowd.

yeah. he got the message.

you want him to look. want him to know you’re busy, wanted, surrounded. want him to think you’ve moved on so hard you had to document it.

it’s a bad tell. you’ve always had them.

yoongi sets his phone face down, jaw tight, a faint smile tugging at his mouth despite himself.

two can play dirty.

yoongi exhales, then reaches for his phone anyway. opens his contacts, scrolls, presses.

hoseok answers on the second ring. “yeah?”

“you seen it?” yoongi asks, skipping everything else.

there’s a pause. then a laugh. “the close friends thing? yeah.”

“and?”

“and what?” hoseok says. “she fucks. not news.”

yoongi closes his eyes briefly. “i need a favor.”

another pause. longer this time.

“absolutely not,” hoseok says immediately.

yoongi opens his eyes, stares at the ceiling. “i didn’t even tell you what it is.”

“don’t need you to,” hoseok replies. “every time you say ‘favor’ in that tone, something is wrong.”

“relax,” yoongi says. “it’s not that bad.”

“that’s worse,” hoseok mutters. “no.”

yoongi’s mouth twitches. “you still owe me.”

silence.

hoseok sighs, long and put-upon. “don’t do that.”

“i covered for you,” yoongi continues, calm. “twice. once with joon. once with management. you said you’d get me back.”

hoseok clicks his tongue. “i said within reason.”

“this is within reason.”

“i don’t like the way you say that.”

yoongi waits. lets it sit.

finally, hoseok groans. “fine. i’ll hear you out.”

“that’s all i’m asking.”

“i’m not promising anything,” hoseok adds. “and if this turns into you being petty about—”

“i’m not petty,” yoongi cuts in.

hoseok snorts. “sure.”

there’s a beat.

“talk,” hoseok says. “but make it quick.”

as much as you enjoy watching yoongi try so desperately to get in your head, it comes to a point where eventually, even you have to admit enough is enough.

this is beyond a point. this is excessive.

it’s like if you took too much and multiplied it by every girl yoongi’s posted since this whole thing started—which, if your math is correct, is a whole lot. enough that it’s stopped being irritating and crossed neatly into exhausting.

you’re tired.

tired of the green circles. tired of the implication. tired of pretending it’s funny when it’s clearly just noise now. there’s no edge to it anymore, no thrill. just repetition.

the final straw was when his story popped up again.

hoseok was tagged this time. some smug caption about the eiffel tower, the implication loud enough without trying. you don’t even need to watch it all the way through to know what it’s meant to say.

so you decide to do the mature thing. you lock your phone, set it down, and sit there for a beat with your jaw tight, resolve settling in slow and steady—nip the problem at the bud.

you pick your phone back up.

the screen lights your face, bright and unforgiving, thumb hovering for half a second before you open his profile.

you type it out first in notes. delete it. type it again.

can we talk?

you send it before you can overthink it. a dm, because of course it has to be a dm—you’re still blocked.

that pisses you off all over again.

d.agust: about what

you stare at the screen, jaw tightening, and your fingers move on instinct.

about you being an immature man child

you pause. reread it. imagine his stupid mouth twitching when he reads it.

you delete it and try again.

don’t act dense, dipshit.

send.

the bubble pops back up right away, like he’s been waiting all this time to finally see you crack. the reply comes fast, too fast.

d.agust: are my posts bothering you :(

you let out a short, incredulous laugh, staring at the screen. your thumbs hover, already itching at how he’s so smug and so irritatingly aware of himself.

you type back without thinking.

don’t flatter yourself.

then, because that’s not enough—

it’s just gotten old.

you watch the typing bubble appear again, disappear, then reappear. he’s taking his time now, considering. enjoying it.

you lean back against the counter, phone pressed to your palm, jaw set. you exhale through your nose, irritation sharpening.

we’re both grown. you should be able to handle your problems like the well-adjusted adult you pretend to be.

the reply comes quick.

d.agust: my problems??

you scoff out loud.

obviously yes. you have a problem.

three dots. gone. back again.

d.gust: you cannot be serious right now.

you press your lips together, thumb hovering, heat creeping up your neck.

you’ve been posting like a teenager who just discovered attention, you type, then erase all of it before sending:

this whole thing is excessive.

you watch the screen, waiting.

he’s quiet longer this time. then,

d.agust: my only problem is your weird attachment to me

you stare at it, jaw dropping just a fraction before you catch yourself. then you laugh, sharp and humorless, thumbs flying.

oh my god. are you serious?

so the fact you can only get hard knowing you’re pissing me off isn’t a problem to you?

the typing bubble vanishes.

reappears.

vanishes again.

you can practically see him staring at his phone now, jaw tight, expression unreadable, that delicious little pause he always takes when you hit closer than he wants to admit.

the bubble reappears.

d.agust: are you insane?

you don’t hesitate.

are you hard?

there’s a pause this time.

d.agust: are you serious?

you smile to yourself, all smug satisfaction.

i’m trying to prove a point.

the reply takes a second longer than the rest. you can practically feel him choosing his words, temper pulling tight around them.

d.agust: yeah. i am.

your chest tightens despite yourself.

d.agust: but not for the reason you think.

d.agust: i’m only thinking about putting you in your place.

you scoff, already typing.

and what place would that be?

d.agust: you really wanna ask that?

yeah. spell it out for me.

d.agust: you want it spelled out? you’re just a dumb bitch who needs to be reminded what happens when she runs her mouth.

your breath catches, heat crawling low and deep.

you like it when i run my mouth.

d.agust: only when i get to shut you up. put you on your knees and see how long that attitude lasts with my hand in your hair.

your thighs press together, heart pounding.

d.agust: bet you’d shut up real quick for me. bet you’d beg for it. act all proud until i make you drool, make you thank me for it.

almost instantly, your phone lights up with an incoming call. his username, sharp and bright on the screen.

then a text, before you can even react.

d.agust: answer.

you smirk, typing out a reply instead.

what if i don’t?

his response is immediate. don’t test me.

your heart jumps, heat curling in your stomach. you hesitate, just long enough to feel like you’re winning something, then swipe to answer the call.

silence for half a second—then yoongi’s voice, low, a little rough. “pick up faster.”

you roll your eyes, but you’re already smiling. “what, scared i wouldn’t?”

“not scared,” he mutters. “just don’t like being ignored.”

“mm. must be hard for you.”

he laughs, quiet. “shut up.”

“make me,” you say, voice soft and challenging.

“where are you?”

his voice is rough in your ear, low enough to shiver right down your spine.

you lean back against your headboard, phone warm in your hand. “would it bother you if i said i was at someone else’s place?”

there’s a pause, just long enough to make your stomach flutter.

“no,” he says, tone flat. “because i know you’re not.”

you swallow, lips twitching despite yourself.

“where in your house are you?” he asks, voice a little sharper now.

you hesitate, just for a second, knowing he can hear it. you glance around, eyes catching on the faint reflection of city lights in your window.

“kitchen,” you say finally. “why?”

yoongi’s quiet for a beat, then: “what are you wearing.”

you snort, rolling your eyes even though he can’t see it. “are we playing twenty questions now?”

there’s a smirk in his voice, sharp and deliberate. “i just want to know if you dress like a slut all the time, or only when you want attention.”

your jaw tics, irritation and heat mingling, sparking under your skin.

“wouldn’t you like to know,” you shoot back, kissing your teeth.

he hums, low. “i would. so? tshirt and sweats, or are you parading around half-dressed just in case someone decides to call?”

you picture him now, phone pressed to his ear, imagining you exactly how he wants.

you let your voice drop, slow and unhurried. “robe.”

there’s a little silence on the line, weighted and wanting.

you trace the edge of the counter, biting back a smirk. “some old lingerie underneath.”

you know he’s picturing it. you want him to.

“you might remember the set,” you add, voice softer. “black. lacy. little bows on the front.”

you can almost hear him swallow, the static in the line stretching taut.

yoongi’s breath hitches, and when he speaks, his voice is rough, low enough to leave no room for misunderstanding.

“sit on the counter.”

you pause, lips parting, heat blooming in your chest.

“now,” he says, firmer.

you obey, sliding up onto the cool marble, the robe parting just a little, lace brushing your thighs. “‘kay.”

“spread your legs,” he adds, slower this time. “want you open for me. want you thinking about how you’d look if i was there.”

his words hang in the space between you, thick and electric, every nerve in your body strung tight and ready.

“hands where i’d want them. show me you still know how to listen.”

you smirk, legs swinging a little.

“you’re not here,” you say, voice light but taunting. “why should i listen to you?”

“because that’s what this whole thing is about,” yoongi says. “you, obsessed with me even when i’m not there. can’t help yourself. you want me to tell you what to do, even if you pretend you don’t.”

your fingers tighten on the edge of the counter, body reacting even as you try to play it cool.

“so do it,” he says, voice velvet and command. “spread your legs for me. just like you would if i was right there.”

you do as you’re told, easing your legs open until the robe slips wide open.

“and?” you ask, voice barely above a whisper.

yoongi hums, low and approving. “now,” he says, slow, drawing it out, “rub yourself. over your underwear. just your fingers, just enough to make it ache. slow—really slow.”

you press your palm down, circling over the thin fabric, the sensation both sharp and unsatisfying. your breath catches, nerves tingling.

“don’t rush,” he murmurs. “i want you aching for it. want you thinking about how it’d feel if it was me instead of your hand.”

your eyes flutter shut, fingers moving just the way he wants. he hears every soft catch of your breath, and you can sense his smug smile on the other end of the line.

“that’s it,” he says, voice thick with control. “keep going. let me hear you.”

there’s a pause, yoongi just letting himself listen, before he speaks again.

“i’ll let you speed up a little bit for every answer i like,” he says, voice low and taunting. “so answer right.”

your fingers falter, anticipation prickling along your skin.

“who was in your ‘three’s a crowd’ story?” he asks, tone edged with something a sharp enough for you to feel it all the way through the line.

you scoff, but you’re already throbbing, desperate for more. “no one. it was for show.”

he’s silent for a second.

then—“stop,” he says flatly.

your hand freezes, frustration burning through you. “what?”

“i said stop,” yoongi repeats, cold satisfaction threading every word.

you whine, hand still and aching, frustration sharp in your chest. “yoongi—”

he just waits, cold and patient. “who was it?”

you swallow, heat crawling up your neck. “a coworker,” you mumble. “and his friend. it wasn’t anything.”

he exhales, long and quiet. you can almost hear the gears turning, satisfaction and irritation twined together.

“good,” he says finally, voice soft but strict. “now keep going.”

your hand moves again, slow at first, but quickly gaining confidence, circling and pressing, heat building with every careful touch. you let out a shaky breath, your hips shifting for more friction.

yoongi hears it. you know he does.

“faster,” he says, satisfaction curling in every syllable. “good girl.”

your head tips back, jaw slackening as you follow.

“that story,” he says, not naming it. “the one with me and hoseok. you see it?”

your fingers stutter, just for a second. “yeah,” you admit, a little breathless.

he hums, slow. “how’d it make you feel?”

your cheeks burn. you hesitate, pulse thumping.

“did you wish it was you?” he asks, softer now. “in between us. me behind you, hoseok in front, taking everything we gave you?”

your breath hitches, thighs trembling as you press down harder, hips rocking against your palm without even thinking.

“well?” he prompts, voice all dark promise. “tell me.”

your voice comes out small, honest. “yeah. i did.”

yoongi’s breath is heavy in your ear, control thin.

“greedy bitch,” he murmurs, voice rough with heat. “knew you liked having two men. can’t ever get enough, can you?”

you gasp, hips rocking into your hand, the words making everything sharper and hotter.

you whimper, unable to help it, thighs tensing as you chase the friction, every nerve lit up.

“that’s what you want, isn’t it?” his voice curls dark around you. “someone behind you, holding you open. someone else in front, making you feel how full you can get in every hole.”

he lets the silence draw out, waits for you to answer.

“say it,” he commands, softer but no less firm. “tell me how much you like being used like that. tell me how badly you want it.”

“i like it,” you whisper, voice rough and shaky. “i like being used. i want it—want you both—”

yoongi’s breath comes out dark, satisfied. “fuck yourself on your fingers,” he orders, slow and commanding. “right now. make yourself as messy as you’d be if it was us.”

you slide your hand beneath the lace, sinking your fingers in deep, hips rocking desperately against the pressure. you moan, open and needy, the sound spilling out before you can catch it.

“tell me how it feels,” yoongi demands, voice low and hungry. “tell me how desperate you are for it.”

you can barely form words, pleasure rushing up and out, everything tangled up in the sound of his voice in your ear.

“please,” you gasp, eyes squeezed shut, hand moving faster. “it’s—fuck, it’s good—i want you, i need you so bad—”

“that’s it,” he groans. “don’t stop. let me hear you lose it for me.”

you can hear it now, the slick, unmistakable sound of him stroking himself on the other end of the line. he’s not even trying to hide it. the wet glide and the sound of his breathing, ragged and sharp, only makes everything hotter.

it should make you feel smug. maybe usually it would. but you’re too lost in it, body pulsing, hips rocking, breath coming quick and uneven as you fuck yourself harder, chasing every filthy command he gives you.

his breath comes rough through the speaker, uneven, close.

“fuck, you sound so good like this,” yoongi groans. “wish i could see you—legs spread, fingers deep, making a mess just for me.”

you whimper, grinding down, barely able to get words out. “yoongi—”

“yeah, that’s it,” he mutters, voice shaking. “say my name again.”

“yoongi,” you gasp, everything tight, strung so high it hurts.

he groans, the slick of his fist loud in your ear. “wish i could feel you. bet you’re so fucking wet right now. bet you’re dripping all over your hand, aren’t you?”

you nod, even though he can’t see. “i am—fuck, i am, yoongi—need you so bad—”

“god, you’re perfect,” he says, low and rough, losing his rhythm for a second. “such a needy little thing for me. you gonna cum for me?”

your breath stutters. “please—i’m so close—”

“do it,” he orders, voice dark, trembling with it. “want you to cum for me. want to hear how fucking pretty you sound when you let go.”

you moan, loud and helpless, and let yourself break, coil snapping hard as his name tumbles from your lips again and again.

on the other end of the line, yoongi’s breath catches, a low curse spilling out, and you know without even seeing him that he’s right there with you, falling apart at the same time.

for a moment, there’s only the sound of both of you breathing, ragged and uneven.

yoongi is the first to break the silence, voice rough but softer now, almost fond beneath the exhaustion.

“knew you’d listen,” he murmurs. “always do.”

you let out a shaky breath, sliding your hand out from beneath your underwear. “shut up.”

yoongi laughs, breath a little uneven but smug. “don’t get shy now.”

you roll your eyes, shifting on the counter, closing your robe a little more over your thighs. “wasn’t exactly shy a minute ago.”

“good,” he says, tone flat, but there’s a low satisfaction threaded through it. “don’t start.”

there’s a small pause. the sound of yoongi shifting. then he speaks again, voice cool. “clean yourself up.”

you scoff, already hopping down from the counter. “wasn’t waiting for your permission.”

you hang up first, tossing your phone down and heading for the bathroom, skin still humming.

the club is loud, bass heavy and lights strobing across spilled drinks and sweaty bodies. yoongi’s halfway through something strong and poorly mixed, warmth buzzing under his skin, when namjoon leans in close.

“so,” joon says, shouting over the music, “are we finally over it?”

yoongi blinks at him, slow. “over what?”

jin, already tipsy, barks out a laugh from the other side. “over whatever made you a fucking sex fiend for the past month.”

yoongi scoffs, lifting his glass. “dramatic.”

“you’ve been unbearable,” jin continues, counting on his fingers. “fucking, flirting, disappearing, coming back smug. like a menace.”

hoseok grins, slinging an arm over yoongi’s shoulder. “kind of impressive, honestly.”

namjoon squints at yoongi. “so?”

yoongi takes another drink, lets the burn settle.

“yeah,” he says finally. “over it.”

jin hums, skeptical. “sure you are.”

yoongi smirks, eyes drifting back to the crowd. “relax. i’m just enjoying myself.”

namjoon squints at him, unimpressed. “you are wrapping and tapping, right?”

yoongi turns, brows knitting. “what?”

“condoms,” joon says, louder. “it’s not safe to be community dick without one.”

yoongi nearly chokes on his drink. “community what?”

jin snorts, leaning in. “he’s got a point. you’re basically handing it out for free at this point.”

“i am not,” yoongi scoffs.

hoseok laughs. “bro, you kind of are.”

jin shrugs, unapologetic. “no foul. what’s the point of being in a band if you’re not having sex?”

“exactly,” hoseok agrees, raising his glass.

jin opens his mouth again, already warming up. “like literally, my girlfriend the other night—”

“nope,” namjoon cuts in immediately.

“absolutely not,” hoseok adds.

yoongi holds up a hand. “i do not need details.”

jin groans. “you’re all so boring.”

“we’re protecting the vibe,” namjoon says. “drink your drink.”

the bass drops again, conversation swallowed by noise. yoongi takes another sip, shaking his head, a faint smirk tugging at his mouth.

he’s having fun. and it’s been nice, fucking around, even if it only was to prove a point that you were fucking obsessed with him. why did he let himself stay under your thumb for so long? because you smiled at him once at orientation?

he remembers vaguely enough. you moved through the orientation crowd with a clipboard tucked to your chest and a stack of drink vouchers balanced in one hand, handing out welcome packs with a smile that was clearly practiced, but still warm. you greeted everyone individually, sweet and attentive, as if there weren’t hundreds of faces blurring together in front of you.

it was the first time he saw you.

he remembers dropping his own pack into the nearest bin the second he clocked you. remembers the pointless excuse it gave him while he worked up the nerve to approach, copper hair washed out and his confidence already failing.

you didn’t treat him differently. you just handed him another pack when you noticed, even slipped an extra voucher on top, generosity easy and unexamined. it meant nothing to you.

it meant everything to him.

he walked away after that with the pack pressed to his chest, knowing he’d missed his chance to say something memorable. knowing, somehow, that it wouldn’t have mattered anyway.

years later, it still sits wrong in his chest. how something so small ended up mattering for so long.

hoseok slings an arm around his shoulders, grin wide and bright, already half-drunk.

“hey,” he says, knocking his forehead lightly into yoongi’s temple. “descartes.”

yoongi blinks. “what?”

“you’ve got that look,” hoseok continues, waving his glass in front of yoongi’s face. “the i’m thinking about things that don’t matter look.”

jin leans in from the other side, squinting. “yeah. scary. hate it.”

hoseok presses a drink into yoongi’s hand. “stop thinking. start drinking.”

yoongi exhales a laugh despite himself, shaking his head. “fuck off.”

“nope,” hoseok says cheerfully. “that’s philosopher brain talking. we’re killing that tonight.”

namjoon raises his glass in agreement. “for the love of god.”

yoongi looks down at the drink, then back up at the lights and noise and bodies pressed close. he takes a sip, then another. the warmth settles easy this time.

hoseok grins, satisfied. “there we go.”

yoongi lets the music pull him back in, lets the thought loosen its grip. he bumps shoulders with hoseok, then turns toward namjoon, eyes narrowing with interest.

“so,” he says, raising his glass, “how’s that celibacy vow going?”

namjoon chokes a little on his drink. “it’s not a vow.”

jin squints at him. “you literally said vow.”

“i said temporarily abstaining,” namjoon corrects, ears going red. “for the sake of cleansing my body of lustful energy.”

there’s a beat.

“…what,” hoseok says.

jin stares. “say that again. slower.”

yoongi snorts.

namjoon groans, dragging a hand down his face. “that’s what she says, okay?”

“oh,” hoseok says immediately. “of course she does.”

jin laughs, loud and delighted. “so you’re sexless for art?”

“i’m not sexless,” namjoon protests. “i’m just—resetting.”

yoongi lifts his glass in mock solemnity. “rest in peace.”

namjoon flips him off. “you’re all idiots.”

hoseok claps him on the back. “yeah, but we’re idiots who fuck.”

jin howls.

namjoon lifts his glass, dead serious. “unlike bicycle dick,” he says, nodding toward yoongi, “this gives me the opportunity to form a meaningful relationship.”

yoongi squints. “first of all, rude. second of all—” he straightens, offended, “i have meaningful relationships.”

there’s a split second of silence.

jin raises a brow.

hoseok raises a brow.

namjoon raises both.

all three of them just stare at him.

“…with who?” jin asks slowly.

yoongi gestures vaguely with his drink. “people.”

hoseok tilts his head. “plural?”

“yes,” yoongi snaps. “i can be emotionally complex and sexually active.”

jin snorts. “name one.”

yoongi opens his mouth. closes it. opens it again. “that’s not the point.”

namjoon hums, satisfied. “interesting.”

“you’re all assholes,” yoongi mutters.

hoseok grins, clapping him on the back. “we just want you to find love.”

“i don’t want love.”

jin laughs. “that was fast.”

yoongi doesn’t rise to it. he just downs the rest of his drink.

hoseok claps his hands once, loud and decisive, cutting straight through the laughter.

“okay,” he announces. “no more relationship talk.”

jin blinks. “who died and made you god?”

“me,” hoseok says, already grinning. “just now.”

namjoon opens his mouth, then closes it when hoseok points at him. “especially you. no more women speak. no muses. no celibacy journeys.”

yoongi snorts. “thank fuck.”

“tonight,” hoseok continues, throwing an arm around both of them, “is about the boys.”

jin raises his glass. “finally.”

“drinking,” hoseok says.

“bad decisions,” jin adds.

“and absolutely zero emotional growth,” yoongi finishes.

namjoon sighs, but he’s smiling when he lifts his drink anyway. “you’re all terrible influences.”

“yeah,” hoseok says, clinking glasses with him. “and you love us.”

jen’s stretched out on your bed, laptop open, hair twisted up in a claw clip while you stand at the vanity, lining your eyes.

“are you sure you don’t wanna come?” you ask, glancing at her in the mirror. “last chance.”

she doesn’t even look up. “positive. i’m buried in work and if i don’t catch up tonight, i’m gonna hate myself tomorrow.”

you hum. “if you’re sure.”

“i’m sure,” she says. “go be hot for the both of us.”

you finish your makeup in practiced motions, you slipping into your dress and tugging it into place before you reach for your earrings.

jen looks up then, eyes lighting. “so,” she says casually, “who’s the lucky guy tonight?”

you shrug, unclasping one earring. “haven’t decided yet. maybe no one.”

she snorts. “of course you haven’t.”

“what?” you glance at her. “i like options.”

jen’s eyes narrow, curious. “did things go well with jungkook?”

you slide the earring through, then pause. “it wasn’t really… a thing. more a one-time thing than anything.”

jen tilts her head. “does he know that?”

you scoff. “obviously. i make it abundantly clear that i only do casual.”

“yeah,” jen says gently, “but some people aren’t built for casual.”

you still, hand dropping slowly. you turn to look at her.

she doesn’t flinch. “you tend to have an effect on men,” she continues. “especially the shy ones. the insecure ones. you make them feel seen, and then they start hoping.”

you lift your chin. “it’s not my fault i’m desirable.”

jen smiles, fond but firm. “no. but you do need to decide whether you’re gonna wield your powers for good or for evil.”

you stare at her, then scoff softly. “dramatic.”

“accurate,” she says.

you put the earring in anyway, turning back to the mirror. “life isn’t a love story.”

jen hums, waiting.

“you fall in love with someone,” you continue, steady, practiced. “or worse, with the idea of them. and then it rots. people change. expectations creep in. someone gets bored or scared or resentful and suddenly everything’s falling to shit.”

jen closes her laptop partway. “that’s not—”

“it always is,” you cut in, calm. “just takes different routes.”

she opens her mouth again, already gearing up. “okay, but that’s not how it was for me and—”

“i don’t wanna hear about that bum right now,” you say, dry.

jen blinks. “wow.”

“i’m serious,” you add, reaching for your bag. “save the meet-cute. i’m not in the mood for inspirational content.”

she sighs, rubbing her temple. “you’re such an asshole.”

you smile faintly. “and yet.”

jen watches you for a moment, then shakes her head. “one day, you’re gonna let someone prove you wrong.”

you sling your bag over your shoulder. “doubt it.”

“mm,” she says. “famous last words.”

you grab your keys, already halfway to the door. “lock up after me.”

“be safe,” jen calls.

you pause just long enough to glance back, lips curling. “i always am.”

and then you’re gone, heels clicking.

the club is packed when you get there.

not just busy, packed. bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder, heat clinging to skin, bass thudding so hard it feels like it’s rearranging your organs. the line outside had been a mess, but inside is worse. louder.

you take it in with a slow breath, letting the noise wash over you.

this is easy. this is familiar.

you slip through the crowd with practiced ease, hips angling just enough to pass, fingers brushing arms and backs without apology. the bar glows ahead, bottles stacked high, bartenders moving fast and sharp.

you order something strong, neat. the first sip burns in a way that feels deserved.

you check your phone once, nothing you care about, then slide it back into your bag and step deeper into the crowd.

tonight isn’t about thinking.

it’s about noise and movement and the freedom of being wanted without being known.

good.

this is exactly what you needed.

yoongi’s pretty buzzed. loose around the edges, warm in a way that makes the lights softer and the music hit just right.

the others, however, are a lot more than buzzed.

hoseok’s halfway feral, shirt damp and hair sticking to his forehead, yelling lyrics that don’t exist at the top of his lungs.

jin’s got an arm slung around some poor guy’s shoulders, shouting over the music with the kind of enthusiasm that guarantees he’s sharing some embarrassing story he’s gonna regret tomorrow.

and namjoon…

yoongi squints.

namjoon is gone.

eyes glassy, grin lazy. swaying a little where he stands, drink hanging loosely in his hand. namjoon, who usually nurses one drink and lectures the rest of them about hydration, looks like he’s two beats away from a breakdown on the dance floor.

that sobers yoongi up a notch.

“holy shit,” he mutters, leaning toward hoseok. “is he okay?”

hoseok squints at joon, then laughs. “never seen him like this.”

“me neither,” yoongi says.

jin pops up beside them, delighted. “he tried to explain poetry to the bathroom attendant.”

yoongi winces. “yeah, okay. we’re pacing now.”

he drains the rest of his drink anyway, but slower this time. someone’s gotta stay upright.

“i’m gonna get some air,” yoongi says, already backing away.

“don’t die,” jin says, already distracted.

hoseok gives him a sloppy thumbs-up.

yoongi weaves through the crowd, shoulders brushing bodies, the music dulling as he pushes toward the exit. he’s almost there when something flickers in his periphery. movement, familiar in a way that makes his steps slow.

common sense says keep walking. he doesn’t—he turns.

and there you are.

what the hell.

for half a second, his brain stalls. then it recalibrates, defensive and sharp. you’re allowed to be here. you’re allowed to do whatever you want. this isn’t his territory, and you aren’t his responsibility.

he’s not obsessed with your life the way you are with his.

you must feel it anyway, the weight of his stare, because your head turns. the surprise flashes quick across your face before it smooths into something amused.

you smile, then you lift your hand and blow him a kiss, exaggerated enough to be unmistakable. you add a wink for good measure, all smug confidence.

yoongi scoffs under his breath, jaw tightening.

you, of course, don’t stop there. you lean back into the guy behind you, close enough that your mouth brushes his ear. yoongi can’t hear what you say, but he sees the way the guy’s posture changes instantly, attention snapping sharp and eager.

you pull back just enough to look at him, then crook a finger, beckoning.

the guy steps closer without hesitation.

yoongi tells himself to be the bigger person. he knows he should be. he turns his head toward the exits, inhales, then counts—one, two—reminding himself that whatever this is, it’s not worth it. that you’re doing this on purpose. trying to see if you can piss him off and make him jealous.

he doesn’t care about that. he’s just pissed you still think he’s some lapdog you can whistle for.

the alcohol blurs the edge of that thought just enough.

he pivots back inside before he can stop himself, reaches out as he passes the bar, plucks a drink straight out of someone’s hand.

then he bumps into you. just hard enough.

the drink tips, dark liquid spilling down the front of your outfit, cold and unmistakable.

you gasp. “what the fuck—”

“oops,” yoongi says mildly, already stepping back. “tripped.”

the guy at your back stiffens, anger flaring fast. “hey, man—”

yoongi turns to him, blank and unimpressed. “stay out of it.”

the guy hesitates, thrown by the flatness of it.

yoongi looks back at you, eyes sharp, unrepentant. “this is between me and the lady.”

your mouth is still open, shock flashing into something hotter.

“are you demented?” you snap, voice sharp over the music.

yoongi lifts his hands, maddeningly calm. “accident.”

you laugh, short and ugly. “fuck off.”

you shove him—not hard enough to move him much, but hard enough to make your point. your balance wobbles for half a second after, heel scraping against the floor before you catch yourself.

yoongi’s eyes flick down, then back up. amused.

you jab a finger into his chest, missing center and correcting, breath warm with alcohol. “you know what your problem is?”

he looks down at your finger as though it’s something mildly interesting. “enlighten me.”

“you think you’re special,” you say, words tumbling faster now. “you think you’ve got some kind of claim over me. always have. since college.”

his brows lift. “me?”

you scoff, hand dropping, then lifting again as if you can’t quite decide what to do with it. “yeah you. with your looks, your sulking, your whole—thing.”

yoongi lets out a soft laugh, shaking his head. “no, babe.”

the word lands wrong.

“that’s all you,” he continues, voice low and certain. “you’re the one who’s been acting like i belong to you.”

you snort, stepping back half a pace, nearly bumping into someone behind you. “don’t flatter yourself.”

“i’m not,” he says. “i’m correcting you.”

your mouth twists, irritation flaring bright. “you’ve always wanted to be something i chose.”

yoongi leans in just enough to make you still. “and you’ve always wanted to be something i’d chase.”

you scoff again, louder this time, waving a dismissive hand between you. “please.”

yoongi turns, already done with it, angling away as if this is where he exits and leaves you sputtering.

you don’t let him.

your hand snaps out, fingers closing around his arm. “what about my dress?”

he stops. slowly looks down.

the spill has darkened the fabric, clinging where it shouldn’t. your—very exposed—chest glistens with droplets of whatever her poured down your front.

his eyes flick back up to yours, unimpressed. “there’s not much dress to worry about anyway.”

that does it.

you laugh, sharp and incredulous. “you fucked it.”

yoongi exhales. “i said it was an accident.”

“you fucked it, you fix it,” you snap.

before he can respond, you’re already tugging him after you, fingers tight around his wrist. your path toward the bathrooms isn’t straight, but your intent is clear.

“hey,” he mutters, resisting just enough to make a point. “what are you doing?”

“fixing your mistake,” you say over your shoulder. “try to keep up.”

the bathroom door swings open hard. fluorescent light replaces strobe, the noise of the club dulling to a muffled thud behind the walls. you click the lock shut behind you.

you let go only once you’re inside, turning on him, eyes bright and furious and just a little unfocused.

“give me your shirt.”

yoongi blinks. “what?”

“your shirt,” you repeat, slower, like he’s the one drunk. “so i can wear it. duh.”

he scoffs, incredulous. “why would i do that?”

“because,” you say, gesturing down at yourself, “you spilled a drink on me.”

“and?”

“and you’ve got a jacket,” you add. “the whole shirtless-with-a-jacket thing? your girls will eat that up.”

yoongi’s mouth twists. “this isn’t about my girls.”

you roll your eyes so hard it looks like it almost hurts. “relax. it’s fabric.”

you step forward before he can say anything else, hands already at his shoulders, tugging at his jacket. the motion’s clumsy but determined, your balance tipping forward just enough that he has to steady you by reflex.

“hey,” he mutters. “what are you doing?”

“fixing it,” you say, peeling the jacket back. “remember?”

yoongi lets out a quiet, knowing huff. “right. because you’re not just looking for an excuse to undress me.”

you look up at him, flat. “obviously not.”

“sure,” he mutters, but doesn’t stop you. his hands drop to his sides, making it easier for you to slip the jacket down his arms.

the fabric slides free, landing in your hands, leaving him in nothing but a thin black tee and an unimpressed expression.

you reach for the hem of his shirt, fingers grazing bare skin. your fingers curl, taking your time, knuckles dragging up along his stomach. he lets you, jaw clenched tight, a muscle ticking as he watches you work.

“hurry up,” he says, voice low. “don’t make this more dramatic than it is.”

you arch a brow, fingers pressing to his waist, nails skimming. “don’t flatter yourself. you’re not even my type.”

yoongi scoffs, but there’s heat simmering behind his eyes now. “good thing you’re not mine, then.”

you pull the shirt up and over, slow, letting it catch just a little on his shoulders before you tug it free.

he stands there, bare-chested, gaze fixed steady on you. for a second, neither of you moves. then your hands drop to his belt, fingers slow, intent unmistakable.

yoongi’s breath catches, dark amusement curling into something heavier.

“still fixing it?” he murmurs.

your lips brush his jaw, breath warm. “don’t complain. you started it.”

and then his mouth is on yours.

the kiss is messy, and he crowds you back against the counter, hands bracing on either side of your hips to pull you closer even as you fumble with the buckle.

your fingers slip, clumsy with adrenaline and vodka and the fact that he’s pressing into you, tongue licking into your mouth. he bites your lip, a low noise rumbling from his chest when you finally tug the belt free.

you pull back, just enough to get your hands around his waistband. you work his pants down, intent and clumsy, but when the fabric slips low enough and you actually see him, you freeze.

“what the fuck am i looking at?” you blurt, eyebrows climbing.

yoongi smirks, half-lidded, head tilting just enough to look cocky. “you like?”

you don’t answer right away, still staring. then you glance up at him, incredulous. “it’s a piercing?”

his smirk deepens. “i know.”

you blink again, gaze flicking between his face and his cock—silver glinting at the tip, the metal perfectly obvious. “you got pierced. on your dick.”

“yeah.”

your mouth opens. closes. “when was this?”

he just looks down at you, lazy, heat curling at the edges of his voice. “you gonna keep grilling me about my jewelry, or you gonna suck my dick?”

your pulse jumps, the shock melting fast into something dirtier.

you roll your eyes but drop your knees, tipping your head. “don’t get cocky, rockstar,” you mutter, voice dripping with attitude even as your fingers curl around his thigh.

yoongi smirks down at you, heat crawling higher. “too late for that.”

you glare up at him, eyes sharp. then you lean in, tongue flicking out to trace the piercing, slow and experimental, deliberately teasing just to make him twitch.

“thought you wanted to be worshipped,” you say, lips ghosting over the metal. “don’t rush me.”

his breath stutters, hips jerking. “who’s rushing?”

you hum, smug, before taking him in deeper. he watches the way your throat flexes, spit slicking his cock. his fingers tangle in your hair, guiding your rhythm. you let him nudge deeper, nose pressed to dark curls, the metal cold and hard against the back of your throat.

yoongi groans above you, voice dark, praise barely more than a growl. “that’s it. fuck, just like that. so messy for me, baby.”

he watches you work him, lips slick and plush, spit gleaming down his cock. he lets his head fall back for a moment, groaning as your tongue flicks over the tip. then, just as your rhythm picks up, he tightens his grip in your hair, forcing your gaze up.

“enough,” he mutters, breath harsh. “bend over the counter.”

you stay put, eyes lifted in challenge.

yoongi exhales, then grabs your arm, hauling you to your feet. he manhandles you, turning you toward the counter and pressing your hips forward, palms flat against the cold sink.

“i said,” he growls in your ear, “bend over.”

you hold his stare in the mirror for a second—defiant, lips swollen—then arch your back, ass pushing out, dress bunched high on your hips. the look in his eyes as he rucks the fabric up and drags your panties aside is pure hunger, no patience left.

yoongi doesn’t even hesitate. he sinks to his knees behind you, palms spreading you wider, thumbs digging into soft skin. the second his mouth meets your cunt, everything else goes static.

his tongue is filthy, licking a broad stripe up your slit before he seals his mouth over your clit, sucking hard, groaning low when your hips twitch back into his face. you whine, one hand scrabbling back to tangle in his hair, tugging him closer.

he only pulls back when your legs start to shake, spit and slick smeared everywhere, his mouth swollen and breath ragged, eyes black with hunger.

“that’s it,” he rasps, thumb stroking the inside of your thigh, “just like that.”

your legs tremble, breath stuttering with every grind of your hips into his face, but yoongi doesn’t let up.

“you’re gonna cum on my tongue,” he mutters against you, voice low, the vibration making your knees nearly give. “and then you’re gonna cum on my cock.”

and before you can do more than gasp, he’s back on you, mouth hot and wet.

your body jerks, a choked sound caught in your throat. you press your hips back against his face, thighs trembling, hand gripping the edge of the counter like it’ll anchor you. your other hand is fisted in his hair, pulling, but he doesn’t budge. he groans again, the sound vibrating through you, tongue flicking over your clit in fast, hard strokes that send sparks shooting through your spine.

your body gives in before your voice can catch up, your orgasm slamming into you. you cry out, breathless and raw, grinding against his mouth while he holds you steady and takes it.

yoongi doesn’t stop, doesn’t slow. not until you’re twitching and gasping, half incoherent.

and when he pulls back, cock hard against your thigh, he just smirks, wrecked and smug. his voice is low in your ear, still soaked in your taste. “stay just like that.”

he strokes himself once—slow and teasing, lining up behind you—then drags the head through your folds, groaning under his breath at how wet you still are.

you whimper, hips pushing back instinctively.

he doesn’t ease in.

he pushes all the way to the hilt in one slow, thick thrust, the curve of the piercing catching just right and making you gasp loud enough to echo. your eyes flutter, forehead pressing to the mirror, breath fogging the glass.

“fuck,” yoongi grits, jaw tight, hands firm on your hips as he starts to move. “you’re so fucking tight like this.”

every thrust is heavy, knocking the breath from your lungs. the slap of skin fills the small bathroom, your slick coating his cock, making every thrust louder and wetter.

your nails dig into the counter. you whine his name, voice breaking as his rhythm gets meaner.

“you hear that?” he pants behind you. “that’s how wet you are for me. you love this shit.”

yoongi watches the way you struggle to speak, lips parted, breath caught in your throat, and it makes him grin, dark with satisfaction.

“yeah,” he pants, snapping his hips into you, the sound obscene. “that’s what i thought. all you needed was cock in you to finally shut the fuck up.”

you moan, and he tightens his grip in your hair, forcing you to lift your head and look at yourself in the mirror. his other hand digs into your hip, keeping you flush against him, cock driving deep and unforgiving.

“say my name,” he growls into your ear, pulling your head back, neck bared.

you choke on a sound, hips jolting as his cock hits too deep. “yoongi—”

“again,” he demands, thrusts getting rougher. “fucking louder.”

“yoongi,” you whimper, wrecked, your hands scrambling for purchase on the counter, fingernails dragging against the surface. “yoongi, fuck—”

“that’s it,” he breathes, rutting into you now, chest slick against your back. “admit you love this.”

you barely manage a breath, head swimming, cunt clenching hard around him. he feels it, groans, and drags his fingers down to your clit, rubbing in fast, rough circles.

“say it,” he hisses. “say you love this.”

you gasp, voice fractured, fucked-out beyond recovery. “i’ve—had better.”

yoongi laughs, breathless.

“no, you haven’t.” he says, and fucks you even harder. enough to make you cry out, your body shaking as another orgasm builds fast.

you cum hard, mouth open in a silent cry as your hands scramble for grip on the counter. yoongi doesn’t stop, hips snapping into you through the aftershocks, each thrust pushing an oversensitive whimper out of your throat.

“fuck,” he groans, breath ragged, hands digging into your hips as you clench around him, soaking and twitching and ruined.

he pulls out at the last second, just as his rhythm breaks, and strokes himself hard once, twice, until he groans your name through gritted teeth and spills hot against the small of your back and curve of your ass, thick and messy.

his chest heaves behind you, hand gripping your ass tight for a beat longer before he finally lets go. for a second, the only sound is your breathing and the muted thud of bass through the walls.

yoongi exhales, steadying himself, then mutters low, “you better not wipe that off yet. looks good on you.”

you groan, breathless, face turned against the cool mirror. “shut up,” you mumble weakly.

he laughs under his breath, hands lifting in mock surrender. “just saying.”

but he doesn’t step away. instead, his fingers drag through the slick at the base of your spine, slow and deliberate, smearing it across the dip of your lower back. then he brings his thumb to your lips.

you glance at him through the mirror, eyes glassy, mouth still parted from the wreck of your breathing. he doesn’t have to say a word, the look on his face says everything.

you open for him.

his thumb presses past your lips, and you suck him in. he watches, jaw tight, chest rising as you pull back just enough to let it drag over your tongue before releasing him with a wet pop.

yoongi’s eyes darken, hand falling away.

“fucking unreal,” he mutters.

you don’t say anything. you just smile.

yoongi pulls his pants up, zipping them without a word. his breath has already leveled out, but there’s still a flush to his face, a sheen of sweat clinging to his chest.

he grabs his shirt from where it landed on the floor and tosses it next to you without ceremony.

“enjoy the rest of your night,” he says, flat.

you don’t look at him, still catching your breath, back turned. he doesn’t expect you to.

you think you’re above all that—lingering touches and whispered reassurances, slow come-downs and soft voices. you act like aftercare is for people who don’t know how to handle themselves, people who need to be cradled after being fucked.

you’ve always made it clear: you’re not one of them.

so he doesn’t offer. not anymore.

yoongi grabs his jacket off the floor and shrugs it on slow, but he doesn’t say anything else.

just turns, pulls open the door, and walks out into the dark, thudding pulse of the club.

and doesn’t look back.

taglist : @rpwprpwprpwprw @glossdebut @angellekookie @ggukivrse @annyeongbitch7 @hemmosfear @auroradamned @jimineepaboya @devinkelsey19 @misshale21 @mar-lo-pap @benyhime @ktownshizzle @hoemeprazole @blueberriesm @yoonglez0613 @apobangpo2025 @sunflowerxrose @esposadomd @thelilbutifulthings @magicshop96

[skzhotpot]

Oh my damn

They were really cutting deep but I’m not complaining I think that was like foreplay for them 😅

This was a trip and a half

💜 more → Min Yoongi · BTS · Fic Rec Library 💜

[persphonesorchid]

Fountain Of Axtaliah - KSJ

Summary: You’re a hacker, and a damn good one --- if you do say so yourself. A legend in underground forums, the kind of person corporate sharks pretend don’t exist. Your job is simple: hack into the database of some spoiled CEO, dig up whatever dirt you could find and cash out. Easy money. 

Until it’s not that simple. 

Genre: SY-FY, cyber-punkish, strangers to lovers, slight enemies to lovers, angst, action, fluff. A bit of espionage and fake dating.

Word Count: (Part One) 27.6k

Warnings: mature language, dark dystopian/post-apocalyptic themes (including descriptions of environmental and societal collapse), implied violence, and brief mentions of parental neglect and widespread criminality. Reader discretion is advised. Attempted murder and wounds x2, swearing. cursing, making out but nothing too serious eheh. a lot of meme references and meta humour. The reader is sometimes called Birdie.

Notes: unfortunately...because of Tumblr's limitations on text posts, i have to split this into two parts, and part two would be posted tomorrow or, a bit later!!! I'll add the link to it at the bottom of the post!

Okay HELLO!! Happy Christmas to those who celebrate and good day to those who don't!! A little gift for you all :)) This was meant to come out much much sooner, but I wrapped it up super late. It also was NOT gonna be this damn long >:((. I'd planned for 20k at least but the plot said no and now we're here...!! This fic had been sooo much fun to write, i hope you guys find all the meme references i put in there. Enjoy!!!

masterlist

If you were wondering---just a tad bit---how exactly the world would look a couple hundred years from now, let’s just say it’s probably not what you’re thinking. 

If your thoughts went along the lines of world peace, zero crime, and Mother Nature finally getting her moment to do some mother-ing---you’d be wrong. 

See, Earth’s always been a shithole. It’s in the archives---what’s left of them, anyway. Environmental collapse. The rich preying on the desperate. Overpopulation so bad cities started building up instead of out. The ice caps melted in ’25, half the world drowned---the Great Flood 2.0, except Noah didn’t give a damn---and the rest choked on its own smoke. Snow fell in deserts. Acid rain burned through skylines. Humanity watched, cursed, then adapted---because that’s what it does best. 

And that’s how the Rise began. 

They called it a new dawn. But you know how people are with pretty names. What it really was, was a scramble. A desperate attempt to build higher, dig deeper, wire the world until even the dirt had a login. 

Fast-forward a couple dozen or so generations, and the world hums different now. The sky’s owned by corporations, the ground by data farms. Cities glow like circuit boards---veins of neon running through towers that never sleep. The air buzzes like it’s carrying a thousand conversations at once. 

Land of freedom, they call it. Don’t like your face? Get a new one. Want to date that robot server downtown? Go for it, Jan. No one bats an eye at anything anymore.  Want to take a holiday on the Jupiter resort? Spend millions for your gate pass to fly out of orbit---you’d be lucky to get perks with that. Kids can get tattoos at twelve---yeah, that one threw you for a loop...well, it is a relatively new thing. 

When you were twelve, your head was buried in books because you had a dad that stepped out for milk and didn’t look back and a mother who couldn’t care less that you were both starving. Too smart for your own good, they’d said, although it didn’t get you very far when you were little and college was just as hard to get into as it was two centuries ago. 

The world’s still the same, no matter how much it twinkles. The strong eat the weak. The rich don’t give a damn about anyone and the government’s still lawless. 

In less words---it’s an even bigger shithole. 

But hey! At least the lights are pretty. 

At least for people like you, that made your own way -----there’s always something to get by on. The world runs on circuits now. Wires breathe in every corner you look, systems locked tighter than the Pentagon. 

Well… not for you, anyway. 

Hackers are criminals---or so the government would tell you in their oppressive propaganda. They’re rats chewing through the wires of your brand-new TV set. But you? You can get into anywhere. No challenge is a challenge for you. 

You probably could’ve used that big brain of yours to solve world hunger, or cure whatever plagues are still chewing through the slums. 

Instead, you used it to get rich. 

Sometimes it’s petty: lift a street vendor’s bogus card reader logs so she can steal back a week’s pay from a local courier who’s been skimming fares. Swap a jealous ex’s social feed for an embarrassing loop of their own old speeches. Patch a friend’s rent account with a tiny, invisible micro-transfer that keeps them fed for a month. Those are the scripts you run before breakfast---cheap, clean and satisfying. 

Sometimes it’s elegant: ghost a senator’s public schedule so their bodyguard chases a ghost appointment while you slip a protest group past checkpoints. Reconstruct a deceased artist’s lost archive from corrupted shards and sell the restored files to a private buyer who wants the exclusivity. You trace fingerprints through six layers of obfuscation and stitch a reputation back together like it was never torn. Those jobs pay in more than credits---they pay in favours and stories that sell your name. 

And then there are the big ones. The jobs that leave scorch marks on your trail. 

You’ve rewritten corporate balance sheets, so a charity got a controversial multi-millionaire’s hidden philanthropic fund. You made an absolute liability vanish from the police servers long enough for an innocent person to get out of jail. Once, for a very specific client, you built a smell-proof blackbox that let them ferry a person past biometric tolls using nothing but a sequence of fake heartbeats and a rewired thermal signature. That one paid for a year of luxuries---and some mistakes you keep in a locked subroutine. 

You’ve breached private vaults where people store not jewellery but memories---stitched consciousness backups saved under dead names. You don’t always take them. You admire how fragile those files are, how people tuck their whole lives into folders like they’re safe. Sometimes you return them, sometimes you sell them to collectors who like owning other people’s pasts. 

You flirt with danger because you’re good at it. You like the artistry of a clean breach: a cascade of permissions peeling away like onion skin, a final tunnel that opens into a vault no one was meant to see. You write your own keys. You know where to press. 

And when the job is ugly you still take it. Not because you’re merciless, but because you’re pragmatic. A job has parameters: scope, risk, payout. You estimate, you execute, and you disappear. The world’s laws are suggestions; your contracts are guarantees. 

So, when the anonymized ping hits your client list that morning---no face, no rep, and one hell of a pay check-----surprisingly, you hesitated. You stared at it for a good long while, fingers pressed against your lips and your brows furrowed. Where the client's name should be---or whatever fake name they can come up with; you never question-----was just a string of number. Which marks the account being used as temporary. It's nothing unheard of, you’ve seen plenty of them.  

It was about just past four am when it came in. That’s what you call ‘the desperate hour’ because it’s just after three am, when any normal person with too much time on their hands would be done wallowing in their overthinking and decide to do something. 

You lean back into your chair, the wheels squeaking as you push away from your desk. Using your feet, you guide the chair back towards the door to your work room before pushing it open.  

“Cali!” you shout, listening to the quiet. Somewhere about there’s a giggle and the unmistakeable sound of a palm striking skin. Irritated now, you call again, “Calico!”  

A girl with ash blonde hair stumbles out of a room down the hall. Knee high silver chrome boots in her slack fingers, matching skirt riding up enough that her ass cheek peeks at you, red and no doubt smarting. You watch with mild disgust as she swaps spit with your partner in crime.  

His hair’s a mess, shirt missing, well...it’s on the girl, hanging on for dear life by a single button. They don’t seem to be stopping, and you smack a hand against your door.  

“Yo!”  

The girl springs away, giggling like a blushing virgin caught in the act and have the balls to act bashful. Your friend half glares at you as he leads the girl past your room -----she fucking winked at you -----and up the stairs. After a moment you hear the door slam shut and footsteps coming back down. He stands at the bottom of the metal staircase and stares at you like a disappointed father.  

“You are the biggest cock-block known to man.” 

“How many times do I have to tell you, Jimin? Play with your toys upstairs. And you’d better not have fucked in my room. I’ll skin you alive.” You grumble, wheeling your chair back to your desk as he comes closer. He stands in the doorway, frowning at you. It wouldn’t have been the first time Jimin had drunkenly stumbled into your bedroom and not the spare you had set up purely because he sleeps down here most of the time. You wish that was enough to save you from seeing his perky ass one too many times. You point at the dark marks scattered across his chest and neck, “did you even use protection? I heard there’s a new thing going around. It's like stage five Gonorrhoea.”  

“Gina’s clean.”  

“Her name’s Gina?” you laugh, and it grows into a cackle when you feel Jimin kick the back of your chair. “I didn’t even hear you come in last night.”  

“That was... probably for the best.” Jimin smiles, the look in his eyes makes you shiver.  

“You could’ve said that without the look. Ew. Now I’ve got an image in my head.” You scowl, and then, using your empty water bottle, you poke it into his tummy, “Can you go shower or something? You’re contaminating my precious air.”  

“Excuse you, I smell amazing.” He protests, laughing. 

“You smell like old man cologne, sweat and Gina.” You push harder until he steps back, swatting at your hand. “I’ll tell you what I was calling you for after you don’t smell like a nightclub.”  

Jimin flicks your forehead before sauntering away.  

Unfortunately, you can’t sell him for a corn chip. If “I’ll do it if you do it” were people, it would probably be the both of you---two brain cells sharing one bad idea at a time. 

Jimin is your bestest friend in a five-hundred-mile radius, born and bred in the same gutter as you. Two rats from the slums, gnawing at wires and bad decisions. You used to joke that there must’ve been something in the drinking water when you were kids; you’re two peas in a pod, just a shot off each other in intelligence. Jimin was also too smart for his own good---dangerously smart, like the kind that could take apart a government drone and put it back together with a butter knife and duct tape. 

When the government started handing out scholarships to the underprivileged, Jimin was first in line. But he refused because they had no place for your talent in coding (looking back on it now, they were probably looking down their noses at you). You still think that was the dumbest thing he’s ever done---brilliant, loyal and infuriatingly Jimin.  

He had such a bright future ahead of him. A mind built for blueprints and machines, someone who could’ve designed the next generation of tech. Instead, he chose to give it all up to stick with you. You know, like an idiot. Could’ve been sitting pretty and retired at twenty-five. 

But you’re doing fine. Really, you are. The dirty work pays enough to keep the lights on and the fridge humming. You don’t have to suck up to anyone in a suit or beg for scraps in a cubicle farm. You’ve carved out your own corner of the world---illegal, sure, but yours. 

Wouldn’t change it even if you could go back in time and pimp smack your mother.  

Sighing, you decide to clear the cluttered mess that is your table. Cleaning it free of empty water bottles and cup ramen containers, listening to the soft whirring of your computer system and the little bleep-bloops of the off-grid server monitor.  

Most of your set up, you and Jimin designed and built yourselves. From junk parts and dumpster diving in the back alleyway of a tech factory. When you’d first started hacking, it was risky, two kids with nothing better to do and absolutely nothing to lose. When you got your first pay out, it was small, because no one wanted to trust a little kid with big work, you were lucky that guy took a chance on you.  

With the little bit of money you earned back then, you’d managed to get you and Jimin out of the slums and into the gutter. Just a little higher from nothing, but it was everything to you both back then.  

You earned your way, and when you got your first big gig, you’d used the money to buy an ancient warehouse. It had an underground system that worked wonders for you. You left the upper portion for Jimin to do what he liked, and with the money you were earning, he’d made something of the old place.  

The outside exterior still looked very much an abandoned old warehouse. Sure, you and Jimin live cushy now, but on the down-low for obvious reasons.  

You shove the last empty cup into the bin and stretch, feeling the ache between your shoulders. The rest of the warehouse is quieter. When you step out, the light changes from cold blue to a softer amber glow.  

Your section of the place is clean, modern, but never sterile---wide couches, a cracked digital photo frame that cycles through half-broken pictures of you and Jimin from when you both had nothing. You don’t replace it. Feels wrong to. 

When you first bought the place, you and Jimin busted out the walls to make a wider space for an open plan living room area with the kitchen.  

The walls are raw concrete, softened with threadbare rugs and a scattering of mismatched shelves, some made from reclaimed wood, others from polished scrap metal Jimin insisted on keeping. Here and there, you’ve tucked in small personal touches: a jar of pressed flowers, a few sketches pinned with magnets, a single potted plant struggling toward the faint amber glow of the overhead lights. You may have let Jimin set most of the tone---smooth floors, clean counters, streamlined furniture---but subtle evidence of you lingers, stubborn and unpolished, like your handwriting on the edge of a notebook. 

Above, pipes and conduits stretch across the ceiling, some exposed, some woven into the wood panelling Jimin added. Thin strands of amber LED filament weave among them, low and warm, tracing gentle arcs that outline the living space without ever feeling like a light show. There’s a soft hum of life from the tech tucked into the corners---servers, work consoles, a holographic workspace that folds down from the wall at your command---but nothing flashy, nothing meant to impress anyone but yourselves. 

A long table dominates one side, scarred from years of projects and meals alike. Chairs and stools around it are an eclectic mix---some polished, some splintered---brought together by necessity and taste rather than design. The kitchen island is smooth steel with subtle neon inlays that glow faintly when you place your hand near sensors embedded in the surface.  

Couches sink deep, their leather cracked and supple, cushions molded to the memory of those who lounge there most. Behind them, one wall is a patchwork gallery of sorts: framed schematics, notes in your messy handwriting, a few scratched-up vinyl records.  

The absence of windows gives the space a certain intimacy---no city to intrude, no sky to distract. Instead, it’s a world unto itself, lit by gentle amber and flickers of holographic displays when needed. You can feel the weight of the ceiling, the subtle coolness of concrete underfoot, and the warmth from the heating pipes that run along the walls. Every item, every surface, is carefully practical yet carries a trace of memory, of small victories, of stubborn pride. 

It is your underground sanctuary: warm, quiet, and unpretentious, a place that reflects both the life you’ve clawed together and the small joys you refuse to let go of. 

You cross the living space and grab a protein bar from the box on the kitchen counter, ripping it open with your teeth. The wrapper hits the bin with a soft crinkle just as Jimin comes down the stairs again. 

Hair damp, shirt clean, and---thank God---smelling like soap. He drops onto the couch with a groan, towel still hanging around his neck. He shifts, looking at you from over the backrest of the couch. 

“All good?” he asks, pulling at the hem of his grey tee-shirt, damp spots clinging to his skin. 

You take a bite of the protein bar, chewing. The chocolate underside smears against the warmth of your fingers, “Got a job offer.” 

He raises a brow, interested. “Big one?” 

“Yeah. Real big.” You toss the other half into your mouth, licking the chocolate smudges from your fingers, and swipe open your Holowatch console. The holographic message flickers, blooming in a shade of chrome blue and enlarged as it’s projected upwards from your wrist. You walk over to the living room area, pointing at the message. “Didn’t even say what it is. Just… payment details. That’s it.” 

“That’s weird,” Jimin says, sitting up, leaning forward squinting. He studies the message with a slight frown, and then his eyes flicker up to yours, “You taking it?” 

You shrug, pretending to think about it. But the truth runs deeper than that. 

You’ve got enough money. Real accounts, fake ones. The ones that keep the lights on, and the ones that stay buried where no one can sniff them out. You could retire tomorrow and live three lives without blinking. But greed isn’t about need. It’s muscle memory. You see, when you grow up hungry, you never really stop chasing the next meal---even when you’re full. 

“It’s a lot of money, Jimin.” 

“It’s always a lot of money,” he counters, tilting his head and then his eyebrows disappear into his bangs. He waves his hand, wrist rolling, “That’s usually the part where I tell you it’s too risky and you agree with me. This could be anything.” 

You glance at the screen again. That those numbers feel like bait, shiny and deliberate. You know it. He knows it. Still, your fingers twitch at the thought of it---another code to break, another secret to steal. 

“That’s true. Only one way to find out.” you say finally, nodding more to yourself, “Guess I’ll take it.” 

Jimin groans, dragging a hand down his face. “You’re insane.” 

“Maybe.” You grin. “But at least I’m rich.” 

He throws the towel at your head, laughing. “And morally bankrupt.” 

“Occupational hazard.” 

You toss the towel back, softer. He catches it, shakes his head with a half-smile, “I still don’t think it’s a good idea...it’s really vague.” 

“Won’t be the first time.” You shrug, and then wave a hand, “It’ll be fine.”  

You turn off the holo, the job’s digits still glowing faintly in your mind. Jimin doesn’t look too convinced but gratefully says nothing. 

You wander back in the kitchen tapping on the fridge monitor interface. Great invention really, less of a practicality, more of a cure for standing in front of your open fridge syndrome. Scratching at your tummy, you stare blankly at the display ingredients stacked neatly inside.  

The TV turns on and Jimin surfs the channels before settling on some ancient ass reality show. Something out of ‘21, bunch of people on an island trying to find love amongst themselves. You don’t know how he finds that entertaining.  

“Cali, wanna cook something?” you call, head swivelling like a bird to look at him across the room. His head of dark hair pops up just to scowl at you.  

“You got two hands.”   

“Just say you hate me, damn.” You roll your eyes and move towards the cupboards instead.  

Jimin’s voice floats over, “I swear to god if you make cup ramen again...”  

“Well.” You snort, pulling the cupboard open, eyeing the various flavours, “If you cooked something, you wouldn’t have to worry about that.”  

Jimin sucks his teeth, and you turn to face him with a mock expression of abashed shock, “Park Jimin. Did you just tell me to kiss your ass?”  

“Why, do you want to?” He fires back, and then he stands, laying out the towel along the back. “I’ve been doing squats.”  

You make a face, “I don’t know where you’ve been.”  

He walks over, smacks your hand and closes the cupboard. He stares you down and you can already see him caving, “What’re you feeling for?”  

You make a sound that was far more gremlin under a bridge than it needed to be. He squats down to rummage through the pots and pans in the cupboards below. 

“Three courses.”  

He turns his head slowly to look up at you, eyes narrowing, “You better be joking.” 

“Yeah, but it’s just a suggestion.”  

He pulls a couple pots from the cupboard, raising to his full height, “You should know that I hate you.”  

“That’s not news.” You wrap your arms around his middle, clinging to his back as he moves to the stove embedded into the island counter. He taps on the interface; sleek black and fine silver chrome, it flares in purple, temperature lines rippling along the glass.  

He turns and you turn with him, he fills the pot with water and sighs loudly, “You’re like a damn nanite. Get off me.” 

Laughing you release him and let him work. Before long, you had stir-fried noodles and fried chicken in bowls. You would argue that it’s definitely not breakfast, but who the hell cares? You even let him convince you to eat with him rather than ‘crawl back to your cave’.  

“Mi, this isn’t even entertaining...what am I looking at?” with your mouth full of noodles and just-right veggies, you point the gnawed end of your drumstick bone at the TV.  

“This was all the craze back in the day.” He shrugs.  

You think if you stay there and zoned out hard enough it’d make a bit of sense to you. Eventually, you get back to your work, abandoning Jimin to his...show. Sipping on water, you actually contemplate the client request.  

Sighing, you accept it. At the bottom left of the screen, an encrypted text box appears. It blinks for a while, all but three seconds before the first message comes it. The person must’ve been sitting at their devices waiting for you to accept. 

[Temporary User]: Hello.  

[Temporary User]: I require your services.  

Who talks like that? You blink, staring at the screen before your fingers fly across the keyboard.  

[Shade]: What can I help you with?  

[Temporary User]: I need information about someone.  

This guy is taking forever to get to the point, you sigh, watching the chat indicator blink and stop and then start up again.  

[Temporary User]: A CEO. All you need to do is get into his company servers and tell me what you find.  

That’s...it? You squint at the initial client request, the amount of money offered and then back at the task they’ve asked. Well...this person clearly has money they have no idea what to do with, and who are you to tell them how to toss it around?  

[Shade]: I can do that. Who’s the guy?  

[Temporary User]: Perfect. His name is Kim Seokjin. I’m sure you’ve heard of him. CEO of Vionix Industries. 

Your brows go up, a sharp laugh bubbling from your lips. Kim Seokjin? Thee CEO of CEOs? Everyone who’s anyone knows the guy. Granted, not for anything remotely good...well, that’s really from an objective viewpoint.  

Vionix Industries is the Godfather of tech. Its name practically synonymous with innovation. Founded during the third wave of the digital revolution, it began with prosthetic integration tech: cybernetic limbs that moved like flesh, nerve-linked and seamless. Within a decade, they expanded into planetary data mapping; launching orbital satellites that didn’t just photograph terrain, but read energy grids, water veins, fault lines, and atmospheric changes in real time. It changed everything from agriculture to climate modelling to warfare. 

When the world needed to see itself clearer, Vionix gave it vision. 

When governments wanted control, Vionix sold them omniscience. 

Their breakthroughs built the infrastructure of the modern age; neural-link interfaces, biomechanical AI companions, self-evolving operating systems, the first functioning digital consciousness. Their name was in every boardroom, every orbit, and every surveillance act. They had patents in every field that mattered. 

And at the heart of it all was legacy. Kim Hye-Shin’s precision. His son’s ruthless expansion. Decades of brilliance.  

Then came Kim Seokjin. 

The golden heir.  

Where his forefathers built an empire, Seokjin built a reputation one scandal at a time. The media called him the Porcelain Prince of Vionix: all polish, no substance. His name was on every tech journal’s lips, and they never had anything nice to say, not that the man gave them anything nice to say about him. Lavish parties sprawling across penthouse floors, champagne baths and guests who woke up with their names in headlines for one thing or another. 

Every week, a new photo: him laughing, glass in hand, silk shirt unbuttoned halfway down, some new socialite on his arm. Notoriously difficult to work with, but somehow always available for a magazine shoot and interview. 

The most recent scandal? A professional interview for Tech Visionary, he arrived at still drunk from the night before; hungover, reeking of whiskey and unable to string a coherent sentence together. The footage went viral within the hour. 

A disgrace to his name. 

A mockery of the dynasty that built the future. Practically spitting in the face of his Great-Grandfather that started Vionix and built it from the ground up. 

And yet, for all his incompetence… the world still watched him. You would think the public would’ve grown bored of the man by now. He’s done the same thing every damn week, you don’t understand the appeal. He’s as exciting as watching paint dry. 

You’re not sure if he’s got anything to dig up. One Google search will get you everywhere. 

[Shade]: Information on that guy is practically free?  

[Temporary User]: Are you refusing?  

[Shade]: Did I say that? I’ll do it.  

“Easy money.” You mutter, shaking your head. Again, you’re not gonna tell anyone how to spend their hard-earned cash. They’re probably after his secrets or whatever that man could keep hidden. Which probably isn’t much. Unless they’re interested in his party guest list. 

[Shade]: I would need 24 hours. 

[Temporary User]: Great. I’ll be in touch.  

The chat box winks closed, and you lean back into your chair, shaking your head again. The twenty-four hours wasn’t something you necessarily needed, it’s simply because you’d be hacking into Vionix. A huge company that, without a doubt, would be crawling with security codes and trip sensors. You actually have to be careful.  

You spend the first hour buried in public detritus; an archaeologist of press releases. Investor decks that read like motivational posters, product spec sheets for consumer neural implants, glossy campaign videos tagged with too-many hashtags, API docs so painfully dry they could anesthetize a server. Career postings for Vionix’s summer intern program. Customer support logs about a dozen people who can’t figure out why their companion-bot won’t stop singing lullabies in strange languages. 

You skim, you archive and you yawn. This is the boring scaffolding of an empire: perfunctory and tidy. 

When it was clear that there was nothing of interest on the public servers, you move inward.  

The map of the network folds up and you push deeper---private VLANs, R&D sandboxes, legal partitions. The company smells different here: less curated press, more human sweat. Meeting minutes with sticky-note sarcasm. Project timelines with blank spaces for “contingencies.” Expense requests with obscene line items. A messy folder of internal chat logs where someone named Mina complains about the coffee and the head of logistics schedules a golf weekend. Little domestic things that make a corporation feel like a large, neurotic animal. 

You let yourself be bored a little longer -----really, there’s nothing interesting---until you stumble across a doorway somebody forgot to stone over. 

It’s a private cluster under an innocuous tag: /board/secure/comm. That one is not supposed to exist in the places you’re poking. It looks like a stub, actually, a placeholder so that the more inexperienced can find it when they’re looking. Handy.  

The encryption is polite and aggressive. you easily slip through it, like water finding a hairline crack in glass. Authentication tokens misrouted, an old admin key cached in a deprecated node, a service handshake that still answers an old secret phrase---nothing dramatic. You don’t need to narrate the theft; you just get in. That’s the art: make it look like it belonged there the whole time. 

The room opens like a private salon. 

Thread titles are clinical: Board.Topics.Q4, Exec.Private, Legacy.Transfers. At the top of the list is a chat thread labelled simply: “Doyun & Associates -----Private.” The head of the board---Han Doyun---he’s the one who smiles in photos with his hand on Seokjin’s shoulder and says the right things at shareholder dinners. You can find out a lot about a person by their eyes, they tell, after all, Han Doyun always gave you such shark vibes, like he’s in the wrong profession. He should be in one that demands a lot more from people who has a lot less. 

The messages are certainly...something. It’s clear these two had no idea how to properly encrypt shit or else you wouldn’t be here staring at it. It was dated a month and a half ago: 

[Han.Doyun]: He’s a fool. Every quarter he burns through more capital, every headline drags us further down. I don’t know how much longer the shareholders will tolerate him. 

[Min.Taejin]: Public sympathy still clings to the family name. But the board is restless. They want control returned to adults. 

[Han.Doyun]: Control will return once he’s gone. Quietly. We keep the legacy intact. No scandal, no blood on paper. Just an unfortunate accident. 

[Min.Taejin]: Do we even need subtlety? The man can barely spell his own title half the time. A little nudge, and gravity will do the rest. 

[Han.Doyun]: Subtlety prevents questions. We’ll arrange the contractors. External. Disposable. 

[Min.Taejin]: And the inheritance? There’s talk he’s been funnelling funds into something private off record. Some secret project. 

[Han.Doyun]: Yes. I’ve heard. A tip came in last week about something enormous. If it’s real, from what I’ve heard, it’s worth trillions. And that idiot doesn’t have the sense to guard it properly. 

[Min.Taejin]: He probably thinks he’s building a toy. Still, if there’s even a fraction of truth to it… 

[Han.Doyun]: Then we take it. Whatever he’s working on becomes Vionix property the moment he’s out of the picture. The contracts will transfer posthumously. Simple. 

[Min.Taejin]: And if he somehow lives long enough to open his mouth? 

[Han.Doyun]: He won’t. Schedule it for the gala. The cameras will be our alibi. 

You read it twice because your brain refuses to stitch the sentences together the first time: quietly gone. Contractors. Trillions. A secret project. They’re talking about erasing a man like they’re adjusting the lighting in a boardroom. 

Your palms go cool. Not fear, exactly. More the hollow, surprised stillness of a body that just learned the floor it stands on is gone. You blink once, then the edges of annoyance sharpen. The audacity. The clumsy sanctimony. The complacent certainty of men who think they’re owed what they didn’t build. 

You scroll. There are attachments. A roster of contractors---black-market brokers with names scrubbed into hashes, transfer windows, an account flagged for a “special operations” payout. Flight manifests. A timeline that pins the “fateful accident” to a high-profile event where Seokjin will be seen surrounded by cameras and crowds. They outline contingency plans: if the cameras fail, a staged accident; if there’s suspicion, a medical misread; if worse comes, an alibi old enough to go viral and disappear into noise. 

You let the words settle. Corporate language, budget lines, murder plans. Polite monsters in tailored suits. 

Your first instinct is stupid and immediate: Who the hell hired you? The anonymized client who tossed you the gig without a spec? Are they trying to outsource conscience? Are they doing surveillance? You scroll back up to the chat header. No extra tags. No breadcrumbs. Whoever messaged you knew exactly what to send and exactly how little to say. 

You should close the window. Delete the evidence. Walk back to the sofa, eat the leftover chicken, pretend you never saw anything that could get your hands dirty with a marked man’s death. That would be the pragmatic move. Safe. 

Instead, your mouth tastes like iron. You sit very still and let a new machine start in your head: problem recognition shifting into something that looks suspiciously like planning. The money flickers in the corner of your mind---the obscene number that brightened the client’s offer---and you think, not for the first time, about what you value and where you draw the line. 

You aren’t a martyr, but your inaction can cost a man his life. It’s not your business, but now you’re here and you feel like you're staring down the barrel of a gun and someone’s telling you to walk a tightrope over uncertainty. 

You copy the thread into a locked buffer, a ghost of the file you’ll need. Then you mull over it for hours, the same thought running through your mind: What would Jesus do? You can warn him, maybe.  

You sit with your head propped up on your fist, staring blankly at your screens with a frown. Your ass is starting to ache, and you wiggle your toes in your socks to bring feeling back to your legs.  

You sit very still and let the city’s neon buzz gloss over you while your fingers map the problem the way you map networks---nodes, points of failure, empathy as a nonfactor. The question isn’t whether you warn him. It’s how to do it without turning your life into a headline. Is there a way you can do that without getting in too deep? 

First: get him alone. You ghost into the public routing, trace the comm nodes that bounce his traffic, and find the thin thread that’s more forgiving than the rest---a personal line he never thought to harden because, of course, he probably never thinks. It’s ugly beneath his gloss: an old number tied to a vanity carrier, a lazy auto-forward that still points to a disposable handset. Amateur hour. Perfect. 

You craft the message like you’d craft an exploit---short, cold, and no flourish. The sort of thing that reads like a warning, you’d hope. 

Seokjin -----meet tonight at The Lumen, east mezzanine. Midnight. Come alone. Don’t wear your watch. -----A friend. 

You don’t say who you are. You don’t tell him you crawled through his company’s veins and found men in suits arranging his funeral as if it were paperwork. You’re not trying to be noble. You want one thing: him breathing the morning after and a clear conscious. 

Sending the ping is mechanical. You slip it through the feed his concierge checks---one of those soft, stupid pipelines the rich assume is safe because it’s cushioned by service contracts and smiling faces. The message slides into his screen. You watch the delivery tick from grey to green. Then you watch the tiny double dot that says “read” and hold your breath like it’s some kind of superstitious ritual. 

He reads it and he doesn’t reply. 

Second: satisfy the client without burning the trail. You compile everything public---press kits, investor slides, ordnance on product releases, the usual corporate fluff. From the private layers, you pull meeting minutes, expense statements, HR whining, a folder of the R&D timelines that’s mostly mundane but useful for anyone looking for leverage. You scrub metadata, resequencing the logs so the files look tidy and unremarkable, then encrypt the package with a key for the client to use and push it to the drop. You include a tidy little checksum note delivery confirmed, files intact. 

You don’t include the board chat. You don’t include the contractor roster or the payment windows or the line that reads like a murder memo. You copy it, lock it in a secondary buffer, and bury that buffer behind five different dead drops and fake identities. If anyone asks, you didn’t see anything you weren’t paid to see.  

The client pays immediately, because that’s how obscene offers work---cash first, conscience later. You feel the number in your accounts like a bad aftertaste. This became less about the money when you got into the private servers, you don’t even want it anymore.  

You don’t tell Jimin. You don’t tell him because he’ll either try to talk you out of it, and talk sense at you, or he’ll plant that smug, inevitable “I told you so” like a flag in a battlefield. It would be best that he’s not involved in... whatever this is. And hopefully, this turns out to be nothing at all... Let him sleep. Let him keep being the idiot who distrusts scholarships to stick with you. 

You lock the buffers, purge the ephemeral traces, put everything on a flash drive and then you sit with the after that sounds like a drumbeat behind your ribs. You didn’t do this to be a hero. You did it because you have a mirror and you clean it when it gets too dusty. You did it because, profit aside, the idea of men with spreadsheets scheduling someone’s death like a budget line is obscene in a way that makes your stomach clench.  

There’s selfishness in the choice, yeah---clear conscience is a currency you’ve hoarded at times. But it’s not the ugly kind. It’s the kind that lets you sleep with your eyes closed two nights in a row. That matters. Small mercies matter when you’ve learned not to trust anything bigger. 

You slide your chair back, feel the mechanics click, and stand. The warehouse smells faintly of oil and noodles and the kind of detergent Jimin likes. You walk to the windowless wall where the holo frame sits and watch the city pixels smear into a smear of indifferent colour. 

You don’t know how this would work, maybe he’d think it’s phishing, and ignore it. Somewhere where a man who drinks too much will think he’s invincible and a ghosted message will feel like a prank. 

You refill your water. You tell yourself you’ll do two things next: sleep, and plan. 

Plan what? You don’t know yet. Rescue, maybe. Maybe exposure, that is...if you can do it without becoming a target. Maybe you should do nothing at all and quietly watch from the shadows. That’s...not an option, no matter how tempting it seems to you. The job changed. The brief turned into a choice. Consequences will follow, whether you like them or not. 

You go back to the console and open the locked buffer. The board’s chat sits there, patient and stupid and criminal. You unplug the external drive, slide it into a Faraday pouch, and tuck it in a drawer under loose sheets of paper. 

You end up not sleeping. You pull up the city feeds and watch the time until midnight tick closer, and you feel, absurdly, like a kid waiting for fireworks to start. 

When it was about eleven pm, you shower and get dressed in something simple; jeans, a plain tee-shirt and a dark-wash denim jacket. The Lumen was a prime party spot smacked in the middle of downtown; some place you’ve only ever seen from the safety of passing cars and live streams. It's not your scene. 

Jimin’s been there more times than he could count on his stubby little fingers. You’re certain that’s where he met Gina. 

You wonder at your outfit in the mirror of your bedroom, frowning. You’re certainly underdressed for where you’re going, but you very well couldn’t tell the guy to meet you in a back alleyway. Besides, you’re going there for no other reason than having a clear conscious. You’ve already been paid, so afterwards you can move on with your life and pretend you hadn’t seen anything at all.  

Your boots scuff along the floor, clinking softly against the black steel steps as you head upstairs. You pat your pocket every few seconds to make sure the external drive is in there. 

You push the door open and let it swing closed behind you. The door to your section of the warehouse sits underneath a steel landing that cuts the space in half. The stairs that lead up towards it is a spiralling thing off to your right that goes up to Jimin’s bedroom space.  

To your left is a kitchen and dining hybrid, separated from the rest of the room by a panelled glass wall. It looks a lot warmer than your mostly dark scheme below; white speckled granite countertops and beige wood. Where you had limited your space to only the basic needs of today’s technology, Jimin embraced it.  

During the day, most of the light comes from the slanted sunroof above Jimin’s bedroom loft. He’d stripped the ceiling to install windows there, so that he could seek the sky on its less cloudy nights. 

The middle of the outer space beyond is dominated by a large couch set, leather and brown that cages the space in a boxy semi-circle. The soft white light comes from the pendant lamps hanging from above on impossibly thin wiring. It makes the dark rug that covers the concrete flooring seem even darker. A large TV sits against the wall, one that Jimin barely ever uses.  

A small portion of the room is taken up by Jimin’s office-work space. Like the kitchen area, it’s sectioned by floor to ceiling panel glass walls. Though, these ones are frosted and can be made clear at the touch of a button. 

His workbench stretches almost the entire length of the wall -----an altar of organized chaos. Spools of filament, soldering irons, precision cutters, and a charred anti-static mat scarred by a thousand prototypes. Half-assembled drones hang from ceiling hooks like metal bats in stasis, their wings sleek and skeletal -----chrome, graphite and midnight blue. 

Two monitors float above the desk on mechanical arms, hydra-like, their screens filled with code and thermal readings. A third screen sits lower, dedicated to schematics -----components blown apart and annotated in neon handwriting only Jimin understands. 

In one corner -----a charging rack of palm-sized exploratory bots, all glossy white and faintly humming, light strips breathing softly like they’re asleep. 

It smells faintly of ozone, copper, and burnt plastic. Sometimes it takes days for that scent to get out of your nose and out of Jimin’s hair.  

He does all his work there, and it’s where he sits now, tinkering with a drone. The stick of a lollipop pokes out the side of his mouth, glasses with a magnifying tool perched on his nose as he pokes an electric screwdriver about. His tablet lays near his hand, which he turns to him and slides around for a minute before muttering to himself and going back to the drone.  

As you walk across the living room, he catches your visage and looks up. “Hey, Birdie. Where’re you off to?”  

His right eye looks impossibly large with the magnifying tool, and then he tilts his head, peering at you above the frame. “...Dressed like that?” 

You wave a hand, “Out.” 

Albeit it’s for his own good, you feel guilty that you’re keeping it from him.  

“I won’t be too long. Just gonna grab a drink.” 

Jimin raises a brow, and before you can get too far, he slips off the stool he’s sitting on and takes off his glasses. He walks over to the doorway of his workshop, work forgotten. “As in... outside outside? Is the sky falling?” he squints behind you, ducking his head a little to look up at the windows above his bed.  

His eyes trail back to you, a twinkle there. A smile curls the corners of his mouth upwards, plush lips parting around his crooked front tooth. “Are you going on a secret date?”  

“Sure, Cali, let’s call it that.” You pull your keys from the pocket of your jacket, wrapping your fingers securely around the cold metal.  

“Shit, really?” He eyes you up and down with scrutiny this time, but there’s a certain mirth there, “dressed like that?”  

You sigh and he goes on, “Where’re you going?” 

“Lumen.”  

“Dressed lik---”  

“Jimin.”  

He puts his hands up in surrender, “Just wanted to make you aware that you look like you haven’t seen the light of day ever. You’ll scare off your date.” 

You give him the finger, and he blows you a kiss, watching you as you walk towards the door.  

“Be safe! And don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” He calls out, wiggling his eyebrows with a smile. 

“That’s not a very long list, Jimin.”  

When you get outside, the steel door closes behind you and the biometric lock system beeps. The warehouse sits on the city’s fringe, where the skyline begins to bruise the horizon and the ground still smells faintly of machine oil.  

Your car waits where you left it---your car, not one of those chrome, self-driving pods that swarm the highways like obedient insects. You hate those. The design is ugly. It looks exactly how a kid from ages ago would imagine a car in the future to look; smooth and silver and kind of round. You’re pretty sure it’s a passion project for someone’s grandkid.  

Your car’s an old thing by everyone else’s standards---Jimin likes to stand and make fun of it for kicks---: a deep green coupe with manual locks, chipped paint, and an honest-to-God steering wheel. You bought it years ago, back when the idea of ownership still meant something. People stare when you drive it through the city---half in disbelief, and the other half turning their noses up because how dare?  

You chuckle to yourself as you slide into the seat, the leather soft and familiar under your palms, and start her up. The engine rumbles awake, purring while turn the heat on, you rub your fingers together. The vents make a little rattling sound as the fans sputter to life; you should fix that. 

The drive downtown takes twenty minutes if the roads behave. Neon arteries run through the city, pulsing with holographic ads that ripple across glass façades. Giant screens shimmer with faces of pop idols and politicians, voices selling perfection in thirty-second bursts. Drones skim overhead, their red sensors blinking like restless eyes. 

The world is bright and glittery, and nothing dazzles your eyes anymore.  

You stick to the old roads of the city, thankfully you’re not the only person with an older model car. Mostly elderly folks keep ‘em nowadays, but there’s even less of them on the roads. 

Luckily for you, that means it’s less of a hassle to drive to the centre of downtown. An old song plays on the radio as you stop at a red light, you tap your fingers to the beat but you’re not really listening to it.  

You don’t know exactly what you’re going to tell Seokjin if he does manage to show. Somehow you don’t think, ‘Hey so someone paid a shit load of money for me to hack into your company, and I found out that your own board wants you dead, ha-ha’ would fly. He’d probably call the cops. Or, at the very least think you’re bat shit insane.  

You sigh, leaning your head against your hands on the steering wheel. You turn your head to look out the window, at the people walking up and down the sidewalks despite the hour, the old shops that have long been boarded over. Eaten up by time or left behind by people seeking greater, more modern things.  

The green light glows against your dashboard, and you push your car forward.  

You pull the coupe into a tight space between two silent, black-glass autonomous vehicles. They look down their metaphorical noses at your chipped paint and rattling vents, but you ignore them. They might be sleek and safe, but yours has a soul, and the soul smells faintly of gasoline, not sterilizing spray. 

The Lumen is a vertical wall of chrome and light, bleeding neon rainbows into the smoggy night sky. It looks like an extruded corporate symbol. You park, hit the manual lock, and slide out, immediately feeling the city pressure hit you---the cold air, the distant pulse of bass, the faint, sweet-chemical scent of recreational use already drifting from the heavy, automated doors. 

You walk toward the entrance. You know what you look like: a ghost in a denim jacket and decent jeans, surrounded by a herd of creatures wearing materials that cost more than your car. Their fabrics shimmer with self-cleaning polymers, their footwear glows softly, and their hair is styled with impossible, architectural precision. They look like expensive, genetically optimized goldfish. You feel like a rat that snuck in through the ventilation shaft. 

Inside, the sound hits you like a physical wall---a deep, resonant thud that vibrates in your chest cavity, and nearly turns your teeth loose. The main floor is a sensory obscenity. The ceiling is too high, the light is too rapid, and the air is thick and hot with the smell of cheap ambition and expensive champagne. 

“Tacky,” you mutter under your breath. It’s too loud to hear anything else, which is probably the point. 

The crowd is dense, a sluggish river of polished plastic and oiled skin. Everyone is either laughing too hard at nothing or staring blankly at the floating, three-dimensional holographic projections of stylized dancers that drift through the air like transparent, blue phantoms. You push through the crush, annoyed by the sheer inefficiency of these bodies---they take up too much space, they move too slowly, and their focus is criminally diverted. They are the same idiots who click phishing links and leave ‘1234’ as their network password, just in better clothes. 

You make your way to the back perimeter, seeking the stairs. The mezzanine is your target, the east mezzanine---elevated, slightly more exclusive, but still offering a great view of the inevitable fall. The irony is not lost on you: the perfect spot for a subtle exchange, or for an assassin to ensure a clean shot. 

Climbing the stairs, the air gets marginally cooler, and the bass becomes slightly more directional; less overwhelming. You arrive on the mezzanine level. It’s less crowded up here, featuring velvet couches and small, private booths protected by thin, shimmering kinetic-light screens that flicker with distracting, abstract patterns. The patrons here are older, quieter, and the deals they’re closing are probably far dirtier than anything happening on the dance floor below. 

You scan the area, hands tucked into your jacket pockets, feeling the solid outline of the external drive. 

It’s midnight. You’re on time. You look at the spot you specified: a small, low wall overlooking the main floor, slightly shielded by a potted, glowing plant. You lean against the railing, feeling exposed but professional. 

Alright, porcelain prince, you think, ignoring the dizzying lights below. Your turn. 

You wait, watching the crowd, trying to blend into the shadows of the gaudy architecture. The air smells a headache inducing mixture of different perfumes. You want to be home, where the smell is ozone and burnt copper and Jimin’s questionable cologne, not this fragrance of imminent disaster. 

The music hammers on, the lights flash, and you’re calculating the odds of getting out of here without a full security scan when a voice, smooth and perfectly pitched to cut through the din without shouting, speaks right behind you.  

“You look rather underwhelmed, considering you have a private meeting with the most sought-after man in the hemisphere.” 

You rotate slowly on your heel, years of living with Jimin has forced you to be prepared to be snuck up on, and thankfully, it doesn’t make you jump out of your skin.  

The man standing before you is undoubtedly Kim Seokjin, dressed impeccably in a white turtleneck sweater -----which somehow makes his broad shoulders look even more so ---tucked into sharp black slacks. The shine of his leather shoes reflects the club's neon floor lights. His hair rests perfectly, a side part that shows off his forehead and lets just a bit sway above his left eyebrow.  

He should start suing for photos, honestly. Doesn’t do him justice at all. Now isn’t the time for thoughts like that, though.  

Confusion furrows your brow; you look off to the side and then turn to check if there was anyone behind you and then point at yourself. Like the one meme of that white kid. Absolute classic. It's still around today if you look in the right places...getting off topic. 

Seokjin lets out a chuckle that’s more a puff of air than a roll of sound, “I got your message.” 

You know how in those silly kid’s cartoons where there’s tens of little you’s running around keeping everything going? You feel like they’ve all frozen up with a red, flashing warning alarm blares on.  

Your brain stutters. You blink, staring at him. He was supposed to be confused, maybe indignant, certainly defensive. Not knowing who you were, let alone acknowledging the anonymous ping you sent. He shouldn’t have approached you first. What the fuck is this?! 

“Excuse me?”  

A slow, sweet smile curled his plush lips, revealing a flash of genuine, unexpected amusement. He tilted his head, the posture making him look less regal, more predatory. 

He takes a step towards you and leans into your space. The scent of his cologne was dizzying; sharp and clean and something slightly fruity. The warmth of his breath races down your ear and the side of your neck and sends and involuntary shiver chasing after it.  

“I trust the payment was satisfactory?” he asks, his voice smooth like velvet and he pulls away, smiling patiently like he’s waiting for you to catch up to him.  

It takes a good few seconds, where you brain has to stop and push the power button for your frontal lobe. You have a strange, unnerving feeling like you’re a teen who’s just been pantsed in the middle of a full cafeteria. Or a joke just flew over your head like an airplane.  

“You... you’re ---”  

“Correct.” He says, and then he turns away from you, eyes scanning the mezzanine. With a gentle hand on your arm, he turns you towards a booth in a far corner, near a decorative water feature that would mercifully mute some of the noise. 

“We shouldn’t discuss corporate treason standing next to the raw sewage of high society,” he murmurs, his tone dry as dust. He gestures toward the booth, inviting you go in first.  

Your brain is working double time as he sits opposite you. You’ve half a mind to reach for your watch and scan him. There’s absolutely no way that this man and the man running rampant in the tabloids are the same. His eyes aren’t dulled by substance or alcohol, they’re wide and bright, a deep brown, almost black that looks far too intelligent to belong to him.  

Either you’re talking to an android replica, or The Porcelain Prince is just a perfectly curated mask donned to hide the man sitting before you now.  

“You’ve found something in the servers, yes?” He asks, and you’re not sure if he picks up the placard menu just to have something to do with his hands, or if he was genuinely browsing. “It's why you asked to meet.”  

He chuckles to himself as though he’d told a funny joke, “Well, ‘asked’ is a bit of a stretch. Ominously demanded is more like. Very misleading, by the way.” 

“You’re my client?” You’re still trying to process, and he raises his eyes from the menu to frown at you.  

“Yes, I thought I made that clear. Keep up.”  

You blink, and then take a deep breath, because if you just start wailing on him, you’d probably get kicked out. And arrested.  

“Why would you hire me to hack into your own company?”  

Seokjin lets out an almost disappointed sigh, “It was the fastest way to get an unvarnished security audit, wasn’t it?” He puts the menu aside, “Vionix is too porous. Anyone inside could be compromised. I needed proof of internal malice, delivered by someone with no allegiance to the name.”  

A laugh bubbles its way up your throat before you can stop it, slipping past your lips with a shake of your shoulders. While you’re laughing it up, Seokjin looks decidedly unimpressed, leaning back into the soft leather cushions of the booth to watch you.  

“I’m sorry...” you put up a hand and then smack it down against the polished table. The small, circular tabletop rattles a little, “I just have a hard time believing all of this.” 

“Hm, well.” Seokjin begins, waving his hand as though your words and confusion was a mere fly. “I do cut a perfect picture, don’t I?”  

He winks at you and now it’s your turn to look unimpressed. He shrugs when you don’t swoon, apparently, and then he taps a finger on the glossy menu.  

“Would you like a drink?”  

“No, thank you.”  

He shrugs again, and all he has to do is raise a hand and a server comes over hurriedly, “Suit yourself, then. Don’t complain to me when you’re thirsty after all the talking we’re gonna do.”  

He orders a gin tonic...virgin. You don’t know why that shocks you more than anything you’ve found out tonight.  

“So.” He begins, plucking the wedge of lime off the rim of the short glass. He sets it aside neatly on a napkin and sips at his drink, “Tell me what you really found on the servers.”  

You take a deep, steadying breath, surveying the man across from you. A man, not as foolish as he makes himself to be for the public, who’s utterly oblivious to the immediate, visceral danger you’d discovered.  

You dip your hand into the pocket of your jacket, pulling out the external drive that sits in its safe little pouch and slide it across the table. “It's all on there. I think internal malice is the least of your worries.”  

“How so?” He carefully lifts the flap of the pouch and wiggles his fingers around inside, “A flash drive?” 

“Does the names Han Doyun and Min Taejin mean anything to you?”  

Seokjin chuckles, “Only that one is the Chairman of the Board, and the other is the Chief Financial Officer. They were both appointed by my father before he stepped down.” He says, narrowing his eyes slightly, but otherwise, doesn’t seem too bothered by your question. “They’ve been with me for years, and my father even longer. It's no secret that they want me gone.”  

“They’re planning to have you killed.” You blurt out, and Seokjin’s hand pauses halfway lifting his glass to his mouth.  

He looks past you for a second and then his eyes refocus, “...Really?”  

He looks genuinely shocked, and for a moment, he loses the flippant arrogance he’d been displaying. He sets the glass down with a barely audible clink against the polished table. “I was expecting a coup or a cumulative voting, anything...” 

He looks distressed now, a crease forming between his perfect brows. His Adam’s apple bobs when he swallows and he nods, more to himself, you notice, “What else?”  

“The chat log was dated for a month and a half ago. They’re planning to do it at some high-profile event.” You knock your knuckles against the table, “They also talked something about a project. They’re know you’re working on something and they want it.” 

“Is that all they said about it?” his very real death threat hanging above his head is seemingly forgotten, and he looks almost desperate when he asks. “The project?” 

“No... they didn’t mention anything else. Just that it costs a lot and they think you’re ---”  

“A fool?” He scoffs.  

That was not what you were going to say...  

Seokjin sighs and rubs his thumb against his plush bottom lip. He looks at you like he’s considering something, “That project is my life. It was my grandfather’s, then my father’s and now it’s mine. The kind of work it is...I would kill me out of curiosity to get my hands on it too.”  

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Why are you telling me this?” you put your hands up, and look around, but you’re certain no one can hear your conversation over the club music, “I don’t want to be involved in...whatever this is!”  

“Funny you’d say that---” There’s a sharp sound that whistles past your ear, and a hot, burning sensation that spreads from your earlobe to your cheek.  

The kinetic privacy screen of the booth shatters into a thousand shimmering shards, the sound barely audible over the club’s bass but terrifyingly real. It rains over you in little black shards.  

Seokjin lets out a ragged, guttural grunt of pain. His hand flies to his left shoulder, a sudden, blossoming shock of red staining the perfect white turtleneck. He hadn’t screamed, but the sound he made---pure, involuntary animal distress---was worse. He shoves the small table aside, collapsing toward you, his body a heavy, muscled weight of high fashion and rapidly failing adrenaline. 

The second shot slams into the velvet cushion where your head had been moments before. Chaos erupts on the mezzanine; the club music drowned in a wave of raw, panicked screaming. 

Blood, shockingly bright, was already soaking the shoulder of your denim jacket. 

You don’t hesitate. Survival was a simple choice, and the variable currently contaminating your jacket with his blood was the one you had to move. You scramble to grab at the pouch on the ground, among the shards of black glass and shove it into your pocket. Getting to your feet, you shove aside a couple paralyzed with terror and, gripping Seokjin’s good arm, begin hauling the bulk of him off the leather seat of the ruined booth, dragging him toward the exit sign flashing red behind the decorative water feature. 

He’s stumbling, leaning against you, his breathing shallow and rattling. 

The exit door leads you to a hallway, the music in The Lumen had been cut off and all you can hear is the panicked screams of the patrons. The hallway stretches towards another exit, which spits you out on the opposite side of the carpark where your car is.  

Seokjin is thankfully cooperative, his good arm slung over your shoulder, he’s holding most of his weight himself. Though, his steps are less than ideal.  

You rush over to your car as quickly as you can, trying to not be distracted by the screaming, confused people coming out of the club in droves. You yank the car door open and get Seokjin inside, he slurs something to you as you buckle him in. 

You slam the door shut, scramble around and into the driver’s seat, and shove the key into the ignition. The engine catches with a loud, protesting rumble and you barely give it time to warm up. You peel out of the parking space with a screech, forgetting about traffic and direction, caring only about the distance between the club and the life you were desperately trying to protect. 

The scent of blood is instantly overwhelming. You risk a glance at the man slumped beside you. He’s clutching his shoulder, his skin pale and slick with sweat, but thankfully awake. You’re not sure how much longer that would be for, though.  

You need to think. Think quickly!  

You realise after a moment, that you’re just tearing down the street, and belatedly, a thought comes to mind: You can’t go home.  

If someone saw you getting into this car with a very obviously injured and bleeding man, you could be followed. You’d lead them right home and put Jimin in danger.  

“I can’t go home...I...I don’t know what to do.” You say, voice quiet, but your hands grip the steering wheel tightly. You take a breath and then another all too quickly, the speed gauge is just climbing. You frantically check your mirrors, voice pitching upwards in your panic, “What the fuck!”  

You feel like your ears are suddenly filled with cotton and you can’t get a decent string of thought to settle. There’s a man actively bleeding out in your damn car, you have nowhere to go and he’s probably going to die before anything else, and you don’t know! 

“Calm down!” Seokjin snaps, and you hear him over the ringing in your ears, “You need to calm down, or we’re both going to die.”  

You glance at him, and he looks worse. He’s even more pale and the blood stain is eating up the white of his sweater even more. His breaths are shallow, and he isn’t putting enough pressure on that wound. 

You ease your foot off the pedal, and the car slows marginally.  

“What do I do?” you ask, staring straight ahead. You don’t know where you should go. “You need to get to a hospital.” 

“No.” Seokjin grunts, “No hospitals.” 

“You’re bleeding out!”  

“Do you know the...” Seokjin closes his eyes and takes a couple breaths, and him not addressing your panic is probably best for the both of you, “the 312 Overpass?”  

“Y-yeah.”  

“Find Drayton Street. There’s a lock-up.” He’s very clearly trying to stay conscious long enough to tell you what he needs to. His voice is soft, and you can just barely catch his words, “You’re looking...for Kim... Namjoon. Doctor.” 

His eyes flutters and his head give a little thump against the window. That wakes him a little, but it isn’t for long as his head then lolls forward.  

“Oh god, are you dying?!” You cry, reaching your clammy hand over to smack sharply at his cheek, “Please don’t die in my car!”  

His eyes blink warily open, and he lifts his head. He lets out a weak laugh, “Imagine...” he mumbles, “making this terrible upholstery worse?”  

He blinks hard and winces as the wheels go over a speed bump. You maintain your speed, pushing the engine to its limit.  

The streets here are darker, older, less patrolled by autonomous cars and flashing billboards. You roll the windows down a crack, hoping that the slight chill would help keep you calm or keep Seokjin awake a little longer. The air smell of damp concrete and neglect. You grip the wheel, your eyes constantly flicking between the road ahead and Seokjin. 

“You’re...” He doesn’t open his eyes, just forces the air past his throat. “You could at least... tell me where we are. Or let your GPS handle the route.” 

“It doesn’t have a GPS,” you snap, the cold necessity of the situation keeping your panic pinned down. “I use the old municipal grid.” 

He lets out a slow, wet sigh that makes you flinch. “No GPS. Manual ignition. A person of your...talents,” he whispers, a thread of contempt pulling through the pain. “Should have access to something less likely to leave my blood all over the pavement.” 

“My car is reliable,” you bite back, the defence automatic. “And it doesn’t log my routes. Unlike your fancy self-driving pods.” 

“No logs,” he murmurs, his head lolling. “Admirable. But inefficient. You’re... you’re driving blind.” 

“I’m using the old municipal grid maps,” you explain again, already running a mental trace on the 312 Overpass. “They’re rarely maintained, but they work.” 

“Of course,” he manages, the sound laced with quiet disdain. “The only kind of map a rat would trust.” 

“And the only kind that gets you out alive,” you retort, the exchange firing a small, necessary burst of focus into your brain. 

His breathing hitches, and he goes quiet. 

You wait for the next sarcastic critique, but it doesn’t come. You risk a full glance. The man is slumped against the door, his head pressed against the glass. The blood stain is vast and dark, and his skin is an alarming shade of grey under the intermittent streetlights. His eyes are closed, his face slack. 

The absence of his voice is instantly more terrifying than the sound of the gunshot. Your hands, briefly warmed by the pointless argument, turn icy cold on the steering wheel. 

“Hey,” You prompt, your voice tight, pulling your gaze from the road to check on him. “Seokjin!?” 

No response. 

“Fuck!” 

He’s out. Completely passed out. The silence is deafening, broken only by the loud, protesting rumble of the engine. 

A moment more and you finally spot the overpass; a monumental arch of forgotten infrastructure. You brake hard, slowing for the off-ramp into the industrial periphery. The area is dark, dominated by blocky warehouses and the shadows they cast. This is the old city limits.  

You check the street signs---faded, chipped enamel signs that the city largely ignores now. Drayton Street. 

You slow the coupe to a crawl, navigating the pitted asphalt. The air here smells stale, like old metal and industrial runoff. He had called it a “lock-up.” This implies secrecy, a hidden workshop, not a public facility. You scan the buildings---mostly blank, windowless walls, cheap composite metal siding, and heavy steel doors, all blending into one uniform line of neglect. 

Why would a doctor be staying out here of all places? I mean, you’re not one to judge...much. But it is a strange place for a doctor to be in. You feel like you’d just wandered onto an old zombie movie set. 

You have the nagging feeling that you’re running low on time, or that could just be your paranoia about Seokjin actually dying. So, you pull over on the dark street and kill the lights. You roll up the sleeve of your jacket and tap at the small screen of your Holowatch. Seokjin hadn’t told you exactly where to look, so you’re going to have to use your brain.  

Holowatches are simple in design and can be used for pretty much anything. It was a walk in the park to modify to suit your needs, and despite not having the foresight to find yourself in this particular situation, you’re thankful, nonetheless.  

The interface comes up dimly, casting a pale blue glow over most of the dark space. You do a comprehensive scan of the local grid. The initial results are useless; standard industrial drone recharge stations or dormant warehouse HVAC systems. This area is mostly offline. 

You switch the search parameters, isolating the sector grid and filtering for indicators of an off-grid facility: Any unusual power consumption spikes would suggest high-end medical or research equipment. Or even archaic, segmented network traffic that would help you narrow it down. 

The grid flickers in your display overlay. Most of the data remains quiet, but then a faint signature appears---a small, steady power draw coupled with a high-volume, highly encrypted data stream, localized to a single building about three blocks down the street. It’s a network running its own rules, completely divorced from the main city traffic. A strong, isolated line. 

There.  

You start your car up again and drive slowly down the pitted asphalt until you reach the building corresponding to the trace: a large, ugly steel-sided warehouse, indistinguishable from the others. No windows, no signs. The main door is a massive, bolted plate of reinforced steel. 

You unbuckle your seatbelt and clamber out of the car. There’s an old ---ancient ---looking coms system set up beside the steel door. You clumsily press the button, and it buzzes loudly in the quiet. You wait impatiently for two minutes before pressing it again and holding it down for good measure.  

There’s a click and the buzzing cuts short, and a groggy, sleep-filled voice crackles through.  

“Yes?”  

“Dr Kim? There’s an emergency.”  

“S’it urgent?” the guy sounds about ready to fall asleep again.  

You glance at the emergency passed out in your passenger seat, probably one foot through the pearly gates. “Yes.”  

“Give me a minute.” The line crackles to death and you pace the short distance between your car and the door. Not three minutes had gone by when the steel door was lifting, rolling Its way up soundlessly.  

You don’t really have much brain capacity to spare taking in the large expanse of room the door reveals. The good doctor takes up much of your vision anyways. He’s tall and powerfully built, dressed in soft cotton sweatpants and a thick, dark shirt, rubbing sleep from his eyes. His hair is tousled, and his features---mono-lidded, thoughtful eyes and a strong jaw---are currently dominated by sleepy annoyance at being woken at what’s probably two in the morning.  

Then his eyes drop to the blood-soaked shoulder of your jacket but follow the length of your arm when you point to the car. “Seokjin told me to bring him here.”  

That seems to wake him up, and suddenly he’s walking forward and peering into the window. He pulls the door open quickly, and curses, leaning in to unbuckle the belt and haul Seokjin and all his weight out.  

He grunts with effort as he half carries, half drags Seokjin into the warehouse. “Bring your car in.” And then he disappears into a sectioned off area.  

You do as you’re told, driving your car in and parking it, and then finding the switch to send the door back down.  

The large steel door shuts with a heavy finality, severing your connection to the dangerous streets outside. The sound echoes in the cavernous space, replaced by a sudden, intense silence broken only by your strained breathing. 

You stand for a moment, letting the silence settle the frantic ringing in your ears, finally taking in the vast expanse of the warehouse. It is surprisingly sterile and organized, a stark contrast to the grimy industrial exterior. The floor is smooth, polished concrete, segmented by strips of clear, directional LED lighting. 

The main bay serves as a garage and staging area. Against one wall, a complex rack of server stacks and specialized equipment hums quietly, the source of the private network traffic you traced. 

Your eyes sweep across the open space, and you see the true structure of the ‘lock-up.’ Running along the far side of the warehouse, nestled against the back wall, are three prefabricated modular offices, side-by-side. Boxy, functional structures built with matte panelling and large, continuous horizontal windows. 

Namjoon disappeared into the central module. You walk toward it, drawn by the faint sound of rattling metal. 

This central structure is clearly the working module. Its windows offer a glimpse inside, revealing a long, organized space. There are beds visible; simple, clean cots with monitoring equipment set up off to one side. Further down the room, through another internal partition, you can see the bright, focused light of the surgical zone where Namjoon is currently working.  

Through the gauzy partition you can make out the leg of Seokjin’s pants, and you turn away, trying not to think too hard on it. You’re sure Seokjin wouldn’t have told you to come here if he didn’t trust this guy. You’re sure he knows what he’s doing, and you don’t have to worry about being hunted down by the police for essentially putting Kim fucking Seokjin right in the middle of a bear trap. Hahaha.  

You try to focus on something else. The modules on either side are dark and silent. You can only speculate on their purpose, but their presence reinforces the feeling that this place is self-sufficient and entirely separate from the world outside. There’s a small, labelled plaque on the first one, PRIVATE, in little bold lettering.  

The warehouse itself isn’t a large thing, might be a couple feet wider than yours and Jimin’s. You drag your feet back to your car to lean against the hood, the adrenaline that’s finally beginning to crash has you exhausted, or that just may be the fact you’ve been awake since the night before. You go to press the heel of your palm to your eyes, and spot the blood on your hand, already crusted and gone brown. Your other hand is miraculously clean of it, but your right hand has Seokjin’s blood under the fingernails. Your hands shake.  

You almost got a man killed tonight. Never mind that, you almost died. That second bullet was obviously meant for the outlying variable. If you hadn’t told Seokjin to meet you there, he could’ve probably been partying it up somewhere right now. 

 Safe...maybe...and you could’ve been sleeping in your nice warm bed and Jimin would’ve crawled in by now like a kid that ‘frew up’ and refuse to leave. Safe.  

No, you’re standing in the weird ass warehouse of some doctor you’ve never heard of all because you wanted to play hero. This was not the origin story you wanted to have! You really hope your canon event doesn’t sneak up on you. You don’t even know any Uncle Ben’s! 

Maybe you should’ve taken that drink offer.  

You let your hands fall listlessly to your lap and take a deep breath.  

Soft footsteps make you raise your head, Namjoon has come out from the module, wiping his hands with a disposable wipe.  

“He’s stable.” He says when he catches your gaze and tosses the wipe into a nearby bin. “Luckily, the bullet when straight through the muscle and missed everything. He’s lost a dangerous amount of blood though, so I’m giving him a transfusion. He’ll be fine.”  

Why does he say that like Seokjin getting shot was some regular Friday occurrence? Does he have another secret mask to wear? A secret life, or something?! You can’t even handle the fact that he’s clearly not what everyone knows him to be...well, almost everyone. Either way! This is crazy enough.  

He squints at you, “You’re injured.” He points at your cheek, and you raise your hand, fingers brushing against the dried crust of blood there. The bullet had whizzed past your ear, but it didn’t miss your cheek. You remember the sting of it when it grazed you.  

“It’s nothing...” you dismiss, but Namjoon was already disappearing back into the centre module before he was out again with a first aid kit.  

“I still have to clean it.” He says, laying the kit out on your car hood He cleans the wound with a sterile wipe, gently turning your cheek towards the light as he applies a gel antiseptic and a band-aid. “It’s superficial, wouldn’t leave a scar.”  

Whoever took that shot is a damn good shoot to have only unintentionally grazed you.  

“He’s lucky you were there.” Namjoon says softly, and the gratitude in his tone is oddly overwhelming. You only nod as he finishes putting things back into the kit. “I’m Kim Namjoon, are you a friend of his?”  

You give him your name in a soft murmur, though you shake your head. You’re not sure how to answer that. Seokjin may trust him, but you don’t know zilch about the guy, so you don’t. You barely know what’s even happening anymore.  

Namjoon doesn’t say anything about your lack of words, instead he smiles at you. Dimples sink into his cheeks, and you manage just half of one.  

“When was the last time you slept?” his eyes dart between your own, a serious look on his face.  

“Oh...um...”  

He points over his shoulder to the centre module, “Beds are that way, you look exhausted.”  

You turn, leaving the comforting presence of Namjoon for the cold, clinical safety of the warehouse. You cross the open garage floor and step into the central modular building. 

The space is quiet now, the atmosphere heavy with the clean scent of antiseptic. Immediately to your left is the Observation Area. 

Seokjin lies on the farthest cot, positioned against the back wall. He is stripped of the blood-soaked white turtleneck, covered by a sterile white blanket up to his chest. His shoulder is heavily bandaged, and an IV line runs from his arm to a stand where a blood bag hangs, steadily dripping life back into him. Nearby, a small heart monitor beeps rhythmically, a steady, reassuring sound that confirms his continued existence. 

You move to the corner nearest the door, where a deep stainless-steel sink is positioned for general use before the surgical partition. You peel off your denim jacket; the fabric is stiff and heavy with dried blood. You drop it onto the clean floor without a second thought, the garment already a casualty of the night. You turn the tap on and thoroughly scrub your hands, chasing away the metallic tang of Seokjin’s blood that had dried beneath your fingernails. The water runs pink, then clear. 

Relief is a sudden, dizzying wave. You choose the cot directly opposite Seokjin. You watch him for a moment---bandaged, pale, but breathing deeply and steadily. He looks like a high-end statue wrapped in linen, utterly unlike the man who was just thirty minutes ago gasping in the seat next to you. 

The constant beep of the monitor is now the only sound accompanying your exhaustion. You shed your shoes, kicking them carelessly onto the floor, and sink onto the cot.  

You close your eyes. The chaos of the gunshots, the screech of tires, and the metallic smell of blood fade, replaced by blessed silence. 

Sleep claims you immediately. 

When you wake its well past noon, you sit up in bed, rubbing at your eyes. The bed opposite you is empty, the blanket folded neatly at the end of it. As you swing your legs over the side of the bed, there’s a vibration at your wrist. Your holowatch lets out a soft beep, and when you raise your hand, you see the missed calls from Jimin and the one text he’d sent over an hour ago.  

[Insp.Gadget]: you better be getting your back blown out for you to miss four calls >;( call me!!  

You’d call him later, you promise. For now, you simply send him a text, so he knows you’re alive.  

When you’ve woken enough, you’re a little more than embarrassed to remember you just dropped your jacket on the floor, but it isn’t there. You make your way out of the module to the main bay of the warehouse, where Namjoon moves in and out of the module on the left. There’re about two dozen brown boxes stacked neatly near a steel side door, and Seokjin is standing off to a corner, talking lowly.  

He looks better, at least; showered and not covered in his own blood. Wearing a threadbare hoodie and sweats and thankfully doesn’t look like he’s on the brink of death. His arm is in a dark blue sling, held close to his chest and he gestures this way and that with his other hand.  

Namjoon sets the last of his boxes down and straightens to his full height. He looks rather indignant about whatever they’re discussing, brows drawn together in a frown, jaw working.  

Seokjin’s eyes flicker to yours and he goes quiet, and it causes Namjoon to turn to face you fully. He smiles at you, expression softening before he carries on with his work.  

He eases open the side door, and it unlocks with a metallic clank. There’s a murmur of voices when it pushes open, and Namjoon quietly greets the waiting people outside. He hands out box after box, smiling all the while.  

“He comes out here for two weeks every month.” Seokjin says, voice low, “He uses this space as a free clinic and support distribution for people who can’t afford it.”  

This man must be some kind of angel, you think. There’s not many that would even look at the lower, struggling class, and here he is risking his security for the underprivileged. A mixture of respect and awe blooms in your chest as you watch him smiling and speaking softly to the owner of a pair of dirty young hands.  

“Bathroom’s in there.” Seokjin says, effectively breaking your little awe-based spell. He points to the first module with the little private plaque on the door. “Namjoon put some clothes out for you.”  

“Might have to roll the sleeves and pants a bit, though.” Namjoon nods his head, turning to you just slightly as he picks up another box.  

“Have any of you seen my jacket?” You ask, pointing a finger over your shoulder.  

“I threw it in the wash...it’s pretty much ruined now.” Namjoon says and then looks at Seokjin as though expecting him to say something. When he doesn’t answer, an exasperated look crosses the doctor’s face.  

Seokjin looks at him, and then and you, and then rolls his eyes, “Sorry I bled all over you.” 

Namjoon sighs loudly. 

He’s seemed to have dropped whatever extra mask he was wearing last night when he came to meet you. The air of detached professionalism is gone, and he looks very much a spoilt brat with daddy’s money.  

You don’t care about the jacket. You use the private module to wash up quickly, scrubbing the last vestiges of dried blood from your hairline, and then change into the track pants and Henley tee Namjoon left out for you. The clothes are soft and clean, and you do have to roll the sleeves and pant legs several times. 

When you get out of the bathroom, Namjoon and Seokjin are both sitting in the small kitchenette space Namjoon has built into the far end of the module. The space is simple: a small table, three chairs, and a compact surface with a kettle and a few basic appliances. It’s an island of domestic calm. Namjoon offers you a cup of coffee with jam and toast, which you readily accept. 

“So,” Namjoon starts, setting a black ceramic mug in front of you as he sits, “Gonna explain why she dragged your ass here at two am with a gunshot wound?”  

“I might.” Seokjin says, scratching at his cheek with a finger, “It's a long story, though.”  

“Not as long as you think.” You mutter into your mug.  

Namjoon’s eyes dart between the both of you with an odd mix of confusion and amusement. He rummages around in his pocket and pull out the pouch you'd forgotten in your jacket. “What’s this?”  

“A flash drive.” Seokjin says and you swiftly kick his shin under the table. A hiss of breath goes through his teeth and he leans down, rubbing his shin and glaring at you. “What was that for?” 

“You’re being difficult.” You say as he straightens, “You realise your life is in danger? You were almost killed.” 

“Well, I wouldn’t have been there if you hadn’t asked to meet me.”  

“You have free will? You didn’t have to show up, asshole. Not to mention I saved your ass.”  

Namjoon clears his throat loudly, “Can you both have your lover’s spat later?”  

You and Seokjin share an equally disgusted look before turning back to Namjoon. Seokjin points at you with his good hand, and you both speak at the same time.  

“Him?”  

“Her?” 

“I would rather put my bare ass on a hot stove.” Seokjin says indignantly and then shakes his head.  

You make an offended sound, you’d not forgotten he’d essentially called you slow last night. “Like you’re a wonder to the world.”  

“We’re getting off topic.” Namjoon knocks on the table between the both of you. He’s got that same disappointed father look Jimin puts on when you’re doing something he doesn’t think is a good thing. Except it’s somehow way more effective coming from him. You lean back into your chair, and Seokjin turns slightly away from you.  

“Fine,” Seokjin concedes, the petulance draining out of his voice, replaced by a cold, sharp urgency. He leans back, the movement tightening the sling against his arm. “The reason I agreed to meet you---the reason I was shot...” 

He gestures with his good hand toward the little black pouch Namjoon still holds. “That drive contains irrefutable evidence. Han Doyun and Min Taejin are planning an internal coup. They found out I was quietly liquidating my assets. They don’t just want me gone; they want me dead. That bullet was meant to secure their succession.” 

You set your mug down, “Take the evidence, take the server logs, and go to the authorities! This is attempted murder by high-ranking executives.” 

Namjoon nods immediately, his face serious. “She’s right, Jin. You bring the evidence to the police, you secure your safety, and they face life in prison. Why risk being on the run?” 

Seokjin shakes his head, rubbing his forehead with his thumb. “You don’t understand. If I take this to the police, the investigation will make everything public. And if the world knows about the project... we’ll have a much bigger problem than two greedy executives.” 

“What project?” Namjoon presses, holding up the pouch. “What is worth risking your life for?” 

Seokjin stares down at the table, taking a breath. “My grandfather had an ambition---some called it foolish---of achieving human immortality through cybertronics. The project is called Axtaliah.” 

He pauses, allowing the name to settle over the small kitchenette. 

“Axtaliah,” he continues, “is essentially a way for humans to live forever. It’s a system where people could upload their consciousness---their entire mind, their sense of self---into a digital, persistent architecture. The body decays, but the consciousness and sense of self would remain. It works like an avatar; you can live within Axtaliah like you would in the real world.” 

He looks at the disbelief hardening your expression, then back at Namjoon. “Axtaliah is designed to become a new Earth---a digital, permanent sanctuary. 

Doyun and Taejin didn’t just want Vionix. They want Axtaliah. They want to control digital immortality. If I go to the police, that data goes public. And trust me, the corporate world fighting over trillions in assets is nothing compared to humanity fighting over eternal life."

You three sit in silence for a while, Namjoon had slid the flash drive back towards you.  

“I’d hired Miss Pessimistic here to hack into my servers to gather intel. It was...a lot more than I was expecting.” He looks down at his hand, scratching at the corner of his index finger with the nail of his thumb.  

Namjoon runs a hand through his hair, looking like this was a lot more than he was expecting, too. He nods, “What do you need?”  

“Nothing more from you, Joon.” Seokjin smiles, it’s a more genuine one than the ones he’d given you, “It was risky enough to come here.”  

“And her? She’s innocent in this; you can’t just drag her around.” Namjoon says, and you’re a little touched to see at least one person has some compassion.  

“She’s not innocent.” Seokjin says, making a face, “She’s a hacker, you know? Literally committed a crime hacking into my servers.” 

“You hired me to do that?! Hello?” You protest, slapping your hand down on the table. 

Seokjin just shrugs, a careless movement that makes Namjoon wince in sympathy for his friend’s shoulder. 

“She’s technically an accomplice now,” Seokjin continues, as if you aren’t sitting right there. “She knows the entire structure of the attack, she drove the getaway car, and she has the primary evidence on that drive. She’s in this as deep as I am, legally speaking.” 

“That’s because you bled all over me and then passed out!” you shoot back, you think you sound rather childish, but so does he so you don’t care. “I was following your minimal instructions!” 

Namjoon rubs the bridge of his nose, looking deeply regretting allowing either of you in the same room together. “She saved your life. You owe her a decision, Jin. A way out.” 

Seokjin looks at you then, the annoying aloofness replaced by a flicker of respect that’s gone just as quickly as it appeared. “There is no ‘way out.’ Not unless I dismantle Axtaliah entirely, which I won’t do. I need help to move the core files and the prototype.” 

He slides the drive back across the table, offering you not a job, but a choice.  

You stare at it for a long moment before dragging your eyes up to meet his, “And what about your mole?”  

He narrows his eyes at you and presses a hand against his chest, looking scandalized, “How do you know about those? I only have moles on my back.”  

“No, you idiot...” you sigh, “the informant. Someone told Taejin and Doyun about that project. They got a tip from someone. And since it’s secret, I assume you have a selected few that know about it. Someone in your circle sold you out.”  

He contemplates this for a moment, staring off into space. There’s something in his eyes that makes them look far away from here. Namjoon shares a glance with you and then he reaches for your empty mug and Seokjin’s.  

“What’re you gonna do? You need a plan. Or...something.” Namjoon asks over the sound of flowing water, he washes the mugs and utensils and puts them neatly on a rack to dry. 

Seokjin sighs, “For one, we can’t stay here.” 

“We?”  

“Yes, we.”  

“You better mean the royal we. I’m not going anywhere with you.”  

“You’re smarter than that, I’m sure.” There he goes again, calling you dumb. You glare at him, and he leans forward towards you, voice low, “You were shot at too, if you recall. And I distinctly remember you saying you can’t go home. I can assume there’s someone you don’t want involved in this.”  

You aren’t responsible for your own life alone. This could’ve all been avoided if you minded your own damn business. A headache blooms at your temples.  

“Fine.”  

Within the hour, Namjoon had given Seokjin enough painkillers to take down a horse, and a light hug goodbye. While they discussed things quietly, you’d taken a moment to survey the damage done to your upholstery. You can’t exactly blame the guy for almost dying, so you just quietly give the old leather seats a wipe down.   

You take a moment to let Jimin know you’d probably be out all weekend. Saying that your ‘date’ went well.  

Namjoon had given you your jacket back, which is well unusable now. The blood had sunk deep into the denim and stayed there even after a wash. You just throw it in the backseat. 

You shake Namjoon’s hand and thank him before getting into your car with Seokjin. The engine rumbles to life and you give Namjoon a little wave as you back out into the street.  

“Where to?” You ask, as you drive out of Drayton Street and onto the main strip. You look at Seokjin, who’s currently wiggling his thumb between the strap of the seatbelt and his shoulder to alleviate the pressure.  

He looks at you and then nods at your watch, “Does that have GPS?”  

You roll your eyes, “What’s with you and GPS? If I put you out on the street, could you find your way home? Jesus.”    

You activate the expand feature that projects the interface upwards. You realise belatedly you left your chat with Jimin open, but Seokjin gracefully doesn’t say a word. You open the GPS system and let him input the address of where he wants to go.  

You stare at the map, “...That’s hours away.” 

“Yes, and?”  

“I don’t want to be stuck in here that long with you.” You say, and Seokjin rolls his eyes. You peer at your gauges, “And I have to stop for gas.”  

“Really?” He shakes his head, “Why do you drive this bag of bolts around? Do people even sell diesel anymore?” 

“Hey!” You exclaim, rubbing your hand along the dashboard, “Ignore him, baby, he’s loopy on pain meds.”  

Seokjin huffs a laugh as you glare at him.  

Road trip. Yay.  

You’d have to stop at the nearest gas station, full up, probably get some crappy food and snacks and mentally prepare yourself for an hours’ long drive outside the city.  

Staying on the old roads, you were lucky to find a gas station quick. And even luckier to find that it’s ran by an older gentleman who barely paid you mind.  

“I’m gonna grab stuff.” You say, coming back to your car after paying for the gas. You lean down, “Do you even know how to manually fill up a tank?” 

“What do I look like to you, hm?” Seokjin grumbles, then he slowly unbuckles the seatbelt. You feel kind of bad watching him do that, but then he gets out and scowls at you and it goes down the drain.  

“Well, all those fancy drifters got internal batteries. I don’t expect you to know, Princess.”  

He comes around the car and takes the gas nozzle off the holster. 

“Righty tighty, lefty loosey.” You say, and his scowl deepens. 

“I’ll hit you.”  

“Mhm!” You walk backwards, laughing at him. You turn and walk through the automatic doors of the Quick Stop. The exterior is faded, cracked concrete, but inside is clean, cool, and lit by buzzing LEDs. 

The older gentleman is behind a wide counter, leaning on a dull grey register terminal that looks like it hasn’t received a software update in a decade. He looks up briefly, nods, and goes back to polishing a small figurine.  

You bypass the shelves of pre-packaged, brightly coloured synth-fibre bars and head straight for the hot counter. The gas station convenience store luckily offers a wide range of things to munch on, including readymade hot-dogs and miniature Hamburger Jr’s, kept perfectly warm inside a thermal dispensing unit. You grab a selection of savoury, processed snacks and load up on several bottles of water so that Seokjin doesn’t have to raw dog his pain meds cross country. 

You bring your haul up to the counter. The old man patiently lifts each item, manually inputting the codes into the terminal. When he finishes, he holds up a small, flat card reader. You raise your wrist, and the reader beeps as you scan your watch to pay for the goods. Instead of plastic, a machine next to the terminal dispenses a flexible, reusable fabric mesh carry-bag. You quickly stuff your snacks and water into it. 

You walk out, and Seokjin is thankfully back in the car waiting. At least he’s successfully filled up the tank.  

“Congratulations.” You say, getting in the car and starting it again, “you successfully completed a manual fuelling process.”  

“Don’t sound so surprised.”  

You drop the bag of goodies in his lap, “Help yourself.”  

Seokjin mumbles a quiet thanks and the rummages through the bag, he takes out a bottle of water and a granola bar as you peel out of the gas station.  

It’s a couple moments of silence that prompts you to turn the radio on, and Seokjin, staring at the bottle in his hand. He grips the bottle firmly in his food hand, and twists at it with the fingers of his other. Nothing happens.  

He tries again, applying more pressure, there’s a pained hiss and he stops immediately. Avoiding your gaze, he holds the bottle out to you.  

“What’s the matter, did the cap win?” You ask, trying to sound bored, even as you reach over and easily twist the cap off the bottle. The seal snaps audibly.  

“They over-torque these things.” He grumbles, but thanks you anyway. 

 “Do you need help opening that, too?”  

He ends up opening the granola bar with his teeth. Where Seokjin wants to go is about a four-hour drive, should just be about sundown when you get there. On the map it’s a secluded, private property, so it doesn’t really give much.  

The radio hums softly, a newer song of techno-beats that scatters under the backdrop of wind in your ears. Seokjin had complained about your choice of snacks but opened a bag of chips anyway.  

“You know.” He says through a mouthful, the wind sends his hair fluttering across his forehead, “I never asked for your name.” 

You raise a brow, glancing at him, “Didn’t ask Namjoon?”  

“You two are on a first name basis now?”  

Both your brows go up at his tone, and in the moment, you chuckle because it reminded you of those ancient memes about Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande. “Does that matter?”  

He shrugs his good shoulder, “Not really, but I can’t just call you ‘Shade’. Who came up with that, a twelve-year-old?”  

“Actually, yes, I was twelve and it sounded cool at the time.” Seokjin laughs and you can’t find it in you to be offended, so you laugh too, giving him your name. 

“I’ve got a question.” You venture, when you’d stopped giggling, he nods and you continue, “Was that your first time hiring a hacker?”  

“What gave it away?”  

“‘I require your services’” You say, doing your best to mimic the timber of his voice, “Who talks like that?”  

“I was nervous!” he laughs, shifting in his seat. There’s a quiet wince in his expression and then he quiets. There’s probably a lot on his mind and you don’t blame him for being lost in his own head. 

By the time you make it out on the old highway, it’s just about three pm. There’s nothing but road, and the radio that’s filling the thankfully not awkward silence.  

With his head laying comfortably against the headrest of the passenger seat, Seokjin turns to you. You catch the movement from the corner of your eye, the way he stares at you just long enough for to you wonder what he’s thinking about.  

“Can I ask you something?” He mutters, still staring at you.  

You have a feeling you know where this is going to go, and you’re already uncomfortable, flexing your suddenly clammy fingers against the steering wheel. “Sure.”  

“You didn’t have to tell me anything.” He says, and then finally looks away, staring straight ahead and then down at his lap, “You could’ve taken the money and pretended like you didn’t see anything at all.”  

There it is!  

“Yeah, well...” You make a face, “I have a conscience. It’s nothing to do with you.” 

He studies you for a long while and then chuckles, nodding his head, “Under all that cynicism, you’re not half bad. Nice, even.”  

“Oh, really?” You say with mock astonishment, “Thanks, I’m honoured. It’s almost like I’m a decent human being.”  

“Ah, I wouldn’t go that far.” Seokjin laughs, “You are a hacker, after all, so that’s debatable.”  

“Not all of us are criminals. I’ve known people who’s done far worse than me. And with the things I’ve done, you’d be surprised how low the bar is.”  

“Thank you...for saving my life.” He says softly, leaning forward trying to catch your gaze. You turn your head just to avoid him straining his wound. The genuine gratitude in his eyes curls around your chest and you’re not sure what to do with it. “And I’m sorry for dragging you into this mess.”  

“It’s...it’s fine.” You are... terrible at this. It’s a wonder you don’t shrink away from the sunlight; you’re like a gremlin that’s never had any human interaction. “Uh, you’re welcome.”  

“Okay, I’ve another question.” You try your best to spin the bottle, turning the vibe back on him to avoid the awkwardness you’re feeling. Seokjin reaches into the glove box, pulling out the bottle of painkillers Namjoon had given him. “What’s with all of that, anyway?”  

He tosses two of the pills into his mouth and chases them with water, “What?” he points at himself and tilts his head.  

“You.” You gesture with a hand, “do you have any idea how the public sees you?”  

“Why should I care how the people perceive me?” He retorts, and for a moment, seem to think his words over. He sighs, shaking his head, “When you give someone nothing, they expect nothing of you. By making everyone think I’m a spoilt brat hopped up on nepotism with not a thought in my head I was able to get this far.”  

He looks out the window, his eyes far away, “I don’t enjoy drinking or partying. Believe it or not, I’m actually an introvert. I just don’t like making people uncomfortable.” He shrugs, “I did what I had to do to continue my father’s work in secret, but acting like an idiot can only get me so far, I suppose.”  

“Huh.” You say, because, well...what do you say to that? Seokjin slowly turns to look at you, and at his expression you can do nothing but laugh, “That was a way more depressing answer than I thought it’d be.”  

“What, did you think I liked having my name slandered every week?”  

“Well, you didn’t look like it bothered you all that much to be honest.” You wince, and then, “But I’m no longer ignorant, so...um, tough?” 

“Remind me to never ask you for comfort.” Seokjin shakes his head, an amused smile in his eyes, “I think your attempt would hurt me a lot more.”  

You share a laugh.  

“I’ve got another question.” 

“Damn, what is this, twenty questions?”  

“You started it. I’m just playing along.” Seokjin runs his thumb along the wrapper of the water bottle, “I’m curious.”  

“That’s dangerous.” You chuckle, shifting in your seat because you can feel a cramp starting. Maybe you should stop and stretch your legs.  

Seokjin chuckles too, “Why are you a hacker? You can be... more...with what you can do.” 

“I don’t do much...” you deflect. 

“It takes a lot of skill to hack into Vionix’s servers and all without activating the security protocols. Anyone else would’ve been arrested in twenty-four hours.”  

“I never said I wasn’t good at what I do.” You chuckle but sober up pretty quickly as the next set of words tumble out of your mouth without your consent. “Some people start hacking for whatever nefarious reasons they could muster. And some people do it because they had nothing else.”  

“Which is yours?”  

“I had nothing going for me, that’s all. Nothing to lose and only one thing keeping me going. I wanted better and the world couldn’t give it, so I took.” Your smile doesn’t feel very genuine and paired with the clamminess of your palms and the sinking feeling in your stomach, Seokjin knows it isn’t. 

You shrug a shoulder, “Turned out all right, so. Nothing to cry over. It’s more of a hobby than a need.” You wave a hand, “My life’s loads better for a kid from the slums, got nothing to complain about.”  

“Hm.” Seokjin hums, “I suppose that’s pretty valid.”  

“Yeah, I guess?” You laugh, “for what it’s worth, though...I don’t think you’re an idiot.”  

Seokjin presses his good hand against his chest, “Is that a compliment? Was there something in that hot dog?”  

“Har-Har.”  

An hour later you’ve shifted in your seat one too many times, and your back is starting to hurt. Seokjin is dozing off against the window but opened his eyes when you tap his arm.  

“I’m pulling over.”  

“What? Why?”  

“My back is hurting, and I’ll be damned if I let a cramp take me out.” You slow the car to a crawl before it stops completely. Opening your door you unbuckle and get out, groaning as you stand. “Oh, thank fuck!”  

Seokjin is more careful getting out the car, mindful of his sling. His head pops up on the other side and through squinted eyes he peers at you. “I need to pee.”  

Halfway between stretching your arms out you glance around, “What’d you want me to do? Cup my hands? Find a bush.”  

Seokjin looks around and then back at you with a pointed look, “See any bushes around here? You might as well.”  

“Then stick your dick in a bottle.”  

It seems like the air in the car was loaded with something, because you’re both right back at it as soon as you get fresh air.  

He stomps his way across the road, and you turn around, leaning your back against the car door, “Watch for snakes! I’m not sucking your dick to save your life.” 

“Fuck off.” He calls, but there’s no real heat behind it.  

By the time the sun was a molten ball sinking beyond the distant horizon, you finally pull off the highway and onto a suspiciously maintained sprawl of asphalt.  

Your watch beeps, and at a glance, it’s Jimin replying to your text from hours ago with a string of wild emojis. And then:  

[insp Gadget]: How good is that dicc?!? You’ll be gone ALL weekend? 👀 Use protection!!!  

Still call me tho!! 

You cover the watch face to disable the projection, but Seokjin apparently can’t let it slide this time.  

“Your friend?” He snorts but tries to cover it with a cough.  

Mortified you press your lips together and nod. Seokjin chuckles but says nothing more, instead, he directs you down another paved road. And it’s only a short distance away a steel gate blocks most of the road.  

“Slow down.” He says and as you do, he unbuckles the seatbelt and awkwardly turns to stick his right hand out the window. From a non-descript corner, a small, round drone floats down silently and scans his palm with a blue glow. It flashes green and gives a little beep before it floats back from where it came and the gate slides open. “Bio-drone.”  

You drive up and over a little ramp onto a smooth gravel road. The landscape that expands before you is almost jaw dropping. You expected a house, but this is a whole damn estate, you’re pretty sure. 

On either side of the road is neatly trimmed grass, all leading up to a dense, private forest that completely seals the property off from the outside world. This isn’t just a perimeter fence; it’s a strategically planted, towering wall of native hardwoods and evergreen foliage, maintained to military precision. The trees aren’t haphazard; they look deliberately spaced, creating a natural sound and sight barrier designed to absorb all traces of the complex within. 

The road itself winds lazily, paved with a dark aggregate that absorbs light, hinting that the property continues far deeper than you can see. There are no signs, no mailboxes, and no visible power lines---everything is buried and reinforced. 

As you follow the curve of the drive, the land opens up slightly. You see glimpses of a small, clear reservoir reflecting the rapidly darkening sky. Every patch of grass is impossibly green, every tree perfectly pruned. The quiet is total, broken only by the crunch of your tires on the fine gravel---a sound that’s almost too loud in this vast, secluded space. 

The architecture of the landscape tells you that security was the first priority. You realize there isn’t a single spot on this sprawling land where a car could accidentally veer off the path or where someone could easily slip unnoticed through the boundary trees. 

The final stretch of the drive leads up to a wide plateau where the main residence finally comes into view. The house is a low-slung, multi-winged structure built from black slate and enormous panels of tinted, reflective glass, making it look less like a home and more like a high-end, stealth bunker designed to vanish into the night.  

You pull into the garage, the automated door raises, and you pull up next to what’s most definitely a vintage 1968 Ford Mustang. It’s covered by a clear tarp, which has a layer of dust like the thing hasn’t been touched in years.  

You cut the engine and point at it, “You were shit talking my baby this whole time!”  

Seokjin sighs like he was expecting your outburst, as he unbuckles the seatbelt and climbs out. He grabs the bag of empty water bottles and snacks wrappers. The garage door comes down behind your car and for a moment it’s dark until lights blink on. 

You clamber out the car, walking around the front to get a closer look, “This thing’s ancient.”  

“It was my great-grandfather’s.” He grabs you by the elbow and steers you away, “You can gawk at it later.”  

He leads you towards a door and places his hand against a scanner. For the second time his palm is scanned and the door unlocks. You suppose it’s fair, being this rich and famous one much have a precaution or two. 

The door opens and he lets you go in first, there’s a short hallway and another door that leads to what must be the largest living room you’ve ever seen.  

The space is colossal, the walls of floor-to-ceiling glass presenting a breath taking, uninterrupted panoramic view of the dark forest and the reservoir reflecting the last, fiery streaks of sunset. The ceiling is extraordinarily high, giving the room an almost cathedral-like feel, yet the precise integration of dark, raw-cut stone and vast panels of matte black slate somehow prevents it from feeling cold. 

The floor is seamless, wide-planked dark wood, polished to a mirror shine, leading the eye out to the wilderness. The furniture is sparse and low-profile, strategically placed to maximize the view. A massive, sectional sofa, upholstered in thick, oyster-grey fabric, curves around a central feature---a suspended, cantilevered fireplace---a flat, rectangular slab of polished metal that floats several feet off the ground, emitting silent, odorless heat.  

Along one side wall, you notice a section of glass looking in on a climate-controlled server room---a glowing, humming technological heart encased in smoked glass. This is clearly the control center of the entire property. Beyond the main living area, an open-concept kitchen features a massive island counter made of a single slab of white quartz. All the high-end appliances---induction cooktops, thermal ovens, chilling units---are fully recessed behind panels of dark, custom cabinetry.  

The entire house is silent, and smells faintly of purified air and expensive cedar---a deep, luxurious quiet that speaks of insulation and absolute privacy.  

There’s very clearly a stark difference between being born into money and having to roll around in mud to get it. You’re no stranger to wealth, but this...this is something else.  

“Wow...” you mumble, gazing around.  

“Welcome to my humble abode.” Seokjin says, coming up behind you.  

“I never want to hear that word come out your mouth ever again.” You say, laughing a little in disbelief.  

Seokjin laughs almost bashfully, rubbing the back of his neck. “Make yourself comfortable...” he says and then, pulls at the collar of his borrowed hoodie. He peers down the hoodie, “I think I aggravated my stitches.”  

He walks through the living room, and towards a flight of stairs, “Guest rooms are, uh, that way...” he leans over the banister and points to a hall straight ahead of you, “I’ll be back.”  

He goes up the stairs and disappears, and you go towards where he pointed. The doors are seamless panels of matte wood. You choose the first one, which opens onto a large, minimalist room. The bed is huge, the bedding impossibly white, and a wall of glass offers a private view of the darkening woods. The attached bathroom is all pristine white marble and brushed metal; a rain shower, a soaking tub, and a vanity counter.  

After everything you’ve been through you think a nice, hot shower would be heavenly. After you almost trip on the leg of the pants you realise you don’t have any fresh clothes.  

You look down at yourself, and figure Namjoon’s Henley covered more than enough. You’re no blushing virgin and neither is Seokjin, you’re sure. You kick the pants against the wall and walk back out the room and towards the staircase Seokjin went up.  

The second floor appears to be his private domain. You find a half-open door leading into what must be his master suite, drawn by a soft, rhythmic snip-snip sound.  

“Seokjin?” you call out softly, approaching the doorway. 

He is inside a large, luxurious, all-marble bathroom. He’s standing in front of a wide mirror over a double vanity, shirtless. The bright, white LED lighting overhead illuminates the room perfectly. He’s using a pair of surgical shears in his good hand to carefully snip away the adhesive from the old self-sticking wound covering. 

He stops the snipping, turning his head slightly to acknowledge you. He registers the borrowed shirt you’re wearing, which hangs loose on your frame, but his expression remains perfectly neutral. There is no flicker of surprise, just a flat, focused gaze. 

“Don’t sneak up on me,” he says, his voice tight with concentration as he carefully peels away the last piece of dressing. 

“Sorry,” you manage. “I need fresh clothes.” 

Seokjin turns, facing you fully, holding the soiled bandage loosely in his hand. He points with his chin to a built-in wall of dark, sleek cabinetry. “Take anything from the second drawer on the left. There might be pants with a drawstring in there somewhere.” 

You walk toward the cabinetry, acutely aware of the expanse of his bare chest and the fresh, taut stitches visible on his shoulder. You pull out a simple, incredibly soft, dark grey tee and dark purple soft cotton pants that looks like the bottom of a pyjama set ---they smells faintly of him. 

“While you’re here,” he says, his voice losing its playful edge, “could you help me with this? The exit wound is impossible to reach.” He gestures to a tube of antibiotic ointment and a roll of sterile gauze on the counter. 

You place your newly acquired clothes on a velvet bench. You approach the vanity, and as you step into the bright light of the bathroom, you’re suddenly close. 

You take the tube and gauze. His uninjured back is to you, offering a clear view of the stitched exit wound. As you apply the cool, slick ointment to the angry red circumference, you notice something else in the unforgiving white light. Just beneath his ear, and another faint spot near the hinge of his jaw. 

“I thought you only had moles on your back,” you say, your voice barely a whisper, surprised by the softness of the sound. You press your lips together. 

Seokjin slightly turns his head, the movement tight, surprised by the comment. “You have a couple on your face.” 

“They’re not as noticeable,” he says, equally soft, as though speaking any louder would break whatever this is. He turns slowly, and then leans into your space, much like he did at The Lumen, except this time he’s shirtless, the warmth of his skin radiating outwards. He opens a cabinet over your head and pulls away with a soft chuckle through his nose. 

“Am I making you uncomfortable?” 

“No...” Your voice is a lot more...breathless than you intended, but he doesn’t mention that either. You suddenly feel like a Victorian man seeing ankles for the first time. Trying to stare at anything but the wide expanse of his chest, you clear your throat and step sideways. “Need anything else?”  

“Yes, actually.”  

You help him reapply the covering to the back of his shoulder and then he’ll him carefully bandage his shoulder again. He thanks you softly, and you escape back to the guest room downstairs as he gets into his tee-shirt.  

By the time you were showered and in fresh clothes, Seokjin was back downstairs when you walked out. It’s just about seven and he’s looming by the window.  

“You good?” you call, pausing just short of turning into the living room.  

He turns at the sound of your voice, you realise he’s also showered and changed. “M’fine.” He smiles faintly, and then, “I’d like the flash drive, though.”  

You fish it out of the pocket of your pants and walk over to the coffee table to set it down.  

“Are you hungry? I can make something...”  

You stare at his arm, back in its sling, and then back at him with a raised brow. “You’re a walking hazard.” 

He chuckles, “Can you cook?”  

“I can boil water for ramen...”  

Seokjin laughs, a high sound that makes you laugh, too.  

“Ramen it is, then.”  

Unexpectedly, Seokjin had all sorts of ramen brands in his pantry. He’d explained that he doesn’t come here often and it’s only there for when he doesn’t feel like cooking something. So, you make a couple packs, and spruce it up with some eggs and kimchi.  

You both just stand around in the kitchen eating it from the pot.  

There’s a comfortable silence that’s broken by the slurping of noodles, and both your hums about how good it is. 

“It’s been a while since I had instant ramen.” Seokjin sighs, chewing a mouthful. A stray droplet of broth goes down his chin, which he wipes at with a hand.  

You honestly don’t know how you’re not sick of instant ramen by now. There’s a reason why Jimin complains every time you walk into your own kitchen.  

Now that things are in a state of relative calm, you’re left to wonder, what now? You’re sure Seokjin has some sort of plan, but between the drive and getting here, he’s said absolutely nothing about anything.  

When dinner was over, Seokjin had sauntered his way back to the living room to brood some more, and you go back to your room and crawl into bed. You really hope he has a plan for all of this.  

Sunday comes and goes without any fanfare. Surprisingly every social media outlet is quiet. You’d thought that a shooting at a popular club would warrant some sort of public unrest, but there’s absolutely nothing on it. No talks about an investigation, no word on if anyone else was injured, no word on Seokjin even being there.  

You find that odd, and you say as much to Seokjin when it was late into the night. He’s sat on the couch; a pair of thin framed glasses perched on his nose as he reads through the contents on the flash drive. He’s been frowning for the better half of fifteen minutes, staring at his laptop screen, silent as you ramble on about the implications of media silence.  

“Do you think your guys paid the club owner off to keep quiet?”  

“I wouldn’t put it past them.” Seokjin mumbles, barely paying you mind. His shoulders are tense, and the sigh he lets out doesn’t seem to loosen them one bit.  

He suddenly unplugs the flash drive and then looks up at you, a seriousness to his gaze. “My team of trusted individuals is small. Even smaller if we’re talking about the ones that work with me.”  

He says this softly, looking away from you to gaze at the fireplace. “They’re people that I’ve trusted with the knowledge of my life’s work.”  

There’s something in his gaze, as though he’d finally come to some great acceptance. His brows furrow, troubled, and then he’s quiet again, so you push.  

“Do you have an idea of who it is? The mole.”  

Seokjin leans back against the couch, and nods. “I didn’t want to be rash and point fingers, because these are people that I’ve trusted for so long, the the idea of them doing something like this is hard to digest.”  

He sighs softly, tilting his head.  

“The conversations on this drive,” he continues, nodding toward the laptop, “they confirm the murder plot, and they confirm that Taejin and Doyun were tipped off about Axtaliah. The person Taejin mentions can only be Hoseok.” 

Seokjin looks pained as he says this, as though saying the name stabs at him. The name sounds familiar to you, but it’s like trying to remember a dream you had when you were nine. He reaches up and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose, the small motion betraying his exhaustion.  

“He’s my creative lead, and partner on this project. What my grandfather had was just an idea. It was barely even a dream. My father made it into something that we could work with. I was the one who pushed it forward, because my father made it my ambition. Hoseok and I... We designed Axtaliah together. He knows everything.” 

His voice drops to a near whisper. In the glow of the laptop light, you can see the sadness in his eyes. “I’m closer to him than anyone else on the team. We were supposed to unveil this project together. I told him that I would be at Lumen on Friday. He would have known exactly where to send the assassins.” 

Seokjin slowly closes the laptop, his eyes haunted. “He’s not just a trusted employee, Y/n. He was my best friend.” 

You watch the haunted look settle deep in his eyes, the high-tech brilliance of the house fading under the weight of his grief. You feel the familiar reluctance to intrude on private pain but seeing him this exposed---wounded and betrayed by the person he trusted most---stops the cynical comeback forming on your tongue.  

You clear your throat, staring intently at the pattern of the huge, expensive rug. “That’s...” 

You pause, choosing your words carefully. You walk around the coffee table and stand near the arm of the couch, close enough to be present without invading his space. 

Jimin had always said you had a very particular issue; the inability to truly express comfort towards others. You aren’t a sociopath by any means, frankly, that assessment is a bit harsh even if Jimin jokes about it sometimes. It makes you uncomfortable when people have such vivid emotions, not because you’re incapable of understanding them, but because it puts you in a position where you have to extend a gentle hand. You have to say a nice thing, sympathise, look beyond your own discomfort to comfort. You don’t blame anyone for their emotions, never that.  

You think it comes from all the years of it just being you and Jimin. You had yourself and him to look out for and nothing else. You’ve learnt young that people don’t care and you shouldn’t expect folks to pick you up when you stumble and fall. You pick yourself up. That’s that.  

You feel like you’re mentally monologuing, and you’ve been silent for too long. This moment isn’t even about you. Seokjin is very clearly in distress, though he’s trying to hide it and hides it well. But you aren’t so removed that you’d simply let him do it alone. You pick yourself up, and sometimes, you try to pick others up too.  

“I’m really sorry.” You say quietly. The words feel impossibly small, and you feel like nothing you can offer now would erase the hurt painting his visage. It lines the curve of his spine as he hunches forward, just narrowly missing the frame of his glasses as his head falls into his palm. It feels like a private moment you shouldn’t be standing around for.  

Kim Seokjin, for all his intelligence and façades, looks like a small child dealing with something way greater than his hands can hold.  

He had curated his image so well that you, previously a part of the general public, the outliner, saw what he allowed to be perceived. But here he is now, just a man, with ambitions and a sense of self, just like everyone else, having everything stripped away one after the other.  

You hated the sincerity, but you didn’t retract it. You can’t imagine what he’s feeling right now.  

He doesn’t acknowledge the apology with a nod or a word, still staring at the fireplace, grappling with the betrayal. 

“I don’t understand it,” he finally murmurs, shaking his head. “If he wanted the recognition, he could have had it. We were going to share the credit for Axtaliah. The money is irrelevant to him; he’s already a millionaire from his own family’s patents. He’s not jealous of my status---he hates the public side of it almost as much as I do.” 

Seokjin turns to you, the confusion plain in his eyes. “I’ve been trying to find a motive that fits the crime, anything at all, but come up empty. Why risk everything just to hand a life-saving project over to a pair of executives who only care about weaponizing it? It makes no sense.” 

He runs his thumb along the smooth curve of the laptop case. “I have to assume he thinks he’s doing the right thing, or that he has some kind of leverage against Taejin and Doyun. But to betray me like this... I just don’t know.” 

You nod slowly; the name finally lights a bulb in your brain. “Hoseok... wait. Jung Hoseok?  The one with the robotics company his father founded?” 

“The very same.” Seokjin runs his hand through his hair; the strands stick up before falling perfectly back into place. He takes his glasses off, setting them down on the table.  

You worry at your bottom lip. There’s no way for you to say your next words without possibly making Seokjin feel worse. But you try gently, anyway, “He must know what’s going on. He’s your best friend, right? Doesn’t he at least care about your life and what happens to you?”  

Sure enough, Seokjin looks even more pained. He leans his head back, staring up at the ceiling as though it would offer some sort of consultation. His eyes look glassy.  

“I don’t know.”  

Your heart genuinely breaks for him, but you’re not sure what to do. By the time you’ve formulated some sort of action, he’s decided he’s done with the conversation.  

He leans his head to look at you, “You should get some rest. It’s late.” 

“What am I, five?” comes your natural, involuntary response. Curse your speak first, think later system. You realise that Seokjin wants to be alone to process all his worries and you snap your mouth shut, wincing, “Sorry.”  

He doesn’t seem to mind it or take it to heart. Honestly, it’s a bit scary that he’s seemed to have developed a certain understanding of you. Or maybe right now his mind is too muddled with everything else on his plate he doesn’t have a spare brain cell to analyse you.  

The latter is safer.  

He offers a mirthless smile as you pass by, and you ignore the little voice in the back of your mind saying you should stay with him anyway.  

“Goodnight.” He says softly, still staring at the spot you’d vacated, he doesn’t turn to look at you.  

“Night.”  

It was much later when you ventured out again. Your watch said it was about two in the morning, as you drag yourself to the kitchen in search of water.  

Seokjin was still in the living room, though, he was sleeping. Peeking at him over the back of the couch tells you everything. In the dim glow of the led lights, you can very clearly see he’s been crying.  

There’s a furrow to his brow even as he sleeps, and the red, blotchiness to his face and around his eyes.  

You walk back to your room and bring back one of the spare blankets in the cupboards. He doesn’t stir when you gently tuck it around him, but the furrow in his brow does smoothen out.  

You feel a little bit like a creep just staring at him sleep, and you don’t know why you brush the soft strands of his bangs away from his eyes. He murmurs something unintelligible, shifting a little into your touch.  

If this were a story, or a silly fanfic those kids are into these days, this moment would be a golden step in a plot line. But you just feel kind of bad you hadn’t stayed with him earlier when he clearly needed someone. But he was also the one to tell you to leave, and you respected that so there’s really nothing else.  

You wonder if non-buzzing bugs ever grow tired of ones that do. You imagine, having a constant noise maker in your vicinity would drive about anyone crazy.  

You feel like you’re waking from a strange dream, burrowed tee-shirt halfway up your midriff, leg hanging off the edge of the bed, and lord knows where the blanket’s gone.  

Your eyes peel open. It’s still dark outside, the sky showing just the barest hint that dawn was on the way.  

The annoying buzzing your brain is struggling to comprehend stops, and your eyes sluggishly blink slip close.  But it’s starts up again, vibrating along the surface of the bedside table, is your watch.  

For a moment you simply watch it, watching the way it slightly slides along the wood. It stops again and immediately starts back up.  

With a sigh, you reach out and grab it.  Holding it by the band, you squint at it in the dark.  

Jimin is calling. And by the looks of it, you’ve missed his other seven.  

You tap on the screen, and the projection interface pops up. Jimin’s contact flashes in red, insistent, and you finally pick up.  

“Mimi, what? It’s the ass crack of dawn.” You croak sleepily, eyes closing again. 

You expected him to be yelling at you, complaining about you missing so many of his calls, but he’s eerily silent. So silent that you unbutton your eyes to see if the call was connected. It is, the little numbers ticking upwards, but the voice line is one flat thing.  

“Jimin.” You call.  

“Where are you?”  

His tone seems off, something you’ve only heard twice in your life and never directed at you. It wakes you up a little.  

“I’m at my date’s place, I stayed the weekend, I told you.”  

“Don’t bullshit me, Y/n.”  

Wow, okay. Government name. You’re in trouble.  

There’s a beep and Jimin’s requesting a video call. Sitting up now, you accept. It’s dark at first, and then you spot the light of your kitchen and then he turns. There’s a murmur of sound in the background that grows louder: 

“... isn’t anything bizarre, as the CEO of Vionix is known to have even weeklong vanishes. I think he’s not doing anything out of the ordinary....”  

The local news is the only light in the living room, and for a moment, you have no idea what you’re looking at. The news anchor, sharply dressed and too wide awake for the hour, stares into your soul. He and his co-anchor share a look and a knowing smile.  

“But just an hour ago his company had put out notice of his disappearance ---a first. He was last seen entering The Lumen at 11:30 on Friday night and eyewitness claims he left the downtown club with this unidentified female sometime after one.”  

There, on the screen, is clearly a still picture of you. With the angle, it’s impossible to see your face, but that’s your jacket, and your gait, and the club lights shining on your hair. It was just when you walked out of the carpark and turned towards the entrance of the club. It occurs to you that they haven’t said anything about a shooting.  

“I don’t know, Tyler, it seems like Seokjin is doing what every young man that has his amount of money would. It’s a bit rash to say that he’s missing considering his history.” The other anchor says, shaking his head, “Friday night benders, we all had those days! Some say it’s an invasion of privacy for his partner, whom he was last seen with...” he turns to look at Tyler with a smile as he adjusts his earpiece, “in other news: The government is looking into passing anti-violence against android laws...”  

Jimin walks back to the kitchen. He looks like he’d just woken up, too, but not as rudely awakened as you. His eyes are puffy -----and confused, and angry all at once -----his eyebrows are so tightly knit you fear he’d get a headache soon.  

“Why the fuck are you on the news? In a broadcast about Kim fucking Seokjin being missing?!” Jimin all but shouts, gesturing wildly at the TV. “And don’t lie to me! I’ll track your watch and hunt you down, I swear to God!”  

Your head hurts.  

“Jimin...” you call, trying to be heard over his angry rant about tracking your watch. “Jimin! Listen to me.”  

You close your eyes for a moment, taking a breath, “I know what this looks like. But you have to trust me, okay? I’m safe, I promise. Everything’s fine.”  

Jimin stares at you, and you can see the thought in his eyes before he says anything, “It was the job, wasn’t it?” When you don’t answer, his head falls back in a show of pure exasperation, “Y/n, I fucking told you -----oh my god. You never listen to me.”  

“I know. I know.” 

“You told me you were going on a date.” He continues, and then he’s out of view of his own watch and you watch the walls swing by and the shift in lighting. There’s clicking, and the sound of his fingers on your keyboard, “Your location is blocked. Where are you?”  

“Jimin, please.” He comes back into frame and now he just looks worried on top of it all. “Yes, okay. I got myself into trouble, and I can’t tell you anything, but you have to trust me, okay? Please?”  

The anger drains from his eyes, and you can see his shoulders drop. He presses his fingers against his eyes, “Of course I fucking trust you, Birdie. You...” he sighs heavily, “I should’ve known something was up when you didn’t answer my calls on Saturday.” He shakes his head, stares forward, the glow of your computer screen lighting his face. “Can you just...tell me where you are? Are you safe?” 

“I can’t tell you, no. But I’m safe, I promise.”  

He stares at you skeptically, as if waiting for you to change your mind and say that you’ve been the one kidnapped and is being held hostage.  

He opens his mouth again, but there’s a knock on your door. A very deliberate tap-tap. Like a bird, your head swivel towards the sound. “Who’s that?”  

“It’s---”  

The door opens and Seokjin comes into the room without much prompt. He’s dressed in fresh, dark sweats and a tee. He looks significantly better than he did last night, though his expression is sharp and alert---he’s clearly seen the news report, or Namjoon has called him. 

Seokjin walks right up to the bed, gently taking your wrist and turning your holowatch interface toward him. You’re stretching a little awkwardly over the space to reach him.  

“Y/n is perfectly safe,” he reassures, “if you like I can contact you, I’ll explain everything myself.”  

“Well, someone has to.”  

Seokjin nods, “I’ll be in touch.” And before Jimin can say anything more, he promptly ends the connection.  

You pull your hand back, frowning, there’s a bit of genuine anger at him inserting himself into your conversation like that. “Why did you tell him you’d explain? I don’t want him involved.”  

“Well...” Seokjin rubs at the back of his neck, “I don’t think you’d have been able to stop him anyway...he’s going to get involved one way or another.”  

“That doesn’t give you the right to---’ you take a breath and look away; he has the decency to look at least a bit ashamed. “What do you want?”  

“Do you...wanna get changed first?” 

You take a while getting ready out of spite, still a little upset at Seokjin for cutting off Jimin and involving him. When you finally traipse your way out into the living room, Seokjin is pacing the entire length of floor in front of the sweeping glass window. You walk over, standing by the couch and watch him. The oversized grey tee hangs loose on your frame, a stark contrast to his dark, tailored sweats. 

He stops abruptly, turning to face you with the full force of his strategist gaze. He walks towards you but stops a coffee table’s length away.  

“Give me a hickey.” 

“Excuse me?” You take a definitive step back and away from Seokjin. He looks completely serious, if not a little awkward, as he waves his good hand at you in a hurried gesture. “Why would I... why do you need me to do that?” 

“Because... I’m certain you’ve heard. Apparently, I’ve been kidnapped and is now missing. Now, come here and give me a hickey.” 

“That explains nothing?!” You laugh, the sound a little high-pitched and incredulous in the silent room. 

Seokjin sighs, dropping his hand, and then looks at you like you’re a child and he’s explaining primary colors. “My reputation is a mess, and I’d like to keep it that way. Everyone thinks I left the club with my lover, so I’m going to show them I did just that.” 

You have to admit, he’s right. Taejin and Doyun are trying to activate a police manhunt, and the public is already giving him the benefit of the doubt based on his past scandals. The fastest way to shut down an investigation is to publicly confirm a reckless weekend of passion.  

“And you need me to give you a hickey?” You ask, just to be sure, because it’s like he’s not hearing the crazy he’s spouting. 

“Yes.” And then, he shakes his head like he’s just realised how he sounds and what he’s asking. “I need to capitalize on the narrative. I’ll also have to briefly record you.” As you open your mouth to protest, he puts his hand up. “Don’t worry. I won’t show your face. I just…” 

“How about I hit you really hard?” 

“Y/n...” He honest to God whines your name, the sound laced with a genuine desperation that, frankly, wouldn’t be there otherwise. “Please.” 

You both stare at each other for a minute, the absurdity of the request hanging in the air between you.  

“I don’t know where you’ve been.” You make a face, scanning him from head to toe. It’s satisfying to see the frustration tick up in his eyes. You should record this for blackmail, so that if he tries anything once all of this is over and done with, you’d remind him that he was just above kneeling at your feet for a love bite.  

“Fine. Then I’ll give you one.” He takes a step towards you, and you dart across the room and around the couch, the polished wood floor suddenly an obstacle course. He stares at the spot you just left and slowly turns his head to look at you. 

“That’s sexual harassment, sir.” You say, and for some reason, you find this absurdly funny. 

“I would never!” Seokjin cries, looking genuinely appalled that you’d say that. Then, he gives you a sort of kicked puppy look that makes it even funnier, and you brace your hand against the couch, leaning forward with a laugh. “C’mon. Help me out.” 

“You can’t say that.” You snort through a fit of giggles. “This ain’t a porno.” 

There’s a helpless smile growing on his lips as he walks around the couch, following as you do. “This is really important.” 

“I’m sure you don’t need me sucking on your neck to fix that.” You say, reaching the spot where he was standing before. The seriousness of the situation isn’t lost on you, and as amusing as it is to you to watch Seokjin nearly explode as give him a run-around, it is the best course of action.  

“Alright, alright.” You sigh, and Seokjin looks immensely relieved, smiling widely. 

“Perfect! Only---” he looks around at the living room with a too scheming look slipping into his smile, “We have to go back to your room.” 

“You know.” You say, watching him walk past you, “I saw a porn that started just like this.”  

Seokjin tugs you along with an exasperated sigh. 

When you get back to your room, he’d adjusted the tint of the windows to let more of the morning light in, and then, gently directs you to sit on the edge. He stares at you for a moment before fussing with your hair, like a hairstylist on a time crunch to get things just right. Maybe he’s wasted in the tech industry. He carefully roughs up the ends and strategically musses the layers around your face---creating whatever exact look of ‘we spent the weekend messing around’ he thinks the public expects. When he was done, he takes a step back to stare at you intensely. 

The heat of his gaze is palpable. He closes the distance in a single step, leaning into your bubble. His scent---that same clean, expensive, smell you remember from the club---fills your lungs. 

“Can I kiss you?” 

“What?” You blink up at him. He’s already looking at you, waiting for you to process. A hickey is one thing. This is another entirely! It must have shown on your face because in the next minute, he’s apologising.  

“I’m sorry… I… they’re trying to smoke me out,” He sighs through his nose softly and gazes above your head, focusing on some distant, invisible point. “I need you to look a certain way else this won’t work.” 

“Alright.” 

Seokjin raises his right hand, fingers lightly brushing up your arm and then across your cheek until the length of his fingers disappear into your hair, cradling the back of your head. He gently tilts your chin upwards, and then he’s suddenly closer than he’s ever been. Your heart kicks against your ribcage like a frantic, trapped bird. 

You’re not blind; you have eyes that work. Seokjin is an attractive guy. You’d thought as much when you first saw him on Friday, no point trying to backtrack. From this close, you can see the faint moles that dot his face, subtle and soft in the light: one just off the bridge of his nose, another above the right side of his upper lip. And wow, his eyes are really brown---deep, dark pools that you could easily lose yourself in. 

You wonder, briefly, if this is what those ancient Victorian maidens felt like. Heck, like you said before, you’re no blushing virgin. But the last time you dated was...a long time ago. Didn’t end well.... well, it ended amicably enough, but regardless! You’d be clutching your pearls right now if you had pearls to clutch.  

“You’re allowed to say no.” He says softly, his breath a warm whisper against your mouth. 

You shake your head, the movement slight, your throat too tight for a proper word. “It’s fine.” 

Seokjin tilts his head slightly and leans towards you. The kiss is surprisingly soft, a lot gentler than you imagined; a hesitant, almost questioning press of his lips against yours. Not… that… you’ve imagined kissing him, no! At all! 

He pulls away, and you think for a minute he’s done, but he doesn’t let you breathe. Seokjin kisses you fiercely this time, his mouth possessing yours with a sudden, needy urgency. Your knees hit the back of the bed. You’re lucky enough to catch yourself without bending your wrist the wrong way against the mattress. His knee comes up to rest between yours to counter the lost balance, pinning you lightly to the spot. One of your hands curls into the bedsheets. 

Through your little surprised gasp, the warmth of his tongue slides along the seam of your parted lips. His fingers tighten in your hair and give a barely-there tug, just enough to tilt your head back some more, and sharp enough that the involuntary sound you make surprises even you. 

He pulls away slightly, his mouth trailing fire along the line of your jaw, his teeth skating over your pulse point. The sensation sends a shiver down your spine that you have no control over. Your hand that isn’t gripping the sheets for dear life, instead, goes to the back of his neck. 

He tugs your hair a little harder, giving him access, and spends a good, messy minute going at your neck. The suction is deep, the pressure just bordering on painful, ensuring a visible mark is left behind. 

Then, just as suddenly as the fierce kiss began, it stops. 

Seokjin doesn’t pull far away. Instead, he rests his forehead against your shoulder, his weight pressing down slightly as his body shudders with a deep, shaky inhale. His hand tightens momentarily against your scalp, breath coming in little bursts, dancing along your collarbone and the front of your tee.  

You almost ask if he’s alright, although you’re not much better. You feel the slight tremor in his frame. It’s almost as if he’s thought about this long before it needed to happen, and the reality has overwhelmed him. Or maybe! You’re being delusional. The rush of blood pounding in your ears slowly fades, replaced by the thud of your heart beating furiously against your sternum. 

“That,” you manage, your voice coming out hoarse, “was...thorough.” 

He gives a humourless, choked sound that might be a laugh. He slowly pushes himself upright, hand---now out of your hair---holding his weight. His eyes are more black than brown now in the light filtering through the windows, and he carefully brushes his fingers over the now-tender spot on your neck, confirming the damage. The skin there already feels hot. 

“Good,” he whispers, his voice thick.  

You raise an eyebrow, the adrenaline starting to give way to your usual sharp-edged practicality. “It won’t be convincing if only one of us looks like they got lucky.” 

You try not to think too hard about any of this as you lightly tug on the collar of his tee to find the smooth expanse of his neck. Your ears feel incredibly warm, and you can bet his are too, if the red flush is anything to go by.  

You give him a couple, one deep, calculated suction right on the pulse point where his jaw meets his neck that will certainly turn purple, and another slightly lower, just above the dip of his collarbone, accessible by the stretched neckline.  

Seokjin lets out a low, involuntary grunt as the pressure registers, his body tensing beneath the points of contact. 

You pull back just far enough that your breath ghosts across his skin. You look at the two prominent, reddening marks you left. 

“Is that good?” you ask, your voice soft and breathy, the pragmatic question feeling absurdly out of place given the heat of the contact. 

Seokjin doesn’t open his eyes, his head still resting near yours. The warmth of him is intoxicating. 

“Mhm,” he murmurs, the sound low in his throat. You probably wouldn’t have heard it if you weren’t so close.  

His hand moves to your waist, and you jolt, he lets out a breathy chuckle, pulling back, but not too far from you. The way he’s looking at you makes you want to stick your head in some dirt and scream. Or, well, maybe just hide under the blankets for a bit until the warmth of your skin settles and doesn’t muddle your brain all that much.  

You’re about to open your mouth to really ask if he’s okay now, because he’s done nothing but stare at you, but you barely get the chance.  

He leans in again, pulling you flush against him. 

This second kiss is completely different. It has nothing to do with Taejin or Doyun or the news cycle. It’s deep and possessive, a silent question he demands you answer with equal fervour. His good hand hooks around your back, pulling you taut against the solid wall of his chest. His lips are insistent, demanding, and you melt into the contact, answering the unexpected aggression with a sudden, matching hunger. 

He presses you back onto the bed until you’re half-lying on the pristine white duvet, the kiss only breaking when he needs air. 

He finally backs up and away from you, swiping at his bottom lip with his thumb. He clears his throat, staring out the window as your right yourself on the bed.  

“I need you watch.” He says, looking at you briefly before looking away again. He almost looks shy, and the red flush to his ears had crawled its way down his neck. Shy! After all of that.  

You’re no better.  

You fumble to find the release pad of your watchband, and in a second it loosens and slides down your arm. You hold it out to him, sniffling loudly.  

Seokjin takes the watch from you, navigating to the camera app. He adjusts the settings for a quick, vertical video upload. 

“We need the right lighting,” he murmurs, already moving. He directs you back toward the headboard, where the morning light is just starting to streak across the duvet from the window. He sits down, leaning slightly against the headboard, and turns your watch camera to face both of you. 

“Okay,” he instructs, gesturing with his head. “Sit behind me. Lean your chest against my back, arms over my shoulders---gently, the sling.” 

You manoeuvre yourself awkwardly behind him. You can feel the heat radiating through the fabric of his shirt, and the solid, muscled plane of his back is surprisingly comforting. You carefully drape your arms over his shoulders, ensuring you avoid putting any pressure on the sling protecting his left arm. 

He brings the watch up, tilting it slightly. The angle is a bit tricky, but it works: it perfectly frames his face, his messy hair, the hickey you left near his jaw and the one that peaks above the collar of his tee. Behind him, your face is cut off just above the bridge of your nose, ensuring your eyes and identity are hidden, but your chin, the curve of your neck, and the angry, reddening marks he left on you are prominently displayed. 

He nods to himself, checking the composition. His features instantly soften into a look of casual, rumpled contentment---the kind that makes magazines millions. “Right.” 

He taps the record button, and a small red light starts blinking on the watch face. 

The camera is rolling.   

You settle your chin onto the ridge of his shoulder, your arms lying limply over his chest. You keep your neck rigidly straight to ensure the hickey is visible. You think, this is how people sit when they’re together. Casual, relaxed. You blink slowly and wait. 

Seokjin maintains the passive, satisfied expression for about fifteen seconds, then sighs, silently ending the recording. 

He slowly rotates his body slightly to look at you over his shoulder; his brow furrowed in confusion. 

“...What?” you ask, genuinely confused. Did the camera overheat? 

His expression is utterly deadpan. “What are you doing?” 

“I’m sitting here. I’m being still,” you defend, tilting your head so that you’re not looking down your nose at him. 

“I know what still is and you’re being stiff, very big difference there.” He counters, exasperated. His professional ease is completely shattered by your complete lack of performance skills. He gestures toward the watch. “Look at yourself. You look like you’re being held hostage. You’re stiff as a board! Just act natural. Be comfortable. Put your head down, rub my neck, whatever. Have you never had a boyfriend before?” 

The accusation of awkwardness stings, hitting close to your deep-seated discomfort with emotional performance. You almost laugh at the fact that he’s taking this so seriously ---it is pretty serious ---but it also reminds you that despite his flaws in the eyes of the public, Kim Seokjin is the CEO of Vionix. He’s spent most of his corporate time in front of a camera, for magazines, ads, interviews and you don’t doubt somewhere in his childhood he’s had media training. He knows his way around a camera, and he certainly knows how to fake an image.  

“I’m not a virgin if that’s what you’re asking,” you retort, your voice sharp. 

Seokjin stops, turning his head further back to stare at you, his eyes wide in genuine, disbelieving shock. 

“That is not what I’m asking you!” he cries, the absurdity of the statement breaking through his focus. He throws his head back with a loud, surprised burst of laughter. He catches himself on the headboard to avoid jostling his sling. 

You ignore the warmth spreading across your cheeks. 

“It’s not as hard as you think.” He says, taking a deep breath and wiping the smile away, though his eyes remain crinkled at the corners. “Just try to look like you hate the camera, not me. Let’s go again.” 

Seokjin resets the watch camera. He holds his face closer to the lens, pulling focus only onto his eyes and the new mark on his neck. 

“Look, you don’t have to do anything,” he explains patiently. “Just lean your head against my back, like you’re comfortable but annoyed that I’m making this video. You can move your fingers on my chest or whatever feels right. Make it look like you own the space.” 

Own the space. You can do that! It’s less acting and more asserting dominance.

He hits record again. 

This time, you drop your chin onto the cushion of his shoulder, letting your body weight settle fully against his back. You deliberately soften your posture, mimicking the exhaustion of a truly long weekend. You let your fingers, draped over his chest, drag slowly across the fabric of his tee, just enough to be seen in the close-up shot. 

Seokjin immediately responds to the shift. His eyes, though still conveying a reckless, satisfied look for the camera, lose the tightness of the strategist. He lets his head tilt back slightly, a silent, possessive gesture that draws the viewer’s attention to the contrast between his neck and your chin. 

He lets the video roll for about twenty seconds, just long enough to capture the mood, the marks, and the rumpled morning light. Then, he ends the recording. 

“Perfect,” he murmurs, his tone low and professional once more, the intimate moment sealed off. He immediately navigates your watch to his social media interface---an elegant, obsidian-black app that runs the new age equivalent of Instagram; a platform known as Aura.  

He quickly reviews the video, using the watch’s augmented features to crop the edges into a neat, vertical story format. He types a short, dismissive phrase onto the screen, blurring the text slightly so it looks flippant and unplanned: ‘Didn’t realize I was supposed to check in.’ Then, he quickly assigns a popular, generic pop song from the platform’s library to loop softly in the background---something catchy, easily ignored, and very unserious. 

He hesitates for just a fraction of a second, his thumb hovering over the post button. This isn’t just a flippant upload; this is the official countermove to a corporate coup. 

“Posting now,” he warns. 

He taps the screen. 

Within five minutes, the silent, intimate twenty-second video is viral. Which is as terrifying as it is insane to you. Seokjin could probably post a video about him eating a slice of cake and people would cheer him on.  

The watch begins to buzz softly on the bed next to you, alerting Seokjin to the exponential surge. The news channels, which had been tentatively running the “Missing CEO” ticker, are forced to scramble. The “missing” narrative dies instantly. The focus is entirely on the identity of the Mystery Woman, who is now definitively The Girlfriend, a sudden, reckless, and highly scrutinized feature of the world’s most eligible CEO. 

“That should buy us forty-eight hours of silence from the police and the board,” he says, putting the watch down. “They’ll be too busy fighting the optics of this to track my location.” 

Over the next couple of hours, the video continues to be shared across platforms. You and Seokjin stand around in the kitchen, discussing your next course of action.  

There’s still one tiny issue in the Very Big Problem: the photo of you on the news. The one that had spread like a fire in a dry field after this morning’s broadcast.  

Luckily, the photo itself is your saving grace, your face is nowhere in it. However, caution is your best friend right about now. Technology is so advanced that even if your face is mistakenly a blurry, grainy reflection on the club building’s exterior, someone can make something of it.  

Unfortunately, there’s only so much you can do from your watch. Jimin knows his way around hacking systems but not on the scale you need.  

“I know a guy.” You told Seokjin, waving off his worry before it becomes yours. 

This would be the part in an epic movie where the main character gets to contact a very cool guy that probably knows a way cooler guy to do some stuff valuable to the plot. Unfortunately, this guy is just your ex, and he owes you a favour. Doesn’t make him less valuable, just makes it a lot harder to actually reach out.  

You’d left Seokjin in the living room, using a Holowatch he’d magically procured from a drawer in his server room to contact Jimin for “explaining the situation”. It’s not that you don’t trust Seokjin, though, purely based on the fact that he’s so good at fooling people, you suspect that’s not the only reason he needs to speak to your best friend-–who you didn’t want involved in any of this!---without you in the room.  

Your list of contacts is... dismal at best, and it doesn’t take long to find the contact name you never switched out. Like you said before, it ended well enough, in a way that you were still in contact as friends afterwards and just...stopped talking. Amicable.  

You hadn’t spoken to him in a long while, you’re not even sure if his contact is still the same. It better be. Or you’d have to get Jimin to do it. And he and Jimin are...well...cordial at best.  

Your finger hover over his contact name, and you take a breath before tapping on it.  

It rings, which is a good thing, and by the fourth, just as you think it’s going into voicemail, he picks up.  

“Nero.” Comes the grumble on the other side.  

You snort, “Is this your work number, now?”  

There’s a pause, and then a low laugh, “Well, well, well. Fancy hearing from you, Birdie.” He drawls. Your watch beeps as he requests a video call. Sighing, you accept, he smiles when the feed loads. “Been, what, two years?” 

“Two and a half.”  

“Ouch.” He says, a hand on his chest, and his eyes narrowed in a show of mock hurt, “thought we were better than that.”  

“Yoongi.”  

“I saw your fine ass on the news this morning. Whatcha got yourself into this time?”  

Min Yoongi, fellow hacker in the underground, adept in making people disappear. If you want to not be found, have all traces of you gone from every system? He’s your guy.  

“I’m calling in the marker.” You say and he pokes his tongue into his cheek. From where he’s sitting, you can see that he’s in his work room. It’s a deliberately dark, comfortable space, lit primarily by the cool, steady glow of a massive, curved wall of monitors that fill the background behind his desk. The black couch you’d spend many days on is tucked into a corner, and the guitar you bought him is propped up against the wall next to it. 

“I mean...” he drags the word out, spinning slightly on his chair, “I’m kinda busy....working.”  

“This is literally important.” You deadpan, “And I know your ass isn’t doing shit. You go off grid when you work. You wouldn’t have answered my call.”  

“Maybe you’re special.” He smiles, all gummy, but he nods, “You need me to ghost you, right?”  

“I wouldn’t have called otherwise.”  

“Treated like a common whore.” Yoongi shakes his head, “Give me a minute.” 

He spins his chair to face his wall of glowing monitors. You watch his profile go rigid, his fingers flying across the keyboard, already executing background searches. The silence stretches, filled only by the frantic click of keys and the low hum of his server farm. 

It only takes a couple of minutes for him to run the deep search, cross-referencing the news broadcasts from the morning. The quiet clicking stops, and he leans back in his chair, rotating slowly to face you again. 

His mouth is a thin, flat line, but his eyes hold a spark of respect for the sheer scale of the digital cleanup. 

“Damn,” he says, shaking his head slowly. “They spread your ass far and wide... the image is everywhere. Luckily for you, I’m a professional.” 

He spins back to the monitors, pulling up a complex, dark-themed dashboard. “I’ve tagged the source image and mirrored the initial suppression command across the main news conduits. It’ll start scrubbing copies, but it’s going to take time to completely disappear from all caches and social mirrors. Expect it to be gone from major networks within the hour, and almost completely untraceable by tomorrow morning.” 

He glances at the feed. “I’ve done you an additional favour and cleaned Lumen’s footage. Tell that boyfriend of yours your ex says hi.”  

“He’s not my boyfriend.”  

Yoongi doesn’t wait for a reply, his face already intense as he focuses on his complex task. The video feed remains open, a silent window into the world-class operation he is running on your behalf. 

“You owe me, Birdie.” He says before the video drops and he’s gone. Seconds later you receive a pop up of a black cat disappearing behind a lamppost and a “Tag, you’re it.” text.  

You walk to the living room, Seokjin is no longer talking to Jimin, and you don’t have the chance to ask him about it.  

“Okay.” He begins, turning to face you as you sit on the couch next to him, “I have a plan.”  

Tags: @dontstoptime @themwordsblog @haru-jiminn @yukina0521

please, please, please. A lot of effort and time went into the creation of this fic, taking the time to write a comment would be so nice! Don't be a silent reader!! Ask questions, rant, anything at all is appreciated. Also!!! Reblog! rebloging is very important for visibility and for other folks that enjoy these types of fics to discover em!

part two here

[skzhotpot]

Y’all gotta blow this one up it’s insane!!!!!

I’ll never skip CEO Seokjin 😛😛 and this MC was truly a badass. Author, are you secretly a hacker?! This world building was unmatched!!!! And funny in all the right places! I’m obsessed with this I already know I’m going to be coming back for a second round.

Don’t skip part 2!!!

💜 more → Kim Seokjin · BTS · Fic Rec Library 💜

[yourfavtangerine]

We burn together

Pairing: son of Hephaestus!Mingyu x daughter of Aphrodite!reader

Percy Jackson AU, sex buddies to lovers, fluff, smut

Wc:~10.1k

Part of the Cabin Hearts series ! Masterlist

Summary: He thinks he’s awkward and unworthy, covered in soot and calluses. She sees brilliance in every invention. Together, they build something more enduring than steel.

Warnings: sex buddies, multiple smut, unprotected sex, oral, fingering, self-esteem issues, scars, burns (basicaly only smut warnings)

The forge never truly slept. Even when the last camper had stumbled back to their bunks and Chiron began his patrols, the coals in Hephaestus’ hearth glowed like a dragon’s heart, pulsing low and steady. Mingyu liked it that here. No one expected him to talk. No one expected him to smile for capture-the-flag photos or flex for the Aphrodite kids who giggled behind their manicured hands. Here, the only thing that judged him was the metal, and metal could be persuaded.

He struck the celestial bronze again. Clang. The shield boss rang like a temple bell, sending a tremor up his forearms. Sweat slid down the groove of his spine and soaked the waistband of his cargo pants. His black tank had given up hours ago, clinging to his chest in damp patches that outlined every ridge of muscle he’d earned the hard way. Soot streaked his cheekbones; a curl of dark hair stuck to his forehead. He looked like something that had crawled out of the volcano itself.

And he felt like it, too.

Across the camp, the Aphrodite cabin glittered like a jewelry box under the moon. You were supposed to be there, trading skincare secrets and painting each other’s nails with liquid starlight. Instead, you were storming across the green with your bow slung over your shoulder, quiver bouncing against your hip. The straw targets at the archery range had mocked you all evening, arrows wide, form sloppy.

You wanted noise. You wanted heat. You wanted something that didn’t pretend to be perfect, something raw and real to change your mind.

The double doors of Cabin 9's workshop stood ajar. You slipped through without knocking.

Inside, the air shimmered. Chains hung from the rafters like jungle vines, clinking softly. Half-finished automata twitched on workbenches, mechanical owls, bronze serpents, a tiny Pegasus no bigger than a sparrow that kept trying to flap its one good wing. Every surface was covered in scorch marks and love notes from grateful campers: "Thanks for fixing my dagger, Mingyu!!" scrawled in purple gel pen, "You’re a legend" in red Sharpie. The place smelled like hot iron, ozone, and something faintly sweet, like brown sugar left too close to the fire.

Mingyu didn’t notice you at first. He was bent over the anvil, one massive hand steadying the shield while the other swung the hammer in a slow, hypnotic arc. The muscles in his back moved like cables under bronze skin. His dark hair fell into his eyes, and when he blew it away, the motion revealed a thin scar that cut through his left eyebrow, a souvenir from the time a piece of metal burst out of nowhere.

You leaned against a pillar and let yourself look. Really look. Not the way people stared at him in the dining pavilion, half-scared, half-curious, like he was a tame bear. You looked at the way his fingers: thick, scarred, impossibly gentle, curled around the hammer’s handle. At the tiny frown between his brows when the metal didn’t behave. At the soot smudged across his collarbone like war paint.

He finally sensed you. The hammer paused mid-air.

"Hey" you said, soft enough that it could have been the wind.

Mingyu startled anyway. The hammer slipped, clanged against the anvil, and sent up a shower of orange sparks. He straightened too fast, shoulders hunching like he’d been caught doing something embarrassing.

"Oh...uh...hi." His voice was low, rough from disuse. He wiped his hands on a rag that had once been gray and was now mostly black. "The Cabin’s technically closed after curfew. Not that anyone listens" he added, almost smiling. Almost.

You stepped closer. The heat rolled off the forge in waves, curling the ends of your hair. "I got kicked out of archery for 'excessive sulking.' Figured I’d sulk somewhere prettier."

His eyes flicked to you, then away, then back again, like he couldn’t decide where to put them. You were wearing the camp T-shirt knotted high above your navel and a pair of denim shorts that had seen better days. A streak of dirt from the range still clung to your calf. You looked nothing like the polished dolls in Cabin 10, and you knew it.

Mingyu cleared his throat. "You’re… not hurt, are you?"

"Just my pride." You tilted your head. "You fix things, right? Got anything for a bruised ego?"

He laughed, short, surprised, like the sound had escaped without permission. "I’m better with swords."

"Shame." You wandered deeper into the workshop, trailing your fingers over a half-assembled chariot wheel. "I break hearts, not blades."

His ears went pink beneath the soot. He busied himself quenching the shield in a barrel of oil that hissed like a cat. You watched the muscles in his forearms flex as he lifted the glowing metal. When he set it on the rack to cool, the silence stretched, thick and humming.You broke it. "What are you making?"

"A shield for Ares kids. One of them cracked theirs during a training last week." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Trying to reinforce the rim so it doesn’t happen again."

"Those kids are terrifying" you said cheerfully. "One called me ‘Barbie’ once and threatened to use my bow as kindling."

Mingyu’s mouth twitched. "They calls me ‘Forge Boy.’ I think it’s affectionate."

You moved closer, close enough to see the flecks of gold in his dark eyes, like embers trapped under glass. "You don’t look like a boy."

His breath hitched. Just once.

You reached out, slow enough that he could have stepped back. He didn’t. Your fingertips brushed the soot on his cheekbone, tracing the sharp line of it down to the corner of his mouth. His skin was fever-hot.

"You’re filthy" you whispered.

"Sorry" he rasped.

"Don’t be." You smeared the soot across his lower lip with your thumb. "It’s honest. You're a real worker"

Mingyu’s hands hovered at his sides, fists clenching and unclenching like he didn’t trust them. You took one of those hands, calluses like tree bark, fingers that could snap your wrist without trying, and pressed it to the bare strip of skin above your shorts. His palm spanned your waist entirely.

"Tell me if I’m too much" you said.

He shook his head once, jerky. "You’re-" His voice cracked. "You’re the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen."

The words punched the air out of you. Not because they were smooth, they weren’t. Because they were clumsy and raw and true, the way only Hephaestus kids ever said anything.

You kissed him. It wasn’t soft. It was teeth and soot and the taste of smoke on his tongue. Mingyu made a helpless noise low in his throat and kissed you back like he’d been starving for it. His hands, those careful, terrifying hands, slid up your back, lifting you clean off the floor. You wrapped your legs around his waist without thinking, and he staggered back against the workbench. Tools clattered to the floor. A jar of screws exploded like shrapnel.

You laughed into his mouth. He groaned when your hips rolled against his.

"Careful" he panted "the forge-"

"Don't mind. Let it burn."

He set you on the edge of the bench, hands shaking as they fumbled with the knot in your T-shirt. You helped him, yanking it over your head and tossing it somewhere near the quenching barrel. His tank followed, peeled off with a sound like ripping canvas. The scars across his chest were silver in the firelight: burns, blade cuts, a jagged line over his ribs that looked like lightning.

You traced them with your mouth. He shuddered so hard the bench creaked.

Your bra was pink lace, ridiculous against his soot-streaked skin. He stared like he’d never seen one before, then figured out the clasp with the same concentration he gave to celestial bronze. When it fell away, he exhaled your name like a prayer.

The shorts went next. His cargo pants were trickier: belt buckle, button, zipper, but you managed between kisses that left both of you breathless and laughing and desperate. Somewhere in the haze, his boxers disappeared. Yours followed, snagging on the spur of a gear that had rolled under the bench.

Skin on skin. Heat on heat.

Mingyu lifted you again, turning so your back met the one clear spot on the wall, cool wood paneling between two racks of swords. He braced one arm beside your head, the other sliding under your thigh to hitch your leg higher. You felt him, hard, blazing hot, pressed against your hip.

"Look at me" you whispered.

His eyes met yours, wild and dark and impossibly young. You reached between you, guided him, and watched his face go slack with wonder as he sank into you inch by inch. The stretch burned beautifully. You both stilled, foreheads touching, breathing each other’s air.

Then he moved.

Slow at first, like he was afraid you’d break. You bit his shoulder, hard, and he snapped his hips forward with a groan that rattled the chains overhead. The rhythm turned hungry, frantic. Every thrust rocked the workbench behind him; an owl sculpture toppled off and hooted indignantly on the floor.

You came first, clenching around him with a cry that echoed off the rafters. Mingyu followed seconds later, burying his face in your neck as he spilled inside you, shaking so hard you had to hold him together.

For a long moment, the only sound was the forge’s low growl and the soft clink of cooling metal.

He didn’t let go. Not yet. His arms stayed locked around you, nose pressed to your temple, breathing you in like oxygen after drowning.

Eventually, he carried you to the battered leather couch in the corner, the one where he napped between projects. You curled against his chest, tracing idle hearts in the soot on his skin, basking in his manly scent.

The leather couch smelled like oil and old campfire smoke. Fifteen minutes later, you were still half-draped across Mingyu’s chest, legs tangled, heartbeats slowing into something almost peaceful. His fingers traced lazy circles on your bare shoulder, like he was memorizing the shape of you. The forge had settled into a low, satisfied growl, the coals glowing the color of a dying sunset.

You lifted your head just enough to see his face. His eyes were closed, lashes fanned against soot-smudged cheeks, lips parted like he’d forgotten how to breathe through his nose. He looked wrecked. Beautifully wrecked.

You pressed your mouth to the hollow beneath his ear and whispered "This stays between us."

His arms tightened reflexively, pulling you closer. You felt the wordless question in the way his fingers dug into your hip.

You answered it before he could ask. "No strings, Mingyu. Just release. You want that?"

He swallowed hard. Nodded once, slow, like the motion cost him something.

"Good." You nipped his earlobe, felt him shiver. "Because I’m not looking for a boyfriend. I’m looking for someone who can make me forget my own name for an hour."

His laugh was shaky. "I can… try."

You kissed him again, softer this time, tasting salt and smoke. Then you slid off the couch, hunting for your clothes among the chaos of scattered screws and bronze pieces. Your bra had landed on a half-finished helm; one strap was melted. You laughed under your breath and left it there. The pink lace looked good against the dull metal, like a dare.

Mingyu watched you dress with the same concentration he gave to tempering steel. When you tugged your shorts up, he finally found his voice.

"You’re really just… leaving?"

"Curfew’s in twenty minutes" you said, knotting your T-shirt under your ribs. "And I still have to sneak past Chiron."

He sat up, magnificent and ridiculous with his cargo pants barely zipped and a streak of your lip gloss on his collarbone. "When-" He stopped, cleared his throat. "When can I…?"

You grinned over your shoulder. "When I need you, Forge Boy. You’ll know."

You slipped out the side door, barefoot, the grass cool and wet under your soles. Behind you, the forge door clicked shut like a secret.

You stepped away, found your sneakers, and slipped out the side door without looking back.

The night air hit you like cold water. You shivered, hugged your arms, and jogged across the grass with the biggest, stupidest grin on your face.

Behind you, the forge door creaked shut. You didn’t hear it. You were already halfway to Cabin 10, replaying the way he’d groaned your name like it was the only word he knew.

Mingyu stood in the sudden quiet, staring at the closed door. His heart was trying to hammer its way out of his ribcage. Eventually he found his boxers, snagged on a ceiling hook, because of course they were, and pulled them on with shaking hands.

He sank onto the couch again, dropped his head into his palms, and laughed. A low, incredulous sound that echoed off the rafters.

He was so screwed. But gods, he couldn’t wait to be screwed again.

Weeks slipped by like molten metal cooling into something stronger than anyone expected.

The first few nights were pure wildfire. You’d ghost into Cabin 9 long after curfew, hair still damp from the showers, wearing nothing but an oversized Camp Half-Blood hoodie and mischief. Mingyu would be elbow-deep in a project (hammer paused mid-swing, goggles fogged, biceps flexing under a fresh layer of sweat). You’d lock the door with a soft click that sounded louder than any gong, and thirty seconds later he’d have you bent over the nearest flat surface, your palms squeaking across celestial bronze still warm from the forge, his low growls drowning out the hiss of quenching steel.

But somewhere between the seventh and the twelfth stolen night, the rhythm changed.

It started small. One evening you arrived to find him wrestling with a tangle of silver wire and tiny gears no bigger than sesame seeds. His tongue was poking out the corner of his mouth in concentration, ridiculous and adorable. You didn’t pounce. Instead you hopped onto the workbench, legs swinging, and asked, "What poor monster is that going to murder?"

He startled, nearly dropped a cog the size of a pinhead, then flushed the color of fresh lava. "It’s… not for murder. It’s a music box. For the Hera cabin. They keep saying the hearth feels lonely at night."

You blinked. "You’re building a music box. Out of celestial bronze. For the children of the goddess who literally never gets gifts."

He shrugged, ears scarlet. "It’s stupid."

"It’s perfect" you said, and meant it so hard your voice cracked.

That was the first night you didn’t have sex.

You sat cross-legged on the floor while he worked, passing him tools when he grunted for them, asking questions that grew more and more technical. You learned the difference between tempering and annealing, why he preferred oil quenching for dagger blades but water for shields, how he could tell the temperature of steel by the color of its glow alone. His voice, usually so quiet people had to lean in to hear him, filled the workshop, low and steady and alive. When he got excited, his hands sketched shapes in the air: spirals for spring tension, figure-eights for cam timing. You watched the way his eyes caught fire brighter than the forge itself.

At some point you ended up on the battered leather couch, your head on his shoulder, his big arm draped around you like it had always belonged there. He smelled like charcoal and cedar and something indefinably Mingyu. You traced idle circles on his forearm, following the raised white lines of old burns.

"Tell me about this one" you murmured, tapping a crescent-shaped scar near his wrist.

"Exploding automaton, summer I was twelve. Thought I could make a spider that shot webs. Turns out Greek fire doesn’t care about your intentions."

You laughed into his neck. He shivered.

Another night, you brought strawberries stolen from the dining pavilion. He fed you one, hesitant, juice running down your chin. You licked it off his thumb without breaking eye contact. He forgot how to breathe for a solid ten seconds.

Some nights you still fucked: hard, fast, filthy, against the wall, on the floor, once bent over the anvil itself while the forge roared approval. But more and more, the sex became punctuation marks in a different kind of conversation.

You learned he kept a tin of brown-sugar oatmeal cookies under the workbench because he got low blood sugar when he worked too long. You started bringing him water bottles laced with nectar so his hands would stop shaking at 3 am. He learned you hated the way Drew’s clique talked about "fixing" people’s faces with charmspeak, how you’d once spent an entire week refusing to speak because you were terrified your voice could hurt someone. He started leaving the forge door unlocked on purpose, even when he knew you had early-morning archery drills.

One Thursday, rain hammered the tin roof like a thousand angry fists. You arrived soaked, hoodie plastered to your skin, shivering despite the heat rolling off the coals. Mingyu took one look at you and panicked.

"You’re going to get sick" he scolded, voice pitching high the way it did when he was flustered. He towed you to the back corner where he kept spare clothes, all miles too big for you and wrapped you in his hoodie like a burrito. It smelled like him, warm and smoky and safe.

You burrowed into it, nose pressed to the collar. "I like when you worry about me."

He muttered something that sounded suspiciously like "someone has to" then spent twenty minutes trying to dry your hair with a clean shop towel while you sat on his lap and pretended not to notice how carefully he avoided your breasts.

Later, when the rain eased to a whisper, he showed you the shield he’d been working on for weeks. It was for you, though he’d die before admitting it. The outer rim was etched with tiny doves in flight; the boss was a rose blooming from hammered bronze petals. When you touched it, the petals unfurled with a soft mechanical sigh, revealing a hidden compartment just big enough for a dagger or a love note.

"I thought…" He rubbed the back of his neck. "If you ever had to fight, you’d want something beautiful. Not just functional."

Your throat closed. You kissed him so gently he swayed.

That night you didn’t have sex at all. You fell asleep on the couch with your head in his lap, his fingers combing through your hair in slow, hypnotic strokes. He stayed awake until dawn, afraid to move, afraid the moment would end if he so much as breathed wrong.

The next morning you left before the conch horn for breakfast, pressing a strawberry-flavored kiss to the corner of his mouth and whispering "See you tonight, Forge Boy."

He watched you go, hoodie sleeves swallowing your hands, bare feet leaving damp prints across the floor. The forge felt too big without you in it.

That afternoon, during sword practice, you caught yourself smiling at nothing while Leah tried to explain why she’d replaced all the Ares cabin’s spears with pool noodles. She noticed. She always noticed.

"Someone’s glowing" she sang, flipping her hair. "Spill."

You twirled your dagger and lied through your teeth. "New highlighter. You should try it."

She bought it, barely. You exhaled.

But the secret was getting harder to keep. Mingyu started leaving the forge’s side window cracked open so the smell of your perfume wouldn’t linger. You started wearing his hoodies over your camp T-shirts and telling everyone they were "vintage." Once, one of your sisters caught you sneaking back at 5 am with soot in your hair and a hickey the size of a drachma on your collarbone. She took one look, squealed, and promised silence in exchange for full details later. You paid up in strawberry lip gloss and sworn secrecy.

Still, the camp gossiped. Someone saw Mingyu carrying a girl’s pink flip-flops across the green at dawn. Someone else noticed the Aphrodite table was one strawberry bowl short every morning.

You told yourself it didn’t matter. Casual. No strings. Just release.

But every time you left the forge, you took a little piece of him with you: soot under your nails, the ache between your thighs, the echo of his laugh when you asked if he could make a vibrating automaton "for science". And every time you came back, he was waiting with that shy, stunned smile, like he still couldn’t believe you chose his grimy workshop over the entire world.

The horn for capture-the-flag sounded like a war-cry across the valley, and every camper sprinted toward the woods with the kind of reckless joy that only comes when you’re seventeen and half-immortal. Mingyu had spent three sleepless nights perfecting his masterpiece: an automated net launcher built into the roots of a tree. Pressure plates, counterweights, celestial-bronze cables thinner than spider silk. It was supposed to drop from the canopy, ensnaring the entire red team in one glorious, non-lethal swoop.

He stood at the edge of the blue team’s territory, goggles pushed up into his sweat-damp hair, heart hammering louder than any forge. You were on the opposite side, red plumes in your hair, war paint streaking your cheekbones like a goddess of beautiful violence. You blew him a kiss across the creek. He almost forgot how to breathe.

Chiron’s whistle shrieked. War began.

It took exactly four minutes and thirty-two seconds for everything to go nuts. The first trigger fired perfectly, net blooming open like a deadly flower, scooping three Hermes kids mid-sprint. Cheers erupted from the blue side. Mingyu allowed himself one fist-pump.

Then the second plate misfired. The third jammed. The fourth decided to drop its entire payload on the blue team instead.

Twenty yards of netting collapsed in a glittering avalanche. And Mingyu, sweet, mortified Mingyu, stood frozen as his own teammates flailed like fish in a trap he’d built.

Laughter exploded across the forest, sharp, merciless, unstoppable. Someone started a chant: "Forge rat! Forge rat!" It echoed off the trees and lodged straight into his ribcage.

By the time Chiron called time, Mingyu was gone. Vanished into the dusk before anyone could slap his back or offer pity. The red team won by default. You collected the flag with a smile that didn’t reach your eyes, because you knew exactly where he’d run.

The forge door was barred, actually barred, a two-by-four jammed across the handles like he thought the entire camp might storm in to mock him. You slipped through the side window instead, landing cat-quiet among the shadows.

He was at the anvil, hammering the same piece of bronze over and over until it glowed cherry-red and hissed. Each blow was punishment. Sparks showered his bare forearms; he didn’t flinch. His shoulders were curved inward, spine a tight bow of humiliation.

You waited until the hammer paused mid-swing.

"Hey, genius" you said softly.

The hammer clattered to the floor. He didn’t turn. "Not tonight." His voice was raw. "Please. Just… go."

You stepped closer anyway, boots silent on the packed dirt. "Mingyu."

"I said go." He spun, eyes wild, soot streaking down one cheek. "I’m not...I can’t..." He gestured helplessly at himself: sweat-soaked tank, grease to his elbows, hair plastered to his skull. "Look at me. I’m a joke. The whole camp saw it."

You moved before he could bolt, sliding between him and the anvil, close enough that the heat of his body rivaled the forge. "They saw a net malfunction. They did not see you."

He laughed, a broken sound. "Same difference."

"No." You caught his wrists, forced his trembling hands still. "They didn’t see the boy who stayed up seventy-two hours straight because he wanted his team to be safe. They didn’t see the blueprints you drew with a stub of charcoal because you ran out of paper. They didn’t see you test every cable yourself so no one would get hurt." Your thumbs swept over the pulse points in his wrists, frantic as trapped birds. "I saw. I always see."

His knees buckled. You went down with him, sinking to the floor amid curls of copper shavings and scattered gears. He tried to pull away; you climbed into his lap instead, knees bracketing his hips, palms framing his face.

"Why me?" The question tore out of him. "You could have anyone. Apollo kids who write songs about your eyes. Ares brutes who’d kill dracaenae just to watch you smile. I’m...I’m the forge rat. I smell like oil and failure and-"

You kissed him to shut him up. Hard. Teeth clicking, tongues warring, a kiss that tasted like salt and fury and desperation. When you pulled back, his lips were swollen and trembling.

"Because you’re real" you said against his mouth. "Because your mind builds things that save lives while the rest of us are busy posing. Because when you look at me, you don’t see a daughter of Aphrodite, you see me. And I’m selfish enough to want that forever."

Something in him snapped, not broke, snapped clean, like a blade finally tempered right.

He surged up, lifting you with him, spinning until your back hit the floor and his weight pinned you there. The impact drove the air from your lungs in a delighted gasp. His hands were everywhere: rough, calloused, perfect, ripping your red-plumed T-shirt over your head, yanking your bra down instead of off because he couldn’t wait. Your shorts met the same fate, shoved to your knees along with your panties.

You arched up to help him, nails raking down his back hard enough to leave welts. He growled, actually growled and bit the curve where your neck met shoulder, marking you in a way that would purple by morning. You wanted it to. You wanted everyone to see.

His tank top was gone in one violent tug. You scored your nails over his chest, tracing the ridges of muscle and scar tissue until he shuddered. When you reached the waistband of his cargos, he was already straining against the fabric, hard and hot and huge.

"Off" you demanded, voice shredded.

He obeyed, kicking free of pants and boxers in one motion. Then he was back, spreading your thighs wide, settling between them like he belonged there. You were slick and ready, had been since the moment you saw him breaking himself on that anvil. He slid two thick fingers into you without warning, curling, scissoring, stretching you open with rough efficiency. You cried out, hips bucking.

"Need you now" he rasped. "Can’t...can’t be gentle tonight."

"Just do it the way you want. It's all about you" you panted.

He lined up and thrust in to the hilt in one brutal stroke.

The world whited out. He was huge, always was, but tonight he felt catastrophic. Every inch of him dragged against your walls, filling you so completely you forgot how to breathe. He didn’t pause, didn’t give you time to adjust , just pulled back and slammed home again, setting a punishing rhythm that rattled your teeth and made your toes curl.

The floor was unforgiving beneath your shoulder blades, but you didn’t care. You hooked your heels over his ass, urging him deeper, harder, faster. He obliged, hips snapping with weeks of pent-up frustration, humiliation, longing. Each thrust drove a broken sound from your throat; his name, curses, pleas in ancient Greek you didn’t know you knew.

He shifted angles, grinding against that spot inside you that turned your spine to lightning. Your nails carved red trails down his back; he hissed and fucked you harder, sweat dripping from his brow onto your breasts. You felt the orgasm building low and vicious, coiling tighter with every slap of skin on skin.

"Look at me" he snarled.

You forced your eyes open. His face was inches away, fierce and beautiful and wrecked. Tears streaked the soot on his cheeks, rage or relief, you couldn’t tell. You cupped his jaw, thumb smearing the wetness.

"Never a joke" you whispered. "Never to me."

The words shattered him.

He crushed his mouth to yours, swallowing your scream as you came apart around him, clenching so hard he groaned like he was dying. He followed seconds later, burying himself deep and pulsing hot inside you, hips jerking with every spurt until he had nothing left to give.

Afterward, the forge was silent except for your mingled breathing and the distant drip of water in the quenching barrel.

He didn’t roll away. Couldn’t. He stayed inside you, forehead pressed to yours, arms trembling as they held his weight off your chest. You traced the fresh scratches on his shoulder blades, gentle now, soothing.

"I’m sorry" he mumbled into your neck. "Was too rough-"

"You were perfect." You kissed the hinge of his jaw. "Exactly what you needed."

He exhaled shakily and finally slipped free, but only to gather you against his chest and roll so you were draped over him instead of the hard floor. You curled there, ear over his heart, listening to it slow from sprint to gallop to something almost peaceful.

His fingers drew idle patterns on your spine : circles, then hearts, then tiny automatons marching in formation. You felt the shift before he spoke.

"This isn’t just physical anymore" he said quietly. "Not for me."

You lifted your head. His eyes were steady, no trace of the earlier shame. Just raw, terrifying honesty.

"I know" you whispered. "Me neither."

Outside, the victory bonfire crackled, and somewhere across the green, campers were still laughing about the net that caught the wrong team. Inside Cabin 9, two demigods clung to each other on a soot-streaked floor, hearts hammering in the same rhythm for the first time.

The net had worked after all. It just caught the only two people who mattered.

The rumor mill at Camp Half-Blood ran on jet fuel and spite.

It started with Connor, because of course it did. He’d been sneaking back from a midnight raid on the camp pantry when he spotted you slipping out the forge’s side door at 5:17 am, hair a bird’s nest, hoodie inside-out, lips swollen, and a constellation of hickeys blooming across your throat like purple galaxies. Connor took one look, grinned like a jackal, and sprinted straight to the Hermes table at breakfast.

By lunch, the entire camp knew.

Your siblings were merciless. One cornered you outside the dining pavilion, arms crossed, glossy lips curled in a smirk sharp enough to slice bread. "Really, Y/N? The grease monkey? I thought you had standards." Another giggled behind her manicured hand. "Is he at least good with his hands, or is it just the tools that do the work?" A third tried to shush them, but even she looked curious.

You flipped your hair, forced a laugh that tasted like rust. "Jealousy’s a bad look. Orange isn’t your color."

But the words followed you everywhere.

'Slumming it.' 'Beauty and the Beast, but make it tragic.' 'Bet he smells like motor oil and regret.'

Across the green, Mingyu heard every single one.

He was repairing a chariot wheel when an Hermes kid sauntered past, whistling. "Yo, Forge Boy! Heard you’ve been keeping Aphrodite’s princess real warm at night. Didn’t know you had it in you."

Mingyu’s hammer slipped, denting the rim. He didn’t answer.

Later, during archery, one of the Apollo kids mimed wiping grease off his hands and called out "Hey Mingyu, when you’re done playing mechanic with Y/N, maybe fix my bow? Or is your schedule full of… other projects?"

Laughter rippled. Mingyu’s ears burned crimson. He packed up his tools and left without a word.

That night, you found him in the forge long after Chiron had started his rounds. The place was dim, only the banked coals glowing like dying stars. He sat on the floor amid a battlefield of scattered gears, bronze shavings glittering around him like fallen constellations. His knees were drawn up, arms wrapped around them, shoulders curved inward like he was trying to fold himself into nothing.

You closed the door softly. "Hey."

He didn’t look up. "We should stop."

The words hit you like a slap. You stood frozen in the doorway, heart suddenly too big for your ribcage. "Is that what you want?"

He shrugged, still staring at the floor. "It’s getting messy. Everyone knows. They’re laughing at you. Because of me." His voice cracked on the last word. "You shouldn’t have to deal with that."

You crossed the room in three strides and dropped to your knees in front of him, close enough that your legs bracketed his. "Mingyu. Look at me."

He shook his head, curls falling over his eyes. "I’m not...I’m not worth the gossip, Y/N. I’m the guy who builds things that explode in his own team’s face. The guy who smells like charcoal and can’t even talk to people without tripping over his tongue. You’re-" He gestured vaguely, helplessly. "You’re sunlight. And I’m the shadow that keeps dragging you into the dirt."

Your chest ached so sharply you had to press a hand there to keep your heart from spilling out.

You reached out, slow enough that he could pull away. He didn’t. Your fingers curled around his wrist, thumb finding the frantic flutter of his pulse. "Come here."

He let you tug him forward until his forehead rested against yours. His breath trembled across your lips.

"Talk to me" you whispered. "All of it."

He laughed, a wet, broken sound. "Where do I even start?"

"Start with the first thing they ever said that stuck."

Mingyu swallowed. His hands found your waist, gripping like you were the only solid thing in the world. "When I was nine, I built a bird out of scrap metal. It actually flew. Three whole minutes. Everyone clapped. Then it crashed into the Big House and set Chiron’s tail on fire." He huffed a humorless laugh. "They called me 'Firehazard Kim' for two years. Every time something went wrong: a broken sword, a jammed automaton, even when the strawberry fields flooded, they looked at me like I was the reason the gods invented bad luck."

You brushed a curl from his eyes. "Keep going."

"Freshman year here, I liked this girl from Demeter. Asked her to the solstice dance. She laughed in my face. Said, 'Why would I go with the kid who smells like a gas station?'" His voice dropped to a whisper. "I still check my reflection every morning to see if I missed a spot of grease. I shower three times a day. I use that stupid lavender soap Lacy sells because I’m terrified someone will smell the forge on me and remember I don’t belong anywhere but here."

Your throat closed. You pressed your lips to the corner of his mouth, soft, steady. "More."

He exhaled shakily. "Every time someone calls you ‘out of my league,’ it feels true. Because you are. You’re beautiful and brilliant and everyone wants you. And I’m just-" He gestured at the forge, the soot, the scars. "This."

You pulled back just enough to cup his face in both hands. His cheeks were wet. You hadn’t realized you were crying too.

"Now you listen to me, Kim Mingyu." Your voice shook, but you didn’t care. "I spent my entire life being told my worth was in how many hearts I could break before breakfast. That my greatest power was making people fall in love with me whether they wanted to or not. Do you know what that does to a person?"

He shook his head, eyes wide.

"It makes you terrified to be seen. Because if they see past the smile and the hair and the charm, they’ll realize there’s nothing underneath. Just a girl who’s good at pretending." You laughed, bitter and watery. "I’ve had Apollo boys write sonnets about my eyelashes. Ares kids offer to kill monsters just to watch me smile. And none of them ever asked what I wanted. Not once."

Mingyu’s hands tightened on your waist.

"You asked" you said simply. "That first night, when I was shaking from archery and you handed me a wrench like it was the most natural thing in the world. You asked if I was cold when I fell asleep on your couch. You ask every single time if I’m sure, if I want this, if I’m okay."

You leaned in until your foreheads touched again. "You see me, Mingyu. Not the daughter of Aphrodite. Not the pretty face. Me. And that scares the hell out of me, because what if you stop?"

He made a wounded sound and crushed you to his chest, arms banding around you so tightly you could feel his heartbeat through both your shirts. "Never" he rasped into your hair. "Gods, never."

You clung to him just as desperately, fingers twisted in the back of his shirt. "I don’t care what they say. I don’t care if they call me names or laugh behind my back. I care about this." You pulled back, pressing your palm over his heart. "I care about the boy who built a music box for the Hera cabin because her hearth felt lonely. Who stayed up seventy-two hours to keep his team safe. Who looks at me like I hung the moon even when I’m covered in your soot and screaming your name."

His eyes searched yours, wide and wondering. "You’re not ashamed? Of… us?"

You kissed him then, slow, deliberate, pouring every ounce of truth into it. When you pulled back, his lips chased yours involuntarily.

"I’m proud" you whispered against his mouth. "Proud to walk out of here with your marks on my skin. Proud to wear your hoodie like a flag. Proud to tell every single one of them that yes, I chose the forge rat. And I’d choose him a thousand times over."

Mingyu’s breath hitched. He rested his forehead against yours, eyes closed, lashes dark against his cheeks. "I don’t know how to do this" he admitted. "The… being together thing. In public. Where people can see."

"We’ll figure it out" you promised. "Together."

For a long moment, you just breathed each other in, sweat and smoke and strawberry shampoo and the faint metallic tang of tears. The forge glowed softly around you, casting long shadows that danced like they were celebrating.

Eventually, he shifted, tugging you down until you were both lying on the floor amid the scattered tools. You pillowed your head on his bicep; he curled around you like a question mark, nose buried in your hair.

"We’re a mess" he murmured.

"Yeah" you agreed, tracing the newest scratch on his forearm: a thin line from where you’d dragged him down earlier. "But we’re our mess."

And for the first time in weeks, neither of you moved to leave when the sky outside began to pale.

The invention showcase was Chiron’s attempt at peace-brokering.

After three straight weeks of cabin rivalries exploding into glitter bombs, stolen mascots, and one unfortunate incident involving the Aphrodite cabin’s mascara wands and the Ares cabin’s entire underwear drawer, Chiron declared a mandatory camp-wide festival of "constructive creativity." Translation: everyone had to show off something that didn’t maim, humiliate, or permanently dye another camper purple.

The amphitheater had been transformed. Banners in every cabin color snapped in the breeze. Tables groaned under the weight of projects: Hermes’ lock-picking drone, Athena’s self-assembling battle strategy board, Demeter’s carnivorous tomatoes (still under review).

Mingyu almost didn’t enter.

You found him three nights before the showcase, hunched over a half-finished automaton in the forge, eyes bloodshot, muttering about pressure plates and ignition sequences. "It’s stupid" he kept saying. "They’ll laugh." You sat on his workbench, stole his goggles, and refused to give them back until he agreed to finish the damn thing.

The automaton was a wolf. Not a cute direwolf plushie. A life-size, celestial-bronze-plated beast with articulated joints, glowing ruby eyes, and a spine that housed a pressurized Greek-fire reservoir. Mingyu had spent weeks perfecting the flamethrower mechanism (safe, controlled, and terrifyingly beautiful). He called it Lupus Ignis. You called it "the most Mingyu thing ever created."

Showcase day dawned bright and merciless. You wore the sundress he liked (the pale yellow one that made your legs look endless) and stood front row center, heart hammering louder than the drums Hephaestus cabin had rigged to announce their turn. When Mingyu walked out, he was in his least-sooty work clothes: dark jeans, a black T-shirt stretched across his shoulders, and the leather apron he only wore for special occasions. His hands shook as he set the wolf on the demonstration platform.

The crowd quieted. Chiron gave the nod. Mingyu’s voice cracked on the first sentence. "Lupus Ignis is… uh… a multi-terrain guardian. It can patrol borders, detect monsters by heat signature, and-' He swallowed. "And provide controlled fire support without risk of friendly casualties."

A ripple of murmurs. Someone whispered, "Forge rat’s gonna blow us all up."

You flipped them off without looking. Mingyu pressed a rune on the wolf’s flank. The automaton’s eyes flared crimson. Its head lowered, ears flattening. A low growl rumbled from its chest, mechanical, but so realistic three Apollo kids actually stepped back. Then it moved.

Fluid, silent, lethal. It prowled the edge of the stage, tail lashing. When it reached center, it reared up on hind legs, jaws opening to reveal a lattice of bronze nozzles. Mingyu snapped his fingers.

A perfect spiral of blue-white flame roared out: ten feet high, tightly controlled, shaped like a blooming rose. The crowd gasped. The fire twisted mid-air, forming a soaring dove before winking out without a single spark escaping the containment field. Silence. Then the amphitheater erupted. Cheers, whistles, actual screams of delight. Someone started chanting "Forge Boy! Forge Boy!" and for once, it wasn’t mockery.

Mingyu stood frozen, eyes wide, like he couldn’t compute the sound. His gaze found you in the front row. You were on your feet, clapping until your palms stung, tears streaming down your face because you’d never been prouder of anyone in your life.

When the noise finally died down, Chiron awarded Lupus Ignis the Golden Drachma for "Most Innovative Defense System." Mingyu accepted the medal with shaking hands, mumbled a thank-you that was barely audible, and practically sprinted offstage.

You found him twenty minutes later behind the amphitheater, packing the wolf into its protective crate with the kind of frantic energy that meant he was two seconds from bolting to Canada.

"You idiot" you said, launching yourself at him.

He caught you on reflex, arms banding around your waist as you wrapped legs and arms around him like a koala. "That was brilliant" you whispered fiercely into his neck. "You were brilliant."

He laughed, shaky, disbelieving. "Yeah? Not too awkward up there?"

"You made a fire wolf shoot a flaming dove, Mingyu. Awkward is not the word."

He set you down gently, but didn’t let go. His hands stayed on your hips, thumbs sweeping nervous arcs. "They clapped. They actually clapped."

"They did more than clap. Chiron’s talking about patenting it for the camp borders." You cupped his face, forcing him to meet your eyes. "You deserve every second of this."

His eyes searched yours, still stunned. "I kept thinking they’d laugh. Like the net. Like always."

"They didn’t." You rose on tiptoes and kissed him.

It was different from every kiss that came before. No urgency. No teeth-clashing desperation. Just soft, slow, deliberate, like you had all the time in the world. His lips trembled against yours; you steadied them with your own. When you pulled back, his lashes were wet.

"Hi" you whispered.

"Hi" he whispered back, voice wrecked.

You laced your fingers through his and tugged. "Come on. Your adoring public can wait." He followed you like a man in a dream.

Back in the forge, evening had settled into that perfect golden hour where the light slanted through the windows and turned every speck of dust into glitter. The space still smelled like scorched metal and victory. Lupus Ignis stood proudly on its display pedestal, medal dangling from one ear like a dog tag.

You locked the door. Turned the sign to CLOSED. Then you hopped onto the workbench, the same one that had seen so many frantic nights and patted the spot beside you.

Mingyu obeyed, movements careful, like he was afraid the moment would shatter. You sat side by side, legs dangling, shoulders touching. For a long time neither of you spoke. The quiet wasn’t empty; it was full of everything you hadn’t said yet.

He reached for your hand first. His fingers, callused, scarred, impossibly gentle, traced the lines of your palm like he was reading a map only he could see. He followed the curve of your lifeline, the swell of your thumb, the delicate ridge of each knuckle. When he reached the tiny burn scar on your wrist from the night you’d tried to help him quench a blade and learned why he always said "stand back", he pressed his lips to it.

You shivered.

"I used to think" he said quietly "that if I built something perfect, people would finally see me. Not the explosions or the grease or the kid who can’t look anyone in the eye. Just… me." His thumb swept over your pulse point. "Turns out I didn’t need perfect. I just needed you in the front row, crying because you were proud."

Your throat closed. "I will always be in the front row, Mingyu. Always."

He turned to face you fully, knees bumping. The golden light caught the sharp line of his cheekbones, the soot still smudged at his temple, the raw, open hope in his eyes.

"I practiced this" he admitted, cheeks flushing. "In the mirror. Like an idiot. About a hundred times." He laughed at himself, soft and self-deprecating. "None of them sounded right."

You waited. Heart in your throat.

He took both your hands in his, cradling them like something precious. "I think…" His voice cracked. He cleared his throat, tried again. "I think I love you."

The words hung in the air, fragile and perfect and terrifying.

You felt them land in your chest like sparks on dry tinder, instant, consuming, beautiful.

"About time you caught up" you whispered, tears spilling over.

His face crumpled: relief, joy, everything at once. He pulled you into his lap, arms wrapping around you so tightly you could feel his heartbeat thundering against your ribs. You buried your face in his neck, breathing him in: smoke and cedar and just Mingyu.

"I love you" he said again, stronger this time, like he’d been holding the words behind his teeth for months and finally set them free. "I love the way you steal my hoodies and leave strawberry lip-gloss on my tools. I love how you ask questions about tempering steel like it’s the most fascinating thing in the world. I love that you cried today because a fire wolf made a dove. I love every single piece of you, even the ones you think are broken."

You pulled back just enough to kiss him, slow, reverent, tasting salt and truth. When you broke apart, you rested your forehead against his.

"I see you, Mingyu" you whispered. "All of you. The boy who built a music box for a lonely hearth. The one who stayed up seventy-two hours so his friends wouldn’t get hurt. The one who’s holding me right now like I’m the thing worth protecting." You brushed your thumb over his lower lip. "I love every single piece of you, too."

He made a sound, half-laugh, half-sob and kissed you again, deeper this time, like he was trying to pour three months of almosts and maybe-laters into one perfect moment. You melted into it, hands sliding up his chest to tangle in his hair.

When you finally parted, the sun had dipped below the horizon, leaving only the forge’s glow to light the two of you. You stayed on the workbench, legs tangled, trading kisses that tasted like forever.

Outside, the camp celebrated late into the night: bonfires, music, Lupus Ignis demonstrations that drew cheers every time the flames shaped a new wonder. Inside Cabin 9's forge, two demigods discovered that sometimes the greatest invention isn’t a weapon or a guardian or a fire that roars.

Sometimes it’s the quiet, steady burn of choosing someone, every day, every flaw, every triumph and being chosen back.

Mingyu tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, eyes soft. "So… girlfriend?"

You grinned, bright enough to rival the forge. "Boyfriend."

Outside Cabin 9, the world was silvered with ice, the forge’s chimney puffing lazy spirals into a sky so clear the stars looked close enough to snag on the roof. Inside, the heat was a living thing: banked coals glowing like a dragon’s heart, oil lamps flickering gold across scarred workbenches, the air thick with cedar shavings and the faint sweetness of the honey candles you’d stolen from the Big House.

You’d been official for four months, three weeks, and two days. Mingyu still counted.

He was at the anvil when you slipped in, hammering a final curve into a steel cuff, your winter-solstice gift, though he thought you didn’t know. Shirtless despite the cold, because the forge never let him feel it. Sweat traced the deep lines of his back, caught the lamplight, turned every muscle into molten sculpture. His curls were tied up with a strip of leather; loose strands stuck to the sweat at his temples.

You locked the door. Turned the sign to CLOSED. Leaned back against the wood and just watched.

He sensed you the way he always did, like a tuning fork struck in his chest. The hammer slowed, then stilled.

"Hey, stranger" you said, voice low enough to curl around his spine.

Mingyu set the hammer down carefully, wiped his hands on a rag that had long since given up being clean, and turned. The look he gave you: half-shy, half-hungry, still made your knees weak after all this time.

"Hey, beautiful." His eyes flicked to the clock above the door. "It’s past midnight. You’ll freeze walking back."

You pushed off the door, letting your coat slide from your shoulders to pool on the floor. Underneath: one of his old black tank tops, hem hacked short so it barely skimmed your ribs, and a pair of his boxer briefs you’d stolen weeks ago. Nothing else.

"I’m not going back tonight" you said.

His breath hitched. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." You crossed the room slowly, bare feet silent on the packed dirt, until you stood between him and the anvil. The heat rolling off his skin kissed yours. You reached up, untied the leather cord, let his curls spill loose. Ran your fingers through them, nails scraping gently at his scalp the way you knew unraveled him.

Mingyu’s hands found your waist on instinct, thumbs slipping under the ragged hem to stroke bare skin. "Missed you today" he murmured. "You were at archery all afternoon."

"You watched the last hour from the ridge" you teased. "I felt you."

He flushed (adorable, always). "Couldn’t help it. You look lethal with a bow."

You rose on tiptoes, brushed your lips over his, once, twice, soft as moth wings. "Take me to bed, Mingyu."

His bed was in the back corner: a narrow cot he’d widened with scrap oak and reinforced with bronze brackets, piled with quilts your siblings had charmed to stay warm. He’d added fairy lights after you mentioned liking them: tiny glass orbs that glowed soft gold, strung along the rafters like captured stars.

He lifted you easily, hands under your thighs, and carried you there. Laid you down like you were something sacred. You pulled him with you, unwilling to lose the heat of him for even a second.

The first kiss was still slow, learning, worshiping. You tasted the corner of his mouth, the faint salt of sweat at his jaw, the tiny scar on his lower lip he’d gotten from a misfired gear. He sighed into you, a sound of pure relief, like coming home.

Clothes peeled away in degrees. He tugged the tank over your head, breath catching when he saw you wore nothing beneath. You traced the waistband of his jeans, popped the button, eased the zipper down with deliberate care. He toed off boots, shoved denim and boxers down together, stepped free. The lamplight painted every inch of him gold and shadow: broad shoulders, tapered waist, the heavy curve of him already hard and leaking at the tip.

You reached for him; he caught your wrists, kissed the inside of each palm, laid them gently above your head.

"Tonight’s mine" he said, voice rough velvet. "Let me take care of you."

You nodded, throat tight. He started at your throat: open-mouthed kisses, the gentle scrape of teeth, tongue soothing every mark. Worked his way down, slow enough that anticipation coiled low in your belly. When he reached your breasts, he paused, eyes flicking up to check. You arched into him, and he smiled, small, reverent, before taking one nipple into the wet heat of his mouth.

You moaned, loud enough that the sound echoed off the rafters. He hummed approval, switched to the other, rolling the first peak gently between calloused fingers until you were writhing.

Lower.

He mapped your ribs with his lips, traced the curve of your waist, dipped his tongue into your navel just to hear you gasp. When he settled between your thighs, he didn’t dive in, he worshipped. Kissed the soft skin of your inner thigh, nipped gently, soothed with his tongue. By the time he finally licked a slow stripe up your center, you were trembling, fingers twisted in the quilt.

"Mingyu..."

"I’ve got you" he whispered against your clit, and then he devoured.

Slow, then faster, then slow again. Long, flat licks followed by tight circles that made your hips chase his mouth. He slid two thick fingers inside you, curled them just right, crooking in time with the flick of his tongue until your thighs clamped around his head and you came with a broken cry, back bowing off the cot.

He didn’t stop. Kept licking gently through the aftershocks until you were boneless, tugging weakly at his hair.

"Need you inside me" you panted. "Now."

He rose up over you, forearms braced beside your head, eyes searching yours. "Tell me again."

"I love you" you said, clear and steady. "I want you. All of you."

He groaned like the words undid him, lined up, and pushed in with one slow, relentless glide.

The stretch was perfect: full, overwhelming, home. You wrapped legs around his waist, heels digging into the small of his back to urge him deeper. He bottomed out, held still, buried his face in your neck.

"Gods, you feel-" His voice cracked. "Like you were made for me."

You clenched deliberately; he shuddered, hips jerking. Then he moved. Not the frantic, desperate rhythm of earlier months. This was deliberate, long, deep strokes that dragged over every sensitive spot inside you, withdrawal almost to the tip before sinking back in until you felt him in your throat. His hand slid between you, thumb circling your clit in lazy figure-eights that matched the roll of his hips.

You met him thrust for thrust, nails raking down his back, leaving fresh marks over old ones. The cot creaked beneath you; the fairy lights flickered with every shared gasp.

"Look at me" he whispered.

You did. His eyes were dark, pupils blown wide, but the love in them was brighter than any forge. You cupped hiss face, thumb sweeping over the sweat at his temple.

"I’m yours" you said. "Always."

He kissed you through the next thrust, swallowing your moan. The pace quickened , still controlled, still reverent, but urgent now. You felt the second orgasm building, slower this time, deeper, a wave instead of a crash.

"Come with me" he rasped against your lips.

You shattered first,clenching around him, crying out his name into his mouth. He followed moments later, hips stuttering, spilling hot inside you with a groan that sounded like your name and prayer combined. He kept moving through it, drawing out every aftershock until you were both trembling, oversensitive, clinging.

When he finally stilled, he didn’t pull out. Just shifted to the side, keeping you tucked against his chest, still joined, legs tangled. You felt him soften slowly inside you, the warmth of him leaking out, marking the sheets and your thighs and every inch of skin that touched.

His hand found yours, laced your fingers, brought them to his lips. He kissed each knuckle, then the tiny burn scar on your wrist again.

"I still can’t believe you’re real" he murmured into your skin.

You smiled against his collarbone. "I’m here. Not going anywhere."

Outside, snow started to fall: fat, lazy flakes drifting past the window, melting the moment they touched the forge’s warmth. Inside, the fire settled into a steady glow, and two demigods stayed wrapped around each other until the lamps burned low.

Later (much later), he carried you to the wide leather couch, laid you down, cleaned you both with a warm cloth and steady hands. You fell asleep to the sound of him humming under his breath, some half-remembered lullaby from a childhood spent in workshops, his fingers tracing infinite patterns on your back.

Just before dawn, you stirred. He was already awake, watching you with that soft, stunned expression he wore whenever he thought you weren’t looking.

"What?" you mumbled, voice sleep-rough.

"Just memorizing" he whispered. "In case I wake up and this was all a dream."

You reached up, tugged him down until his head rested over your heart. "Not a dream, Forge Boy. Real. And staying."

He pressed a kiss between your breasts, right above where your heart beat for him.

"Good" he said, voice thick. "Because I’m never letting go."

Outside, the first light of winter painted the forge rose-gold. Inside, you slept tangled together, sweat-cooled skin, shared breath, the quiet certainty that some fires don’t need taming. They just need someone brave enough to hold them close and never let the cold win.

The taglist for the next parts is still open!

Taglist: @choit-cherry @cheolcolatechip @ateez-atiny380 @reiofsuns2001 @wooahoe @bumblebreex @ms-indifferwnt @doorsandfloors @itsdevinjones @curlie-frys @ladeldiminutivo @scoupsonlycherry @atashiboba @peachytokki @amisuh @atashiboba @itsmooniebaby @asyre @imhereonlytoreadxoxo @blaycke @deluluzy @xuaiyinsworld @codeinebelle @fairwanda @luumiinaa @mxnhoeuwu

[skzhotpot]

Sweat slid down the groove of his spine and soaked the waistband of his cargo pants.

Heheh this did something for me 🥵

But by the end I was totally smitten, I feel like every time I read a fic from this series I decide that couple is my new favorite but I truly haven’t read one that hasn’t resonated with me yet. Catch me finding the next one real quick 😛

💜 more → Kim Mingyu · SEVENTEEN · Fic Rec Library 💜

[smileysuh]

cinnamon girl

🌙 starring. Choi Seungcheol x afab!Reader 

🔮 preview. When you’ve thought about your first time with Seungcheol, you always assumed he’d be the one taking care of you, but now you realize, although you’re the anxious one, your anxiety makes him extra nervous about doing something wrong. In this situation, you need to make the first move; you need to show him you want this, and as you adjust to sit up onto your knees, he grabs the bedsheets, a betrayal of how wound up he is over the fact that you’re finally ready for the next step. 

tw/cw. Protected sex, foreplay, body worship, breast worship, big dick seungcheol, pussy eating, fingering, multiple reader orgasms, dirty talk, praise, hair pulling, sex while there’s a storm outside, mentions of past celibacy and wintertime sadness, mentions of a big fire and workplace exhaustion, lowkey soft first-time missionary sex, multiple sex positions, etc… I pet names: (hers) princess.

👹 rating.18+ explicit I wc. 7.9k 

🍭 aus. Non idol au, fireman! Cheol, librarian! reader, a fireman saves a kitten from a tree and now you have a cute cat and an equally cute fireman, sad girl! reader, etc…

☀️ mlist + an. I used “Cinnamon Girl” by Lana Del Rey as inspiration and adapted some of the lyrics to form a plot for this fic.“Cinnamon in my teeth from your kiss, you're touching me. All the pills that you take: violet, blue, green, red, to keep me at arm's length, don't work. You try to push me out, but I just find my way back in. Violet, blue, green, red, to keep me out. I win. There's things I wanna say to you, but I'll just let you live. Like if you hold me without hurting me, you'll be the first who ever did.”  I’m on new antidepressants because my doctor says I have severe depression, and I’ve been in my feels. Writing is an outlet, so I wanted to do something that felt applicable to some of the things I’m dealing with, while still being artistic and interesting.  

One:

You’re walking a little faster than usual as you head home after finishing your shift at the library. Heart pounding, eyes scanning the trees as you get closer to the firehall- it’s your ears that pick up the small mewing sounds before you even see the kitten, who is still in the tree she was in when you were coming back from your lunch break four hours ago.

You stop by the trunk of the Callery Pear, whose autumnal purple leaves half obscure the black kitten as she struggles on a high branch.

Then, you look around, and your eyes land on the fire station. With a deep sigh, you cross the street toward the old brick building, wrapping your arms around yourself as anxiety floods through you.

You’re not the type to make a fuss about anything, not the type to bug others or ask for help, so when your eyes land on the broad shoulders of a man who appears to be doing pre-shift tasks with his back to you, it feels like the cat has your tongue. 

Another deep breath and a shake of your own head to remind yourself that you can do this.

“Excuse me!” you call, not wanting to step into the station but instead stopping on the threshold of the large bay doors. 

The man turns to look at you, and you swallow thickly at the sight of strong, regal features, of dark curly hair.

“Can I help you?” he asks, setting down whatever he was working on so he can turn his full attention toward you.

“Yes, um, I think so. There’s a cat,” you explain, pointing back toward the tree, “it’s been stuck in that Callery Pear for at least four hours. I saw it on my walk back to work after my lunch break, and now it’s still there. It’s just a small kitten-”

“Say no more,” the man assures you, slightly jogging toward the wall, where there’s a folded A-frame ladder. “Which tree?”

You hurry to show him where the kitten is, and as he sets up the ladder, he explains, “I just started my shift, I had no clue there was a cat up here, and our air vac system is pretty old and can be pretty loud, so I didn’t hear any meowing.”

“It’s alright,” you assure him, watching as the man begins to climb the ladder.

His red fireman shirt is tight on his shoulders, and you watch the way his muscles ripple under the fabric as he climbs.

You swallow the lump in your throat, heart racing as he sweet-talks the kitten, who allows him to pick her up and cradle her against his broad chest. 

He slowly comes down to the pavement, checking the kitten as she purrs and cuddles closer to him.

“No collar, no ear tag, no nothing,” the fireman tells you. “Probably a street cat, we’ve got a lot of those kicking around. The fire department leaves dog and cat food out for strays, but I’ve never seen this cat before.”

“Have you heard of the cat distribution system?” you ask. 

He laughs, looking up at you, handsome face alight with amusement. “Yeah, I’ve heard of the cat distribution system.”

“Well, maybe this is finally my chance.” You release a shaky breath. “I can take her to the vet, sort this whole thing out.”

“Works for me,” the firefighter nods, gently handing the kitten over to you. 

“Thanks for helping me,”

The beautiful man smiles, turning to close up the A-frame ladder so he can get back to work. “Don’t mention it.”

Two:

You’re on the same route you always take home when the firefighter you saw a week ago waves you down from the station.

“Hey!” he calls, jogging to catch you despite his long, baggy, yellow bunker gear pants.

“Hello,” you nod, stopping to address him.

“I uh, I realized last week I never got your name,” the handsome man explains, coming to a stop in front of you.

“Y/N.”

“I’m Seungcheol. It’s nice to meet you,” he smiles, holding out a hand.

You swallow thickly, adjusting your book bag so you can gently press your palm to his. He’s soft with the handshake, and you’re quick to retract, downcasting your eyes instead of looking at this handsome, broad firefighter. 

“So how’s the kitten doing?” he asks.

“Oh, she’s good. You were right about there being no microchip, so I officially adopted her. She’s named Brontë.”

“Brontë… that’s ringing a bell.”

“It’s a literary name, in reference to the Brontë sisters,” you explain.

“Oh.”

“I work at the library,” you tell him, skin heating with embarrassment. “I’m a bit of an English nerd.”

“That’s cool though,” Seungcheol assures you. “Listen, my shift starts in a moment, so I have to run, but I’m on schedule for nights for a couple more days, and then, I’d love to drop off some cat food or something if you’re okay with it. I feel bad that no other firefighters realized there was a cat in the tree, even though saving cats from trees is the most stereotypical non-fire-related job that firemen do.”

You find yourself giggling, and you can’t help but peek at the way Seungcheol’s face lights up as he smiles at you. 

Then you correct yourself, looking down again. 

You’re not in the market for a relationship. It’s the Fall, and soon it will be Winter, and this is your sad girl era. Now is not the time for cuffing season; now is the time for reading books and watching movies with your new cat in the warmth of your tiny apartment while the world rages and dies outside your window. 

But… if it’s just some cat food he wants to drop off, that could be acceptable.

“I’ll give you my number,” you tell him, “I’m sure Brontë would love to see you.” 

Three: 

Seungcheol pauses at your door, adjusting his grip on the bag of cat food as he raises his knuckles to tap on the wood.

“One moment!” you call out, and he steps back to give you space as you appear on the threshold.

You’re wrapped in a cream coloured cardigan, and you look completely relaxed, as if you’d just put down a book. Seungcheol has always liked smart girls; cute nerds are definitely his type, and he finds himself kind of tongue-tied as he looks at you.

“I uh, I brought the cat food,” he chokes out, lifting the bag.

“Would you like to come in for a moment? I was just drinking some Chai tea and reading with Brontë.” You step to the side, and Seungcheol realizes that in your own home, you’re much more relaxed than the previous two times he’s seen you.

He steps into your apartment, and the sweet spicy scent of cinnamon perfumes the air around him. It must be from your tea, but he wouldn’t be surprised if the candles that litter the space are also to blame for the pleasing aroma. 

There’s a small thump as the tiny black kitten jumps from the couch and stretches, yawning deeply before padding over to Seungcheol.

He can’t help himself; he puts down the cat food and picks up the kitten. She starts purring like a train engine, immediately cuddling up to his neck and trying to get into his hoodie, which she succeeds at despite his laughter and protest. 

“Brontë likes you a lot,” you muse, drawing his attention as you shift to the kitchen. “Would you like to have some tea? It’s getting stormy outside.”

“That would be great,” Seungcheol tells you, highly aware that his plan was not to invade your space and annoy you, but you’re the one making the offers, so who would he be to turn them down?

Soon, the two of you are sitting in your small living room area, and your gaze shifts to the window as you sip on your tea.

“I like Autumn,” you muse.

“The rain and bad weather?” Seungcheol asks with a laugh.

“Yes, an excuse to stay inside and not talk to anyone.”

“I guess that’s one way to look at it,” Seungcheol nods. He plays with his teacup, bringing it to his lips. The taste of honey and cinnamon washes over his tongue, and he closes his eyes for a second to enjoy it before setting his tea down again. “If I’m being honest, I don’t really like the Fall, or the Winter for that matter. Seasonal depression is a bit of a hereditary thing in my family.”

“Seasonal Affective Disorder,” you nod, and it’s immediately clear that you’re also aware of the simply acronymed ‘Sad’ that so many people face. “I deal with that too.”

There’s a stagnant pause, but the room is not silent; instead, the pattering of rain on the cement outside becomes even louder, and your gaze shifts once more to the window. 

“What got you into firefighting?” you ask.

“I always wanted to help people,” Seungcheol responds immediately, releasing a breath as the tensions shift in the room. He cuddles Brontë closer under his hoodie, and she purrs like a little engine. “Police men get a bad reputation at times, but firefighters are always the good guys. There’s no question that they’re there to save you, no question that we have the best intentions.”

“I can understand that.”

“And you?” he asks. “What made you want to be a librarian?”

“I just love books. I like peace. I don’t love people.” You let out a laugh, turning to look at him. “As an antisocial bookworm, the library felt like the place to be.” 

“Makes sense,” Seungcheol smiles, admiring you.

You’re one of those dark, mysterious, moody, smart girls. 

Just his type.

But you’re working on things, so it's clear that now is not the season to try to engage with you.

In many ways, the two of you are opposites.

Seungcheol is loud and social compared to your quiet aversion to talking. He’s an athlete; you’re clearly a girl who had her nose buried in a book during high school.

But regardless of these base-level differences, it’s also clear you’re kindred as people who know and have felt sadness. 

You’re extremely alluring to him, but Seungcheol has never wanted to be the guy who disregards the social cues that a woman is not interested… only, you’re giving mixed signals, so he’s not quite sure what to make of you.

Instead of trying to figure all of this out, he simply sits with you, turning his attention to the storm brewing outside as he pets the tiny cat now cuddled in his hoodie. 

This is a slice of life he could get used to, but if it is a fleeting moment, he’ll be sure to enjoy it as it comes.

Four:

“I’m really sorry about this,” you apologize when you invite Seungcheol into your home for the second time in one week. “The sink was leaking, and I just didn’t know who else to call.”

“You called the right person,” he assures you, slipping past you with his toolbag in hand.

You guide Seungcheol to the kitchen, showing him the leak under the sink, and he’s quick to get down onto his knees to start working.

Sipping your tea, you try not to be too obvious about the way you’re watching him, but his biceps are just so beautiful as he begins to use a wrench to tighten bolts.

Brontë is quick to jump onto his chest, and he jolts in surprise, only to laugh, reaching down to pet the black kitten. “Hi, Honey,” he greets the cat, and your heart flips in your chest at how soft this big, burly man is.

God, he really is so handsome…

Truly a Prince Charming, like the softer heroes you read about in your books.

Sure, he’s not a Mr. Rochester or a Heathcliff, but you’re entirely fine with that. Gothic love interests are always a touch too dangerous for you anyway.

“So a few bolts weren’t tight enough,” Seungcheol explains. “Try the water again.”

“With you under it?” you ask in shock.

“I’m pretty confident I’ve fixed the problem, might as well put my money where my mouth is,” he laughs.

With a shake of your head, you hesitantly turn on the water.

“Good as new,” Seungcheol concludes after a moment, adjusting himself out from under your sink. He sits up, cuddling Brontë close to his chest. “Any other broken or wonky things I can fix for you?”

You can’t help but laugh. “Not off the top of my head.”

“Oh.” He looks around. “Any art I can help you put up?”

“Not really,” you grin.

“Okay, well… I’ll get out of your hair then.”

Part of you wants him to stay, but you’re too shy to say it out loud, so you watch him stand up, collect his tools, and hand Brontë back to you. As you walk him to the door, he stops.

“I don’t want to overstep or anything,” he tells you, and you notice a pink tint in his cheeks, betraying he might be just as flustered as you are. “But uh… I was thinking maybe I could take you out for a coffee date or something sometime? I mean, we could do dinner, but you seem like a coffee date kind of girl to me.” 

Your heart leaps into your throat, and you do your best to swallow it. There’s a war inside of you, with part of you wanting to stay in your little single bubble, and another part of you wanting to take a leap of faith with this beautiful man.

“No pressure or anything,” Seungcheol says, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.

“Sorry, no, I, uh… I just, I haven’t been on a date in a while,” you try to explain.

“Me neither,” he admits. “Maybe, if it’s less pressure, we can just say let's go out for coffee and leave the ‘date’ word out of it.”

“I think that would be nice,” you smile.

He returns your grin. “Perfect, it’s a coffee then,” he muses, adding a twist to the age-old saying ‘it’s a date.’ 

He can be kind of dorky, too, which isn’t something you expected from this beefy fireman, and your heart melts as you watch him go. 

Five:

The coffee date that’s not a date, except that it is, is going better than you had imagined. Seungcheol is charismatic, honest, and intelligent, all things that you enjoy in a man. He makes you laugh, and you find yourself becoming more and more comfortable with him.

There’s still something in the back of your mind that tells you that maybe you should hold yourself back, that you’ve been burned before, that you’re still working on yourself, and don’t want to enter a relationship while you’re not fully healed.

But there’s the other side of you that acknowledges you’re not perfect, and despite that imperfection, you deserve happiness. You deserve to be laughing with a handsome man over coffee as it rains outside. You deserve to find some joy even as the seasons shift from bad to worse.

It’s clear neither of you wants the date to end, and you spend three hours in this coffee shop until the rain slows a bit, and then, with a sigh, Seungcheol offers to walk you home.

You both have umbrellas, and there’s a space between you as you meander down a couple of city blocks until you arrive at your apartment.

“That was a good coffee,” Seungcheol muses, once again using the word ‘coffee’ as a substitute for the word ‘date,’ and you can’t help but smile.

“It was.”

“You don’t have to answer right now, but I’d love to do this again sometime.”

“I think I would too,” you say, honesty getting the better of you.

Seungcheol’s smile widens, and the two of you stare at each other for a moment, then he leans forward and kisses your cheek. “Say hi to Brontë for me.”

Your skin practically burns from where his lips had brushed you, and your heart thunders in your chest. You trip over your words, whole body tingling. “Yes, I uh, I will.”

“See you soon,” Seungcheol promises, reaching down to gently squeeze your hand. With one final smile, he turns and leaves, and you stand in shock for a moment in front of your building, heart racing, whole body alight with a fire that contrasts with the cool fall air.

You feel giddy and excited, which are not feelings you’ve experienced for quite some time, and your hands are shaky as you push your key into the door to enter the building. You feel like you’re buzzing as you get back to your home, and you let out a deep breath as you reach your apartment.

Brontë lets out a soft mewl, stretching by the window before she jumps down to approach you.

You pick up your little blessing, kissing her soft head as he purrs with pleasure to have you home again. She’s already saved you in more ways than you can count.

Six:

Your second date is spur of the moment, as you’re sitting down to watch a movie, you decide to text Seungcheol, and upon a short back and forth, you invite him over to watch with you.

He’s as respectful as ever, waiting an entire movie before he asks if you want to cuddle, and he allows you to dictate how close you get as you adjust next to him, gently grabbing his arm and leaning against his shoulder.

You relax during this date, and when it comes to a close, standing on the threshold of your apartment, he asks if he can kiss you for the first time.

Your heart leaps at the question, and you nod, hardly able to contain a smile as he gently pulls you closer by your hips. One hand cups your cheek, and he moves in slowly, giving you ample time to change your mind before he presses his lips to yours.

It’s as if a ton of pressure is released from your body, your muscles relaxing as you melt into the kiss, pressing your palms gently to his broad chest as you lean closer.

Seungcheol adjusts, wrapping you in his arms, and you have to fight back a moan, your skin tingling with need.

Then, he pulls away, and you notice he’s breathing heavily, as if holding himself back from you is taking a lot of effort.

“We should do this again sometime,” Seungcheol muses with a half-chuckle.

You compose yourself too, managing a smile. “I would like that.” 

Seven:

It’s been a month of movie dates and cuddling without taking the next step, and Seungcheol hasn’t brought it up at all. He seems perfectly content to spend time with you, to cuddle, and kiss… There have been heated moments for sure, but the two of you have always cooled down. If Seungcheol is good at anything, it seems he’s good at putting out fires, even metaphorical ones.

He has an inherent understanding that you need to take things slow, and his respectful nature draws you closer to him every day. You’re becoming used to being in his arms, used to the feeling of safety he has gradually brought you.

It’s a new experience, as all the guys you’ve dated in the past have ended up hurting you… badly.

But… you’re starting to realize, maybe not Seungcheol.

The most difficult thing about this budding relationship - which isn’t even Seungcheol’s fault - is that as a firefighter, he’s in a high-stress environment and can’t always be on his phone to message you back.

Sometimes you go a few hours without hearing from him, and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to endure that. It’s not that you’re worried he’s off with some other girl; he’s clearly not the type to be like that, but you worry about his safety.

Even with all of the safety rules in action for firefighters, accidents still happen, and you’d be devastated if anything happened to Seungcheol.

Tonight, you haven’t heard from him for about four hours, and you’re starting to worry. Even your books can’t distract you, and you keep checking your phone, but to no avail.

When there’s a knock at your door, your heart leaps into your throat, and your body freezes for a moment before you will yourself to stand up and see who is in the hallway. 

A breath escapes you when you find Seungcheol standing there, but he looks worn out, and you immediately reach for him.

“Cheol?” you ask.

He doesn’t say anything, just wraps you in his arms, squeezing you desperately.

You melt into the hug, rubbing his back, and although there’s something clearly wrong, you’re just happy he’s here, happy he appears to be okay.

After a minute, Seungcheol pulls away, and you invite him into your apartment, where the two of you sit on the couch. You sneak closer to him, resting your hand on his thigh, giving him space to tell you what’s gotten him worked up.

“I uh…” Seungcheol swallows thickly. “There was this big fire, some low-level drug dealers made a kitchen in their apartment, and something went wrong. The whole building lit up. I just spent the last half of my shift there, and it was a lot.”

You nod, squeezing his thigh to show him you care while not wanting to interrupt his train of thought.

You can smell the smoke on him, although it’s clear he’s had a shower, his hair wet, yet still carrying the scent of fire.

“I don’t want to stress you out with the details, but I just…” Seungcheol lets out a deep sigh. “I think we both clearly have roadblocks. I can’t speak for you, but I know on my side, I have a dangerous job. Being a firefighter is rewarding for me, but I think I’ve held back a bit with you because I don’t want to put you in a situation to be hurt if something happens to me. And I think you have a past where you’ve been hurt before. I just… today made me realize, although we both are holding back for our own reasons, if something bad had happened to me today, I didn’t want you to be left wondering how I feel about you.”

Your breath catches as Seungcheol turns to look at you, and he places his hand over your own.

“I’m crazy about you,” he admits. “I knew there was something different about you from the moment we met, and getting closer to you this month has been the most rewarding thing outside of being a firefighter that I’ve ever experienced. I want to give you time, and I don’t want to pressure you, but if you’d consider being my girlfriend… I just… I’d love to take that next step with you.”

You feel tongue-tied as you look at him, and he’s as respectful now of giving you the floor to speak as you had been when he’d first sat down, so you collect your thoughts.

“I mean… It’s no secret that I struggle with depression. I’ve been hurt before, and it makes me scared of relationships. But… being with you this past month has been so different from anything I’ve experienced before.” Your voice cracks, and you swallow to control yourself, looking down at where your hands are connected. “I would love to be your girlfriend, it’s just scary sometimes to put yourself in a position to get hurt.”

“I know all about that,” Seungcheol admits, cracking a smile. “But the most rewarding things can come from putting yourself out there.”

“I guess we’re just built different,” you laugh. “You, the firefighter, me, the librarian.”

“I like that you’re a librarian,” he assures you, cupping your cheek while you lean against his palm. “You’re smart, and funny, and I always come away from my time with you having learned something new.”

“Yeah?”

“For example, the first time we talked, you pointed to a tree and called it a Callery Pear. That tree is one of the most common trees in the city, but I never bothered to learn its name. You taught me that. Now every time I’m on the streets, and I see one, it reminds me of you.” Seungcheol smiles. “You’re smart, and it’s one of the many things I love about you.”

Some past boyfriends have been intimidated by your brains. They’ve made your intelligence and memory something to be put down, but not Seungcheol, and your heart warms at his words.

“You’ve had a long night,” you tell him. “You must be tired.”

“I am pretty exhausted,” he concedes.

“Why don’t you stay here?” you suggest, feeling confident.

“Really?”

Even in a month of slow dating, Seungcheol hasn’t stayed at your home for a night, but if there were ever a time to rip the band-aid off, it would be now. You get the sense he needs the comfort, and you want to comfort him more than you’ve wanted to do anything in a long time.

“Come,” you prompt him, standing up. “I’ll get you a guest toothbrush, and we can get you settled.”

Twenty minutes later, you’re both set for bed. Seungcheol is lying flat while you curl next to him, and Brontë is on his chest, enjoying the attention from both of you.

This feels so natural, and you know it’s helping Seungcheol calm down after his stressful day at work.

Soon, you hear him softly snoring, and your entire body relaxes, knowing that you’ve helped this man find some peace.

Falling asleep next to a new man has always been something of a difficulty for you, but before you know what’s happening, you’re drifting into an unbothered dreamland. 

Eight:

You wake up slowly, pressing against something warm. It takes you a moment to realize it’s Seungcheol, and he pulls you closer with a groan, still asleep.

A smile appears on your lips, and you release a deep breath, feeling your entire body relax.

That had been one of the best sleeps you’ve had in a very long time. 

You open your eyes and notice some light coming through the blinds. It’s a grey day outside, and you can hear rain now, softly pattering against the window pane. 

Brontë notices you’re awake and lets out a small chirp. She sits up and stretches, mewing at you.

After a moment of enjoying the situation, you carefully get out of bed, the little kitten running around your ankles as you go to the kitchen to get her some breakfast.

While she’s preoccupied, you go back to the bedroom, gently closing the door behind you.

Seungcheol is a vision even while he’s asleep, and you simply look at him for a few seconds, admiring him.

You pop into the bathroom, brushing your teeth and freshening up before going back to bed.

Returning under the warm covers, you cuddle up close to his chest, and Seungcheol stirs, letting out a soft groan as he takes you in his arms.

Everything about this feels so natural, and Seungcheol slowly wakes up, smiling as he cuddles closer, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head.

“Good morning,” he groans, and the deepness of his voice makes your skin tingle.

“Hi.” 

“Been awake long?” he asks.

“Not really. How did you sleep?” 

“Really good,” Seungcheol chuckles. “You?” 

“Best sleep I’ve had in ages.”

“That’s nice,” he muses, pressing another kiss to your forehead.

The two of you cuddle, enjoying a soft, lazy Sunday morning, and then Seungcheol asks if he can have a quick shower. The smell of smoke is still clinging to his skin, and while it’s not necessarily a bad smell, you know a rinse off will make him feel better.

You wait patiently while he’s in the bathroom, and a short time later, he returns.

You put your book down, admiring the fact that he’s shirtless now, using a damp towel to scrunch through his dark curls while his sweatpants hang low on his hips.

You’ve never seen him like this, and while you’ve always known Seungcheol is beefy under his hoodies, finally seeing his uncovered form with your own eyes takes your breath away.

He’s an absolute vision, a true physical masterpiece, but you suppose you shouldn’t be shocked, as he’s a firefighter and being physically fit is part of his job. 

“Do you have plans for the day?” you ask, putting your book on the nightstand.

“Was thinking maybe I could stay here with you for a bit, if that’s okay. I could also take you out for breakfast since we both have the day off. Whatever works.”

“That all sounds nice,” you muse, stretching and forcing your eyes away from his chisled body.

Seungcheol comes and joins you on the bed, gently grabbing the blankets to adjust them to cover your legs. “Are you cold?” he asks.

“A little,” you admit. 

“Here.” Seungcheol gets under the covers with you, and you curl against his side, enjoying the warmth he provides. His hand gently strokes your arm, and you release a deep sigh.

“Where’s Brontë?” Seungchol asks.

“Eating breakfast.”

“The bedroom door is closed,” he muses.

“Yeah.” Your skin heats. “I thought maybe we could have some alone time.”

“Really?” Seungcheol laughs, tugging you closer to his body. 

“Last night I realized how safe I feel with you,” you admit quietly. “I think… I’m ready for another next step, if you are.”

“Another next step,” Seungcheol echoes, and it takes a moment for it to click for him. “Oh.”

You laugh shyly, tucking your face down against his chest to hide your embarrassment. “Or not.”

“No, sorry, I just, I didn’t expect-” Seungcheol’s chest is blooming pink now. “I don’t want you to feel pressured that just because I asked you to be my girlfriend and you let me stay over last night, now you have to… put out, or whatever.”

“I don’t feel pressure,” you assure him, trailing your finger along his bare skin.

Seungcheol looks down at where you’re tracing his bicep, and he lets out a deep breath, shifting slightly. You avert your gaze, and that’s when you notice that he’s started to stiffen in his sweatpants.

Tingles erupt through you, and you move your hand down his body slowly until you reach his waistband. Then you look up at him again. “I want this,” you confirm. “Do you want me?”

He swallows thickly and nods, and you realize he’s holding his breath, waiting to see what you do next.

When you’ve thought about your first time with Seungcheol, you always assumed he’d be the one taking care of you, but now you realize, although you’re the anxious one, your anxiety makes him extra nervous about doing something wrong. In this situation, you need to make the first move; you need to show him you want this, and as you adjust to sit up onto your knees, he grabs the bedsheets, a betrayal of how wound up he is over the fact that you’re finally ready for the next step. 

Part of you wants to just go for it, to pull his pants down, but it would be a shame for your first time to lack more foreplay, so instead, you mount him.

Seungcheol’s hands find your hips to steady you, and you press your palms against his broad chest, leaning down so your lips can meet.

He kisses you back desperately, and you love how he’s already coming undone.

Seungcheol cups the back of your head, and the kiss deepens as you begin to grind down slightly against him, earning a groan that sets your whole body on fire.

You can feel his cock pressing up against his sweatpants as you tease him, gently rocking your hips for stimulation while you remain in a heated battle of lips and tongues.

Part of you wants to continue, to move down toward where he needs you most, but kissing him just feels so good. Your entire body is buzzing with pleasure, and the anticipation of the ecstasy to come.

He’s stiff as a rock now, and even with clothing acting as a barrier, the feeling of a hard cock rubbing against your clit has you whimpering already.

Seungcheol finally breaks the kiss, panting hard, and you lock eyes as you both try to collect yourselves. 

You reach a hand between your bodies, rubbing him through his sweatpants, which makes him groan again, his eyes closing. His hips rock slightly, pushing up toward your palm.

Then, quite suddenly, Seungcheol flips you onto your back, his lips finding your throat as you let out a giggle of surprise.

So maybe you won’t have to be the one taking control of this situation; maybe Seungcheol just needed a bit of a push. 

He grinds down against your core at the same time his mouth finds your sweet spot, and you let out a moan, tangling your fingers through his hair.

One of his hands reaches up to cup your breast, his thumb teasing your nipple through your shirt. Your buds are hard and ready to be attended to, and when Seungcheol realizes this, his mouth descends from your neck.

You take the opportunity to try to get a breath while you lift your shirt, and he gives you enough space to take it off completely, now leaving your torso bare for him.

“You’re so pretty,” he groans, his hair tickling your skin as he leans down to lick one of your nipples, his hand massaging the other breast.

You can only mewl in response, your entire body lighting up with pleasure as he begins to suck on your sensitive bud. 

As he works you up, you continue to tangle your fingers in his soft hair, using him as an anchor of sorts as you give yourself to him.

Your core is practically throbbing now, and you can feel your panties getting wetter by the second, your body anticipating something you haven’t had in months. 

While you’ve chosen to be celibate and distance yourself from men, you still have needs, needs that have never been quite fulfilled while flying solo. You’re shocked at how sensitive your body is, how you react when he flicks his tongue against your nipple and makes you gasp, writhing against the bed as insatiable need overtakes you.

You’re getting more desperate by the second, but you do your best to take what he’s giving you, to let him choose the pace now. 

By the time he sinks lower, kissing down your abdomen and hooking his fingers in your shorts, you’re sure your panties are soaked through.

“Can I take these off?” he asks.

“Please,” you moan, lifting your hips to make the task easier.

There’s a distant rumble of thunder outside, and the air in your room is cool as Seungcheol gets you completely naked, but there’s something comforting about sex during a storm.

Seungcheol gets down onto his knees next to the bed, and your heart skips a beat when he drags you closer, his breath warm on your wet core.

“Please, I need-” you whimper, writhing against the sheets already.

“I’ve got you,” Seungcheol promises, pressing a kiss to your inner thigh.

The slow way he works his mouth toward your core has your skin feeling electrified, and you’re throbbing by the time he makes contact with your pussy.

He starts with a long, drawn-out lick that ends with your clit, which he circles deliciously with the tip of his tongue. 

“Oh my God,” you pant, throwing your head back as your entire body jolts from such a soft, yet intense motion.

You feel Seungcheol smirk a little as he continues to kitten-lick you, switching between soft kisses and languid movements with his tongue.

His warm hands find your thighs, and he pushes them into a spread eagle position, giving him plenty of room to work on you.

“Cheol!” you whimper when he takes your clit into his mouth, sucking on it with a little more pressure. “I’m close already!”

You’re not sure if your sensitivity is due to going so long without having the proper attention of a man, or if it’s because Seungcheol is just so good at this, and you have such a great connection.  Regardless, your muscles are already tensing, and your eyes are clenched shut, your breath coming out in hot pants of pleasure.

Seungcheol lets out a small groan, and the vibration makes your legs shake, your body teetering on the edge. You understand his sound as an affirmation that you can cum, that he wants you to experience an orgasm without holding back.

So you don’t hold back.

You reach down and tangle your fingers in his hair again, prompting him to suck on your clit harder, and seconds later, your first orgasm crashes into you like the thunder that erupts in the skies outside.

You’re a moaning mess as he works you through your high, your core throbbing desperately around nothing as waves of pleasure overtake you. 

Fuck, cumming has never felt this good, and it leaves you breathless as your muscles begin to relax.

You let go of his hair, and Seungcheol chuckles, pulling away from your core to look up at you.

“Was that okay?” he asks.

“That was amazing,” you tell him, heart still racing in your ribcage.

“Yeah?” He plays with your slit, rubbing you with a finger, toying the tip inside of you, and making you groan.

“More,” you demand. “Please.” 

“You got it, princess,” he muses, pushing his digit into you, testing your walls, which immediately try to clench around him.

It feels like you haven’t been touched here in years, and your body is eager for this. As he finger fucks you gently, adding a second finger, you can hear your pussy squelching, its wet sounds mixing with the noise of rain splattering against concrete, brick, and glass outside.

“You sound so pretty when you cum,” Seungcheol muses, leaning in to press a kiss to your clit that makes you shiver. “I want to hear it again.”

Two orgasms before he even puts his cock in you? 

You’ll take that action.

You wiggle your hips slightly, looking for more pressure, and Seungcheol responds by crooking his fingers up to find your G-spot. You groan deeply from the feeling, closing your eyes and focusing on the pleasure that’s still surging through you.

“Right there?” he asks.

“Right there,” you confirm. “Feels so good.”

Satisfied he’s found a good spot, Seungcheol presses his mouth to your clit again, sucking on the sensitive bud and making your legs shake.

“Oh my God,” you whimper, pleasure radiating out from your core and engulfing your entire body.

The combination of pressure on your G-spot and his mouth on your clit has you writhing within minutes, grasping at the bed sheets, heart thundering in your chest.

“Just like that,” you tell him, “I’m close again.” 

Like the first orgasm, when you tell Seungcheol you’re close, he increases the pressure of his motions, sucking your clit harder and thrusting his fingers up into your sweet spot with a faster speed that has you seeing stars.

All you can do is whimper and moan in ecstasy as you get closer and closer to the edge again. 

You let out a loud gasp and a moan when you cum, your core clamping down on his fingers, squeezing him as he works you through your second high.

Your entire body is pulsating. There are no thoughts in your mind as you give yourself completely to the pleasure.

He works you through your high until you’re twitching, almost overstimulated by all the sensations overwhelming your body. Then, Seungcheol pulls away.

You open your eyes to watch him lick his fingers clean, releasing a small groan, then he heads over to where his hoodie is lying on the floor. He pulls out his wallet. “I brought a condom just in case,” he tells you shyly, rubbing the back of his neck as his skin blossoms with pink.

“Good idea,” you tell him, still trying to catch your breath.

You adjust on the bed, scooting back up so you can rest against the pillows.

Seungcheol slips off his sweatpants, and you have to swallow the drool that immediately fills your mouth at the sight of him.

He’s big.

Maybe the biggest you’ve ever seen up close like this, and suddenly, you’re thankful he’d worked you open with his fingers because how else would you fit a cock of his size inside of you after being celibate for months?

He rolls the condom onto his cock, and then he joins you in bed.

You’re struck by how shy he is as you pull him close, pressing your lips to his pink cheek. “I want this,” you assure him again.

“I do too,” he tells you, nuzzling his nose against your throat. “Let me know if it’s too big or I need to slow down or-”

“You’ll be fine,” you tell him, nibbling on his earlobe. “We’ll make it fit.”

He laughs a little at your comment, and to try to show him you truly mean it, you reach between your bodies to grab his cock. Your thumb and pointer finger can’t even touch with the girth of him, and you groan as you adjust his tip to your entrance.

Seungcheol lets out a shaky breath, looking down at where you’re gripping him, then back at you.

As he pushes his tip into your wet core, he presses his lips to yours, and you kiss him back desperately as he stretches you open, slowly working himself deeper and deeper and deeper.

You can’t help the whimpers that escape you, your fingernails digging into his shoulders as your body adjusts to accommodate him. 

When he’s fully snug inside of you, you both break the kiss to take strangled breaths, and Seungcheol swallows thickly. “Ready?” he asks.

“Yeah.” You nod, trying to slow the racing of your heart, but it’s a pointless attempt because when he slowly starts to fuck you, your pulse surges even faster.

“Oh my God,” you whimper, throwing your head back, which gives Seungcheol more room to press his lips to your throat.

He fucks you languidly, still giving your body time to adjust to his motions while he does his best to relax you with kisses elsewhere.

Your toes are curling already, and you adjust slightly, lifting your thigh higher onto his hip for a better angle.

The tip of his cock hits a spot deep inside of you that makes you groan, and you thread your fingers in his hair, drawing his mouth back to your own.

His pace is slowly increasing, matching the desperate way your lips are locked. The room is filled with the sound of skin on skin, the noise of the rain and thunder outside, and the music of moans intermingling as you find pleasure in one another.

“Wait,” you tell him, as you feel another orgasm threatening to bubble in the pit of your stomach. “I want to be on top.”

There’s a moment where he looks shocked, but then he nods, allowing you to flip him over onto his back.

You press your hands against his broad chest to get an anchor, enjoying the view of him below you. Then you slowly ride him. It’s a shift in pace, but it feels so good to be on top, and when he presses his thumb to your clit, your entire core tightens around him.

You let out a deep moan, throwing your head back and bouncing faster.

“You’re so pretty like this,” Seungcheol groans, his other hand cupping your breast and teasing your nipple, making you whimper even louder.

Then, he begins to rut his hips, fucking up into you and making you gasp.

“Cheol,” you groan, knowing that an orgasm is now extremely close.

Seungcheol sits up abruptly, cupping the back of your head so he can press his lips to yours.

You grab onto his shoulders, anchoring yourself better as you bounce desperately on top of his cock, chasing the high that’s so close you can almost taste it.

A few seconds later, you cum with a loud gasp, throwing your head back as your walls threaten to suffocate his length, which is still buried completely inside of you as you sink to a fully seated position. 

Seungcheol growls, pressing his lips to your throat, and as your walls clench around his cock, he jolts, signifying that he’s cumming too.

Part of you wishes he didn’t have to wear a condom, but he’s a firefighter, so you suppose safety is in his nature. And the flimsy piece of rubber clearly doesn’t take much away from his own orgasm if his sounds are anything to rely on.

God, his groans are music to your ears, making you whimper even louder, clutching his shoulders as the pleasure engulfs you both as if you’re one complete entity.

Your legs are shivering, and as your orgasm subsides, Seungcheol slumps back down against the bed, looking up at you. 

You’re both trying to catch your breath, but you lean down, kissing him one more time before you collapse against his shoulder, nuzzling your nose along his neck.

A large, warm hand strokes your back, comforting you as you twitch with aftershocks of one of the most insanely passionate orgasms of your life.

You spend a few minutes just breathing together, holding onto each other, and basking in the warmth and afterglow of your highs.

“I know you’re not supposed to have dessert before breakfast, but I could get used to this,” Seungcheol says, cracking a smile to finally break the soft, comfortable silence.

“I could too,” you admit with a chuckle.

“I still want to take you somewhere nice for food, though,” he assures you. “I’m not one of those guys who gets laid then stops trying.”

“Trust me, I know that.” You shake your head at him, charmed by how soft and shy and awkward he can be sometimes.

Seungcheol presses a kiss to your lips. “Maybe we could shower together first?” he suggests. “You know, proper aftercare and everything.”

Your heart melts for him, and you nod. “I’d love that.”

“Is it weird for me to say I’m excited about all of this?” he asks, his chest flushing that rosy pink colour that’s starting to become a signature of his. “I mean… you’re kind of my dream girl.”

“Cheol…”

“I mean it,” he says. “I just… I think this could really work.”

“I think so too.”

“And after breakfast, I want to go to a store and get more treats and toys for Brontë, since she’s the matchmaker behind all of this.”

You laugh, shaking your head at him. “Has anyone ever told you that for a big, burly firefighter, you’re kind of adorable?”

“Don’t tell my coworkers,” he teases.

You melt at his words, a happiness unlike any other overtaking you. As the storm continues outside, you and Seungcheol shower together, basking in the warmth and promise of this new relationship, and for the first time in a long time, you’re excited about what the future may bring. 

☀️ mlist + an. thank you for reading! I appreciate those of you who responded to my post about the tough month I've been dealing with. I'm working on posting fics earlier but life has just put me through the wringer lately.

🍭 support me by. sending a tip here or here - or become a patron to access monthly bonus content and extensions for fics like this one :) find the Patreon teaser below! 

🔮 preview.  He’s so sexy, and you look up at him, loving the way the water drips down his chiseled chest, his curls all wet. You like the way his skin flushes, not from the temperature of the shower, but from you working him up with your mouth. The sounds he makes are the true goal, however, and the deep groans seem to echo in the small shower, filling you with confidence as you suck harder on his cock.

cw/ tw. Unprotected sex, shower sex, oral, pussy eating, blow job, multiple reader orgasms, reader overstimulation, praise, dirty talk, use of sex toy, vibrator, multiple sex positions, fingering, munch/pleasure kink!cheol, big dick! Seungcheol, etc…  I petnames. (hers) princess. 

👹 rating. 18+ explicit I wc. 2.3k I teaser wc. 100

🌙 starring. Seungcheol x afab!Reader

bonus

Springtime has so many new wonders now that you’re in a relationship. 

You’ve always kind of morbidly enjoyed the death, decay and antisocial vibes of Autumn, but with Seungcheol, Spring is starting to signify new hope and joy. 

He’s the king of cheesy dates, taking you to flower farms, on picnics, to the minigolf spot, and out for farmers market walks. Seungcheol has also taken to getting you lavender and other beautifully scented plants, and your apartment has truly never smelled so nice.

After months of discussion and relationship growth, the two of you are taking a new step. 

Seungcheol is moving in with you. 

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[skzhotpot]

Fucking SWOONING for firefighter Cheol eeeeeeeeeek

Truly a match made in heaven opposites be attracting

💜 more → Choi Seungcheol · SEVENTEEN · Fic Rec Library 💜

[words-in-purple]

｡⋆𓇼 unfortunately yours | jjk | masterlist

synopsis: jungkook is the last person you want to be stuck with on your holiday—irritating, smug, painfully attractive—but the universe keeps placing him in your path: at the airport, on the plane, in the room next door.

𓇼 pairing: jeon jungkook x reader

𓇼 genre/warning: e2l, strangers-to-lovers, modern au, travel romance, airport meet-cute, forced proximity, one-bed energy (hotel room next door edition), mutual pining, tension, sun-drenched holiday vibes, light bickering, flirting, slowburn-but-fast-burn, smut (18+), consensual intimacy, alcohol mention, soft feelings, mild angst

𓇼 dedication note: the amazing trip to morocco that has inspired this fic

𓇼 total word count: 45k~

𓇼 status: completed

𓇼 playlist 𓇼 main masterlist

｡⋆𓇼 chapters

teaser ｡⋆ day one ｡⋆ day two ｡⋆ day three ｡⋆ day four ｡⋆ day five ｡⋆ day six ｡⋆ day seven ｡⋆

｡⋆𓇼 drabbles

still yours | part one ⋆.˚

read on wattpad

review your experience, thoughts, or unhinged feelings here

[skzhotpot]

Oh no now I need to visit Morocco!!!! I was smelling the spices, picturing the architecture and the markets omgggggg it almost…ALMOST…made me forget this was a fic about JK instead 😂😂😂

But boy did he not disappoint. I’m totally into this black cat “thundercloud” JK. I can’t wait to read more drabbles!!! I am rooting for them!

💜 more → Jeon Jungkook · BTS · Fic Rec Library 💜

[jungkoostar]

╰┈❥ CONVENIENTLY YOURS — ✿

✿ Synopsis: What began as a quiet marriage of convenience—a contract of mutual respect and minimalist peace—slowly transforms into an agonizingly beautiful slow-burn as Jungkook and Y/N discover that "convenience" is no match for a soul-deep connection. Behind the closed doors of their serene home, the air grows thick with the scent of vanilla candles and the unspoken hunger of two people desperate to cross the final line. Jungkook, a man of profound tenderness and playful charm, spends months worshiping his wife through small gestures and flirty whispers, waiting for the moment their hearts finally sync. When he presents her with a delicate gift of baby-pink lace, the restraint finally snaps. In a sanctuary of rose-gold light and silk sheets, the shy housewife and her devoted husband shed their roles, uniting in a worshipful, vocal, and desperate night of intimacy that proves they were never just roommates—they were the missing halves of each other’s souls.

✿ Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Y/N (Reader)

✿ Genre: Slow Burn Romance, Domestic Fluff, Explicit Smut, Married Life.

✿ Word Count: 8k-9k

✿ Trope: Arranged Marriage, Convenience to Love, Only One Bed, Virgin/First Time Together.

— Detailed Warnings —

✿ Heavy Romance & Love: Emotional depth, soul-bonding, and mutual pining.

✿ Explicit Sexual Content: Highly detailed descriptions of missionary sex, penetration, and physical fluids.

✿ Body Worship: Extensive breast and nipple play

✿ Vocal Intimacy: Heavy use of soft and desperate dirty talk, praise, and vocal expressions of pleasure (groaning/whimpering).

✿ Sensory Details: Lingerie (pink lace/silk ribbons), sunset lighting, and vanilla/sandalwood scents.

✿ Aftercare: Deeply emotional and physical aftercare, including delicate cleaning, skin-to-skin cuddling, and sleepy pillow talk.

✿ Morning Intimacy: Needy, playful morning-after play and flirting

...

The gold band on Y/N’s finger felt heavy, not with the weight of a burden, but with the weight of a promise. It had been six months since she and Jeon Jungkook had stood before a small gathering of family and friends, pledging a life of "convenience and happiness."

There was no drama in their arrangement. No weeping over lost loves or bitter resentment over corporate mergers. It was a simple agreement between two souls who were tired of the chaos of the world and wanted a sanctuary. But on that day, under the soft glow of the wedding hall, something unplanned had happened.

When the officiant told Jungkook he could kiss his bride, he hadn't just brushed his lips against her cheek. He had tilted her head back with a gentle finger under her chin, eyes searching hers for permission. When he found it in the shy flutter of her lashes, he leaned in.

That kiss—the only kiss they had ever shared—had been soft, tasting of expensive champagne and the sudden, terrifying realization that "convenience" might be a lie. It was a slow, pressing contact that lasted just a second too long to be platonic. When they pulled away, both of them were flushed, their hearts hammering a rhythm that whispered: Oh. This is going to be difficult.

Their first few months were a masterclass in polite distance. They lived in a beautiful, minimalist apartment—all clean lines, white oak, and soft beige linens. It was a space designed for peace, but as the weeks bled into months, the peace began to feel like a held breath.

Jungkook was the perfect husband. He was the man who remembered how she liked her coffee (black, but with some drops of vanilla) and the man who would leave small, handwritten notes on the kitchen island when he had to leave for work early.

The turning point was the "Miles to Smiles" cake.

Jungkook had been away for two weeks on a business trip, the longest they had been apart since the wedding. The silence of the apartment had been deafening for Y/N. She found herself staring at his side of the bed—the side he kept impeccably neat—and feeling a pang of genuine loneliness.

To distract herself, she turned to the one thing that always grounded her: baking.

When Jungkook walked through the door at 11:00 PM, exhausted and smelling of the cold night air, he didn’t find a sleeping wife. He found the kitchen glowing with a warm, amber light and the scent of rich chocolate and toasted hazelnuts.

There, on the marble counter, sat a small, perfectly frosted bento cake. It was a deep, chocolate brown with minimalist cream piping that read: "Miles to Smiles. Welcome home, Jungkook."

He had frozen in the doorway, his suitcase handle slipping from his grip with a soft thud. Y/N stood by the fridge, her oversized sweater sleeves covering her hands, her cheeks already turning that soft shade of pink he had come to associate with her presence.

"You're home," she whispered, her voice small in the quiet room.

Jungkook didn't say a word at first. He walked toward her, his dark eyes fixed on the cake, then on her. The distance between them closed until he was standing just inches away. He smelled like woodsmoke and rain.

"You made this for me?" his voice was husky, vibrating in the small space between them.

"I missed... the noise," she lied poorly, looking down at her fuzzy socks. "The house felt too big."

Jungkook reached out, his hand hovering near her waist before he pulled it back, settling for leaning against the counter. "It’s beautiful, Y/N. Thank you."

They ate that cake together at midnight, sitting on the floor of the kitchen, sharing a single fork. It was the first time they truly laughed—real, deep-bellied laughs as Y/N told him about her failed attempt at tempering chocolate. Jungkook watched her, his gaze lingering on the way her lips moved, the memory of their wedding day kiss flashing through his mind like a lightning strike.

He wanted to kiss her again. Right then. With frosting on her lip and the moonlight hitting her hair. But he didn't. He had promised her time. He had promised her a bond built on respect, not just impulse.

From that night on, the "convenience" was replaced by a deliberate, sweet intimacy.

The house transformed. It was no longer just a minimalist showroom; it was theirs. Y/N began filling the corners with small touches—organic candles that smelled of sun-drenched linen, soft throws draped over the couch where they spent their evenings.

Jungkook, in turn, became a man of "small gifts."

He would come home with a single stem of a hibiscus flower because he remembered her mentioning she liked the shape of the petals. Or he’d bring a specific brand of organic face packs he’d found at a boutique, knowing her love for skin-safe products.

"I saw this and thought of you," he would say, his voice always soft, always tender.

He was a natural flirter, though he kept it "safe" for her. He loved the way she flushed. He began to gently ease her into his closeness, slowly building a bond through shared proximity, so that one day it would feel natural rather than unfamiliar.

One afternoon, as she was reaching for a high cabinet in the kitchen to grab a bag of flour for her brownies, she felt a sudden warmth at her back. Jungkook was there, his chest nearly brushing her shoulder blades as he reached over her head to grab the bag with ease.

He didn't move away immediately. He stayed there, effectively trapping her between the counter and his body.

"Need anything else while I'm up here, Princess?" he murmured, his breath fanning the stray hairs at her temple.

Y/N felt her breath hitch. She could feel the heat radiating from him, the solid strength of his frame. She turned around slowly, her heart drumming against her ribs, only to find him looking down at her with a smirk that was equal parts sweet and devastating.

"No," she breathed, her hands clutching the edge of the marble. "I... I think that's everything."

Jungkook’s eyes dropped to her lips for a fraction of a second—a look so hungry and focused that it made her toes curl in her slippers. Then, just as quickly, he stepped back, giving her space, his expression returning to that of the "perfect husband."

"Bake something good for me then," he winked, leaving her breathless in the middle of the kitchen.

They shared a bed every night.

It was a king-sized bed, and they would lie there in the dark, the only sound the steady hum of the air conditioner and the rhythmic sound of each other’s breathing.

Y/N would often lie awake, staring at the silhouette of his shoulders. She wondered if he was awake, too. She wondered if he felt the same electric hum in the air that she did.

They had talked about it, once. A quiet conversation on the balcony under the stars, both of them wrapped in a single oversized blanket to ward off the evening chill.

"I don't want to rush you," Jungkook had said, his hand finally finding hers under the fabric of the blanket. He didn't grip it; he just rested his palm against hers, an invitation. "I want this—us—to happen when it feels like we can't breathe without it. I want it to be the most natural thing in the world."

Y/N had squeezed his hand, her heart swelling with a love that terrified her. "I want that too. I want the spark to be so bright that we don't even have to ask."

And so, the foundation was laid. A house filled with the scent of baking, the sight of minimalist beauty, and the sound of two hearts waiting for the permission to finally, truly, belong to one another.

The physical tension was a slow-growing vine, wrapping around them tighter every day. They were happy.

...

The minimalist quiet of their home had shifted. It was no longer a cold, organized space; it was a sanctuary that Y/N had breathed life into with every folded shirt and every perfectly seasoned meal. She wasn’t a woman of many words or complex stories; she was a woman of actions. She showed her love in the way Jungkook’s favorite gym clothes were always fresh and placed exactly where he could find them, and how the pantry was always stocked with the specific snacks he craved after a long day.

But lately, the domestic peace was being disrupted by a heavy, magnetic pull.

Y/N was in the living room, humming softly to herself as she folded a stack of warm towels. She took pride in the neatness of their life, but her hands shook slightly when she heard the front door click. Jungkook was home early.

He didn't go to his room to change. He walked straight into the living room, shedding his blazer and tossing it over the armchair. He watched her for a moment—the way her small hands smoothed out the fabric, the way her hair fell over her shoulder. To him, she was the most grounding, beautiful sight in the world.

"You're always taking care of things, Y/N," he said, his voice dropping into that low, vibrato tone that made her heart skip. He stepped behind her, and she could feel the heat radiating off his body, cutting through the cool air of the room.

"I like it," she whispered, her face heating up instantly. "I like making sure you're comfortable."

Jungkook didn't move away. He stepped closer, until his chest was a fraction of an inch from her back. He reached around her, his large hand settling over hers as she tried to fold a washcloth. His skin was tan and rough against her soft, pale palm.

"And who takes care of you?" he murmured, his breath ghosting over the back of her neck, sending a violent shiver down her spine. "Who makes sure you're comfortable, Princess?"

Y/N’s breath hitched. She couldn't look at him, her eyes fixed on their joined hands. "You do. You bring me flowers... you're kind."

"I want to be more than kind," Jungkook whispered. He turned her around slowly in the circle of his arms. Y/N felt small against him, her head barely reaching his chin. He looked down at her, his eyes dark and heavy with a longing that made her knees feel weak. "I see you working so hard to make this a home for us. And every time I see you move, every time I smell that vanilla scent on your skin, I want to stop being the 'convenient' husband. I want to be the husband who stays in bed with you until noon."

Y/N’s cheeks burned a bright, sunset pink. She looked up at him through her lashes, her hands trembling as they rested against his chest. "Jungkook... you shouldn't say things like that."

"Why not?" He smirked, a playful, flirty glint entering his eyes. He leaned down, his nose brushing against hers. "Does it make you shy? Does it make your heart race like it’s doing right now?" He moved his hand from her waist to her heart, feeling the frantic thump-thump beneath her ribs. "You're so responsive. So sweet. It makes me want to see just how much more I can make you blush."

The tension became a living thing between them. It was in the way she cooked for him—how he would stand in the kitchen and "help" by chopping vegetables, only to end up standing so close that their shoulders rubbed, his hand frequently finding the small of her back.

"You missed a spot," he’d tease, pointing to a smudge on the counter. And when she’d go to wipe it, he’d catch her wrist, pulling her close just to whisper, "Actually, I think I just wanted an excuse to touch you."

She began to feel the "desperate" need he spoke of. It wasn't just about the chores anymore; it was about the way her skin hungered for his touch. They had agreed to wait, to let the bond grow until the spark became a fire, but the wood was dry and the air was hot.

One evening, as they shared a quiet dinner she had prepared—a simple, elegant meal of roasted chicken and herbs—the conversation turned toward the unspoken.

"I don't think I can keep my promise much longer," Jungkook said, setting his chopsticks down. He was looking at her with a raw honesty that stripped away all her defenses. "The waiting... it was good for us. It made me love you for more than just your face. But now? Now I just want you. All of you."

Y/N felt a surge of boldness. She reached across the table, her fingers grazing his. "I don't want to wait anymore either. I’ve been ready. I’ve been waiting for you to tell me."

Jungkook’s eyes flared. He gripped her hand, his thumb pressing firmly into her palm. "Then it’s settled. No more holding back. I’m going to show you exactly how much I appreciate everything you do for me."

He stood up, pulling her with him. He didn't kiss her—not yet. He just tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, his touch lingering on her jawline. "I have something for you. A gift. It’s for when we’re ready."

...

The light that crept through the curtains of the Jeon household that morning didn't feel like the light of a normal Tuesday. It was soft, pale, and seemed to hum with the secret they had shared the night before. Y/N stirred in the large bed, her hand instinctively reaching out for the warmth of her husband’s side, but the sheets were already cool. Jungkook was a man of discipline; he was always up before the sun, his presence lingering only in the scent of sandalwood on his pillow and the neat way he folded his duvet.

Usually, Y/N would rise immediately to start her duties—preparing his breakfast, pressing his shirts, and ensuring the minimalist harmony of their home was maintained. But today, her heart felt too heavy with anticipation to move. She lay there for a long moment, staring at the ceiling, her mind replaying the gravelly vibration of his voice from the night before: “I have something for you. A gift.”

When she finally swung her legs out of bed, her feet hitting the cool oak floor, she walked toward her vanity. There, sitting among her neatly organized bottles of organic oils and hibiscus-scented creams, was a box.

It was wrapped in the exact shade of pale, shimmering pink that the sky was turning outside. A silk ribbon was tied in a perfect, military-precise bow. Y/N sat on her stool, her reflection in the mirror showing a woman whose cheeks were already stained with a deep, shy rose color. With trembling fingers, she pulled the silk tie.

As the lid came off, she let out a small, broken breath. The lingerie was a masterpiece of lace—thin, delicate, and unapologetically feminine. It was a soft baby pink, the color of a first crush, but the design was mature, meant to be unwrapped. Beside it lay a small card.

“For when the moment feels right. I am yours, in every way you’ll have me. — J.”

Y/N pressed the silk to her cheek. It smelled faintly of him—that clean, sandalwood scent that was the backdrop of her life.

The words "I am yours" echoed in her head as she spent the morning moving through her "housewife" routines. But today, the cleaning wasn't just a chore; it was a ritual. She spent three hours in the kitchen, her hands dusted in flour as she baked a deep, dark chocolate cake—something rich to ground them later. She organized his study, smoothing out the papers on his desk, her fingers lingering on the pens he used, imagining his hand holding them.

As the afternoon light began to fade into a bruised, romantic purple, Y/N began the physical transformation of their bedroom. This was her domain, the place where she expressed the love she often found too shy to speak aloud.

Every action was an act of devotion. She wanted the house to be perfect for him. She wanted the minimalist white oak and the beige linens to feel like a soft cloud they could fall into.

She removed the standard white bedding, replacing it with heavy, rose-gold silk sheets that felt like liquid against her skin. She hid sunset-hued lamps behind the sheer curtains, so that when they were turned on, the entire room bathed in a dark, cozy, pink glow. It was a sanctuary. It was a signal.

She bathed slowly, using the organic things—scented soaps, face masks—he had gifted her weeks ago. She wanted to smell like the things he liked. When she finally stepped into the pink lace, her heart was beating so hard she could see the delicate fabric jumping over her chest. The ribbons were long and complicated, crisscrossing over her ribs and tying in small, teasing bows at her hips.

She looked at herself—not as a "housewife," but as a wife. A woman waiting for her husband to finally claim the heart she had given him months ago.

The sound of the front door was a low, heavy thud that vibrated through the floorboards. Y/N stood by the bed, her hands clutching the silk sheets. She heard his footsteps—slow, deliberate, and clicking with a weight that told her he knew. He knew today was the day the "convenience" ended.

Jungkook didn't call her name. He walked straight to the bedroom, the scent of the vanilla candles and the dark-chocolate baking leading him like a trail. When the door pushed open, the rose-gold light spilled into the hallway, catching the sharp line of his jaw and the dark, dilated depth of his eyes.

He stopped in the doorway. He was still in his dress shirt, the top two buttons undone, his tie hanging loosely around his neck. He looked exhausted from work, but the moment his eyes landed on her—standing there in the pink lace, surrounded by the sanctuary she had built for him—the exhaustion vanished. It was replaced by a raw, starving hunger that made Y/N’s knees tremble.

“Y/N,” he said. It wasn't a question. It was a vow.

The sight of her stopped the air in his lungs. Y/N stood in the center of the rose-gold glow, her hair falling over her shoulders, the pink ribbons of the gift he’d chosen trailing down her pale skin.

“Y/N,” he whispered. It wasn't a greeting; it was a prayer.

He didn't move for a long time. They just stared at each other—a deep, soul-searching gaze that stripped away every layer of the "convenience" they had lived under. He looked at her body with a reverence that made her feel like a masterpiece. He saw the flush on her neck, the way her chest rose and fell with her shallow breaths, and the desperate, shy light in her eyes.

“You came home,” she breathed, her voice a soft anchor in the quiet room.

“I couldn't have stayed away if the world was ending,”

He didn't move. He just stared. He looked at the way the light hit the lace, the way her hair fell over her shyly hunched shoulders. He looked at her soul through her eyes, and for the first time in their marriage, there was no wall between them.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “I spent all day trying to focus on meetings, but all I could see was this color on you. All I could feel was the memory of that wedding kiss, wondering when I’d get to taste you again.”

He stepped into the room, closing the door behind him with a soft, final click. The sound of the lock turning was the loudest thing in the room.

“I made the room for you,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “I wanted it to be... perfect.”

The click of the bedroom door locking was the loudest sound Y/N had ever heard. It wasn't just a piece of metal sliding into a frame; it was the sound of the world being shut out. In this rose-gold-lit sanctuary, there was no more "convenience," no more "arrangements." There was only Jungkook, and the heavy, electric silence that lay between them like a living thing.

“It is perfect,” Jungkook said.

Jungkook stood against the door for a long, agonizing minute. He didn't move. He didn't even seem to breathe. His eyes, usually so sharp and professional, were dark and glassy, swimming with a mixture of disbelief and a hunger so raw it made Y/N’s pulse thrum in her fingertips. He looked at the room she had built for him—the way the sunset lamps turned the minimalist white walls into a soft, hazy pink, and the way the vanilla scent of the candles seemed to coat his skin the moment he stepped inside.

Then, his gaze settled on her.

Y/N felt exposed in a way she hadn't anticipated. She was a woman who found safety in being the background of a house—the one who folded the laundry, the one who made the tea—but standing there in the pink lace he had chosen, she was the center of his entire universe. The lace was so delicate against her pale skin, the intricate floral patterns tracing the curves of her breasts, while the silk ribbons crisscrossed over her midriff in a teasing, complex lattice.

"I can't believe you're real," Jungkook finally whispered. His voice was a broken, gravelly thing, stripped of all its usual polished confidence. "I’ve spent months imagining what you looked like under those oversized sweaters you wear. I’ve spent every night lying three feet away from you, counting your breaths, wondering if you knew how much I was struggling to keep my hands to myself."

He took one step forward. Just one. But the floorboards seemed to groan under the weight of his intent. He began to shed his work clothes, his eyes never leaving hers for a single second. It was a slow, hypnotic stripping away of his "perfect husband" persona. First the tie, dropped carelessly to the rug. Then the buttons of his dress shirt, flicked open by steady fingers until the fabric hung open, revealing the hard, tanned planes of his chest and the sharp line of his collarbones.

"The house smelled like chocolate when I walked in," he murmured, his voice dropping into a low, vibrating hum that made Y/N’s stomach flip. "You did all of this. The baking, the candles, the sheets... you did all of this to tell me it was okay, didn't you?"

Y/N nodded, her throat too tight to speak. She watched the way the rose-gold light played over his muscles as he moved. He looked like a statue brought to life—strong, solid, and terrifyingly handsome.

"I wanted... I wanted you to know that the wait was over for me, too," she finally managed to whisper. Her voice was small, trembling with a shyness that she couldn't quite shake, even though her body was screaming for him to close the distance. "I didn't want to just say it. I wanted to show you."

Jungkook reached the edge of the bed. He was so close now that she could feel the heat radiating off his body—a dry, searing warmth that made the cool silk of the sheets behind her feel like ice. He smelled like the rain from outside, mixed with the sandalwood of his cologne and a darker, pheromonal scent that was purely him.

He reached out, but he didn't grab her. He didn't pull her into a desperate embrace. Instead, he raised his hand slowly, his fingers trembling just as much as hers were. He let his knuckles graze the very top of her shoulder, right where the pink lace strap sat.

The contact was electric. Y/N let out a sharp, hitching breath, her eyes fluttering shut as the sensation of his skin against hers finally, finally happened.

"You're shaking," he noted, his voice impossibly soft. He moved his hand from her shoulder to her neck, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw with agonizing slowness. He stayed there, just touching her face, his eyes roaming over every inch of her features as if he were trying to memorize her soul. "Are you scared of me, Princess? Or is it just the tension?"

"It's the tension," she breathed, leaning her face into his palm, her eyes opening to meet his dark, dilated gaze. "It's been six months of wanting to touch you like this. Every time you walked into the room... every time you flirted with me in the kitchen... I felt like I was going to break."

Jungkook’s expression softened into something worshipful. He leaned down, his forehead coming to rest against hers. They stood there for a long time, just breathing the same air, their heartbeats so loud in the quiet room that they seemed to sync up.

"I'm never going to let you feel like that again," he promised, his breath fanning her lips. "From now on, there’s no distance. Just us."

He tilted his head, his nose brushing against hers, his lips hovering just a fraction of an inch from her mouth. He waited. He gave her that last, tiny moment to pull back, to be the shy housewife again. But Y/N reached up, her small hands finding the open collar of his shirt, her fingers curling into the fabric to pull him closer.

The first kiss wasn't a collision; it was an unfolding. It was slow, tasting of the vanilla candles and the months of unspoken promises. It was the sound of a heart finally finding its rhythm.

The kiss deepened, shifting from a tentative question into a frantic, soul-searching answer. Jungkook’s mouth was warm and firm, tasting of the mint he’d used before coming home and the raw, sweet hunger that had been simmering in his veins for months. He didn't rush; he savored the way her lips parted for him, a soft, hitching sob escaping her throat as his tongue swept against hers. It was a slow, rhythmic dance—a "facing" of their spirits before their bodies ever touched.

"You're so responsive," he murmured, his voice a low, vibrating growl that she felt in her very marrow. "Just one kiss and your heart is trying to jump out of your chest. I can feel it hitting my palm."

He slid his hands down her arms, his touch trailing fire over her skin until he reached the first set of silk ribbons tied at her sternum. The pink lace of the bodice was stretched tight over her breasts, the floral patterns straining with every ragged breath she took. Jungkook’s eyes dropped, fixed on the center bow.

"I’ve been thinking about these ribbons all day," he confessed, his voice dropping into that velvety soft talk. "Wondering how long it would take me to untie them. Wondering if you’d let me take my time, or if you’re as desperate as I am to see what’s underneath."

He didn't wait for an answer. He pinched the ends of the first silk tie, pulling it slowly. The sound of the silk sliding against itself was a sharp hiss in the quiet sanctuary of the room. As the lace loosened, the valley between her breasts was revealed, the pale skin flushed a beautiful, deep rose.

"Look at you," he whispered, his eyes tracking the way the light hit her collarbones. "So shy, but you built this whole world just for me to find you in. You’re a good wife, Y/N. The best. And I’m going to spend the rest of the night showing you exactly how much I worship that."

He moved to the second ribbon, his knuckles grazing the underside of her breast as he worked. Y/N gasped, her head falling back, her eyes fluttering shut. The sensation of his rough skin against her soft, sensitive curves was overwhelming.

"Do you like that?" he asked, his voice a teasing, hungry thrum. "Do you like knowing that I can’t stop looking at you? That I’ve been starving for this since the day we said 'I do'?"

He untied the final bow at her waist, and the bodice fell open, hanging precariously off her shoulders. Jungkook didn't push it off yet. Instead, he let his palms settle over the sides of her breasts, his thumbs brushing over the lace that still covered her nipples.

"You're so soft," he groaned, his eyes dilating until they were almost entirely black. "I’ve spent months imagining the weight of you in my hands. Every time I saw you in the kitchen, organizing the pantry or baking those cakes... I just wanted to walk up behind you and do exactly this."

He squeezed gently, his hands molding her shape with a possessive, reverent pressure. Y/N’s knees finally gave out, and she sank back onto the rose-gold silk sheets, pulling him down with her. The bed dipped under his weight, his large, muscular frame hovering over her like a shadow of pure desire.

"Look at me, Y/N," he commanded softly, his voice thick with the "raw" need he had been suppressing.

She opened her eyes, seeing him through a haze of pleasure. His shirt was completely open now, his tanned chest pressed against her pale skin, the contrast making her breath hitch. He looked like a man possessed—by love, by hunger, and by the sheer awe of finally having her.

"I'm going to take this off now," he whispered, his fingers finding the straps again. "And then I'm going to spend a very, very long time making sure you know you're the only thing that matters in this house. In the world."

He slid the lace down her arms, discarding the gift he had bought her onto the floor. Discarded like a ghost of their past restraint onto the soft rug. Now, there was nothing between them but the humid, vanilla-scented air and the rose-gold glow of the sanctuary Y/N had built. Jungkook’s breathing had become a ragged, rhythmic sound, his chest expanding and contracting as he looked down at her. She was sprawled against the silk sheets, her skin flushed a deep, beautiful pink that matched the room, her hair fanned out like a dark halo.

“I’ve waited a lifetime for this view,” Jungkook groaned, his voice dropping into a register so low it felt like a vibration in her very bones.

He moved then, his large, tanned body lowering until the weight of him was a solid, comforting press against her. He didn't rush. He supported his weight on his forearms, his chest grazing her breasts with every breath. The contrast was breathtaking—his skin dark and roughened by his active life, hers pale and soft from the care she took in their home.

He began his worship with his hands. He reached out, his palms cupping the underside of her breasts, lifting the weight of them as if they were the most precious offerings he had ever received. His thumbs began to move in slow, agonizingly deliberate circles over the peaks.

“You’re so sensitive for me,” he whispered, his eyes fixed on the way her nipples budded and hardened under his touch. “Look at how you react to me, Y/N. Every time I touch you, you bloom. It’s like you were made specifically for my hands to hold.”

He leaned down, his mouth replacing his thumbs. The first touch of his tongue against her nipple was a spark that sent a jolt of pure electricity straight to her core. Y/N let out a sharp, broken cry, her back arching off the silk as she sought more of him. He was relentless, his tongue swirling and flicking, his teeth grazing the sensitive bud with a hunger that was barely contained.

“Jungkook... please,” she whimpered, her fingers tangling in his dark, silken hair, pulling him closer, deeper.

“I’ve got you, Princess,” he murmured against her skin, his voice muffled by her breast. He moved to the other side, his hand migrating down to her waist, his fingers digging into the soft curve of her hip. “I want to taste every inch of the woman who made this house a home. I want to know exactly how much you’ve been wanting this.”

As he worshiped her chest, his hand began a slow, torturous descent. He moved past the dip of her waist, his palm stroking over her flat stomach until he reached the edge of her panties. He didn't move inside yet; he stayed on the surface, his fingers brushing the soft hair there, the heat of her radiating through the thin fabric.

Y/N felt a wave of liquid heat pool between her legs. She was slick, aching, her body opening up for him like a flower to the sun. She shifted her hips, a silent plea for the contact she had been dreaming of for six months.

“You’re so ready for me,” Jungkook whispered, his hand finally sliding beneath the elastic. His fingers were warm, his touch incredibly gentle as he began to map the sensitive folds of her anatomy. He found the center of her desire, his middle finger grazing over her, finding her completely drenched. “So wet... did you get like this just thinking about me? While you were baking? While you were waiting for me to come home?”

Y/N couldn't answer. She could only moan, her head thrashing against the pillow as he began to move his fingers in a slow, rhythmic pace. Each stroke was a promise, a building of the tension until she felt like she was going to shatter.

“You’re making me so hard, Y/N,” he groaned, pulling back just enough to show her. He reached for the fastening of his trousers, discarding them with a frustrated haste until he stood before her, completely raw.

The sight of him stole the breath from her lungs. He was magnificent—solid, powerful, and thick with a need that was undeniable. He was straining, the skin tight and pulsing with the same rhythm as his heart.

“Look at what you do to me,” he whispered, his eyes dilating. “I’m dropping for you. I’m yours, completely.”

Y/N reached out, her hands trembling as they found the length of him. He let out a choked sound, his eyes fluttering shut as her soft, cool fingers wrapped around his heat. She began to move her hand, a slow, pumping gesture that she had only ever imagined in the dark of their shared room. She felt the strength of him, the way he jumped under her touch, and the sheer power of his arousal.

“Soft... you’re so soft,” Jungkook gasped, his head falling back. “Keep doing that. Don’t stop. God, Y/N, I don't think I can wait anymore.”

He moved back over her, his hands finding hers and pinning them gently beside her head, their fingers interlocking. He looked down at her, his face a mask of love and desperate, starving hunger.

“No more waiting,” he promised, his voice a low, final vow. “I’m taking you home.”

Jungkook hovered over Y/N, his large, tanned hands still intertwined with hers, pinning them gently against the rose-gold silk. He looked down at her, his dark eyes dilated and glossy with a mixture of raw desire and a tenderness that was almost painful to behold.

He moved slowly, positioning himself between her thighs. The friction of his skin against hers—the heat of his stomach against her soft belly—sent a shock of pure electricity through the room. He didn't rush. He stayed there for a long, heavy second, his forehead resting against hers, their noses brushing in a soft, intimate "facing" that grounded them both.

“I’m going to be so careful with you,” he whispered, his voice a low, gravelly vow. “But I don’t think I can hold back the truth anymore. I’ve been yours since the day we met, Y/N. Everything else was just waiting.”

As he began to enter her, the world seemed to stop spinning. It was a slow, agonizingly beautiful stretch—a sensation of fullness and "home" that made Y/N let out a broken, high-pitched sob. She arched her back, her eyes fluttering shut as she felt the sheer weight and heat of him claiming the space she had kept for him alone.

He moved in and out with a pace that was purposefully slow, his gaze never leaving hers. He wanted to see every flicker of emotion on her face—the way her brows pinched in pleasure, the way her lips parted to gasp his name.

Suddenly, as he pushed deep, a small, wet sound of their bodies connecting echoed in the quiet room—a "wet" squelch of friction and intimacy that was so honest and raw it made them both pause. Y/N’s eyes flew open, her cheeks burning a shade of crimson deeper than any candle flame. Jungkook froze, a look of surprise crossing his handsome face before a small, boyish dimple peeked out.

He let out a soft, breathy laugh—a sound of pure, unadulterated happiness. Y/N started to giggle through her shyness, and something much more real and human.

“Did you hear that?” he teased, his voice husky but light.

“Jungkook!” she whined, hiding her face in the crook of his neck, her arms finally breaking free to wrap around his shoulders.

He chuckled, leaning down to press a series of soft, worshipful kisses to her temple, her cheek, and finally her mouth. “It’s perfect. You’re perfect. It just means you’re mine.”

The laughter melted back into a desperate, out-of-control hunger. Jungkook began to move again, but the rhythm had changed. It was no longer the cautious movement of a gentleman; it was the rhythmic, driving pace of a man who was finally letting go. He lost his composure, his head falling back as he made low, guttural noises—half-groans, half-whimpers of her name—that made Y/N feel powerful and cherished all at once.

“You... you feel... God, Y/N,” he gasped, his pace becoming faster, more desperate. He was vocal, his "soft" dirty talk turning into a breathless stream of praise. “I can’t... I can’t believe I waited this long. I want to stay like this forever. Inside you. Wrapped in you.”

Y/N wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him deeper, her nails grazing his back as she met every thrust. The "facing" became intense, their eyes locked as the pleasure built into a blinding, rose-gold peak. They reached the climax together, a shared cry echoing through the sanctuary as their souls finally, officially united.

...

The silence that followed was heavy and warm. Jungkook stayed buried in her for a long time, his heart hammering against hers like a trapped bird. He eventually rolled to the side, but he didn't let her go. He pulled her flush against his sweat-slicked side, his arm a protective weight over her waist.

“Don’t move,” he murmured, kissing the top of her head. “I’m going to take care of you.”

He disappeared for a moment, returning with a basin of warm water and soft, organic wipes. He sat on the edge of the bed, his expression returning to that of the devoted husband, but there was a new, playful glint in his eyes. He began to clean her, his touch incredibly delicate as he wiped the traces of their union from her thighs.

As he reached her down, his movements slowed. He didn't just clean; he lingered, his fingers grazing her sensitive skin with a teasing familiarity.

“You’re still so flushed,” he whispered, a smirk playing on his lips as he looked up at her. “And so sensitive. I wonder if I could make you make those sounds again just by doing this...”

He used the warm wipe to swirl over a particularly sensitive spot, his eyes dark with mischief. Y/N’s eyes widened, her face heating up as a fresh wave of shyness hit her.

“Jungkook! Stop it!” she squealed, reaching out and giving his hard, tanned chest a playful smack.

He laughed, the sound deep and resonant in the room. He caught her hand, kissing her knuckles before finishing his task with a final, lingering stroke. “I can’t help it. I finally have you, Y/N. I’m going to be a very 'vocal' husband from now on.”

He tossed the wipes aside and climbed back into bed, pulling her into his chest so her back was against his heartbeat. They lay there in the dark-cozy glow, the scent of vanilla and love surrounding them.

“This was the best day of my life,” he whispered into her hair. “I used to think 'convenience' was enough. But this? Being yours? This is the only way I want to live.”

Y/N smiled, closing her eyes as she listened to the steady, rhythmic beat of his heart—the heart she had finally, truly claimed. “Me too, Jungkook. Me too.”

...

The sun had barely begun to peek through the minimalist linen curtains of the Jeon household, the room was still bathed in the faint, lingering scent of vanilla and the musk of their late-night union.

Jungkook, usually the first one out of bed to start his disciplined morning routine, hadn't moved an inch. Instead, he was propped up on one elbow, his eyes tracing the silhouette of his wife as she stirred. The rose-gold silk sheets were tangled around them, a beautiful mess that mirrored the way their lives had finally intertwined.

As Y/N’s eyes fluttered open, she found him already watching her with an intensity that made her heart skip. Before she could even whisper a "good morning," she felt his large, warm hand slide beneath the duvet.

"I told you I was going to be a vocal husband," he murmured, his voice thick with sleep and a newfound, playful hunger.

His fingers found her breast, his palm cupping the weight of her as his thumb began a rhythmic, teasing swirl over her nipple. Y/N let out a soft, sleepy gasp, her cheeks instantly deepening into that familiar, beautiful crimson.

"Jungkook... it's morning," she breathed, her voice small.

"It's the first morning," he corrected, leaning down until his nose brushed against hers. He looked down at her chest, watching the way her nipple budded and hardened instantly under his touch. He let out a low, needy sound—almost like a pout. "And I think I’ve been deprived for far too long. I feel like a baby who’s been denied his favorite thing. Do you think I could just... stay here all day? Right here?"

He didn't wait for an answer. He lowered his head, his mouth replacing his thumb. He began to suckle and swirl his tongue over her, his movements slow and deliberate. He was being "needy" in the most masculine, desperate way possible, his hands never leaving her skin.

"You taste like the brownies you made," he whispered against her skin, his breath hot and damp. "Sweet. Addictive. I think I’m going to have a very hard time going to work today, Princess. Or ever."

As he worshiped her chest, his other hand drifted down, disappearing beneath the sheets to find the soft, sensitive area he had spent the night exploring. He didn't just touch; he played. His fingers brushed over her with a teasing, light-as-air pressure that made her hips buck instinctively against him.

"Look at you," he chuckled, looking up at her with a wicked, flirty glint in his eyes. "So shy last night, but your body remembers exactly what I like. Are you trying to seduce your husband before he’s even had his coffee? Because it’s working. I’m dropping for you again, and it’s all your fault."

"It is not my fault!" Y/N laughed, reaching out to swat at his shoulder, though her hand ended up lingering on his bicep, feeling the hard, solid strength of him.

"Oh, it definitely is," he countered, his hand down below picking up the pace, his fingers finding her slick and ready for him once more. "You made the room pink. You wore the lace. You made me lose my mind, Y/N. Now you have to deal with the consequences of having a husband who never wants to let you out of this bed."

He leaned up, capturing her lips in a deep, messy morning kiss. The "dirty" talk was replaced by a soft, genuine laugh as he pulled her closer, his heart beating a steady, happy rhythm against hers. The house was quiet, the minimalist oak furniture stood still, but inside the rose-gold sheets, a new, vibrant life had truly begun.

"I love you, my beautiful, vocal husband," she whispered against his lips.

"And I love my perfect, sweet wife," he replied, his hand continuing its playful, desperate worship. "Now, let's see if we can make those neighbors wonder why we're so happy this morning."

a/n : Writing this has been a dream; it’s the exact kind of heavy romance I’ve always wanted to see. The insane response to the teasers within 24 hours kept me fueled to make this as long and detailed as possible! I apologize for mentioning the 10,000-word count, but I removed unnecessary sentences when I revised the chapter. Anyways this update is dedicated to:

- My "Ink without name" lovers: To everyone who has supported my fics from the start—your comments and love mean the world to me. This one is for you.

- My Sister: For being my constant sounding board and being there through every plot twist😙. (Including my life twists🥹) AND I LOVE YOU FOR EVERYTHING. THANK YOU FOR THE IDEA of arranged marriage and i hope you are blushing in your room ☺️🫶🏻 @amorsarasstuff

- Aery berry: For the immense love and unwavering support you’ve shown me. You are a gem! 💎 Aery is the ultimate "Writer’s Muse"—the kind of reader every author dreams of having in their corner. When someone is that consistent and that genuinely sweet, it’s not just a review; it’s a lifeline. To be completely honest, sometimes I stare at a blank screen and think: 'What could I possibly write that is worthy of the heart Aery pours into her reviews?' Aery, your consistency is actually insane. You have never left a chapter behind. You aren't just a reader; you are the sole fuel in my engine🥺🫶🏻 @mikrokookiex

…

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[skzhotpot]

Oh my, how precious this couple is. Pure devotion coming out of every carefully chosen word. I was so absorbed in their incredibly special moment

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[skzhotpot]

Ellie’s NCT Dream Recs (part 2)

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Huang Renjun

One-shots

Oreo Cream (Double Stuffed) by @sluttyten (ft. Xiao Dejun)

Back to Friends by @sincerelyneo

Lee Jeno

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The Short Stop by @yutaholic (1/6 Smashing the Six Series)

Step On a Crack, Dr. Lee’s Gonna Break Your Back by @guanana

Next Door by @neochan

Hell Hath No Fury by @jl-micasea-fics

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Homebound to You by @sourrpatched

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Go Go Juice by @sincerelyneo

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Wish List by @sincerelyneo

Sniff by @guanana

Zhong Chenle

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When Did You Get Hot? by @sincerelyneo

Training Wheels by @sincerelyneo

[muniimyg]

*ੈ εつ‧₊ ctrl+alt+delete // jjk ₊‧ εつ ੈ*

the twt war between youtuber jungkook and onlyfans oc

m.list // mini m.list // smau m.list

kimi's note ૮₍ ˃ ⤙ ˂ ₎ა nsfw is applied in all my content + fluff , angst , and crack .

— info

· strangers to enemies to lovers

· smau + written

— parts

01 · 02 · 03 · 04 · 05 · 06 · 07 · 08 · 09 · 10 · 11 · 12 · 13 · 14 · 15 · 16 · 17 · 18 · 19 · 20 · 21 · 22 · 23 · 24 · 25 · 26 · 27 · 28 · 29 · 30 end .

˗ˏˋ© 2025 muniimyg on tumblrˎˊ˗

[skzhotpot]

Hehehehehehehehe they ended up SO DOWN BAD 🥵🥵

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[memoiresofaneternaldreamer]

Sins and Sundays

Pairing: Lord! Mingyu x Reverend’s daughter! F. Reader

Themes: Smut | Angst | Regency AU | Opposites Attract | Rake vs Saint | Forbidden Romance | Religious Control | Found Family | Inspired by 'Bridgerton' | T.W.: mentions of arranged marriage, punishments, public humiliation, physical violence, whipping, abuse of power

Wordcount: 62.4K (Yikes!)

Smut Warnings: Explicit sexual acts - Masturbation (M. Solo) - Unprotected intercourse - Slight breast play - Oral (F. and M. Receiving) - PIV - Cowgirl - Implied virginity (Periodical context) - Use of petnames

Second part of the series ‘The House of Carat’.

This story is intended for an adult audience only. Minors do not interact.

The bell calls you to holiness the way a chain calls a prisoner to roll-call.

The sound threads through the stone and the polished wood and the careful bodies gathered inside—threading through bonnets and black coats, through gloved hands folded over obedient paper, through the quiet that is not peace but performance. It is a bell that does not invite so much as it summons, a sound that has always meant be good, be seen, be still, and you answer it the way you have been trained to answer every call that comes with God’s name tied around it. You sit where you are placed, the way you have always sat, beside the man the parish calls Reverend Marlowe with the same reverence they reserve for Scripture itself.

You are his best passage.

Your collar is pinned high enough to make the shape of your throat feel like a secret—high enough that swallowing feels like a challenge, like you are not meant to forget that even breath can be controlled. Your sleeves are tidy. Your wrists are still. Your hands rest together, pale and proper, as though they have never trembled around anything more dangerous than a teacup, as though they have never wanted to do anything at all. Your eyes are lowered on command—not because you are meek, not because you are shy, but because you have been trained to understand that looking is a kind of hunger, and hunger is the first sin.

Beside you, your father’s presence is a wall: tall, dark, cleanly cut, everything about him sharpened into righteousness. His Bible lies open on the lectern. He does not need to look at you to know you are behaving. He does not need to touch you to remind you what happens when you do not.

The church is full in the way churches are always full—less desperate than dutiful, more attentive to who is seen than to what is said. But your father has always enjoyed a certain kind of congregation: those who like their God respectable. Those who like their judgment refined. Those who whisper about sins the way they whisper about lace—softly, with delight, as though it is not cruelty at all. They have come to be reminded that they are better than someone. And your father—your father is very good at giving them a someone.

A sunbeam lays itself across the aisle, pale and uninvited, and for a brief moment it looks like an escape route. You do not move. Escape is a word that lives in novels and scandals and other people’s lives—not yours. Your life is built in measured steps and locked doors and the expectation that you will be grateful for your cage because it is gilded with praise.

In your palm, hidden by the fall of your sleeve, your beads press warmth into your skin. Red, small, smooth—carnelian stones strung on a thread strong enough to withstand the thousands of prayers your father has made you speak into it. He called it a rosary with the severe satisfaction of naming something useful. You think of it less as a holy thing and more as a tally of obedience. Tiny coals. Tiny counts. Tiny proof. Your thumb finds the next bead and turns it, turns it, turns it until the pressure becomes a low ache—until pain becomes the simplest kind of certainty, the only certainty you are allowed to own.

Around you, the parish settles: skirts sighing against pews, a cough politely disguised, the low rustle of hymnals opening like wings. A child fidgets; a mother stills him with a gentle hand. The small rebellions of bodies are corrected quietly. In your father’s church even restlessness has consequences. The organ settles into a hymn. The first notes rise, solemn and measured, as if even music must behave. The congregation rises and falls like the notes told them when to move, bodies trained into worship the way your body has been trained into decorum. You follow the motion precisely. You have always been good at precision. You have always been good at making the outside of you match the story everyone needs. Because you are a story. Because you are not allowed to be anything else.

Your father steps forward to begin, and the church breathes in as one body. His voice arrives the way winter arrives: without apology, without softness, making even warmth feel like a mistake. He does not speak to be heard; he speaks as if he is entitled to silence. “Beloved,” he begins, and the word does not sound like affection. It sounds like ownership.

You keep your gaze lowered. You keep your hands quiet. You keep your heartbeat where no one can see it—tucked behind bone and pinned beneath prayer, hidden like a shameful thing. Your father likes the illusion of serenity. He likes a congregation that believes discipline produces peace, not bruises. He reads, and the sound of Scripture unfurls through the nave. He reads from the Gospel of Matthew with the cadence of a man who believes he is not merely interpreting God’s word but enforcing it. “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction… Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life.”

The narrow way. The phrase sits in your muscles like a familiar bruise. He speaks of the wide gate the way other men speak of vice—half warning, half fascination. He describes temptation as if it is a living thing stalking the city, slipping into ballrooms and drawing rooms and bedrooms with its painted mouth and soft hands. He does not use the word desire as a human thing. He says it as a contagion. Your thumb moves along another bead.

He paces slowly, not because he needs to, but because movement keeps eyes on him; because the rhythm of his steps makes his sermon feel inevitable, like the Last Judgment approaching. He speaks of sin as though he has never tasted it, as though it is a smell he can detect on other people, the way a hound detects blood. “You will be tested,” he says, voice smoothing into certainty. “Not perhaps with hunger or poverty—no. The devil is not so crude with the well-fed.”

A ripple of discomfort moves through the pews, quickly disguised as attentiveness. He has struck a nerve, and the parish respects him for it, the way they respect a wound when it is inflicted on someone else. “You will be tested with opportunity,” he continues. “With novelty. With charm.” Charm. The word feels like it shouldn’t belong in a church at all, and yet it does, because your father understands something about the world: the most effective warnings are the ones that make people imagine what they are being told to fear.

Your father’s gaze sweeps the flock, and you feel it skim across every face, every secret, every careful lie. It passes over the men who look harmless in their restraint. It passes over the women whose devotion is measured by the severity of their smiles. It passes over you, and when it touches you, the whole church seems to straighten. Because you are the illustration he likes best. He pauses. Then he turns—deliberately, unhurriedly—and his hand lifts, palm open, a gesture that is almost gentle if one does not know what his gentleness costs. “Come,” he says. The word is not loud, but it is absolute.

Your stomach gives a small, obedient drop. Your beads shift between your fingers. You rise. The movement feels as though every eye of the parish hooks itself into you. You step into the aisle with grace, your skirt whispering over the stone. Your father’s hand extends, not to help you, but to guide the moment. He takes your wrist—lightly, properly—so the congregation can see the intimacy and mistake it for affection. His fingers are warm through your sleeve; his control is cold. He looks at them, voice deepening into pride dressed as piety. “This is my daughter,” he announces, and the word daughter lands like a title you did not choose. “Raised in discipline. Raised in prayer. Raised upon the narrow path.”

A murmur moves through the pews—approval, envy, hunger. Your father’s fingers tighten just a fraction at your wrist. A reminder. “She understands,” he says, “what the world has forgotten: that restraint is not cruelty. It is mercy.”

You stand at his side like a carved saint, posture perfect, face serene. The inside of you stays very, very quiet, because quiet is safer than truth. Your father tilts his head toward you as if inviting you to speak. The invitation is a command. “Recite,” he says softly.

Your throat tightens. Your mind reaches automatically, conditioned as breath, toward the verse he has made you say until it lived behind your teeth. You lift your eyes just enough to face forward—not to meet anyone’s gaze, but to look in the direction of the congregation without truly seeing them. You feel their attention like sunlight on skin. You inhale carefully. Then you speak, voice steady, neither too loud nor too small, a voice that has been trained to sound like devotion. “Proverbs 4:23 — Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.”

The verse leaves your mouth and settles over the pews. Keep thy heart. Keep it guarded. Keep it shut. Keep it obedient. Your father nods, satisfied. He turns to the congregation with the pleasure of a man displaying a flawless instrument. “Do you hear her?” he asks, as though you are not standing there as a person but rather as proof. “A young woman in a city determined to make daughters forget they have souls.”

A few ladies press handkerchiefs to their lips, touched by the performance. Your father’s hand slides from your wrist to your shoulder, a possessive blessing. “She does not ask what she wants,” he says, and you feel the words land in you like pebbles. “She asks what is right.” He looks down at you, finally, and there is no tenderness in it—only assessment. “Is that not so?” You answer because you must. “Yes, Father.”

The congregation hears obedience. They do not hear the quiet scraping inside your ribs. They do not see the way your thumb, hidden against your palm, presses a bead so hard it hurts. They do not see the flinch you swallow, the breath you control, the fire you smother beneath layers of performance. Your father’s smile is small, collected, reassuring. “The narrow path,” he repeats, and the church murmurs as if reciting a prayer.

He guides you back to your seat with the same light touch. You sit as you are placed. You fold your hands. You lower your eyes. Only when your body is safely back in its assigned stillness does your heartbeat begin to thud again, as if the performance has loosened something inside you that refuses to return to perfect quiet. Your thumb finds the bead again. Press. Turn. Ache.

Your father continues as if nothing happened, as if he did not just use you like a parable. He speaks of women and virtue without saying the word woman because the implication is always there—folded into every line, stitched into every warning. Their purity becomes, in his mouth, a garment that must remain spotless—white fabric held up to the light, inspected for the smallest stain. He speaks of the world outside these walls as mud waiting at the threshold, of certain men as the street itself: slick, tempting, careless with consequence. Men drawn to vice, men who make ruin look like entertainment, men who carry charm the way others carry prayer. He does not name anyone. He does not have to. His followers readily supply faces; it is one of their favourite pursuits.

Behind you, a lady rustles her skirts and settles more comfortably, as though the sermon has given her permission to be interested. She leans toward her companion, and the whisper slips out—thin as ribbon, sharp as a pin, soft enough to pretend it is not there. “It is said he has returned,” she murmurs. Her friend answers with a quiet thrill, the kind people reserve for scandal they can pretend to condemn. “From Wrotham. The second Ashbourne brother. The one who—oh, you know—” A small pause. A shared smile. “—never learned to behave.”

You do not turn your head. You have learned how to hear without appearing to listen. You have learned how to let gossip wash past your face without changing it. The art of not reacting is one of the first disciplines your father taught you—because reaction invites interrogation, and interrogation invites punishment. The name arrives a second later. “Mingyu.”

Ashbourne. A house with too many sons and too much attention. Not the Viscount. Not the one who has been steadied by marriage and a wife who fits beside him as though she has always belonged there. A brother. The one London has not watched grow proper under its eyes. The one who has been elsewhere—long enough for “elsewhere” to become a story people tell when they are bored of their own lives. Notorious, perhaps. Reckless, perhaps. Or merely ungoverned in a city that worships governance.

Your father’s voice tightens. “There are those,” he says, “who believe the wide path is freedom.” He lets the word sit there, bait for the foolish. “They mistake indulgence for liberty. They mistake sin for life.”

Your stomach makes a small, traitorous turn. It is not a romantic flutter. It is not girlish nonsense. It is something older and uglier and more honest: a momentary, instinctive hunger for difference. For anything that is not measured and scheduled and contained. For a day that does not repeat itself endlessly. The hunger appears and you hate it immediately, because you have been trained to hate yourself for starving. Your thumb tightens around the bead. Shame rises quick and hot, a familiar burn, and you do what you have always been taught to do when your mind strays: you take up Scripture like a lash. “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God… But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.”

The words flare behind your lowered eyes like a warning painted on the inside of your skull.

Your father continues, his gaze sweeping the congregation, taking inventory of every bowed head and folded hand. It passes over the young—girls with bright eyes, boys with restless knees—and you can feel the weight of his attention settle on that collective youth like a warning. “All children of the Lord,” he continues, and the words are broad enough to include everyone while still somehow feeling aimed at you, “must understand this: the enemy does not begin with ruin. He begins with permission.”

Permission. A shiver goes through you that has nothing to do with cold. Permission is what you have never been granted. Permission is what your life has been built to deny. Permission is the closed door you press your palm against in the dark, not even daring to knock—because you have been taught that wanting the other side is proof of wickedness.

Your father lifts his hands once more, gesturing outward—toward the whole room, toward every obedient posture like it is an altar he has built himself. “We are blessed to live in a world where the narrow path is still visible, still walkable, still—by God’s grace—chosen.”

Chosen. As if choice is not a luxury. As if the narrow path is not a corridor with the doors nailed shut. He continues, his sermon widening like a net. “The flesh is weak,” he speaks. “And so we must be vigilant. We must be disciplined. We must be obedient.”

Discipline. Vigilance. Obedience. The three words you have carried since childhood—three stones in your pocket, dragging at you no matter how carefully you walk.

Your father’s gaze drifts again—slow, inevitable—and though you do not lift your head, you feel it find you anyway. He does not need to speak your name this time. The congregation does not need him to. They know who sits beside him. They know what you are meant to represent. You refuse to meet his attention. You fix your stare on the grain of the pew in front of you and pretend you are simply listening like everyone else. But your mind does what it always does when he speaks of discipline: it opens a memory you have spent years trying not to touch.

Your knees bare against wood—no cushion allowed, your father insisting comfort makes sinners soft. Candlelight trembling on the wall, making the shadows look like they are moving closer. Your father’s voice above you, patient and relentless, guiding you through verses the way a man guides a blade along a whetstone. Again, he had repeated. Again. Again. Your hands clasped so tightly your fingers ached. Your throat raw from repetition. Your head bowed until your neck burned, because lifting it would have meant defiance, and defiance was always punished first by silence, and then by something worse. You remember the way he corrected the smallest things—your posture, your breath, the angle of your hands—as if even the shape of prayer could be sinful if not performed properly. And then his voice, soft beside your ear, the most intimate kind of threat: “If you cannot govern your thoughts, you will never govern your life.”

The memory closes again as quickly as it opens, but it leaves heat behind it—shame, yes, but also something cramped and furious that you do not have words for in this place. A refusal that cannot surface because refusal would be the end of everything you have been permitted to be.

Your father’s voice continues. “Some believe temptation is obvious. That it arrives loud, vulgar, easily refused. But temptation is more often polite.” A pause. “It is dressed well. It speaks pleasantly. It makes you laugh. It makes you feel—” He stops there, as though the idea of feeling itself is something dangerous. Then, with controlled calm: “—entitled.”

You feel bodies shift in the room. You feel people thinking of ballrooms, of charming men, of the city beyond these walls. You feel, too, the way your father’s gaze returns to you, as if he is checking that you are absorbing the lesson properly. Your mind reaches for verse the way it reaches for breath. “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

You keep your posture perfect. But beneath it all, beneath the hymn and the stone and your father’s steady voice, you feel the weight of expectation settle onto you again, the way other girls might feel the weight of a lover’s hand—heavy, constant, shaping you.

Another whisper rings out behind you, and this one carries the kind of delighted disgust the parish does best. “They say he is a scandal in fine tailoring.” A suppressed laugh answers, quickly smothered into a cough. “Unserious. Immoral. And pretty enough to make women forget their prayers.”

The words should disgust you. Your father has taught you that they should. Your father has taught you that a man like that is a trap with a smile. And yet—curiosity pricks at you before you can stop it, a spark landing on dry kindling. You feel it, immediately, like wrongdoing. Like heat in a place there should be only calm. Shame rushes in to stamp it out. You repeat Scripture in your mind as correction, as penance, as self-violence dressed as invocation. “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God… But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.”

You roll the next bead under your thumb and then the next, until sensation returns you to the only safe truth: pain you can control.

Your father leans into the second part of his lectern, his voice lowering, as if he is sharing something intimate. “The devil does not need force,” he declares. “He needs only permission.” The ripples of his words travel through you silently, so no one can see the disturbance. Your father speaks of freedom like it is a lie men sell to women who are too hungry to see the cost. “Freedom is not the absence of restraint,” he says. “Freedom is the presence of righteousness.”

The church breathes in rhythm with your father’s authority. He returns again and again to the same axis—sin and temptation, restraint and righteousness—circling it like a hawk, as if repetition can hammer obedience deeper. “Abstain from all appearance of evil.”

He glances at the congregation, then at you, and in that glance, you understand the real sermon is not for them. It is for you. It is always for you. You are praised publicly because praise is a leash. Because being called virtuous makes it harder to disappoint them. Because being called pure turns any desire into disgrace. Your father’s mouth curves into satisfaction. “We are living in a city that worships indulgence.”

A murmur of agreement. A shared sense of superiority from those who indulge privately and condemn publicly. He continues, “London offers a thousand wide gates.”

The way he says it makes the city sound like a woman with her dress loosened, waiting to ruin men. You picture the streets outside the church—carriages, footmen, silk, mud, laughter. London, alive. London, immense. London, full of things you have never been permitted to taste. And then you picture your home: controlled, quiet, grey. Your father’s study. Your prayer kneeler. Your window that looks out but never invites you to step through. You think of the wide gate and you hate yourself for wondering, for even a moment, what it looks like. “For the wages of sin is death.”

The line rises in your mind reflexively. Death. But you have been living a kind of death for years—breathing and smiling and obeying while everything in you that wants to run beats itself bloody against the inside of your ribs.

The service moves like it always does: measured, orderly, unavoidable. You stand when you should stand. You kneel when you should kneel. You bow your head the way you have bowed it since girlhood, a motion so practised it feels like part of your being. The stone beneath your knees is cool through the fabric of your dress.

There is something in you, buried deep, that is not meek. It is not shy. It is not a plant. It is a flame. It is a want that has never had a name that wasn’t condemned. You keep it hidden because you have learned what happens when it shows. You have learned the way your father’s disappointment feels like punishment even before the true punishment begins. You have learned the weight of his silence. You have learned the hours, the recitations, the bare knees, the prayers repeated until your mouth goes numb and your mind goes hollow. And yet—somewhere inside you, something still burns. Not for romance, not for love as the ton likes to pretend it believes in, not for a husband’s approval. For life. For the sensation of choosing a direction and moving in it. For a day that is not prewritten like your father’s sermons. For a breath that belongs to you. That is what you want. That is what you do not say.

When the final prayer is spoken, the congregation rises as if released. You rise too, smoothing your skirt. Your father closes his Bible with finality. People turn, smiling, murmuring, gathering themselves into their social shapes. Church, here, is not only worship—it is theatre. It is a place to be seen being good. And you are the best actress.

Your father’s hand touches the small of your back, guiding you into the aisle. You walk beside him at an exact pace—half a step back, never beside him. A daughter, not a companion. An ornament, not an equal.

Outside, in the churchyard, faces brighten at your father’s approach. They gather like moths to a flame they do not understand is burning them. At the doors, the ritual begins: parishioners lined in polite order, offering thanks, offering praise, offering themselves as good people who listen to good sermons.

Your father stands at the threshold like a gatekeeper. You stand a pace behind—close enough to be displayed, far enough to remain secondary. A woman steps forward first, all pearls and propriety. “Reverend Marlowe,” she greets, voice syrupy with approval. Your father inclines his head. “Lady Henshaw.” He says her title precisely. He is always precise. Her gaze flicks to you, and her smile grows brighter. “Your words were bracing,” she says.

“Truth should brace,” your father replies. Lady Henshaw’s eyes linger on your collar, your posture, your hands. “And your daughter,” she adds, “is a blessing. Such a picture.” A picture. Yes. That is what you are.

Your father’s hand settles on your shoulder. “She is devoted,” he says, and the words sound like a boast. Lady Henshaw sighs, pleased. “The narrow path, indeed.”

You can feel her assessing you the way one assesses a gown: the cut, the fit, the expense. You can feel her measuring how useful your virtue might be to her own social story—how closely she should stand to it, how loudly she should praise it. Then, she turns her head slightly, leaning in as though sharing a prayer. “And to think,” she murmurs, “that such a city is about to welcome Mr. Ashbourne back into its arms.”

Your father’s jaw tightens. “The city will welcome any corruption if it is wrapped in charm,” he says. Lady Henshaw’s lips press together in pious agreement. “He is said to be… untamed,” she whispers, and the word sounds too pleased on her tongue. Your father’s gaze moves, briefly, across the churchyard—across the men, across the carriages, across the world you are not allowed to enter without supervision. “Then he should be avoided,” he says simply. Lady Henshaw’s eyes return to you, and there is a question in them—unspoken, but clear: Will she be avoided? Will she avoid?

Your father answers for you by tightening his hand at your shoulder, gentle enough for the world, hard enough for you. You smile, small and correct. You do not speak. You are the obedient daughter. You are the narrow path. You are the proof.

When the line thins, and the last hand has been shaken, and the last compliment has been received like a tithe, your father’s fingers slide from your shoulder to your forearm, stopping you with a quiet authority. The parish is still close enough to watch. Your father is aware of that the way he is aware of everything. “You did well,” he measures.

“Thank you, Father.” His gaze searches your face—not for emotion, but for deviation. “You will remember,” he says, “that the world admires ruin. It claps for it.” Your throat tightens. You keep your expression calm.

“Yes, Father.”

He nods slowly, satisfied you understand the lesson. “And you,” he adds, the gentleness turning sharper, “are not for applause.” Not for laughter. Not for charm. Not for men the parish whispers about with heat disguised as disgust. You bow your head the way he likes.

“No, Father.”

His thumb presses once—barely—into your elbow, right where your pulse beats. A reminder you cannot pretend not to feel. Then he releases you, and together you step away from the church doors.

The carriage ride home is quiet. Your father’s carriage is always quiet. Silence is his preferred atmosphere. Silence is where his authority breathes easiest. You sit opposite him with your hands folded in your lap, your beads hidden in your palm. The carnelian stones are warm from your skin, as if they have absorbed the heat you do not show. Outside, London moves. The city passes like a page you are not allowed to read: shopfronts, pedestrians, the brief flash of a painted sign, the clean curve of a bridge. The world is enormous. Your life is small.

Your father watches you without moving his head. He does not need to stare to make you feel seen. His presence alone is surveillance. At last, he speaks. “You heard them.” It is not a question. Your thumb stills on the bead. You do not make the mistake of pretending you did not understand. “I heard whispers.”

He leans back, folding his hands over his cane, the picture of composed authority. “The city loves to speak of sin as though it is entertainment,” he says.

“Yes, Father.”

“And you?”

The question slides under your collar, cold as a blade. Your throat tightens, but your voice does not waver. “I have no interest in such talk.” It is the correct answer. It is also a lie. Your father’s eyes narrow slightly, as if he can taste dishonesty in the air. “Curiosity is how the devil enters.”

The carriage rolls over a small unevenness in the street. Your rosary shifts in your palm. Your father’s voice continues. “Mr. Ashbourne is not for your notice.” Not for your notice. Not for your eyes. Not for your thoughts. Not for your life. “No, Father,” you agree.

He watches you a moment longer, then looks away, as though the matter is decided. But your mind—traitorous, alive—catches on the name again. Mingyu.

You imagine the way it might be spoken without disdain. You imagine the way it might be spoken with laughter. You imagine—briefly, dangerously—what it would feel like to be someone the parish whispered about with fascination instead of approval. Shame slams down again, quick and hard. You pray, not because you want to, but because you must. “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” The words taste like water poured over fire.

Your father’s carriage turns onto your street. The house rises ahead: neat, respectable, symmetrical—built like a sermon. Home is not loud, not warm, not cruel in obvious ways. Home is controlled. Home is schedules and measured footsteps and your father’s study door that never truly feels open. Home is servants who speak quietly because the reverend prefers his household to sound like a church.

You step inside, remove your gloves, hand your bonnet away, and move through the hallway like a ghost. Your father disappears into his study, as he always does after service, to write letters and plan lives that are not his to plan. You are guided upstairs by habit.

In your room, the air is still. Your bed is made with strict neatness. Your dresses hang like obedient bodies in the wardrobe. On your vanity sits a small Bible, a brush, and a bowl for pins. Everything in its place. You close the door behind you, and for a moment—one breath, one heartbeat—you let your shoulders loosen. Not collapse. Just loosen. It feels wicked.

You move to the window and look down at the street. Carriages pass. A pair of young women laugh as they step into a shop. A man hurries past with a bouquet tucked under his arm. There is motion everywhere. There is choice everywhere. And you are trapped behind glass.

Your fingers lift toward your collar, then stop. Even alone, you hesitate to undo anything without permission. That is what your father has built inside you: a warden that looks like your own hand. You lower your hand and instead bring your beads out fully, letting the rosary settle across your hand. The carnelian stones glow darkly in the light, like something alive. You count. One bead. One prayer. Two beads. Another prayer. The prayers are mechanical, memorised the way children memorise songs. But today, the words snag. Because behind them, behind the verses and the warnings, there is a whisper. A whisper that is not the parish. A whisper that is not your father. A whisper that is only you. Live.

Your breath shudders slightly, handled before it can become anything visible. You tell yourself the whisper is wicked. You tell yourself it is the flesh. You tell yourself it is the devil scratching at the door. But you have lived with your father’s voice in your head so long that sometimes you do not know where he ends and you begin.

If you want, you are bad. If you hunger, you are weak. If you imagine, you are already fallen. That is the equation your father has written into you. And yet—your thumb pauses on a bead, and your mind does something unbearable: It wonders what kind of man could make a parish whisper with such heat. It wonders what kind of life is so bright that even condemnation sounds like envy. It wonders what unserious feels like.

It wonders what it would be like to laugh without immediately paying for it. Your cheeks warm. You close your eyes, as if closing your eyes can close your mind. You press the beads to your lips—not in sweetness, but in desperation. “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

You open your eyes again. London continues outside. You remain inside.

You swallow the syllables like you swallowed the dullness in church. But unlike the dullness, the sensation does not disappear. And when you finally look down at your hands, you realise, with a small flare of horror, what you have done. The cord of your rosary has been wound around your fingers, loop after loop pulled tighter until it has cut into the soft skin at the base of your knuckle.

A bead of blood pools at the wound, round and glossy, and then it touches the carnelian stones—those tiny coals you have been counting—so that blood meets red bead, flesh meets symbol, and suddenly your devotion looks like something else entirely. You don’t let it fall. You don’t wipe it away. You simply watch it, breath shallow, as if even this small proof of your own body—this single, trembling bead of red—might betray you for wanting to live.

The first thing London asks of Mingyu Ashbourne is that he button himself up. He refuses it in the most intimate way imaginable—by dragging his travel shirt over his head in the tight, velvet-lined confines of the carriage, the fabric catching for the briefest moment upon his shoulders before it yields and leaves him bare-chested in the half-light: all warm skin and careless confidence, with the faintest bruise of road-wear where a collar has rubbed him raw.

The coach is too small for three grown men and one Soonyoung, and yet somehow Soonyoung contrives to occupy the greater share of it—knees angled out, hands everywhere, laughter loaded behind his teeth like a musket awaiting a spark. Wonwoo sits opposite with the composed patience of a man long resigned to being outnumbered by disaster. Jeonghan reclines as though he has been poured into the cushions, not even pretending to be surprised. He studies Mingyu’s bare torso with exaggerated solemnity, as if inspecting a scandal for flaws. “Saints preserve us,” Jeonghan drawls, voice slick as syrup. “If you undress any slower, the footmen shall begin charging admission.”

Soonyoung’s laugh bursts out—cheerful, uncontained, the sort of laugh that makes respectable men forget they are meant to frown. “Let them!” Soonyoung says. “We’ll make a fortune. Mingyu, do it again. For art.”

Wonwoo’s hand appears with a folded shirt before the chaos may become a carnival—crisp linen, London-approved, the colour of propriety itself. “Put this on,” Wonwoo says, flat as a verdict. “Or at the very least stop flexing like you’re trying to seduce the upholstery.”

Mingyu catches the shirt with an easy hand and an easier smile, and there it is—what London recalls of him; what London forgives in him; what London uses as proof that charming men are permitted to be dangerous: sunlight, trouble, laughter that makes people soften against their will. He shakes his hair back from his brow as though he has nowhere to be hurried to, no one waiting to weigh him, and then he leans forward to draw the London-approved shirt over his head. It is crisp where his travel clothes have been softened; proper where foreign habits have grown lax. The collar settles at his throat like a polite hand. It does not, however, alter the fact that he is Mingyu.

He fastens the buttons with the same carelessness he brings to everything that matters too much—quick, neat, rehearsed—as if making himself presentable is only part of the joke. The carriage wheels roll over Mayfair stone. The rhythm of the city changes. Even the air beyond the window feels altered—thicker with expectation, thinner with mercy.

Jeonghan watches him with the lazy interest of a brother who knows every mask Mingyu owns and which ones crack first. “You are late to your own reputation,” he says. “London has been insufferably bored without you.”

Soonyoung leans in, elbows upon his knees, eyes bright. “How many days, do you think, before someone writes a poem about Mingyu Ashbourne ruining a debutante with nothing but his smile?”

Wonwoo’s mouth makes the smallest movement—almost a smile, then thinks better of it. “It will not be a poem,” he says. “It will be a warning.”

Mingyu secures the last button and tilts his head, pleased. His grin is a currency he has never yet been refused. “Warnings are still literature,” he says. “Let them write.” He says it as though he means it—as though nothing may reach him through ink. Yet the truth sits under his ribs: London’s writing has always been sharper than any knife, and his name is a favourite blade.

The carriage turns. Through the window, Ashbourne Hall rises—townhouse proud and dark against the pale sky, its front steps swept clean as though the very building has learned to fear judgment. Footmen await direction, lanterns await their lighting. Everything about the house is designed to appear effortless, and everything about the house is labour. Mingyu exhales as though he has come home and also as though he has walked back into a trap. “Smile,” Jeonghan murmurs. “You know they’ll be watching.” Mingyu’s grin widens, because that is the game. And he is excellent at games.

The carriage slows. Somewhere outside, a woman laughs too loudly; a man’s voice answers; the city hums with its endless appetite. Mingyu draws in a breath and lets it go, slowly—an old habit learned abroad, where breath was the only thing a man could control without paying for it. Then the carriage stops, and the footman opens the door, and Mayfair’s gaze finds him.

Ashbourne Hall is louder now than it used to be, and it has nothing to do with the number of brothers under its roof. It is a subtler alteration—an adjusted gravity, a new centre of warmth. It is the Viscount. It is the new Viscountess. Even before Mingyu sees them, he feels the difference their presence makes in how the house moves around itself. The air holds a new kind of certainty, as though the household has been reminded it is not merely enduring life but directing it.  

Mingyu’s boots cross the threshold. The door closes behind him with a finality that feels almost ceremonial. He is met with the familiar flurry—footmen taking coats, an elderly butler feigning indifference whilst plainly relieved, the faint echo of laughter drifting down from somewhere higher. Joshua crosses the entrance like a constellation: with a ledger tucked beneath one arm, already half inside Carat & Co. And then Seungcheol appears.

Not the Seungcheol of whispered grief and clenched strategy, not the one London has watched with hungry suspicion—the new Viscount, cut into his title like stone into a signet. He moves like a man who has learned where to place his authority. Like a man who has ceased apologising for the space he occupies. His gaze catches Mingyu’s. There is something like relief there—quick, undeniable—before it becomes composure again.

And at Seungcheol’s side—Lady Whitlock. His brother’s wife. Not a rumour, not a wedding portrait, not a gossip column’s attempt at poetry. She stands with her shoulders back and her chin level, wearing her title not as though she was born to it, but as though she decided it would be hers and dared anyone to contest it. There is nothing fragile about her. Nothing simpering. Her kindness is not soft; it is deliberate. Her attention is not scattered; it is exact. She looks at Mingyu as though she has already counted him into the family’s heartbeat. And Mingyu—who has always lived as the youngest brother, the spare laugh, the pretty problem—recognises her with the sudden, unsettling clarity of a boy who has always known what he lacked. Not a mother. Not a governess. A sister. A woman who will not treat him like a liability to be managed, but a person to be understood.

She steps forward—not with the grand flourish of a new bride playing her part, but with a grace that suggests she has been learning their habits and adjusting herself without losing herself. “You have returned in one piece,” she says, and the smile that accompanies it is small but true—no performance for the servants, no pious sweetness for the world. Mingyu bows, because manners are easier than feelings. “I make everything look accidental,” he replies.

Seungcheol’s hand settles at the small of her back—so unconsciously protective it is nearly an admission. Like he is reminding himself she exists. Like he cannot bear a room without her in it. Mingyu has seen men love women, of course. He has watched it in taverns and upon bridges, in theatres and in foreign streets. He has watched it in the way husbands call their wives “my dear” whilst looking elsewhere. But this—this is different. This is Seungcheol with his edges softened in the one place he never used to. This is Seungcheol looking at his wife as though strategy finally met devotion and lost. Lady Whitlock’s hand lifts to Seungcheol’s sleeve, fingers resting there briefly—a quiet correction, a quiet calm. As if she is reminding him he need not carry everything alone. As if she is teaching him a new way to stand in a room. Mingyu feels something in his chest tighten.

He laughs instead, because laughter is his first language and his safest. “Should I congratulate you,” he says to Seungcheol, “or apologise to London?” Seungcheol’s mouth curves, barely. “Both,” he says. Lady Whitlock’s eyes brighten with amusement, and for a heartbeat, Ashbourne Hall feels less a fortress than a home. It is disorienting. Mingyu detests disorientation. He lives in it anyway.

A servant takes Mingyu’s gloves. Another takes Soonyoung’s hat. Jeonghan charms the butler with a compliment delivered like a bribe. Wonwoo inclines his head at Lady Whitlock the way he inclines his head at very few people. Lady Whitlock’s gaze follows each brother in turn—like she is understanding their angles, their weaknesses, the places where they fray. And when her eyes return to Mingyu, there is the same unasked question: who are you when you are not performing?

Mingyu brightens his smile like a lantern being lit. “We are home,” he declares. Soonyoung throws an arm around him at once. “Home!” he echoes, delighted. “Which means—”

“Don’t,” Wonwoo says immediately. Jeonghan’s grin turns wicked. “—we ought to celebrate,” he finishes for Soonyoung, eyes fixed on Mingyu like a promise. Seungcheol exhales through his nose, the long-suffering sound of an eldest brother who has learned command is often only a suggestion. Lady Whitlock, impossibly, smiles. “You will come to dinner first,” she says, and it is not a question; it is a command placed gently into chaos. Mingyu’s instinct is to rebel. He does not. Not because he is obedient—God, no—but because her tone is not his father’s tone, nor society’s. It is not a leash. It is an invitation to belong. That, Mingyu thinks, is far more perilous than rules.

Dinner is a glittering thing even within the family dining room.

Candlelight makes the silverware look almost liquid, pouring gold along the edges of plates and goblets. The long table is dressed like a stage—linen stretched smooth, crystal glittering in flashes—yet it does not feel cold. Not tonight. Not with the house full, not with laughter threading itself between courses.

The first course arrives: a clear soup, pale and steaming, ladled with reverence; warm bread set in a basket lined with cloth; butter shaped into neat curls that look too pretty to touch. Everything is proper in the way propriety loves—restrained, polished—until the brothers make a gentle ruin of it simply by being themselves.

Soonyoung eats like a man who has spent too long in the country air—too hungry, too joyful, too unbothered by the fact that forks were invented to slow people down. He tears into his bread as though it has personally offended him, talking between bites, laughing at his own jokes, and Jeonghan—ever delighted by any breach of decorum—encourages it with the kind of smile that could start a war and blame it on charm. “You’re meant to wait,” Wonwoo remarks, watching Soonyoung butter a slice. Soonyoung blinks, genuinely confused. “Wait for what?”

“For shame,” Jeonghan supplies, and lifts his glass as if toasting it. Joshua makes a soft sound that is half-laugh, half-sigh, the sort of sound that smooths the moment. He steers the conversation with an easy gentleness—asking Wonwoo about the book he’s been seen reading, asking Soonyoung whether he truly means to scandalise the cook by requesting seconds before the fish course has even arrived. Wonwoo answers in spare sentences that somehow still feel full—like he has chosen each word for its weight. When he does speak, it isn’t loud, but it turns heads anyway, simply because he never wastes air. Jeonghan keeps the room warm the way a hearth keeps a house warm: not by being earnest, but by being impossible to ignore. He leans back in his chair, loose-limbed, telling some ridiculous story from the road—painting it with flourishes, making even the footman pause at the edge of the room too long, forgetting his invisibility because Jeonghan’s laughter feels like permission.

The second course shifts the table: fish set upon greens, lemon cut and placed like a bright accent; then a roast brought in, the meat carved, the gravy poured like indulgence. A bowl of potatoes, crisp at the edges; carrots glazed; something dark and sweet set in a small silver dish that Soonyoung eyes in temptation. “If Father could see you,” Wonwoo murmurs, watching Soonyoung reach for the sweet dish again. Soonyoung pauses, spoon mid-air. “Which father?” Jeonghan’s grin turns wicked. “Any of them.”

Joshua clears his throat like a gentle warning. “Eat,” he says. “But do not die.” Soonyoung beams as though this is endorsement. Mingyu takes his wine and lets it sit on his tongue, the taste rounding out the edges of the day. He listens to their voices overlap until it feels less like a dining room and more like a living thing.

At the head of it all sits Seungcheol, and Mingyu cannot decide if it is startling or inevitable how well the position suits him now. Seungcheol does not have to raise his voice to command the room. He simply looks, and the room understands. Yet he laughs, too—small, rare, real—when Soonyoung tells a story badly and insists it is brilliant. He corrects Jeonghan with a single glance that says, “Do not push your luck”, and Jeonghan looks delighted by it, as if being chastised by an eldest brother is its own intimate amusement. And then there is Lady Whitlock.

She sits at Seungcheol’s right, not like an ornament placed to be admired, but like the spine of a book that has always belonged on this shelf. The candles throw soft light along the line of her cheek, catch the gleam of her onyx wedding ring when she lifts her glass, and Mingyu sees, in the smallest gestures, how she alters the house around her.

She watches Joshua when he speaks—not with the cool, appraising gaze of someone taking measure, but with something gentler: a kind of respect that settles. As if she knows how he redirects without making anyone feel corrected, how he makes space for the quiet ones to remain quiet without being swallowed by louder ones. Her attention moves to Soonyoung with fond indulgence, yes—but it is more than humour. There is warmth there, the sort reserved for souls too bright to be dulled and too loyal to be doubted. When Soonyoung eats too fast, she does not scold; she simply slides the breadbasket closer, as if offering him the comfort of abundance.

When she glances at Wonwoo, it is quieter still—respectful, careful. She does not demand he speak more; she allows him the dignity of silence without treating it as rudeness. When Wonwoo does speak, she listens as though she expects his words to matter. Jeonghan earns her amusement easily—he always does—but even there, her smile has a watchfulness beneath it, the knowing look of a woman who understands that charm can be both a gift and an edge.

And when her gaze finally turns to Mingyu, it does not land like judgment. It lands like curiosity. Not curious about his scandals. Curious about him. It is the worst sort of curiosity: the kind that might see through him. So Mingyu does what he always does when people draw too near the part of him that aches. He performs.

He offers stories of travel as though they are nothing more than caricatures. He paints foreign cities in bright strokes—sunlit harbours, crowded taverns, women who laughed and taught him new ways to sin. He boasts about escapades like trophies rather than distractions. Jeonghan eggs him on with a grin. Soonyoung howls with delight. Even Joshua’s mouth quirks once, reluctantly. Lady Whitlock listens with the tolerance of someone who knows when a man is charming because he is pleased, and when he is charming because he is afraid.

At one point, Mingyu mentions Greece offhandedly, as though it is merely another place where he was adored and fed and forgiven. But when he says it, he feels the sea again: salt upon his lips, sun upon his shoulders, the ache of a horizon that asks nothing of him. Lady Whitlock’s head tilts. “You speak of it as though you miss it,” she says. Mingyu’s smile remains. Something beneath it shifts. “I miss being unknown,” he answers—too honest, by accident. The table stills.

Seungcheol’s gaze flicks to him sharply. Joshua’s brows lift slightly. Wonwoo’s eyes go quiet. Jeonghan’s smile softens a fraction, as though he has seen the crack before. Soonyoung looks between them, sensing the mood the way a dog senses thunder. Lady Whitlock does not flinch. She does not pity him. She does not chastise. She nods as though she understands. “Unknown is a kind of rest,” she says. Mingyu laughs quickly, covering the moment as one might cover a flame with a hand. “If rest were what I sought,” he says lightly, “I should become a clergyman.”

Jeonghan makes a delighted sound. “Can you imagine?”

Soonyoung’s eyes widen, theatrical. “Mingyu in a pulpit? He would flirt with the choir.”

Wonwoo deadpans, “He would flirt with God.”

Mingyu bows his head, mock-humble. “I have always been drawn to unattainable things.”

Seungcheol cuts in. “You may cease attempting to shock her,” he says, nodding toward his wife. “It will not succeed.”

Mingyu’s brows lift. “That sounds like a challenge.”

Lady Whitlock sips her wine and replies, very calmly, “If you shock me, Mr. Ashbourne, I shall reward you.” Soonyoung chokes on laughter. Jeonghan claps as though the room were a theatre. Joshua looks down at his plate like he is trying not to smile. Wonwoo’s mouth does that almost-smile again and abandons it. Mingyu feels his grin widen. “A reward,” he repeats. “I have always been motivated by praise.”

Seungcheol’s hand finds Lady Whitlock’s beneath the table—an unconscious tether—and Mingyu watches it like he is watching a language he does not speak. He clears his throat, brightens his smile, throws another story into the air. He does not mention that every time he leaves a woman’s bed, he feels colder than when he arrived. He does not mention that laughter may be armour and also a prison. He does not mention that he has never known what he is for.

When dinner ends, London waits outside with its open mouth.

Soonyoung is already standing. “We are going out,” he declares, as though the city belongs to him. Wonwoo’s gaze flicks toward Mingyu. “Try not to break anything important.” Jeonghan takes Mingyu’s arm, leading him toward the door. “Only his heart,” Jeonghan says, and smiles as though he knows precisely where Mingyu keeps it hidden. Lady Whitlock watches them go with fond exasperation—the sort of expression a woman wears when she has adopted a houseful of trouble and chosen to love it anyway. Seungcheol’s eyes follow Mingyu one beat too long. A warning and a plea in one. Mingyu lifts two fingers in a salute. “I shall be good,” he calls. And then he laughs, because even he does not believe it.

Mayfair at night is a different religion. It is lit by gas and gossip. It is worshipped with coin and consequence. Men in tailored coats spill out of clubs and into the street. Carriages glide like sharks in water. Laughter blooms and dies behind curtained windows. Mingyu takes to it like a man returning to a vice he never truly quit.

Soonyoung leads them first, hungry for noise—somewhere loud enough that no one may hear a thought. A tavern, then a private room above it, then another place with quieter doors and louder women. Mingyu buys drinks as though generosity were absolution. He flirts with a barmaid as though flirting were prayer. He winks at a married woman as though the world were a stage and he the only actor who knows his lines. He is unserious in the manner London expects. He makes it look effortless.

Men clap him on the back, delighted to have him back in rotation. Someone calls him a “sly dog” with affectionate envy. Someone else calls him “harmless” as though that were the category men like Mingyu should be grateful for. Harmless. As if it is not a carefully concealed insult. He laughs, because laughter keeps the word from clinging.

Soonyoung is deep in conversation with two girls who have no business being in this room unless they are business themselves—his hands moving as he speaks, his smile too bright to be anything but dangerous. Jeonghan has arranged a card game in a corner, and somehow looks as though he is winning before the first card is even dealt.

Mingyu tells a story about an Ottoman dock and a woman with a knife tucked into her boot, and the room roars. He embellishes it—of course he does. He turns danger into comedy, turns loneliness into applause. What he does not tell them is the moment after, when the laughter died, and he stood alone upon the dock and felt the sea wind cut through him. He does not tell them about the nights abroad when he lay awake and listened to silence, wondering whether he might ever be missed in any manner that mattered. He does not tell them he came home because he was tired of being a story without an ending. Instead, he leans close to a woman with too-red lips and says something that makes her giggle, and he lets her giggle become proof that he remains the man London wants.

Later—much later—he slips somewhere discreet, where the curtains are heavy and the women smile like professionals. He pays, because payment is simpler than promise. He returns to Ashbourne Hall before dawn with his collar slightly askew and his grin still in place. The footman pretends not to observe. Mingyu pretends not to be lonely.

Morning arrives with bright light and no mercy, and if Mingyu were a different sort of man—if he were Joshua, perhaps, or Seungcheol—he might spend the day in penance: tea, ledgers, careful conversation, the slow labour of being respectable. Mingyu spends it in preparation. A valet assaults him with linen and fuss, with the severe assumption that a cravat may keep a man from disgrace if tied tightly enough. Mingyu sits still only because Wonwoo is there, quietly watching, and Wonwoo’s patience is a rarer thing than affection in this family. Mingyu’s fingers drift toward a ring he does not wear—toward a necklace he does not possess—toward any talisman that might explain him to himself. He has none.

By afternoon, he wanders the ground floor of Ashbourne Hall like a visitor in his own inheritance—because it is not his inheritance, not truly. He pauses by the portrait gallery, not out of reverence, but habit. Faces stare down: men who owned their lives without apology; women who were owned and called it destiny. Mingyu looks at them and feels the familiar old ache: being adopted means your life begins with someone choosing you—and never letting you forget it. It is kindness. It is also a sentence.

He thinks of the Viscountess who raised them—formidable, terrifying, brilliant. The sort of woman who could turn boys into men through sheer force of expectation. The sort of woman who could love you and still make you feel love must be earned anew each day. He thinks of Seungcheol, now Viscount, now steadied by a wife who looks as though she was born to calm his storm. Mingyu thinks: And what am I?

The answer London gives him is immediate: trouble. Unreliable. Entertaining. Mingyu gives London what it wants because it is easier than asking for something else.

After dinner, Jeonghan appears at Mingyu’s shoulder like temptation dressed as a brother. “Cards,” he says simply. Mingyu’s eyes narrow. “You mean to ruin me.” Jeonghan smiles. “You are already ruined. I mean to make you wealthy.”

Wonwoo, passing by, pauses. “Try not to get robbed.” Soonyoung bounds down the stairs with the energy of a lit match. “May we be robbed?” he asks, hopeful. “I have never been robbed in Mayfair.” Mingyu points at him. “Give it time.” They go out into the night as though they own it.

The card room is private, polished, chosen for discretion—dark wood, low light, men who speak softly because they know power does not require volume. Haversham is there, lounging like a man who thinks bloodline absolves him of decency. Dalrymple as well—loud enough to be a nuisance, influential enough to be dangerous. They greet Mingyu like a returning toy. “Ashbourne!” Dalrymple booms. “Our wandering son! Come to lose money with grace?” Mingyu bows perfectly. “I only lose with style.”

Jeonghan slides into his seat like a fox into a henhouse. Wonwoo stands behind, watchful, shadowed. Mingyu sits opposite Haversham and smiles as though he has never been wounded by a room like this. Cards are dealt. Coins are stacked. Mingyu plays as he always does: recklessly, beautifully, as though losing cannot hurt. It is a lie, of course. Losing hurts. Winning hurts too. Everything hurts, if one is paying attention.

Haversham leans in at one point, voice low, eyes glittering. “Heard your brother married well,” he murmurs. “Made a spinster into a Viscountess. How charming.” Mingyu’s smile does not move. “It is only charming if you do not know her.” Haversham’s eyes gleam. “Oh, I believe I should like to.”

Dalrymple drinks and grows louder. Someone at the table—some lesser lord with an expensive sneer—lets his gaze travel over Mingyu with contempt disguised as humour. “Adopted sons make such entertaining men,” the lord says. “So eager to prove they belong.” The room quiets: not shocked, not offended—interested. Curious. Waiting to see what Mingyu will do. Mingyu smiles. He has been trained for this, too. “Eager?” he repeats, pleasantly. “No. I merely dislike boredom.” The man laughs. The table laughs. They let it pass, because Mingyu made it light, made it easy, made it forgivable. But the words slide under his skin all the same: adopted. charity. ornament. He has heard them his whole life. He will hear them until he dies.

Jeonghan wins a hand with lazy grace. Mingyu loses one deliberately to keep the room friendly. Then Dalrymple—drunk enough to be bold, foolish enough to be cruel—leans back and says, loud as judgment: “Charity sons,” he declares. “Pretty little ornaments your late Viscountess collected—”

Mingyu’s chair scrapes back. The sound is ugly. The room inhales. Jeonghan’s eyes flick up in warning. Wonwoo’s gaze narrows, already measuring exits. Haversham smiles like he has been waiting for this show. Mingyu smiles too—sweet as venom. “Say it again,” he says softly.

Dalrymple laughs, believing it is still a game. “Charity sons,” he repeats, louder. “Collected so the Ashbournes might pretend at generosity—” Mingyu’s fist meets Dalrymple’s jaw with a speed that shocks even Mingyu. The sound is wrong—flesh upon bone, a crack of consequence. The room gasps. Dalrymple collapses back into his chair with a curse.

Jeonghan swears beneath his breath. Haversham’s smile widens. Mingyu stands there, breathing a touch too hard, knuckles stinging, grin gone. For a split second—only a second—he looks like the truth of himself: not harmless. Not unserious. Not a boy. A man who can be wounded. Jeonghan’s hand closes around Mingyu’s sleeve firmly. “We are leaving,” Jeonghan announces. Mingyu lets himself be pulled, because he knows when to flee—and because he does not trust what he shall do if he stays.

They spill out into the night. The carriage ride home is full of the sort of silence Mingyu detests—the silence where consequences are tallied. Jeonghan leans back, eyes closed, as though resisting the urge to laugh and the urge to scream in equal measure. “You idiot,” he murmurs, not unkindly. “You absolute, beautiful idiot.”

Mingyu flexes his sore hand. “He was asking for it.” Wonwoo’s voice comes from the corner. “So were you.” Mingyu laughs then, but it does not reach his eyes. “London likes me bloody,” he says. “It proves I am still entertaining.” And because he cannot say the truer thing—that he is tired of being entertainment—he adds lightly, “Besides, Dalrymple’s face required rearranging.”

Jeonghan exhales. “Seungcheol will kill you.”

Mingyu’s grin returns, quick as a curtain. “He may try.”

But when they reach Ashbourne Hall and the house is dark and still, Mingyu’s steps soften. In the mirror of the entrance hall, he catches his own face: smile too rehearsed, eyes too bright, jaw too clenched. He looks like a boy desperately trying to become a man. He looks away.

Seungcheol does not kill him. Seungcheol does something far more unsettling: he looks disappointed. Mingyu finds him the next morning in the study—ledger open, ink set out, the new Viscount’s life arranged in papers. Lady Whitlock is there as well, standing by the window with a letter in hand. Mingyu arrives with his knuckles bandaged neatly and his grin armed. Seungcheol does not rise. He does not shout. He simply says, low: “Dalrymple?” Mingyu shrugs like a boy caught stealing sweetmeats. “He was speaking out of turn.” Lady Whitlock’s eyes flick to the bandage, then to Mingyu’s face. Not anger. Not pity. Assessment. “And you?” she asks. Mingyu’s grin falters a fraction. He recovers. “I was listening.”

Seungcheol’s gaze hardens. “You are not a child.”

Mingyu’s mouth curves. “No, but men like him like to pretend I am.”

Seungcheol’s hand closes around his pen, too tight. Lady Whitlock steps forward, and her voice is calm enough to settle storms. “What did he say?”

Mingyu’s breath catches—because she is asking for truth, and truth is not his preferred sport. He gives her something adjacent. “He insulted Mother,” he says lightly. Seungcheol’s jaw ticks. “He insulted us.”

Mingyu laughs softly, “Much the same.”

Lady Whitlock’s gaze holds his. It does not drift away. It does not soften him with kindness. It demands he meet it like a man. “You need not bleed to prove you belong here,” she says. Mingyu opens his mouth to make a joke. Nothing comes.

Seungcheol’s voice is quieter than his anger. “Stop giving them stories.” Mingyu’s brows lift. “London will write them regardless.” Seungcheol leans forward, eyes dangerous. “Then do not hand them the pen.”

Mingyu smiles, because smiling is easier than admitting he does not know how to stop. “Yes, Viscount,” he says, mock-sweet. Seungcheol’s gaze narrows. Lady Whitlock’s hand comes to Seungcheol’s shoulder. He eases back a fraction, as though reminded he is not alone in his anger. Mingyu watches that touch like thirst. Then he bows, turns, and leaves before anyone can ask him what he truly feels.

Night three is where Mingyu doubles down. Because that is what he does when something draws too near to hurting: he becomes louder. The bruise upon his knuckles becomes a jest. The whispers about the fight become proof of vitality. He walks through Mayfair that evening as though he owns the street, as though consequences are for other men. Soonyoung meets him at the door with a grin wide enough to swallow shame. “I heard you struck Dalrymple,” Soonyoung says. “Did it feel good?” Mingyu lifts his sore hand and flexes it theatrically. “Like prayer.” Soonyoung laughs like a bell. “Then we ought to worship.” Jeonghan appears behind Soonyoung with a look that says I will assist you in sin and then drag you from the gutter afterwards.

“No cards tonight,” Jeonghan declares. “Cards require patience. Mingyu possesses none.” Mingyu drapes an arm over Jeonghan’s shoulders affectionately. “I possess patience.” Wonwoo, passing by, murmurs, “For women, perhaps.”

Mingyu gasps, offended. “Wonwoo.” Wonwoo’s eyes flick up. “For applause, then.” Mingyu points at him. “That is also a kind of woman.”

Soonyoung’s grin sharpens. “We are going somewhere scandalous.” Mingyu’s smile is already set. “Somewhere that will make Seungcheol regret not killing me.”

They go to a party where the chandeliers are too bright and the laughter too indulgent. A drawing room full of bored women and hungry men. Someone’s country house just far enough from Mayfair to pretend it is not Mayfair at all. Mingyu flirts as though it were his birthright. He dances with a Marquess’s wife as though husbands are scenery. He tells stories that make women lean closer, and he makes men envy him for precisely the wrong reasons. He kisses a gloved hand and watches the woman’s eyes soften, and he feels the familiar ache—hope, stupid and tender, flickering within him like a candle. He smothers it with another drink.

Jeonghan is in his element—smiling, listening, gathering secrets the way other men collect watches. Soonyoung is a comet—bright, beloved, disastrous. Wonwoo remains near enough to intervene if required, far enough to let Mingyu hang himself with charm.

A man corners Mingyu near a sideboard and speaks with the smirking intimacy of someone who believes rakes are animals one may pat. “You will never marry,” the man says, half-taunt, half-envy. Mingyu lifts his brows. “Is that a warning or a blessing?” The man laughs. “A pity. Women like a man they can reform.”

“Then they should find someone broken enough to enjoy it.” The man blinks, uncertain. Mingyu’s laughter smooths it over at once—mask secured.

Later, outside upon a terrace, Mingyu leans on the stone balustrade and looks down at the garden where lanterns swing like captured stars. He laughs at something said near him, and then—when the laughter fades—he is left with himself. The night air is cool. The sky is indifferent. London glitters as though it is determined to distract him.

A sense of longing creeps up without a name. Of being the youngest, the spare, the one with no title waiting at the end of the line. No inheritance carved into his future. No business dependent upon his decisions. He has always been told his purpose is to be charming, to be useful as a smile in a room, to be the brother who lightens the air. He has been excellent at it. He has also always suspected that excellence does not equal meaning.

A woman slides up beside him—perfume, laughter, intent—and presses close, fingers brushing his sleeve like an invitation. Mingyu turns, offers his smile like coin. “Mr. Ashbourne,” she purrs. “I have heard you are wicked.” He bows, close enough for scandal. “Madam,” he murmurs, “I have heard you are bored.” She laughs. He takes her inside, because it is easier than being alone.  

He leaves later, because staying would mean pretending it mattered. He finds the discreet house again—quiet curtains, paid smiles, a woman who calls him “love” without meaning it. He clings to the lack of meaning like safety. He pays. He thanks her. He departs for Ashbourne Hall before dawn.

Mingyu slips up the stairs like a thief returning to the scene of his own crimes. In the corridor, he passes Seungcheol’s closed door. He hesitates—an absurd impulse to knock, to ask his brother something he has never dared ask any member of his family: What is the point of me?

He keeps walking. Because he already knows the answer he would be given. Be useful. Be charming. Be quiet about your hunger. He reaches his own room and shuts the door. The silence within is thick. He rests his forehead against the cool wood and closes his eyes, smiling though there is no one to see it. “Unserious,” he whispers to himself, tasting the word like a prayer and a curse. He laughs once. Then he straightens, washes the night from his hands, and sleeps like a man who has run out of places to run.

On the fourth night, White’s receives him as though he never left.

It is a different sort of establishment than the taverns Soonyoung favours—less raucous, more assured. The lamps throw their amber over polished wood and well-cut coats, over brandy glasses and newspapers folded with disdain. A room in which men may be boisterous without being vulgar, and careless without ever calling it carelessness. Mingyu goes because it is familiar ground—because it is one of the few places in London where a man may be entirely himself, provided his self is agreeable enough.

Jeonghan comes with him, naturally—games are Jeonghan’s religion and he is never so devout as when money is on the table. Wonwoo is there too, his presence less companionable than it is protective; he does not hover, but the room seems to notice him anyway. Soonyoung arrives late, hair slightly disordered, grin intact, as though chased by delight and only barely escaped it.

Dalrymple is present—of course, he is—installed at a far table with a cluster of men too proud to move their chairs even when resentment makes the air taste faintly metallic. His jaw is still tender if one looks closely enough; his eyes, when they catch Mingyu across the room, are sharp with the kind of grudge that insists on being seen. Haversham lingers near him like a man who enjoys other people’s injuries. They do not approach. Mingyu does not oblige them by looking troubled.

Heads turn when he enters—not in scandal, not in outrage, but in recognition. Someone calls, delighted. “Ashbourne! Back amongst the civilised at last!” Mingyu spreads his arms as though welcoming applause. “Civilised?” he echoes, and his grin lands like flirtation. “I thought this was where gentlemen came to pretend.” The room laughs—because he makes it easy, because he makes everything sound like a joke.

A familiar figure rises from near the fireplace: Lord Pembroke, a pleasant sort of acquaintance—young enough to still enjoy mischief, old enough to know when to keep it discreet. Pembroke’s eyes are bright with amusement as he takes Mingyu in from collar to cuff, as though measuring how well the Continent has worn him. “We heard you became positively shameless abroad,” Pembroke states, a grin tugging at his mouth. “It seems the rumours were modest.” Mingyu inclines his head with mock humility. “Rumours always are.”

Pembroke snorts. “I’ve three sisters. They’ve been talking of you like you’re a storm on the horizon.”

Mingyu’s brows lift, delighted. “I do hope they bring umbrellas.”

Pembroke laughs again, then leans closer, lowering his voice in that intimate way men use when they’re trading currency. “Tell me the truth,” he says. “Are the Frenchwomen truly as obliging as London insists?”

Mingyu’s smile turns dangerous at the edges—not cruel, simply pleased at having an audience. “The French,” he says, as if offering a lecture, “are honest about wanting what they want. It is remarkably restful.”

“Restful,” Pembroke repeats, incredulous and envious. Mingyu’s gaze flicks, briefly, to a group of men watching him from the far side of the room—men whose wives will pretend not to notice him while ensuring their daughters do. He feels the weight of London’s appetite the way a man feels weather about to change. “London,” he adds lightly, “prefers to want in secret.”

Pembroke’s grin sharpens. “And you, Ashbourne? Do you prefer secrets?”

Mingyu lifts his glass. “I prefer whatever the room will forgive.”

The answer is meant as charm. It is also truer than he likes.

Mingyu moves further into the club, accepting a drink, refusing another, accepting a third—because refusal is a power play and Mingyu enjoys power games almost as much as he enjoys being adored for pretending he does not.

He tells a story—Naples, a balcony, a woman who stole his coin purse and kissed him for the privilege—and the men around him roar with delight. He is careful with the details, wicked enough to entertain, clean enough to repeat. He knows where the line sits in this room, and he dances along it like he was born on the edge.

A man with a sharper nose and a sharper laugh—Sir Vale, new to Mingyu’s orbit—leans in with the proprietary air of someone who believes charm is an invitation. “Is it true,” Vale asks, “that you broke a duchess’s heart in Vienna?” Mingyu’s smile flashes. “It is not. I have never broken a heart.”

Vale’s brows rise. “Never?”

Mingyu’s gaze turns innocent. “I only misplace them temporarily.”

The men laugh again. They love him for it—love the ease, the irreverence, the way he makes depravity sound like sport. Vale, encouraged, nudges further. “You are becoming something of a legend,” he says. “My cousin swears you could seduce a nun.”

Mingyu’s eyes glitter—because that is the sort of line that spreads through Mayfair like flame through lace. “A nun,” he repeats, savouring it. “How very ambitious of your cousin.” Pembroke laughs from behind his shoulder. “He’s the youngest Ashbourne,” he says to Vale, as though that explains everything. “He has nothing to inherit but trouble.”

Mingyu’s smile holds—beautiful, bright, well-trained. “I inherit charm,” he says lightly. “It is far more useful than land.”

Vale’s laugh is sharp. “And what do you do with it?” Mingyu lifts his glass, tilting it as though saluting the room. “I spend it,” he says. “Freely.”

Across the room, Dalrymple shifts in his seat, jaw tight, gaze burning—but he stays where he is. Haversham murmurs something to his companions, and they all glance over, hungry for a second round of humiliation. Mingyu does not give them the satisfaction. He turns his shoulder, blocking them out as one blocks out an ugly painting. He is not here for grudges. He is here for the familiar comfort of being wanted—if only for the story of him.

Soonyoung reappears, triumphant, with a glass in each hand. “They’ve missed you,” he declares, settling close with giddy satisfaction. “One gentleman called you ‘a blessing to boredom,’ Mingyu.” Mingyu’s grin deepens. “That is the kindest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

Pembroke shakes his head, laughing. “You will be the ruin of half the Season.” Mingyu’s eyes flick over the room—over the men who will go home to wives and sermons, over the ones who will go home to silence, over the ones who will go home to nothing but themselves. “Half?” he says. “What restraint you credit me with.”

Vale leans in again, voice dropping into the tone men use when they think they are sharing something delicious. “Speaking of the Season,” he says, “there is a new fascination.” Mingyu’s brows lift—polite, faintly bored. He pretends he is not always listening for the next story to swallow him whole. “Is there?” he asks, as though it hardly matters. Pembroke chuckles. “You’ve been gone too long, Ashbourne. You’ve missed the newest saint.” That word—saint—lands with a curious weight, as though it has been polished for effect. Mingyu tips his head, amused despite himself. “A saint,” he repeats. “In Mayfair. How novel.”

Pembroke supplies the name like the punchline to a joke.“Miss Marlowe.”

It lands softly, and yet something in the air changes—the faintest click of a latch somewhere across the city, as if a door has been opened in a house Mingyu hasn’t yet visited. Mingyu does not react. He is far too adept at not reacting. But his attention—quiet, quick, predatory in the gentlest sense—tilts. Pembroke speaks with the relish of a man delivering gossip. “Reverend Marlowe’s daughter,” he says. “Devotion made flesh. The sort of girl men speak of as though she were carved of marble and placed on an altar.”

Vale snorts. “Her father displays her like proof,” he adds. “Like virtue is a bauble he may polish and hold up to the light.”

Soonyoung makes a face. “That sounds miserable.”

It should have been enough to dull Mingyu’s curiosity. It does not. Because anything described like that—anything displayed, polished, praised for stillness—sounds like a performance. Or a cage.

Mingyu takes a slow sip, letting the taste of challenge settle upon his tongue, and then repeats her name as though testing it for sport. “Miss Marlowe.”

Pembroke watches him over the rim of his glass as he leans closer, eyes gleaming with the wicked enjoyment of a man who has found a new way to entertain himself. “They say she has never been alone with a man. Never so much as accepted a private word without her father hovering. They say she recites Scripture as easily as she breathes,” he murmurs. “And they say,” he adds, “that she’s the most virginal creature in the ton.”

There it is—not admiration, not piety: the core of the thing. A conquest framed as purity. A woman turned into an object simply by remaining untouched. Mingyu should be disgusted. Instead, he feels—terribly—something like interest bloom, bright and reckless, because boredom has always been his greatest enemy and Mayfair has just offered him a new distraction dressed in holiness. Vale gives him a look, half-taunt, half-invitation. “Surely even you wouldn’t,” he says, voice too casual to be innocent. Pembroke laughs, and the laugh carries the thrill of a wager. “No,” he agrees. “Even Ashbourne must have limits.”

Mingyu’s smile widens. “Is that what you think?” he asks. Pembroke’s brows lift. “Do you mean to tell me,” Pembroke says, “that you could draw a saint off her pedestal and have her thank you for it?”

Soonyoung groans, already weary. “Oh, here we go.”

Vale’s eyes gleam like a man watching a match meet oil. “Prove it,” he states simply.

The room around them continues—games, laughter, quiet cruelty—but in this small circle something tightens, becomes intent. Men have always liked to dare a man like Mingyu. They like to see if the legend is true. They like to borrow danger for an evening and then go home to their respectable beds. Mingyu turns his glass slowly in his hand, considering. Not her, not really. The story of her. The idea of a girl kept so carefully holy that her life must feel like a room with the doors nailed shut. The possibility of making Mayfair gasp. The delicious ease of leaning into the persona he has perfected: rake, flirt, pretty trouble, a man who takes what he wants and laughs while doing it.

He lifts his eyes to Pembroke and Vale—two men grinning like boys holding a stick over a kennel, waiting to see what bites. Mingyu’s expression remains warm, lazy, amused. “Gentlemen,” he says, “you make her sound like a locked room.” A pause—just long enough for the image to settle: a door, a key, a secret kept too carefully. Mingyu’s smirk curves, wicked at the edges. “And I’ve never met a lock I didn’t wish to pick.”

The effect is immediate. Pembroke brightens as though he’s just been handed an excellent story. Vale leans back, satisfied—challenge accepted, wager sealed. Soonyoung lets out a long, suffering breath, as if he can already see the scandal unfurling like a banner across the Season. Pembroke raises his drink first. “To trouble,” he declares—pleased as a man who will not have to carry the consequences. Vale follows at once. “To trouble,” he echoes, laughing into the rim of his glass. Soonyoung mutters, then lifts his glass anyway, resignation painted over reluctant amusement. “To trouble,” he says.

Mingyu lifts his glass last, letting the room around them hum on, ignorant of the small pact being struck at its centre. “To saints,” Mingyu replies. “May they finally learn to live.”

The room around him chortles—already composing tomorrow’s version of the tale: Mingyu Ashbourne and the reverend’s perfect daughter, vice leaning close to virtue for the amusement of a man. Mingyu lets them. But somewhere deep—beneath the laughter, beneath the mask—something in him awakens, alert and hungry and terribly alive. Not for innocence. For what innocence so often hides: a want sharp enough to cut through holiness, if only someone dares touch the weapon. He drowns it in laughter before it can become anything so dangerous as hope.

Music, in your father’s world, is only holy when it does not sound like pleasure. The charity performance is held beneath a ceiling painted with saints who seem, from the floor, to be either ascending or falling; it is difficult to tell which, and perhaps that is the trick of such ceilings—to make collapse look like devotion from a sufficient distance. Tonight, London has dressed mercy in satin.

Your father approves of this sort of event because it allows goodness to be seen. It permits charity to become a spectacle; piety to become architecture. Ladies in pale gowns carry sympathy in their posture and diamonds at their ears. Gentlemen lower their voices when speaking of abandoned children, as though quietness itself might be mistaken for depth of feeling. A list has been published. A sum has already been whispered about with satisfaction. Names matter as much as donations. More, perhaps. Your father likes that. He likes rooms where virtue may be measured publicly. He likes rooms where you may be measured too.

The journey there is performed in silence, as most things in your father’s company are. He sits opposite you in the carriage, immaculate in black, his gloves folded beside him, his Bible absent only because this is an evening of respectable society rather than open worship. Yet his authority travels with him the way incense clings to church walls. Even in a carriage lined with velvet, even beneath the muffled rattle of wheels over stone, he manages to make the air feel arranged. You sit as you have been taught to sit: straight-backed, hands folded lightly over your lap, chin neither too high nor too low, your face composed into that gentle attentiveness people call sweetness. The gown chosen for you is dove-grey, because your father distrusts colours that appear to enjoy themselves. The neckline is modest. The sleeves are neat. A narrow ribbon trims the bodice with such restraint that even the ornament seems apologetic. At your throat, there is nothing bright enough to accuse you of conceit. At your wrist, hidden beneath your sleeve, the red carnelian beads press quietly into your skin—your rosary, your burden, your small chain disguised as prayer.

“You will remain near me,” your father says at last, and though the instruction is unnecessary—though you have already arranged your entire body around obedience—the words still settle over you like an iron fence lowered into place. “Yes, Father.”

He studies you, not with tenderness but with exactness, as though checking a lock. “This is not a ball,” he continues. “Nor a place for frivolity. The purpose of the evening is charity, not display.” A small pause. “You understand.” Of course, you understand. You always understand. Understanding is rarely the issue. Endurance is. “Yes, Father.”

His gaze lingers on your face, perhaps searching for any sign that your mind has drifted into vanity, vanity being his preferred name for any spark of selfhood he did not authorise. “There will be many present,” he says. “You will answer when addressed. Briefly. Kindly. Without encouragement.” Without encouragement. As if warmth in a woman is a door left ajar. “Yes, Father.” He nods once, satisfied, and the silence returns. You watch the blurred lantern-light through the carriage glass and think, not for the first time, that London is a body in constant motion while your own life has been reduced to posture. You are being taken somewhere full of music and money and fashionable concern, and still it feels less like an arrival than an arrangement. Your thumb presses, once, against the hidden bead nearest your wrist. A prayer without words. Or perhaps only pressure.

The hall is already full when you arrive. Names meet names at the entrance with softened exclamations. Gloves are surrendered. Invitations are shown. Somewhere within, instruments are tuned—the delicate complaint of strings, the low testing breath of winds, the anticipatory murmur of a room learning how to become an audience. Your father offers his name and title with that measured gravity which makes even a simple introduction feel like a correction. People move to greet him quickly. A woman in plum silk curtsies too low. A gentleman with side-whiskers and moral enthusiasm praises the cause and looks at your father as though the Reverend Marlowe himself might have personally rescued each abandoned infant from the streets. You stand at his side, a pace behind and half-turned toward him, exactly where years of conditioning have taught you to place yourself.

You are looked at. Not stared at—staring would be vulgar—but considered, noted, approved of in glances. A daughter such as you reflects well. You know this. It is one of the first truths your father built into you: that your body, your speech, your stillness, your very expression, may all be made useful to another person’s reputation if properly arranged.

Lady Henshaw is among the first to approach, all pearls and quiet hunger. “Reverend Marlowe,” she greets, her voice smooth with the pleasure of being seen in the right place for the right reasons. “How good of you to attend. And Miss Marlowe—” her smile settles on you, “—such grace in so young a creature.” Your father inclines his head. The compliment is accepted on your behalf. You lower your gaze by the exact degree expected. “You are kind, Lady Henshaw.”

Her eyes flick over your face, your gown, the disciplined line of your posture. “And so modest,” she says softly, almost to herself. You have learned that praise, from women like her, is often only a prettier form of inventory.

Another group approaches. Another introduction. Another set of approving glances. Another remark on your father’s sermon last Sunday, on your father’s admirable devotion, on the cause tonight, on the state of the city and the mercy due its lost children. The irony is not lost on you. Abandoned children. Foundlings. A room full of titled concern raising funds for those the world has discarded.

The announcement ripples through the room not formally, but in that subtler way of good society—a bend in conversation, a turning of heads, the faint collective adjustment of attention as though half the room has been tugged by the same invisible thread. A lady, midway through a sentence, lets the words die prettily on her lips. A gentleman near the aisle shifts to gain a clearer view while pretending not to. Your father notices the change and stiffens almost imperceptibly. You do not look immediately. That, too, is training. But eventually your gaze lifts with polite delay, and there they are. The Ashbournes enter not as one body but as a constellation—related, distinct, impossible not to trace together.

The man at the front can only be the Viscount. There is something about him that settles the question before reason does: the way he carries the room without performing for it, the grave assurance in his posture, the sort of composure that stopped trying to prove itself and became authority instead. He is darkly dressed, impeccably cut, broad-shouldered without ostentation, his expression held in that line between courtesy and reserve. At his side—just enough to preserve decorum, just close enough to undo it—is his wife. The new Viscountess Ashbourne.

You know her for no better reason than that no woman in this room could be mistaken for anyone else while walking beside him like that. She is not fragile in the pretty way the ton likes its brides to be. There is something unshakable in her. Her elegance does not plead to be admired; it assumes the room will sort itself out around her, and, most irritatingly for many present no doubt, the room seems inclined to do exactly that. She turns her head as someone greets them, and the Viscount inclines toward her, as though the axis of his attention has been altered by marriage. A touch follows—brief, unconscious perhaps, the kind of touch that should not feel intimate in public and yet does. They are not making a display of devotion. Which is, perhaps, why everyone keeps staring as though they are.

A pace behind them, or perhaps merely orbiting at a distance chosen by habit, come the others.

One of the brothers—beautiful in a manner almost too deliberate to be innocent—seems to wear charm not as instinct but as strategy. There is something too smooth about him to be harmless, with a ledger-minded sort of expression in evening dress. He pauses almost immediately to acknowledge a committee member. You place him, tentatively, as the one connected to the family business. Jeonghan. If any of the brothers could step from a counting room into a ballroom without changing expression, you think it would be him.

Another remains half in shadow longer than the others, enough that people register him only after they have finished registering those more obviously brilliant. His stillness has a different quality from your father’s. Not rigid. Not corrective. Simply observant. He moves little and misses nothing. There is something almost private in the severity of his attention, as though he has not entered the room to be seen but to take measure of everyone else already in it. That one, you think, must be the silent one—Wonwoo. The brother whose name is usually spoken with a small shrug and a curious sort of respect, as though nobody can quite understand what he thinks and suspects it might matter.

Then another turns slightly, speaking to some older woman near the entrance with a smile so polished and a face so open and handsome it nearly constitutes insolence. There is a softer grace to him than to the others—not weakness, but steadiness, the kind that suggests he knows how to make space in a room rather than occupy it. He does not glitter the way Jeonghan does, nor brood the way Wonwoo does. That must be Joshua—the one whose name tends to surface in conversation with less scandal than the others and yet never without affection, as though even gossip struggles to sharpen itself against him.

And then there is one more—a flash of movement, of barely-contained life—who seems as though he might at any moment remember that standing still is an option and decline it on principle. He says something to one of his brothers and is answered with what can only be fraternal tolerance. Even from where you stand, you can sense the brightness of him, the kind of man who enters a room as though rooms are opportunities rather than obligations. Soonyoung. It is almost enough to make you smile, though you would sooner confess a crime than permit that in front of your father.

Near you, two women lower their voices into the polite hush of people pretending not to gossip. “The foundlings,” one murmurs, as though charity itself has become somehow more pointed by their attendance. “Yes—well,” the other replies, “one can hardly imagine a more suitable cause.” The words are quiet. Soft enough to pass for sympathy. Biting enough, still, to draw blood if one wished.

Then the last of them enters your notice, not because he was hidden before, but because the eye arrives at him differently. A pair of young ladies farther down the row lower their voices and yet lean perceptibly forward. One gentleman near the gallery smiles in that knowing, mildly envious way men smile at the mention of a well-liked rogue. Even Lady Henshaw’s attention, for one indecorously honest instant, strays from the patroness she is flattering. You know him at once without having ever seen him. Not by certainty. By instinct. Mingyu Ashbourne.

Not because he is louder than the others—he is not—but because he seems to move according to some private rhythm of his own. Everything about him is correct—his evening clothes immaculate, his cravat tied precisely, his posture easy in the way only very well-born or very reckless men can afford. And yet there is something in him that resists the polish. Something half-loosened. Sun-warmed. Unrepentantly alive. He is smiling at something said beside him, and though you cannot hear the words, the smile itself is enough to explain why his name arrives wrapped in warning wherever it is spoken. It is not merely that he is handsome, though he is. It is not merely that he looks charming, though he does. It is that he carries ease like a provocation. As though the rules pressing down on everyone else have slipped from his shoulders without his ever once apologising for the relief of it. You understand, suddenly and unwillingly, why the women at the sermon had not sounded wholly disapproving.

Beside you, your father says, low enough for only you to hear, “Do not stare.” Only then do you realise that you are. Heat flashes through you—part shame, part irritation, part the old childish resentment of being corrected before you have even committed a crime. “I was not, Father.” He does not answer. He merely offers his arm, and you place your hand there because refusal is not among the choices available to you. You are guided deeper into the hall.

The performance space has been arranged with all the grandeur money can purchase and taste can justify. Rows of chairs fill the central floor. The orchestra sits assembled in a half-moon of poised instruments. Music stands catch the candlelight. Programs printed on cream paper have been left on every seat. There are flowers, of course—white and pale gold, chosen to signal purity. Your father has already decided where you will sit.

The second row, slightly to the side, near enough to the front to be visible and near enough to the aisle to be managed. He seats you first and only then takes his place beside you, which is his way of ensuring the arrangement feels less like subordination. You smooth your skirts. Fold your hands. Lower your eyes to the program. Messiah. Selections to be performed in aid of the Foundling Hospital.

People continue to take their seats. Murmurs rise and fall. Programs rustle. Somewhere to your left, a young man whispers with indecorous excitement to his friend until his mother hushes him with a glance. Somewhere to your right, an elderly lady clears her throat like a woman who believes all cultural undertakings improve in proportion to her audible approval. When at last the house settles and the anticipatory murmur thins into something more disciplined, the conductor lifts his hand. And then the first notes rise.

The strings lay down their bright foundation; the winds answer; and the sound, once begun, behaves like something older than every person gathered beneath the painted saints above—older than rank, older than fashion, older even than the pieties this room has dressed itself in for the evening. You have always thought there is a species of cruelty in sacred music. It awakens. It reaches. It dares the body to feel. And then, in the same breath, it reminds you that feeling itself must be governed.

The chorus rises after—each voice submitting itself to a greater order and thus becoming, by some impossible contradiction, more piercingly human for the surrender. Sorrow is clothed in harmony. Hope is arranged. Grief becomes something lustrous enough to bear witness in public. Around you, the audience receives it with the solemn pleasure of people permitted, for one evening, to be moved respectably.

Your father sits beside you in absolute stillness. He does not cough. Does not shift. Does not betray, in any visible manner, that music may enter him at all. Yet you know the severe attention of his listening face: the narrowing about the eyes, the tightening of the mouth, the look of a man defending himself against any sensation not already sanctified by doctrine. You listen too, because not listening would be impossible. Because however carefully your father has spent the years of your girlhood attempting to train every inward motion into order, music still slips where sermons cannot. It touches without permission.

A soprano rises from the body of the chorus, and the note she holds is so brilliant, so startlingly human, that something within your chest answers before you can forbid it. Not with tears—you are not a child. Not with any blush of romantic foolishness. With ache. With that old, half-buried sense of being called toward something unnamed and then condemned for hearing it. The audience is very quiet. A page turns somewhere three rows ahead. A lady’s bracelet gives a delicate chime against the stem of her glass. Outside, faint beneath the walls and the candlelight and the velvet intentions of the evening, a carriage rolls over stone. Inside, music opens door after door.

You try not to think of freedom. You think of it anyway. Not freedom as scandal. Not freedom as some breathless impropriety whispered about over tea. Nothing theatrical. Only freedom as motion. As breath taken without anyone listening for irregularity. As thought permitted to remain your own. As laughter that does not require repentance after. The notion enters your mind with such absurd untimeliness that you nearly resent the music for having loosened it there. Your fingers tighten, once, over the hidden beads at your wrist. Then, as though the thought itself has conjured consequence, some instinct turns your head. One glance cast over the line of your shoulder, a look meant for nothing and therefore all the more dangerous for what it finds.

He is behind you. Not near enough to scandalise, not near enough even to claim significance, merely one gentleman among many gathered in polished rows beneath candlelight and charity. And yet your gaze finds him at once, as though recognition had preceded acquaintance and merely waited for sight to confirm it. Mingyu Ashbourne is not watching the conductor. He is watching you.

It cannot have been for long. Perhaps he had only that instant looked up. Perhaps your own traitorous awareness has dressed accident in meaning. Yet when your eyes meet his, his expression alters—not with insolence, not with the easy predatory satisfaction of a man pleased by being admired, but with something far more aggravating: a flicker of interest so immediate and so unforced that it feels less like being looked at than being found. You turn away first.

Heat rises along your throat with the swiftness of shame long-practised. You lower your eyes to the cream-coloured program in your lap, though the neat black print swims for a moment before it steadies. “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.” The verse rises in your mind like a hand at your throat. Guard the door. Shut the gate. Still, that brief look remains—small as a spark, ridiculous as a spark, and yet capable of setting something alight if you are foolish enough to cup your hands around it. You force yourself toward the music.

A printed subscription list is passed down the line. Your father signs—his hand neither ostentatious nor mean, his donation proper enough to be admired and modest enough to be called sincere. You watch the black line of his name dry upon the page and wonder, not for the first time, whether children ever truly benefit from events like this, or whether the greater sum is paid merely to purchase the right to call oneself compassionate. The list passes on. The next selection begins.

By the time the final notes of the piece fade and the room rises into applause—the restraint cracking just enough to admit genuine admiration—your nerves feel peculiarly taut, as though the performance has not calmed you but stretched something thinner beneath the skin. People stand. Your father stands. You rise with him as naturally as a shadow rises with the body that casts it. The hall loosens at once into its second life: no longer an audience, but society again. Chairs scrape back. Programs are folded. Footmen appear with trays. Committees reform in conversational knots. Gratitude begins to circulate as visibly as the refreshments.

Your father is immediately drawn into the orbit of significance. A donor of consequence greets him. A patroness praises his continued support. Some ecclesiastical acquaintance requests a word on the morality of charitable theatricals, as though tonight’s event had not already answered the question more profitably than theology ever could. You remain where you are placed—half a pace to his side, a degree behind—answering when addressed and only then.

“You are very kind.” “It is an honour to attend.” “The cause is worthy.”

Small polished responses, shaped by repetition, each one giving away nothing not already approved.

A slight disturbance in the current of attention near your father’s shoulder tells you before sight does who has approached. Viscount Ashbourne.

He offers your father the formal courtesies first. His thanks for the Reverend’s attendance. A word on the evening’s success. Another, lower and more sincere, upon the cause itself. There is no theatricality in him. No effort to display virtue because he does not seem to mistrust its existence in himself. And that, perhaps, is what gives the exchange its brief, surprising weight.

Your father receives him with the kind of civility he extends only when refusal would itself become noticeable. You lower your eyes because you are not the person being addressed. Yet you are aware, sharply, of details all the same. The Viscount’s voice—deeper than your father’s, steadier, not built for laughter but capable of gentleness when turned toward it. The simple gleam of his signet ring when he gestures. The unmistakable fact that he has given generously tonight, and not because fashion required it.  

You have heard enough of the Ashbourne history to understand why this cause would draw them. Foundlings raising money for foundlings. The city finds such circles poetic when they end in wealth.

Your father says something about Christian duty. The Viscount answers with a politeness so controlled it nearly disguises the weariness beneath it. They begin to speak of the hospital itself, of governance, of obligations, of the practical burdens charity prefers not to name when music is still in the air. And because your father is listening—truly listening, which is rarer than most people realise—his attention shifts just enough for your leash to lengthen. Not drop. Never drop. But lengthen.

You remain still. You would not know what else to do. There is nowhere to go. No legitimate reason to move. Only a table near the wall where lemonade gleams in crystal and little sugared cakes go untouched by all but the very young and the secretly greedy. A low warmth enters the air at your shoulder, and before surprise can form, a voice says, close enough to belong to you and yet wholly unentitled to the position: “If I am not mistaken, I have found the only person in the room not pretending to enjoy lemonade.”

You turn. He is there. Mingyu Ashbourne holds an untouched glass in his hand and another in yours before you have consented to the exchange, as though conversation is a current he has stepped into and naturally assumes you will be carried with him. He bows, though not deeply enough to suggest obedience. “Miss Marlowe.” It is not a question. He has guessed you correctly. You are vexed by the accuracy of it. “Mr. Ashbourne.”

His mouth curves, as if pleased less by being answered than by the fact that you have not fled at once. “I considered introducing myself more properly,” he says, glancing lightly toward your father and the Viscount, “but your father looks as though he would have me excommunicated for breathing near you.”

You should be horrified. You are horrified. And yet something perilously like amusement stirs beneath the horror simply because no one—no one—speaks of your father as though he might be inflated. As though he belongs to the natural world rather than to God himself. “Then you ought not breathe near me at all.”

He smiles at that—not broadly, not triumphantly, but with the bright private pleasure of a man who has just discovered that a statue has opinions. “A harsh sentence,” he says. “Especially after such a holy evening.”

You do not answer. The lemonade in your hand feels absurdly cold. Mingyu glances toward the flower arrangement, then back at you, and there is something almost infuriating in the ease with which he seems to stand in the room, as though architecture and hierarchy and expectation alike are only furniture to be moved around his own comfort. “Did you like it?” he asks. The question is so simple that you do not at first understand it. “The performance,” he clarifies. Not whether it was worthy. Not whether it served the cause. Not whether the chorus was admirable or the evening elevating or the charitable attendance sufficient. Whether you liked it. The indecency of the question nearly steals your breath.

No one asks women such things unless they mean to flirt with trivialities—ribbons, pastries, weather, dances. To ask whether you liked music, as though your pleasure in it might matter independently, feels unnervingly close to asking whether you exist somewhere beyond obedience. You answer the way you have been trained. “It was beautiful.”

One of his brows lifts. “Yes,” he says. “It was also long. And solemn. And full of men congratulating themselves. I asked whether you liked it.” You stare at him. He ought to offend you. He does offend you. Yet not cleanly enough to spare you the second, worse sensation: curiosity.

“It is not always the same thing,” he continues lightly, “beauty and liking. I have known ladies admired by entire ballrooms whom their husbands found intolerable by breakfast.”

You cannot help it. Your eyes flick to his face in startled disbelief. His own remains perfectly grave—so grave, indeed, that the line ceases to be wicked and becomes ridiculous. Which is when he ruins you. He lowers his voice, glances at the untouched cake nearest the lemonade tray, and says with the utmost solemnity: “Though I do think the sugared ones may yet save the evening. They possess more warmth than half the gentlemen present.”

You look at the little cakes. At his face. At the terrible earnestness with which he appears to place their moral significance above the sermon of the evening. And something in you—something starved, something buried, something that has been held too tightly for too long—slips its leash. A laugh escapes. It is not loud. God, no. It is scarcely more than a startled breath shaped suddenly into brightness. But it is unmistakably a laugh. Your world—built of lowered lashes and measured answers and the constant vigilance of never permitting too much life to show—falters around that one small betrayal. You hear it yourself as though from outside your own body. A laugh. Like a crime. Your hand flies to your mouth too late.

Mingyu stills. He looks at you not with self-satisfied delight, but with something far more disarming—something startled and almost tender, as though he had not expected the laugh either and now cannot quite believe it exists. “There you are,” he says softly. The words strike you with far more force than the joke that produced them. As if he has found something. As if there is, beneath all your father’s discipline and your own careful stillness, a version of you waiting to be heard. You hate him for the intimacy of it. “You are impertinent,” you say, lowering your hand. His smile returns, though quieter now. “Frequently.”

“And intolerable.”

“Less often than I deserve.” The answer comes so promptly, so smoothly, that your mouth threatens treachery again. You force it into composure.

“Miss Marlowe.” Your father does not raise his voice. He does not need to. The quietness of it is far worse—edged so finely it slices through the moment without disturbing a single other note in the room. Shock turns you before thought can. Reverend Marlowe is no longer wholly occupied by Viscount Ashbourne. The conversation has been severed with all the cold elegance of a man too disciplined to make a scene and too displeased to conceal himself. Seungcheol stands beside him, his expression unreadable save for the fact that he has understood, at once, what has occurred and what it has cost you. But it is your father’s face that arrests you.

Not anger. Not in any vulgar, visible sense. Something worse. His gaze rests first upon Mingyu, then upon you, then returns to the fact of the two of you standing near enough to suggest familiarity, near enough to suggest ease, near enough to make the blood in your veins turn suddenly to ice. Mingyu straightens at once.

Whatever lightness had softened him before is banked. Disciplined. He inclines his head with a courtesy suddenly exact. Your father gives him less. “Mr. Ashbourne.” The words are polite enough for the space. Cold enough for you. Mingyu answers in kind. “Reverend Marlowe.”

A beat passes. In it lives every whispered warning from the pews, every sermon sharpened by implication, every instinct in you already recoiling toward punishment. Then your father turns to you. “We are leaving.”

No explanation. No room for protest. No raised tone. Yet the sentence lands with the full weight of command. Your breath catches. For one absurd instant, you are aware of Viscount Ashbourne standing there, of his presence becoming witness by accident, of the unbearable mortification of being seen at the edge of discipline by a family whose very existence seems to offend and fascinate your father in equal measure. You lower your gaze at once. “Yes, Father.”

Only then does Reverend Marlowe conclude the interruption with the bare minimum of social grace. He inclines his head toward the Viscount, offers some final, measured phrase regarding the evening’s admirable purpose, and receives the Viscount’s reply without allowing even the shadow of disorder to show upon his face. Then his hand comes to your arm. To anyone watching, it is guidance. To you, it is a warning given flesh. His fingers close just firmly enough over your elbow to make the meaning plain.

You do not dare look at Mingyu again. Not now. Not with your father’s hand upon you and consequence moving toward you with the dreadful certainty of a carriage set on rails. Yet as Reverend Marlowe turns you toward the exit and steers you from the hall with a speed only barely restrained into respectability, you feel the echo of that one impossible laugh still caught somewhere beneath your ribs—bright, illicit, living— like contraband you have not yet learned how to surrender.

By the time you return home, your father’s displeasure has shed whatever public shape it was obliged to wear and become something infinitely more dangerous. He says nothing in the entrance hall, nothing while your cloak is taken, nothing as he mounts the stairs. It is not until he has led you, not toward your chamber, but toward his study, that your pulse begins to beat in hard, distinct strokes beneath your skin.

The room is exactly as it always is—shelves lined with theology and commentary, desk squared to the carpet, candlesticks trimmed, Bible laid where it ought to be. There is the prayer kneeler in the corner, the straight-backed chair near the hearth, the faint smell of lamp oil and paper and extinguished fire that belongs only to this room where man mistakes control for righteousness. He closes the door behind you, and the sound lands ike a lock.

When he tells you to kneel, your body obeys before your mind has completed its recoil. The rug beneath your knees is thin enough to remind, thick enough that he may still call what follows small. Small, in your father’s lexicon, has never meant merciful. It has only ever meant invisible. You fold yourself down with care—knees together, back straight, hands in your lap—while he goes to the desk and opens the Bible with those calculated fingers of his. The candlelight sharpens the severe line of his profile. He does not look at you immediately. That, too, is part of it. He likes a punishment to gather itself before it falls.

At length, his voice cuts through the room. “Repeat James,” he commands, and your lips part, the words rising because they have been made to live inside you. “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man.” He does not let the verse settle before telling you to continue, and so you do. “But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.”

The word enticed seems to hang there, newly sharpened by the memory of lemonade, candlelight, and a laugh that was never meant to escape. Your father does not look up from the page and bids you say it again. Then again. Then once more, until the verse begins to loosen from meaning and become rhythm only—the way repeated correction often does, sanding language down until it ceases to illuminate and serves only to bruise. Your knees feel a gradual ache. The carnelian beads hidden at your wrist burn quietly against your pulse.

When at last he closes the Bible, he does not raise his voice. He merely asks, in the manner of catechism, what a woman’s first defence is. “Discipline, Father,” you answer. He asks for the second and third, and you give him “modesty” and “silence” in turn, because you have known these responses so long they sit in your mouth like prayers. He inclines his head once. “And what did you fail in tonight?”

The truest answer lodges like a stone in your throat: that you failed in letting something living in you be heard. But that is not the answer he seeks, and so you give him the one he does. “Silence, Father.” He asks what came before that, and you answer “discipline.” Before that? “Modesty.” The order scarcely matters; what matters is the confession. Your father is not interested in sequence. He is interested in surrender.

He steps nearer—not enough to touch, but near enough that his shadow reaches you first and lies itself across the floorboards. “A woman’s reputation,” he announces in that gravely even tone, “may be ruined first in sound. A laugh. A tone. A response too eager. Men hear invitation where foolish girls imagine they have merely been pleasant.”

Pleasant. How swiftly, in his mouth, even warmth is made suspect. You keep your eyes lowered and answer “Yes, Father,” because there is no utility in refusing a truth he has no intention of allowing you to contest. When he tells you that you are not foolish, the words ought perhaps to resemble mercy. They do not. “No, Father,” you reply, and his answer comes at once: “Then do not behave like one.”

He moves to the kneeler and returns with a square of rough cloth folded once over itself. You know it before he places it upon your outstretched hands. There are objects in this house whose purpose is so constant they become as eloquent as law. The cloth scratches through your gloves; then he sets the Bible upon it. The weight is not unbearable. That is the point. You are told you will hold it and pray for discernment, and you answer “Yes, Father” as the burden settles itself first into your palms, then your wrists, then the line of your shoulders. Your father returns to his desk. “Aloud,” he says, and so you begin.

Not your own prayer. Confession first. Protection from temptation. Then at last he directs you toward the psalm he has favoured since your twelfth year. “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Again. “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Again.

The minutes cease to move after that. They lengthen and soften at the edges until they become something more like weather than time. Your arms grow heavier by degrees. Your knees throb steadily beneath the fabric of your skirts. The Bible reveals its full shape to your body only slowly: first as weight, then as drag, then as a demand not to tremble. From the desk comes the quiet scratch of your father’s pen, for even your punishment need not interrupt his usefulness. The humiliation of that—of being made to strain and pray and hold while he writes as though one more letter mattered no less than your correction—settles over you almost more heavily than the book itself.

Once, your right hand trembles. He does not even look up when he tells you to steady it. You do. You always do. The heat gathering at the corners of your eyes is not quite tears, only pressure; you blink it away before it may become visible. Again the prayer leaves your mouth, and again, until the words fracture and reveal their rawest shape beneath the piety. Make me easier to govern. Make me less audible. Make me less alive where I ought to be.

Yet, beneath the prayer—because the mind is its own treacherous country and your father cannot patrol every field of it, no matter how fervently he believes he should—another voice returns, warm with amusement and impossible now to unhear. There you are.

You hate yourself for the comfort of it. You hate him for having spoken it. You hate the fact that even here, on your knees, under Scripture, beneath your father’s eye, some small hidden part of you reaches toward that remembered tone as though toward heat. You pray louder.

Finally, your father rises. He comes toward you and lifts the Bible from your hands, and the sudden absence of weight is so abrupt it leaves your arms suspended before you may lower them into your lap. Needles of relief and pain race through your wrists. You do not flex your fingers. You do not give your body away. He does not yet tell you to stand.

Instead, he looks down at you and asks, “What will you do if Mr. Ashbourne addresses you again?” Your throat tightens around the answer before you shape it. “I will withdraw, Father.”

He studies you for a long moment, perhaps searching for sincerity, perhaps contenting himself with obedience. Finally: “You may rise.” Your knees protest when you stand, but you keep the wince from your face. Years of practice. Years of necessity.

He closes the Bible with finality. “You will take no supper tonight,” he tells you, and though the punishment is small, it carries all the force because it is not hunger he intends, but reminder. “And tomorrow morning, before breakfast, you will recite James again,” he adds. You answer as expected. “Yes, Father.”

He dismisses you with a turn of his hand. You leave the study on unsteady legs and close the door behind you without sound. Your chamber receives you exactly as you left it—neat, still, obedient in every corner. The bed has been turned down. The washstand prepared. The curtains half-drawn against the night.

You remove your gloves slowly. The marks the beads have left upon your skin are faint but visible, small red impressions where carnelian pressed into your wrist. Higher up, beneath silk, your father’s fingers have already left their deeper ache. Your knees throb. Your palms bear the shape of the Bible’s edge. Yet when you sit at the vanity and stare at your own face in the mirror, nothing is obvious. That is the point of small punishments. No bruise another person might be required to notice. No tear-swollen eyes. No disorder dramatic enough to testify for you. Only a little more caution fitted beneath the skin. You ought, perhaps, to feel corrected. Instead, you feel divided.

The obedient daughter sits here now in dove-grey silk, one pin at a time loosened from her hair. The other girl—the one who laughed—is nowhere to be seen and yet somehow more present than ever. You hate her for emerging. You hate him for hearing her. There you are.

You shut your eyes. No. You do not belong to a sentence spoken by a man you have met once. Then, so quickly it startles you upright, another thought flashes behind it, bright and terrible as a struck match in the dark: you do not belong to your father either.

When you open your eyes again, your own face in the mirror looks like it belongs to someone else. Because now that you know what it is to answer without permission, to be seen not as proof but as presence, you cannot unknow it. And desire, in your father’s theology, begins not with action but with memory.

Later, when you kneel at your bedside—because distress seeks the posture—you bow your head and pray for the things you have always been told are worth praying for: forgiveness, restraint, silence, the removal of temptation, the forgetting of one man’s face, the forgetting of your own laughter. But when you finally lie down, the house dark around you and your body sore in all the small, hidden places discipline favours, it is not Scripture that returns first. It is his voice. There you are.

You turn onto your side and press the heel of your hand hard against your mouth, as if you might physically punish the shape of future laughter before it can betray you again. Sleep comes slowly. And somewhere in the long darkness between one hour and the next, horror arrives with the knowledge of it: you want to hear him say something foolish again. You want to hate it. You want, impossibly, to laugh.

The church bells drag Mingyu out of sleep with all the tenderness of a creditor pounding at the door.

For one suspended, fog-thick moment, he does not know where he is—only the heavy velvet drapes admitting a thin wash of morning light; the banked warmth of a fire gone mostly to ember; the scent of extinguished candles, perfume, and sweet sweat gone faint with the passing of hours; the pleasant ache in his body that belongs to a night spent too fully to be called restful. There is silk beneath one hand and skin beneath the other. A ribbon is looped somehow around his wrist. His cravat has died elsewhere in the room with all the dignity he ever truly expected of it. The bell tolls again, dragging its iron across the morning as if God Himself has developed a personal interest in Mingyu’s schedule. He opens one eye.

A bare shoulder lies half across his chest, the curve of it marked where a mouth—his, certainly—has been less reverent than the church presently demands of all gentlemen. Dark hair fans across his arm and pillow both, tangled through with a strand of pearls that have fared no better than his cravat. At his other side, a warm leg remains draped over his thigh in the soft, proprietorial weight of someone who fell asleep still bargaining with pleasure. One woman breathes against the hollow of his shoulder with the deep and unguarded calm of satisfied exhaustion. The other has taken half the blanket and not one ounce of shame with it.

There is a stocking hanging from the edge of the canopy. A glass overturned on the bedside table. A candle guttered to a wax lake on the mantel. His shirt is on the floor. One of the women’s stays has been flung over the back of a chair with the dramatic despair of a heroine from a novel, midway through Chapter Twenty. Mingyu stares at the ceiling and lets the bells finish telling him what sort of man he is. Late.

He groans, though without conviction, and the movement stirs the woman against his chest. She makes a sleepy sound of displeasure and lifts her head only enough to narrow one eye at him through the blur of sleep. “If that expression means regret,” she murmurs, voice rough, “I shall be offended.”

He turns his head toward her and smiles at once, because smiling is easier than repentance and infinitely more useful. Then he leans down and kisses her—slow enough to be an apology, brief enough to remain magnetic.

“That is cruel,” the other mutters from somewhere amid the linen, one arm flung over her eyes. “If you are kissing her, I must object to being excluded.” Mingyu laughs, low and rough with fatigue, and obliges with the helpless fairness of a man who has made a career of distributing pleasure. He leans across the sheet’s chaos and kisses her, too. Her hand slips behind his neck as though last night has not yet fully ended and might, with the proper encouragement, be persuaded to continue. The bells disagree.

He pulls back with a sigh that is mostly theatrical and swings his legs over the side of the bed. The floor is cold. His head is not precisely aching, but it is not thankful either. He reaches for his shirt and finds instead a stocking, one glove, and another ribbon from someone’s stays. The women watch him with increasing amusement as he begins excavating his clothing from the room as if from the site of a very elegant crime. “You are not leaving,” says the dark-haired one, propping herself up on one elbow. The sheet falls low across her stomach. “It is criminally early.”

“On a Sunday,” adds the other, appalled on principle now that the hour has made itself known. “No decent man is conscious on a Sunday.”

Mingyu locates his trousers, triumph in motion, and steps into them while hopping toward his waistcoat. “I have never claimed decency,” he says.

The women exchange a look over the wreckage of the bed—one of those silent female conversations men are permitted to witness only because women know men never fully understand what has passed between them. “That,” one says dryly, “is the first honest thing you’ve said since midnight.”

He grins. It is automatic, that grin. Sunlight where there ought perhaps to be apology. He fastens buttons with the brisk inattention of a man dressing not for dignity but for speed, shoving his hands through his hair, locating his cravat by smell rather than visual, abandoning any hope of true neatness the moment the bells ring again. He should go home first. Bathe. Change. Present something to God and Mayfair that at least resembles a gentleman rather than a rake given limbs. Instead, he snatches up his coat, finds his boots, and begins assembling himself from last night’s remains.

The dark-haired woman watches him with narrowed, entertained eyes.

“Where are you going?” she asks. He should lie. It would be simpler. Some men become more honest in vice. Mingyu has always preferred to spend honesty where it might cause the greatest confusion. “Church,” he says.

The room goes very still. Then both women laugh so suddenly and completely that the sound of it follows him as he wrestles one cuff into place. “You?” says the fair one, incredulous. “Darling, did someone die?”

The question hits harder than she intended.

His hands still for the briefest of moments on the button at his wrist.

His mother’s face rises from whatever part of him stores old grief with old weather: the cool severity of her profile, the immaculate line of her collar, the chapel at Wrotham heavy with flowers and men pretending it was not the strongest force in their lives they were burying. Mingyu smiles before his silence can grow teeth. “Not today,” he says lightly.

One of them catches his wrist as he reaches for his gloves. The other traces a lazy finger down his side, as though the bells are not still tolling. “If that means you are coming back later,” the dark-haired one says, “I may forgive the sacrilege.”

“You may certainly try,” he answers. The fair one laughs into the pillow and reaches for him again. He bends just enough to kiss her goodbye once more, because it costs him nothing and leaves things easier than apology ever does.

He splashes water over his face from the basin with no regard for precision, runs damp fingers back through his hair, and accepts that whatever he looks like now, it will have to pass for respectable. There is no time for returning home. No time for self-invention. Only the strange urgency beating beneath his ribs with each receding bell note.

He should not be hurrying to church because of a girl. He is not hurrying because of a girl. He is hurrying because men at White’s had challenged him. Because a challenge, once thrown, ought to be met with elegance. Because Reverend Marlowe’s daughter has become an excellent way to relieve the city of boredom and himself of any inconvenient introspection. That is what he tells himself. It is, like most of Mingyu’s best lines, only partially true. Then he is out into the corridor, into the thin bite of early morning, into the full and immediate absurdity of racing from a night like that toward a pew.

You are kneeling. Not with any theatrical bloom of piety meant to turn heads. That would almost be easier to dismiss. No—you kneel like you have done it too often for the motion to mean choice any longer. Spine straight. Hands folded. Head bowed with such exactness it no longer looks like humility.

Where you were dove-grey at the concert, you are now in church colours more severe—soft cream perhaps, or pale morning blue muted by shadow, everything about you arranged. The line of your neck is modest. The turn of your head obedient. Your mouth, which he now knows is capable of laughter, is held in perfect stillness. You look, from a distance, exactly what men like Reverend Marlowe would be proud to have made of a daughter. And Mingyu—who came here prepared to amuse himself with conquest—feels something shift under the neat structure of his plan.

Because now that he sees you here, in the place that made you, the thing no longer feels simple. He had thought it was a challenge. He sees, instead, an apology. Not once offered. Lived in. Kneeling like you were born to ask forgiveness for taking up space. The thought enters him and goes deeper than he means to allow.

From the pulpit, Reverend Marlowe is speaking of temptation in the way such men always do—with too much intimacy for true innocence and too much certainty for real mercy. Mingyu catches fragments only because he is not trying to catch them, and perhaps that is how sermons most effectively wound.  

“The flesh invites ruin where discipline has not first been laid.” “The appearance of virtue must be guarded.” “A woman’s modesty is her shelter.”

Once, while the congregation bows their heads in prayer, you press your thumb faintly against the inside of your sleeve as though feeling for something hidden there. A seam? A wound? He cannot tell. But the gesture is intimate enough to unsettle him. He thinks of your laugh.

He thinks of the immediate terror after it. He thinks, unexpectedly, of his own mother—not her face exactly, though he remembers that well enough, but the sensation of loving someone formidable enough that the world mistook discipline for control. Of being shaped by expectation so completely that even rebellion grew in the shape of performance. Of learning very young that one may be grateful to be chosen and still ache beneath the conditions of being kept.

The organ rises. The congregation answers. Mingyu remains at the back, hands in his gloves, feeling suddenly as though the church has trapped him in a far less amusing sort of intimacy than he came seeking. This is supposed to be sport. He reminds himself of that as Reverend Marlowe speaks on and you kneel on. A lock. A challenge. A lovely, impossible thing to put his wit against. That is all. Then the service ends, and you stand, and Mingyu realises he has not heard a word of the final prayer.

Church releases people differently than a ballroom.

No instant brightening. No rush into appetite. No laughter flashing openly across rows of chairs. Instead, the congregation unfolds in careful degrees, reverence loosening at the seams into social order. Hands reach for gloves. Prayer books are closed. Murmurs begin, each one initially shaped to still sound like worship. The respectable filters of society slide back into place.

At the front, Reverend Marlowe is immediately claimed by those eager to be seen claiming him—parishioners with earnest concerns, widows with carefully folded questions, men who enjoy discussing doctrine when others can overhear. You remain beside him, exactly where he expects you to remain, gaze lowered, body arranged into usefulness.

Mingyu waits. Not because patience is his virtue. Because he has learned, in rooms like these and far worse, that direct pursuit is rarely elegant if a little gravity will do the work. He lets the congregation thin around the edges. Speaks lightly to an old gentleman near the back who looks scandalised to find an Ashbourne in church at all. Smiles at a matron who clearly intends to report his attendance to half of Mayfair before luncheon. Offers an answer, charming and sufficiently vague, when asked if he has returned to grace. “Returned to London,” he says. “Grace remains to be negotiated.” She clucks. He grins. The transaction is successful.

Reverend Marlowe is caught by a vestryman with a ledger and a face that suggests eternal distrust of joy. You stand half a pace aside, no longer the object of direct attention and yet still held by its shadow. You do not wander. Of course, you do not wander. But the leash slackens by inches, and in rooms governed by severe men, inches are opportunity enough.

Mingyu positions himself not in your path but near enough that coincidence may be politely argued by anyone desperate to preserve the fiction. When you appear beside the courtyard steps, the change in light catches you fully and he has the odd, inappropriate thought that you look younger outside your father’s sanctuary and older in the face than you ought to. There is no one directly beside you. Reverend Marlowe remains detained within.

Mingyu steps forward. Not too close. Never cornering. He has cornered women before, socially if not physically, in the harmless-seeming ways handsome men are allowed to do because the room assumes their intentions are a form of flattery. He knows precisely how it looks. He knows how to weaponise ease. But something about the way you held yourself in prayer has rearranged the game. Careless pressure feels wrong here. Not chivalrously wrong—he would laugh at himself if that were the motive. Intuitively wrong. You are strung tight enough already. Any harder a touch and the whole instrument may snap. So he stops at a respectful distance and bows as though this meeting is less improbable than both of you know it to be. “Miss Marlowe.”

Your gaze lifts. Recognition comes first. Then caution. Then something he likes far better and should not—annoyance. Good. Annoyance is alive. Annoyance answers back.

“Mr. Ashbourne.” There it is again—that small exact way you say his name as though you would rather it not have become familiar to your mouth. He smiles. “I begin to suspect we are destined to meet only in worthy places.” Your mouth does the faintest thing, almost not there at all. “Then perhaps you should avoid them.” The answer delights him out of proportion.

“I have tried,” he says. “The worthy places keep insisting.”

You should walk away. He knows you should. Every line of your posture knows it too. And yet you remain where you are, gloved hands folded, shoulders squared beneath all that careful modesty, looking at him as if you cannot decide whether he is a nuisance or a symptom. He glances back at the church doors. “You make the place look more severe than it already is.” A faint crease appears between your brows. “That is an odd compliment.”

“It was not a compliment.” He pauses, lets the edge of the smile return. “Those are usually more successful.”

You should not be listening. You are. He can see it in the minute stillness you have not yet turned into escape. The churchyard moves around you—parishioners drifting past, greetings exchanged, wheels shifting in the street—but the sound seems to recede slightly at the edges while he watches you decide whether politeness is stronger than instinct. “Why are you here?” you ask at last. A dangerous question, because the true answer has changed since dawn, and he would prefer not to inspect that too closely. So he chooses a prettier lie. “Repentance.”

Your eyes sharpen at once, and for one glorious second, he thinks you might laugh again. Instead, you say, “You do not look sorry.”

Mingyu presses a hand lightly to his chest. “You wound me.”

“I imagine it takes more than that.” It does, and does not, and he cannot decide if your saying so is insult or insight. He tilts his head, studying you. There are faint shadows beneath your eyes. Not enough for others, perhaps. Enough for him. Your composure today looks less effortless than deliberate, as though it cost you sleep to rebuild it after the concert. The thought lands uncomfortably. He ignores it with practised speed.

“I was told church improves a man.”

“By whom?”

“Men less entertaining than me.”

Your gaze flicks away, then back, as if you do not trust yourself to look at him for too long and dislike him for making that necessary. Mingyu leans just slightly, not closing the distance, merely shifting the angle of attention. “And you?” he asks. “Do you come willingly?” The question leaves his mouth before he decides whether he should ask it. It is not flirtation. Not exactly. It is too direct for flirtation and too curious for safety. You go very still. Then, with that careful tone people use when stepping around a precipice, you say, “Does it matter?”

There it is. A touch of the hidden thing. He should make a joke. Smooth it over. Return to the game. Instead, because some damned stubborn honest streak in him refuses to behave once fully provoked, he says, quieter, “It might.”

You look at him then—not at his cravat, not at his smile, not at the charming broad outline of him that London has taught itself to consume without chewing. At him. And all at once, he has the sharp bodily sensation of being seen too clearly by a woman who has been ordered all her life not to look directly at anything dangerous. It is exhilarating. It is also not at all what he came here for. He reaches reflexively for mischief like a man reaching for his coat in rain. “At the very least,” he says, letting warmth back into the words, “I wanted to know whether you laugh in church as well as concert halls.”

The flush that rises is quick and real enough to satisfy the worst parts of him immediately. There. That is easier. A challenge again. A game. A little bright offence in your face, and he can breathe properly. “I do not laugh in church.”

“Pity.”

“Mr. Ashbourne—”

Your mouth tightens, and he can hear the warning in the use of his name.

The pleasure of this is not simply that you resist. It is that you resist with intelligence. Most women of his acquaintance are either too accustomed to flirtation to be surprised by him or too deeply invested in appearing unschooled by it to do anything but blush and retreat. Miss Marlowe does neither. You hold yourself against him with the concentration of someone fighting for an inch of ground she was never promised. It makes him want to push. Just enough to see where the walls are sound and where they only look it. He softens his smile before it can turn mocking. “Forgive me. I forget sometimes that not everyone treats conversation as a blood sport.”

“Some of us were not trained to.”

The answer lands so neatly that he nearly misses what lives beneath it.

Not taught. Not raised. Trained. Mingyu feels, with a flicker of something too close to understanding, the shape of your life hidden inside that one choice of word. And then the church doors open wider, and Reverend Marlowe steps toward you.

His black coat falls severely around him. His face is controlled into civility, which makes the intelligence in his eyes all the more cutting. Men like this do not erupt; they reduce. As he approaches, Mingyu sees several things at once. Your silence. The Reverend’s gaze flicking over the distance between you, measuring it as if proximity itself is a moral substance. The fact that his own instinct—to meet disapproval with wit, to laugh first and thereby own the room—rises immediately and is, for the first time in recent memory, checked before it reaches his mouth. Reverend Marlowe stops near enough to claim his daughter without touching her. “Mr. Ashbourne.” His tone makes the name sound like a smear of dirt on boots. Mingyu bows. “Reverend.” The older man’s eyes rest on him with all the warmth of a shut gate. “I had not realised the church had broadened its welcome so far.”

Mingyu should smile. He usually would. He should offer something about grace, repentance, prodigals, all the lovely ironies available to a man who has spent the night as he has and the morning as he has chosen to. He almost does. Then he glances at you. Shame has risen in your face so quickly and so silently that it chills him more effectively than the morning air. As if his reputation has splashed onto you merely by standing near.

And Mingyu knows exactly what reputation has reached Reverend Marlowe’s ears—cards, women, the discreet houses that are not truly discreet—because he knows what sort of man he seems here in morning light against a Reverend’s daughter’s careful stillness—because he suddenly understands that if he jokes now, the joke will not land on the father but on you—Mingyu does something nearly incongruous. He goes careful.

“My attendance is irregular,” he says mildly. “But I was under the impression salvation encourages persistence.”

The Reverend’s mouth does not move. “Salvation and spectacle are often confused by men who have not the seriousness to distinguish them.”

That one would sting more if Mingyu had not heard its variations since boyhood. Pretty boy. Spare son. Charming waste. Delightful until consequence. London has always found him easiest to adore when simultaneously preparing to despise him. Still, he feels the old defensive wit rising again. Still, he checks it. Because your gaze has lowered again and your gloved hands are now too tightly clasped. “No doubt,” Mingyu says. “I am frequently improved by the opinions of my elders.”

Reverend Marlowe turns to his daughter. “We are expected elsewhere.” Not come along. Not shall we. Expected. As though duty itself has sent for her and disobedience would offend heaven. “Yes, Father.” Your answer is immediate, careful, and it irritates Mingyu disproportionately—no, not the answer, but the speed with which you erase yourself into it. The Reverend’s hand comes to your elbow. The gesture is perfectly respectable. Mingyu dislikes it on sight. He should leave it there. Let you go. Let the Reverend imagine victory too early. That would be wiser. It would also be dull. So before prudence can intervene, Mingyu says, with just enough lightness to remain plausibly harmless: “Miss Marlowe, if worthy places continue to insist on our meeting, I shall be forced to develop a better reputation.”

Your head turns, just slightly. It is the tiniest movement. But he catches it. Reverend Marlowe’s fingers tighten visibly at your sleeve. “That would require a foundation, Mr. Ashbourne,” the Reverend says. Mingyu meets his gaze.

There are men who can terrify with volume and men who can terrify with force. Reverend Marlowe is of the more pernicious species—the ones who have weaponised calm so thoroughly that anger becomes almost unnecessary.

“Then perhaps,” Mingyu says, “I am overdue construction.” He means it as irony. He hears, even as it leaves his mouth, the dangerous possibility that he does not entirely. Reverend Marlowe does not grant him the courtesy of a response. He turns his daughter fully toward the waiting carriage. That should be the end. It almost is.

You step forward. Mingyu moves back half a pace as good manners require. The churchyard gravel shifts underfoot. A lady passes on the path behind them, forcing the alignment of bodies into the briefest, narrowest adjustment. Your hand brushes his. A gloved slide of fingers against his knuckles, so slight it could be nothing. An accident born of morning crowds and movement and too many sleeves too close together.

It does not matter. The sensation is minute and immediate and entirely disproportionate in effect. Not heat—there are warmer things than this. Not shock exactly—he has been touched by women a hundred times with far less cloth and far more intention. But this is different for the absurd reason that it means almost nothing and therefore means far too much.

He looks at you. You do not look back. Yet he sees the smallest tightening at the corner of your mouth, the faint stutter in the line of your breath before you master it. Then you are moving on, the Reverend’s hand guiding, the carriage swallowing you both in black-painted order and polished restraint. The door closes. The wheels begin. And Mingyu stands in the churchyard with the morning all around him and the impression of one gloved touch lingering across his hand like a mark nobody else can see.

He should laugh. He should turn on his heel, make some wicked remark to the nearest acquaintance, and go in search of late breakfast, stronger coffee, and perhaps Jeonghan to make all of this sound amusing. Instead, he remains where he is until the carriage has disappeared into Sunday traffic. People move around him. A cluster of parish ladies descend the steps with the self-importance of women carrying both gossip and hymn verses. A gentleman nods and remarks upon the sermon. Mingyu answers something smooth enough to dismiss him and barely hears himself say it. His mind has snagged.

Not on the Reverend—men like Reverend Marlowe are everywhere, though usually less honest in their cruelties. Not even on the challenge, though the challenge is still there: prove the impossible thing less impossible than the city thinks. It snags on the look of shame on your face when your father named him corruption without using the exact word. On the stillness with which you absorbed it. On the possibility that he, Mingyu Ashbourne, London’s well-tailored problem, might accidentally have hurt you simply by arriving as himself. The notion is both irritating and unfamiliar. Mingyu dislikes unfamiliar notions.

He walks his horse rather than mounting immediately, taking the long way down the church lane towards Ashbourne Hall. The bells have finished. The morning is fully underway now—vendors, carriages, children too scrubbed for comfort, ladies discussing luncheon. He passes a window and catches his own reflection in the glass: slightly wind-roughened hair, tie imperfect, coat not quite sitting right at one shoulder because he pulled it on in haste, mouth set in thought when he would far rather see a grin there. He looks as if church has done something to him. Disgusting. He fixes the mouth into something easier and swings up into the saddle.

Ashbourne Hall on a late Sunday morning has its own peculiar softness. The house is quieter than on business days, its bustle gentled rather than gone. Somewhere downstairs, a servant is laying breakfast. Somewhere else a fire is being built. Doors open and close without haste. The family settles into itself differently on Sundays—some reading, some escaping, some pretending rest is a moral achievement rather than merely a temporary absence of obligation. Mingyu hands off his coat and gloves and goes first not to breakfast but to his room, because he cannot with dignity sit across a table from Lady Whitlock while still faintly carrying last night’s scents beneath his clothes.

A valet has prepared fresh water. Shirts have been laid out. Boots aligned. His life, once he enters a house properly run, is always being tidied on his behalf by men who know better than to comment on what state he returns in. Mingyu is half grateful, half resentful, and wholly dependent on it. As he strips off the clothes that have carried him from scandal to sermon, he catches himself replaying the churchyard conversation with embarrassing accuracy. Do you come willingly? Why had he asked that?

It was too pointed. Too curious. Not nearly enough like the sort of smiling nonsense he usually throws at difficult women when intending only to charm them. The plan, insofar as there had been one, required wit and patience, not interest. Interest is dangerous. Interest has depth. Depth leads men to do foolish things, like attend church in yesterday’s sins because a girl laughed once in a concert hall.

He drags a comb through damp hair, splashes clean water over his throat, and tells his reflection sternly that he is being ridiculous. He is curious. Curiosity and conquest have always made excellent companions in him. He likes stories that resist finishing themselves. He likes women who are not too easy to read. Miss Marlowe simply happens to be a finer puzzle than most. And perhaps, a quieter voice suggests, a lonelier one. He ignores that voice so completely he almost deserves praise.

By the time he comes down to the breakfast room, washed and reassembled, the household has mostly gathered. Lady Whitlock is there, seated with a cup of tea and a small stack of correspondence that she is sensibly pretending not to prioritise over food. Seungcheol sits near her, reading a letter and looking as if he distrusts every word in it. Joshua is speaking softly with Wonwoo about a matter related to the shop. Jeonghan is buttering toast with the concentration of a man preparing sustenance. Soonyoung has arrived before him and is already on his second helping of something sweet.

Lady Whitlock looks up as Mingyu enters and, because she is far too observant for his own comfort, takes him in with one swift glance that notes the changed clothes, the newly washed face, and perhaps the faint remainder of whatever expression he has not yet masked. “Well,” she says lightly, “a resurrection. We had begun to fear the church kept you.”

Mingyu bows toward her chair. “It tried.”

Jeonghan snorts into his coffee. Soonyoung, traitor that he is, grins like a lit fuse. “He went for the saint,” he announces to no one who asked. Joshua closes his eyes briefly. Wonwoo looks up only enough to prove he heard and would rather not. Seungcheol lowers his letter with deadly slowness. Lady Whitlock does not so much as blink. “Did he now?” She asks. Mingyu reaches for coffee before he answers, because caffeine is preferable to familial scrutiny. “I went to church,” he says. “The rest is my brother’s embroidery.”

“Your brother rarely embroiders,” Lady Whitlock replies. “He sets fires and calls them decoration.” Soonyoung beams at the accuracy. Seungcheol’s gaze remains on Mingyu; older-brother suspicion sharpened by knowledge of exactly what sort of plans his younger siblings call harmless.

“Her father dislikes me,” Mingyu says, because stating the obvious sometimes moves a room along. “That was guaranteed before you arrived,” Jeonghan murmurs. Mingyu pours cream into his coffee. A laugh touches Lady Whitlock’s mouth before she reins it in. Seungcheol, however, does not smile. “Leave the girl alone.”

Mingyu looks up. There are many ways an eldest brother may speak. This is not amusement. Not advisory teasing. Not even the mild contempt reserved for predictable bad behaviour. This is a warning. Under other circumstances Mingyu would answer it with pure insolence just to hear the resulting argument. Today, he finds himself unexpectedly defensive. “I haven’t touched her.” The sentence lands harder than intended, weighted by truths nobody here asked for. Jeonghan’s brows lift. Joshua glances discreetly down. Soonyoung, for once, has the good sense not to grin. Lady Whitlock watches him with that infuriatingly intelligent calm of hers, as though she is reading not the words but the truth beneath them. Seungcheol’s gaze remains fixed. “That is a very low standard.”

It should anger Mingyu. Instead, it does, annoyingly, shame him. He covers the sensation with a sip of coffee and lets the warmth buy him half a second. “I only meant—” He stops. Reconsiders. “She is not what the men at White’s think.”

That gets everyone’s attention. Wonwoo is the one who speaks first. “And what do the men at White’s think?”

“A wager. A prize. A saint to ruin for sport.”

Lady Whitlock’s fingers still on the handle of her cup. Seungcheol’s jaw tightens visibly. Joshua says nothing, but the silence around him changes texture—the way still water changes when something has been dropped into it. Jeonghan, who has likely known this from the start because Jeonghan knows too much, studies Mingyu with open interest.

“And what do you think?” Lady Whitlock asks. There it is again—that damned ability she has to ask a question in such a way that the joke routes vanish and only truth, or a convincing counterfeit of it, will do. Mingyu sets down his cup. He could say a challenge. It would be neat. Expected. Close enough to his own understanding to satisfy without exposing anything vulnerable. So naturally, he hears himself say something else. “I think she is watched all the time.”

No one answers immediately. Lady Whitlock’s expression shifts into recognition. Jeonghan looks at Mingyu as if weighing whether this is genuine perception or merely the latest angle of the game. Wonwoo, inscrutable as ever, gives nothing away. Soonyoung looks unusually subdued. Joshua exhales once through his nose. Seungcheol breaks the silence. “Do not make her pay for your boredom.”

Mingyu’s instinct flares at once. “You think so little of me?” Seungcheol meets his gaze without flinching. “I think exactly enough of you to know charm can be careless.”

That lands. Because the thing Mingyu cannot say—will not say—is that Seungcheol is right. Charm is his first language and, too often, his bluntest weapon. He has spent years making himself into a performance that lets him move untouched through rooms that would otherwise ask what he is for. He knows how often women have mistaken his attention for more than it is. He knows how often he has preferred them dazzled rather than truly seen. And now he has looked at one woman kneeling in church and felt the shape of his own carelessness before committing it. It is intolerable. It also means he cannot honestly promise to stay away. Not because he intends harm. Because he intends pursuit.

He smiles at last, though quieter than usual. “I haven’t decided yet whether she is a temptation or a lesson.” Lady Whitlock lifts a brow. “Men generally assume the two are different.”

Soonyoung chokes on his tea. Jeonghan closes his eyes as if receiving divine satisfaction. Even Seungcheol’s mouth curves. Mingyu lets them laugh. Better that. Better not to examine why Reverend Marlowe’s daughter, of all women in London, has managed to rearrange the furniture in his mind after two meetings and one laugh.

The better part of the afternoon is spent pretending to read in the library, and another part allowing Jeonghan to drag him into a conversation with a tailor about evening coats he does not care about. He says the correct things. He laughs in the correct places. He flirts absentmindedly with a widow at tea and catches himself halfway through, not because the flirtation is unwelcome but because he wonders what you would make of widows who laugh openly over marmalade. He discards the thought and fails to discard it fully.

By evening, when London’s lamps awaken and the city shifts toward appetite, Mingyu stands at his window with a glass in his hand and watches the street below move in contained glitter. There are easier women. Kinder ones. Bolder ones. Women who would answer his smile with smiles of their own, women who know the shape of games and choose them gladly, women who would not bring a Reverend’s judgment and a churchyard’s shame and all this absurd self-interrogation in their wake. He knows this. He also knows, with terrible useless clarity, that none of those women laughed like you did. He lifts the glass and drinks.

Tomorrow, perhaps, he will be sensible. Tomorrow, he will remember that you are a conquest and ought to remain one. Tomorrow, he will construct his approach properly—gifts small enough not to accuse, encounters plausible enough to survive scrutiny, words pitched carefully between insolence and warmth. Tomorrow, he will become strategic again. Tonight, he allows himself the private pleasure of anticipation.

Because Reverend Marlowe may think him corruption incarnate. White’s may think him a sly dog. His brothers may think him bored enough to hunt trouble for the sake of it. But Mingyu knows something they do not. A laugh like that does not disappear once heard. And a woman taught all her life to kneel does not accidentally touch a man’s hand without that touch meaning something to herself, even if only in the dark. That is enough. More than enough. He turns from the window, already thinking of Sunday next.

The painted man stands above a world that refuses to end.

He is turned away from you, booted upon black rock, his coat pulled close against a wind you cannot feel, and before him the earth dissolves into whiteness—not emptiness, not absence, but a sea of cloud and vapour so vast and luminous it gives the eye nowhere to rest. Peaks rise through it like thoughts not yet named. Distance becomes possibility. The whole canvas seems to breathe in that peculiar way certain landscapes do, as if what is being depicted is not merely a place but a condition of the soul.

You stand before it longer than decorum requires.

Around you, the gallery murmurs with curated approval: patrons and subscribers moving from canvas to canvas beneath chandeliers and commentary, silk hems brushing parquet floors, gloves lifting spectacles toward landscapes no one in this room has ever truly walked. Voices soften instinctively before beauty, though never so much that social recognition is interrupted by it. A gentleman two paces behind you is praising the handling of light to a woman who is plainly more interested in being overheard admiring him than the light itself. A widow in violet tilts her head just enough to look intelligent beside a still life. Someone says the word sublime with such satisfaction that it becomes less an observation than a self-congratulation.

Your father is not at your shoulder for once. He stands some yards away in grave conversation with a patron whose enthusiasm for moral seriousness appears equal only to the width of his side-whiskers. The invisible leash he keeps on you has not vanished, but it has lengthened by precisely the number of minutes required for one man to finish praising another man’s sermon. In those minutes, you have found yourself here: before a painted precipice, looking at a figure turned outward toward whatever comes after the known world, and wondering with a kind of quiet ache what it must feel like to stand so high above one’s own life and not immediately think of falling. Your fingers press lightly at the hidden beads inside your sleeve. The carnelian rests warm against your skin. Tiny counts. Tiny chains. The man in the painting has no visible chains at all.

“He looks intolerably pleased with himself,” a voice says beside you, warm with mischief and far too familiar now to be a surprise. You turn.

Mingyu Ashbourne stands beside you in evening black so perfectly cut it ought, by right, to have made him look respectable. It does not. Nothing ever quite manages the feat. He wears propriety the way some men wear cologne—lightly, attractively, and with every intention that it remain the most superficial thing about him. There is colour in his face from the cold beyond the museum doors, brightness in his eyes as though the evening itself has amused him from the first step inside, and that impossible, infuriating ease about his mouth that makes everything he says sound half like an admission and half like a joke. For one appalled moment, all you can think is that he has done it again—appeared in one of your approved places like some smiling contamination your father has warned you against too often.

“Mr. Ashbourne.” His smile deepens at once, as if your use of his name is a private blessing. “Miss Marlowe.” He glances back at the painting. “You looked as though you meant to follow him.” The answer rises before prudence can stop it. “Into the fog?”

“Into whatever he has mistaken for freedom.”

The words leave him lightly, but they do not fall lightly. You look back at the canvas before you can be caught looking at him too long. That, at least, is still under your command. The painted figure continues to face outward into uncertainty and some immense white promise the world below could never permit. “Perhaps,” you say, and then wish at once that you had not, because perhaps is a treacherous word. It admits desire merely by declining to deny it. Mingyu seems to hear that treachery and enjoys it. “You see it too, then.”

“I see a man standing on a rock.”

“No, you do not.” It is intolerable how gently he says it. Intolerable, too, that he is right.

You ought to move. Your father may turn at any moment. Lady Henshaw may notice. Some moral aunt with a talent for scandal disguised as concern may already be filing away the image of you standing before a landscape with Mr. Ashbourne at your side. Still, you remain.

The room behind you continues to hum—fabric and scholarship, compliments and candlelight—yet here, before the painting, there is the distinct and private sensation of having stepped slightly outside the approved arrangement of the evening. Mingyu tips his head toward the canvas again. “If he turns around,” he says, “I expect he’ll find the path behind him has disappeared entirely.” You should not answer. You hear yourself do it anyway. “Then he ought not have climbed so high.” A soft laugh leaves him—not loud enough to turn heads, not sharpened enough to mock. “And miss the view?”

There is something deeply aggravating in the ease with which he inhabits possibility. He speaks of cliffs as if they are invitations. Of fog as if uncertainty were merely another word for adventure. He speaks, in short, like a man who has never once been told that safety is holier than joy. You should despise him for it. Instead, you feel the old inward tightening: curiosity, shame, a kind of starving astonishment that such ease exists at all outside novels and very bad examples.

A small group passes behind you too closely, forcing the width of the gallery into a momentary narrowness of bodies. Someone’s sleeve catches against the edge of your own. Your slipper turns slightly on the polished floor. Mingyu’s hand comes to your elbow. Only for half a moment. Less, perhaps. A steadying pressure. Entirely proper in its function and entirely improper in what it does to the rest of you. You right yourself at once. He removes his hand at once. But the place where he touched you behaves as though it has been marked.

“Careful,” he says. It is the sort of word other men use thoughtlessly. From him it arrives with just enough softness to be dangerous. Your fingers close once more around the hidden beads at your wrist. “I am.”

His eyes flick to the movement of your hand hidden beneath your sleeve, and something in his expression alters. “You are,” he agrees, though the answer contains entirely too much amusement for a man supposedly accepting correction. Mingyu glances once more at the painting and then, with infuriating satisfaction, says: “I think you should follow him.”

“That would be improper.”

His eyes return to yours. “Then perhaps improper things are not always wrong.” That sentence goes through you like a draft under a door. You do not have time to answer. Reverend Marlowe’s voice, calling your name from somewhere down the room, reasserts the shape of the world immediately. You step back. Mingyu inclines his head. There is no insolence in the gesture, only that same bright, impossible ease. “Good evening, Miss Marlowe.”

You leave him there before the painting, before the cloud-sea, before the suggestion of high ground and vanished paths and all the rest of the metaphors your life cannot afford.

That night, your father waits until the house has quieted into its accustomed obedience before sending for you to come to the study. He does not tell you to kneel this time. Instead, he directs you to the straight-backed chair near the hearth and places a stack of sermon pages before you. Your workbasket is set at your feet. A pen, an inkwell, and several clean sheets await beside the pages. “You will remain here,” he says, “until these are copied.” You glance at the neat pile. There are more pages than there ought to be for one evening. “Yes, Father.”

He opens his Bible and turns the pages not toward you but for himself, as a man might prepare a mirror before a difficult grooming. “And beneath each page,” he continues, “you will write the verse I give you. Ten times.” Of course you will.

He speaks it slowly, and the words are familiar enough to feel written into your flesh. “Abstain from all appearance of evil.”

You take up the pen. Copy the first page. Then again. Then the verse, ten times, each line smaller and sharper as the hours stretch and the muscles of your hand begin to stiffen. The rosary remains hidden beneath your sleeve; every so often, when your fingers cramp, you press the beads into your wrist until the pain steadies rather than distracts.

Your father writes at his own desk while you work. That is the worst part—not the labour, not the hunger when he dismisses supper from your routine, not even the slow burn in your limbs—but the quiet scratch of his pen accompanying yours, as if your correction is no more extraordinary than his correspondence.

By the time he finally tells you to stop, your fingers are ink-marked and aching and the verse has detached itself from language entirely. It has become pattern. Punishment does that. It sands meaning down until only submission remains. When sleep comes much later, it is treacherous.

In your dream, the man in the painting turns. It is not a stranger’s face beneath the wind. It is Mingyu’s. He stands above the cloud-sea with his coat snapping open in light that belongs nowhere on English soil, and when he holds out his hand to you, there is laughter, as though he means to show you something beyond the fog. Beneath that laughter, the single terrifying knowledge sits that if you stepped where he stood, there would be no path back to the version of yourself your father approves of. You wake with your mouth parted and your heart beating too quickly for morning prayer.

Lady Henshaw’s community breakfast takes place three days later in the parish assembly room.

Long tables run the length of the room beneath white cloths and a modest profusion of preserves, buttered rolls, tea urns, boiled eggs, and dishes whose virtue lies in nourishment. It is all brightened beyond its natural dignity by flowers, polished silver, and the determined cheer of women who understand that benevolence is more persuasive when served on good china. The event is meant to aid parish widows, orphaned children temporarily placed in respectable houses, and several industrious families who have recently become poor enough to deserve notice.

Your father stands near the head of the room, greeting benefactors and receiving gratitude in equal measure. You remain close as instructed, helping where directed, speaking when spoken to, passing plates, refilling cups, and allowing yourself to be used exactly as a correct daughter ought to be used on a philanthropic morning.

A little girl with scraped knuckles curtsies too earnestly at you when you hand her bread. An elderly widow tells you your eyes are kind. A gentleman from the vestry praises your father’s continued zeal and adds, in the same breath, that it is reassuring to see a young lady still take interest in useful work. You smile because smiling is easier than answering. You do not think of the painting. You do not think of church bells. You do not think of a warm hand at your elbow. You think, resolutely, of eggs.

This lasts until the door opens and Soonyoung Ashbourne arrives carrying a basket of oranges on one shoulder as though he has single-handedly provisioned the Empire.

He is all brightness and movement, apologising to no one in particular for his lateness and somehow making lateness itself sound generous. There is laughter immediately in his wake, because Soonyoung appears to belong to the species of man for whom rooms reorient out of pure amusement. Behind him come Jeonghan and Joshua, the latter carrying the grave patience of someone who has volunteered for the practical parts because practical parts actually matter. And with them—Of course. Mingyu.

He is not carrying anything at all, which should not surprise you and still does. He enters as if attendance were enough of a contribution, and then, with a grin to Lady Henshaw and a compliment too warm to be innocent, he rolls up his sleeves and takes charge of the tea tray with such conviction that three matrons forgive him on sight. You should not be watching. You are.

The other Ashbournes scatter into usefulness in exactly the way foundling boys grown into men might do when asked to serve in public: Joshua balancing accounts and practical arrangements, Jeonghan charming the money out of women without ever appearing to ask for it, and Soonyoung carrying more than anyone sensible would carry and laughing when half of it nearly slips.

Mingyu catches you looking from across the room. He does not smile broadly. He only tips the kettle a fraction in your direction, as if toasting you with tea. You look away at once.

There is no reason at all that your pulse should alter for so little. Yet it does, enough that you overfill one cup and have to apologise to the woman receiving it.

An hour into breakfast, when the room has settled into the pleasant fatigue that follows successful nourishment, Lady Henshaw directs you toward the sideboard with a list of names and asks that you see to the distribution of wrapped loaves meant for several parish households. It is a simple enough task. You are glad for anything that requires movement. Stillness has become too aware of itself where Mingyu is present.

You cross to the sideboard and begin matching names to parcels. One loaf for Mrs. Bell, two for the Cartwright sisters, one with preserves for the widow on King’s Lane whose sons are both at sea.

A plate appears beside your hand. On it: half a roll, one boiled egg neatly cracked, and a small wedge of seed cake no one has yet claimed because seed cake is always either the first thing gone or the last thing touched. “Mercy,” says Mingyu at your shoulder, “is less persuasive on an empty stomach.”

You do not turn immediately. “You ought not sneak up on people in charitable institutions.”

“I was under the impression charity improved me.”

You look at him then, because the answer is too polished not to have been prepared in advance. He is holding a second plate for himself, though his own breakfast appears to consist mostly of coffee and insolence. “I am working.”

“So am I.” He glances at the orderly arrangement of loaves. “Though I admit your method looks more trustworthy.”

The room stirs around you. Children are wrapped into shawls. Lady Henshaw receives praise as if she personally invented bread. Your father is engrossed in conversation with a parishioner devout enough to keep him still. The morning is full of witnesses and yet, somehow, this small square of space at the sideboard feels bracketed off from the rest. You should refuse the plate. It would be the safer thing.

Instead, because no one is looking and because you have not eaten since a supper denied in silence two nights before and because there is something unnervingly considerate in the way he has not chosen sweetmeats or indulgence but simple sustenance, you take it. “Thank you.”

He watches you with unearned satisfaction. “See?” he says. “Already church has made me useful.”

You peel the shell from the egg with perhaps more concentration than is strictly necessary. It is a relief to focus your eyes on something not him. “If this is repentance,” you say, “it is oddly cheerful.”

“I have always thought gloom rather vain in sinners.” That answer should not please you. It does. A sound catches in your throat before you can prevent it—too small to be called laughter, too bright to be mistaken for anything else.

His expression changes with immediate warmth. Not triumph. More like delight finding the door it had hoped for. “There,” he whispers. “You do know how.” The rebuke rises before gratitude can do something more dangerous. “I did not say I wished to.”

“No.” He picks up his own cup of coffee from the tray beside him. “That is why it interests me.”

You ought not let him say things like that to you as though interest itself were something flattering rather than compromising. Yet the room is so crowded, so obviously harmless, the morning so publicly kind, that forbidding the conversation begins to seem almost unwarranted.

Mingyu leans one shoulder against the sideboard. “Tell me,” he says, nodding toward the row of loaves, “do you always organise benevolence alphabetically?”

You stare. “No.”

“By household need, perhaps?” The absurdity of the inquiry is exactly calibrated. Beneath it lives a more dangerous curiosity, and both of you know it. That is why it works. “By direction,” you confirm. “West streets first. Then the lanes.”

“A woman of systems.”

“A woman trying not to misplace other people’s breakfasts.”

“Heroic,” he murmurs. Something in his tone undoes you just enough that you look down quickly at the plate in your hands and discover, mortifyingly, that your mouth is smiling. That is the precise moment your father turns his head.

By the time your gaze lifts, his eyes are already on you. Not on the plate. Not on the loaves. On the expression you have failed to erase quickly enough. Mingyu notices the shift. Of course he does. He notices everything one most wishes him not to. His posture alters at once—not retreat, but a loosening of focus that would allow anyone to preserve the comfort of calling the exchange ordinary. He bows lightly. “Miss Marlowe.”

Then he is gone before your father reaches you. Not fled. Simply absorbed elsewhere into Lady Henshaw’s event with the effortless ease of a man who has never had to fear what follows being seen.

Your father’s voice, when it comes, is smooth enough to pass in company. “You have neglected the Cartwright parcel.”

You look down. Indeed you have. Your fingers tighten once around the rosary under your sleeve until the beads bite. “Forgive me, Father.”

“Attention,” he voices softly, “is the first duty of a woman who would remain blameless.” The words follow you home like a ruling.

That night, there is no desk and no copying.

Instead, your father sends your maid away, removes the shawl from your shoulders with his own hands, and instructs you to sit upright in the straight-backed chair near his fire with your palms open upon your lap.

He loops the rosary around them. Not around your wrist where you may hide its pressure in a sleeve. Around your open hands, crossing the beads over skin so that every movement presses them deeper.

Then he resumes his place at the desk and begins the long, patient work of sermon preparation while you sit beneath his eye and the slow weight of his silence. Each time your fingers curl instinctively inward, he speaks one word without looking up: “Open.” You do. Again. Again. Again.

By the end of the hour, the beads have bitten so deeply into your skin that pain ceases to feel sharp and becomes instead a slow, bright throb. Blood has begun to gather where the cord has cut deepest, small red beads swelling slowly before slipping free and trailing into the centre of your palm. No verse is assigned. No explicit accusation offered. Only posture. Only exposure. Only the unmistakable lesson that your hands, like your laughter, are not yours to close around whatever warmth they please.

Later, in your room, you unwind the rosary with shaking fingers and watch the wounds bloom beneath the lamplight. You press your marked palms against your face, and behind your closed eyes, the dark fills not with blackness but with red.

Saint Joseph brings not one clear dream but fragments. A church aisle flooded with sunlight. A breakfast table stretching into the sea. A man’s voice saying your name as though it is neither proof nor property but merely something worth saying again.

You wake before dawn, the marks of the beads still visible, and feel filthy for being relieved that they are there. Punishment, at least, you understand. It is wanting that ruins everything.

The lecture is held in the hall adjoining a private collection newly opened for scholarly admiration. Antiquities, travel, accounts of ruins, objects brought back from abroad and set beneath glass for the improvement of those too well-bred to admit they are merely looking at other people’s freedom. You sit beside Reverend Marlowe in a row of severe chairs while a gentleman with an admirable profile and an overconfident relationship with maps speaks of coastlines, ancient ports, islands flung bright against seas no English sky has ever properly imitated.

The lecturer’s voice, though dry, cannot entirely strip wonder from what he describes. Each place named feels like proof that the world contains distances your father’s theology cannot fold neatly into a parlour. Cythera. Corinth. Naples. Rhodes. The words themselves sound less like geography than freedom.

You do not realise how intently you are listening until the lecture concludes and your father says, under his breath and without turning his head: “An appetite for elsewhere is often only ingratitude in finer dress.”

Heat rises in you—shame first, because shame is quickest, then something more rebellious behind it. “Yes, Father.”

The hall empties slowly. Scholars gather in knots. Gentlemen dispute dates. Ladies examine sketches of columns and coastlines while pretending not to prefer the coastlines. You remain where you are placed until your father is drawn into one of those excruciating post-lecture exchanges in which men repeat one another’s opinions until someone important hears them.

There is a table near the side wall laid out with pamphlets, catalogues, and a modest row of books for sale. You should not drift toward it. Yet your father’s attention is claimed, and the books are there, and your own feet seem to decide before your conscience does.

A slim volume bound in faded blue catches your eye. Not a novel. Not a scandalous romance. A travel account—letters from the Mediterranean, or perhaps notes kept during a tour. The gilt at the spine is modest. The corners are worn by previous hands. It is exactly the kind of harmless object that feels, to you, improper. You do not even realise you have leaned slightly nearer until a voice behind you says: “That one is dangerous.”

You turn too quickly. Mingyu is there with a catalogue tucked beneath one arm, and that look in his face which suggests he has been watching for some time already. “You cannot appear in every room in London simply because it interests you,” you say.

“Can’t I?” You hate the way your pulse reacts before your temper does.

He looks over the table of books as though considering them on your behalf. “That one begins with a storm off Trieste,” he says, nodding toward the blue volume. “And ends with the author in love with a country he cannot afford to remain in. It seems to me an efficient arrangement.”

You look back at the book. “You have read it?”

“No.” His smile turns brighter. “But I admire any object that pretends to be practical while smuggling escape.”

The answer is so exactly pitched to your weakness that for one mortifying instant, you suspect strategy. Then again, perhaps everything with him is strategy. Charm rarely grows wild; men cultivate it. “You ought not say such things to women in public.”

“Then it is fortunate,” he replies lightly, “that the room considers books morally strengthening.”

Mingyu picks up the blue volume. He turns it in his hands, glances at the title page, then at you. “Have you ever seen the sea?” The question arrives so simply it steals the breath you might have used to fend it off. “No.”

His expression does not change into pity. It only sharpens—interest again, interest with light behind it. “Then the first thing you should know,” he whispers, “is that it looks nothing at all like the maps men draw of it.”

Something in your chest aches. Mingyu sets the book down again, nearer to you than before. “Mr. Ashbourne—”

“You’re allowed to want,” he says. There is no flirtation in the line. The words are almost grave, which makes them far more dangerous than any wink or suggestive tone could have managed. You stare at him. Want.

The word, in your father’s house, is usually followed by punishment. Rebuke. Fire. Rot. Ruin. Never permission. Never this impossibly gentle unmaking of all the old machinery. You ought to step away. Instead, you say, because honesty bursts in strange places when one is least defended: “That is not what I have been taught.”

His eyes remain on yours. “No,” he says. “I thought perhaps not.”

Footsteps approach. Your father’s voice sounds in the distance, thanking someone for their instructive observations. The world rushes back around you.

Mingyu does not press. That is perhaps the most disarming thing of all. He simply lifts the book, tucks it beneath the catalogue under his arm, and says with infuriating ease: “Good afternoon, Miss Marlowe.” You think that is the end. It is not.

When the carriage is brought around and your father is delayed in one last exchange on the steps, a small parcel appears on the seat beside you just before the door shuts—a brown-paper wrapping tied with plain string, no note, no flower, no flourish, only your name in a hand too clean to be accidental. You stare at it as if it might explode. Your father gets into the carriage opposite you.

The parcel sits between you like contraband. “What is that?” he asks. You do not lie well under direct scrutiny. You have never had reason to practice it. “A pamphlet from the lecture, Father.” He extends his hand. For one vicious second, you are certain everything ends there.

Then the carriage jolts slightly as it turns into traffic, and his hand, reaching for the parcel, turns to reach for the strap at the window instead. He glances at the paper wrapping, finds nothing beautiful in it, and apparently judges the matter too dull to pursue. Your heart does not resume its ordinary function until halfway home.

The parcel stays hidden under your cloak all throughout the evening. You do not unwrap it until your room, where even then you listen before touching the string. It is the blue volume.

Inside the front cover, on the blank endpaper, there are only six words. For the days you travel nowhere. No initials. No impropriety. Nothing that could be called an offence by anyone not already looking to condemn. It feels more scandalous than a love letter.

You hide it first beneath your mattress and then, dissatisfied, in the false bottom of the cedar box where your winter gloves are kept, wrapped inside an old handkerchief embroidered with your mother’s initials. Your room has always been full of approved objects. This one unapproved book changes the atmosphere. From then on, every time you cross the room, you know exactly where it is.

And because your father senses change in you as other men sense rain, punishment follows before the night is through. Not because he has found the book. Because when he speaks to you before dinner, you answer half a second too slowly—as though some portion of your mind remains elsewhere, perhaps on a coastline you have never seen, perhaps on six words written in a hand far too warm to be safe.

He sends you to the small chapel room at the back of the house with a bucket, rags, and the candlesticks from the family pew. They have been deliberately left unpolished from the previous week’s use; wax has run down the brass in ugly little hardened rivers. “Brightness,” your father says, “belongs to holy things. If you admire it so much, you may earn the sight of it.” You kneel on stone and scrape wax until your knuckles redden and your wrists burn and the candlesticks glow.

When you are dismissed to your room, you bolt the door and kneel not in prayer but at the box. You slide the hidden panel and find the blue cover still there. Untouched. Yours. There are sketches inside—coastlines, ports, a columned ruin above dark water, quick notes in the margin in an unfamiliar hand. The first line mentions morning light on stone so warm it burns the soles of feet. You read three pages only. That is all you dare. Because to want a book, a place, a line of sky you have never seen, a laugh, a voice, a man—your father has taught you to file all of it under one word. Temptation.

Nevertheless, alone in the dark, you know that word no longer fits cleanly. This is not lust, not in any simple form. It is hunger. For air. For elsewhere. For a life that does not arrive preinterpreted. That knowledge makes you feel filthier than desire would have. Because desire might at least be admitted to the body and condemned there. This—this touches the soul.

The ball, hosted by the recently widowed Lady Rutledge, comes at the end of the third week.

It is held in a house whose chandelier-light flatters everyone and forgives no one. Gold climbs the walls. Mirrors multiply the crowd into greater abundance. Musicians tucked above the floor draw out the evening’s pulse in waltzes and quadrilles and polished orchestral commands. Everything glitters. Everything watches.

Your father has dressed you in soft blue tonight, perhaps because grey would have looked too penitential for an event built to display girls. The gown is modest still, of course. Your throat remains spare of ornament. But the fabric catches candlelight at the sleeves in a way that makes you feel, uncomfortably, a little more visible than usual.

The room is full of the familiar cruelties of fashionable society—smiles that inventory, compliments that measure, laughter that excludes by tone rather than volume. You move through it at your father’s side, answering what is required and no more. You are not looking for Mingyu. That would be a vulgarity of mind as well as eye. You do not need to look. Awareness of him has become a skill your body performs on instinct.

Somewhere across the room a warmth changes shape. Somewhere, a current of amusement shifts course. Somewhere, a woman lowers her fan and pretends not to notice whom she notices. Your gaze skims the room in brief escape and lands on him, regardless.

Mingyu stands between his brothers near one of the mirrored walls—all black evening clothes and impossible ease. He sees you seeing him. His mouth curves. You look away. Which is when your father says, with an almost satisfied gravity you have learned to dread: “Lord Carroway wishes to make your acquaintance.” The name means nothing. Then the man steps forward.

Older, certainly. Not merely older in the acceptable way mature bachelors are called older by girls too green to know better, but older in truth: nearer your father’s age than your own, the hair at his temples silvering, his cheeks padded by indulgence, his mouth too thin for generosity. His evening coat fits him expensively and badly, as though he believes cost a sufficient substitute for taste. He smells faintly of pomade, starch, and the stale righteousness of a man convinced God admires him personally. His smile appears by effort rather than instinct. It does not reach his eyes.

“Miss Marlowe.” He bows. Not low enough. “Your father speaks highly of your steadiness.” Not wit. Not kindness. Not intelligence. Not grace. Steadiness, as one might praise a horse that startles at nothing. You lower your gaze. “My lord.” Your father is pleased. You can hear it in the silence beside you.

Lord Carroway asks you no questions that require an answer longer than yes or no. He inquires whether you enjoy music, then interrupts your cautious reply to inform you that a wife’s fondness for accomplishments ought always to remain secondary to her domestic usefulness. He remarks that the modern world has become too lax with daughters. He praises your father’s “excellent severity” as though complimenting the condition of a hedge. “Girls are far better directed than indulged,” he says, smiling that warm-less smile. “A young wife, properly guided, becomes the crowning peace of a household.”

Carroway continues as if addressing property transferred in principle, if not yet by contract. “I have always said,” he remarks, “that affection in marriage is best understood as obedience.” Something in your stomach turns over, cold and final.

He asks you for the dance and does not wait for your answer before your father gives it for you. The set begins. Carroway’s hand at your waist is heavy, proprietary, and too knowing in its certainty that such contact has already been sanctioned. He guides you correctly through the figures, yet even his correctness feels like a kind of trespass. Each time he draws you in and sets you out again, there is in him no play, no ease, no delight in motion for its own sake. Only possession disguised as courtesy.

When he leans nearer to speak over the music, his breath warms the side of your face. “A wife should be content to be known by her husband’s household,” he says. “Ambition in women has made untidy things of very good families.”

Your heartbeat is so loud that the music recedes. You wonder—with the sort of clean terror reserved for truths one cannot unknow—if this is what your father means by solution. Not safety. Continuance. One cage opening neatly into another. When the figure turns, your gaze lifts involuntarily across the room. Mingyu is still watching. Not at the dance as a whole. At Carroway’s hand. On your waist.

Something has altered in him. Not enough to be called anger. More dangerous than that, perhaps, because it remains leashed. Jeonghan says something in his ear; he does not answer. Lady Whitlock, standing with a cluster of ladies near the edge of the floor, follows the line of his gaze and understands at once.

The next several minutes occur with the efficiency of an Ashbourne operation you do not have the language to name. Lady Whitlock glides toward your father under the cover of congratulating him on the success of last week’s sermon and requests, with disarming gravity, his opinion on a charitable petition Carroway himself is said to support. Joshua appears as if conjured from the air and speaks to Carroway at the close of the set about a benefaction that requires his immediate comment. Soonyoung collides lightly, impossibly, with a passing footman carrying champagne, creating just enough sparkle and apology and mild disorder to shift everyone by half a yard. Jeonghan says something to Lady Henshaw that causes three matrons to turn at once and block your father’s direct route toward you.

It is done so neatly that anyone not born and trained among brothers who cover one another like weather fronts might have missed the intention entirely.

One moment, the set ends and Carroway turns toward you, preparing to reclaim the conversation as though it belongs to him by right; the next, the room has opened in an entirely new direction, and Seungcheol’s calm hand at your sleeve redirects you with the softest murmur. “The ballroom is rather warm, Miss Marlowe. Do take a breath.” It is not permission. It is rescue wearing perfect manners.

You slip through the gap he has created and walk quickly through the edge of the crowd, past a pair of palms in great porcelain urns, into the side gallery where portraits look down over a less crowded stretch of corridor lit in diluted gold. A window stands cracked somewhere farther along. Cool air moves in faintly. Your heart has not yet resumed any civilised rhythm. You press one hand to the wall. For one shameful instant, you think you might cry. Instead, you breathe. Once. Twice. And then: “I leave you alone for three minutes, and society proposes livestock arrangements.”

Mingyu stands at the mouth of the gallery, not close enough to corner, not smiling enough to tease. The relief that goes through you is so immediate it feels like another kind of risk. “You should not be here,” you say.

“That is becoming a very dull refrain between us.” He comes nearer, slowly, giving you time to object. You do not. That, too, is a decision, however much you later disguise it from yourself.

In the softened light away from the ballroom, he looks less polished and more real somehow—the line of his mouth firmer, the bright carelessness banked rather than extinguished. Music reaches you here as through walls of water. The glitter of the ballroom has become distant enough to feel almost imaginary. “Who is he?” Mingyu asks, though clearly he already knows enough.

“Lord Carroway.” The name seems to offend him on instinct.

“He dances like a mortgage.”

You should not laugh. You almost do. “My father approves of him.”

“Then I dislike him already.” He says it lightly, but the lightness does not wholly disguise what sits beneath: a kind of sharp protective amusement, as though he is trying not to let something harsher into the room. You look away. The cracked window admits a thread of cold air. Beyond the glass, night has settled over the square in black silk and lantern-fire.

“He is generous to the church,” you say.

“How admirable.”

“He is… proper.” That word tastes foul tonight. Mingyu watches you silently. “And are you?” he asks. “Grateful?”

The question opens something. Not enough for tears. You do not weep easily and never where anyone may see. But enough for honesty to become less impossible than performance. “No.” It is the first clean truth you have spoken all evening.

His expression changes by a degree—less wit, more attention. “Good.” The word lands with scandalous softness. You fold your hands together too tightly. The rosary hidden beneath one glove presses into your skin like a warning. “You make everything sound easy.”

He leans back against the window frame, one shoulder braced, and looks not at you but out into the dark square for a moment before answering. “No,” he says. “I make it sound possible. Those are not the same thing.” Something in your chest gives way.

He tells you then—not in the tone of a man performing exotic adventures for ladies hungry for novelty, but more quietly than he has spoken to you before—about Greece.

Not the cities listed by lecturers. Not the scholarly parts. He speaks of light first. Of the way morning on the water arrives not grey but gold. Of cliffs above whitewashed villages where the wind smells of salt and thyme. Of ferries and little harbours and fishermen shouting across blue so bright it appears invented. He speaks of standing above a coastline at sunrise and feeling as though the world has not yet decided what it means to make of you. You listen. God help you, you listen with all of yourself.

“It is not cleaner there,” he says. “Not simpler. Men still lie. Priests still preach. Money still behaves like a petty god. But the light…” He smiles then, not at you, at the memory. “The light refuses to apologise for itself.”

The painted man above the white sea returns in your mind with startling force. “You speak of it,” you say, though your voice has gone soft, “as though it set you free.” He looks at you then, and something in his face—some brightness usually spent upon wit—turns unexpectedly bare. “It reminded me,” he says, “that there are places where a man may breathe without first being explained.”

The music from the ballroom swells faintly, then recedes again as doors open and close in the distance. “I have never left England,” you confess.

“I know.” The answer startles you. He continues. “You look at maps like a woman reading scripture for loopholes.” You should be offended. Instead, you say, because the truth has become treacherously near the surface tonight: “I do not know what I would do with freedom if it were placed in my hand.”

His mouth softens. “You needn’t know.”

You stand very still. He takes one step nearer. Still not touching. Still not pushing. His voice, when he speaks again, is quiet enough that it feels like something placed carefully rather than thrown. “No one knows what they would do with freedom before they have any,” he says. “That is hardly a crime.” You give a breath that is almost a laugh and almost not. “In my father’s house it likely would be.”

“Then your father has made a religion of the wrong things.”

The words land somewhere between blasphemy and truth, and it is precisely because you cannot decide which that they unsettle you. “You should not speak of him so.”

“Why?” he asks, and there is no mocking in it, no easy provocation. Only that maddening, dangerous sincerity he produces when you least expect it. “Because he is your father? Or because he is accustomed to no one speaking of him frankly?”

You turn away from him, just enough that your gaze may go somewhere other than the terrible steadiness of his. A portrait hangs on the wall opposite—some deceased lady in lace and pearls, her painted face arranged into the sort of calm that requires no actual contentment beneath it. You have known that expression all your life. You could wear it in your sleep. “It is very easy for you,” you whisper, “to speak as though rules are only furniture one may rearrange.”

The air between you narrows. When he answers, his voice is lower than before. “No,” he says. “It only looks easy from the outside.”

That brings your eyes back to him. There is no grin waiting for you this time. No cleverness poised to soften the line. Only Mingyu, standing with his evening coat catching the dim light, and all his careless brightness banked for once into something steadier and far more difficult to survive. “People forgive me for laughing,” he says. “They call it charm, and because they call it charm, they do not ask what it covers.”

The confession is so bare, so unexpected, that it steals whatever answer you might have made. Mingyu looks down for a moment, then back up, and there is something almost rueful in the set of his mouth. “You think I do not know what it is to be performed back at the world,” he says. “I do. I only learned to grin first, that is all.”

You have seen it, of course. The polished ease. The bright deflection. The way rooms forgive him because he makes their cruelty entertaining to itself. But this—this is the first time he has turned even the edge of that knowledge toward you and let you see the machinery rather than the gleam. You do not know what to do with the tenderness that rises in answer. Tenderness is far more dangerous than desire. Tenderness lingers. Finds reasons. Makes room.

“That is different,” you say, though the protest lacks the conviction you intended. One dark brow lifts, very slightly. “Is it?”

You open your mouth and then close it again. Because no—no, perhaps it is not entirely different. Because there is a kinship in being made useful. In being turned into a shape the world prefers. In learning how to survive within the role given, even when the role begins to feel like a cage one carries on one’s shoulders. The recognition of that kinship feels indecent. You lower your gaze to your hands. “If you were sensible,” you say, “you would leave me alone.” He laughs once under his breath, but there is no mockery in it. “Almost certainly.”

Mingyu shifts then—one step closer, no more than that, but enough that the air alters with him. Your breath catches and betrays you instantly.

He hears it. But if he is pleased, he is merciful enough not to show it. “Do you know what I think?” he asks. You should not answer. You do. “No.”

His gaze stays on your face. “I think you have been told so often what sort of daughter you ought to be that no one has thought to ask what sort of life would make you happy.” You look away so quickly it feels like flinching. “Happiness is not the measure of a good life.”

“Perhaps,” he says. “But misery should not be mistaken for it either.”

You think of Carroway’s hand at your waist—heavy, proprietary, already certain. You think of your father’s fingers pressing meaning into your arm, into your wrist, into your every answered breath. You think of scraped wax from brass candlesticks, of copied verses until your hand cramped, of open palms and rosary marks and a hidden blue book wrapped in your mother’s handkerchief. And then you think of this man speaking of sunlight on foreign water as though light itself may belong to whoever stands in it.

Your voice, when it comes, is scarcely more than air. “You know nothing of my life.”

He takes another half-step. The restraint of it is beginning to undo you more thoroughly than any boldness could have done. “No,” he says. “Not enough. But I know what you look like when you are trying not to want anything.”

The whole gallery seems to narrow. Your hand tightens around nothing.

He is too close for safety, though not for scandal. Close enough that you can see where one dark strand of hair has slipped free near his temple, where his pulse beats once in the hollow of his throat as though he is not half so unaffected as he pretends. You should make your leave. Instead, you hear yourself say the one thing you had never meant to tell anyone, least of all him. “I do not think I was made for this.”

His expression stills. “For what?”

The answer takes everything. “For smiling when spoken to and saying the correct thing and calling it peace. For being handed from one set of rules to another and being grateful that both are respectable.”

Mingyu’s eyes darken. “No,” he says softly. “You were not.”

No sermon has ever answered you so quickly. No prayer has ever returned with such immediate force. You do not know whether the thing that rises in you is relief or grief. Perhaps they are too close to separate.

He is very near now. “You should stop,” you say, though the plea is ruined by the fact that you do not move away.

His voice drops. “Tell me to.”

The whole of you goes still. Not because the words are forceful. Because they are not. Because they are the opposite of force. An offering of choice. A handing back of will. No one in your life has ever made permission sound so intimate.

Trust arrives where it has no right to be, where it has not been earned, where it should not be possible after so little and yet somehow is—because he has not once cornered you, not once pushed, not once taken one inch you did not first leave undefended. Your hand lifts of its own accord—uncertain, almost not daring to complete the motion—and comes to rest against his sleeve. A gloved touch against dark cloth. His eyes drop briefly to the place where your fingers rest and then return to your face, and what lives in his expression is so carefully held it makes your pulse stumble.

You think, absurdly, of standing on the edge of something vast enough to terrify and tempt in equal measure. Of how a person might step forward without meaning to and still know, in the deepest part of themselves, that the step was chosen. You move. Not much. Only enough to make the space between you no longer his to guard alone. He does not close it. That, perhaps, is why you do.

Your mouth meets his with all the trembling certainty of a woman doing the most reckless thing she has ever done and understanding, even as it happens, that recklessness is not the same thing as regret. Your fingers tighten around his sleeve.

Mingyu’s mouth answers yours. His lips are soft and warm and devastatingly certain, parting just enough to make the kiss real—undeniable, impossible to mistake for accident. You feel the breath leave him, feel the sharp contained force of his wanting as it meets yours and folds into it.

His hands come to your waist—not snatching, not claiming anything you have not already placed in his keeping, but closing there with a heat that goes through fabric and bone and every starved place inside you that has spent years mistaking deprivation for virtue. His grip tightens just enough to tell you he is feeling the same vertigo, and when you sway into him, the kiss deepens by its own terrible logic.

His mouth moves over yours again. He tilts his head, and the kiss turns hotter, deeper, as though he has made some swift and private decision to give you exactly as much as you are asking for and not one inch more.

The world contracts. The cool draft from the cracked window. The distant pulse of violins through the wall. The warmth of his hands at your waist. The scandalous, ruinous fact of his body so close to yours.

You make a small sound against his mouth—half breath, half shock—and the answering flex of his fingers sends molten desire through you. The pressure of it, that first real crack in his discipline, makes you bolder in a way that would have horrified you an hour ago. Your hand slips from his sleeve to the line of his lapel and then higher, into the thick dark of his hair, and when your fingers tighten there, he gives a breath against your mouth that feels almost like a groan swallowed before it can become a sound. It emboldens you further.

Your mouth opens beneath his with a desperation that is no longer trembling or accidental, and when your tongue brushes the fullness of his lower lip in one instinctive, shamefully curious motion, Mingyu’s hand shifts, sliding to the curve of your hip, and squeezes—enough to let you feel the shape of his restraint cracking. You moan softly before you even understand the sound has come from you. The sound undoes him. His head dips lower, his mouth taking yours again with a heat that is no longer innocent. Your fingers pull faintly at his hair. His breath catches sharply through his nose.

Then something clatters in the corridor beyond the gallery. A tray, perhaps. A servant’s misstep. Glass against silver. It is not a loud sound, not truly, but it strikes through the moment like cold water dashed over fire. You break apart at once. The loss of him is immediate and brutal. Your mouth aches with him. Your whole body feels suddenly lit from within like a chapel full of candles no one has yet thought to snuff. His eyes are on you—dark, wide, the careless brightness gone entirely. He looks less as though he has been kissed than as though he has been struck open. You take a step back.

The gallery spins back into shape around you—the line of portraits, the dark window, the pulse of music through the wall, the dreadful ordinariness of everything that should no longer be ordinary at all. “I must go.” Your voice does not sound like yours.

Mingyu moves as if to say something—your name, perhaps, or a warning, or nothing more than a breath made audible—but you do not wait to hear it. You turn before he can speak, before his gentleness can undo you further, before the memory of his mouth can become anything more dangerous. And you run.

You go into the music, into the chandeliers, into the ballroom still glittering with all the polished certainty of society while your body rings with the memory of something stolen and living and utterly unsanctioned. When you find your father again, lips cooled and pulse still in ruin, you know with a terrible, thrilling clarity that nothing in your life may remain quite as it was before the kiss. Not because he kissed you. Because you kissed him. And if Mingyu looked at you again and asked what you wanted, the answer would no longer be freedom.

Mingyu wakes before dawn with your name nowhere near his mouth and everywhere else. Not spoken—not even in sleep, for he is vain enough to be grateful for that much dignity—but lodged behind his teeth, in the pulse of his blood, in the abrupt and furious awareness of his own body where the morning has found him uncompromisingly honest. The room around him is dim with the last softness of night. Ashbourne Hall keeps its silences well at this hour; doors have not yet begun their careful opening and closing, and servants have not yet fully set the machinery of the house in motion.

His sheets are warm. His breath comes out once, hard, through his nose. His hand, flung sometime in the night across the empty breadth of mattress beside him, closes on nothing at all. Nothing but the memory of your mouth.

The recollection arrives with such violent clarity that he shuts his eyes against it and only succeeds in sharpening every detail: the cool dimness of the side gallery; the softened throb of the music beyond the wall; your fingers at his sleeve with all the desperate uncertainty of courage being invented in real time; the first startled contact of your lips against his and the immediate impossible understanding that you had chosen it. Not he. You.

There are men in London who would have made a triumph of that. Men who would have rolled onto their backs afterwards in some club chair and told the story as proof of irresistible charm, proof of feminine weakness, proof of their own particular brilliance in teasing innocence into surrender. Mingyu is humiliated to discover that his first and strongest feeling on waking is not triumph. It is want.

Not the easy bodily kind alone, though his body makes its own hard case beneath the sheets and refuses to be denied. Not even the rakish vanity of having been wanted by a woman who should, by every story London prefers to tell about girls like Miss Marlowe, still be blushing at the concept of lips. No—what grips him is something more dangerous and infinitely less forgivable: the aching, reverent shock of being chosen by someone who had no practice choosing anything for herself.

He rolls onto his back and stares up at the canopy with the sort of bleak irritation usually reserved for sermons and bad port. This is ridiculous. He has kissed women in private houses and theatres and dark corners of stairwells. He has kissed women in carriages and gardens and one memorable library in Vienna that smelled strongly of dust and scandal. He has kissed women who wanted from him a story, an evening, a vanity to remember later. He has kissed women who wanted to be chosen where other women could see it. He has kissed women because he was lonely and because they were lonelier and because loneliness, when well-dressed, is often mistaken for appetite until morning proves otherwise. None of those kisses followed him into sleep and came back in the dawn like this.

He presses the heel of one hand over his eyes and exhales a curse too quiet to be heard by anyone but God, who seems lately to have developed an unhelpful interest in his habits. He should get up. He does not.

He recollects the exact moment your mouth softened against his—not awkwardly, not innocently, not as a child might steal a peck in ignorance of what was being done, but with a tremulous certainty that had gone straight through him and lodged itself somewhere under his ribs where wit has no jurisdiction. Your hand had tightened in his hair. Your breath had broken. The small sound you made when he kissed you back with enough hunger to answer—God.

His body has already concluded its own argument. His cock is hard enough that the ache of it has become almost abstract, no longer sensation so much as insistence. The linen beneath him shifts. Mingyu opens his eyes, stares at the dark line of the bedhangings, and says to the room with all the dignity of a condemned man, “Excellent.” No answer comes, which is perhaps for the best.

He lets his hand slide beneath the sheet with the brisk, annoyed efficiency of a man handling an inconvenience that would be much less inconvenient if it were not attached to his own mind. His fingers close around his cock and strokes once, slow, testing, and he nearly laughs at the absurdity of it—that after years of women, after rooms full of perfume and paid smiles and all the easy arrangements, it is a reverend’s daughter and one stolen kiss who have reduced him to this. His jaw tightens.

He works his hand a little faster, breath catching in uneven measure. The sheets tangle around his legs. His free arm folds behind his head as if that could lend the whole scene some parody of ease. It does not. All ease has deserted him. What remains is urgency sharpened by memory.

You in blue under Lady Rutledge’s chandeliers. You in the side gallery saying you were not made for smiling and calling it peace. You saying, “I do not think I was made for this.” You kissing him.

The pace of his hand turns rougher. His head tips back against the pillows. The room remains dark and decent and wholly ignorant of the fact that the youngest son of Ashbourne Hall is coming undone quietly beneath his own sheets to the thought of a woman who still probably prays after touching him. That thought should cool him. Instead, it nearly finishes him. Because he can see it too well: your knees on hard boards, your mouth moving over penitential words while the memory of his mouth burns through all that holy repetition like fire through paper. Something in him twists—want and anger and awe wound too tightly to separate.

His orgasm comes with a low, rough moan bitten off before it can rise into the room, body locking around the release with all the graceless force of a man betrayed by his own imagination. For a few moments, he lies utterly still, breath hard, pulse hammering, one hand fisted in the sheet and the other covered in his own sticky release.

The silence in the room is immense. When it settles over him fully, he is left with the cooling awareness of his own body and the far more difficult truth that the thing he feels for you has already begun the alarming process of outrunning language he trusts.

Conquest will not do. Challenge, perhaps, but only barely, and even that is beginning to rot around the edges. Sport has vanished. What remains is sharper. He stares up towards the ceiling and thinks, with the deep unwilling sincerity reserved for only the most inconvenient revelations, that he wants to deserve what happened in that gallery. He wants to be the thing your mouth would choose again. Worse still: he wants to deserve the choosing.

The thought so thoroughly disgusts him that he throws back the bed covers, rises, and goes to bathe in cold water before the house can catch him in anything so undignified as reflection.

By breakfast, the house has resumed its civilised structure, and Mingyu has put himself back together with enough care that no one outside the family would think him altered at all. The valet has tied his cravat into something fit for daylight. His hair is obedient by force rather than conviction. His coat sits neatly on his shoulders. He looks, in short, like a gentleman who slept soundly and woke with no greater concern than coffee. Mingyu steps into the room with his usual smile already in place. It would probably fool anyone who did not know him well. Unfortunately, the Ashbournes are the least gullible audience in London. Apparently, that includes those married into it.

Lady Whitlock looks up from her paper. Her gaze travels once over him, and in that swift assessment, he feels the peculiar nuisance of being read by someone too intelligent to be fooled and too kind to be tactless. “Well,” she says, “you look dreadful.”

“Good morning to you too, sister.” The Viscountess does not smile. That would have made the exchange easier. Instead, something in the corner of her mouth threatens amusement and then settles into composure again, which is far worse. “Coffee,” she says, gesturing toward the silver service. “Before you attempt a defence. I should like you to be fortified if you mean to lie to me.” Mingyu pours for himself a cup when he discovers, with a private stab of aggravation, that his hand is not quite as steady as he would prefer.

Lady Whitlock folds the paper and returns it to the table. Her attention remains on him, which suggests she has no intention of making this a trial and every intention of hearing what he will reveal by trying to avoid one. Mingyu sets down the pot. Lifts the cup. Drinks. Lady Whitlock waits until he has put it down. “Was she worth losing sleep over?”

There is no flourish to the question. No teasing. No false innocence. It lands between them with graceful inevitability. Mingyu reaches for the toast, if only because his hands ought to be seen doing something. “You have become alarmingly direct since marriage.”

“That is because I no longer require courtship to disguise my opinions.” He glances her way at that. She is seated in morning blue, one elbow resting lightly against the arm of her chair, looking not like a woman prepared to pry but one entirely content to let silence make the first confession. It is a strategy he recognises at once and resents on principle. “I had not realised,” he says, with careful brightness, “that a ballroom conversation now merits post-mortem over breakfast.”

Lady Whitlock folds her hands. “A ballroom conversation does not.” A pause. “My husband’s brother looking as though he has either fallen in love or lost a war does.”

Mingyu nearly chokes on his coffee. She waits patiently while he recovers enough dignity to answer. “You overestimate both my sincerity and my fragility.”

“Do I?” The question is mild. It is also a trap, and he knows it. He has spent years laying gentler ones for other people. He should laugh. He usually would. He should say something careless, something about challenge, something with enough easy rot in it that the whole subject may return to the category of sport and remain there. Instead, he hears himself say, “It is not as simple as that.”

Lady Whitlock’s gaze softens—not into pity, thank God, but into understanding restrained by good manners. “No,” she says. “I did not imagine it was.” Mingyu tears off a piece of toast he does not particularly want and regrets the motion at once.

The memory of the previous night has done him no service. It sits too near the surface. Even now, even seated at breakfast beneath his sister-by-marriage’s calm regard, the recollection threatens to alter his pulse in some visible and humiliating fashion. Lady Whitlock interrupts his train of thought before it can make him bold. Or reckless.

“You need not tell me anything you do not wish to,” she says. “Though I will note, for the sake of fairness, that whatever happened in that gallery appears to have improved your posture and ruined your rest.”

That draws the smallest smile from him despite himself. “Cruel woman.”

“Observant woman.”

He leans back a little, studies her over the rim of his cup, and thinks—not for the first time—that Seungcheol did absurdly well for himself. “And if I said it was nothing?”

Her expression does not change. “Then I should assume it is either much worse or much better than nothing.” Mingyu laughs then, softly, because there is no resisting a line like that when it lands so cleanly.

The silence settles. Lady Whitlock does not rush to fill it. That, perhaps, is the kindness of her. She does not press where another person might. She does not begin arranging his heart for him as if she had some right to its shelving. She merely allows him the dignity of coming to his own ruin in proper order. At last, he says, looking down at the coffee rather than at her, “I do not know what to call it yet.”

The answer seems to satisfy her more than certainty would have done. “That sounds,” she says, “surprisingly sane.” He glances up, affronted on instinct. “I am always sane.”

This time, she does smile. “Mingyu, I watched you stand across a ballroom and forget every woman in it had a face.” The accuracy of that is intolerable. Mingyu rises to it with what remains of his vanity. “I have always been selective in my attention.”

“No,” she says calmly. “You have always been generous with it. This is rather different.”

Mingyu lets out a breath that is not quite a sigh. He sits in his daylight coat and immaculate cravat, and feels for the first time in years as though his own life has become a room in which all the furniture has shifted overnight.

Lady Whitlock reaches for her cup again. “I trust you,” she says, so simply that for a second he nearly misses it. He looks at her. She keeps her gaze on the tea as she continues, as if the matter were too obvious to require ceremony. “Not to be wise,” she adds. “You have never given anyone reason for that. But to know when carelessness would make you contemptible.”

His throat tightens with a sudden and wholly unwelcome flare of gratitude. She lifts her eyes then, at last, and there is warmth in them. “Do not make me regret that distinction.”

Mingyu should answer lightly. He should bow and grin and tell her she credits him with too much virtue, too much depth, too much anything at all. Instead, because she has earned better than performance in this one moment, he says only, “I will try.”

Lady Whitlock nods once, accepting that for what it is worth and no more. Then, in a mercy so complete it nearly undoes him, she picks up the paper again and says in the mild, domestic tone of a woman restoring the world to manageable proportions, “Now eat something before Seungcheol comes down and assumes I have been bullying you on an empty stomach.” Mingyu obeys because he is still too off-balance to think of a graceful refusal.

Across the rustle of newsprint and the quiet clink of china, the house remains civilised. Morning remains morning. He still looks, to anyone outside these walls, like a gentleman with no greater concern than coffee. But when he reaches for the knife to cut his eggs, he finds, absurdly enough, that his hand is steadier now than when he first poured his coffee. And that, more than any of her questions, tells him how deep the crack has gone.

Mingyu does not go back to the house on Half Moon Street. It had been incidental, at first. A matter of mood. Then, it became a matter of opportunity. Then, embarrassingly fast, a matter of impossibility. Because each time he had thought of it—of wine-dark rooms and easy transactions by which loneliness is softened into forgettable pleasure—your face had intervened.

One madam sends a note as delicate and discreet as a butterfly pinned to paper, asking whether ill health has removed him or only ingratitude. He sends flowers in return and no promise. Another sends word through a footman that Miss Celeste still has his cufflink. Mingyu tells the footman she may keep it and means it.

Jeonghan notices the change by the end of the week. He finds Mingyu in the library with a book open and unread before him, which is itself enough to provoke suspicion. The room is warm with afternoon light. It slants gold across the rows of leather spines, some of which have not been opened in decades. Jeonghan leans in the doorway and studies Mingyu the way one studies a horse with a limp—curiously, not unkindly, with every expectation of pursuit. “How long has it been?” Mingyu does not look up. “Since what?”

“Since you’ve paid for forgetting someone.” That gets his attention. He glances up at once, closing the book on a finger he has not once moved from the same page. “Have you come here to be insufferable on purpose?”

“No,” Jeonghan says, pushing off the doorway and crossing into the room with the lazy grace of a man who rarely hurries. “I came because the staff is beginning to miss your patronage and because you look like a poem written by someone recently denied.”

Mingyu laughs, but it is a near thing. “What a horrifying sentence.” Jeonghan lowers himself into the opposite chair. “You’ve stopped going out properly. You attend church. You forget to flirt with widows who are practically sending written invitations through their earrings. And yesterday at White’s, when Vale spoke of Miss Marlowe as though she were a card trick, you very nearly put your glass through his teeth.”

“Dalrymple,” Mingyu corrects.

“Yes,” says Jeonghan, “which rather proves my point. You are distracted.” Mingyu looks away toward the window. It would be easy to dismiss this. Easier still to feed Jeonghan some bright version of the truth and let him enjoy the shape of it without the depth. Yet there is something exhausting in performance when performed too close to someone who has long ago catalogued all your tricks. “I am thinking.” Jeonghan makes a low sympathetic sound that contains no sympathy at all. “My deepest condolences.”

Silence settles, companionable only because Jeonghan has no respect for solemnity and therefore does not sit like a priest waiting out confession. He picks up a paperknife. Sets it down. Studies Mingyu with open, feline interest. “Do you love her?” Mingyu turns so fast that the movement is enough of an answer. “For God’s sake.”

“You do, then.”

“I did not say that.”

Jeonghan’s expression remains insufferably serene. “No,” he agrees. “Your face did.” Mingyu should leave the room. Instead, he stays precisely because leaving would be even more revealing. “I kissed her.” It is the first time he has said it aloud to another person.

The room does not change. The library remains a library. The afternoon light remains indecently calm. Jeonghan’s face, however, loses its ease by one thoughtful degree. “Did she want it?”

Mingyu’s answer comes before reflection. “She chose it.” Jeonghan studies him for a long moment, then leans back. “Ah.” That single syllable contains more understanding than Mingyu strictly wished to endure. “Don’t,” Mingyu says. Jeonghan’s mouth curves. “I haven’t done anything.”

“You are doing that thing where you look at me as if I’ve become a sonnet.”

“No,” Jeonghan says. “A tragedy, perhaps. Sonnets are shorter.” Mingyu throws the nearest cushion at him. Jeonghan catches it one-handed and laughs, which is probably the kindest possible response. Finally, he speaks, quieter: “Then stop treating her like a prize and start behaving like a man who understands the difference.”

Mingyu understands because he has just begun trying to do exactly that and already knows the work will not be easy. When Jeonghan leaves, he does so with no further prophecy, which Mingyu appreciates almost as much as he resents everything already said.

The pew behind yours has ceased to belong to chance. There had been a time, not so very long ago and yet already belonging to some former arrangement of your life, when his attendance might still have been mistaken for whim, for one more bright inconsistency in a man made, so everyone said, of appetite, laughter, and the sort of handsome carelessness society forgives because it finds the spectacle flattering. There had been a time when Mingyu, if he appeared at all, belonged to the back of the nave, to the loose and unreliable margins of worship, to the final row and the half-mocking murmur of matrons who liked their sinners visible enough to condemn. There had been a time when, if you felt him in church, it was as one feels a draft from a door left open—an interruption, a passing thing, a disturbance the room would right itself against once the latch had fallen shut again. No longer. Since the ball, Mingyu has missed no service. Not one.

Mingyu does not make a performance of this newly formed habit. That would be too easy, too vulgar, too plain in its intention, and if there is one thing he understands better than most men, it is the value of not handing the whole shape of one’s purpose at once. He arrives dressed as he always dresses—too well, too beautifully, too composed for the rumours that inevitably rise around him. He bows his head when the congregation bows. He rises with the hymns, kneels when the rest kneel, and says nothing that might allow the church ladies the pleasure of calling him irreverent. Yet no one in Reverend Marlowe’s church is foolish enough to mistake him for devout. Even piety, you are beginning to understand, has a way of recognising when it is being used for purposes that have little enough to do with God.

He sits behind you more often than he sits at the back. Not beside. Never so close to offer your father a visible offence he might condemn. He sits one pew back. Sometimes directly. Sometimes offset by half a row, the way a gentleman might sit if he wished to preserve the fiction of indifference while remaining near enough to matter. Always close enough that your body, traitor and witness both, recognises his presence the way other bodies recognise heat from a fire at their backs. If you were to turn quickly, if your neck were to betray the whole rigid architecture of your upbringing, he would be there exactly where your blood has already imagined him. You never turn quickly. You do not need to.

You sit at your father’s side with your prayer book opened to the proper page, your hands folded in your lap with all the obedient serenity expected of Reverend Marlowe’s daughter, your throat bare of ornament and your ribbons chosen under scrutiny, and still your whole body keeps count of the pew behind you. The scrape of boots. The discreet little disturbance in parish order when an older lady shifts to admit him. The exact moment your father’s sermon moves from doctrine into the bright, dangerous severity of warning, and you feel the quality of attention behind you alter by a single intolerable degree. You tell yourself it is imagination. You tell yourself many things.

Then there are the smaller proofs, too intimate to deny and too small to confess aloud even to yourself.

A prayer book slipping from the pew ledge when you rise too quickly, caught by his hand before it can strike the floor, his fingers brushing the leather cover and then—inevitably—the edge of your own gloved knuckles as he returns it wordlessly. A crowded church vestibule where the departing line tightens unexpectedly, bodies pressing closer than decorum likes to allow, and you feel the careful hover of his hand at the small of your back—not touching, not even quite daring, only ready—prepared to steady if needed, refraining just enough that the lack of contact burns worse than a touch might have done. A hymn ending in so much gathered stillness that your own breath leaves you too sharply, and his answer comes, low enough to vanish under the organ’s dying note and yet clear enough to find you: “You sing more loudly now.”

Your composure has not shattered in public. That is the miracle and the misery of it. It only cracks in bright, private places between one moment and the next.

In the churchyard, where your father is detained by wardens and vestrymen and widows whose charity sits upon their lips, Mingyu drifts near with all the false ease of a man willing to let coincidence shoulder the blame. The exchanges remain brief because they must. He understands that in the marrow of him. He arrives, offers a line half-teasing and half-true, lets you answer or not answer, and withdraws before danger grows visible. These little conversations accumulate. That is the danger of them.

No one moment, taken by itself, would justify the treachery of your pulse or the marks left by beads pressed too hard into your palm later that evening while your father reads aloud from Proverbs or Paul or whichever male saint best suits his corrective purposes. Yet no one moment remains alone. They stack one upon another like kindling kept dry beneath a roof. A sentence here. A look there. A hand hovering and not touching. Breath catching where no breath ought to catch. The memory of the kiss has not faded under repetition. It worsens.

It returns at the strangest hours. In prayer. In the small domestic stillness, while your maid fastens the final hooks at the back of your gown. In the cold pause before your father says grace. In the minute before sleep, when your body lies in the dark and the shape of his mouth against yours comes back with such heat that you turn onto your side and press the rosary into your palm until pain makes wanting easier to survive. You had thought, in the first immediate days after it, that shame might cauterise desire if only it were given enough time and enough scripture. It has not. Shame has merely learned to live beside it.

The whispers come as nothing more than a slight sharpening beneath ordinary conversation. Not gossip, not if one asked directly. Concern is the preferred perfume of women who enjoy ruin most when it arrives in satin shoes and sweetened voices. Lady Henshaw’s smile changes. It remains bright, remains all the things it has always been when turned upon you in rooms full of flowers and parish ladies and properly funded benevolence. Though now there is a sharpened edge beneath the brightness, a tiny inward thrill beneath the kindness, as if your presence has become more interesting than your father’s sermons. A widow in navy lace who once praised your modesty asks, in a tone almost too innocent to challenge, whether you find Mr. Ashbourne’s sudden diligence in matters spiritual “encouraging.”

Two ladies from the church circle fall silent as you approach the hat stand after service and resume, once you have passed, with lowered voices and a quick glancing urgency. A matron with cheeks like sugared apples murmurs to another, while examining the fastening of her glove, that “gentlemen who reform so suddenly generally do so in pursuit of a witness.” The other answers, “Or a temptation.”

You are not meant to hear either line. That is why they are placed precisely where hearing becomes inevitable. There is indecency to the implication that open accusation never quite manages. The ton, you are beginning to understand, drinks scandal the way certain men drink claret—not because thirst compels it, but because it warms the blood and lends ordinary conversation the glamour of risk.

These whispers have not yet travelled upward into the more official structures of your life. They have not reached your father as fact, only as atmosphere. They have not yet reached Lord Carroway in any form he would recognise as threat. Yet you feel them gathering at the edges of rooms like mist over water. And each time they gather, your father’s gaze grows a fraction cooler, his silences longer, his instructions more exact. As if he smells smoke before ever seeing flame.

Lord Carroway’s visits arrange themselves into the shape of inevitability. Outwardly, they remain what men call respectable: A glass of port in your father’s study after vespers. Conversation upon church subscriptions, the state of the poor, municipal obligations, the dangers of modern laxity, and the alarming decline of proper reserve among younger generations. He brings no flowers. Men like Lord Carroway do not understand flowers except as evidence of waste. He speaks of household order. He looks around the Marlowe estate drawing room with the calculation of a man imagining which furnishings he would keep. One Thursday evening he stays through supper.

Candlelight burns steadily in the candelabra between the courses, polishing the crystal, flattering the china, throwing soft gold along the edge of the decanter by your father’s hand. Everything about the table has been arranged with enough care to suggest welcome. The linen is spotless. The roast has been carved properly. The wine is decent, though your father has chosen restraint over indulgence. Your place has been set as it is always set. Napkin folded, water glass full, knife aligned. It is, in every outward way, a respectable dinner. That is precisely what makes it worse. Respectability is so often where cruelty hides best.

Your father sits at the head of the table in black evening clothes severe enough to pass for mourning. Lord Carroway sits at his right, broad and expensively upholstered, his waistcoat strained only just enough to suggest appetite. He is less polished here in the private candlelight than he had been at the ball. Or perhaps you are merely seeing him more clearly now that there is no music to disguise him. You sit lower down, where a daughter sits: visible enough to be included, peripheral enough to be forgotten whenever men begin discussing matters they think too important to be interrupted by the presence of a woman whose life they are arranging.

The conversation starts within the boundaries of public decency. The state of the parish. The latest subscriptions. One benefactor’s tedious gout. The alarming laxity of younger men in matters of observance. Carroway speaks with the heavy assurance of a man who believes agreement the natural effect of hearing him long enough. Your father listens with the grave patience he reserves for men whose money, reputation, or theological vanity make them useful.

Then the fish is removed. The second bottle is opened. And whatever scruple had hitherto made the arrangement decorous enough to survive your presence appears to dissolve with the port. “A household requires order,” Carroway says, cutting his meat with the same deliberate force he brings to the opinion. “One sees the consequences when women are encouraged to imagine companionship where obedience would have served them better.” Your father inclines his head. “Quite.”

You keep your eyes lowered to your plate because looking directly at either man would require some expression, and you can afford none. Your fork lifts. Lowers. You have no memory of tasting the food. Only the act of making your hand perform while something inside you begins, slowly and with terrible certainty, to recoil.

Carroway glances toward you—not as one looks at a person participating in conversation, but as one glances toward a field under consideration. “Miss Marlowe has the advantage of excellent formation.” The sentence should not be survivable. It is said with almost absent approval, as if discussing the straightness of a row of hedges or the temperament of a mare. Your father’s mouth settles into that faint line which passes, in him, for satisfaction. “I have always considered discipline a father’s first mercy.” You grip your napkin beneath the table so tightly that the linen twists in your fist.

Carroway continues as though you have not heard, and perhaps in his mind, you have not. Perhaps in his mind, women hear arrangements only after rings are placed and papers signed; until then, they remain conditions rather than witnesses. “My late wife,” he says, and there is no softness at all in the mention, no grief, no tenderness—only ownership extended beyond death, “understood the comfort of a rightly ordered house. Submission spares a woman confusion. She need not form opinions on matters for which she has not the training.” Your father lifts his glass. “A rare understanding.”

You might have thought yourself prepared. You were not. The worst part is not that they speak of marriage. Marriage has hovered at the edge of your life from girlhood onward, not as a dream but as an eventual transfer. You have always known some hand would one day open the door of your father’s house and direct you toward another. No—the worst part is the ease with which the conversation proceeds as though your future were a practical matter already discussed behind closed doors where you were not required. Not if. Not even when. Only how. How best to settle you. How best to place you. How best to ensure that Reverend Marlowe’s well-kept daughter passes from one righteous authority into another without ever making the vulgar mistake of believing herself consulted.

Carroway lays down his knife and dabs at his mouth. “Of course,” he says, “a young wife must occasionally be corrected before she grows accustomed to indulgence. But a husband’s task is a sacred one. To guide. To shape. To preserve.”

His gaze comes to rest on you again. This time, he smiles. It is not a kind smile. It is not even a lustful one, which would at least possess the honesty of appetite. It is the smile of a man congratulating himself on ownership. Your father follows his glance. “Miss Marlowe has always responded well to instruction.”

A hot wave of humiliation moves over you so swiftly that the room goes thin and bright at the edges. The candle flames appear too sharp. The silver too polished. Carroway too close, too broad, too secure. Your father’s voice too calm. You are not in the room. That is what they require of you: the correct kind of daughter, the correct kind of prospective wife. Present enough to prove modesty. Absent enough that the terms may be discussed over your head. Something in your chest goes frighteningly still.

When the supper ends, your body feels as though it has been left elsewhere, and only your posture remains at the table. You rise when your father does. Curtsy when expected. Leave the room because women leave the room and that is called virtue instead of exclusion. Yet the men’s voices continue from the study once the door closes, and because your father has never thought it necessary to protect your hearing from your own fate, you catch enough through the wall to understand what is being purchased.

That night you do not cry. You stand at your window with the hidden travel book in your hands and feel something more useful than tears settle into you. Freedom, you realise, is not some poetic longing after all. It is a fact from which you have been excluded. The distinction changes everything.

Your first rebellion is so small it would look laughable from the outside. At breakfast the next morning, you take sugar in your tea. Your father prefers it plain. Has always preferred it plain. So the household takes it plain. You have never questioned this any more than you would question gravity, because in your father’s house, preference becomes principle at astonishing speed.

The spoon slips into the bowl, lifts white crystals, and tips them into the tea before you can fully consider what your hand is doing. One spoonful. No more. You stir. Nothing in the room changes. The servants do not cry out. The windows do not break. The house does not split. You lift the cup, taste sweetness, and nearly laugh from the perversity of it—not because sugar matters, but because choice does. Your father notices. His gaze rests on the cup, then on your face, and because it is only tea and only sugar and only one spoonful, he says nothing. That is worse. It means he is storing the moment. Counting.

The second rebellion is the ribbon. Not scarlet or gold or anything dramatic enough to announce itself to the house. You are not suicidal. Merely tired. When dressing for Sunday service, you choose a pale cornflower ribbon instead of the ash-grey one laid out by your maid under your father’s instructions. It is nearly the same shade as modesty itself, only brighter by a degree small enough to be denied and large enough to feel like insolence against your skin. Your father says nothing as you descend. At church, however, two parish ladies look at the colour, then at one another, with the identical, sharpened smile of women scenting proof. Mingyu sees it too. While Reverend Marlowe speaks of modesty from the pulpit and the ribbon at your throat seems to burn in the sight-lines of every respectable woman in three pews, you only feel Mingyu’s gaze touch the back of your neck and then, faintly, your shoulder where the colour lies. He says nothing. Your pulse spends the entire sermon behaving as though it has forgotten itself.

The punishment waits until afternoon. No study this time. No desk. No prayers on bare boards. Instead, your father receives two ladies from the parish in the front drawing room and sends for you to join them, dressed not in your ordinary visiting gown but in plain white muslin entirely stripped of ribbon or trim—purity turned penitential. The dress is not ugly. That would at least feel honest. It is bleached of any selfhood and presented as simplicity. You are made to pour tea. To stand while the ladies speak of young women and vanity and the necessity of vigilance in an age of loosened morals. Your father, from the hearth, remarks upon the spiritual value of humility. One of the women smiles at you with a pity so sharpened by pleasure that you understand at once this is punishment made public and called instruction.

When one of them remarks that young girls often fail to understand how colour excites the eye, your father says, “Miss Marlowe is learning the difference between being looked at and being seen well.” The humiliation is surgical. No titles. No accusation. Only implication placed so neatly in the room that everyone may admire the cleanliness of the cut. Afterwards, in the privacy of your room, you take the ribbon and hide it inside the travel book. A silly rebellion. A stupid one. It matters more than whole catechisms.

The white muslin appears more often. You are made to accompany your father on parish visits where he speaks, before assembled women, of the necessity of humble daughters who do not seek admiration. He has you read aloud from conduct manuals after Bible circle under the guise of “benefiting from edifying passages.” Once, after a Lady remarks too sweetly that youth is prone to excitement, your father thanks her and then asks you to distribute alms in the vestibule while matrons smile and call you dutiful. It is not literal public repentance. It is worse. It leaves room for everyone to say, if challenged, that no humiliation was intended at all.

At another Sunday service he calls you forward after the final hymn—not before the whole congregation, no, he is too cruel for that, but before enough of the church ladies and vestry wives gathered near the front that the effect spreads instantly through the room—and asks you to recite “Let your moderation be known unto all men” as an example to the younger girls. Your voice does not shake. The triumph you take from that is tiny and bitter and entirely your own. Back in the carriage, he says only: “A daughter who must be corrected publicly is a father’s quiet grief.” The line is fashioned to wound and sanctify the wound in the same stroke. You stare out the window and think of coastlines, islands and sun-kissed skin.

The day your father announces the betrothal, the church is fuller than usual. You know why before he speaks. Women have dressed with an extra degree of care. Carroway stands nearer the front than he has any right to in a parish not his own. Lady Henshaw’s expression has honed into that concerned expectancy which means she knows something and relishes being among the first permitted to hear it. Mingyu is in his accustomed place behind you. There is no comfort in that. There is too much of it. You can feel him all through the final hymn, all through the prayers, all through the rustle of the congregation rising into that post-service half-order where news travels quickest because people are still arranged into listening.

Your father steps forward and clears his throat. The church quiets. He speaks first of blessings. Of gratitude. Of the comfort of divine provision. Then, with all the dignity of a man delivering what he believes to be both good news and moral correction, he announces that Lord Carroway has made honourable intentions known and that, with prayerful consideration and paternal gladness, those intentions have been received favourably. You hear the words. You understand them. Yet the meaning remains outside the body, as if language itself has become too far away to enter flesh.

Then the church ladies begin their little sounds. Surprise arranged into approval. Smiles sharpened by relief. Carroway inclines his head as though receiving a minor distinction. Your father’s hand settles on your shoulder with solemn proprietorship. Your future, such as it is, has been spoken aloud before the church before it was ever spoken to you as a matter of your own choosing.

Mingyu does not move. That is how you know the news has struck him. If he had laughed, if he had shifted, if he had muttered some blasphemy under his breath, the world might have stayed intact enough for you to survive it. Instead, he goes so still that the silence behind you becomes a thing with shape.

The congregation dissolves into congratulations. Women turn toward you with all their sympathy arranged around their satisfaction. Men gravitate toward Carroway and your father, eager to approve another man’s arrangement of female obedience. You smile. You have been trained well enough to smile.

By the time the church begins to empty, you no longer feel your face. What remains is motion. Your father directs. Carroway receives hands. Lady Henshaw tells you, clasping your fingers too tightly between her own, that stability is a blessing many girls are too foolish to appreciate until it is too late. You answer nothing that can be remembered later.

Someone—a churchwoman, perhaps, or one of the older girls from Bible instruction—mentions that the front pews have not yet been scrubbed after the alms distribution, and Reverend Marlowe, hearing it, instructs you to remain behind and help with the pews. “Since humility,” he says in the hearing of two matrons, “becomes a bride better than excitement.” You bow your head with a composure that no longer feels like obedience but like vacancy. He leaves you there.

Sunlight weakens over the stained glass and turns the coloured patterns on the floor into something duller and less magical. The vastness of the nave becomes more apparent in emptiness, more cold. The silence after a congregation leaves is not true silence. It is the sound of all the prayers and judgments and hypocrisies still hanging in the air after the bodies that made them have gone. You kneel between the pews with a bucket and a rag.

The wood is cold beneath your hands. Polish stings faintly at the skin around your knuckles where the rosary has already marked you this week. Your white muslin gathers at your knees. You scrub at the polished rail as though effort might return you to some earlier version of the day before your father stood before the church and gave you away to a man who spoke of wives as though they were livestock.

“Miss Marlowe.”

Mingyu stands half in shadow where the side chapel opens toward the confessional alcove, coat still on, gloves absent, face stripped of every easy public brightness. There is no grin. No light line prepared to make this bearable. Only him.

You straighten so abruptly the cloth slips from your fingers. “You should leave,” you rush, too low for any echo but sharp with fear all the same. “If anyone sees—”

“No one is here.”

“They will be.” He comes no nearer. That restraint hurts more than pursuit would have. You pick up the rag. “Go.”

Mingyu does not obey. Instead, he glances toward the side aisle where the confessional stands—dark wood, curtained, half-hidden in the architecture of the church—and then back at you. “Come here.”

You stare. “Absolutely not.”

His mouth almost moves, but what rises in it is not amusement. Something lower. More frayed. “Miss Marlowe.” He says your name like a plea dragged through discipline. “If I stand here another minute, I shall either say something ruinous in open church or do something worse. Spare us both.” The words should horrify you. They do. They also work.

Perhaps because the church has already become a site of humiliation, and some furious inward part of you refuses to let it claim every possible thing. Perhaps because your father has named your life before half the parish, and you cannot bear to stand obediently in the wreckage of it. Or perhaps because this is Mingyu, and every terrible thing between you has so far begun with the world telling you to remain where you were.

You rise. Bucket, rag, white muslin, rosary, betrothal, shame. You carry all of it with you into the side aisle as if bearing offerings to the wrong God. The confessional door closes softly behind you. The cramped dark of it changes everything.

The church remains beyond the wood lattice and curtain. God remains wherever men insist He does. Yet inside the narrow, enclosed space, the world feels abruptly reduced to breath and shadow, and the shape of him, half-visible, where the dividing screen catches the light. Mingyu is close. Close enough that you can see where the tension sits in his jaw. Close enough that the heat of him enters the small box and alters the very air. No laughter survives in either of you. The absurdity of the place presses around you—a confessional, of all things, built for rehearsed guilt and holy absolution, now holding the two most dangerous truths in your life. Mingyu rests one hand against the dark wood beside the screen, fingers spread. “I should have said something.”

You look at him. “In there?”

“No.” His mouth tightens. “Before.”

The distinction undoes you in some small private way. “There was nothing to say.” His gaze sharpens. “There was everything to say.” Somewhere beyond, a door closes in the nave with the mild thud of ordinary church business. The sound makes your pulse leap. “My father is here.”

“I know.”

A kind of helpless anger rises in you then—not at him, not even at yourself precisely, but at the unbearable calm with which he says I know as if knowledge itself were a hand held out over water. “Then you know I should not be here.” His eyes hold yours through the dimness and the carved lattice. “And yet you are.” You hate him a little for the truth of it.

The rag remains clenched in your hand like a ridiculous remnant of obedience. When you speak again, your voice has gone thin with effort. “You should not have come to me after… that.”

He understands what that means. The announcement. The public betrothal to a man you cannot bear to picture touching you outside a ballroom set. “No?” His voice is very low. “Then where am I to go with it?” The question catches you. “Go with what?”

Mingyu laughs once under his breath, not because anything is funny, but because men like him have always used laughter where other people would bleed. “With the fact,” he says, “that I have spent three weeks trying to behave as though what happened in that gallery could be made smaller by any means.”

The words enter you with impossible force. You had not known, until that moment, how badly you needed him to say it had not been small for him. Your hand tightens harder around the rag. The bucket at your feet seems absurd. The church walls absurd. The whole truth of your life absurd.

Mingyu leans his head against the dark wood beside the screen. “I thought,” he says, “that if I kept moving loudly enough, I should not hear myself think. It worked for years.” His eyes lift again. “Noise is easy. Laughter. Cards. Women. Clubs. Cities. You go far enough and fast enough and no one asks what you are running from, least of all yourself.”

There is no pose in him. No rakish sheen. He does not look like the man Mayfair prefers. He looks younger. Not boyish. More dangerous than that. Honest. “What are you running from?” you ask.

His mouth curves without humour. “Stillness.” The answer is so simple you almost miss its terror. “When my mother died,” he declares, and your breath stills because you have never heard him speak of her, “everyone in the house became useful. Seungcheol became duty. Joshua became reason. Wonwoo vanished into silence. Soonyoung became noise before I thought to claim it for myself. I learned quickly that if I was laughing, no one asked whether I was grieving. They only called me charming and made room.” The confessional seems smaller now than before. Not because the wood has moved. Because something in him has. “And if I was desired,” he adds, voice flattening into a kind of self-disgust, “it meant I was not being left. Even if only until morning.”

You close your eyes. The line enters too close to the heart and strikes places your father’s theology never reached because it had no language for abandonment except sin and no language for hunger except weakness. When you open your eyes again, the lattice between you feels suddenly very thin. “My life,” you say quietly, “has been one long hallway in a house I never leave.”

You had not meant to say it like that. Yet once the image arrives, it insists on staying. You see your own childhood suddenly not as years but as rooms connected by locks—bedroom to breakfast room, breakfast room to church, church to study, study to drawing room, drawing room to carriage, carriage to other women’s drawing rooms where your father’s respectability might be reflected back at him in polished form. “Everything in it,” you continue, because the words have broken loose and will not be called back, “has been decided by someone else. The colour of my ribbons. Which books remain in my room. Whether the window may be open. How long I may stand in sunlight. What I say. What I do not say. What is useful. What is vain.” Your throat tightens around the next line, but you force it through. “I do not know who I am without permission.”

Mingyu’s hand leaves the wood. It falls to his side with visible effort, as if keeping it from reaching through the lattice toward you has become a labour more serious than any sermon your father preached that morning. “Then learn,” he tells, and the force in the whisper nearly undoes you. “Even if it is in scraps. Even if it begins with sugar and ribbon and hidden books and hating every second of what it costs.”

You stare at him. The confessional has become a place where truth cannot pretend to be anything other than itself. He knows. He knows about the scraps. Perhaps not each one. Not the exact shape of them. But enough. The ribbon. The changed look. The fact that something has begun resisting in you and is not yet big enough to be called revolt, but too alive now to be mistaken for peace. “You make rebellion sound easy.” His answer comes immediately. “No.” A pause. “Only worth it.”

The silence between you is so taut it seems to hum. Your whole body is aware of the nearness and the wood and the screen and the dark and the fact that if he reached for your hand, you do not know whether you would pull away. “I am to marry him,” you remind. The words remain unbearable even in whisper.

Mingyu’s face changes. No bright remark. No sharp joke at Carroway’s expense. Not even anger, though anger is there if one looks deeply enough. What moves across him looks more like injury. “No,” he says. You almost laugh. “That is not a thing you may contradict into being untrue.”

He slides a fraction nearer. The confessional is too small for such movements not to count. “No,” he says again, quieter. “I mean, I don’t believe it belongs to him because your father says so.”

The room tilts. You are becoming too bold in private. You know it while it is happening and cannot seem to stop. All you can think about is kissing him again. How his mouth felt. How your body had answered before doctrine could. How he had stopped with you and not despite you. His breath catches. So does yours. He knows. That is the worst of it, perhaps—that he does not need a confession for this part. The wanting is all over the air between you. Neither of you moves. Finally, he says your name. It sounds unlike any other person’s use of it. Not because he says it more sweetly. Because he says it as if it belongs to a woman and not to a role.

Your hand loosens on the rag. Falls a little. His fingers lift—not quite toward the screen, not quite away. Hovering in the narrow dark, the gesture half-made and full of everything unsaid. If he touched you now, you think you might break into light. If he did not, you might go mad.

The church beyond the confessional is very quiet. Too quiet. Mingyu seems to feel it too. His gaze flicks once toward the seam of the door, then back to you. “You should go.” The disappointment that goes through you is so immediate it nearly startles you into speech. He sees that too. God help you, he sees everything. “Not because I want you to,” he corrects. “Because if I keep you here, I’ll forget every sensible thing I’ve spent three weeks learning.”

You think of White’s. Of the women, the city assumes he keeps. Of all the easy bright appetites he could have spent himself on if he wished. And here he stands in a dark confessional looking at you as though restraint itself has become a form of suffering.

You should leave. You do not. Instead, your hand rises and comes to rest against the lattice between you. Your palm fits where his would fit on the other side if he chose to mirror it. He looks down. Then he lifts his own hand and sets it there too, separated from yours by carved oak so thin it might as well be non-existent.

In the nave beyond, a floorboard creaks. Mingyu’s gaze flicks once toward the door. His hand leaves the lattice. It moves, slow enough that you could stop him if you wished, around the edge of the dividing screen where the wood opens near the hinge. He does not take your hand. Does not drag, does not grasp, does not claim. His fingers only touch the inside of your wrist, where the rosary remains tangled around your skin. The contact is feather-light.

Mingyu says your name again, so softly it feels like the opposite of prayer. And then, before sense or safety or fear can recover sufficiently to govern either of you, he bends and presses his mouth against your forehead. A blessing in the wrong chapel. A tenderness so unguarded it feels more perilous than hunger. Your mouth parts. No sound leaves it. When Mingyu straightens, his face is close enough that the dark of his eyes feels like a storm gathering. “Go,” he says again, and his voice is frayed with effort. “Before I forget what sort of place this is.” You pull your hand back too quickly, and the loss of warmth is immediate. The blood in your ears is so loud you cannot tell whether the church itself has shifted or only the shape of your composure. You leave the confessional.

The pews wait. The bucket waits. Everything in the church has remained exactly where it was, and yet the world no longer appears arranged in the same order.

You do not see the figure standing half-screened by the vestry door. You do not see the black coat held perfectly still in shadow. You do not see Reverend Marlowe’s face—gone to that terrible, prayerless stillness which means he has seen enough.

Your father’s anger, when it finally sheds its church clothes, is not loud. You had imagined—foolishly, perhaps—that if Reverend Marlowe ever truly lost command of himself, it would arrive in thunder. In a raised voice. In some visible collapse of the solemn discipline he has worn for years like a second skin. But fury, in your father, does not come unravelled. It comes sharpened.

The door of his study closes with the same finality with which he has closed it a hundred times before—for prayer, for correction, for private interviews with churchmen and benefactors and those respectable little violences by which a household is kept “orderly”—and in the instant after it shuts, the room remains precisely as it always is: the desk squared to the carpet, the Bible laid open upon it, the shelves standing close and watchful in the lamplight. Nothing in the room has altered. The setting remains constant. Only the sentence changes.

You are still wearing white. The muslin hangs from your shoulders in that punishing purity your father had been using for public corrections, plain enough to pass for humility, colourless enough to strip the wearer of anything approaching selfhood. Now, beneath the low light of the study, it makes you feel less like a daughter and more like a prisoner.

Your father stands between you and the door. He does not demand confession because confession would grant you the dignity of interior life, and Reverend Marlowe has never believed his daughter possessed one independent of his governance. He voices, louder than if he were requesting a chapter and verse at the table, “Hold out your hands.”

You do not move. The refusal is not grand. It does not ring through the room as rebellion might in a novel. It is smaller than that, quieter, and therefore more dangerous. Your hands remain where they are, hanging at your sides and trembling in the still air, and in that one disobedient action, you feel all the narrow corridors through which you have been guided and folded and trained until even your breath seemed to arrive by permission. Something in that structure gives, just slightly, with the simple fact that your hands do not rise.

Your father looks at you. His face does not change. Or rather, it changes in the one way his always has when displeasure deepens into something more dangerous: the stillness grows finer. “Hold out your hands.” The words fall again, thinner, honed.

You think of the confessional. Of shadow and wood and that impossible, devastating tenderness of Mingyu’s mouth at your forehead. Of the way his hand had touched the inside of your wrist where the rosary had rested and marked. And because you think of these things, perhaps, because your body has been kissed and witnessed and taught, in scraps, to imagine the existence of choice, your hands still do not rise.

The slap comes so quickly, you only understand it after it has already happened. The crack of it strikes through the room and through your face and through whatever childish expectation you had once preserved that his cruelty might always remain deniable. Pain blooms bright and immediate across your cheek. Your head turns with the force of it. The room lurches. The taste of metal arrives at the edge of your mouth before the breath has even fully left you, and for one sickening second, you are no longer certain whether what shocks you more is the violence or the proof of how calmly he can carry it. You stagger once against the chair. Catch yourself. Straighten.

Your father does not raise his voice. That is the line, and he has crossed it without surrendering so much as a thread of his composure. “I will not,” he declares, each word a separate instrument, “be shamed by a daughter who has forgotten her place.”

His hand closes around your arm and turns you toward the desk. There, beside the open Bible and the trimmed pens and the papers waiting to be filled with righteousness, lies a crop—no doubt once for horses, perhaps for discipline in some practical country sense, now made useful here for a lesson more intimate and more vile. For one heartbeat, you cannot breathe at all.

Then you wrench from his grasp, instinct exploding before strategy can form. The movement is useless. He is larger than you, older than you, so fortified by certainty and by custom and by the legal sanctity of fatherhood that your resistance only clarifies the shape of what is to follow.

The first stroke lands across the backs of your calves through the muslin. It is not the agony described in novels. It is worse. Sharp, immediate, shocking enough that your knees nearly give, the pain trailing behind the impact in a line of fire that seems at first too bright to belong to the body at all. The second follows before the first has settled. The third catches where cloth no longer protects, and the sound that tears from your throat is no proper cry, no lady-like gasp, only the involuntary sound of flesh receiving what flesh was not made to welcome.

Your father speaks while doing it. That is perhaps his greatest obscenity. Not cursing. Not shouting. In that grave, clerical tone with which he has spent years interpreting God for lesser souls. “A daughter—” the crop whistles through the air and finds you again “—who invites corruption—” another strike, another line of heat and ruin “—must be corrected before she mistakes appetite for liberty.”

The room contracts. The world becomes impact and breath and the impossible dignity of not wanting him to hear you beg. You taste blood where you have bitten your lip. The fourth blow lands lower. The fifth higher. By then, your body has ceased separating pain into individual moments and has become, instead, one great, bright field of it, every nerve lit and shuddering. You hear the crop sing through the air before each strike and begin dreading the sound even more than the contact, because the dread gives time for imagination to do its own work.

And somewhere inside the heat and humiliation and the old well-trained instinct to obey, something else rises. Not meekness. Not collapse. Something feral. It gathers slowly, with dreadful clarity, in the very place your father means to break. Each stroke strips away one more layer of obedience until what remains is no longer the frightened, dutiful creature who could once be led back into herself through prayer and silence and copied verses. What remains is fury—white, clean, unornamented. Not the sort that screams. The sort that survives.

By the time he stops, your legs are shaking too hard to hold you upright, the white muslin has become a red, miserable witness to what has been done in this room, and your cheek still burns with the earlier blow as if your father had meant to mark your face and your body with separate signatures.

He lays the crop down. “You will pray,” he says. “And you will thank God that I have corrected you before the world is forced to.”

You straighten by sheer hatred. Your face is wet. You had not noticed the tears. They do not feel like grief. They feel like the body overheated, spilling what it can no longer contain. When he tells you to kneel, you do not. You look at him.

Not with childish rebellion. Not even, perhaps, with anything he can safely name. You look at him with a stillness he has spent your entire life attempting to monopolise, and in that look lies something colder than disobedience and more dangerous than tears: the knowledge that pain has not led you back into his keeping. It has pushed you beyond it. Your father sees enough to go pale at the mouth. “Go to your room.”

You go. Not because he commands it. Because you have decided not to remain in it.

Your maid draws breath sharply when she opens the door.

She does not cry out. She has been in this house too long to waste shock where walls may echo it back to the wrong ears. Yet her candle trembles in its brass holder and her free hand rises halfway to her mouth before she masters herself. You shut the door behind you with your own hand. “Do not call anyone,” you say. The sound of your own voice startles you. It is low, scraped raw, as though the evening has stripped away the final coating and left only the hard grain beneath.

She sets the candle on the dressing table and comes nearer. In the warmer light, she sees the mark on your cheek, the split at your lip, the way you are holding yourself with all the painful precision of someone who cannot permit her body to admit what it has just endured. “Miss—”

“I need your help.”

There is no room left for delicacy. Your maid’s face changes. Not into horror —horror is a luxury, and women who serve in clerical houses learn very quickly which feelings are safer than others. What takes its place is something fiercer, quieter, and entirely more useful. She nods.

It is one of the great secret generosities of womanhood that some of the most life-saving loyalties are formed not through declaration, but through immediate practical understanding. She asks no moral questions. Does not tell you to be still while she fetches your father. Does not whisper of duty or patience or the Lord’s refining fire. She draws the bolt, goes to the washstand, and begins assembling what is needed as if tending damage done by righteous hands were as ordinary a domestic labour as brushing hair. You sit where she places you.

The act of lowering yourself is enough to make your whole body seize. A hiss escapes you despite yourself when the fabric shifts against the raw lines at the backs of your legs. Your maid’s jaw tightens. With small, quick movements, she loosens the gown and lifts the blood-marked chemise away from the places where cloth has begun to cling. Cool water touches your skin, and every inch of you burns in answer. You do not cry out. You grip the edge of the chair until the bones of your hand stand white under the skin.

When she finishes cleaning what may be cleaned, the marks remain livid and unmistakable, crossing your calves and thighs in angry lines that will blacken by morning. Your cheek has begun to swell. Your lip is bloodied. You look, in the mirror’s blurred candlelight, not like a girl seduced into error, not like a penitent daughter reclaimed, but like someone who has had the final excuse for obedience taken from her by force.

Your maid wraps a shawl around your shoulders. “He’ll bolt the lower hall after midnight,” she says, keeping her voice low. “The side servants’ door will still catch if Cook has gone down and the scullery maid’s asleep.”

You look at her. She meets your gaze and knows, from that alone, that there will be no sleeping in this house tonight. “Where will you go?”

The answer leaves you without pause, without surprise, as if your body had chosen long before the rest of you had the courage to admit it. “Ashbourne Hall.”

Her eyes widen once. Then narrow, not in judgment but in the swift, hard arithmetic of women who understand what must happen next. She fetches your darkest cloak. Not elegant. Not costly. Plain enough to vanish in shadow. Your stoutest boots. A small purse. Pins your hood with capable fingers while the room hums with the quiet urgency of conspiracy. When she draws the fabric around you, there is tenderness in her hands and fury too, though she says little. “You must go quickly,” she murmurs. You stand. Pain answers from every place your father touched. You no longer care.

The narrow lane behind the house lies washed in a thin grey-silver moonlight and the weak amber of distant lamps. Somewhere farther off, wheels move over stone. A door closes. The city breathes its enormous dark breath around you, and, for the first time in your life, there is no carriage wall between that breath and your skin. The cold is bitter and clean enough to make everything feel sharper. Your cheek. Your mouth. The places where the crop bit. The place inside you that has gone beyond sorrow into something more earnest.

You are not some girl stealing into the night because a gentleman smiled too beautifully in church. Not a blushing fool ruined by a side-gallery kiss and a little bright talk of Greece. The blood beating in you has nothing to do with girlish softness. You are running because Reverend Marlowe’s hand crossed a threshold tonight, and Lord Carroway’s name has become the polite face of a lifetime’s continuation of that threshold. You are running because your body has been used as a sermon. Because your life has been arranged in rooms where you were visible enough to be traded and absent enough not to be consulted. Because if you remain where you are, every small scrap of self you have begun gathering—sugar, ribbon, sunlight, pages hidden in cedar, a kiss, a hand against a lattice, one impossible forehead blessing in the wrong chapel—will be taken back away from you.

By the time Ashbourne Hall rises before you, black and elegant against the sleeping square, your breath is ragged and every step sends hot pain up through your legs in jolting lines. The great townhouse looks impossibly self-possessed, as though houses such as this one never imagine women arriving at their doors with bruised cheeks and a will only half held together by fury.

The footman who opens the door nearly forgets his face. Servants are trained against surprise. They are not trained against seeing a clergyman’s daughter standing on the steps past midnight in a dark cloak, mouth bloodied, eyes bright with something too hard to call tears. “Miss Marlowe?” His whisper contains the whole scandal and none of the cruelty. “I need Mr. Ashbourne.”

He hesitates only long enough to understand the stakes belong well above his station and far outside ordinary service. “Come in, miss.” He steps aside and closes the door behind you with respectful discretion.

Ashbourne Hall at midnight is all softened and possessed luxury: a banked glow from wall sconces, the gleam of polished banisters, the hush of an expensive house built to look effortless even in sleep. A clock ticks somewhere deeper in the hall. “Wait here,” the footman murmurs. “I’ll fetch him.”

You stand there, cloak still clasped shut at your throat, trying not to breathe too hard and not to think too much. The hall swims at the edges of your vision and rights itself only because you force it to. Your fingers are numb with cold, and yet you can feel, through layers of fabric, the pulsing burn of your feverish skin. Every second waiting seems to expose the enormity of what you have done: a lady in a gentleman’s house, no chaperone, no excuse that may survive daylight. Then Mingyu appears at the head of the stairs.

His shirt lies open at his collar. His dark hair is roughened from running his hand through it. Sleep is nowhere in him. He is moving before the footman has fully vanished from the hall. “Miss Marlowe—” He stops. Starts again, lower. “What happened?”

You had not intended to tremble until he spoke. You do now. The sound of your own breath seems far too loud in the silence. Mingyu’s eyes move over you quickly—not with the slow appreciative notice of a man taking in a woman’s appearance, but with the terrible precision of someone searching for injury. Your cheek. Your mouth. The way you cannot quite stand evenly. Something in him hardens.

You do not want questions. You do not want sympathy. You do not want, above all things, for him to look at you and see a broken thing instead of a woman who has made one last selfish, furious choice before the world closes over her. “Take me somewhere private,” you say. He obeys at once.

He brings you not to a drawing room where the house might overhear, nor to the library with its long respectable echoes, but to his own room, where the fire still lives low in the grate and the bed stands half-turned in the warmth of the room and everything in the air smells faintly of clean linen, extinguished candle, and him.

When the door closes behind you, the privacy becomes immediate. So does the danger. Mingyu turns. There is no humour in his face at all. “What happened?” The words come rough, almost hoarse.

You should tell him. You should speak plainly and be done with it. Yet the humiliation of naming what your father did feels almost worse than the pain itself. You look away. Mingyu crosses the room slowly, as though approaching some skittish, wounded thing that might either bolt or bite. “Miss Marlowe.” Then, more softly, because the use of your formal title in this room suddenly sounds absurd between you, “Angel.”

Your mouth shakes. That is all. A little treachery in the line of it. Yet Mingyu sees the whole fracture. His hand comes up and hovers near your face. Not quite touching until you give the slightest nod. His thumb brushes the edge of your cheek where the swelling has begun. The pain is bright enough that your breath jerks. His hand stills at once. He looks at you. “Who hurt you?” he asks, and there is such concentrated softness in the question that you nearly weep from it.

“My father,” you confess. Mingyu lets his hand fall then, not away from you but lower, until he takes hold of the clasp at your throat and loosens it. The cloak slips from your shoulders. The shawl with it. His breath catches when the movement bears the full damage of the evening to the gentle lamplight. The white muslin has become an obscenity—too innocent a fabric to carry such evidence, and so making the evidence appear even crueller for the contrast. His fingers follow the line of your arm until they reach the edge of the muslin, where the fabric has shifted against your calf. He does not lift it. “May I?” he asks. You whisper, “Yes.”

Mingyu gathers the hem with both hands and lifts it only enough to see. The silence that follows is terrible. His gaze takes in the raised welts striped along the backs of your calves and higher, where cloth has not fully spared your skin. His mouth parts and shuts. The muscles of his jaw work with visible effort. When he speaks, the words are so soft you almost miss them. “I’ll kill him.”

Mingyu’s eyes lock with yours, and there is such naked fury in them that for one unstable moment, you think if you said yes, he truly would leave the room, walk out into the night, and kill Reverend Marlowe with his bare hands. That thought should frighten you. It does not. It reaches you as protection reaches a creature too long kept in captivity—warily, disbelievingly, with instinct answering before reason can. “No.” You shake your head, and the room rocks with the movement. “That would still leave him having had the last word.”

Mingyu rises to his full height. Whatever first violence had flared in him at the sight of you has gone inward, banked behind control, leaving only that grave, steady purpose in its place. One hand comes to your waist, the other to the nape of your neck—not to claim, only to guide. He means to turn you toward the chair near the fire, to press you gently down into it before your shaking legs betray you entirely. “Sit down,” he voices lowly.

You do not. Before he may steer you further, your hands close over his wrist. The touch arrests him. You stand there between his hands, trembling and upright, and something in your face tells him more clearly than any protest could: you have not come here to be handled softly back into helplessness.

The words have been building in you from the moment the study door closed behind your father, all the way across the square and up the steps of this house, and if you do not speak them now, you think they may tear their way out of you by force. “I did not come for pity.” Mingyu’s brows draw together. “I came because…” Your voice catches. You taste blood again where your lip has reopened slightly from the force of speaking. “Because tonight he touched what belongs to me as though it had never once belonged to me at all.”

The hand at your waist tightens. The fire gives one small sound in the grate. The silence that follows seems to gather itself around the two of you until even the room’s shadows feel like witnesses. You force yourself to continue because stopping now would be another kind of death. “Take me,” you say, and your voice shakes, though the decision does not. “Before I forget I’m allowed to belong to myself.”

For one breath, perhaps two, Mingyu says nothing at all. He stares at you as if you have placed some holy and unbearable object directly into his hands and asked him to profane it beautifully. His thumbs move—small, unconscious motions that tell you how near he is to losing himself. “Don’t ask me that if you don’t mean it,” he pleads.

“I mean it.” Your answer comes without tremor. That surprises even you.

Mingyu shuts his eyes. Just long enough to seem as though he is bracing against the blow of your want. When he opens them again, what looks back at you is naked wretchedness. “You don’t know what you’re asking me to do.”

“I know exactly what I’m asking.”

“No.” His mouth twists, not in refusal, but in the agony of resisting the austerest path laid before a starving man. “You know what you need. That isn’t the same.”

You want to strike him—not from anger, but because refusal after all this would be unbearable and because the gentleness of his resistance hurts more than if he had simply reached for you like every cautionary tale ever whispered about him. You lift your chin despite the pain in your cheek. “Are you refusing me?”

He laughs under his breath, not from amusement but from disbelief. “Christ, no.” His fingers flex at your waist. “I am trying, for perhaps the first time in my miserable life, to be better than what’s easiest.”

The confession warms the whole room with its honesty. You do not reply. Mingyu goes on because if he does not, he will touch you, and then all the lines will be ash. “Because once I touch you like that,” he whispers, “there is no pretending it can be swept away after. Not for you. Not for me. Not if anyone learns it. Not if no one ever does.”

Something in you, held too tightly for too many years, breaks with a kind of terrible calm. “Nothing can be swept away after this.” You hear your own voice and barely know it. “That happened before I came.”

There is no gentleness left in the world capable of saving you tonight. Because your father’s study still lives in your nerves, Carroway’s smile does too, and because you have not come across the city to be given back whole to those men who call damage duty. All of that presses against your back while the only free space seems to exist in the narrow distance between your body and Mingyu’s. You step into that distance and put your hand flat over his heart. “Do not give me back to them tonight,” you assert. “Not untouched.”

His breath leaves him as if you have driven it out with force. “Angel,” he says again, and the word is no longer an endearment, but a man’s last coherent prayer before ruin, “you will unmake me.” Your fingers close in the linen of his shirt. “Then be unmade.”

His mouth takes yours with all the wrecked restraint he has been trying to keep standing between the two of you, and can no longer hold upright. The first press of it is almost savage in its relief. You feel him try for gentleness and lose it halfway through because you are kissing him back like a woman taking something owed to herself by blood and right. His hands move, one sliding up in your hair to hold you in the angle he wants, the other tightening at your waist until the space between your bodies ceases to exist.

You make a sound against his mouth. He answers it with another kiss, slower and deeper, his lips parting yours; it sends heat straight through your aching body and gathers low, hot, insistent, in your core. “If you want me to stop,” he says against your mouth, kissing the words apart, “you say it once.” You shake your head. “No.”

His lips ghost over the corner of your mouth where the split has begun to clot. He pauses there, not kissing the wound itself, only hovering close enough to honour the hurt without making worship of it. “No what?”

It is not cruelty. He is making you choose again. Giving the choice back and back and back each time you move toward him so no one—least of all you, tomorrow, in whatever room your father locks you in—may ever tell the story differently. You answer by taking his lower lip between your teeth and letting your hands slide upward into his hair. “That,” he groans hoarsely, “is not fair.” You do not know what fairness has to do with anything left in your life.

He kisses you again, the hand that was in your hair sliding down towards the fastening of your gown, while the other spreads broad and sure at your back. The white muslin loosens under his fingers. The simplicity of it feels vulgar now, this dress your father chose for punishment becoming, under Mingyu’s hands, merely another thing to be opened and shrugged away from skin. He draws the fabric down your shoulders until it pools at your feet.

Mingyu’s mouth breaks away from yours to touch the bruised side of your face. Then he switches to the unmarked side. Then down the line of your throat, where he kisses you as if beginning there might remake what has been done. Your hands tighten in his hair. He moves lower. His mouth finds the slope of your shoulder. The hollow just beneath. The upper curve of your naked chest as your chemise, loosened in the struggle of the evening, ceases to offer any meaningful defence against his hands.

The first touch of his palm over your breast sends a violent shiver through you. Not because you are innocent. That word has been used on you too often to mean anything. But because no one has ever touched you like this—like your body is not a thing to be regulated or displayed or bargained over, but a country he intends to cross slowly and with wonder. His thumb passes over your nipple and your whole body arches with a raw, helpless response that makes him curse softly into your skin. “God.”

Mingyu pushes the chemise lower and bares you fully to the room. The heat of his gaze moves over your breasts, and is enough to make your knees weaken. “You’re beautiful, do you know that?” he asks. You shake your head. His mouth curves—not mocking. Struck. “No,” he murmurs. “Of course you don’t.”

Then he bends and takes one breast into his hand while his mouth closes over the other. The sensation is so shockingly, exquisitely wet and warm that the moan you make tears out of you before shame can stop it. His tongue rolls with purposeful slowness around the tight aching peak until the ache becomes something far hotter. His hand kneads the other breast in time with the pull of his mouth until your head tips back, and you are no longer standing so much as held upright by the hand at your waist and the impossible steadiness of his body. “Mingyu—”

You have never said his name like that. He shudders. The sound goes straight through him. He lifts his head only long enough to drag his mouth across the swell of your breast and say, voice gone velvet-thick with desire: “Say it again.” You do, because you cannot not.

Mingyu answers by taking the neglected breast into his mouth in turn, giving the first one over to his hand and a rough brushing of his thumb that sends another helpless cry from you. He seems to like that very much. Not in the vain way of men who enjoy being admired. In a far more dangerous one—the way a famished man likes proof that the food before him is real.

His kisses trail downward. Across your ribs. The soft inward curve of your waist. The skin of your stomach where his hands follow, soothing and possessive all at once, holding you open to him as he lowers you, slowly, onto the edge of the bed. He kneels between your knees. The sight of it almost stops your heart.

A man like Mingyu, on his knees before you, shirt open, mouth reddened from kissing you, and body still leashed by the effort not to frighten or rush you—that sight alone might have unbound a better-trained woman than you. He looks up. “Still yes?” The room has narrowed to him. To the fire. To your own pulse beating like a struck drum through every nerve. You whisper, “Yes.”

His fingers slide up your bare calves, parting your knees wider over the coverlet. The motion pulls the welted skin there into fresh awareness, and when he sees the flinch cross your face, he stops immediately. “Tell me where not.” You swallow.

“Not there.” Your breath hitches as you guide one of his hands higher, past the worst of the damage, to the inside of your thigh where the skin is untouched and already hot with anticipation. “Here.” His thumb strokes the soft inner flesh once, twice, and your whole body tightens in answer. “That,” he says very softly, “I can do.”

He kisses the inside of one knee. Then the other. Up the tender inner length of your thighs in slow, ruined increments, his mouth turning reverent over skin that no one has ever touched except to dress, cleanse, or correct. Each kiss leaves heat behind in its wake. Each one seems to teach your body a new language you had not known it was capable of learning. When he reaches the edge of your drawers, he pauses only to look up at you once more. You are breathing too hard now to bear suspense. “Please.” The word escapes you before your pride can stop it. His eyes darken.

“That,” he says, fingers hooking delicately into the ribbon of your drawers, “you may say again.” He draws the fabric down. The room’s cool air touches your naked core, and you nearly close your legs on instinct. Mingyu’s hands are already there, broad and sure against your thighs, keeping you open.

The first touch of his mouth on your pussy is so shocking that your back leaves the bed. Not because it hurts. Because it does not. Because no sermon, no warning, no whispered disgust from church ladies had prepared you for the devastating ruin of a man kissing you there as though it were not shameful at all, but something worth kneeling for.

His tongue strokes between your folds slowly, as if learning the taste of your arousal. Then again. Deeper. More deliberate. Your hands fly to his hair with no memory of deciding to move them. He moans—actually moans—into you when your fingers tighten, and the vibration sends such a fierce, hot shudder through your clit that your whole body jolts. “Mingyu—God—”

He laughs, low and wrecked, without lifting his mouth. The sound melts into another long stroke of his tongue, then a slower, crueller circling on your clit already pulsing and throbbing as if it has waited all your life for recognition and is now furious in receiving it. His hands smooth your thighs, holding you apart when you close them around his shoulders against the unbearable intensity. He works you open with the sort of mastery that turns pleasure into something nearly impossible to survive in silence. You do not survive it silently.

The room fills instead with every breath you cannot catch, every small broken moan his mouth drags out of you, the wet, warm rhythm of his tongue and the occasional wicked suckling of his lips around your nub just long enough to make your whole body go rigid. It builds too quickly. No—that is not true. It builds exactly as quickly as he means it to, and the truth is worse because it means he already understands the places where your body will betray itself. Your thighs are shaking. The hand in his hair becomes a fist. “I can’t—”

He lifts his head only enough to speak against the inside of your thigh, his lips leaving a damp, shining trail there. “You can.”

Then his fingers join his mouth, sliding through the wetness he has made of you with obscene ease. One finger enters you first, pressing carefully, slowly, and the stretch of it is enough to pull a sharp little cry from you that is not pain so much as newness. He stops there, knuckles white where he is bracing himself on the bed, eyes fixed on your face. “Breathe,” he commands. You do.

He kisses your pussy again, his tongue soft and ruthless, while his finger eases farther inside your walls until your body stops fighting the intrusion and begins, to your own astonishment, to take it greedily. A second joins the first. The angle changes. His mouth closes over your aching clit harder. And suddenly the whole world contracts into one violent line of pleasure running from the base of your spine to your throat. You cry out and his name breaks apart in it.

The heat rushing through you is unlike anything you have ever known. Your body tightens helplessly around his fingers while his mouth drives you higher and higher until the sensation becomes too much to endure in any human shape. Then it breaks. Your climax takes you with a force that feels almost like anger turned into light. You arch hard, one hand in his hair, the other braced uselessly against the coverlet, and whatever sound tears from your throat scarcely resembles speech. Mingyu holds you through it, his free arm pinning you gently where you would otherwise have slid off the bed, his mouth working you through every shaking aftershock.

Mingyu lifts his head from between your thighs with your release still glistening upon his mouth. He bends over you, one hand braced beside your hip to accommodate the height of the bed, the other sliding to the nape of your neck as his mouth finds yours again. The kiss is deep and immediate and far more obscene for the softness with which this night began. You taste yourself on him, and the shock of that—of the intimacy, of the proof, of the wickedness of having him carry your own pleasure back into your mouth—draws a broken sound from you that seems to tear straight through him. Your fingers go to the buttons of his shirt. He breaks the kiss only far enough to look down. “What are you doing?” The question falls from him half as a laugh, half as a groan.

“I want to touch you.”

He hesitates—not because he does not want it, but because wanting has become the least of what troubles him now. Then he releases your wrists and lifts them one by one to his mouth, kissing the tender places where the rosary has marked you permanently before setting your hands back against his chest as though returning something important to its rightful owner. You open his shirt.

The linen parts under your fingers. One button. Then another. Then all of them, until the cloth hangs loose from his shoulders, and you push it down enough to bare him to the waist. The lamplight catches on the breadth of him—the hard planes of his chest, the lean pull of muscle down his abdomen, the quick rise and fall of breath that has lost every trace of ease. He stands between your knees, looking like something too beautiful to have been let into your moral world at all.

Your palms move over his warm skin. Over the flat, tense shape of his stomach. Around his sides. He shivers beneath your hands with the involuntary force of a man whose body has been waiting for your curiosity almost as desperately as your mouth. You bend and kiss him. Not his mouth. His chest. The hollow beneath his throat. Your lips travel lower over skin gone hot beneath the room’s quiet warmth, and the hand that had been resting at your waist slips into your hair with a rough, unsteady tenderness as though he does not trust his own legs through the sensation. When your mouth reaches the line of his stomach, he gives a breath that is nearly a curse. “You do not know,” he murmurs, fingers tightening at the back of your head, “what that does to me.”

You do not answer. You only look up through your lashes as your hands go lower, to the fastening of his trousers. “Angel,” Mingyu says your name. You open him fully. The sight of him bare before you—his cock hard and flushed and heavy with want—sends a fierce answering heat through your own body. You have no experience with this. Only imagination, hunger, and the memory of the way his mouth had worshipped you just before. You let your hand close around his girth and feel, with an almost violent jolt, the full living weight of what you hold.

A strange power enters you then. Not vanity. The bewildering knowledge that this body—this beautiful, dangerous body so many other women have touched with confident hands—has gone rigid beneath yours. You sink to your knees. Mingyu makes a sound and reaches for you at once. “No—”

You look up. His mouth is open. He has one hand gripping the bedpost so hard the knuckles have gone pale. “No?” you ask, and there is challenge in the question, and something of your new ferocity, too. “You may do as you like with me, and I am to do nothing with you?”

His eyes close briefly. When he opens them again, they are darker than before. “That is not what I said.”

You stroke him once, then again, learning by feel and by the way his body answers. How his stomach tightens. How his jaw sets. How the hand at the back of your head tightens its hold in your loosened strands. You lower your mouth to him.

You do not know precisely how a man is to be taken this way, only that you want to try. You kiss the heavy crown where he is already leaking, and the taste of him is startling—warm, salt-edged, heady. He jerks as if struck. “Angel—”

You do not stop. You kiss him again, then you part your lips and take him in only a little, enough to feel the shape of his length against your tongue, enough to hear his breath break above you. “Slow,” he mutters, and the word costs him. “Here—like this—”

His fingers gather your hair away from your face, and his thumb traces the corner of your mouth, showing rather than instructing, urging your lips to soften, to open more fully. You try again. Better this time. Deeper. He sucks in breath through his teeth, and his hand tightens around your chin. “That’s it,” he whispers hoarsely. “Easy—God—yes, like that.”

You move because you want to know. Because hunger has made curiosity fearless. Because the fact of his cock in your mouth is so astonishing that your body cannot bear to remain still. You let your tongue sweep over him, clumsy and earnest, and when another low, involuntary moan leaves him, something in you grows bolder. Your hand joins your mouth. You stroke what your lips cannot take, inelegant at first, then less so as his own body teaches you. Mingyu’s head falls back. One hand releases your jaw to brace against the canopy. “Christ,” he says, and this time the curse is shredded by pleasure. “Don’t—no, don’t stop—”

You do not stop. You take him farther, the stretch of it making your eyes sting and your throat protest, but you do not pull away. You are past caring for elegance. You pull back for breath, then lower your mouth again, more determined. Mingyu makes another broken sound, and the hand in your hair closes hard enough to betray what even his mouth cannot. Your palm works him while your mouth follows as much as it can manage. It is not pretty. It is not polished. It is wet and sloppy and a little desperate, and that seems to undo him far more thoroughly than any practised seduction might have done. “Angel—enough.”

You look up, lips parted around his cock, breath unsteady. He is watching you with an expression so nakedly wrecked it sends heat straight through your already-aching body. “Enough,” he says again, voice ragged and frayed, “or I come in your mouth and this ends here, and I am not—” He breaks off, swallowing hard. “Not like this.”

Before you can decide whether disobedience might be worth it, he bends, catches you under the arms, and hauls you up from the floor. You make a startled sound, half-laugh and half-protest, and find yourself upright against him, your knees weak, your mouth swollen, his breath hot at your temple. Mingyu holds you there for a moment as if his own balance now depends upon the fact of your body against his. Then he kisses you once more—hard, open, with all the force he has been biting back while you knelt before him—and when he breaks away, both of you are breathing like porters. “If I put you in that bed,” he says, “I am going to fuck you.”

You do not lower your eyes. “Yes.”

A sound leaves him—a helpless, ruined exhale that might once have been a laugh in some earlier, lighter life. “That is not how ladies are expected to answer me.”

“Then perhaps ladies have been taught badly.”

His eyes flash. The next moment, Mingyu lifts you with terrifying ease, one arm behind your back, the other beneath your thighs, just clear of the worst of the welts. He lays you back against the coverlet and comes down over you, bracing on one arm so his weight does not bear fully on your bruised body, and kisses you slowly until your own tension begins to melt into the mattress beneath you.

“Look at me,” he voices quietly. You do. His hand moves between your thighs, finding the wetness he made there earlier, gathering it to ease what must come next. When he presses the heavy blunt head of his cock against your entrance, the stretch of it feels impossible. Your breath catches so sharply you nearly bite through your lip to hold it in. “I know,” Mingyu whispers, one hand finding yours and lacing your fingers together hard enough to anchor. He enters you slowly.

No sermon ever uttered could have prepared you for this. Not the pressure. Not the fullness. Not the way your body resists before it yields and then seems suddenly to know, in some deeply hidden place, what to do with him after all. The first breach hurts. There is no virtue in pretending otherwise. A hot, sharp pull and a breathless ache that makes your eyes sting, and your body go rigid around him.

Mingyu stops at once. His forehead comes to rest on yours. “Angel.” You shake your head, not in refusal but in fury at the interruption. “Don’t.” His eyes search your face. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t look at me like I’ll break.” Something hard and bright moves through his expression—understanding, desire, respect, all wound too tightly to name. “You won’t,” he replies. And very slowly, Mingyu moves again. The second advance is easier. The third easier still. The ache does not vanish, but it changes, softening under his patience into something thicker, something fuller. He fills you until there is nowhere in your own body that is not aware of him.

Your joined hands shift over the coverlet. Mingyu’s free hand travels up your side, cups your breast, strokes your throat, and returns to your hip. When he is fully inside you, he stays there for one suspended moment, both of you breathing hard, both of you feeling the scale of what has been done. Then he begins to move.

The first strokes are shallow, testing, almost maddening in their control. Mingyu watches your face, not because he doubts your consent, but because he is learning how pleasure changes your mouth, your eyes, your breath. The angle shifts. He goes deeper. A cry catches in you, and his whole body tenses around it. “There?” he asks, voice shredded thin. “Tell me.” You answer by dragging your nails lightly down his back. He groans into your mouth.

The rhythm grows. Slow at first, then slower still in that deliberate torment men think women do not understand because they are fools. You understand it now very well. Each thrust drags against your aching walls and pushes lower and lower inside you. You want more. “Mingyu.” He lifts his head. Your cheeks burn. Your body no longer cares for modesty. “More.”

The word transforms him. His mouth opens on a rough breath. His eyes go dark and molten. He kisses you, hard, before he changes the angle, hooks an arm around your waist, and pulls you up. He sits back against the headboard with you gathered into his lap, his cock still inside you, the change in position driving him deeper all at once, making both of you groan at the same time. Your knees fall to either side of his hips. His hands settle at your waist, broad and firm enough that you know he could move you if he wished. He does not. He lets you feel the choice. “Take what you came for,” he commands.

You brace your hands on his shoulders and move. The first rise-and-fall of your hips is inelegant. The second less so. By the third, your body has found the rhythm and the room disappears—gone into firelight and breath and the stretch and drag of his length filling you over and over. His hands keep hold of your waist only enough to keep you from losing the angle that makes each descent hit the sweetest, deepest place inside your core. You ride him, and he lets you. “That’s it,” Mingyu says, mouth at your throat, each word broken by a kiss, by a breath, by the contained strain of not taking over. “Yes—just like that—Christ, angel—”

You rock faster. His head falls back against the bedboard with a thud. One of his hands slides to your hip, gripping hard enough that the coming bruises will bear his shape. The other clutches your hair at the nape of your neck and drags your mouth back to his. Your breasts brush his chest with each motion. His cock drives into you from below in answering force every time you come down, and the wet, hard friction of it becomes so overwhelming your whole body begins to shake. “Look at you,” Mingyu murmurs against your lips. “Look at you taking me.”

Something tightens again low in your belly, fiercer this time, built not from his mouth or fingers alone but from being joined to him like this, from the angle, the fullness, the terrible rhythm that makes your body feel both wholly yours and wholly undone by what it is choosing. Mingyu’s hand slips between you. His thumb finds your aching clit that had already yielded so helplessly to his mouth and strokes it in devastatingly quick circles. The world blurs white at the edges. “Mingyu—”

“I know. Come for me.” Your second climax hits harder than the first. It tears through you with such force that you cannot breathe through it, can only cling to his shoulders and ride the breaking of it while he holds your waist and works you through every convulsion. Your mouth falls open against his neck. Your whole body clenches around him in sharp, relentless waves that make him swear into your hair and lose, finally, the last of his restraint. Mingyu takes over then. His hands lock on your hips and drive up into you once, twice, harder, the bed striking the wall softly behind you in time with the force of his thrusts. The sound of your name is torn raw from his lungs. His head drops forward against your chest. “God—yes—”

Mingyu comes with a shuddering violence that seems to rip straight through the elegant man the world thinks it knows, leaving only the body beneath—hot and hard and spent and holding you as though letting go now would mean dropping something sacred and breakable and wholly his to protect.

The fire ticks low in the grate. The lamplight breathes. You remain in his lap, boneless with the aftershocks of your combined release, forehead against his shoulder, the room spinning quietly around the edges. Mingyu’s mouth finds your temple. Then your cheek. And you realise, in the long, trembling silence after climax, that the thing most dangerous in the room is no longer freedom. It is that what you have taken for yourself tonight now wears his face, too.

The journal still smells faintly of salt when Mingyu draws the envelope from the back cover.

It is near midday now—far enough from dawn that whatever private indignities the morning brought have been dressed, washed, and buttoned into something resembling a gentleman again, yet not so far that the memory of the night has lost any of its edges. Even his own room has been put right around him with the discreet efficiency of wealth. Fresh water. Fresh linen. The fire coaxed back to proper life. The bed smoothed of what it knows. He had woken alone.

That fact lives in him still, though he has made a point of not standing too near it. Only the impression of you remained: warmth gone from the sheets, a strand of hair caught against the pillow where your head must have turned, the ghost of cold night air and woman still clinging to the coverlet as if the bed itself refused to be practical about what had happened in it. He had lain there longer than he ought to have done, staring at the canopy and understanding with a sort of savage humiliation that you had gone back. Gone back into the world that would punish you for coming. Gone back marked by choice in ways no one must know, and he will never be able to forget. Mingyu ought to have felt victorious. Instead, he had felt flayed.

There is no appetite pure enough to explain what passed between you last night. Not merely because he had had you—that is the sort of language boys use at White’s when they want to reduce women to proof of one another’s masculinity—but because you had come to him with your body burning from another man’s violence and asked for the one thing no one in your life had ever permitted you: a choice that belonged wholly to you. Mingyu has been trying, since breakfast, not to think about that, too. He is failing.

The leather cover of the journal is worn at the edges where weather, travel, and his own restless handling rubbed it smooth. Within, the pages tilt slantwise with salt-stiffened ink and impatient handwriting—notes on harbours, on white houses above blue water, on cliffs, on inns, on nights too bright with wine to be worth remembering and mornings too clean not to be. Between one page and the next are pressed fragments of maps, receipts in foreign hands, one dried olive leaf ground almost to dust. The boyish theatre of a man who thought movement itself might one day amount to a self. Mingyu turns a page. A sketch of a little harbour, all angled masts and white walls. Another. A line written in the margin and crossed out: stillness is worst at sea because there is nowhere to throw it.

His mouth hardens at that. The old arrogance of it. The old fear dressed as wit. He had written such things with the confidence of a man convinced no one would ever be foolish enough to read them except himself and, perhaps, one day a woman in a foreign bed who preferred mystery to honesty.

At the back of the journal, tucked where he had left it months ago simply because keeping it hidden felt easier than opening it, lies the envelope. His name is written on the front in a hand that turns his chest unexpectedly hollow at the sight of it. No title. No rank. Only his name, as his mother used it when he was young enough to believe being loved and being understood might prove the same thing in the end. He breaks the seal. The paper inside is still heavy, folded exactly, the ink preserved. Mingyu sits at the desk with the Greek journal opened beneath his hand, the room warm around him, and reads.

My dearest Mingyu, If you are reading this at last, then one of two things has happened. Either you have found someone who makes a mockery of your usual vanities, or you have managed to confuse wanting with worth and require maternal intervention from beyond the grave. If it is the second, put this away and do not touch the ruby until you have learned the difference. You have always been the easiest of my sons to underestimate. That was your gift and your danger. Rooms brighten when you enter them, and people, being lazy in their judgments, mistake brightness for lightness. They call you charming when they mean harmless. They call you unserious when what they truly mean is that you make seriousness look less lonely than they would like. You have encouraged this, of course. I know you too well to pretend otherwise. It is easier to be adored for delight than known in depth. The ruby was chosen for you because it keeps its fire in plain view. It does not apologise for its heat. It does not ask permission to burn. Let it remind you of this: passion is not performance. Heat is not the same thing as love. A fire may warm a house or destroy it. The difference is not in its beauty, but in whether it has learned how to remain. If you place the ruby in a woman’s keeping, it must not be as an ornament, nor as a conquest, nor as some pretty proof that at last even you have chosen to behave. It must mean that you will not make a theatre of what ought to be sacred. That your constancy, once given, will not be another trick. If you love, let it steady you into purpose rather than send you racing once more into escape. Stand still long enough to tell the truth, Mingyu. Not only that you want her. That is the easiest confession a man may make. Tell the harder one. That you mean to remain. Your mother

He reads the last line again. Then once more. Tell the harder one. That you mean to remain. Those words would have struck him differently half a year ago. Even a month ago. Three weeks past, he might still have smiled at them with that fond, dismissive contempt reserved for maternal omniscience, folded the page back away, and gone on to White’s, to cards, to women who laughed in all the proper places and forgot him by breakfast. Three weeks past, he had still been capable of believing that want—provided it were dressed sufficiently well and made amusing enough—might pass for a life.

Then you had stood before him in church, composed of discipline and hidden fire, and looked as though kneeling had become less an act of faith than a posture your body had been forced to learn. Then you had laughed. Then you had kissed him. Then you had come to his door with bruises on your face and fury in your blood and asked for him not because he was easy, but because he was yours to choose. Such things alter the mathematics of a man.

Mingyu lays the letter flat and stares at his own hand beside it. The same hand that had once written clever little evasions in the margins of travel journals. That had thrown coins carelessly onto tables in foreign ports. That had known women by eagerness, by skill, by the confidential shape of one-night confessions soon forgotten. That had touched you last night with every power in him bent toward not making theft of what you had brought to him in trust. He closes his eyes.

The challenge is gone. More than gone. It shames him now to think of the first small male vanity that had attached itself to your name. The saint. The Reverend’s daughter. The locked room. He had imagined himself amused by difficulty, intrigued by denial, interested in the elegant puzzle of virtue. Looking back from here, the whole thing appears juvenile in the ugliest masculine sense. Not merely young. Trivial. Because none of this is about difficulty any longer. It is about you.

You in white, turned into an emblem by your father’s cruelty. You in cornflower ribbon beneath church eyes too eager for proof. You in the confessional saying your life had been one long hallway in a house you never left. You in his bed, not soft and grateful and dazzled to be wanted by the notorious Mr. Ashbourne, but furious and feral and determined to take ownership of yourself. The truth comes not with fanfare, but with the dreadful steadiness of recognition. Mingyu loves you.

The phrase ought to have sounded grander. More theatrical. Catastrophic, perhaps. Instead, it settles into him with the calm of something that has already been true for some time and has merely, at last, been cornered into language. He loves you. Not your innocence, though God knows Mayfair has tried to make that the only notable thing about you. Not your beauty, though he is neither blind nor a fool. Not the glamour of transgression, nor the exquisite danger of wanting what ought not be wanted. You.

The woman who takes sugar in her tea because choice matters even in a spoonful. The woman who hides ribbons in books and still finds room in herself to feel ashamed of wanting air and sunlight as though such things were sins rather than ordinary human needs. The woman who kissed him in a side gallery because she wanted to, and came to him last night because she refused to be given back to the men arranging her life as though she had never once inhabited it. The room feels smaller with the knowledge. Or perhaps he has simply grown too large for the man he was pretending to remain.

A knock sounds at the door. Two measured taps, then the handle turns without waiting for permission, which reduces the field of possible visitors to family alone. Wonwoo steps in and shuts the door behind him with the quiet economy he brings to all things. He is dressed already for the day, though with less ornament than Jeonghan would permit and less casual disregard than Soonyoung ever manages. His expression remains, as ever, unreadable to anyone who does not know that unreadability is simply the shape his attention prefers to wear. His gaze goes first to Mingyu’s face, then to the desk, to the Greek journal spread open, and finally to the unfolded letter beneath Mingyu’s hand. He does not speak.

Mingyu, still too raw from his mother’s hand and his own belated honesty to tolerate any performance in himself or anyone else, leans back in the chair and lets out a breath without humour. “If you’ve come to tell me I look dreadful, our dear sister got there first.”

Wonwoo crosses to the desk and stops at the far side of it. His gaze lingers for a moment longer on the letter, recognising perhaps the kind of private weather required for Mingyu to have opened it at all. “You do look dreadful,” he says at last. The line, delivered in Wonwoo’s plain, unadorned manner, is ridiculous enough to draw the faintest curve from Mingyu’s mouth despite everything. “This family is becoming repetitive.”

Wonwoo does not trouble himself to acknowledge that. He glances once toward the bed—made now, smoothed, betraying nothing—then back to Mingyu. “The footman on last night’s duty has developed an impressive respect for discretion.” It is not an accusation. Not even curiosity, precisely. Merely a fact laid down upon the table between them. Mingyu’s hand tightens slightly over the edge of the letter. “Has he?”

Wonwoo’s voice does not alter. “He said only that a lady called after midnight. He did not name her.” A pause. “He did not need to.” Mingyu laughs once, low and brief and without mirth. “You always were intolerably observant.”

“No,” Wonwoo replies. “You were always easier to read than you thought. People simply preferred not to look too carefully.” That lands because it is true. It is precisely the sort of truth Wonwoo specialises in: quiet enough to pass for conversation, sharp enough to bleed all the same.

Mingyu looks down at the journal. At the letter. At the old notes written by a man who thought movement might keep him forever from having to stand still inside himself. When he speaks again, his voice has roughened around the edges. “She came to me bruised.” Wonwoo’s face changes by almost nothing, which is how Mingyu knows the line has struck hard. “Her father?”

“Who else?”

Wonwoo moves then, not to the bed nor the window, but to the hearth where he rests one shoulder against the mantel and folds his arms. It is an old posture of his, perhaps learned from years spent watching rooms before deciding whether to speak in them. He looks not outraged exactly. Outrage would be easier. What settles into him instead is something colder. “And she went back.” Mingyu’s mouth hardens. “She had to.”

“Yes.” There is no comfort in the agreement—only fact. Fact is often more difficult to survive than grief because it makes no claim to tenderness. For a while, the fire performs most of the speaking. Mingyu remains at the desk, while Wonwoo watches the flames with the same grave severity he brings to books, balls, and people who insist on lying to themselves in his hearing. When he speaks again, it is with that same unembellished directness that has always made his clearest lines. “Do you know what men like Pembroke and Vale would do now?” Mingyu tips his head back against the chair and shuts his eyes. “Something idiotic, I imagine.”

“They would call it rescue.” That opens his eyes again. Wonwoo’s voice remains level. “They would decide she had been driven to them by cruelty and therefore required immediate, dramatic action. Elopement. A duel. A scene in the churchyard. Some public gesture large enough to flatter their own sense of heroism.” He lets the image hang between them. “They would make her life more visible and call the spectacle devotion.”

Mingyu’s jaw tightens. The fantasy possesses enough appeal to prove its danger. He has imagined exactly that species of glorious nonsense often enough in less disciplined hours—carriages, confrontations, declarations made in morally satisfying places where everyone might hear him tell Reverend Marlowe what kind of man he is and what kind he is not. The vision burns bright because it is simple. Which is precisely why it would be useless.

Wonwoo lifts his gaze from the fire and fixes him with it. “You do not save a woman by stealing her agency and calling it protection.” The sentence falls into the room without drama. It has no need of any. “You save her,” Wonwoo continues, “by standing beside her when she chooses. Not in front of her. Not over her. Beside.”

Mingyu says nothing. There is too much that feels uncomfortably like rebuke and, worse, like instruction he already knows to be correct. He thinks of last night. Of your voice saying Take me. Of the force with which he had almost refused, not because he wanted to, but because he understood too well that choosing for you, even under the pretence of caution, would itself have been a theft. Wonwoo sees the thought pass across his face and does not name it. For that one mercy, Mingyu could love him more. “I know,” Mingyu says at last. Wonwoo’s mouth moves by a fraction. “Good.”

It is astonishing how much relief may fit inside a single syllable when given by a brother who has no fondness for extravagance. Mingyu looks back down at the letter. A corner of the page lifts in the draught from the fire and settles again. Without meaning to, he traces the edge of his mother’s folded hand. Wonwoo watches the gesture, and his expression alters—not private exactly. Softer. “You opened it.”

“Yes.”

“Then it’s bad.” That makes Mingyu laugh despite himself. “That was your first interpretation?” Wonwoo shrugs one shoulder. “If Mother has been dragged in from the grave, the situation is never good.”

“She was unbearable.”

“She was usually right.”

The small exchange eases something in the room without diminishing the gravity beneath it. Mingyu glances again at the line that has gutted and steadied him in equal measure. Tell the harder one. That you mean to remain. He says, more to the paper than to Wonwoo: “I thought I wanted her because she was impossible.” Wonwoo does not interrupt. “I thought the challenge was the point. The woman everyone else said I ought not want if I had any sense.” Mingyu lets out a breath. “And somewhere between the first laugh and the church and the gallery and last night, it stopped being any of those things.” Wonwoo tilts his head slightly. “Stopped?”

Mingyu meets his gaze. It is one thing to realise love alone at a desk beneath his mother’s handwriting. Another to say it aloud to a brother who has spent half his life understanding him without encouragement. Yet he has been instructed today by ghost and blood alike to stand still long enough to tell the truth. The harder one. “Yes,” Mingyu says. A pause. Then, quieter still: “I love her.”

Wonwoo receives this with the same composure he might have brought to the weather, if the weather had at last admitted itself fatal. He does not grin. Does not offer fraternal mockery. Does not call him ruined, though the term would not be inaccurate. He only nods once. “I know.” Mingyu stares. “Does everyone know before I do?”

“Frequently.” That earns Wonwoo a black look and, because Wonwoo is neither Jeonghan nor Soonyoung, offers no greater display of satisfaction than the almost imperceptible settling of his shoulders. He pushes off from the mantel and crosses back toward the door. There, with one hand resting on the knob, he glances over his shoulder. “Joshua had a note from Wrotham this morning.” Mingyu frowns, still too deep in other matters for the turn to land at once. “And?” Wonwoo’s expression remains even. “The jewel chest has been inventoried for the season.” His gaze flicks once to the letter, then back to Mingyu. “If you decide you are, in fact, a man who means to remain, Joshua can have the ruby pin sent to Ashbourne Hall.”

Mingyu sees it as though it were already in his hand: the dark, steady fire of the stone, elegant and unapologetic, chosen for him by a woman who knew too much and loved him anyway. The heirloom still at Wrotham, still in Joshua’s careful keeping, waiting not for appetite but for certainty.

Wonwoo opens the door. “Carat & Co. can remake it into whatever shape you want,” he says. “A ring, if you prove you deserve one. Something else, if she prefers it. Joshua will know how.” Then, because he is Wonwoo and constitutionally incapable of leaving truth half-driven once he has begun, he adds with the faintest edge of dry emphasis, “Provided, of course, you do not behave like an idiot first.” The door closes behind him with quiet finality.

By the time Mingyu reaches Reverend Marlowe’s church, the afternoon has turned the stone a colder colour. The square outside lies half emptied of traffic, the respectable hour thinning into that quieter interval between luncheon calls and evening obligations, when London appears, for a little while, to have stepped out of its own noise. The church doors stand open, not in welcome but in routine, and the air within carries that familiar mingling of candle wax, damp stone, and the stale remains of piety breathed too often into a confined place. Mingyu enters with his hat in one hand and his purpose in the other.

Reverend Marlowe is alone near the front of the nave, standing beside the lectern with a ledger half open before him. He is not praying. Men like him rarely are when no one is watching. He appears instead to be taking stock of subscriptions or alms or whichever form of moral arithmetic presently occupies him. The sound of footsteps carries farther than it ought in an empty church. Reverend Marlowe looks up and his face hardens, not in surprise, but in recognition sharpened by dislike.

Mingyu comes to a halt a few pews short of the altar rail. The winter light filtering through the upper glass turns everything severe: the polished wood, the brass fittings, the black cut of the Reverend’s coat, the cold set of his mouth. There is nowhere in the space for softness to hide. Reverend Marlowe closes the ledger with deliberate hands and says, “Mr. Ashbourne.” The name sounds less like a greeting than contamination. Mingyu inclines his head. “Reverend Marlowe.”

The older man studies him, and in that study Mingyu feels all the old judgments gather at once—rake, foundling, sinner, ornament, danger—each one sharpened by whatever was seen in the church two Sundays ago and whatever has been suspected since. Good. Let him sharpen them. Mingyu has not come here to be forgiven into God’s grace. Reverend Marlowe rests one hand upon the closed ledger. “If you are here to offer an apology for the disturbances your attentions have caused, you are late.” The line is an invitation to defence. Or wit. Or embarrassment. Mingyu offers none of the three. He sets his hat down on the nearest pew and says, with a steadiness that surprises even himself, “I am here to ask for your daughter’s hand.”

Reverend Marlowe does not blink. Then something small and ugly passes through his expression—not shock, nor outrage in any vulgar fatherly sense, but contempt confirmed in its worst predictions. He lets out a breath through his nose. “No.” Just that. No incredulity. No raised voice. Only refusal delivered with such immediate certainty it seems less answer than doctrine.

Mingyu had expected anger. He had expected pious disgust, perhaps, or one of those long sermon-shaped speeches by which men like Reverend Marlowe turn their prejudices into moral architecture. The simplicity of the refusal is almost more offensive. He does not move. “You have not heard the request.” Reverend Marlowe’s mouth hardens. “I heard it. It is the answer that remains unchanged.”

Mingyu feels, very distinctly, the old instinct to smile. To go bright. To make this into a game of superior nerves. To lean one hip against a pew and say something easy and cutting about devils quoting Scripture and clergymen mistaking control for righteousness. It would have been simple. It would also have been exactly the version of himself Reverend Marlowe expects and therefore exactly the wrong weapon. So he remains still. “I intend to marry her.” Mingyu does not say it like a boast or a dare. He says it like a fact, not yet legally arranged.

Reverend Marlowe steps away from the lectern then, leaving the ledger where it lies. He comes down one step from the chancel and stops, elevating himself by only a little and thus making the distance feel chosen. His hands fold behind his back. “You intend,” he says, with a thinness that approaches disgust, “many things beyond your station, Mr. Ashbourne.” There are a dozen answers available. Mingyu selects none of them. The Reverend continues, each word growing colder for its control. “You are corruption dressed in a fine coat—a man who mistakes appetite for character and charm for worth. Your affairs are discussed in every decent drawing room in Mayfair. Your irreverence is public. Your habits are notorious. If you imagine that such a name may be laid beside my daughter’s and make anything but ruin of her, then your vanity has finally overtaken even your judgment.”

Mingyu lets the whole thing pass over him without flinch or smile. The list is familiar. White’s has said worse, if less biblically. Reverend Marlowe’s gaze narrows, as though the lack of visible reaction itself has become another irritation. “No daughter of mine,” he says, “will marry an Ashbourne.”

There it is then. Not simply disgust for vice, but the old classed and blooded contempt beneath it. Foundlings polished into gentlemen. A family built by choice where men like Reverend Marlowe prefer lineage to masquerade as moral legitimacy. Mingyu feels the truth of it settle with a cold and almost welcome clarity. Very well. “Because I am myself,” he says quietly, “or because I am theirs?” The Reverend’s face grows stiller. “Do not play clever games in my church.”

“I am not,” Mingyu states. “I am trying to learn which part offends you most. That I am not respectable enough to want her, or that I belong to a family built by something other than blood and your kind of approval.”

For the first time, something like open anger flashes in Reverend Marlowe’s eyes. “You belong,” he says, with cutting emphasis, “to a house in which excess has always disguised itself as feeling. You are proof that indulgence, if given sufficient money and tailoring, may pass itself off as distinction. My daughter has been raised for steadiness. For obedience. For a life under God. Not for spectacle. Not for vice. And never for a man who has spent his years bedding whores and calling himself charming while the city laughed.”

The word hangs in the nave with a vulgarity sharpened by being uttered beneath a church roof. Mingyu’s hands tighten once behind his back. He had thought, on the way here, that if Reverend Marlowe descended to open insult, he might feel rage first. What comes instead is a colder, more clarifying thing. Because the Reverend speaks of you as though you were an object he has polished and therefore owns. Because nothing in his face suggests he believes he is discussing a life that belongs, in any measure, to the woman he calls his daughter. Mingyu takes one step closer. Not enough to threaten. More than enough to refuse dismissal. “You may think what you like of me.” Reverend Marlowe’s lip curls slightly. Mingyu continues. “I am not asking your blessing for my vanity. I am asking because I mean to remain. Because what I feel for your daughter is not appetite, and because whatever else you believe of me, you will not call it corruption simply because it has displeased your plans.”

The Reverend’s expression darkens, as if each word forces him into closer contact with something he would prefer remain abstract. “You presume too much.”

“Do I?” Mingyu asks. The church has grown so quiet that the very air seems to wait between them. Mingyu thinks, fleetingly, of you in white muslin, in bruises, in fury, coming to his door because every other man in your life had mistaken authority for right. He thinks of the Ashbourne name itself, and of all the men who once wore it uneasily until they chose to stand inside it by conviction rather than inheritance. He has no wish, suddenly, to make this pretty. Let Reverend Marlowe have the whole shape of it. Let him hear, in full, what sort of enemy he has made. The older man speaks again before Mingyu may answer, and there is steel in the composure. “You will leave this church.”

Mingyu looks at him. Looks, too, at the pulpit from which so many judgments have been pronounced, at the pews in which you have been made to kneel and listen and smile and be shaped into other people’s reassurance. Then, with a precision that seems almost like obedience, Mingyu inclines his head. He takes up his hat. Turns and walks down the aisle at an unhurried pace, the sound of his footsteps carrying him back through the nave. He does not look back. It is this, perhaps, which makes the thing more unnerving than if he had stormed or argued or flung one last bright insult over his shoulder. He appears to comply. To accept. To leave. Reverend Marlowe remains where he is, hands clasped behind his back, the posture of a man who believes dismissal and victory to be near relations. Mingyu reaches the end of the aisle.

There, with the church doors before him and the light lying pale beyond the threshold, he pauses. He sets his hat beneath one arm. Then he turns. The distance between them is greater now, and for that reason, the line, when it comes, strikes harder. There is no heat in his voice. No youthful recklessness. No attempt at wit. Only certainty—cold, plain, and perfectly beyond negotiation. “You do not own her future.”

The words fall into the church and remain there. Mingyu does not wait to see what shape they make of Reverend Marlowe’s face. He has said what he came to say, and saying it in that place is warning enough. He turns again, steps out, and lets the doors stand open a moment longer than courtesy requires before they close behind him.

Inside the nave, Reverend Marlowe is left with the echo of the line, the ledger upon the lectern, and the first clean understanding that the danger represented by Mingyu Ashbourne does not lie in seduction, nor in appetite, nor even in scandal. It lies in the fact that he means to remain.

The sentence is delivered before supper and enforced before you are allowed the dignity of breath. By now, your father’s study has ceased pretending neutrality. It is simply the place where his authority most enjoys hearing itself pronounced. The desk remains squared to the carpet. The Bible lies open, though not because he requires Scripture any longer to justify himself; habit is enough for men like Reverend Marlowe. The fire has been laid but not lit. The room feels all angles and waiting.

You stand before him with your hands folded so tightly they ache. The mark upon your face has yellowed at the edges. Those hidden beneath your clothes no longer burn with the same white violence as before, though the flesh still protests with every careless shift. Your father has not mentioned the punishment. He has not mentioned the crop. He has not mentioned what he saw in the church. Men who prefer their own hands translated into doctrine rarely like to name the hour in which their cruelty became too human to disguise. He looks at you over the desk. He does not ask you to sit. He does not invite questions. “Lord Carroway has withdrawn his intentions.”

The words fall without preamble. You had imagined, once, that if the thing ever shattered, it might at least do so noisily enough to feel like mercy. Instead, it breaks with the clean, administrative neatness of male pride. Withdrawn. As though marriage were a subscription one gentleman had elected not to renew. You do not move. Relief comes. It arrives bright, involuntary, almost instantly soured by your father’s face—by the fact that he is not sorrowful, nor startled, not even properly angered so much as offended. Something has happened. Something has been said. Some certainty has been disturbed. Carroway, in preserving his own dignity, has evidently found yours expendable. “Why?” you ask. Your voice is steady enough to sound borrowed. Reverend Marlowe’s mouth hardens. “That does not concern you.”

Of course, it concerns you. That is precisely why he will not permit the answer. You know at once, with the sort of instinct women learn in houses ruled by men, that Mingyu has not allowed the matter to lie quietly where it was placed. The knowledge flashes through you in a dangerous kind of heat. Your father sees the colour move in your face and mistakes it, as he always does, for something he may still control. “Do not flatter yourself with romantic fictions,” he says. “A man like Carroway withdraws only when a thing ceases to recommend itself.” You lower your gaze because if you do not, something ungovernable may appear in yours. “Since marriage no longer offers the correction it ought,” he continues, “you will be removed from society entirely.”

This time you do speak. “You cannot—” You do not finish. Your father is around the desk before the sentence fully leaves you. His hand closes hard around your upper arm, fingers digging through cloth and skin alike, and the force of the movement swings you half toward him. Pain sparks hotly through the half-healed places your body still keeps secret beneath its proper layers. He does not shout. That is the worst of it. “You will not speak over me.”

The words are low and cold enough to cut. Your arm throbs in his grip. You try to wrench it free on instinct, and the motion only tightens his hold. His face is close now. Close enough that you can see the little broken vessels at the side of his nose, the faint dryness at the mouth, the absolute prayerless composure of him. “A house of religious discipline in the country has been recommended to me,” he says, as if your attempt to interrupt had been no more consequential than a dropped fork. “Its governance is strict. Its society modest. Its atmosphere appropriate to repentance.”

A convent. It rises all at once in the imagination: stone corridors, female silence, veils, prayer, years rubbed smooth by obedience until a woman becomes so pale of spirit that even her own reflection might fail to know her. “For how long?” You hate that the question still comes out. You hate more that he hears the fear in it. “As long as is necessary.” Which means forever if he may arrange it. Or until another man of sufficiently righteous and convenient and may be persuaded to take what remains of you. Duration is beside the point. The point is removal. You try once more. “Father—”

That earns you the other hand. Your father catches your jaw, hard enough that your teeth strike together, and holds your face where he wants it. “You will go this evening,” he says. “You will take what is necessary. Nothing frivolous. No novels. No adornment. You will be grateful that I have acted before your soul was entirely lost to your own disobedience.” His fingers leave your face. Then your arm. The absence of pain there feels almost as cruel as its presence. He steps back. The dismissal is immediate. “Go and prepare.”

You do not ask again. Not because obedience has suddenly returned, but because protest now would only delight the part of him that believes correction most holy when it is resisted. He has made the boundaries clear. This is not a conversation. It is a sentence pronounced by a man too certain God sounds like his own voice. You curtsy. Not from submission. From exhaustion so complete it has learned how to pass for grace.

Your maid says nothing when you tell her. That is how you know she understands the shape of disaster. The trunk brought out is not one of the handsome travelling cases meant for Bath or visits to relations. It is the plain one used for practical storage, the one that smells faintly of cedar and old winters. Your maid folds your underthings with quick, neat hands. Sets aside a second dress. A shawl. Gloves. A Bible. She does not ask whether you wish to bring music. There will be none worth imagining. She does not ask whether you wish to bring ribbons. That would be mockery. She does not ask whether you wish to bring the travel book because she has already tucked it quietly at the bottom of the trunk beneath folded linen, wrapped in an older petticoat, as though hiding not a volume but an organ. The kindness of it nearly undoes you. Nearly.

You sit at the dressing table while she works. The light outside has begun to thin. Somewhere below stairs, a maid laughs and is immediately hushed. Somewhere else, a door closes. Your face in the mirror does not look tragic. That would at least feel satisfying. It looks pale. Tired. Your mouth seems older than it did a fortnight ago. There is no bloom left in you that society might call maidenly. What remains is something barer, less forgivable, and infinitely more real: awareness.

You think of Mingyu. Not in the soft, dangerous way you allowed yourself the night you ran to him. You think of him as one thinks of a hidden blade or a coin sewn into a hem—something real that once proved the world need not be only what your father called it. You had left him before the house properly woke. Not because you regretted it. Never that. But because staying would have made the tenderness visible, and tenderness has become the most dangerous luxury in your possession. When he stirred as you rose from the bed, when his hand caught at the sheet as though some sleeping part of him already knew you were going, you had stood looking at him in the first weak light and understood, with a kind of private terror, that escape alone was no longer the whole truth of what tied you to him. Now, in your room, with exile being packed around you in clean, folded layers, that truth returns with renewed cruelty. You do not merely want freedom any longer. You want him in it. The distinction hollows the body.

Your maid closes the trunk. “You should eat something before you go,” she says. You shake your head. Food belongs to ordinary days and manageable futures. Your stomach has become a locked thing. She does not press.

The carriage is sent for before the last light has gone. Your father does not accompany you to the door. He stands instead in the front hall with his hands clasped behind his back and his face composed into that solemn vacancy by which he prefers to enact great domestic severities. A servant carries the trunk. Another brings your cloak. The footman waits at the open door of the carriage as if this were an entirely ordinary departure and not the burial, in all but name, of Reverend Marlowe’s daughter. The house has chosen propriety over grief. Your father offers no embrace. No blessing. Not even a final admonition, which is almost worse. The whole matter has moved beyond speech in his mind. You have become absent to him, the sort of woman who may be mentioned later in lowered tones as having required removal for the good of her soul. When you step into the carriage, the movement drags sharply at all the half-healed injuries across the backs of your legs. Pain comes hot and familiar. You make no sound. The door closes. The house vanishes behind glass and gathering dusk.

For the first stretch of the journey, you feel nothing at all. The sky dims from bronze to violet to that iron-blue hour which makes every familiar thing look like a half-memory. Your hands lie folded in your lap. The trunk rattles faintly behind you whenever the wheels strike a rut. You keep your back straight. Your mouth closed. Your eyes dry. Numbness is not peace. It is only grief grown too tired for emotion.

You think of the convent as little as possible. Whenever the image rises, you turn instead to the window, to the last lights of the city. But the road lengthens, and even London cannot accompany you forever. Houses grow fewer. The dark widens. Open country begins. And with country comes the true knowledge of it. The convent is not punishment in the common sense. Punishment ends. This is erasure arranged to resemble mercy. A life emptied of choice, of colour, of witness, of every small gathered thing you had begun to call your own. The numbness cracks.

The rosary lies in the pocket of your cloak. You take it out without fully knowing you are doing so. The carnelian beads catch what little light remains, red-brown and glossy, warmed for years by your skin and prayer and pain. Your father had called it devotion. You had called it obedience. Here, in the failing blue of the carriage, it appears for what it has always also been: a tally. A counting-chain. A little portable artefact of guilt. You wrap it once around your hand. Then twice. Your breath comes harder. The carriage rolls on. Something rises in you—not tears, though they exist somewhere behind the eyes. Something more intense. An anguish too hot to remain orderly. The knowledge that if you arrive where you are being sent, the pieces of yourself you have fought so hard and so badly and so magnificently to gather will be pressed out of you one by one until even memory has been taught to kneel. You pull. The cord snaps. Carnelian beads fly from your lap and strike the floor of the carriage in a hard scatter. They bounce against the opposite seat, roll into corners, vanish beneath the hem of your skirt. In the dim light, they look like drops of blood thrown across dark wood. You stare at them while your chest heaves with the aftermath of the motion, and the violence of that tiny act seems to split your whole life into before and after.

The carriage stops so violently that you are thrown sideways against the squab. The driver swears above. Horses scream in harness. A male voice answers from the road—low, commanding, impossible to mistake even through the carriage wall and the sudden hammer of your blood. Your heart knows before reason does. The door is wrenched open. Night stands outside in a dark coat and riding boots and wind-roughened hair. So does Mingyu.

He is on horseback still, one gloved hand holding his reins, the animal turned broadside across the road before your father’s carriage like a line drawn by will alone. Another horse waits behind him, riderless, saddled for speed and intention. The driver is protesting in frightened outrage. A groom or lad from the convent carriage has half risen from the box and then thought better of it when faced with the expression on Mr. Ashbourne’s face. Mingyu looks only at you. The lantern light from the carriage catches the planes of him in gold and shadow—the line of his jaw, the set of his mouth, the dangerous stillness in his shoulders. He does not look reckless. He looks certain. He steps down from the horse and comes to the open door. The whole world seems to narrow to the space between the carriage and the road.

For one blinding moment, you think he has come to seize you and carry you off in one of those glorious masculine follies men call rescue when they mean possession in better tailoring. The fear of that flashes white-hot through you. Then Mingyu holds out his hand and says, very quietly: “I have not come to rescue you.” The night stills around the words. His hand remains where it is, open, unforced. “I have come to ask.”

You cannot speak. The broken rosary lies scattered at your feet like a small dark slaughter. Your breath is unsteady. The road smells of horse, damp earth, and the fields cooling under the evening. Somewhere in the distance, an owl gives one sound and falls silent. Mingyu’s gaze does not leave yours. “If you stay in that carriage,” he says, and there is not one grain of false comfort in his voice, “it goes on to the convent. If you step out of it, you step into everything that follows me instead.” The words hang between you, grave and exact.

“Your father will disown you.” You already know this. Hearing it aloud still hurts. “You will have no dowry. No churchwoman will ever call you proper again. Society will say you were ruined before I touched you and damned after.” His mouth tightens very slightly in contempt for the world he is naming. “There will be no soft version of it. No pretty lie to make it easier.”

The numbness shifts, not back into terror, but into something that can at last feel the truth in pieces. “Why?” you whisper. The question means more than one thing. Why are you here. Why this road. Why me. Why now. Why should I trust you when every man in my life has made authority sound like care and ownership sound like holiness. Mingyu understands. Of course, he does. He rests one hand on the edge of the carriage door, nearer to you, but still he does not touch. “Because I love you.”

The wind moves at the edge of the road. Your dress swirls around your ankles. Somewhere under your shoes, the carnelian beads shift when the carriage settles on its springs. Mingyu goes on, and though the words remain sober, there is something in the tone that belongs not merely to gravity but to hope held with both hands. “Because I asked him properly.” His eyes darken at the memory, though his voice remains controlled. “Because he said no as if your life were a thing he had built and therefore owned. Because I told him what I will tell any man, in any room, until my last breath if I must.” A pause. “And because I will not steal this from you and call it devotion. I am asking.” He draws in one breath, not to steady himself, but to steady the world around the question. “Marry me.”

It is not a proposal wrapped in satin phrases, though something in the way he looks at you makes the bare honesty of it feel lovelier than ornament could have done. No polished performance. No courtship speech memorised for effect. Only a man standing in the road before the carriage meant to erase you, offering not safety but a future chosen in the open. Your pulse begins again in earnest, not the frightened beating of a trapped thing but something wilder. “If I come with you,” you say, and the words feel as though they are being shaped by a mouth no longer wholly numb, “I lose everything.” He gives the smallest shake of his head. “No.” His eyes remain fixed on yours. “Not everything.” It sounds like a promise spoken by a man who knows the cost and is willing, still, to stand there beneath it.

You look past him into the dark road and see the whole constitution of it. Your father’s face when the empty carriage returns. The church ladies with their sharpened pity. Carroway receiving the news with relief disguised as disgust. Doors closing. Invitations vanishing. Your name travelling through Mayfair in tones of pious regret. No dowry. No portion. No father. No return. Fallen, they will call you. And yet the word does not fit. You have not fallen. You have been kept. Kept in hallways, in pews, in white muslin, in correction, in prayer, in all the narrow little cages by which your father teaches women to mistake captivity for moral worth. Kept until the keeping itself became a theology. Now the carriage door stands open. The night enters. Mingyu waits. The road stretches dark and unpromising in two directions, and for the first time in your life, no one is moving your body except by invitation.

Your hand tightens around a single carnelian bead hidden in your palm. Then you open your fingers and let it fall among the others. The sound it makes on the carriage floor is very small. It feels like a conclusion. You shift toward the open door. The moment your fingers close around his, the whole of your life seems to move. Something old releases. Something long-strangled inhales. His hand closes around yours—warm, firm, real. You step down from the carriage. The road receives you. It is only common earth beneath the soles of your boots, and yet the sensation of standing there outside the vehicle meant to deliver you into disappearance is so violent in its simplicity that you cannot breathe.

Behind you, the driver has gone silent. Good. Let him carry that silence back to Reverend Marlowe’s house like a proper servant carrying a tray. You look at the open carriage, at the trunk inside, at the little dark scatter of beads, at the life that would have gone on without you if you had remained seated and obedient. You turn your face fully to Mingyu. “I choose you.” Your voice is stronger than you expected. He searches your face as if making room still for retreat if retreat is what you truly want. It is not. God help you, it is not. You had thought freedom might feel like triumph. It does not. It comes instead like this: your hand in his and the knowledge that fear has not vanished and yet has ceased to govern. It comes in the form of the steadiness of the man before you who has not stolen, not commanded, only asked—and in the answering certainty with which your whole life steps toward him.

Mingyu says your name, low and almost disbelieving, as if he cannot quite trust the miracle of hearing yes where so much of the world taught him to expect refusal. Then he turns, keeping hold of your hand, and leads you toward the waiting horse and the dark beyond it. This time, when you follow, it is not because someone has told you where to go. It is because you have chosen.

“There,” Mingyu says, nodding toward the waiting ship with infuriating satisfaction. “A perfectly respectable vessel, a decent captain, and a scandalous quantity of sunshine. I have outdone myself.” You look at the ship, then at him. “I was under the impression the Aegean was the point.” His mouth curves. “Angel, I am always the point.”

The harbour is all rope-creak and gull-cry and salt wind worrying at cloaks and ribbons, though the latter concerns you less now than it once would have done. Morning lies bright upon the water, turning the harbour to hammered silver where the sun catches it. Beyond the masts and rigging, the sea opens itself in one long impossible line, blue and bluer still, as though your world has finally remembered it was not built only of walls.

Mingyu stands beside you in a travel coat the colour of dark ink, hat in one hand, the other reaching—as it has done so often as of late—for yours. Wedding gold glints on his finger. So does yours. The ruby that once sat in the old cravat pin now burns dark-red upon your hand, remade into a ring that catches the light. On his wrist, just visible when the sleeve shifts, a slim bracelet of carnelian beads rests warm against the pulse that once knew only restlessness and now, improbably, seems content to be tethered. You glance down at it. “You wear my old sins very elegantly.” Mingyu lifts his hand as if examining a work of art. “Your old sins are excellent craftsmanship.” Then, softer, with that private warmth he has learned to let into his voice when you are involved: “And they suit me better than escape ever did.”

He takes your left hand then, turning it palm-up before bringing the ruby to his mouth. The kiss he presses against the ring is not possession. It feels instead like vow and wonder and some gentler form of worship than any you were ever taught at your father’s knee. When he lowers your hand again, his thumb lingers over the stone. “Still time to change your mind,” he says lightly, though there is no lightness at all in the way his eyes hold yours.

You look beyond him to the ship. To the gangplank. To the sea stretched out with no pew at its end, no pulpit, no father’s hand waiting to direct your face toward the proper angle of obedience. “And miss the scandalous quantity of sunshine?” you ask. “Never.” That wins the grin from him—the true one, bright and shameless and so entirely Mingyu that even now it can still surprise joy out of you.

A little way off, your family waits without intruding, each of them making a valiant, transparent attempt to grant privacy by standing only just near enough to hear everything. Seungcheol has one hand settled at the small of his wife’s back, though every so often it slips lower, more protective than absentminded, while Lady Whitlock’s own hand rests over his and then, in a moment when she turns toward the light, drifts briefly to the gentle new curve beneath her dress before returning to him. The gesture is small enough that another person might miss it. You do not. Neither, from the look on Joshua’s face, does anyone else in this family. Soonyoung waves the moment he catches you watching and immediately ruins the dignity of the scene by calling, “If you return with a tan and stories, I expect both in proper detail!”

“You will get neither,” Seungcheol says.

“He’ll get both,” Jeonghan replies, adjusting one immaculate cuff. “Mingyu has never in his life come back quietly from anywhere.”

Joshua laughs under his breath. Wonwoo, hands folded behind his back, looks toward the ship and then toward the horizon beyond it with the expression of a man regretting everyone else’s noise in advance. Mingyu follows your gaze. “They are pretending not to watch us.”

“Poorly,” you say.

“It’s a family talent.”

The wind freshens. The water shifts. You look once more at the sea and feel, with a strangeness still tender enough to catch at your ribs, that devotion has not left you after all. It has only changed its object. You are still reverent, in your own fashion. Still moved by things larger than yourself. Light on water. A horizon without end. The hand of the man beside you. The truth that holiness was never meant to resemble captivity, however often men dressed the cage and called it sanctuary.

Behind you, Jeonghan says, in a tone of lazy wickedness clearly intended for Wonwoo, “Well, another one of us has done the decent thing and married for love. I suppose the rest of the season must now content itself with Her Majesty’s newest obsession.” Soonyoung brightens at once. “The Crown’s Choice?” Joshua’s mouth twitches. Seungcheol looks resigned already. Wonwoo, after a pause that speaks volumes, says only, “I should like one season in which none of you behaves like lunatics.”

Jeonghan smiles like a man smelling future entertainment on the wind. “Then this family will continue to disappoint you.”

Mingyu laughs, low and delighted, then offers you his arm toward the gangplank. You take it. And when you step forward with him toward sun, salt air, and a horizon that no longer ends in submission, it feels less like leaving than like finally, gloriously arriving.

A/N: Ouffff, I’m finally done with this monstrosity. Is this the longest fic I have ever written? Probably. Am I happy with it? Meh. Somehow, this was extremely hard to write, and I think I must have rewritten it five times. But I guess this is the final version. Hope you enjoy it, anyway!💟

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[skzhotpot]

This might be the longest one shot I’ve ever read!!!

Sara is hitting it out of the park AGAIN with this one. The constant reframing of little moments gave it such emotional complexity. Also I had my phone so close to my face trying to physically insert myself into this fic that I forgot where I was. I thought I was at my parents house 😂😂

I can’t wait til the next installment is out!!

💜 more → Kim Mingyu · SEVENTEEN · Fic Rec Library 💜

[minyoonjin]

the wind was a paid actor... jesus he looks so good

cr. dianesjavier