The second morning in the new officetel wasn’t all that refreshing.
At least, not for Baek Kanghyeon.
It was around 7 a.m.
Kanghyeon’s default wake-up time was 6 a.m. So 7 a.m. wasn’t exactly a time that should sour his mood.
Even so, he wasn’t in great spirits—because the neighbor kept mashing the doorbell without a break.
Liquor smell.
The harsh reek that swept in the moment he opened the door made his brow pinch. Had he been soaking in a vat of whiskey he’d been chugging?
He had no intention of dealing with a drunk, but the face was far too intact for the thickness of the alcohol on his breath, so he had to ask.
“What is it this time?”
For some reason, the expressionless Kwon Haeil just stared fixedly at him and said nothing.
Just a drunk’s habit, then.
He didn’t have time to babysit someone else’s quirks.
Kanghyeon leveled a cold look at the unresponsive Haeil and reached to shut the door.
In that instant, Haeil grabbed his wrist. Then, without leaving him any chance to brace, yanked hard.
Pulled off balance by unexpected strength, Kanghyeon ended up folded straight into Kwon Haeil’s chest. Before he could push him off, strong arms clamped hard around his waist.
“What are you—!”
“Quiet.”
The extremely low voice tickled Kanghyeon’s ear. His breath touched the white nape of his neck. So did lips steeped in thick alcohol.
“Different. …Mm, different.”
He heard Kwon Haeil inhale, savoring the scent.
“As I thought—you smell much better.”
There was a faint laugh in Haeil’s voice for some reason.
Kanghyeon didn’t find it funny. He just found it absurd.
It was the first time some lunatic had treated him—a burly Dominant Alpha—like an Omega.
With an icy face, he shoved at Haeil. The grip around his waist was so tight that pushing only managed to separate their chests.
“Cut the nonsense. If you’re drunk, go back in and sleep it off.”
“Not sleepy.”
“Whether you are or not isn’t my concern. And let go. Ease up.”
“Oh, that’s kind of dirty talk?”
Haeil snorted a foolish little laugh.
How the hell do you hear “dirty” in that.
Just as Kanghyeon’s eyes narrowed, Haeil muttered under his breath.
“Weird. I don’t usually get drunk.”
“If you were soaking yourself in booze till morning, anyone would be drunk.”
“Are you defending me?”
Turning over Haeil’s languid tone, Kanghyeon’s eye corner twitched.
“I’m saying you’re drunk, so cut the crap.”
Not a single word out of him was friendly. Even so, Haeil kept chuckling, as if something were terribly amusing.
The arms banded around his waist were so stubborn that Kanghyeon wondered if he should just kick his shin. Words never worked on drunks; left alone, he might be stuck like this.
Drunk or not, an Alpha was still an Alpha.
Hugging a strange Alpha—much less one who wasn’t an Omega—couldn’t have been pleasant. At least, that was how it seemed to Kanghyeon.
“Ah.”
Shoving Haeil back over the threshold, Kanghyeon paused mid-motion at a belated thought.
“Wait here a minute.”
“Why?”
Head tilted, Haeil asked, but Kanghyeon went inside without answering. He even closed the door.
Haeil stood quietly before the now-still door. Then he began to get peeved. Why did the door-slam from the day Kanghyeon moved in come to mind?
Just as his impatient fingers were about to hit the bell again—
With a clear chime, the door opened.
Baek Kanghyeon held out a neat, square box to Kwon Haeil, who had frozen mid–bell-press. It looked like an expensive box of chocolates, or maybe a slightly flat premium cake box.
“Take it.”
It hadn’t occurred to Haeil that Kanghyeon would hand him anything.
He blinked, a little vacant.
“What is this?”
Facing that dazed look, Kanghyeon said flatly,
“You asked for it.”
“Huh?”
“Housewarming rice cakes.”
“…What?”
Time seemed to stop for a few seconds. The silence that fell between them was sudden and intense.
Kanghyeon broke it first.
Lowering the box he’d been holding out, he said, still offhand,
“If you don’t need it, fine.”
“No—no. I never said I didn’t.”
In a hurry, Haeil snatched the box. Since he’d intended to give it to Kwon Haeil anyway, Kanghyeon yielded it easily. Box of rice cakes hugged tight to his chest, Haeil still wore that half-vacant look.
“If it’s bad, just throw it away.”
Leaving that, Kanghyeon shut the door without a backward glance.
Thud.
For some reason, the sound of the door was a little different this time.
Left standing out in the hall, Haeil stayed right there—just like the first day he’d been turned away.
“What the…”
A small murmur slipped through his teeth. As if to dam it, he covered his mouth with one hand. The flush in his face was half-hidden.
But he couldn’t hide the tremor in his now-clear, sober eyes.
There was no way a buzz, once it arrived, would dissipate this easily.
That sobered me right up.
Haeil hadn’t planned to drink until this hour. He’d meant to enjoy a one-night stand early and get a good sleep.
It wasn’t because the Omega he’d brought out for once was a bit off his usual taste. It wasn’t because the pheromones didn’t suit him, either.
It was simply that the more thickly the Omega poured out sweetness, the more a different person kept coming to mind.
And he compared them, endlessly.
This Omega’s scent is like this, while his sweetness was like that.
Would his sweetness deepen like this when aroused?
No—if it’s him, then even if he’s aroused, surely…
The comparison that began as simple curiosity and interest had no intention of ending.
That was how intense the neighbor Alpha’s sweet undertone was—intense in a way that ran counter to its faintness. Like a small fruit nestled inside a graceful predator.
So small and so red that anyone would want to put a tongue to it, and yet a luscious fruit you wouldn’t dare to covet lightly.
That was the hidden pheromone Haeil had felt from Baek Kanghyeon.
And he had kept comparing it without end.
Naturally, there was no way his eyes would stay on the lump of sweetness lying in the hotel bed.
In the end, he left the hotel without even tugging down his zipper.
It was the first time he’d failed to have sex with an Omega. “Failed” wasn’t quite right—“gave up” was more accurate—but either way, there was no world where that felt good.
Another irritation added to the pile.
Normally, no matter how stressed he was, a one-night stand with a suitably picked Omega was plenty. If he buried himself in sweet pheromones and poured out everything with sweat, he could fall asleep easily.
But when the best stress relief failed, of course he reached for alcohol. He found a reasonably quiet bar and poured back drink after drink.
His tolerance was strong; he almost never got drunk. Even so, drinking straight through until sunrise had him buzzing.
It had been a long time since he’d been this far gone.
He didn’t know where the film had cut. He remembered Omegas drifting over to chat and bat their eyes while he drank—but everything after that was a blank.
When he came to, he was already at the officetel. And he was calling out the next-door man he found so irritating and spouting nonsense.
Haeil dragged a hand down his face and let out a helpless laugh.
“You’re actually insane, Kwon Haeil.”
He was ridiculous to himself.
To get drunk and, of all things, hug the neighbor Alpha and trade dumb lines—he’d never had a drunk quirk like this.
And that man actually prepared the housewarming rice cakes he’d demanded.
It was absurd… and yet, somehow, a laugh slipped out.
While Kwon Haeil stood there in the hallway, blankly layered with disbelief—
Inside, Kanghyeon leisurely cracked open a canned coffee.
Too much of a hassle to bring it over myself—this worked out.
It felt like clearing an old, nagging task.
In truth, Baek Kanghyeon hadn’t prepared the housewarming rice cakes.
He’d never even seen such a thing in his life and hadn’t known it existed. If he hadn’t asked Baek Heeu, who’d happened by, he still wouldn’t know.
Luckily, Heeu knew exactly what housewarming rice cakes were and what they meant. He’d grown up not at the family seat but in a quiet countryside, and said he’d had them now and then.
So, last night—late—Heeu had people send rice cakes. Knowing Kanghyeon didn’t like rice cakes, it was obviously meant for the Alpha next door.
If not for Heeu, he wouldn’t have bothered to give something like that to such a strange person.
Lifting the can to his lips, Kanghyeon recalled Haeil’s final expression.
That vacant face, seriously.
As he drank his coffee, the corner of Kanghyeon’s mouth lifted a little.