The private venue, sat lit up gold against the darkening sky, valets weaving between a fleet of expensive cars parked along the curb.
Chenxi pulled up and glanced at him through the mirror. "You didn’t have to come straight from the office."
"Yuanjun already called twice." Nuocheng stared out the window, tie loosened, his mood still heavy from the warehouse that morning. If he didn’t show up tonight, the calls would only keep coming.
He rubbed his thumb over the seam of his trousers, Sicheng still weighing on his mind since morning. He’d fixed what he could from a distance, though he wasn’t sure it helped.
"I’ll be quick," he told Chenxi, stepping out. "An hour, maybe less."
He knew within seconds of walking through the door that he’d underestimated the night entirely.
The venue was packed, music thumping low beneath a wall of chatter and clinking glasses, string lights strung overhead. Alphas filled the room, dozens of them, laughing too loudly, their cologne thick enough to taste.
His stomach turned when he spotted Mo Lei near the bar, wine glass in hand, laughing at something one of his friends had said. The same man who had tried to drug him at a company dinner two years ago now stood there smiling, still invited to gatherings like this one, as though nothing had ever happened.
Nuocheng looked away before his expression could give anything away.
"There he is!" Yuanjun’s arms wrapped around his shoulders before he could brace for it, the hug lasting a beat longer than necessary. "Thought you’d bail on me."
"Wouldn’t miss it." The lie slipped out easily tonight.
Yuanjun steered him toward a low table ringed with plush seating, five other men already settled in with drinks in hand. Nuocheng sat where he was pointed, sandwiched between two alphas he barely recognized, while Yuanjun dropped into the seat beside him and draped an arm across the back of the couch behind his shoulders.
Not touching yet. Just close enough to make his intentions clear.
"So," one of the men said, swirling his drink, "any luck on the husband-search, Nuocheng?"
He should have known this was exactly where the night would go.
"Working on it."
"You know Yuanjun’s available." Another one laughed, nudging Yuanjun’s shoulder. "You two have history, don’t you? Practically tested compatible already."
"We’ve never—"
"Come on, don’t be shy." Yuanjun’s arm slid lower, his hand settling at Nuocheng’s waist, thumb brushing against the fabric of his shirt. "We had fun a few times, didn’t we?"
Nuocheng’s spine went rigid. "We did not."
"Details." Yuanjun squeezed once, easy and familiar, as though he had every right to. "Any of us would be lucky to marry you. Especially me. I already know what you like."
The men around the table laughed, unbothered, as if Yuanjun hadn’t just invented an entire history in front of five witnesses.
"Get your hand off me," Nuocheng said, sharp enough that the smile on Yuanjun’s face should have faltered.
It didn’t. If anything, his grip tightened.
A server appeared at the edge of the table carrying a tray of drinks, and Nuocheng’s stomach dropped the moment he recognized him.
Sicheng.
Their eyes met for half a second before something unreadable passed behind his gaze and he looked away, setting the drinks down with mechanical precision, refusing to look at Nuocheng again.
Of course he had ended up here after quitting the warehouse. Of course tonight, of all nights, their paths would cross a third time.
Nuocheng couldn’t hold his gaze. Shame crawled up his throat thick enough to choke on, and without thinking clearly, he grabbed the nearest glass off the tray and drank, barely registering the taste.
Yuanjun’s hand slid further around his waist, pulling him half into his lap despite his attempt to shift away.
"Fuck off." Nuocheng shoved at his shoulder, harder this time.
The touching only increased, Yuanjun’s fingers curling tighter against his hip while the other men at the table watched with amused, half-drunk interest, as though this was simply how the night was supposed to unfold.
He wondered, with rising disgust, whether they were all planning to fuck him tonight. He wasn’t a slut, and he didn’t do orgies.
He checked the time. Nine forty. Enough.
He’d shown his face, and now he was leaving.
He stood, and the room tilted violently beneath him.
Alarm shot through his chest. He hadn’t drunk enough for this. One glass shouldn’t have done anything close to this.
His vision blurred at the edges, the lights overhead smearing into streaks of gold.
He grabbed Yuanjun’s collar with whatever strength he had left.
"You fucker." His voice came out thick and wrong. "Did you drug me?"
Yuanjun’s smile never wavered, calm in a way that turned Nuocheng’s stomach colder. "Relax. I’m the only one who’s going to fuck you tonight, though we might have some viewers." He reached up and brushed a strand of hair from Nuocheng’s face, almost tender. "Once you’re knocked up, we’ll get married. Everyone wins."
"You fucking bastard." Nuocheng’s grip tightened despite his shaking hands. "You think you have a chance? Is that what you told your friends, that we’d fucked? We never did. I’ve never once been into you, and I’m not marrying you just because you decided to lie your way into it."
He shoved him off and turned toward the exit, his legs no longer feeling entirely his own.
The room swam around him, faces blurring into smears of color. He bit down hard on his lip, tasting blood, using the pain to anchor himself upright as he pushed forward. He needed to make it outside. He couldn’t pass out here.
His shoulder clipped a table, someone’s drink spilling behind him, but he kept moving, one hand braced against the wall, his vision tunneling as darkness crept in from every direction.
The last face he saw clearly, cutting through the haze, was Sicheng, his tray abandoned somewhere behind him, already moving toward him with alarm sharp in his eyes.
"Help me," Nuocheng managed, just as the floor rushed up to meet him.