There are countless reasons someone might wake in the middle of the night. Waking from overwhelming thirst alone was rare for him, but tonight, unfortunately, was one of those times.
As his consciousness slowly clawed its way through the dense fog of sleep, Gi-hyeon’s first muddled thought was simple enough.
That steamed sea bream was way too salty.
But shaking off the crushing drowsiness that still pinned him down proved difficult. His eyes remained stubbornly shut as he drifted in that murky space between sleep and wakefulness. Then, through the haze, something deeply unsettling registered.
“…”
What is that?
The thought surfaced first.
What the hell is pressing against my tailbone?
It was hard. Thick enough to feel absurd. Heat radiated from it in waves, along with a heavy, undeniable presence. In his half-awake state, the closest comparison that came to mind was the thickest part of a baseball bat just before the handle narrowed. Unless someone had enormous hands, there was no way they could fully wrap their fingers around it.
The remnants of sleep vanished instantly.
Something large and rigid was grinding directly against his tailbone.
What the fuck is that?
Gi-hyeon tried frantically to make sense of it, but his brain was still sluggish with sleep. The only thing that escaped him was a low, confused sound.
“Mmm…”
As if unconcerned by his reaction, the thick weight lodged between the cleft of his ass slid slowly up and down. Every so often, it jerked upward and pressed firmly against him.
His consciousness sharpened all at once.
If he opened his eyes, he would immediately see what was behind him.
And then—
“Haa…”
A rough, uneven breath spilled against the back of his neck.
Someone buried their face deep into the crook of it, exhaling scorching heat against his skin.
Gi-hyeon’s eyes snapped open.
What the fuck…
A massive question mark exploded through his mind. He was just about to jerk upright and demand an explanation when something wet and burning-hot touched the nape of his neck.
Then something rougher dragged slowly upward along the line of his sternocleidomastoid muscle, deliberate and feverishly hot.
A startled gasp nearly escaped him before he forcibly swallowed it down.
“Ah, fuck.”
Gi-hyeon froze.
His lungs locked. He couldn’t even turn around.
A second later, the duvet rustled heavily in the darkness. Blinking rapidly, Gi-hyeon stared blankly ahead as he felt the weight beside him lift from the mattress.
“Now I’m even doing this…”
The curse was ground out through clenched teeth.
There was only one person who could have been lying beside him.
Jo Yeon-oh.
Gi-hyeon tried desperately to process what had just happened, but his thoughts scattered uselessly in every direction.
Standing beside the bed now, Yeon-oh was looking down at him.
“…!”
Gi-hyeon squeezed his eyes shut.
It was an instinctive reaction—completely reflexive, completely absurd.
Why the hell am I closing my eyes? I should be sitting up and asking what the fuck he thinks he’s doing.
Even as he berated himself internally, a shadow fell over him again.
Jo Yeon-oh had leaned back down.
Just as before, the Alpha buried his face against Gi-hyeon’s neck and inhaled deeply.
The heat of his breath skimming over Gi-hyeon’s skin sent a violent shiver down his spine. A strange, unbearable sensation spread through his chest, and blood rushed abruptly to his nipples.
Why the hell are they suddenly…
It made no sense.
A man’s nipples hardening from cold was one thing, but the bedroom was thick with body heat, almost stiflingly warm.
There was no reason for his body to react like this.
Meanwhile, Jo Yeon-oh remained pressed against the nape of his neck, breathing heavily. His lips hovered just barely above the skin. Every now and then, he inhaled sharply, as though searching for something.
A deep ache pooled instantly between Gi-hyeon’s legs.
It wasn’t the familiar throb of an erection. The sensation was heavier than that—dense, suffocating, almost painful—as pressure gathered deep in his perineum.
A chilling certainty crept over him that something was fundamentally, biologically wrong.
Then—
“He’s not even an Omega.”
“…”
With that cold, detached remark, Jo Yeon-oh finally pulled away.
The mattress dipped as he stepped off the bed. A moment later came the soft sound of slippers sliding on, followed by the muffled retreat of his footsteps across the room.
Then the bedroom door opened.
Closed.
Silence swallowed the room whole.
“…”
Left alone in the darkness, Gi-hyeon stared blankly ahead for a long moment.
Then, slowly, he pulled the duvet over his head.