Did you run away again? Why the hell? Did you realize my intentions? Did you see through me like that?
Right, as Lee Woonghee thought, Junhyuk wasn’t such a normal man, nor a wonderful man. He was terribly petty, held grudges, and was utterly ugly.
…Did you, did you look into this crude interior?
So you concluded you wouldn’t let go, right? So you reassured me and ran away? Did you conclude that running away from a monster like me is the only answer?
Once wrongly rooted thoughts grotesquely swelled unevenly and tormented the man.
“Shit….”
The man exhaled roughly. He couldn’t breathe properly. Invisible hands seemed to choke the man’s throat, blocking his windpipe.
…Beep, beep, beep.
A high crying sound from one side pierced his ears. Like the man’s vital signs, it echoed in the air.
“……”
At that, the man stepped forward as if entranced. The source of the sound was the birdcage. He opened the birdcage door as if stealing.
He carelessly shoved his hand in and grabbed the small body. It was a very small and shabby bird. Having become the same state as the man, it was crying with all its might.
Even though it was also abandoned by Lee Woonghee. As if asking to be saved, or as if telling him to come to his senses.
“What exactly should I have done.”
You could have told me, you should have taught me instead of running away like this. A cold sea breeze swept toward him feeling despair. It shook his body like a whip. Whoosh, something rippled on the bed.
The man’s eyes naturally clung there. Reddish lace fabric, thin enough that skin would almost show through—it was a wedding dress. Looking at it, he felt very sad and longing.
…Was he such an emotional man? If it would be like this, it might have been better not to learn emotions at all.
The man released the bird as if dropping it and approached the bed. He was about to grab the end of that lace and stroke it.
Something bumped against his feet. The man’s knees flinched. With his head fixed in the air, only his pupils dropped eerily.
It was a cold, hard black lump. The man slowly reached under the bed and grabbed it.
…It was a gun, a gun. Looking at the model, it was the one Lee Woonghee had stolen from the man. It was even loaded. Was it a situation where he tried to use it but couldn’t?
“…Ah.”
The man sighed slowly. Really, Lee Woonghee was an endless labyrinth. Did you really run away? The touch that reached toward him last night, the gestures toward him seen every morning upon opening eyes. Did Lee Woonghee really try to run away?
…What if he was kidnapped?
…Where did he go?
This cruise was entirely the man’s. To hide on it, he would have to hide in a blind spot not caught by CCTV.
For example, the basement.
Before the thought could be tied up first, his feet moved first. While clutching the wedding dress in his hand, the man left the suite room. He concentrated all his nerves on his nose. He moved forward pulling like a rope the faintly remaining Lee Woonghee’s pheromone in the air.
One step, then the next step. His footsteps moving like that gradually headed toward the dining room.
“……”
When he kicked the carpet with the tip of his shoes to roll it up, that door handle was revealed. The man lifted it as if gripping it.
Creak, bang!
A huge roar was heard along with dusty smoke. White dust billowed, and then the man slowly moved his steps following the stairs that appeared next.
Drip, drip, sticky water droplets fell from the windows along the corridor. Squelch, squelch, squelch, the man’s shoe heels dug through the sticky pooled basement floor.
Very humid and damp air licked the man’s cheeks. It felt like entering a cave with its mouth wide open with a bare body.
Nevertheless, he couldn’t stop. Because Lee Woonghee’s pheromone was increasingly wrapping around the man’s whole body.
Thump thump, his heart surged roughly as if it would tear through his ribs and come out. All the blood in his body was driven to his head, and the world was cut off moment by moment, then reconnected.
“Haa….”
With his breath caught at his chin, he advanced one step at a time. Hoping Lee Woonghee would be at the end of this, or rather hoping he wouldn’t be. That ambivalence drove his heartbeat even more madly.
The man stood at the edge of a cliff.
…It’s okay even now, so say you’ll return to me. Rather say you were kidnapped. Then I’ll somehow cover your eyes, cover your ears, and even block your nose to listen to you.
And it was the last step. When he turned the cement wall broken here and there, there were pupils glinting toward him.
[Put down the gun…!]
The man had always seen through the entire situation with just a glance. He would read people’s expressions, the direction of their gazes, even their breathing intervals.
But at this moment, only one thing entered his eyes.
It was the white body he had been searching for so desperately. Lee Woonghee was on the young punk’s lap, held in the youngster’s arms.
[If you don’t want to destroy this cruise, prepare a helicopter I can escape in right now. Absolutely within 2 hours, if the helicopter doesn’t come within that time…!]
He was being held. In someone else’s embrace, not his.
“You said you’d wait for me.”
At the words that suddenly popped out, Woonghee involuntarily flinched his knees.
…Is that man really in his right mind right now? His mental world was suspicious to the point of doubt. Did he slip on the stairs and smash his head? Or was he struck by lightning on the way….
Gi Junhyuk, that sharp-witted man couldn’t not know this situation.
All around were things like electric rice cookers spread out. So this was all bombs, bombs.
Even bringing subordinates down wouldn’t be enough. Appearing alone like that as if it didn’t matter what happened to his own life, all he held in his hands was one gun and one piece of reddish fabric.
With bombs spread all around like this, and Tula even aiming with a gun. Gi Junhyuk’s eyes were fixed only on Woonghee.
Gi Junhyuk stood defenseless like a lost child. He wasn’t angry. He wasn’t indignant asking how dare he betray him.
“Did you really betray me again?”
It was literally despair.
[What are you babbling about! Don’t you see all this, fuck! Bombs!]
Tula’s words, escalating in intensity, were blocked by Gi Junhyuk’s words.
“Why exactly?”
He frowned as if he couldn’t accept all this situation. It was a childlike face. Like a broken robot, like a child holding the weapon called emotion in his hands for the first time.
“You said you loved me…. But why did it turn out like this again.”
The end of his voice was miserably crushed. He distorted his face in agony and buried his cheek in the reddish fabric.
“……”
Woonghee kept his lips tightly shut. He was only clenching his fist placed on his thigh. As if he were a criminal whose crime had been revealed….
“I really, fuck, don’t understand.”
Woonghee bit down hard on his tongue. He wanted to tell him the truth right away. That it’s not true, that it’s all a misunderstanding, that he never ran away. That he wanted to protect his side as much as possible.
“Was it all a show?”
That it’s not true, that it wasn’t like that, that he really intended to wait for him, he wanted to tell him that.
That it’s not true, he felt like he would shake his head involuntarily. But something poked at his waist from behind. It was a gun wrapped in cloth.
Tula, this son of a bitch, was holding a gun to his waist. He must be planning to make Gi Junhyuk submit before him and take Woonghee out of here.
‘…Fuck!’
Moreover, deep in Woonghee’s throat was poison held in place.
If even a little seeped into the Omega’s body, it would be fatal. If he moved his tongue even slightly, this would burst and seep into the mucous membrane, and he, a fucking Omega, would be poisoned.
So, that’s why even though he faced the man, he couldn’t say anything.
“Say you’ll return to me even now.”
The man’s gun muzzle that had been fixed on Tula slowly moved. Leaving Tula, it pointed precisely at Woonghee.
“Then I can forgive everything, as if nothing happened, just come back.”
The man threatened as if chewing through his teeth. Is that all he can utter as a threat?
To Woonghee, it sounded like the end of a desperate plea. His heart shrank and ached painfully beyond that.
‘…No, I can’t do that.’
He already knew the power of the bombs surrounding this area. Just one exploded and it was enough to blow away the house on that island.
With this much, this entire cruise would be blown away. Then, then that man would definitely be in danger too.
Woonghee shook his head. That I can’t go, that I can’t go to your side.
