Seojun had decided to forget him, had already concluded that he was a bad person who had only used him, yet he found himself pathetic for worrying about him. He had been someone no different from a first love. He liked everything about him, so even the fact that he was sick wasn’t bothersome. His heart ached when he saw his sad face confessing that he had lost his alpha, and whenever he saw him smiling at him, he knew happiness wasn’t far away.
But even after 3 hours passed, Soohyun didn’t come. Seojun held his cell phone and hesitated about whether to contact him, but he was afraid he might say he decided not to come, so he couldn’t even leave a message.
‘Could he have… collapsed on the way?’
Recalling the image of Soohyun having a seizure, Seojun suddenly became anxious. Feeling like he should wait for him at the company entrance, he ran toward the first-floor lobby.
“Choi Seojun-ssi!”
On the first floor, there was a man struggling with the reception desk staff. Although he had only seen him once, he was someone Seojun remembered too.
“I told you, you can’t come in here!”
“Here! Someone I know was supposed to come here, but I can’t reach them! I came because I’m worried. Choi Seojun-ssi!”
Seojun approached him. As soon as Chaeho saw Seojun, he ran to him and suddenly shouted.
“Where is Soohyun-hyung?”
“What? Suddenly Soohyun-hyung…?”
“Today Soohyun-hyung went out saying he was meeting you, Choi Seojun-ssi. Where is he?”
But Seojun rather questioned him back.
“What do you mean… Lee Soohyun-ssi hasn’t yet…”
“Hyung… hasn’t arrived yet?”
“No… We were supposed to meet at the company, but he hasn’t come yet…”
Chaeho’s face turned pale. Only then did Seojun catch on to why Chaeho had come and urgently asked.
“D-did something happen to Lee Soohyun-ssi?”
“Choi Seojun-ssi, this has nothing to do with you.”
“Nothing to do with me! Today we were supposed to meet…”
Chaeho was irritated by both Seojun’s tone and expression. If he truly worried about Soohyun, if he loved him, he shouldn’t have made him come all this way alone.
“Choi Seojun-ssi, do you even know what condition Soohyun-hyung is in, and you made him come all the way here alone?”
“…What?”
Before Seojun could say anything, Chaeho ran out of the building. Seojun tried to chase after him, but Chaeho got in his car and left. Watching his car disappear into the distance, Seojun took out his cell phone and called Soohyun.
[The customer is unable to answer the phone due to personal circumstances, so you will be connected to voicemail.]
But Soohyun’s phone was turned off.
* * *
“…Hyun-ah.”
“Ugh… uugh…”
“Soohyun-ah. Wake up. Hm?”
Vvvvvvv—
Something soft touched Soohyun’s cheek. A strange sound pounded against his eardrums and his spinning head was dizzy. His eyelids were too heavy to open easily. He tried to move his fingers, but strangely, his entire arm felt stuffy.
“Soohyun-ah.”
“Uh… ugh…”
Realizing he was lying somewhere, Soohyun assumed this was a hospital. Did he have another seizure? There must be a warm-hearted person who would at least take a collapsed person to the hospital. Soohyun slowly exhaled.
“How much medicine did you use that he can’t wake up like this?”
“…I’m sorry.”
But thinking about it again, it couldn’t be a seizure. He was just walking down the street and had paused to rest before going back to Seojun’s company when he encountered someone. Someone he didn’t know well greeted Soohyun and after that, a stinging sensation on the back of his hand…
Recalling up to that point, Soohyun realized that the voice that had been calling his name just moments ago belonged to someone he knew well.
“Huk!”
“Oh. You’re awake. Soohyun-ah, did you sleep well?”
“You… what the hell is this…”
Soohyun was lying on a bed. Both his hands were tied, and at the end of the tied cord was another thick, sturdy rope attached, so Soohyun couldn’t lower his arms.
“You… are you insane?”
“Why are you so surprised, acting all new to this. You were sleeping soundly, you must have been tired, Soohyun-ah.”
“Don’t… touch me.”
When Jang Seokhyeon’s hand approached him, Soohyun gritted his teeth. His body trembled so much from fear that his teeth chattered, but he wanted to avoid this man’s hand touching his body above all else.
“You’re being hurtful again. It’s okay, we’re going to have a good time from now on.”
“What… crazy… are you… saying?”
His tongue, still not free from the effects of the drug, moved clumsily. What Soohyun saw in Seokhyeon’s eyes, which seemed affectionate, was only one thing: madness. He knew he was being monitored, but he never thought he’d go as far as kidnapping him… And to think it happened in broad daylight in the middle of the street—it was outrageous.
“Your mouth has gotten foul. Our Soohyun. You used to only say pretty things before.”
“Shut… up… Let this… go…”
“Soohyun-ah. I’m really hurt. I’ve been letting things slide. Now you need to stop and listen to me.”
“What… are you saying…?”
Soohyun’s eyes filled with shock. Seokhyeon gently stroked Soohyun’s cheek, then grabbed a few strands of his hair and fiddled with them. Joy arose from the trembling of Soohyun transmitted through his fingertips. He felt like he’d go crazy from how lovable he was, reacting to him like this.
“I let it slide when you had sex with Choi Seojun, and when you left that house and didn’t come to me but went to Kim Chaeho instead.”
“Crazy… bastard…”
“That’s right, Soohyun-ah. I’m crazy. You know it too. That I’m… crazy about you.”
Looking at Seokhyeon’s eyes flickering with madness, Soohyun gritted his teeth. He could never understand this man’s obsession with him, nor did he want to understand it.
“But Soohyun, as expected, you still don’t have pheromones. How can this be? But on the other hand, it’s fortunate. If Choi Seojun, that bastard, had fixed your body… I really think I would have killed that bastard.”
Soohyun decided to just close his eyes instead. He hoped this situation was a dream. Ever since the monster named Jang Seokhyeon entered his life, everything had been a mess. It was a life saved by Jeongwon, so he had lived desperately, but now it might all be futile. Rather than being in this guy’s clutches, he’d rather die.
“Let’s start over. I won’t use rough methods like back then anymore. When you get pheromones, we’ll make a baby too… I even got divorced because of you. How pretty would a baby that looks like you be?”
Listening to Seokhyeon’s excited voice, Soohyun rather missed the tinnitus. He could close his eyes, but as long as his hearing was alive, he would continue to hear the voice.
If there was anything he wished for right now, it was just one thing—to die. Rather than give his body to Jang Seokhyeon again, he wanted to go to Jeongwon’s side as soon as possible. But since neither Chaeho nor Seojun would know where this place was or that he was here, the only way to escape from that devil’s hands would be ‘death.’
“Soohyun-ah, why aren’t you saying anything? What are you thinking about?”
Seokhyeon, who had been caressing Soohyun’s body, suddenly began to undress him. Soohyun, who had turned deathly pale, struggled with all his might, but it was far too weak to resist Seokhyeon’s brutish strength.
“No! Don’t! Don’t!!”
“Our Soohyun has really changed a lot. Even doing such cute things!”
Smack-
When Soohyun’s struggling intensified, Seokhyeon struck his face without hesitation. Hit so hard that stars flashed before his eyes, Soohyun froze with his head turned.
“Soohyun-ah. If you stay still, I won’t do things like this either. You understand, right?”
He didn’t want to cry. He didn’t want to moan beneath this worthless man. Soohyun bit his lips hard enough to draw blood.
* * *
‘Soohyun hyung, Soohyun hyung… Please be safe.’
Chaeho gripped the steering wheel, repeatedly wiping his sweat-soaked palms on his pants. Throughout the drive, he’d tried calling Soohyun, but there was no answer. Just moments ago, Soohyun had been replying to Chaeho’s messages. If he’d suddenly collapsed somewhere and been taken to a hospital, they would have surely contacted either him or Choi Seojun.
But there had been no contact from the hospital or from Soohyun. Chaeho checked the signal from the location tracker he’d installed on Soohyun’s phone, preparing for this very situation. While smartphones could be tracked without special devices, that was only possible for the owner or the police, so Chaeho had attached a separate device to Soohyun’s phone that only he could monitor.
—Starting location tracking.
Chaeho hadn’t wanted to use this since he didn’t want to spy on Soohyun, but driven by growing anxiety, he activated the dedicated tracking app. The GPS tracking device with an error range of less than 5 meters—exceptionally accurate among those available to civilians—was one of the products manufactured by Chaeho’s father’s company.
“This… this place…!”
The location where Soohyun was, or more precisely where Soohyun’s phone was, was the very place Chaeho had desperately hoped it wouldn’t be. H Pharmaceuticals. Today’s events were definitely related to Jang Seokhyeon. But even if he rushed to H Pharmaceuticals, would there be any way to bring Soohyun out…?
