Chapter Twenty-Seven #4
It’s a ripple effect, a wave of motion that starts at the front and crashes backward until every single pair of eyes in the vicinity is fixed on me.
I feel the weight of them physically, a suffocating blanket of curiosity and judgment.
The whispers stop. The music from the distant stage seems to fade into a dull, thumping headache.
I don’t move. I don’t flinch. I don’t give Heesung the satisfaction of seeing me scramble.
I stand perfectly still, hands in my pockets, my expression bored, even as my heart hammers a frantic rhythm against my ribs—not from fear, but from a sudden, violent spike of adrenaline.
Heesung is watching me, his eyebrows raised, waiting for the confession. He thinks he’s trapped us. He thinks he’s played a masterstroke that will topple the hierarchy and leave him standing on the rubble.
I ignore him. I ignore the crowd. I ignore Soyoung’s hand tightening on my arm.
I look past them all, straight up to the platform.
Sihwan is trembling.
It’s not the shivering of someone who’s wet and cold.
It’s a deep, structural vibration, like a building about to collapse.
He’s pressed back against the blue vinyl of the booth, his chest heaving, his face drained of so much blood it looks grey under the harsh festival lights.
His hand is still clamped over his shoulder, fingers digging into his own flesh so hard the knuckles are white, trying desperately to hide the evidence of what we did. Of what I did.
He meets my gaze, and the bond between us snaps taut, vibrating with a frequency that makes my teeth ache.
I don’t just see the terror in his eyes; I feel it. It tastes like bile and ash. It’s a drowning sensation.
In his mind, this isn’t just a rumor or a bit of college drama.
This is the end. I can see the spiral playing out behind his dilated pupils.
He’s seeing his reputation incinerated. He’s seeing the whispers, the snickers, the loss of his status.
He’s seeing his father’s disappointment, his mother’s critiques, the confirmation of his deepest, darkest insecurity: that he is weak.
That he is lesser. That he is a fraud who has finally been exposed.
He looks at me, and for the first time since we met, there is no challenge. No fire. No arrogance.
He looks at me like a man begging for his life.
Please, his eyes scream, wide and wet and terrified. Don't.
My anger evaporates.
All the frustration I’ve felt over the last week—the annoyance at his cowardice, the irritation at his hiding—it all vanishes, replaced by a cold, protective rage that settles in my gut like a stone.
He’s an idiot. He’s vain, insecure, and obsessed with things that don't matter. But he’s mine.
And nobody gets to break what’s mine.
The silence stretches, thin and brittle, ready to snap.
I make a choice. It isn't a hard one.
I look at Sihwan, really look at him, trembling against that blue vinyl backdrop like a man facing a firing squad.
I see the absolute, crushing certainty in his eyes that his life is over.
He thinks I’m going to let him burn. He thinks I’m going to stand here and let everyone know that the great Oh Sihwan, whimpered and begged and took me deep inside him until he couldn't see straight.
He values this—this cheap, plastic applause, this fragile hierarchy—more than anything. I value him.
So, really, the math is simple.
I take a breath, inhaling the scent of cheap beer and Sihwan’s terror, and I step forward.
I move casually, shrugging off Soyoung’s hand, and walk right up to the velvet rope. I don’t look at the crowd. I lock eyes with Heesung, who is preening, waiting for me to squirm.
"You're right," I say.
My voice isn't loud, but in the vacuum of sound Heesung created, it carries perfectly.
A gasp ripples through the crowd. It sounds like the air being sucked out of the room.
I see Sihwan flinch. His head snaps up, his eyes wide and wet, flashing with a look of such profound betrayal it feels like a physical kick to my ribs. He opens his mouth, maybe to deny it, maybe to plead, but no sound comes out. He thinks I just signed his death warrant.
I keep my eyes on Heesung. "You’re very observant. You guessed it correctly. We are bonded."
The uproar is instantaneous. It’s a chaotic mix of shrieks, shouts, and the frantic murmur of a hundred rumors being confirmed at once.
Heesung’s smile widens into something predatory and triumphant.
He opens his mouth to twist the knife, to make some comment about Sihwan being a fake, a submissive, a bottom.
I don't let him.
"But," I say, raising my voice just enough to cut through the noise. I step closer, invading Heesung’s personal space until his smile falters. "You’ve got the order backwards."
Heesung blinks. "Excuse me?"
I hook my thumbs in my pockets, rocking back on my heels, letting a lazy, arrogant smirk curl the corner of my mouth. I cast a glance back at Sihwan—who is staring at me in frozen horror—and then look back at the crowd.
"Look at him," I say, gesturing vaguely at Sihwan’s massive, heaving frame. "He’s six-foot-one of pure muscle. You really think I could pin that down?"
I let out a short, scoffing laugh, shaking my head like the very idea is ridiculous.
The crowd goes dead silent again, but the flavor of the silence has changed. It’s no longer judgmental. It’s stunned.
I look back at Heesung, whose triumphant expression is curdling into confusion.
"Sihwan isn't the one being knotted, Heesung," I lie, smooth as silk, without a flicker of hesitation. I tap my own chest. "It's me."