"…Yes?"
"I want to rest a little. You’ll come with hyung, won’t you?"
"…..Yes."
Eunwon nodded slowly. Only then did Muyoung grin in satisfaction, tug over the two fingers of his he was still holding, and suck them into his mouth with a shameless little smack.
"Hngh…!"
They tasted sweetly of apple where the candy had touched. Whether dazed Seo Eunwon let out a strange sound and startled or not, Muyoung sucked his fingers deep into his mouth.
Watching Seo Eunwon—startled and flustered, yet never saying stop, only stammering things like, It’s dirty… I didn’t wash my hands, they’re filthy…—Muyoung felt the awful, filthy mood from earlier lift a little.
Muyoung worked hard to swallow his laughter, greedily sucking on Eunwon’s fingers, which now carried a different kind of sweetness from the candy. Eunwon just sat there offering his fingers, his face full of shock, and Muyoung thought he might go mad from how cute he was.
What am I going to do with you?
My foolish little Seo Eunwon.
The hands toying with their captive Eunwon were no longer cold or trembling. To tell the truth, there had been no episode at all. Earlier he’d just run too fast in a rage, that was all.
The "episodes" Eunwon worried about so much had vanished fifteen years ago. How else could he have lived alone abroad for years?
And yet here he was, pretending to be fragile and staggering, milking his weakness and using treatment as an excuse to burrow into Eunwon’s arms—every bit of it was Muyoung’s dark-hearted scheme. Back when he hadn’t known his own heart, he’d thought of it as a kind of mischievous prank he couldn’t explain even to himself, but now he knew, unmistakably.
Why someone like him—who never cared what anyone in the world thought—fussed and fretted only in front of this tiny person, trying so hard to be the cool hyung; what the real reason was for throwing away his dignity and even putting on this ridiculous sick act to covet this small embrace.
It was through a realization about two years ago that Muyoung had willingly accepted these over-the-top feelings and actions of his.
He wanted to pop Seo Eunwon into his mouth like a candy. Suck on him, roll him on his tongue, crunch him up—he’d probably taste dizzyingly, intensely sweet. He wanted to gulp down that gentle, dazed, kind, pretty thing and carry him tucked safely in his belly. Forever.
A crooked, obsessive love that would send Seo Eunwon—the world’s biggest coward—running in horror if he ever found out,
Muyoung pressed down hard beneath his twitching lips and hid it away.
***
The whole ride, Eunwon stayed trapped in Muyoung’s arms, kneaded to his heart’s content. But Eunwon himself never even noticed the hand that had slipped inside his pant leg—he was too busy fretting over Muyoung’s condition and the excessively radiating pheromones, squirming anxiously.
His temperature and breathing were perfectly normal by now, but it never once crossed Eunwon’s mind to suspect Cha Muyoung of faking it.
Still, he wasn’t a complete fool, so there were moments he tilted his head thinking, Something’s a little off…?—but then Muyoung would groan softly and wheedle, "Baby, feel hyung’s forehead," or plead pitifully, "Apple, hold hyung’s hand," and Eunwon’s heart would melt helplessly.
His deepening thoughts would evaporate in an instant, and he’d end up surrendering his hands, his arms, his nape, his cheeks—everything—for Muyoung to do with as he pleased.
Honestly, even if he’d had time to think it through, Eunwon could never have seen through Muyoung’s antics. In the twenty-five years Seo Eunwon had known him, the image of "Cha Muyoung" in his heart was someone far too magnificent and perfect—never someone who’d pull such childish tricks just to get his attention.
The car that had sliced through the dusk-lit city came to a smooth stop in the apartment parking garage. From the underground lot to the top-floor penthouse bedroom—it fell entirely to Eunwon to transport Muyoung, who was easily twice his bulk.
To exaggerate only slightly, it was the pitiful sight of a rabbit carrying a tiger on its back, but there was nothing to be done.
The driver got out when the engine stopped and rushed over to help, but Cha Muyoung—who had been swaying so wretchedly against Eunwon—snapped his head up at that moment and rejected him fiercely, like a hissing cat.
Both the driver and Eunwon were taken aback, but this was no time to add stress to someone so sensitive and unwell.
Despite the still-chilly weather, Eunwon broke into a beaded sweat on his brow from the effort. He managed to lay the limply draped Muyoung safely on the bed, but his work didn’t end there. Today, Cha Muyoung—unusually clingy—acted like a man desperate to order him around.
"Baby, take off hyung’s socks. And his jacket… aren’t you going to undo his watch? Could you undo a few shirt buttons too? My neck feels tight… my belt and pants too… no, wait. Not that yet. Instead wipe my hands. I want water, I’m thirsty. Hmm… no, just come here. Come hug hyung quick. I suddenly feel so depressed and anxious I could die…."
From soul-sucking wheedling to outrageous nonsense like, "Baby, will you take hyung’s temperature…? You can’t tell from the forehead? Then put your hand inside my shirt and feel… yeah, you can take a temperature from the belly too… how is it? Hot? This is our Apple’s first time touching hyung’s abs, right?"
Seeing that magnificent, impressive man being so uncharacteristically silly today, Eunwon believed he really must be sick, and obediently tended to every tiresome, fussy demand.
By the time he was done, he was utterly exhausted. The moment he granted the final request—to come close so Muyoung could squish his cheeks—he flopped down onto the bed beside Muyoung, and Eunwon wanted to insist it had been truly unavoidable force majeure.
It’s been such an insanely long day…’
The outfit he’d fussed over since dawn for the proxy date was probably a wreck by now. His hair, which he’d smoothed back strand by strand, had all come undone and was tickling his forehead—no need for a mirror to confirm.
Still, belatedly worried he looked too much of a mess in front of the CEO, he was about to finger-comb his hair back into place when Muyoung—who’d been lying on his side watching only Eunwon with a piercing gaze—abruptly launched a barrage of questions.
"Why’d you doll yourself up so much going out?"
"…Yes?"
"Who’d you get all pretty for? Don’t tell me you were actually planning to seduce an omega?"
"Uh, um…."
"And if you get an order that ridiculous, your first move should be to refuse. Or just say you can’t make it and turn around and leave—why are you sitting there having a meal with a total stranger?"
"Didn’t it occur to you it could be dangerous? I’ve told you a hundred times—everyone with a secondary gender except hyung is trash, they’re wolves. Did you forget all of it?"
"……."
He wasn’t just some stranger—he was someone who might marry Cha Muyoung. How could Eunwon have treated him carelessly?
Indignant retorts bubbled up hotly, but Eunwon decided to just keep his mouth shut. Arguing about past business with a patient who’d been unstable all day would do no good.
"Honestly, if you’d just told me properly from the start."
More scolding loomed, already exhausting. Eunwon, already worn out from the day’s accumulated fatigue, instinctively reached out. And instead of an answer, he covered the blazing eyes staring at him with his hand.
"What am I supposed to make of this, Secretary Seo Eunwon?"
"Just… I think you should sleep for now…." It had been impulsive even to himself, and he’d tensed, afraid of being scolded for insolence—but Muyoung, effectively pacified, only chuckled. He didn’t even brush off the presumptuous hand covering his face; he seemed rather pleased and amused.
Feeling the ticklish brush of eyelashes against his palm, Eunwon slowly counted to sixty in his head. That was about how long it took Cha Muyoung to settle down. He must be calmer now.’
The moment he lifted his hand to check, Muyoung’s big hand snatched his wrist. After a minute of lying there as meek as a lie, the eyes revealed again hadn’t settled at all—if anything, they roiled with even more excitement.
The blatantly darkened gaze looked ready to pounce at any moment, hot like a beast’s. Competitive as he was, Eunwon had seen Muyoung look like that more than once or twice, but it felt oddly sudden, and for some reason the taut tension made Eunwon gulp down a dry swallow.
If not for what had happened in the car, Eunwon might have squeezed his eyes shut under the absurd delusion—"Does Cha Muyoung want to kiss me?" But once was enough for such foolish misunderstandings.
He’d been mortified enough secretly hoping for a kiss and pushing his lips out slightly earlier; he wasn’t fool enough to make the same mistake twice in a row.
Not falling for it this time….
Eunwon deliberately squeezed his eyes tighter and held out. He tried to twist his captured wrist free, but the overwhelming difference in grip strength made it hopeless.
"It hurts. Let go, please."
"No."
He’d tried asking, but Muyoung cut the faltering plea off like a knife, only raising a cool eyebrow.
"I just held out for sixty seconds for you, so you hold out too."
So saying, Muyoung snagged Eunwon’s waist too and dragged him even tighter into his arms. Yanked along while lying down, Eunwon suddenly found his nose buried in Muyoung’s solid chest, his eyes going wide as a startled rabbit’s.
Through the thin shirt with three buttons undone, Muyoung’s hot body heat came through exactly as it was.
Hyung’s acting really strange today… or is he? Maybe I’m just imagining it again?’ While Eunwon still naïvely failed to recognize Muyoung’s blatant seduction, Muyoung had buried his face in the nape of his captive Eunwon’s neck, sniff-sniffing, savoring the fragrant scent of his skin to his heart’s content.
"Did you know you smell sweet?"
"Sweet? It’s probably… the perfume. I put some on this morning."
"No. It’s your scent. The scent coming from you."
"Uh… could it be, maybe, from touching the candy earlier…? The apple candy you had in the car…."
"Heh. Yeah, it’s a bit like that. That’s why I started eating them, after all."
"…Yes? What do you mean?"
"But your scent is much sweeter and better. No matter how similar, how could some candy ever beat the original—"
What does that even mean?
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