Chapter 24: The Morning Panic
The scream tore through him before he was fully conscious.
Hyukjae bolted upright, a ragged, panicked sound ripping from his raw throat. The world was wrong—the light was wrong, a cold silver instead of gold, the sheets were too smooth, the scent was cedar and sex and not his own. And he was naked. Completely, utterly naked, the cool air raising goosebumps on his skin.
A warm, heavy weight was pressed against his back, an arm slung possessively over his hip. A stranger’s arm. In his bed.
Pure, undiluted terror flooded his veins, icy and paralyzing. He didn’t remember. The last clear memory was the bottom of a soju glass, the raucous laughter of the Storm players, the alley wall cool against his cheek. After that, a black void.
He moved on instinct forged in back-alley brawls and locker-room shoves. He shoved the arm off, hard, and scrambled sideways, his back hitting the cold glass of the floor-to-ceiling window. “Get off me!” The words were a shredded gasp. “Get the fuck off my bed!”
The body in the bed stirred. A head of messy brown hair emerged from the white duvet. A sleepy, deeply amused groan. “You are so fucking loud in the morning, princess.”
That voice. That fucking voice.
Hyukjae froze, his breath catching in his chest. The panic didn’t vanish; it transformed, collapsing in on itself into a dizzying, weak-kneed relief so profound it felt like nausea. He slumped against the glass, his head falling forward.
“Donghae.” The name was a whisper. He pressed the heels of his palms against his closed eyes, sparks dancing in the darkness. “Oh, god. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I didn’t—”
A soft laugh. The sheets rustled. Donghae sat up, the white linen pooling around his waist. The first light of dawn etched the planes of his chest, the faint bruises from his own practices, the elegant script of a tattoo along his rib. He looked rumpled, beautiful, and utterly at home. “You cried a little. It was cute.”
“I did not cry.”
“You did. Big, wet, drunk sobs of ‘I’m a married man, don’t touch me!’” Donghae’s imitation was high-pitched and theatrical.
Hyukjae peeked through his fingers, his cheeks flaming. “I did not say that.”
“You absolutely did.” Donghae swung his legs out of bed. He was wearing only black boxer briefs, and he padded across the sleek, dark floor towards Hyukjae like a panther approaching cornered prey. He stopped a foot away, his gaze traveling over Hyukjae’s nakedness, pressed against the window with the waking city sprawling behind him. “You were very adamant. Only your husband has the privilege.” He reached out, not touching, just tracing a phantom line down Hyukjae’s sternum. “And then you stripped naked all by yourself and climbed into my bed. So. The logic is flawed, but the sentiment is… noted.”
Hyukjae groaned, hiding his face again. The hangover was beginning to announce itself—a dull throb behind his eyes, a sour taste in his mouth. Shame, hot and prickling, followed the relief. “I hate you.”
“You say that a lot.” Donghae’s voice dropped, warm and intimate. He closed the distance, his hands coming to rest on the cool glass on either side of Hyukjae’s head, caging him in. “But you called me. Not your sister. Not a cab. Me.” He dipped his head, his lips brushing the shell of Hyukjae’s ear. “Your husband.”
The word, spoken in that low, claiming rumble, did something dangerous to Hyukjae’s insides. It unspooled the last of his defensive tension. His body went soft against the glass. He turned his face, his forehead coming to rest against Donghae’s shoulder. “Shut up,” he mumbled, but his arms lifted, circling Donghae’s neck, holding on.
Donghae laughed, a quiet, victorious sound. He kissed Hyukjae’s temple, then his cheek, then finally his mouth. It was a slow, deep kiss, tasting of sleep and shared breath, a reclaiming. When he pulled back, his eyes were dark. “You reek of cheap bar and regret. Come on.”
He took Hyukjae’s hand, leading him across the bedroom, through a discreet door into the master bathroom. It was a cavern of marble and chrome. Donghae turned on the rainfall showerhead, steam beginning to billow.
“I can do it myself,” Hyukjae muttered, but his protest was weak.
“You can,” Donghae agreed, pulling his own boxers off. “But I’m not going to let you.” He guided Hyukjae under the hot spray.
The water was a miracle. It sluiced over his aching head, his stiff shoulders. Donghae’s hands followed it, not sexual yet, but proprietary. He poured citrus-scented shampoo into his palms and worked it into Hyukjae’s hair, his fingers massaging his scalp with a firm, soothing pressure. Hyukjae’s eyes drifted shut. He leaned back into the touch, a low hum vibrating in his throat.
“Feel good?” Donghae murmured, his lips against Hyukjae’s wet shoulder.
“Mm.”
Donghae’s hands moved lower. He took a bar of soap, lathered it, and began washing Hyukjae’s back in broad, sweeping circles. Down the line of his spine, over the swell of his ass. Hyukjae’s breath hitched. The care was dismantling him faster than any rough demand ever could.
Donghae turned him around. Water streamed down Hyukjae’s face. Donghae’s gaze was intense, cataloging. He soaped Hyukjae’s chest, his stomach, his hips. His touch was thorough, cleaning away the night, claiming every inch. When his soap-slick hand wrapped around Hyukjae’s half-hard cock, Hyukjae jolted.
“Donghae—”
“Just getting you clean,” Donghae said, his voice innocent, but his eyes were not. He pumped him slowly, the slide perfect under the water. His thumb swiped over the head, spreading the bead of precome that had already gathered. “See? Dirty.”
Hyukjae’s head fell back against the tile. His hips stuttered forward into the fist. The hangover was still there, a dull ache, but it was being systematically overwritten by a sharper, more urgent need. Donghae dropped to his knees on the shower floor. The sight—Donghae on his knees, water plastering his hair to his forehead, looking up with unabashed worship—stopped Hyukjae’s heart.
Donghae didn’t use his mouth. He leaned forward, nuzzling Hyukjae’s groin, inhaling the clean scent of soap and skin. He pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the inside of his thigh, then bit down, not hard, but enough to mark. “Mine,” he growled against the reddening skin. “My drunk, messy, married man.”
Then he took him in.
The heat was instantaneous, devastating. Donghae’s mouth was a wet, sucking furnace. He swallowed him down in one smooth glide, his throat working around the head. Hyukjae cried out, his hands flying to Donghae’s head, fingers tangling in the wet strands. Donghae hummed, the vibration shooting straight to Hyukjae’s balls.
He set a brutal, perfect pace. Sucking hard on the upstroke, tongue swirling, then plunging deep again. His own cock, thick and flushed, stood untouched between his legs, dripping onto the shower floor. The self-denial, the focus solely on Hyukjae’s pleasure, was its own kind of filthy power play.
“Gonna come—” Hyukjae warned, his thighs trembling.
Donghae pulled off with a wet pop. “Not yet.” He stood up in one fluid motion, water sheeting off his body. He pushed Hyukjae back against the wall, the tile cool through the steam. He reached for a bottle on the ledge—clear silicone. He poured a generous amount into his hand, slicking himself with rough, urgent strokes.
He hooked Hyukjae’s leg around his waist, aligning their bodies. The blunt, slick head of his cock pressed against Hyukjae’s entrance. There was no question, no pause. He pushed in.
It was a stretching, burning fullness that stole the air from Hyukjae’s lungs. Donghae was big, and he gave no quarter, sheathing himself completely in one relentless thrust. He buried his face in Hyukjae’s neck, a guttural groan tearing from his throat. “Fuck. Tighter than ever. Clenching around me like a fucking vise.”
He began to move. Short, deep drives that knocked the breath from Hyukjae in punched-out grunts. The water cascaded over them, mixing with sweat. Donghae’s hips snapped forward, each thrust a claiming. He bit at Hyukjae’s shoulder, his lips, his jaw.
“You,” Donghae snarled, his rhythm fracturing, “calling me. Coming home to me. Letting me take care of you.” He drove in harder, deeper. “That’s how it’s supposed to be. No other team. No other bed. This. Right here.”
His words were a chaotic, possessive litany. Hyukjae could only cling to him, his legs locked around Donghae’s waist, his own cock trapped and leaking between their stomachs. The friction, the overwhelming sense of being utterly possessed, was hurtling him toward the edge.
“Donghae—I can’t—”
“Come,” Donghae ordered, his voice breaking. “Come on my cock. Show me.”
It was the permission that shattered him. Hyukjae’s orgasm ripped through him, silent and seismic. His body clamped down, milking the length inside him as white-hot pleasure erupted from his core, stripes of release painting their stomachs.
The violent clenching pushed Donghae over. With a raw, ragged shout, he slammed home and stilled. Hyukjae felt the hot, pulsing flood within him, each jet a possessive brand. Donghae shuddered through it, his whole body trembling with the force.
They slumped together against the wall, the water beginning to run cool. Donghae’s forehead rested against Hyukjae’s, their breaths mingling in the steam.
Slowly, carefully, Donghae pulled out. He turned off the water. He wrapped Hyukjae in a thick, warm towel, then one around himself. He led him, silent and pliant, back to the rumpled bed.
He pushed Hyukjae down onto the sheets and crawled in beside him, pulling the duvet over them. He arranged Hyukjae against his chest, his arms a tight band around him. The city’s morning glow painted the room in pale hues.
Hyukjae’s mind was quiet, the hangover and the terror and the euphoria all blended into a weary, saturated peace. He traced the line of the tattoo on Donghae’s rib he’d never asked about.
“The Seongnam offer,” Donghae said into his hair, his voice calm, but with a steel thread beneath. “What did you tell them?”
Hyukjae stilled. The real world, with its contracts and rivalries, seeped back in. He’d been avoiding the question, avoiding the decision.
“I haven’t,” he whispered. “Not yet.”
Donghae’s arms tightened. He didn’t speak for a long time. “Okay,” he finally said. The word wasn’t acceptance. It was a placeholder. A temporary ceasefire.
Outside, the city was fully awake, engines humming, lives moving forward. In the bed that smelled of them, a different kind of game was just beginning. The stakes were no longer points on a board, but the shape of the life that would follow the final buzzer. And for the first time, Hyukjae was terrified not of losing the game, but of choosing the wrong one to play.