Chapter 4: Mic Check Meltdown
The silence in his penthouse was a physical weight. Four days had passed since the mirror, since the van had taken her away. Four days of rotating guilt and fury. He’d texted Winter daily, careful, considerate messages. He’d gone to the gym until his muscles screamed. He’d recorded vocals until his throat was raw. Nothing worked. The hollowness remained, and at its core was a single, burning image: Karolina’s reflection, shattered by him.
Tonight was different. Tonight was the “Tonight” show performance. A comeback stage for his latest single. The energy backstage was a live wire—technicians shouting, managers barking into headsets, the visceral thump of the pre-show music vibrating through the floor. Adrenaline was supposed to be his drug, his focus. Instead, it felt like a lid rattling on a boiling pot.
He stood before the mirror in his private dressing room, a last-minute sanctuary carved from the chaos. The stylist team had just left, final touches applied. His stage outfit—black leather pants and a sheer black mesh top that revealed the dark ink of his tattoos—felt like a second skin. His makeup was severe, sharp lines emphasizing his eyes, his lips stained a deep burgundy. He looked dangerous. He felt unhinged.
The door opened and closed softly.
He saw her reflection appear behind his. Karolina. She was holding a spare microphone pack and its battery. Her dress was a simple black slip, professional, but it hugged her curves. Her lips were painted a stark, undeniable red.
“They need you on comms check,” she said, her voice flat. “Your pack is cutting in and out.” She placed the new equipment on the vanity.
He didn’t turn. He watched her in the glass. “You’re late.”
“The traffic from the studio was—”
“I don’t care.” He finally turned, facing her. The room was small, intimate. He could smell her—that clean, green scent over the nervous sweat of backstage. “Fix it.”
She picked up the pack, her movements efficient. “Turn around.”
He obeyed, presenting his back to her. He felt her fingers at his waist, undoing the clasp of the old pack. Her touch was clinical, distant. It infuriated him. He could feel the heat of her body inches from his, see the tense line of her shoulders in the mirror.
She leaned in to secure the new pack, her breath a faint warmth against the nape of his neck. Her breasts brushed against his back through the thin mesh. It was an accident. It was a catalyst.
He moved fast. He spun, grabbing her wrists, pinning them against the mirrored wall on either side of her head. The microphone pack clattered to the floor. She gasped, her red lips parting in shock.
“Jungkook—the performance is in seven minutes—”
“You think I give a fuck about the performance right now?” he snarled, his face inches from hers. He was already hard, the rigid line of his erection pressing insistently against the leather of his pants. He ground himself against her thigh, a crude, unmistakable promise.
Her eyes widened. “You’ll ruin your makeup. Your whole team will know.”
“Let them know.” He leaned in, his mouth hovering over the pulse fluttering wildly in her throat. He didn’t kiss her. He inhaled her. “You smell like you’ve been thinking about me.”
“I haven’t,” she breathed, but her body betrayed her, arching slightly into his.
He laughed, a low, dark sound. “Liar.” He released one wrist to slide his hand down her side, over the curve of her hip. He grabbed a handful of her dress and shoved it up, baring her legs. His fingers found the waistband of her panties—simple black cotton. With one brutal tug, he ripped the side seam. The sound of tearing fabric was loud in the quiet room.
She cried out, a mix of protest and arousal. “You’re insane—”
“You love it.” He shoved the ruined fabric aside. He didn’t bother with his pants, just yanked the zipper down and freed himself. He was thick, fully erect, the tip already glistening. He was beyond foreplay, beyond tenderness. This was a claiming.
He hooked one of her legs around his hip, hoisting her up. Her back was against the cool mirror. He positioned himself at her entrance. She was wet. Soaking. The proof destroyed any last pretense.
“Look at you,” he hissed, pushing into her with one relentless, deep stroke. She was tight, and the gasp she let out was one of pure, shocked pleasure. “Drenched for me. After four days. After you walked away.”
He didn’t wait. He set a punishing rhythm, fucking her up against the mirror, each thrust driving her shoulders into the glass. The room filled with the sound of skin slapping against skin, his grunts, her choked moans. He devoured her neck, sucking dark marks into her pale skin, knowing the foundation wouldn’t cover them.
“Tell me,” he demanded between thrusts, his breath hot and ragged. “Who do you belong to?”
She was mewling, her head lolling back, her nails digging into his shoulders through the mesh. “You—”
“Louder.”
“You!” she cried out, the word torn from her.
He bent his head, taking the neckline of her dress in his teeth and pulling it down, exposing her breast. He sucked a nipple into his mouth, biting down until she cried out again, her back arching sharply. The sensation tipped her over the edge. Her orgasm hit suddenly, a violent clenching around him that made his vision blur. He fucked her through it, relentless, extending her pleasure into a sobbing, shaking wreck.
He pulled his mouth away, panting. “Look at us.” He nodded toward the mirror beside them.
Her eyes, glazed with pleasure, focused on their reflection. Him, a god in stage makeup, fucking her like an animal. Her, dress rucked up, red lipstick smeared, a wild, ruined thing in his arms. The sight was the most pornographic thing he’d ever seen.
It pushed him to his own brink. His pace became erratic, frantic. He slammed into her, once, twice more, and then with a raw, guttural shout, he came, spilling deep inside her. He held her there, pinned between his body and the cold mirror, as the pulses shuddered through him.
For a moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing fogging the glass. The thunder of the pre-show music was a distant echo.
Reality slammed back. A voice crackled from a walkie-talkie left on the vanity. “Jungkook-ssi, you’re on deck in one minute. Please confirm.”
He slowly, carefully, lowered her leg. She wobbled, and he steadied her, his hands gentler now. He pulled out of her, a rush of wet warmth following. He tucked himself away, zipped his pants. His makeup was indeed ruined—smeared kohl under his eyes, her red lipstick blotched across his neck and chest.
She slid down the mirror to stand on shaky legs, quickly pulling her dress down. The ripped underwear hung awkwardly. She looked… destroyed. Beautifully, utterly destroyed.
He reached for a makeup wipe from the vanity. He handed it to her first. Wordlessly, she took it and cleaned the smeared lipstick from his skin with trembling hands. Then she passed it back. He wiped roughly at his smudged eyes.
The walkie-talkie crackled again. “Jungkook-ssi, to the stage, now.”
He looked at her. Her lipstick was gone, transferred to him and the wipe. Her lips were pale, swollen. Her eyes held his, a storm of shame and a terrifying, mirrored hunger.
He cupped her face, his thumb stroking her bruised cheekbone. “You stay here. You watch me on the monitor.”
He turned and left the room, the door shutting softly behind him.
The walk to the stage was a blur of stagehands and flashing lights. He took his position in the darkness behind the curtain. The intro music swelled. The makeup artist rushed up for a final check, her eyes widening at the state of him. There was no time.
The curtain rose. A wall of sound hit him—the screams of thousands. The lights were blinding.
He became someone else. The performer. The idol. His body moved with practiced, explosive grace. His voice, when he sang, was raw and powerful, charged with a real, ragged emotion that the audience felt in their bones. They screamed louder.
High above the stage, a monitor played his every move. In the quiet, ruined dressing room, Karolina watched. She watched him transform. She watched him command the adoration of a continent. She watched the sweat gleam on the skin she had just marked, saw the possessive fury in his eyes transmute into stage charisma.
She slid down the wall to the floor, her dress pooling around her. The physical ache between her legs was profound. The emotional void was deeper. On screen, he was a god. In this room, he was her desperate, beautiful mistake. The scent of him, of them, was everywhere.
As the final chorus roared, the camera zoomed in on his face. He stared directly into the lens, his gaze piercing through the screen. He sang the last line, a promise of obsession and ruin.
In the dressing room, Karolina wrapped her arms around her knees. She knew, with a chilling certainty, that the promise wasn’t for the screaming crowd. It was for her.