Chapter 8: Midnight Relief
The penthouse was too quiet. Seoul’s familiar hum, a constant through the windows, felt like white noise after the roar of the ocean. Donghae stood in the kitchen, rolling a water glass between his palms. The flight had been a study in restraint—polite smiles for staff, separate aisle seats, Hyukjae’s long sleeves hiding the evidence of their last night. It had left a hollow, restless ache in Donghae’s chest.
He heard the bathroom door sigh open. Hyukjae padded into the living room, hair damp, wearing only a pair of loose grey sweats that sat low on his hips. The bruises on his skin were like abstract paintings in the soft lamplight—yellows and deep purples flowering from the grip of Donghae’s hands. He held a small blue bottle.
“My back is killing me from that flight,” Hyukjae announced, his voice cutting the silence. He wasn’t looking at Donghae; he was examining his own fingernails with exaggerated focus. “And my shoulder. And my neck. I think the seat was defective. You should sue the airline.”
Donghae set the glass down. “What’s in the bottle?”
“Peppermint oil.Medicinal. For my profound suffering.” Hyukjae finally met his eyes, a flicker of challenge there. “You could help. Since you’re partly responsible for my current… fragility.”
The corner of Donghae’s mouth twitched. This was the dance. The elaborate, silly, necessary preamble. “Partly?”
“Mostly. Come on. Bedroom. Your hands are warmer.” Hyukjae turned, a deliberate swish in his step, and Donghae followed.
In their bedroom, Hyukjae climbed onto the wide bed, shedding his sweats without ceremony. He knelt naked, his back to Donghae, the elegant line of his spine a pale road between the shadows of muscle. The city light etched his silhouette in silver. Donghae’s throat went dry.
He took the bottle, the oil cool against his palm. He poured a slick pool, the sharp, clean scent of peppermint cutting through the lavender in the room. He warmed it between his hands, then placed them flat between Hyukjae’s shoulder blades.
Hyukjae gasped, a full-body shudder running through him. “Fuck, that’s cold. Warn a guy.”
“You said medicinal,” Donghae murmured, beginning to work the oil in, his thumbs digging into the tight knots along Hyukjae’s shoulders. His husband’s skin was hot, alive under his hands. He mapped the territory he knew so well—the wings of the scapulae, the groove of the spine, the slight bump of an old dance injury at the base.
Hyukjae’s head dropped forward, a low moan escaping him. “There.Yeah. Right there.” His voice was already slurry with relief. Donghae worked in silence, his movements firm, methodical. He felt the tension leach out of the muscles, Hyukjae’s posture softening, becoming pliant. The only sounds were their breathing and the slick slide of oiled skin.
Donghae’s hands drifted lower, smoothing over the small of Hyukjae’s back, his thumbs stroking just above the twin dimples at the base of his spine. Hyukjae made a soft, wanting noise.
The massage changed. It was no longer about knots. Donghae’s palms spread the oil in wide, slow circles over the curves of Hyukjae’s ass. He kneaded the flesh, possessive, remembering how it had felt clenched around him, hot and desperate. Hyukjae was trembling, his breathing shallow.
“Donghae…”
“Shhh.” Donghae poured more oil, letting it drip in a cool trail down the cleft. Hyukjae jolted. Donghae’s fingers followed the oil’s path, a slow, deliberate exploration. He traced the furrow, feeling Hyukjae clench involuntarily. “Still sore?” he asked, his voice dark and low.
“A little,” Hyukjae whispered, pushing back against the touch. “Don’t care.”
Donghae slicked two fingers thoroughly, the peppermint sharp and tingling. He pressed one against the tight ring of muscle, feeling it give, welcoming him into that devastating heat. Hyukjae groaned, collapsing onto his forearms, his back arching obscenely.“God. Yes.”
The first finger slid in easily, still loose from earlier. The second joined it, a slow, stretching burn. Donghae scissored them, his own cock hardening painfully against his zipper as he watched his fingers disappear into his husband’s body, the oil making a wet, lewd sound. Hyukjae was panting now, little punched-out cries with each thrust of Donghae’s hand.
“You’re so open,” Donghae said, curling his fingers, searching. “Still so fucking ready for me.”
Hyukjae found the word, a broken chant. “Yes, yes, I am, I’m ready, please—”
Donghae withdrew his fingers. The sound of his belt buckle was deafening. He shoved his pants and briefs down just enough to free himself, his cock heavy and aching. He used more oil, slicking himself in rough, urgent strokes, the peppermint a shocking coolness on his heated flesh. He positioned himself, the head nudging against Hyukjae’s entrance.
He didn’t ask. He just pushed.
It was a brutal, single, deep thrust. No grace, no patience. Just reclamation. Hyukjae screamed into the sheets, his body seizing around the invasion, so tight it stole Donghae’s breath. He buried himself to the root, his hips flush against Hyukjae’s bruised ass, and held there, shaking.
“Mine,” Donghae growled, the word torn from him. He leaned over, biting the juncture of Hyukjae’s neck and shoulder, not hard enough to break skin, but enough to brand. His hands clamped back onto the existing bruises on Hyukjae’s hips, ownership reaffirmed.
Then he fucked him. It was nothing like the cabana. This was raw, urban, a furious coupling against the backdrop of their silent, watching city. The bed rocked against the wall with every driving thrust. Donghae’s pace was relentless, punishing, a physical purge of all the distance and pretending of the day. Each slam of his hips was a word he couldn’t say in public: Mine. My husband. My life.
Hyukjae was sobbing, babbling, his face pressed into the duvet. “Harder, god, fuck, yes, right there, Donghae, I can’t— I’m gonna—” His hand scrambled between his legs, stroking his own cock in a frantic, messy rhythm.
Donghae felt the telltale clench, the inner flutter that signaled Hyukjae’s climax. He drove in once, twice more, then stilled, buried deep as Hyukjae came with a shattered cry, his release painting the sheets beneath him. The violent pulses around Donghae’s cock tipped him over the edge. He came with a guttural shout, his vision whiting out as he emptied himself inside Hyukjae, the heat of his release a stark contrast to the cooling peppermint oil.
He collapsed forward, his weight pressing Hyukjae into the mattress, his face buried in the sweat-damp hair at his husband’s nape. They stayed like that, joined, breathing in ragged sync, the sharp scent of sex and peppermint hanging in the air.
Slowly, carefully, Donghae pulled out. Hyukjae whimpered at the loss. Donghae rolled them, gathering the boneless, trembling form against his chest. They were a sticky, oily, exhausted mess. He kissed Hyukjae’s temple, his cheek, the corner of his swollen mouth.
Hyukjae’s eyes were closed, his breathing slowing. He traced a fading bruise on Donghae’s forearm. “We have that morning radio show,” he mumbled, his voice shot.
“I know.”
“I’ll wear a turtleneck.”
Donghae’s arms tightened around him. The city’s glow framed them in the window—two figures clinging together in the vast, quiet dark of their sanctuary. The marks would fade. The evidence would wash away. But this, the frantic, desperate truth of their connection etched into bone and sinew and whispering skin—this remained. It was the only thing, Donghae thought as sleep pulled at him, that was truly theirs to keep.
And they would step back into it, carrying the weight of what they’d done here, a living, breathing secret between them. The flight was a twenty-four hour blur of stale air and practiced smiles, of Hyukjae sleeping against the window with his hood pulled up and Donghae staring at the headrest in front of him, feeling the ghost of Hyukjae’s clenching heat around his cock every time he closed his eyes. They landed in Seoul under a greasy, dawn-tinged drizzle that felt like a personal insult.
Their manager, Taewon, met them at arrivals with two black umbrellas and an itinerary. “Good trip? You both look… rested,” he said, his eyes briefly flicking to the high collar of Hyukjae’s shirt, a futile attempt to hide the bruise Donghae’s mouth had left just below his ear. Hyukjae launched into a dramatic saga about a jellyfish, his bandaged finger waving, a perfect deflection. Donghae simply shouldered his bag, the familiar weight of performance settling on him like a second skin.
The car ride was quiet. Hyukjae scrolled through his phone, the blue light etching the fine lines of fatigue around his eyes. Donghae watched the city smudge past the window, a concrete monster swallowing the memory of open sky. Their knees didn’t touch. They were Lee Hyukjae and Lee Donghae again, colleagues, friends, a beloved duo. Not the tangled, bruising mess of limbs they’d been on the cabana floor.
Home was different. The silent, modern apartment in Seoul held no salt-breeze, only the hum of the refrigerator. It was theirs, though. The door clicked shut, locking out the world, and the performance dropped in a single, shuddering breath.
Hyukjae dropped his bags right there in the genkan. “I feel grimy. I need a shower that doesn’t have sand in the drain.”
“You first,” Donghae said, his voice rough from disuse.
But Hyukjae didn’t move. He stared at Donghae, his playful mask gone, revealing the raw want underneath. It had been festering during the flight, during the car ride, during the polite, empty exchanges. “No,” Hyukjae said. The word hung in the sterile air.
He crossed the space between them in two strides. His hands fisted in Donghae’s shirt, dragging him down into a kiss that was all teeth and desperate tongue. It tasted like airplane coffee and shared exhaustion, a brutal reclaiming. Donghae groaned into his mouth, his own control snapping. He walked Hyukjae backwards, stumbling, until his husband’s back hit the cool wall of the hallway.
“The bed—” Hyukjae gasped, as Donghae’s mouth ravaged his throat, worrying the bruise there.
“Fuck the bed.” Donghae’s hands were already at Hyukjae’s belt, the click of the buckle obscenely loud. He shoved the trousers and underwear down in one rough movement, his palm scraping over Hyukjae’s hip, over the fading purple bloom of his grip. Hyukjae’s cock sprung free, already hard and leaking against his stomach.
Donghae dropped to his knees right there on the polished floor. He didn’t tease. He took Hyukjae into his mouth, deep, his throat working open around the thick head. Hyukjae cried out, a shattered sound that echoed off the bare walls, his hands flying to Donghae’s hair. “Jesus Christ, Hae—yes, fuck, just like that.” Donghae sucked him with a filthy, wet intensity, his own need a live wire. He could smell the faint, lingering scent of sex and ocean on Hyukjae’s skin, and it drove him wild.
He pulled off with a slick pop, his own breathing ragged. “Turn around,” he growled. “Hands on the wall.”
Hyukjae obeyed, scrambling, his chest heaving. Donghae spat into his own palm, slicking himself, then pressed his cock against Hyukjae’s entrance. It was still loose, tender from the night before last, and gave way with a hot, yielding resistance that made them both groan. Donghae sank in to the root in one brutal, perfect stroke.
“God, yes,” Hyukjae sobbed, his forehead knocking against the wall. “It’s still… you’re still in me…”
Donghae set a punishing pace immediately, each thrust a claim, a reassertion. The hallway filled with the sounds of their bodies connecting, of Hyukjae’s broken pleas, of Donghae’s guttural curses. “This is us,” Donghae snarled, his hands digging into the bruises on Hyukjae’s hips, reopening the marks. “This. Not the airport. Not the smiles. This wet, fucking heat. Mine.”
Hyukjae came with a shout, his release streaking the pristine white wall, his body clamping down on Donghae in rhythmic pulses. Donghae followed, burying himself as deep as he could, painting Hyukjae’s insides with his own release for the second time in two days. They slumped against the wall, a sweating, panting heap.
The shower was, eventually, taken together. They soaped each other slowly, silently, tracing the new and old marks. A domestic tenderness seeped back in, softening the raw edges of their coupling. By the time they collapsed into their own bed, the exhaustion was total, a weight pinning them to the mattress.
Three days later, routine had them in its grip. Donghae was in the kitchen, scrambling eggs, when the patter of small feet announced a visitor. Jeno, their seven-year-old, padded in, his hair sleep-mussed.
“Appa,” Jeno said, climbing onto a stool. He peered at Donghae’s forearm, exposed by his rolled-up sleeves. He pointed a small, serious finger at a cluster of faint, reddish marks near Donghae’s elbow—leftover love bites, now faded to resemble something else entirely. “You have mosquito bites on you. Was it from our trip to the Maldives?”
Donghae froze, the spatula in his hand hovering over the pan. From the doorway, Hyukjae stifled a sound that was half-choke, half-laugh.
Before Donghae could formulate a response, their five-year-old daughter Haru zoomed into the room, a stuffed rabbit dangling from her fist. She caught the tail end of the conversation. “Naughty mosquito!” she declared, her little face fierce with protective indignation. She jumped up and down, swatting the air near Donghae’s arm. “Next time I protect Appa! I’ll smack the mosquit!”
Hyukjae lost it then, his laughter bursting out in uncontrollable wheezes as he slid down the door frame. Donghae felt a hot blush creep up his neck. He looked from Jeno’s earnest, concerned face to Haru’s fierce, bouncing form, then to his husband, a weeping mess of hilarity on the floor.
“Yes,” Donghae said finally, his voice wonderfully, perfectly even. He turned back to his eggs. “Very naughty mosquito. It got me quite a few times.”