A hand slams onto my bare shoulder with the force of a falling brick. I jump, nearly slipping on the wet grass, and whip around to find Seungchan grinning at me like he just won the lottery.
"You sly bastard!" Seungchan roars, shaking me by the shoulder he just assaulted. His eyes are wide, practically vibrating with excitement. "You keptthatunder your hat? Seriously?"
Behind him, the rest of the swim team is crowding in, their expressions a mix of shock and newfound reverence.
"I... uh..." I stammer, my brain still trying to catch up to the new reality Donghwa just constructed for us.
"Don't give us that humble act!" Shinwon, our backstroke specialist, jeers, elbowing me in the ribs. "You bagged Kang Donghwa? The Ice Prince?"
"And you bonded him," Seungchan adds, his voice dropping to a tone of hushed awe. He looks at the bite mark on my shoulder—the mark everyone now thinks is a trophy of my conquest rather than a brand of my submission. "Dude. You must have put it downheavyto get a Dominant Alpha like that to submit to you."
I choke on my own spit.
Put it down heavy.If they only knew. If they knew that the only thing I was "putting down" last weekend was my face into a pillow while Donghwa rearranged my insides, they’d laugh me off the team.
But they don't know. They’re looking at me like I’m a god. Like I’m the ultimate Alpha who tamed the untamable beast.
"I mean," I start, rubbing the back of my neck and trying to summon even an ounce of my usual swagger. "You know how it is. Chemistry."
"Chemistry, my ass," another teammate laughs, slapping my back. "You’re a legend, hyung. Seriously. We thought you were dodging Omegas because you were having a dry spell, but you were just hunting big game."
"Hunting big game," I repeat faintly. I glance back toward Donghwa. He’s effortlessly fielding the crowd, looking cool and untouched, while I stand here half-naked and shivering. Yeah. I’m the hunter. Sure.
"So, is he crazy in bed?" Seungchan asks, leaning in with zero concept of personal space, his eyebrows waggling. "He looks like the quiet type, but you know what they say about the quiet ones."
My face heats up, and not just from the embarrassment. A flash of memory hits me—Donghwa’s dark eyes blown wide, his sweat-slicked skin against mine, the way he growls when he’s close.
"He's..." I clear my throat, trying to keep my voice steady. "He keeps up. Let's just say that."
The guys whoop and holler like I just scored the winning goal at nationals.
"Sihwan’s the man!" someone shouts, and suddenly I’m being jostled, high-fived, and clapped on the back from every direction.
The fear of rejection, of being ostracized, of losing my place at the top of the food chain—it’s all gone. Replaced by this bizarre, unearned glory. I should feel guilty. I should feel like a fraud.
But as I look at their grinning faces, at the respect in their eyes that’s even stronger than before, I can’t help it. The corners of my mouth twitch. A smile—a real, genuine, relieved smile—breaks across my face.
Seungchan snaps his fingers, the sound sharp enough to cut through the lingering adrenaline buzzing in my ears. His eyes go wide, pupils blown with the kind of epiphany that usually involves beer pong strategy, not social dynamics.
"Holy shit," he breathes, looking at me like I’ve just solved a complex math equation. "It all makes sense now."
I stiffen, gripping the towel I just grabbed a little too tight. "What does?"
"Everything, man! The last few weeks!" Seungchan gestures wildly, nearly taking out a freshman with his elbow. "You’ve been acting so weird. Skipping parties, dodging our calls, leaving early. You kept saying you were 'visiting family' or 'feeling under the weather.'"
He lets out a bark of laughter, shaking his head in disbelief. "I actually believed you! I was worried you were going soft or having some kind of mid-life crisis at twenty-two."
He steps into my personal space, grinning so wide it looks painful. "But you weren't sick. You were just busy."
"I mean—" I start, but he steamrolls right over me.
"I’m actually mad about it," Seungchan declares, though he looks the opposite of angry. He looks impressed. "Here we were, sitting around drinking cheap beer and striking out with Omegas at the karaoke bar, wondering where our fearless leader was. And the whole time, you were holed up in some luxury apartment railing the hottest Alpha in the department."
My face goes nuclear.
Heat floods my cheeks, my neck, probably even my ears. It’s instant and violent, a full-body flush that feels like a sunburn hitting all at once.
Railing him.
