Then I smell it.
It hits me like a splash of ice water, cutting right through the sticky haze of peaches. It’s sharp. Aggressive. Spiced rum and something that smells like burning wood. It’s loud and obnoxious and completely unmistakable.
My spine straightens on instinct. The hair on the back of my neck stands up.
I turn my head, ignoring Heesung mid-sentence, and scan the crowd. It doesn't take long to find the source.
Oh Sihwan.
He’s standing near the makeshift bar, surrounded by his usual court of sycophants, but he’s not paying attention to them. He’s looking right at me.
His eyes are dark, narrowed into a glare that could peel paint. His jaw is set so tight I can see the muscle twitching from here. He looks furious. He looks like he wants to march over here and punch me in the teeth.
Finally. Something interesting.
God, he’s easy.
Most people would look at Oh Sihwan right now—face flushed a blotchy, furious red, fists clenched at his sides, pheromones radiating off him like heat waves from asphalt—and see a threat. They’d see the "Campus King" about to snap a blood vessel.
I just see the best entertainment I’ve had since I got back to Korea.
It’s almost endearing how much space I take up in his head. I haven't said a word to him all night. I haven't even looked in his direction until this exact moment. And yet, there he is, practically boiling over because I exist in the same ten-mile radius.
Heesung is still talking. Something about his skincare routine or maybe his dad’s stock portfolio—I stopped listening three paragraphs ago. But I don’t pull away. In fact, I lean back into the cushions, deliberately relaxing my posture, letting myarm drape casually along the back of the sofa just inches from Heesung’s shoulder.
This whole "war" Sihwan thinks we’re in is hilarious. From the moment I walked into that lecture hall, he’s been circling me like a territorial dog who just realized someone peed on his favorite fire hydrant. He’s so deeply, painfully insecure about his status that my mere presence feels like a personal attack to him.
And honestly? It’s flattering.
Sihwan doesn’t bother with the Betas. He barely tolerates the other Alphas unless they’re kissing his ass. But me? He’s obsessed. He spends all his energy trying to intimidate me, trying to prove he’s bigger, louder, stronger. By trying so hard to crush me, he’s admitting the one thing he’d never say out loud: he sees me as his equal. Maybe even his better.
If I were a nobody, he’d ignore me. But he knows I’m not a nobody.
I think about the soccer game last week. He really thought that gym-sculpted bulk of his was going to translate to the field. It was cute. He spent the first half checking me, throwing his weight around, trying to bruise my ego along with my ribs. He didn't realize that while he was doing bicep curls in front of a mirror for the aesthetic, I was swimming laps until my lungs burned just to feel something other than boredom.
The look on his face when I finally stopped being polite and put him in the dirt? Priceless. He looked like a glitching computer. He couldn't compute that someone leaner than him could use leverage to fold him like a lawn chair.
And the grape incident in the canteen? Pure comedy. He’s so petty. Who knocks a tray over in college? It’s something a middle school bully does because he doesn't know how to process his feelings.
"Donghwa? Are you listening?" Heesung’s voice whines, dragging me back to the present.
I blink, shifting my gaze from the fuming Alpha across the room back to the Omega beside me. Heesung is pouting. He thinks it’s cute. It looks like a muscle spasm.
"I'm listening," I lie smoothly. "You were saying something about... Paris?"
Heesung beams, launching back into his monologue. "Exactly! I was saying we should go for winter break. The shopping is to die for."
I hum noncommittally, but my attention drifts.
I watch Sihwan across the room, swirling the flat soda in my cup. He looks like he’s about to chew through his own tongue.
I’m used to the glaring. Since the soccer game, it’s basically become his default setting whenever I walk into a room. But this is different. This isn’t just the usual "how dare you exist and be taller than me" animosity. This is specific. It’s sharp. He’s vibrating with it, his eyes tracking something with the intensity of a heat-seeking missile. What's got him worked up now, I wonder?
I follow his gaze. He’s not looking at my face. He’s looking at my shoulder.
Specifically, he’s staring at Heesung’s hand, which has migrated from my bicep to rest possessively on my collarbone.
Heesung laughs at his own joke—something about a professor’s bad haircut—and leans in closer, his breath fanning hot and peachy against my neck. "Don't you think so, Donghwa?"
