Chapter 50

The sky had hung dismal and gray since morning, threatening rain, and as evening fell, a torrential downpour finally unleashed itself upon the city. This was no irritating, mist-like drizzle of the sort that usually plagued London, but a proper, violent storm, the first they had seen in a while. It felt almost symbolic, as if the weather itself were reflecting the chaos of their recent cases.

Alex dragged his eyes away from the CCTV footage he had been scrutinizing all day. Heavy raindrops hammered against the windowpane with ferocious intensity. If he left now, even an umbrella wouldn’t save him from arriving home completely soaked. He checked the time: 7:00 PM. Since there was no one waiting for him in his empty flat anyway, he figured it would be far more productive to simply clock in for overtime.

And then Alex abruptly realized that he had spent the entirety of his six-year career as a police officer living exactly like this.

“You’re not leaving?”

The screech of a chair sliding back echoed from the desk right next to his, and Matthew Wayne collapsed heavily into his seat, tossing the question at him.

Alex, who had been staring out the window, turned his head. Just before he looked away, he caught a fleeting glimpse of a blue umbrella passing by on the street below. The moment he saw it, a familiar, leaden weight settled in his chest.

Here we go again. It’s really time to let it go.

Burying the thought beneath a stoic, unreadable mask, Alex let out a slow, measured sigh. “I’m debating it.”

“Your repertoire is always exactly the same. Even the part where you stay for overtime before dragging yourself home never changes.”

Alex brushed off Matthew’s teasing complaint with practiced ease. “Still less monotonous than your plaid shirts.”

“I told you, they’re not the same. Every single one has its own distinct characteristics.” Matthew pushed his thick, black-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose as he spoke. His messy brown bangs, which practically obscured the top half of his frames, fell wildly over his forehead.

A faint smile tugged at the corner of Alex’s lips. The sociability that had begun to plummet near the end of high school had long since been utterly annihilated by adulthood, leaving the Beta sitting across from him, Matthew Wayne, as the only person Alex could genuinely call a friend.

The two had spent the last six years attached at the hip, navigating the grueling ranks from rookie patrol officers all the way to their current posts in the Violent Crimes Unit. Around the precinct, people affectionately, and sometimes not-so-affectionately, referred to them as the ‘Frustrating Duo.’

For Alex, the nickname was born from his stoic, unbothered personality that seemed entirely disconnected from any ambition for promotion. For Matthew, it was purely about his appearance. Because, frankly, Matthew looked exactly like the textbook definition of a socially inept outcast.

While holding prejudices was generally frowned upon, objectively speaking, Matthew was the absolute embodiment of a nerd. The overgrown bangs that practically blinded him, the oversized glasses, and a myriad of eccentric compulsions proved the stereotype completely accurate.

Matthew’s other moniker was the ‘Plaid Shirt Psycho.’ True to the title, Matthew wore navy plaid shirts year-round, entirely regardless of the season. It was a habit he had religiously maintained ever since they transferred to the Violent Crimes Unit, where uniforms were no longer mandatory.

It had gotten to the point where Anna, a rookie who had recently transferred to their squad from the Property Crimes Team, secretly pulled Alex aside on her one-month anniversary to ask if Matthew ever actually washed his clothes. Overhearing the rookie’s dead-serious inquiry, Inspector Janice, the veteran leading their entire investigative team, had quietly supplied a devastating ‘No.’

“Didn’t you just buy them all from the same brand?” Alex asked.

“The color tones are all subtly different. The fact that you can’t even recognize that completely disqualifies you as an investigator.”

“Thanks for the compliment.”

Keeping up the idle banter, Alex stole another glance out the window. The blue umbrella was long gone. Honestly, it was an incredibly pointless habit. People using blue umbrellas were literally everywhere, and the boy he was thinking of wouldn’t even be using one anymore anyway.

“Anyway, just go home today. If you keep logging overtime, the Inspector is going to start breathing down our necks about the budget. The Commissioner keeps rolling out these weird new slogans, bitching about unproductive overtime.”

“I haven’t even reviewed half the tips that came in yet.”

“The night shift will handle it. You’re not the only one working here.”

Alex hesitated. Dragging his pen lazily across his notepad, drawing aimless lines, he stared at Matthew. If he went home, he was just going to obsess over the case files anyway, and if he didn’t go home, he would still be chained to the case. It was simply more efficient to stay here. Furthermore, considering his endlessly mountainous student loans and the living expenses he owed his mother, earning even a single extra penny was the logical choice.

“I appreciate the concern, but you can head out first.”

“You really need to get yourself a partner. If you had an Omega waiting for you at home, you’d be packing your bags before I even had to say a word.”

At the word Omega, Alex averted his eyes. It was a word he had heard countless times since becoming an adult, yet maintaining a facade of indifference remained an agonizing struggle. As a specific face immediately surfaced in his mind, Alex blinked slowly. Nausea churned in his gut.

“Yeah, you’re right.” With that, he closed his mouth. Knowing full well how uncomfortable Alex was with the subject, Matthew didn’t push it any further.

“I just get worried about you sometimes, that’s all.”

That was where the conversation ended. Alex lifted his head, met Matthew’s eyes, and offered a faint, reassuring smile. Regardless of his quirks, Matthew was a precious friend, one of the very few people who actually cared about a broken human being like Alex.

“Smiling at me like that isn’t going to work. I prefer women.”

“Who said anything about that? I also…” The sheer exhaustion of forcing out a lie about preferring Omegas was too much to bear, so Alex clamped his mouth shut.

He used to think that becoming an adult would naturally make him stronger, but contrary to his desperate hopes, he hadn’t fortified his armor at all. If anything, he was just as pathetic as ever. Whenever he traced the root of his misery, the origin point invariably locked onto that single, catastrophic event from nine years ago.

After Nathan transferred, Alex had dated Ian Mack for exactly two years. It lasted right up until Ian legally became an adult. During that time, Alex had learned firsthand that a human being’s personality could never be defined by a single trait. Because Ian had been the one to expose David Mack’s twisted scheme, a naive, subconscious part of Alex had clung to the hope that the boy might actually be on his side.

However, contrary to his desperate prayers, Ian did not break up with him quickly. The fact that Ian wanted to continue dating him at all was completely baffling.

—My brother won’t just let us break up like this, Alex-hyung. And he won’t delete the photo either. Let’s just pretend for a while.

At first, Alex had believed those words. But as six months dragged into a year, Alex was forced to accept a horrifying reality: Ian had absolutely no intention of letting him go. He couldn’t fathom why Ian was so obsessively attached to someone as worthless as him, but the obsession was undeniable. Looking back on it now, Alex theorized that Ian must have deeply resented him for refusing to surrender his heart, despite Ian keeping him caged by his side for so long.

Regardless of the motive, Alex was forcibly tethered to Ian. He occasionally wondered if there was some twisted comfort in being kept around by someone, anyone, when the rest of the world didn’t want him, but the moment he had to hold Ian’s hand, absolute disgust would overwhelm him.

He was entirely incapable of progressing to anything beyond that.

Though it hadn’t been his intention, that psychological barrier was ultimately what drove them apart. In the year Ian reached adulthood, he demanded the sex that Alex had been desperately avoiding, and when that fateful day finally arrived, Alex violently vomited stomach acid right in front of him. Staring at an Alpha who was dry-heaving during what should have been a passionate, intimate first experience, the Omega’s face twisted into a mask of profound disappointment and cold fury.

—Hyung, you’re truly pathetic.

That had been Ian’s parting decree.

“Alex, you okay?” Matthew waved a hand in front of Alex’s face, snapping him out of his silence.

Alex offered an ambiguous chuckle, scrubbing a hand down his cheek as he pushed himself out of his chair. With intrusive thoughts constantly ambushing him, it was clear that focusing on work was a lost cause for the night. In times like this, the most constructive option was to work out until his body completely gave out and he collapsed into sleep. “Yeah.”

“You’re acting weird.”

“Guess I am. Let’s go.”

As if fully satisfied with the outcome, Matthew adjusted his glasses. Watching that ridiculous, habitual tick, a meaningless laugh escaped Alex’s lips. Most people assumed Matthew’s eyesight was terrible, but the truth was his thick glasses didn’t even have a prescription.

Chatting about their current case, the two men gathered their things to leave. Matthew drove his own car, citing his absolute revulsion toward the hygienic state of public transit, while Alex relied on the bus or his bicycle. As an investigator, it was generally expected to own a personal vehicle, but Alex simply didn’t have the financial luxury for one. He occasionally checked out a cruiser from the precinct during emergencies, but it wasn’t a frequent occurrence.

He had stopped taking the subway a long time ago.

Promising to give him a ride because of the heavy rain, Matthew threw out a ridiculous threat, warning Alex not to snitch to Inspector Janice that he planned on illegally flashing his police sirens just to beat the traffic home.

Whenever he hitched a ride, Alex was assigned the critical mission of acting as the DJ. Today was no different. Following Matthew’s demand to find some new releases, Alex scrolled through the radio stations.

Just as the black Audi passed the precinct’s exit barrier and prepared to turn toward Southwark, where Alex’s flat was located, both of their phones pinged simultaneously.

Damn it.

Wearing an expression that looked like he had just stepped in dog shit, Matthew pulled the car over to the shoulder. Alex pulled out his phone.

The text was from their senior investigator, Sergeant Hayden.

—Royal London Hospital, right now. Witness appeared.

While the term ‘witness’ was broadly used across countless cases, both Alex and Matthew instantly understood exactly what Hayden was referring to. Hayden was confirming that the very first witness for the ‘Beta Tester’ case had finally surfaced.

Spitting out a clipped curse, Matthew immediately threw the car into gear and violently wrenched the steering wheel. Kicking up sprays of rainwater, Matthew’s black Audi glided onto the road, tearing through the storm toward Whitechapel.

☂