Chapter 118

“I can act as bait whenever you need. Whether it’s the jewel or my memory, if it has value, you’re free to use it.”

The answer was so far from what Do-hyeop expected that his eyes narrowed in genuine astonishment.

“You said yourself that you were born a bastard. If reforming is too difficult, just keep living like that. Use me to your heart’s content. But…”

“But?”

Seoul’s solemn gaze sharpened with fierce resolve. “At least tell me. I need to know where you’re using me and what you expect me to do, so I can do it properly.”

“…Ha.”

Listening to the tirade, Gye Do-hyeop could not hold back a helpless laugh. Where on earth did a kid like this come from? He rubbed both palms over his face repeatedly, yet unable to soothe the sweet, persistent ache throbbing inside his chest, he chuckled for a long while before finally lifting his gaze.

“Am I allowed to talk now?”

“Yes.”

Some of the tension finally left Seoul’s shoulders. Do-hyeop opened his hand beneath the boy’s chin and tipped his face upward. When he leaned close enough for their lips to brush, Seoul hesitated for only a second. He did not turn away this time, but his eyes made it clear that no kiss was coming before an answer.

“Fuck, seriously…”

The ache in Do-hyeop’s chest felt almost physical, sharp enough to rival broken ribs. How could another human being be this catastrophically lovely? At this point, the kid’s face ought to qualify as a weapon. He pinched the bridge of his nose as though fending off a nosebleed and let out a rough breath.

“I didn’t think that deeply about it.”

“……”

“I literally just thought that was the safest spot. You know?”

Only now, hearing himself say it aloud, did the simplicity of the reasoning strike him. Yet it was the unvarnished truth.

“Because you’re the one person I’ll always keep safe.”

“……”

Do-hyeop’s thumb traced the inside of Seoul’s wrist, catching lightly against the watch strap. One eye narrowed in a teasing wink.

“By the way, Geum Seoul.”

“Yes.”

“You knew Yu Jeong-ham was turning the world upside down looking for that thing. Why didn’t you hand it over? Did you not trust him?”

As he studied the delicate balance of features on Seoul’s small, round face, Do-hyeop tapped the tip of his nose.

“…No.”

Seoul blinked his large, round eyes. Do-hyeop’s mouth twitched. He knew the boy must have realized that Yu Jeong-ham and half the Bureau were tearing the city apart looking for the ledger from the moment Do-hyeop disappeared.

After a moment of silence, Geum Seoul lifted his lashes.

“Because you had to be the one to finish it yourself, Deputy Director.”

It was faith in its purest, most unreasonable form: absolute certainty that Gye Do-hyeop was not dead, and that if Seoul held on just a little longer, the man would finish the job with his own hands. That was why Seoul had lied without flinching even when Yu Jeong-ham questioned him directly.

“If I handed it over right away, other people would catch Noh Pil-gyu and Gwak Chun-young without you. I knew they shared the same objective, but I hated the thought of that. It was your assignment.”

Just a little longer. A few more days. Once the mountain of debris was cleared, the Deputy Director would come out. Keeping the ledger for that brief span was unlikely to place Seoul in immediate danger. That had been the entirety of his calculation.

“Was that very wicked of me?”

The earnest question made him look so painfully adorable that Gye Do-hyeop reached out and cupped his chin.

“Who the fuck gave birth to you?”

Where did devotion like this even come from? Do-hyeop found himself genuinely wondering. Geum Seoul had accomplished something no ordinary person would have dared. He had understood exactly what he could do, recognized that no one else could do it for him, and moved without hesitation. He had even cornered Noh Pil-gyu, an old viper with decades more cunning, using nothing but nerve and threats.

Geum Seoul was strong. Stronger, Do-hyeop thought, than anyone he had ever met. Treating him as nothing but something frail to protect had been a fundamental misreading. All the broad-shouldered brutes who strutted around boasting about strength would not have reached Seoul’s ankles where it actually mattered.

“My mom did.”

The answer was so literal that Do-hyeop barked a laugh and pulled Seoul even closer. It was not only that the boy was beautiful and good-hearted. Watching that sharp mind work made him want to kiss and devour every inch of him, from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes.

There was not a single angle from which Seoul failed to look breathtaking, and watching him grow more radiant by the day was becoming a genuine problem. That radiance remained visible even beneath the hollowness the days of separation had carved into his face.

“Have you looked at your eye color?”

“…Yes. While washing up.”

Fully awakened, Seoul’s irises were brighter than ever, luminous enough to seem sunlit even in the absence of direct light.

“Why the long face? You don’t like it?”

Do-hyeop caught the faint shadow on Seoul’s expression and asked. The boy shook his head.

“It isn’t that, but… I was drowning in grief. Hearing that my jewel grade shot up after all that feels strange.”

That moment had contained a depth of despair Seoul had never known before. Even now, some part of him remained afraid that this reunion would dissolve if he blinked too long. The fact that his grade had reached its apparent peak precisely when he believed Do-hyeop dead sat strangely in his chest, almost like resentment. Gye Do-hyeop took his face between both hands and gently kneaded the soft curve of his cheek.

“Your grade didn’t rise.”

At the man’s low, steady tone, Geum Seoul lifted his head.

“You were probably born that way from the start.”

“……”

“You just never knew because of the shitty life you were living.”

That was Do-hyeop’s conclusion. Seoul had probably been born with a value far beyond ordinary measurement, and his mother could not possibly have missed the signs. She had hidden him from the world and taught him disguise and makeup while he was still far too young, likely out of desperation to conceal an omega growing into extraordinary beauty.

“Wear your glasses whenever you’re around other bastards.”

“I already did.”

Do-hyeop suspected Seoul would not need the glasses forever. His trait had only just fully bloomed, so the radiance in his eyes was naturally difficult to control. Given time, they would find a stable way to suppress or regulate it.

“I heard you refused to take the examination and called Noh Pil-gyu instead.”

“They told me the only way I could return to the site was by the Director’s direct order.”

That had almost certainly been Hwang Gi-dong’s doing. The old fox read politics better than anyone, and he had probably moved after Yu Jeong-ham, forced to keep his distance, appealed for help. Even so, using Noh Pil-gyu himself to gain access to the disaster site had been Seoul’s own decision.

“Geum Seoul, with a face like that, you really don’t need to be this smart.”

Amusement warmed his voice. Do-hyeop had noticed it before, but Seoul’s capacity for deduction was unusually sharp. He leaned in and pressed a slow kiss to the boy’s cheek.

“Did you cut a deal with Noh Pil-gyu or something?”

“……”

Seoul sealed his lips with almost comical determination. Do-hyeop waited, kissing whatever patch of skin came within reach, then drew back just enough to look at him. Seoul blinked once.

“I threatened him.”

Do-hyeop’s grin widened until deep lines appeared beside his mouth. His eyes sharpened with delighted, almost predatory interest.

“You did what?”

“I told him to let me go to the site. Otherwise…”

“Otherwise?”

“I said I’d undergo the jewel appraisal immediately and expose the ledger to the public.”

“And he actually listened to that?”

Seoul decided that certain details could wait, such as the part where he had offered his jewel as collateral and promised to disappear forever with the ledger.

“He thought you were dead, Deputy Director, so he had no other choices left.”

“Mm… You’re dozens of times more competent than bastards who’ve been doing this for ten years.”

He considered the thought for another second, then delivered the praise as casually as if it meant nothing, ruffling Seoul’s hair before attacking his cheek and nose with kisses. Seoul squeezed his eyes shut and endured the barrage until his body gradually softened back into the warmth of Do-hyeop’s arms.

‘Take Gye Do-hyeop’s corpse and that goddamned ledger, and vanish from my sight forever.’

That had been Noh Pil-gyu’s condition. Certain that Do-hyeop would never come out alive, he had made Seoul promise to take the Deputy Director’s corpse, take the ledger, and disappear from his sight forever.

Seoul rested his cheek against Do-hyeop’s broad chest. There was no longer any reason to honor such a demand. He had no intention of leaving the Deputy Director, and the work Do-hyeop had pursued for years mattered far more than any bargain made with Noh Pil-gyu. Still, the promise might be useful in another way. There could be an opening here, if he could shape it correctly.

“Seoul.”

“Yes.”

“They told me not to fuck you for a while. What do you think about that?”

Before they had left the official residence last time, Oh Ga-on had cornered Do-hyeop and delivered that warning with extraordinary emphasis. Even frightened half out of his mind in the suffocating atmosphere of the house, the doctor had repeated himself until the last possible second before retreating. That alone told Do-hyeop how serious he was.

‘You really, truly must not. Not only is it still early, but Seoul-ssi’s body is extraordinarily frail. A genuine disaster could occur…’

At the time, furious and half out of his mind, Do-hyeop had snapped back that he was not some rabid animal who would force himself into a sick kid. The ugly truth was that he was exactly the kind of shameless degenerate who still desperately wanted to bury himself inside this fragile boy.

Warm and drowsy from sleep, Seoul lowered his eyes. A faint flush crept over the tips of his ears. He blinked once, twice, and swallowed.

“They said we can’t?”

Hearing the thick disappointment dripping from that soft inquiry, Gye Do-hyeop let out an incredulous groan. Fuck, seriously… That’s your whole damn problem, he muttered inwardly, pressing his eyes against Geum Seoul’s shoulder and rubbing his face into the fabric while slender, pale fingers trailed gently through his hair.

“Is kissing and sucking considered sex or not?”

You tell me. Cowardly foisting the answer onto a kid nine years his junior, he raised his upper body and applied slightly more pressure with the hand groping over the boy’s chest. Though lean all over, the flesh around the nipples was deliciously soft even through the cloth, making his mouth water with anticipation.

“Ah…”

“Answer me. If I suck your chest, lick your thighs, and eat out your ass, is that sex or not?”

He asked it with the gravity of a philosophical problem. Seoul’s throat bobbed in a tense swallow. Do-hyeop laughed softly, took the entire earlobe into his mouth, and sucked. His tongue traced the delicate folds until a small whimper escaped Seoul, making the slender body draw inward with embarrassment.

Grip.

Seoul clutched at his clothes. The IV had been removed, leaving only a small adhesive dressing on the back of one hand; the gauze around the opposite palm had likewise been replaced by a simple patch. Even in the heat rising between them, the sight tugged a painful tenderness through Do-hyeop’s chest, a feeling no corpse or battlefield injury had ever managed to provoke. He drew back enough to study Seoul’s flushed face.

“…It’s not. Sex.”

His throat worked through another dry swallow. Then Seoul lifted both hands and, with deliberate hesitation, drew Do-hyeop’s nape downward.

Do-hyeop yielded instantly. The pull was barely stronger than a puppy tugging at the hem of a trouser leg, yet he let Seoul guide him down without resistance and accepted the soft breath that met his mouth. There was such careful reverence in the kiss that even Gye Do-hyeop went utterly still.

The lips pressed to his trembled faintly. They had kissed countless times by now, yet Seoul was so obviously nervous that Do-hyeop parted his mouth and let him set the pace.

Their warm breaths mingled. A small tongue entered his mouth with exquisite caution, like a timid animal stepping past a sleeping predator, or a newborn testing uncertain legs.

The care was absurd when directed at a man larger than him in height, build, temper, and every other conceivable measure, but that very hesitation stripped the last of Do-hyeop’s restraint.

Heat gathered hard and fast low in his abdomen, his erection straining painfully against his trousers. He wanted to devour the boy whole, yet he could not bring himself to interrupt this sweet, clumsy effort of a kiss.

Seoul’s tongue moved busily over the roof of his mouth, along the sensitive inner flesh, and lightly against his lower teeth. He was plainly imitating things Do-hyeop had taught him without ever realizing he was teaching. Do-hyeop seized the hospital bed rail beside him until his knuckles blanched. Even then, the force in his hand did not come close to matching the violence of the impulses in his head.

The hands around his nape slid lower, both bandaged palms coming to rest against Do-hyeop’s cheeks. He breathed slowly through his nose and fixed his heavy gaze entirely on Seoul.