The sound of a heavy sigh filled the wide garage. Yoon Min-ho, who was nervously shaking his leg while holding the hood of a car, tried calling his superior again, but as before, the phone remained off.
“Haa…”
There really wasn’t much time left now. He had to fly out the day after tomorrow, but Da Haram’s passport hadn’t even been received yet, and most importantly, Kang Tae-yi wasn’t reachable.
He had rushed to the hospital and gotten his hands on a medication similar to the suppressants Kang Tae-yi had been taking, but the basement, where he had expected to find him lying down, was completely empty. Shocked, he hurried upstairs, and as soon as he reached the second floor, he could immediately feel the pheromones filling the air. All he could do was pray that the Sky Squirrel would hold up and quickly exit the mansion.
That had been a week ago. The rut should be ending soon, but why hadn’t he heard from him? His stomach churned with impatience, and he couldn’t remain calm any longer.
Should I break in and drag Kang Tae-yi out?
It was something that would risk his life. Or should he take care of the urgent matters first? He needed to find the time to go to the countryside and retrieve Da Haram’s passport, but that wasn’t going to be easy. Not only did Da Haram need to collect it in person, but no one else could play the role of the Sky Squirrel with his ears and tail.
When things had been going smoothly up until now, he never imagined that it would unravel right before his business trip.
Muttering curses under his breath and considering the worst-case scenario, Yoon Min-ho was startled by the sudden vibration of his phone and quickly picked it up.
“Director!”
The name that appeared on the screen was such a relief. Unable to suppress the rush of emotions, Yoon Min-ho continued speaking without pausing.
“Are you alright? Is Da Haram alive?”
—Come home.
Kang Tae-yi had quietly listened to Yoon Min-ho’s barrage of questions before answering curtly and hanging up.
Yoon Min-ho rushed back into the mansion, and as soon as he heard the rustling sound coming from the kitchen, he turned away from heading up to the second floor and made his way there instead. Upon entering the kitchen, he stopped and stared at Kang Tae-yi, who was sitting at the table, opening a small bag the size of his palm, before asking.
“Director… Are you alright?”
“Mm.”
Kang Tae-yi nodded and answered while transferring some nuts onto a plate for Da Haram to eat.
“Is Da Haram okay too? I checked on you before leaving to make sure you went up to the second floor… What happened?”
Yoon Min-ho had been thinking about what had happened during the rut and had two possible scenarios. One was that Kang Tae-yi, drugged, had struggled to make it upstairs to find the Omega, or that Da Haram, intoxicated by the pheromones, had gone down to the basement to search for Kang Tae-yi.
“He fell asleep.”
Kang Tae-yi responded briefly to Yoon Min-ho’s question and continued filling the plate with nuts. Not answering the question directly but instead talking only about Da Haram’s current state, he gave Yoon Min-ho a frustrated look, but no further words came.
Still, based on his calm demeanor, it seemed that Da Haram was truly fine. Yoon Min-ho let out a short sigh before continuing.
“I had a look at the ingredients of the suppressant you had, and it was a different medication from the one you’d been prescribed.”
It wasn’t a rut suppressant; it was an excitant, a very potent drug that could induce hallucinations. Yoon Min-ho had expected Kang Tae-yi to get angry or immediately issue orders after hearing the report, but Kang Tae-yi remained silent. He was simply continuing what he had been doing.
“It must have been Kang Tae-jin’s doing. But… I don’t understand why he’d change the suppressant.”
After all, Kang Tae-jin couldn’t stop what Kang Tae-yi was planning to do. No matter how much of a vice chairman he was, it was impossible to halt a project that everyone was eager to push forward. If Kang Tae-jin had wanted to harm him, sending a thug or applying physical pressure would have been the easier route, not this sudden substitution of medication.
Kang Tae-yi, who had been silently staring at Yoon Min-ho, finally spoke up.
“If I lose control and go into heat, who do you think I’ll go after?”
At least it was a stroke of luck that he had only taken one pill. If he had mistakenly taken a few, thinking they were the rut suppressants, his reason would have been lost, and he would have been tangled in bed with Da Haram even now. He might have even forced himself on him. Fortunately, the small dose and Da Haram’s willingness had worked together, and things had turned out alright this time.
“…Ah.”
Yoon Min-ho finally understood Kang Tae-jin’s intentions and tightly closed his mouth. Had Kang Tae-yi gone wild right before a crucial business trip, or had he lost control until the day of the trip, that would have been exactly what Kang Tae-jin had wanted.
Kang Tae-yi, who had gone into heat and been sprawled at home with his lover right before an important business trip—this would have created the kind of scandal that Kang Tae-jin had likely been hoping for.
“That medication… It’s the one I had in the study.”
This meant someone had entered the mansion. He didn’t have time to consider when, how, or who it could have been.
“Da Haram needs somewhere safe to stay.”
It was as if Yoon Min-ho understood what Kang Tae-yi meant, as he nodded and then asked,
“Are you not taking him with you on the trip?”
Kang Tae-yi hesitated for a moment before glancing at the plate of nuts before answering.
“I’ll see how he’s doing.”
He couldn’t wake Da Haram up, have him go to the countryside to retrieve his passport, and expect to get him on a plane the day after tomorrow. Considering how sore Da Haram’s body was—he was still lying on his side, wincing from the pain—it seemed impossible for him to go on the trip. But leaving him behind was too unsettling to even think about.
Sighing deeply, Kang Tae-yi silently picked up the plate and headed upstairs, leaving Yoon Min-ho deep in thought.
***
It’s over…
Da Haram was sure the rut was over, yet he still couldn’t shake the heat coursing through his body. With a heavy sigh, he lifted his eyelids and winced at the soreness he felt all over his body. Every muscle seemed to ache, and his hips, in particular, sent sharp pain whenever the blanket even brushed against him.
“Ugh…”
As he groaned, clutching the blanket tightly, he noticed something rolling around nearby. Slowly, his eyes opened. Scattered across the blanket were the nuts he had been feeding on. He stared at them as they rolled around with every move he made. A small smile crept across his face.
He wondered when they had been spread out. They were scattered so evenly, almost as if someone had been careful about it. He imagined that if they were to plant seeds, he’d be quite good at it.
As he thought about how Tae-yi must have scattered the nuts while he was asleep, he let out a quiet chuckle, which suddenly turned into a fit of coughing.
“Cough, huff…”
Every time he coughed, it felt like something inside his throat was tearing apart. The muscle aches were nothing compared to the pain in his throat. Gripping his neck and coughing, he turned his head at the sound of the door suddenly opening.
“Da Haram.”
Tae-yi, who had been working in the study with Yoon Min-ho, immediately rushed in upon hearing Da Haram’s cough.
“Are you alright?”
Tae-yi scooped Da Haram up from the bed and held him in his arms, gently stroking his back until the coughing subsided.
“You’re home.”
Once the coughing eased up, Da Haram looked up at Tae-yi and spoke in a hoarse voice. Tae-yi, who understood him perfectly despite his cracked voice, responded immediately.
“I was in the study.”
With Tae-yi’s hand constantly soothing his back, Da Haram felt drowsiness creeping in and without a word, rested his head on Tae-yi’s shoulder, closing his eyes.
It felt refreshing. The heat that had been overwhelming during the rut had now settled, and Tae-yi’s body temperature was cooling enough to ease his own burning body.
“Is your head hurting a lot?”
“Mm, my hips hurt. You hit and bit me…”
He couldn’t quite bring himself to speak the rest—how his hips had been pounded and painfully slammed each time Tae-yi had been inside him. The words stuck in his throat.
Seeing Da Haram shoot him an innocent, side-eyed glance, Tae-yi smirked and then reached under the blanket, gently caressing Da Haram’s smooth hips.
“I never hit you.”
Even if Tae-yi had been out of it, he was certain he hadn’t hit Da Haram. His confidence was clear, and Da Haram couldn’t help but get emotional.
“You hit me so hard! Slapping me with your palm! Biting me!”
The harsh slaps on his rear end, which now seemed so contradictory to the tenderness Tae-yi was showing as he patted Da Haram’s back, left Da Haram feeling deeply conflicted.
Da Haram, looking both embarrassed and frustrated, let out a small huff of irritation.
“Then… You can slap my butt and bite it too.”
“No way…”
“Go wash up.”
“I still don’t want to…”
Da Haram, horrified, shook his head fervently, trying to block his ears. There was no way he was doing that. Only someone like Tae-yi, who was a pervert, would want to do something like that.
“You’re heating up.”
Seeing the flustered Sky Squirrel, Tae-yi tried to calm him down again as he softly patted his back.
As Da Haram buried his face in Tae-yi’s body and exhaled deeply, he suddenly looked up at him with wide eyes.
“I’m not about to go into heat, am I?”
His body ached everywhere, his mind was clouded, and the fever he was feeling reminded him so much of the signs before a heat.
