Why should I die? There are plenty of people who’ve done far worse things than me! Ji Haesu right here is the perfect example! Even if I die, I’m dragging Ji Haesu down with me!
Thud!
Gathering what little strength he had left, Choi Suho swung his left hand and smashed it into Ji Haesu’s forearm. Only then did he break free from Ji Haesu’s grip. Clutching his throat, Suho leaned off the bed and retched violently, tears spraying everywhere.
“Khk—ugh! Hahk!”
“Hahahaha, hahaha!”
Despite being struck in the arm, Ji Haesu burst into manic laughter as he looked at Suho. Suho glared at him with murderous eyes, clutching his swollen, reddened neck and coughing harshly while Ji Haesu showed no sign of stopping.
Because of the aftereffects of being choked, Suho’s right eye—where blood vessels had already burst—reddened further, while his left eye, though unbroken, flushed deep red as tears streamed down. Watching him, Ji Haesu smiled with satisfaction and pointed between Suho’s legs.
“You came.”
“…!”
Suho stared at him in disbelief. Ji Haesu bared his teeth in a grin, then grabbed Suho by the neck, forcing him to look at the evidence as Suho tried to flee reality.
“Ah!”
“Look. Look at what you did!”
His bloodshot eyes took in the sin he’d committed. A trembling, metallic sound leaked from Suho’s throat.
“Ah… no. Th-that can’t be.”
“How does it feel, getting back exactly what you did to them?”
“No. I—I…!”
Suho’s pupils spasmed wildly, and as he stared at the traces of his sin, tears poured down in torrents. But when Ji Haesu grabbed Suho’s cock and deliberately shook it, drawing pleasure from it, Suho lost even the ability to argue. His sin was caught in Ji Haesu’s grip, and all he could do was moan as it was worked.
The skin of his knotted glans was rubbed so hard it felt like it might peel, moans spilling from him under the hands of another Alpha. He sagged limply against Ji Haesu, welcoming the fingers thrusting mercilessly into him from behind.
—And after all that, you call it rape? When you were loving it to death?
—After this, don’t you dare go around saying you were raped, you piece of trash.
—On top of that, taking tens of millions in settlement money and crying like a victim. Fucking bastard.
“Hngh!”
“For a rapist bastard, this is practically heaven. Don’t you think?”
Violated from both front and back, Suho ejaculated again with a sharp spurt, then collapsed forward. Ended up covering his own body with the semen he’d spilled, he lay there as Ji Haesu climbed onto his back, Suho gradually beginning to comprehend what he’d done in the past. Ji Haesu pried open Suho’s barely spread hips and thrust his cock in from above, driving it straight down.
“Hahk—ah…!”
Suho’s eyes widened, then twisted. Growing slowly accustomed to the sex, he clutched the sheets tightly with his left hand and bowed his head.
Miserable? Shameful?
No. What disgusted him most was how weak he was—how he was just waiting for this time to pass, feeling rancid to the core.
What it felt like to step out of the utopia his father had built for him… What it felt like to destroy with his own hands the happiness he’d built with Do Si-in and turn his back on reality…
It was a trash heap.
***
Jang Yuguk was on the 11th floor—the floor reserved exclusively for VVIP patients. As befitted capitalism, the only requirement for admission was possessing a certain level of wealth. Typical examples included Jang Yuguk of Free Enterprise, top-tier celebrities, and quasi–chaebol heirs of similar standing.
Access to the floor itself was also restricted. Since it was a special ward for VVIPs, tight security was a given. Depending on the patient’s condition, even visits were limited strictly to family—and only direct relatives at that.
That was why Choi Suho couldn’t stay on the 11th floor and was hospitalized on the nearest possible one: the 10th. It was close enough to reach—yet absolutely unreachable. That was Suho’s position.
But tonight, it was possible.
Because Jang Yuguk’s wife—the woman who most wanted Choi Suho dead and denied his very existence—was absent. In her place, the eldest son she somewhat supported, Jang Jihyeok, was tending to his father. The Jang family was deeply suspicious by nature, and they had a household rule that only direct family members would take turns caring for the patient.
Since Suho wasn’t listed in the Jang family registry, he had no right to nurse Jang Yuguk—even if he wanted to.
“Do you really think you can take care of Father like that?”
It was the first thing Jang Jihyeok said the moment they reached the heavily secured 11th floor.
“I can.”
His voice was unusually hoarse and cracked. As Jihyeok raised the security key toward the scanner, he paused and turned his head.
“Did you catch a cold? If that’s the case, then nursing Father—”
“My throat was choked.”
Suho pulled down the black turtleneck he’d drawn up to his chin. Jihyeok blinked calmly, then scanned the key and entered without another word. Looking up at Suho—who stood several centimeters taller—Jihyeok’s gaze drifted downward. Noticing the right arm hidden beneath Suho’s coat, he murmured flatly.
“With a broken arm, nursing him would’ve been impossible anyway.”
Suho’s face twisted.
“My left hand’s fine.”
Jihyeok stopped walking and looked up at him.
“How long are you going to keep talking to me like that?”
With a crooked tone and a badly hoarse voice, Suho replied,
“Until you die. And how long are you going to keep talking like such a fucking asshole?”
“Until your guts twist themselves apart.”
Jihyeok returned the remark just as elegantly, then turned his back and stopped in front of the room labeled Jang Yuguk.
Suho almost spat out, “You fucking—” but bit it back, his eyes flashing instead.
Jihyeok watched him quietly.
Suho had come with his bangs down instead of swept up like always. Something about Jihyeok’s steady gaze felt pointed, making Suho frown.
“What are you staring at?”
“Why’d you lower your bangs?”
“Whether I wear my hair up or down is my business.”
Jihyeok said something strange.
“You’d better sweep it up in front of Father.”
“Since you told me to, I’m going to keep it down.”
In an indifferent voice, Jihyeok muttered,
“Talking down to someone old enough to be your father. You really have no manners.”
“You’re old enough to be my father, but he’s not my dad or my hyung, is he?”
Standing beside him, Suho spoke with the same cold, blank expression. Jihyeok answered in kind.
“You and I aren’t family. Ever. We never will be, and there’s no chance of that happening.”
Suho’s lips curled upward—then cooled instantly as the door opened.
The moment Suho saw Jang Yuguk lying there, his chest wired with machines from heart surgery, a ventilator attached, tears gathered at his eyes as he walked forward slowly.
“Dad. Dad, I’m here.”
Jihyeok’s eyes sank.
The only one who could call Jang Yuguk Dad was Choi Suho.
But when you accidentally face the truth because of your mistake—what will become of you then?
“Dad. Are you okay?”
Jang Yuguk, lying there wheezing, slowly opened his eyes. Then, seeing the tall, handsome Suho before him, his eyes widened in shock.
“Dad!”
Jet-black hair fell to Suho’s eyebrows, his black turtleneck pulled up to his chin. The coat draped stylishly over his shoulders was really meant to hide the cast on his right arm. To offset the somber clothing, he wore fitted jeans. Though his right eye—burst blood vessels and all—was covered with an eye patch, his handsome face remained unmistakable.
It was as if Choi Juho—the man Jang Yuguk had loved in his youth—had been reborn.
“Ju… Juho-ya.”
Juho? Juho was the name of the older cousin who’d died in an accident—the maternal cousin everyone believed dead. The eldest cousin, Choi Juho. And Suho himself was the youngest son on that maternal side, Choi Suho.
For reasons he never fully understood, his maternal relatives had taken money in exchange for putting his name on the registry, effectively abandoning him. They’d considered his father—who’d fallen in love with Jang Yuguk and given birth to Suho—shameful, refusing to acknowledge him as family.
That was why Suho knew almost nothing about Choi Juho. He’d never even seen his face. The name was all that existed.
“Huh? Dad, I’m Suho. Juho is my cousin from my mom’s side… that name, right?”
As Suho muttered in disbelief about why his father was calling him by his cousin’s name, Jihyeok behind him covered his mouth, barely suppressing a laugh. His heart fluttered with excitement at the thought of becoming a witness to the truth as it slowly revealed itself.
“Juho-ya!”
Jang Yuguk, old and wrinkled and pitiful, struggling even with the ventilator, lifted himself and pulled Suho into his arms, crying.
“Juho-ya, khk! I was wrong!”
“D-Dad! Why are you calling me by my cousin’s name? It’s me!”
Flustered, Suho placed his left hand on Jang Yuguk’s shoulder. But Jang Yuguk, kneeling before him, traced Suho’s face with a deranged gaze and murmured.
“Juho-ya. So you’ve finally forgiven me?”
“Juho? Dad, Cousin Juho is—”
“Juho-ya!”
Beep. Beep. Beep!
Lust-filled tears gathered in his father’s wrinkled eyes.
“Juho-ya!”
In the eyes that had always smiled at him, Suho saw a different kind of love etched deep within.
Flash!
Without realizing it, Suho shoved his father away for the first time.
This wasn’t the father he knew. This was a vile Alpha wearing his father’s face.
He didn’t know why such a dense Alpha pheromone suddenly hit him—or why it felt so nauseating—but Suho clamped his left hand over his mouth and stumbled backward.
