By Zephyria 
Dane! Are you okay? What happened?
“Haaa.”
Hearing Joshua’s voice, Dane first let out a deep sigh. After abandoning the useless parachute and walking for hours on the desolate gravel path to reach the villa, he searched the interior meticulously and surprisingly found a telephone. Seeing even a computer that could use the internet, he was so dumbfounded that he lost all his energy.
Anyway, the first thing to do was clear. He called Joshua, and after a rather long ringing, he heard his voice. But Joshua, who seemed wary at first because it was an unknown number, immediately changed his attitude when he heard Dane’s voice.
“There was an accident. …Sorry, I was careless.”
As he apologized in a voice drained of energy, Joshua continued, “It’s okay. It was also my fault for passing everything onto you alone. I should have been more careful since Grayson is not an easy opponent… Anyway, I’m glad you’re safe. I’ll come to pick you up soon.”
“The location here is…”
“It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me. I know.”
Joshua spoke before Dane could even finish his sentence.
“You know?”
When he asked, puzzled, Joshua readily answered.
“Yes, Grayson is there.”
“So?”
At Dane’s repeated question, Joshua hmmmed and then confessed.
“There’s a tracking device inside the bodies of the Miller family members.”
What was this supposed to mean? While he was speechless and silent, Joshua continued.
“So if something happens, like if contact is lost as it is now, we use the tracking device to find them. It’s connected to a satellite, so they say we can find them even if they’re in the sea.”
“Huh…”
Rich people really do all sorts of things.
Dane thought, but anyway, it wasn’t a bad situation for him. Heh, Dane, who had been holding his breath, changed his tone and asked.
“Okay, so how long will it take?”
“I was already preparing. But it’s going to be night soon, so it’s difficult to leave now. Just wait one day, I’ll go as soon as it gets light.”
“…Okay.”
The fact that he had to spend the night with Grayson Miller wasn’t very appealing, but there was no choice. After exchanging simple greetings, Dane hung up the phone.
When he came outside, the living room was empty. Standing alone in the silence, he suddenly felt a pang of hunger. He soon began searching the house for something to eat.
The villa was quite pleasant, as Grayson had said. It was almost dust-free, as if it was being maintained from time to time, and he even thought that it wouldn’t be bad to spend a quiet vacation here if circumstances allowed.
If circumstances allowed, that is.
Dane, who had opened the refrigerator, soon had his illusion shattered. Inside, there was only a loaf of bread with an expiration date that was impossible to determine. Dane took out the bread and looked at it for a while, then opened the bag and smelled it, but didn’t feel anything special.
As he was looking at it with suspicious eyes, he felt someone behind him. Grayson, who had finished showering, was walking over wearing a bathrobe and rubbing his wet hair with a towel.
“…What?”
Grayson paused, sensing something suspicious in Dane’s gaze as he looked at him. Dane, who had been silently staring at his face, held out the bread he was holding. Dane said to Grayson, who was looking back and forth between the bread and Dane’s face as if asking what it was.
“Eat it.”
“What is this?”
Dane still replied bluntly to Grayson, who was looking at him with a suspicious gaze.
“It’s bread.”
“Then why are you telling me to eat it?”
Grayson still didn’t let go of his suspicion. Was it because he had deceived others so much that he thought others would do the same to him? Dane thought. He should have lived kindly sooner.
“It looks fine, but I don’t know what it’s like inside. So I’m telling you to eat it.”
Grayson looked down at Dane, dumbfounded.
“Do I look like a guinea pig to you?”
Dane didn’t care at all about the sarcastic words, which were absurd.
“You won’t die even if you eat something like this, eat it, hurry.”
“…Ha.”
Grayson put one hand on his forehead and looked in the other direction. He opened his mouth to refute Dane’s words point by point, but when he saw Dane holding out the bread to him, he soon felt empty. What was the point of all this?
Grayson silently stared at Dane, snatched the bread, and chewed it roughly, taking a big bite. Grayson, who had eaten half of it in one bite, returned the remaining bread without saying a word, and Dane finally brought it to his mouth.
“…”
Grayson shrugged his shoulders at the sight of Dane knitting his brows and looking at him after taking a bite.
“I didn’t say it was delicious.”
Dane glared at him once, then reluctantly ate all the remaining bread with a distorted face.
How did this happen?
Belatedly, a sense of futility washed over him, but he already knew the reason. It was because he had been foolishly deceived. By that bastard’s third-rate act.
Looking at Grayson’s shameless face, he got angry again.
‘Because you deserve it.’
Joshua’s words suddenly came to mind. It must have also included the belief that Dane would not be fooled by Grayson. Dane, feeling an unusual sense of self-disgust, instead turned the arrow to the culprit.
“I didn’t know you were so good at pretending to be sick. Wasn’t it you, not Chase Miller, who should have become an actor?”
Dane couldn’t hold back his sarcasm. Grayson’s face had the usual relaxed smile on it.
“I’ve heard that my acting skills are good, but that doesn’t mean I can change my complexion. There was just a little bit of help.”
“Help?”
When Dane asked with a frown, Grayson readily answered.
“I took medicine. It’s a specially made medicine. It only works for Traits like mine.”
Dane, who blinked at those words, asked with half doubt.
“You deliberately take medicine that makes your condition worse?”
“Yes. When I take that medicine, my stomach immediately turns upside down and I really feel like I’m going to die. It only lasts for about 10 minutes, though.”
Grayson laughed out loud again. What was so funny? Dane looked at him, dumbfounded.
Dominant Alphas don’t respond well to medicine or alcohol. To see any effect, they have to take an enormous amount, so it’s almost meaningless. If they take a medicine that causes abnormalities, what would happen to ordinary people?
This wouldn’t end so simply.
“You carry around medicine like that?”
“I take it when I’m in a bad situation. I’ll be fine in about 10 minutes.”
Grayson said again, grinning. A bad situation. He must be talking about a situation like now, such as being kidnapped.
-Don’t you know why Dominant Alphas always have bodyguards? Do you know how many criminal groups are specifically targeting those bastards!
Wilkins’ words suddenly came to mind. Was it a medicine he carried around in case of such a situation? For example, to make the criminals lower their guard…
In fact, Dane had been fooled, so he had nothing to say. It was a damn good medicine. It was when he was inwardly muttering curses. Suddenly, something flashed through Dane’s mind.
“Is that why you know how to unlock handcuffs?”
Grayson raised the corners of his mouth at Dane’s question with a frown.
“I’ve learned a lot of things in preparation for an emergency.”
Dane pondered those words for a moment, then asked with a suspicious expression.
“Is that perhaps why you’re so good at using a stick?”
“That’s right, my Papa taught me himself.”
Grayson then tilted his head as if he was curious.
“How did you know? Did Bailey tell you?”
“Well…”
Dane, who trailed off because he felt uneasy as if he had been gossiping, soon changed the subject and asked.
“Not because you were hit by Ashley Miller?”
“Papa? Me?”
Grayson made an exaggeratedly surprised expression. Suddenly, Dane noticed the cause of the strange sense of incongruity he had felt from him. His expressions of emotion were sometimes excessive. He had unconsciously found it annoying but had passed it by without realizing it, but suddenly it caught his eye.
As if he was imitating what he had learned.
“Papa doesn’t hit us. He did strangle me once when I was very young, but that was the only time.”
At Grayson’s calm words, Dane quietly looked at his face.
“Is what you just said true?”
Grayson smiled brightly, stretching the corners of his mouth as he asked quietly.
“No.”
“You fucking bastard.”
Of course not. Dane cursed at him. He was pathetic for almost being fooled again. He was already in this state because he had been fooled once.
He immediately turned around and went into the bedroom. As soon as he lay down on the bed, fatigue washed over his entire body. The long day was finally coming to an end. He soon took a deep breath and fell asleep, hoping that nothing else would happen.
And that night, something unexpected happened.