By Zephyria 
“I asked how you knew. I thought you’d cut the tail.”
The rough movement of turning on the light and swinging the bathroom door wide open paused for a moment. Then, he cast his gaze diagonally downward. He wasn’t making eye contact, nor was he staring at something specific. His dark pupils simply wandered the floor as if flustered.
“Right. You probably noticed.”
After muttering briefly, Gyu-oh turned his gaze back inside the bathroom. Then, he searched the interior thoroughly as if trying to find something that wasn’t there. His keen gaze was almost savage.
There was no way he wouldn’t have noticed. The only person interested enough to put a tail on him right now was Won Gyu-oh. No matter how much he thought about it, the cause was definitely him. He had said nonsense to a guy who was living perfectly fine, sparking a strange curiosity and confusing him.
“But, even knowing you had a tail, you crawled all the way to the hotel?”
“….”
And he had made him act like a guy coming to catch a cheating lover in the act.
“Has that bastard not arrived yet?”
Since he had kept his distance as much as possible lately, he thought things might have improved. But facing Won Gyu-oh in person, his state seemed even worse than before. Barely suppressing a sigh, he pressed his hand to his forehead.
“…Yeah. So now, use your head and leave.”
Ignoring the persistently clinging gaze, he leaned his shoulder against the wall. Crossing his arms and tilting his head, he showed with his whole body that he found this annoying. It felt awkward because he had never acted this way toward Won Gyu-oh, but since he had already shown himself in a hotel room wearing nothing but a robe, he figured there was nothing he couldn’t do.
“….”
Gyu-oh was silent for a long time. He could see the large frame heaving as he tried to steady his panting breath.
“What are you doing, not leaving? People will misunderstand if a man who wasn’t invited is in their room.”
At those words, Gyu-oh’s shoulders heaved once more. The guy, who had been silently parting his lips, finally spat out a short sentence. It was a heavy and sharp voice, as if he were suppressing his emotions.
“Yeah, let them misunderstand.”
“…What?”
He asked back, thinking he had misheard. On the other hand, Won Gyu-oh repeated the same words, chewing over every single syllable. This time, the message contained a clearer and more explicit meaning than before.
“Misunderstand. Let them do it to their heart’s content, then tell them to get lost.”
The force of his wrist being snatched caused Min-ho’s body to tilt. Min-ho, who had been leaning against the wall, was led toward the inner part of the room by Gyu-oh’s hand in the blink of an eye. He tried to twist his wrist away quickly, but it wasn’t easy because the other was holding on with immense strength.
“Hey, what are you doing? Let go.”
Gritting his teeth, he tried to pull Gyu-oh’s shoulder. He tried to press the upper body down as if to subdue him, but as expected, it was impossible to win against a guy resisting with such strength. In the past, he would have knocked him down before his wrist was even grabbed. In the current situation, no matter how much of that instinct remained, he couldn’t match Won Gyu-oh in strength. The area around his grabbed wrist was already turning white, and a stinging pain spread through the bone.
But then came a sentence that made him forget all those sensations.
“Let’s give them something to misunderstand. Then you won’t feel cheated, right?”
He felt dazed, as if he had been hit on the back of the head. He met a gaze full of conviction, as if Gyu-oh had resolved something.
“You crazy bastard, what are you talking about? Let go, it hurts.”
He shook his captured arm while stepping back, putting his weight into it. He felt the robe tie loosen and the chest area open up, but he couldn’t stop. From the moment he heard Gyu-oh’s words, an alarm had been ringing in his head.
“Didn’t you understand?”
“Let go and then talk, you crazy bastard.”
Unlike him, who was struggling to the point that his robe was disheveled, Won Gyu-oh looked calm. He tossed the helmet he was still holding onto the bed, then gripped his shoulder firmly and pulled him close. Although he tried to resist by putting strength into both legs, eventually their toes touched closely.
“If that’s what you need anyway, Hyung. Instead of some rootless bastards, I’ll do it.”
“…Did you hit your head on the way here? Did you get bashed by your helmet? Suddenly, what kind of crazy talk is this?”
He thought Gyu-oh didn’t even have the energy to get excited usually, but coming to his senses, he found himself pouring out words with the veins in his neck standing out. His flushed face felt exceptionally hot.
“Why is this crazy talk?”
“Then, is this the right kind of talk? What do you mean, you’ll do it instead? Crazy…”
The headache that had seemed to improve began to press down on his head again, and his vision repeatedly blurred into white. He even felt his dry lips cracking every time he spoke.
“It took me exactly 30 minutes to get here. I kept thinking about it during that time.”
“30 minutes? What kind of decision do you make in that time? Get a grip.”
Even though he spat out sharp words, Won Gyu-oh acted as if he were unaffected, as always. No, perhaps he had firmly made up his mind and thus wouldn’t be shaken.
“Exactly. I wondered if that made sense too, but it does.”
“…I don’t want to bicker here. I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, so leave.”
He gestured with his chin toward the door and looked away. In truth, it was because the gaze clinging to him like a shackle was too persistent and sticky to bear. No matter how many emotionless relationships he had with the guys around him, there was no way he could calmly watch a guy he’d shared meals with for over a decade act like this.
“What I agonized over wasn’t just 30 minutes, but from the moment I noticed Hyung was distancing himself. No, maybe from the moment I was worried that you couldn’t sleep.”
“….”
Gyu-oh poured out words without leaving any room to interrupt. The voice, which was neither a question nor a monologue, beat intensely against Min-ho’s ears. A useless sense of guilt bloomed at the exhausted tone. He wondered if Won Gyu-oh’s agony, confusion, and fatigue were all because of him.
“No. From the moment Hyung said those strange things to me? Honestly, maybe from the moment I was bothered by Hyung acting like a man obsessed with work.”
“….”
“So, it wasn’t an easy decision.”
It was an unwavering attitude, as always. Rather, Won Gyu-oh’s judgment shone brightest in urgent situations. In the time they’d done this work, he’d gone undercover more times than he could count, and he’d never once been in danger.
Such a guy had finally fallen into Cha Min-ho’s trap. It must have been because he let his guard down by being too close.
Min-ho steadied his confused heart. No matter how softly he treated Won Gyu-oh, he couldn’t possibly grant him this.
“I gave you an inch and now you’re taking a mile. Stop bullshitting and get lost. Fuck, do you think just because I’m a slut I’ll spread for anyone?”
“Stop talking like that.”
Gyu-oh, his face twisting, took a large step forward to close the distance. The toes of the two men facing each other touched, slightly offset.
“It’s true, isn’t it? Seeing how you roll your body, I thought I’d be okay for once, that’s why I’m doing this.”
The more he spoke, the more miserable he felt for some reason, but he figured it wasn’t exactly wrong. In fact, there were quite a few guys who had approached him with this kind of light curiosity, and most of them usually tucked their tails and ran as soon as they saw another man’s naked body. Gyu-oh, who wouldn’t know those inner workings, simply hardened his face coldly and threatened in a low voice.
“Stop talking like that, Cha Min-ho.”
“….”
“And if that were the case, things would have gone south before Hyung took back his words last time.”
He couldn’t bring himself to face Gyu-oh’s face as he spoke with such conviction. He only stared blankly at the tattoo engraved on the nape of his neck. Gyu-oh, who had been looking down at him while he stood with his mouth shut, let out a low sigh. Then, he relaxed the strength in both hands that had acted as if they would never let go.
“Just go change your clothes quickly.”
His wrists and shoulders, where the strong grip had been clinging, were still hot and throbbing.
“I don’t want to be in a room bought with that bastard’s money either.”
Gyu-oh snatched up the helmet rolling on the bed and turned away. A thick smell of cigarettes wafted from him as he brushed past. Until a moment ago, there had been no smell of cigarettes. It suggested that the path to find him had been a very painful time for Won Gyu-oh.
“If you want to be carried out while wearing a robe, feel free to resist.”
Holding the helmet with his fingertips and draping an arm over his shoulder, Gyu-oh spun around.
“Ha.”
He stared at the broad back standing stubbornly and eventually let out a sigh. First, let’s calm that guy down. Right now, getting angry wouldn’t work anyway. If Son Pro actually showed up, the situation would get complicated in many ways. He should try to talk him into it with some coaxing.
Only after confirming that there was still no contact from Son Pro did he loosely pull the robe tie.
Fifteen minutes passed like fifteen years. They eventually arrived at Gyu-oh’s nearby house. The suffocating silence that lasted throughout the journey was such that he felt he should have just turned the steering wheel and crashed into a wall.
“I’ll wash… no, follow me.”
The guy who acted as if he would enter the bathroom alone suddenly popped back out. Then, he dragged Min-ho into the bathroom as well.
“I already washed.”
As if he couldn’t hear him, Gyu-oh even pushed him into the bathtub. Then, he held the showering head, from which water was pouring, toward him. Swoosh, the stream of water starting from the shoulders drenched him down to his toes in the blink of an eye.
“You crazy bastard.”
“Yeah, wash. The smell of the shampoo there isn’t great.”
The guy replied nonchalantly and stripped off his clothes. Min-ho quickly turned his head away at the sudden reveal of the firm, muscular body.
“….”
Is he really serious? He thought Gyu-oh was lunging at him to fix his bad habits. Does he actually have some kind of feelings? Now that the situation had turned out like this, he was starting to get confused.
“If you don’t take them off, I’ll take that as a request for me to strip you?”
The guy, who had thrown off his pants, whipped his head around and snapped.
Fuck, he meant it. His eyes, usually full of craziness, were rarely this serious. Following him here on a whim, and of all places, coming to Gyu-oh’s house—it all felt like a mistake now.
If he attacked with force, could he beat Won Gyu-oh? If he just ran away, could he escape? If he scolded him terrifyingly, would he listen? Behind the countless question marks, the only answer that followed was ‘no.’
“……Ha, fuck.”
Muttering a curse under his breath, he reached for his wet shirt. However, because it was clinging to his body, it was difficult to take off. As he fumbled clumsily, Gyu-oh had already become completely stark naked.
He had seen the guy’s naked body often, but… being like this together in a bathroom was frustrating to the point of madness.
Hot water poured from the showerhead. Steam rose thickly, to the point where they couldn’t clearly see each other. Thinking it would be better to just wash up quickly and leave, Min-ho was flustered when a familiar presence began to register in his ears.
Slick, slick. Frozen in place, he creaked his head around, shifting his gaze toward the sound.
“…….”
Through the hazy steam, he saw Gyu-oh’s profile, his smooth body exposed. Leaning his forehead against the wall with his eyes closed, the guy was gripping and stroking his dark red, swollen cock. Veins were bulging prominently in his tattooed forearms. Every time he moved his hand up and down, his wet genitals sprayed moisture.