Chapter 67: "I trust you."
Their interlaced fingers, and Taras’s face that Le An could now look at so closely, had become perhaps the only routine that scattered the stillness weighing on him for days.
Each minute passing with him was the only thing squeezing Le An’s heart now.
When Taras tightened the joints of his fingers against his own, Le An raised his head, and, just as he had grown used to in recent days, he began to transfer his guiding energy to him more strongly, without saying anything.
It was as if, after that misunderstanding had been cleared up, the dark clouds that didn’t even have a name yet had finally lifted from between them.
The fact that the one who had tried to kill him was not Taras brought Le An relief, and to Taras as well, it brought a strange calm.
Taras, on the other hand, had recently developed the habit of listening to Le An’s heartbeat whenever they weren’t speaking.
Each time, as if guided by instinct, Taras was blending into the shadows and finding himself here, at Le An’s room. Way earlier than midnight now. And, he was leaving even later, later than Le An thought. Taras was watching him, without showing his presence to him.
Today, Taras had not found Le An at home.
Only after Le An returned from a dinner did he finally see his silhouette among the escorting guards in the garden.
For some reason, there was tension hanging around Le An in the house. Everyone kept glancing worriedly at Treasure, persistently asking whether he needed or wanted anything.
They were whispering among themselves. He’s not okay. It’s obvious something has happened. Even Theo doesn’t know about it.
And Le An, with that same unsettling dullness still weighing on him, had simply said he was fine.
Taras tilted his head slowly, watching him more carefully. There was no denying that Treasure’s mind was clouded.
And he must have bitten his lips, because on those soft pink lips there were peeled, reddened little wounds. And his eyes seemed drowsy.
Taras reached slowly for Le An’s other hand, and his fingers slid over Le An’s palm, wrist, and finally his arm. Rumors whispered that this condition had begun after one of the days he returned from the laboratory.
When Le An gave him none of the reaction he expected, Taras was, for a moment, overwhelmed by the urge to press him harder. Yet that suffocating impulse never reached Le An’s awareness. Instead, it only made Taras more curious.
He slipped his fingers beneath the sleeve of Le An’s blouse.
Le An’s eyes darted upward immediately, and at last, giving Taras his full attention, he looked at him with questioning eyes. Taras’s fingers were now lightly wandering along the inside of his arm.
"What’s wrong with you?" Taras asked.
When Le An began to look at him with eyes full of guilt, as though he had done something wrong, Taras’s chest filled with sudden anger at the thought that he was about to feed him the same lie, that he was fine.
"Don’t dare lie to me."
Le An averted his gaze, and the muscle of his jaw clenched visibly on his round face. Ah... so something had happened after all. A strange unease stirred in Taras as he waited for the answer.
Le An, at the same time, remembered the decision he had made a few days earlier, before he could even think of replying. His decision to help Taras, and those people in the outskirts.
Yet instead of soothing him, this decision only made him feel like a hypocrite trying to confess his sins by standing with the righteous.
Every day he did nothing, things grew worse for everyone around him anyway. Pathetic guilt twisted inside him, and for a fleeting moment, he loathed himself. Taras had been right: he must truly believe the world revolved around him. Every hour that passed in the face of vile deeds, he tried to ease his shame with his own helplessness.
"Hey." Taras’s voice cut in again, almost like a warning.
When his fingers slipped under Le An’s loose blouse and gripped his body just beneath his armpit, Le An flinched.
Taras’s hand enclosed one side of his chest. Uneasy, Le An lowered his arm to push his hand away, but an even more electric touch followed, Taras’s thumb lingered dangerously close to his nipple.
Summoning his courage, Le An answered before he could be provoked further.
"S-something went wrong... in the experiment. That’s why..."
His voice dwindled to almost a whisper, even as his body arched faintly in response to Taras’s touch.
Lowering the hands that were still interlaced with Le An’s, Taras used his other hand to pull Le An’s body closer and commanded:
"Lift your head."
Le An raised his head and looked into his eyes.
Whatever had happened, it was enough to draw fine trails of tears into his gaze, Taras thought.
"What happened?"
Le An told him about drug tests and how the subjects died. He explained that it was because of the trials had been rushed by GAC, and the medicines were tested on people even before the drugs were fully developed.
As Taras listened, his hand slid from Le An’s torso to his back. He quietly observed the way Le An’s body shifted forward as if tickled, and how his skin flushed quickly when Taras’s fingers trailed upward to his shoulder and nape.
For days now, Le An’s body had been responding with the same reactions to Taras’s touch, without ever knowing why or resisting.
Now, with his hand clasping the pulse in Le An’s warmed nape, Taras’s eyes dropped to his bare hipbone revealed beneath his rising shirt.
Though some might say his shoulders could pass for an alpha’s, his narrow waist tapering down into his pelvis betrayed him as omega.
Taras’s gaze slid over the delicate line of his pelvic bone, over the hollow of his abdomen where the fabric of his trousers strained to form the smallest of gaps. As Le An’s words drew to a close, he remained unaware that Taras’s eyes were devouring the contours of his body.
Le An’s feelings toward Taras, Taras’s looks, and his grip on him, all of it was a fire that burned him alone, leaving him unable to make sense of anything.
Blushing to his ears, he thought this closeness meant nothing to Taras.
Or perhaps these touches were just weapons in Taras’s hand, meant to force answers out of a fool like him.
"...And those conducting the experiment," Le An shook his head to clear his thoughts and finally lifted his eyes to meet Taras’s. When Taras returned his gaze, Le An swallowed instinctually.
"Some of them are children of important figures. Two of them..." He gave Taras a look as if to explain why he was saying this at all.
"They’re the children of businessmen sponsoring the trials. Just like—just like the deputy minister’s son." Panic-stricken, he lowered his head and added, "Because the experiment is kept secret, no one... neither the public nor anyone else knows about this."
It could be useful, right?
"Mm..." Taras hummed, listening for a while to Le An’s panicked heartbeat. As Le An waited anxiously for a reply, unable to lift his head, Taras already knew why he had told him this.
Hah... Taras smiled. Treasure was trying, tremblingly, to provide him with intelligence. Why was he still this afraid of him? Wasn’t he aware that...
Taras stroked the back of his nape, soothing him. As Le An’s heartbeat began to steady, he asked Le An, "Why are you doing this?"
Though he had expected the question, when it came from Taras, Le An looked around nervously, as if searching for an answer.
"Because... people are dying for nothing. And they... won’t stop until they figure out how to turn all guides into someone like me," Le An said.
Taras shook his head. "That’s enough. Stop guiding."
As Le An slowed his energy flow, Taras loosened their interlocked fingers and gripped Le An’s arm, rubbing firmly with his thumb over the very spot where blood would be drawn.
Caught off guard by the sudden gesture, Le An looked at him uncertainly. Won’t he say anything else?
Children of powerful men, an inhuman experiment... would this not serve his plans? If Le An brought him a paper-thin scrap of proof like last time, wouldn’t that be useful again?
As he looked at Taras in helpless appeal, Taras studied the needle marks revealed beneath the makeup on Le An’s arm as he wiped them clean.
Biting his lower lip, Le An lowered his head and stared at the needle marks himself.
Perhaps everything he had said was only his problem, meaningless to Taras. Perhaps, because it was his problem and had driven him this far, Taras might even... approve of the experiment. Le An’s eyes stung.
Still gazing at the marks, Taras asked thoughtfully, "What do you think? Will they succeed?"
He watched Le An’s eyes weigh the question carefully. There was no one else like him, and there wouldn’t be. Wasn’t it obvious?
And yet, in Treasure’s eyes, there was less a sense of being unique than of being a disease, one in a million.
Taras already had every clue about the experiment and its sponsors in his hands. Treasure didn’t know this, he had no idea about the photos taken of the documents hidden in his cabinet. How naïve.
"I don’t know," Le An answered shortly.
"What did they promise you?"
Le An looked into his eyes again. "...Retirement."
A mocking expression crossed Taras’s face. "And you believed that?"
Le An just stared at him, the light in his eyes dimming further, before finally lowering his head.
Watching the way his bangs fell forward, Taras knew the chance of GAC ever releasing Treasure was close to zero.
Yet he also knew that before the experiment ever reached its end, he would topple the country and its balance with his own hands.
The only way Treasure could escape this life was still through him.
Taras’s fingers pressed tightly over his nape again. Forcing Le An to raise his head, Taras parted his lips.
"I don’t need information about the experiment. In fact, I don’t need you to do anything," he said.
The fleeting, sorrowful expression that crossed Le An’s face lasted only an instant. His shoulders slumped as he nodded.
He had always known Taras had no need of him.
Taras added, "All you need to do is stay here and wait for me."
As Le An nodded again, Taras likened the expression on his face to that of a pushed-aside puppy. But for a moment, he parted his lips once more. If he left Treasure in the dark again, he knew Treasure would made up foolish assumptions in his head and sulk all night.
"Everything will change," he said, stroking the back of Le An’s nape again.
A small whimper escaped Le An’s lips. "What about the Awakening... movement?"
Recently, while guiding him, Taras had told him he had no ties to Awakening. At the name, Taras scoffed.
"You don’t need to think about those. They’re not part of my plan."
I’m not, either... Le An thought. Then, he asked the question he might never be able to put plainly, but in a softened form this time.
"What will happen afterwards?"
What will happen to me? What will you do to me? Will I... see you again?
As Taras’s eyes lingered on the sudden sorrow etched into Le An’s face, his brows furrowed.
He raised his hand and pressed his thumb between Le An’s brows, as if to erase the expression. "Everything will be as it should be."
He meant only those who deserve it will be destroyed.
Those who did this to me, to the people in the outskirts, and to you, Treasure. They will be brought to ruin. As they should.
Nodding, Le An felt his cheek caught in Taras’s palm, his face held firmly.
"You’re looking at me as if you trust me, Treasure."
Le An’s heart, which had ceased fluttering like a careless bird lowering its guard, stilled. He nodded once in affirmation.
"I trust you," he said.
Taras’s hand froze, trembling for a second.
"You... trust me?"
This time, Le An answered again, nervously parting his lips, but meeting Taras’s eyes with a gaze that laid his heart bare. "...Yes."
Even though Taras knew Treasure wasn’t cunning enough to try seducing him, for a moment, he felt as though under some spell, caught in his gaze.
For the first time, Taras hesitated in front of him, uncertain of his own movements, words, or actions.
Taras’s hand stayed frozen there, on Le An’s face.
If he applied too much force now, he would harm him. Yet if he didn’t hold tightly enough, if he didn’t sate his own desire, Treasure might slip from between his fingers.
Treasure’s trust. Le An had said it with complete honesty, fearfully, exposing himself to every possible blow.
Taras leaned closer, pressing their foreheads together. And without looking away from those lips that had spoken trust, he brought his breath closer and closer to them.
Le An, held tight against Taras’s chest, shivered from the nape down. Panic took over his heart again, and he shut his eyes tightly.
"T-Taras..."
Taras lifted him onto his toes.
With restrained control, he pressed his lips against Le An’s, lightly, then pulled back. Just to quench his thirst.
Tsk.
Closing in again, Taras’s tongue brushed over the mole on Le An’s lip this time. The sensation made Le An’s body tremble, and he moaned.
"H-ha—ngh..."
As Taras watched his closed eyes, his nose and his lips, struggling with the flood of details clouding his mind, he shut his own and pressed his lips to Le An’s again.
"Ha..." Taras ran his tongue over the tiny wounds on Le An’s upper lip and sucked on his lower lip. And unable to resist, just once, he stuck his tongue between Le An’s lips and pulled back as if to taste him. Another moan escaped from Le An’s lips. "Ungh... hng-uhm..."
The slow sounds of their kisses rang in their ears, marking the border they had already crossed.
And being this close to cross even more borders, their tongues nearly entangling, Le An’s warm hips pressed against Taras’s body.
Everything fueled Taras’s desire to tear him out of this cursed house and hide him somewhere no one could ever find.
Right now.
To strip him bare now and make him whisper his name again. Again and again.
He now had Le An’s entire body in his arms. Catching his lower lip between his teeth, Taras sucked it with deadly slowness before letting go and drawing back.
He didn’t release him until Le An could find his balance. Only when Le An, dazed, stood on his own, still staring at his lips, did Taras’s body started to vanish into the darkness of shadow.
The shadow, flowing with satisfied ease, swallowed him into the dark, grazing Le An’s body one last time as it left the room. "I’ll see you," Taras said.
Le An, his fingers pressed to his lips, stared for a while, at the place where Taras had disappeared.