2:03 a.m.
The night smelled like iron, damp sheets, and heartbeats hitting too hard, too fast, too wrong.
Nari opened her eyes the way someone bursts out of a dream still burning on the skin — a silent jolt, a stolen breath, a raw clarity too sharp to be normal.
The ceiling wasn't hers.
Neither were the shadows.
She sat up too quickly.
Air failed her.
Her throat tightened.
A dizzy spell.
A suspended second.
Then reality — slow, cold, merciless — fell on her with the brutality of a slap.
She was in his room.
In his home.
In Jeon Sion's bed.
Her phone vibrated on the nightstand, insistent, almost aggressive in the dense silence of the room.
The screen flashed.
20 missed calls.
Always the same name.
Always the same guilt she should have felt — but that stubbornly refused to come.
She stared at the name, her fingers trembling slightly, not from panic, but from a strange nervous calm, as if something inside her had finally snapped.
She set the phone down.
Lay back down.
Stared at the ceiling like she was searching for an answer she had never truly wanted.
And against all logic, against all morality…
she felt good.
A dangerous kind of good, almost numbing, like her body had walked through a fire she didn't regret at all.
The door opened in a breath.
The air changed instantly.
A presence — massive, warm, animal — filled the room.
Sion appeared.
Towel low on his hips.
Torso still wet.
Veins visible along his arms.
Droplets sliding slowly down his sculpted abdomen.
The dim bedside lamp carved every line of his body, making him almost unreal, almost dangerous to look at.
He walked without a sound, like a predator.
He stopped in front of the bed and looked at her for a long time — intensely.
His golden eyes glowed with a muted, warped, hungry light.
— I bet you already thought about running, he said, voice low, almost amused, but with that hint of challenge that made the air vibrate between them.
Nari held his gaze.
Calm.
Too calm.
As if the exhaustion of her entire life had dissolved into a fire she couldn't name.
— No, she murmured.
— I felt good.
He raised a brow, surprised despite himself, then stepped closer.
He placed his hands on either side of her head, lowering himself over her.
His shadow swallowed her breath.
His chest barely brushed her skin, yet the impact was immediate — hot, brutal, electric.
The bed seemed to tighten around them.
— So you want to stay?
His words slid along her throat like a knife wrapped in a caress.
Nari felt something rise inside her — a mix of desire and fear, that shiver born deep in the belly that climbs like an illicit flame.
— No, she said.
— I didn't say that either.
He pulled back a step, irritated, like an animal provoked without being hurt.
He turned away, grabbed something from the dresser.
That's when her body decided for her.
Nari reached out.
Her fingers closed around his arm.
Slowly.
As if touching his skin was a dangerous confession.
Sion froze.
His muscle tightened under her grip.
So did his breath.
He turned — and their eyes collided with a force that felt violent.
No words.
Only that heavy, charged, irresistible silence pulling everything toward the inevitable.
She moved.
Sat up.
Leaned forward.
Her fingers slipped toward the towel on his hips.
A hesitant breath…
Then she let it fall.
The fabric touched the floor with a soft sound.
The world tightened around them — a thread on the verge of snapping.
Sion didn't move.
Not a muscle.
His breathing became heavier, deeper, as if his own body was slipping out of his control.
She put her hand on him.
His skin.
His heat.
The raw reality of his desire.
Her fingers explored — timid first, then surer.
Gripping.
Claiming.
Demanding.
And watching him lose composure…
watching him blush, groan softly, clench his throat to hold back a sound…
Seeing him like that, vulnerable beneath her touch, eyes half-closed, lips parted, breath uneven — it was a power she had never had before, a power that set her on fire.
It was the first time she had power over him.
And he felt it.
It drove him insane.
He leaned toward her, eyes burning.
— Don't play with me, Nari.
His voice vibrated.
She continued.
Faster.
Deeper.
A blaze in her hands.
He clenched his fists.
A groan escaped him — raw, torn, almost animal.
— Stop…
— Or I'll take you right now.
She didn't stop.
He broke.
He pushed her gently onto the bed, climbed over her, his hands trapping her wrists with trembling strength.
Silence fell like a slab of iron — heavy, thick, saturated with tension, a silence vibrating between two bodies too close, too hot, too hungry to pretend control anymore.
Nari felt every heartbeat striking against Sion's chest — strong, uneven, almost painful — as if their closeness was rewriting his pulse.
Her breath hitched when he tightened his fingers around her wrists, pinning her to the mattress in a position that had nothing tender and everything possessive, claimed, inevitable.
Their eyes met — fierce, burning — one pleading silently, the other refusing to admit he was already pleading.
— You want me to fuck you? he repeated, low, deep, voice vibrating with frayed control.
— Beg me.
It wasn't a phrase.
It was an ultimatum.
A line between who they had been…
and what they were about to become.
Nari swallowed, throat tight, chest rising too fast.
She wanted to answer, to give in, to insult him, to bite him, to burn everything down.
But nothing came out.
Her body spoke first.
She arched.
Slowly.
Her hips brushed his — a tiny movement, but it detonated something in his eyes — a flash almost animal, almost dangerous, almost vulnerable.
Her thighs parted just slightly.
Her fingers trembled under his grip.
She breathed too fast, too hard.
— Sion…
Her voice broke into a breath.
Just his name.
But it was already a surrender.
He smiled.
Slowly.
A smile that had nothing soft.
A smile of victory.
Of a predator.
Of a man finally getting what he had been denied too long.
— Again.
His voice brushed her lips.
— Say it again.
She closed her eyes, unable to withstand the scalpel-sharp intensity of his gaze, and whispered, a little louder, a little truer:
— Sion…
He released one of her wrists.
His hand slid to her throat.
Not to choke — to hold. To feel. To claim.
And then he snapped.
He leaned down and kissed her like a man dying of thirst kisses water — a devastating kiss, long, deep, brutal, starving, a kiss that stole breath, shook skin, and rendered legs useless.
Their teeth collided.
His tongue pushed.
Tasted.
Took.
Demanded.
She moaned into his mouth — a sound torn from her belly, her shame, her fear, a sound she had never heard herself make.
That moan destroyed him.
Sion pushed her fully down onto the bed, his entire body crushing hers in an embrace that had nothing tender in it — everything feverish, desperate, burning.
His hands moved over her, everywhere.
On her hips.
On her breasts.
On her stomach.
Every inch felt electrically charged.
She tried to catch her breath.
Impossible.
He kissed her again, harder, lower, along her jawline, down her neck, over her collarbone, descending slowly as if savoring every reaction, every tremor, every stifled gasp.
— Do you want me? he murmured against her throat, his voice vibrating against her skin.
She opened her mouth to protest.
A lie.
A defense.
He placed two fingers on her lips.
Pushed them in slightly.
She moaned against her own contradiction.
His fingers slid between her thighs.
She tightened, a brutal electric shock shooting up her spine.
He brushed.
Just that.
She jolted.
He smiled.
— Wet, he observed, voice low, dangerously calm.
— So wet when I've barely touched you.
She looked away, ashamed, burning, trembling.
— Look at me.
His voice snapped, commanding.
She obeyed.
Her belly knotted under the intensity of his golden eyes.
— Now say it.
He pressed a little harder against her, just enough to steal her breath.
— Tell me you want me.
— I…
He insisted.
His finger moved.
She stifled a cry.
— Say it.
She broke.
Everything broke.
— I… want you.
He clenched his jaw.
His gaze blurred, darkened.
His hands slid upward.
His mouth found hers again in a kiss that felt like a wildfire.
The world shrank around them.
No more rain behind the windows.
No more night.
No more walls.
Just their mixed breaths, their burning skin, their hearts pounding like two beasts locked in the same cage.
Sion grabbed her face with both hands, forced her to look at him, his forehead pressed to hers, their noses brushing, their breaths colliding.
— You're mine.
His voice vibrated, deep, rough, almost shaking.
— Say it.
Nari felt her legs give out beneath her despite the bed.
She felt like he was holding her at the edge of a cliff — the one she had feared and desired since the first day.
— Sion…
She knew she was going to fall.
She knew she wanted to fall.
He shifted her body against the mattress in one fluid, controlled, powerful motion — his muscular chest pressing against her breasts, his hips anchored between hers, his hot breath sliding down her throat.
He bit her collarbone.
Not softly.
Not brutally either.
Just hard enough for her to lose all sense of reality for an instant.
— Say it, he repeated, his lips gliding over her skin.
She moaned, a muffled, torn, uncontrolled sound.
Her hips lifted on their own.
Her heart raced.
Her whole body screamed yes even as her mouth tried to hold the truth back.
She slid a trembling hand behind his neck, her fingers running over his warm skin, to the base of his hair still damp from the shower.
She pulled him toward her.
Begged him with her lips without forming the words.
— Take me.
Sion froze.
Just for a second.
His golden eyes widened, a raw, almost wild flash crossing his gaze.
— Say. The. Word.
She took a deep breath, her stomach tightening, her hips arching, and finally:
— I'm yours.
Sion lost control.
A guttural sound escaped him — a kind of muffled growl that had nothing human in it — and he kissed her like she had torn a piece of his heart out.
His hands slid under her thighs, lifted her abruptly.
She released a cry of surprise.
He pulled her against him, his hard length pressing against the wet heat between her legs.
A jolt shot through her from her throat to her lower belly.
He entered her.
In one thrust.
Deep.
Total.
She cried out.
Not from pain.
From shock.
From need.
From an overload she had held back for far too long.
He stayed still for a few seconds, breath caught, his forehead against her cheek, his fingers digging into the flesh of her thighs.
— Fuck, Nari…
His voice broke.
— You feel so…
He couldn't even finish the sentence.
Then he moved.
Slowly at first.
As if he wanted to carve every second into stone.
Every sensation.
Every shiver she let escape despite herself.
His hips moved — in, out — a perfect rhythm, deep, controlled.
Nari clung to his shoulders, her nails sinking into his skin, her moans mixing with his ragged breaths.
— Stop… you're… you're gonna…
— No. Not yet.
He pinned her hands above her head, his fingers intertwined with hers.
— You come when I tell you.
She gasped, unable to resist.
Unable to fight.
Her body vibrated under each thrust.
Then he sped up.
A little.
Then more.
Again.
His rhythm grew deeper, hungrier, more desperate.
Their bodies snapped against each other.
The bed creaked.
Their breaths broke into moans, sighs, choked cries.
— Look at me.
He lifted her face with his fingers.
She obeyed.
Her eyes filled with tears — not from sadness, but from intensity, pleasure, too-much-everything.
— Sion… I…
— Now.
She exploded.
Her stomach tightened violently.
Her thighs trembled around his hips.
Her head fell back, her mouth opening in a cry she couldn't hold back.
He followed her.
One deeper, rougher, instinctive thrust — and he came inside her, his hands shaking against hers, his whole body tensed like he was holding himself back from collapsing.
He stayed inside her for a long time, panting, his head buried in her neck, their breaths mixing into one broken exhale.
Silence returned.
Slowly.
Like a wave after chaos.
Nari got up abruptly, without thinking, as if her muscles had moved before her mind — breath still shattered, skin burning, heart pounding too fast, too hard, too close to breaking — she grabbed the bedsheet with trembling hands, wrapped it around her naked body, and fled into the bathroom like someone escaping a fire, the door slamming behind her with a sharp sound that echoed through the entire apartment.
As soon as the lock clicked, her body gave out.
She slid down the cold wall, the sheet loosened, her knees buckled, and she collapsed onto the floor, back against the freezing tiles that bit into her skin, her hands trembling, her breath too short, too chopped.
And suddenly, without warning, the tears burst.
Not small discreet tears.
Not pretty, controlled sobs.
No.
A raw pain.
Ancient.
A faultline cracking open.
She cried without sound, but her body shook under the violence of the shock, as if every emotion she had held back for years — the shame, the guilt, the fear, the emptiness, the need — had chosen this tiny bathroom to gut her all at once.
She buried her face in her hands, her fingers sliding over her wet cheeks, unable to understand what she was feeling — nor why she was shaking so much, nor why her heart hurt so badly, nor why this night, which should have been forbidden, immoral, impossible, had at the same time freed her and shattered her.
She thought of her boyfriend.
Her mother.
Sion.
Herself.
Everything mixed in a thick chaos crushing her chest.
With shame.
With relief.
With desire.
With fear.
With truth.
She cried until she no longer felt her own body.
On the other side of the door, Sion stayed still.
He didn't try to enter.
He didn't try to speak.
He simply listened.
Every sob.
Every broken breath.
Every muffled tremor.
And something — a tiny shard — cracked inside him.
A pinch.
There.
In his chest.
Violent.
Incomprehensible.
Unacceptable.
He clenched his fists, muscles tight, jaw locked, unable to label what he felt — a mix of rage, frustration, possessiveness, tenderness, hatred, fear — a mix he had never experienced for anyone.
He hated hearing her cry.
He hated that he was the one who had put her in this state.
He hated… how badly he wanted to hold her.
When the door finally opened, Nari reappeared, the sheet clutched around her body, hair stuck to her face, eyes red, swollen, broken, and yet… strangely beautiful in their vulnerability.
She didn't dare raise her eyes.
She froze in the doorway, ready to flee again.
Sion looked at her for a long time.
Silent.
Still.
Burning.
Then, without a word, he approached.
He gently grabbed her wrist, as if afraid she would break under his fingers.
He pulled her against him, a firm gesture but trembling with tension he couldn't control.
She tried to protest, to open her mouth, to step back — but he placed a finger on her lips.
A whisper.
A breath.
An admission he should never have spoken:
— Stay.
She shook her head, ready to say no, ready to run again.
But he added, lower, truer, almost fragile:
— Not for me. For you.
And that was perhaps the only thing that could have made her give in.
He wrapped her in the sheet the way one covers something precious, erasing the cold of the bathroom, erasing the tremble in her shoulders, erasing everything except that strange truth vibrating between them.
He pulled her against him, against his chest still warm from the chaos before, one hand sliding into her hair, the other on her waist, as if he were afraid she would disappear if he loosened his grip even for a second.
Nari rested her head against him.
And for the first time, it wasn't desire.
Nor sex.
Nor escape.
Nor lying.
Just… a need.
A visceral need not to be alone in a world that had just fallen apart.
They fell asleep like that, entwined, in a fragile, almost sacred silence where every breath felt like a confession neither was ready to say out loud.
And that night, without realizing it,
something was born between them.
Not a healthy love.
Not a gentle love.
No.
Something darker.
More violent.
More dangerous.
A bond that would save no one.
A bond that would heal nothing.
A bond born from suffering, desire, need, fear.
A bond that would consume them.
Slowly.
Completely.
Inevitably.