Only One Chance Means You Have to Fight for It

"As someone with a husband, you still have to ask someone else to help wash off your mark."

Wan Fuqi's breath against Li Mao's neck was frighteningly hot.

The flesh-toned muscles of Alpha's back were pressed clearly against the misty glass.

Li Mao gritted his teeth and replied, "I don't, I don't have a husband..."

"Oh?"

The sore spot that usually set Wan Fuqi off at the slightest touch seemed to have lost some of its power at this moment.

As if he truly did not understand the situation, Wan Fuqi put on a serious expression and curiously pressed on, "You don't have a husband? Then why do you have a mark on you?"

"So that means just anyone will do, right?"

"Shut up!" Li Mao roared.

"Screech—"

The sound of bare skin scraping against damp glass was not particularly pleasant.

"Shut up?"

Looking at Li Mao, furious beyond measure, Wan Fuqi revealed a somewhat satisfied smile.

"Sorry, sir, shutting up is not among the services I provide. But I can tell you another way to make me shut up."

As he spoke, Wan Fuqi extended the tip of his pale-red tongue and lightly swept it across the corner of his upper lip.

"I'll give you a chance to cheat. Have you thought it through? Same old rule: you only get one chance."

With the steadily rising temperature in the bathroom, Li Mao's skin had taken on an unnatural pale flush, like a green apple slowly ripening into a fully red one.

The last time this man had bullied him with the words "one chance" was still vivid in his mind.

Li Mao wavered.

He knew Wan Fuqi always meant what he said. If he said there was only one chance, then he would never give him another opportunity to run away.

He did not want to hear those things.

No matter how thick-skinned he was, those words were different from the usual mockery and veiled jabs of daily life.

They were like enchanted weapons. Anything Wan Fuqi said seemed to come with magic that pierced straight through, striking directly at Li Mao's self-respect.

The more he listened, the more ashamed he became, until he wanted to find a crack in the ground and crawl into it.

But taking the initiative to kiss the source of all this evil felt a little too much like total surrender...

Even he was starting to look down on himself...

After thinking it over and over, his pride narrowly won out.

Li Mao turned his face away, avoiding those blue eyes that made his back prickle, and growled, "Get lost!"

"So you're forfeiting, right?"

With a cheerful smile, Wan Fuqi raised a hand, removed the hearing aid from his right ear, and casually tossed it onto the floor.

After throwing away the hearing aid that helped him hear, Wan Fuqi supported Li Mao and lifted him into his arms.

"Ah...!"

The sudden feeling of weightlessness made Li Mao's voice rise involuntarily.

Li Mao had no idea where this man got so much strength. He was only a head shorter than Wan Fuqi, maybe five or six centimeters at most, yet Wan Fuqi could lift and hold him so easily.

"Y-you fucking crazy? Put, put me down! What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Unfortunately, after removing his hearing aid, Wan Fuqi seemed to have put up a barrier between himself and the outside world.

The little hearing left in his right ear was not enough to catch Li Mao's increasingly vicious curses.

In the end, Wan Fuqi carried Li Mao to the vanity outside the bathroom.

Just by looking at Li Mao's mouth, gasping for breath, Wan Fuqi could tell how fiercely he had been cursing just now.

He might not actually have managed to curse much. Mainly, when the little stutter got emotional, he stuttered even worse, and his energy expenditure doubled outright.

When he was little, he often used this trick to make his older sister stomp her feet in fury.

Now that it was used on Li Mao, this little stutter, its effectiveness had multiplied several times over.

After putting in so much effort to curse someone out, only for the other person not to hear a single word—how furious must that have made him?

Wan Fuqi wanted to laugh, but in the end, he held back his gloating smile and leaned in to kiss Li Mao's moist lips.

There was a faint bitterness, the taste of the cigarette he had smoked earlier, but since he had only smoked one, it was not very strong.

It was bitter, not as pleasant as the tangy sweetness of green apples.

"Do you know how many days an Enigma's susceptible period lasts?" Wan Fuqi immediately educated Li Mao. "At least seven days."

The instant Li Mao heard that number, his breathing stopped.

How was that any different from sentencing him to death?

Wan Fuqi was very satisfied with his reaction and continued, "Enigmas are different from Alphas. There's no such thing as a susceptible period for us, and smelling any pheromones won't trigger a reaction..."

"But if refined pheromones are injected directly, that's another matter entirely. Don't you think, darling?"

"Darling, after all the times we've spent together, I think you should understand one thing."

He raised an index finger in front of Li Mao's eyes.

"When something gives you only one chance, no matter the cost, you should fight for it with everything you have. Don't you think?"

Wan Fuqi leaned closer to Li Mao. This time, his tongue curled over Li Mao's cupid's bow.

"You'll never wash off my mark for the rest of your life. Do you understand?"

Li Mao's hand braced behind him on the vanity shifted back a short distance.

Driven by instinctive fear, he trembled uncontrollably.

Run?

He knew he could not escape.

Fight back?

He also knew he could not win.

What could he do?

Li Mao had never felt as lost as he did now.

He did not know how things had ended up like this again.

They had gotten along fairly harmoniously last night, with the carefree detachment of keeping it physical and leaving emotions out of it.

But how had things turned into this the moment morning came?

Couldn't Wan Fuqi just let him go?

Why couldn't he let Li Mao wash off the mark and go on being a poor Alpha, while Wan Fuqi continued being one of the upper class—a noble Enigma standing high above and looking down on everything?!

"W-why does it have to be me?" Li Mao knew Wan Fuqi could read his lips, and he asked with a shred of hope.

Wan Fuqi's smile sent a chill through his heart.

He watched Li Mao's wet eyes for a moment, and the irritability of his susceptible period worsened somewhat.

Looking at him with those eyes—that was cheating.

It seemed what he should have shut off most was not his hearing, but his sight.

He could not give this coquettish little cat any opening to exploit.

Wan Fuqi raised his hand and covered Li Mao's eyes as they looked at him.

He answered casually, "Because your voice sounds nice, I suppose...?"