Seven Days Later

"Bzz—bzzz—"

The vibration of a phone by his ear woke Li Mao, who had been sleeping so deeply he no longer knew what was what.

Irritably, he scratched at his long hair, which had become a complete bird's nest. That tiny movement alone made him bare his teeth and suck in a sharp breath.

It wasn't as if Li Mao had never gone through a rut before. Without an Omega partner, he had basically always endured them with suppressants, but he still knew the symptoms of that special period.

Besides, in the rundown unfinished building where he lived, none of the households had any privacy to speak of.

He had heard of partners spending ruts or heats together.

But someone like Wan Fuqi—a perpetual-motion machine who never tired and could endlessly spam his ultimate move—was something he had never seen before.

No wonder the man had said from the start that he was looking for an Alpha partner.

If he had found an Omega partner, this room would look like a morgue by now, with dozens of bodies sprawled every which way.

At that thought, he suddenly realized he still seemed to be lying in that Enigma's home.

Li Mao jolted awake as if from a nightmare and opened his eyes to look around.

He really was still in that mad dog's house.

Only, that mad dog was nowhere to be seen.

He reached out to touch the spot beside him. There was no lingering warmth, and the silk sheets were somewhat cold. It looked like the man had left quite some time ago.

Li Mao relaxed a little. Following the source of the vibrating ringtone, he turned and picked up his phone from the nightstand, a phone he had not seen in days.

But he did not hurry to answer. Instead, he stared with slight confusion at the cigarettes, lighter, and full glass of water that had been arranged beside the phone.

That setup looked a little familiar.

It seemed that when he had argued with Wan Fuqi before, there had been the same setup, the same routine.

He had not thought much of it then, but now it seemed that man had deliberately prepared it here, just waiting for him to use it.

The moment Li Mao realized the truth, goosebumps rose all over him. He did not dare drink it. He seriously suspected the water might contain some unknown aphrodisiac.

Then that man would have something over him, as though he had caught hold of some leverage, and wait for Li Mao to beg him.

Over these seven days, Li Mao seemed to have gotten to know this Enigma a little better.

Though they had spent most of those seven days in bed, they still had to wash up from time to time or eat something to replenish their strength.

That inevitably led to some conversation. Although they could never agree on anything, all those scattered exchanges added up to quite a lot.

At first, he had not wanted to pay the man any attention. He hit and cursed at him, shoved him far away, and even had adrenaline spike several times as he punched Wan Fuqi in the eye, intending to escape.

Without exception, he was caught and dragged back every time.

Later, he gradually ran out of strength. Whenever Wan Fuqi said anything, he simply shut his eyes and played dead, responding with cold violence.

But it had to be said that Wan Fuqi's mental fortitude was truly formidable. He could tirelessly keep pressing his warm face against a cold ass.

Even when Li Mao did not give him so much as a glance, he could still put on a vivid one-man show.

Later still, Li Mao came to terms with it.

Rather than waste energy getting angry with an idiot, he might as well eat a couple more Snickers during breaks, build up his strength, and wear that breeding-obsessed mad dog to death sooner.

And listening to some amusing nonsense and chuckling a few times was better than getting so angry he developed breast nodules.

So later, the situation developed to the point where the two people who had initially argued fiercely and gone at each other hammer and tongs could actually sit harmoniously on the same bed afterward, eating the meal Wan Fuqi had ordered in advance. Once Li Mao was full, he even let the man hold him and tell him trivial little stories to amuse him.

Even when showering, the two took turns using the showerhead.

Whenever Li Mao got foam in his eyes, he even had to grope around and ask Wan Fuqi for help.

After seven days, the way they got along was practically like they were really dating.

But unfortunately, Li Mao had no masochistic tendencies, nor had he developed Stockholm syndrome.

He was still the Alpha who wanted to wash the mark off his body.

Li Mao withdrew his gaze from the things arranged for him on the nightstand and turned his attention back to the phone that had buzzed twice in his hand already.

The caller ID on the screen read "A-Qiang."

He was considered a coworker. They both worked as thugs at Golden Rose Bar and occasionally passed private jobs to each other.

"Fuck..."

Just as Li Mao was about to answer, he accidentally caught sight of the date and let out the simplest, most straightforward exclamation.

No wonder that mad dog was nowhere to be found.

He had slept in a daze for three whole days.

Some of his memories did not quite connect. Sometimes it was Wan Fuqi's face drawing close; sometimes it was the man's concerned questions...

Sometimes it was fingers stroking through his hair; sometimes it was laughter by his ear...

He had even wondered whether Wan Fuqi had gone insane, whether there were eighty or a hundred split personalities inside that body.

So it was because he had slept for too long...

Li Mao pinched at his increasingly throbbing brow and finally answered the call that had been ringing for so long, his conscience belatedly kicking in.

The instant it connected, a rough, hearty male voice came from the other end.

"Bunny, where the hell did you run off to make money this time? Why not bring your brothers along?"

Li Mao had been born in the Year of the Rabbit, and that was where his name came from.

And since the character Mao was hard to use in phrases, every time he introduced himself, he would say it was the Mao from "Mao Rabbit."

Yet people somehow always remembered it as the Rabbit from "Mao Rabbit."

So everyone familiar with him called him Bunny for short, and over time it even became Li Mao's code name.

"Keeping, keeping the King of Hell company in bed. You coming? The pay's not bad," Li Mao answered.

Clearly, the other man did not take him seriously. A-Qiang laughed a few times before asking, "Bunny, there's a job. You taking it or not?"

Li Mao privately wanted to give himself a break. He felt that if this continued, he really would not be far from dropping dead.

But when he thought of the money needed to get the mark washed off at a proper hospital, Li Mao felt he did not deserve a vacation.

So he answered, "Taking it, taking it! A pr-private job or an official one? You know me, don't you? I'll take any job as long as it pays."

Li Mao's main job was still that of a bar thug. Though his usual work was boring as hell, merely helping the boss watch over the place and stopping drunks or rivals from making trouble.

But occasionally, the boss would have this bunch of freeloaders do other jobs.

For example, collecting company debts, teaching some clueless people a lesson, or occasionally acting as drivers, errand runners, deliverymen, and the like...

As for private jobs, they were like the one Li Mao had taken that landed him in Wan Fuqi's hands.

Someone had a commission and found a middleman to name a price. The middleman would then screen it and hand the job to someone they thought capable.

Some clients did not want to show their faces and relied entirely on messages being passed along.

Others, like the one who had drugged Wan Fuqi, were fearless and directly handled the exchange openly.

All that pay counted as extra income.

"A private job, a private job! Bunny, don't say your brother hasn't been thinking of you. I know Xiao Che got into college, and you don't want him to keep working part-time at the bar, so you're trying to save up some money. A few days ago, someone introduced me to a debt-collection job. If it works out, the commission is one percent—more than ten thousand. It's a tough bone to chew, which is why the commission is high. Want to give it a try?"