Heavy Rain Chapter 16

Haejin, slumped in the dark room, was so small. It was as if he might seep into the darkness and disappear just like that. So the moment he heard the whisper that he wanted to vanish, Lyle realized he could no longer hold back.

He strode toward the fellow. Consequently, the guards waiting behind him swarmed into the room.

Even as several people crowded in, Haejin appeared indifferent. That only served to provoke Lyle further, causing him to command the person beside him through gritted teeth.

“Take him.”

It was a situation akin to kidnapping a civilian, but the guard stepped forward without question. When Haejin inadvertently looked at the man approaching him, the guard reflexively raised his hand. It was a gesture intended to knock him out as he was.

The moment Lyle noticed the guard’s movement, he stopped him in spite of himself.

“Wait.”

Before the frozen guard could even cast a questioning look, Lyle strode forward. He then proceeded to lift the fellow, who seemed unable to get up from the bed, just as he was.

“Ah.”

With a lifeless sound, Haejin was slung over his shoulder. He struggled briefly to resist, but he was no match for the strength. Even that effort seemed to drain him after only a few movements, and the fellow soon went limp.

“Let’s go back.”

So, the moment he lifted Haejin, Lyle was confused. He couldn’t distinguish whether he was annoyed by Haejin, who didn’t even struggle properly as if it were someone else’s business, or by this weight that was even lighter than he had imagined.

Haejin, who had unilaterally ended the contract, was thus dragged away by Lyle’s hands after nearly a month.

The touch of the plush sofa against his backside awakened Haejin’s hazy mind. It was the same reception room, the same furniture as when he first contracted with Lyle.

In the end, I’ve returned to this mansion.

“…”

He never imagined that Lyle would personally carry him and drag him off as if kidnapping him. His mind raced busily at the situation, which was unexpected in many ways.

However, his body, having starved for days, seemed to have come down with something like a cold, as he truly had no energy. Even the heating in that cheap motel had been subpar, as expected.

Unconsciously, he glanced toward the door of the reception room where he had been dragged. He heard the sound of Lyle grinding his teeth, glaring at him as if he were about to devour him. The secretary standing behind also appeared somewhat surprised. Because he was a man who remained expressionless even when his business card was thrown away in front of him, Haejin thought that face was quite a sight.

“Contract again.”

“…”

That damned contract. Why did Lyle keep looking for Haejin?

Just as Haejin’s presence, which had been faint to Lyle for the past five years, had recently become a constant irritation, Haejin could not understand this interest from Lyle, who had neglected him all this time.

Come to think of it, the secretary only laid out terms every time he came; he never explained any special circumstances. Could there have been a problem with the blood test? No, if it were something like that, he wouldn’t have been dragged here, but taken straight to the hospital.

“What do you want. Tell me what you want, and don’t give me that bullshit about wanting to disappear.”

It seemed Lyle could not understand at all that a person who has hit rock bottom in life sometimes desires nothing. He simply wanted to remain exactly as he was, in a collapsed state.

He didn’t want to explain his situation to Lyle at this point. Since they stood at absolute opposite poles, they would never be able to understand each other.

So he asked. The reason why he was going this far.

“Why are you doing this to me?”

He believed an answer would come immediately. He thought that while Lyle might not have felt it worth explaining to Haejin, he would have his own reasons.

But unexpectedly, he just stared this way with his mouth clamped shut. That momentary gap was puzzling to Haejin.

“…It’s just because there is no partner as convenient as you.”

However, at the words that followed, a self-deprecating laugh escaped Haejin in spite of himself. The question that had briefly drifted in scattered onto the floor like grains of sand.

Right, I must have been useful.

Haejin’s desperation must have manifested in that way. He probably liked that even his heat cycles were few because he was a recessive type. Lyle utterly hated it when Omegas acted like Omegas. Thus, he tended to loathe things like Omegas who became soggy with their heat cycles.

On the day he met his first heat in this mansion, Lyle, who happened to hold Haejin, was greatly displeased. Looking at the inevitably sticky body, he did not hide his look of disgust. Even though he wore a blindfold, that disgust was felt in its entirety.

Since then, although irregular, the heat had come several more times. Lyle strictly avoided those periods, and Haejin had to endure them by taking medicine. When the heat ended that way, he had to go back to that room with a tattered body and accept Lyle.

So, there was no way he wasn’t convenient.

“I suppose so.”

Haejin’s head, speaking calmly, gradually lowered. It was annoying to meet that empty gaze, but when that gaze pointedly turned elsewhere, this time it brought a sense of thirst.

Even while observing his own incomprehensible state, Lyle tried hard to calm his emotions. It was impulsive, but he did not regret bringing him to the mansion blindly. He even felt that it was something that absolutely had to be done.

Because it was late at night, he wasn’t wearing a tie, yet strangely, the area around his neck felt uncomfortable. As if something were caught, Lyle felt around his own neck. Naturally, there was nothing there.

Lyle tried his best to ignore this unpleasant and ominous feeling. Then, he spoke coldly to Haejin, who had offered no particular response for a while.

“If you’re going to die wandering around like this anyway, use yourself for me.”

Unexpectedly, that sounded like a sort of answer to Haejin. So that was the identity of this bizarre peace.

Anyway, he felt as if his body were being dragged all the way down to the floor. His swollen throat was tightly blocked, emitting a stinging pain. The thoughts that surfaced as his body hit its limit in various ways soon scattered into the air.

“Jin.”

Seeing Haejin making a strange expression without even answering, Lyle was simply dumbfounded. He irritably gripped the table placed between them. Strangely, the anger he had managed to suppress surged up at that one expression.

Tossing the contract in front of him, Lyle urged him to sign. Since he had gone as far as bringing the person back by force, he had to persuade him somehow. At this moment, the option of looking for another Omega did not exist for Lyle.

“I’ll let you live without lifting a single finger, just as you have until now, so contract.”

“…”

Involuntarily, Haejin couldn’t help but receive the strange impression that Lyle was more shameless than he thought. Again, a self-deprecating laugh leaked out. Life in this mansion had never been good enough to be described that way.

The breath entering his lungs strangely would not come out well. It was as if it were stubbornly insisting on staying there, just like the body’s owner. He didn’t even look at the white paper thrown in front of him. When he painfully turned his eyes, the chandelier on the ceiling seemed to look strangely blurred.

Lyle, who had been minutely observing even a single strand of Haejin’s eyelashes in spite of himself since a moment ago, clenched his fists seeing that expressionless face. Haejin’s faint pheromones just flowed down to the floor without carrying any emotion.

Lyle, seized by a strange sense of urgency, opened his mouth even while knowing it was a threat. The words jumping from the tip of his tongue felt strangely rough.

“Or do you want me to violate you by force?”

Haejin shook his head weakly. That kind of emotional consumption was too burdensome. The current him would not be able to endure it. Furthermore, Haejin knew very well. That Lyle was a person who could violate him by force if it were truly necessary.

Thinking this far, his breath suddenly caught. Only then did he realize that he truly did not want to return to this mansion.

But he had already been dragged here. In front of him lay a restraint disguised as a contract. He couldn’t breathe properly, as if the paper contract were strangling him. He hadn’t eaten anything, yet nausea rose from within. The back of his head ached coldly, as if it had struck the ice of a freezing lake.

Haejin thought that Lyle was breaking him again. Just like when he first contracted here.

“…Jin?”