58

'Why'd you come down?' Lu Heyang took the schoolbag from the passenger seat and shut the car door. 'You could've waited for me at home — it's not safe out here.'

Xu Ze's speech centers had temporarily gone offline; he only nodded. Lu Heyang's face seemed strung with invisible threads, tugging his gaze and refusing to let it go.

'Let's go up.' Lu Heyang, walking just behind Xu Ze, raised a hand quite naturally — then paused halfway, and in the end only patted Xu Ze's back twice, lightly.

The climb upstairs was quiet. Xu Ze's hand hung at his side, brushing Lu Heyang's knuckles every so often. He felt as though every one of his senses had gathered into that single point of contact, his body reduced to nothing but a beating heart.

The stairwell had no light, and the doorway was pitch-black. Ordinarily Xu Ze could open the door smoothly even in the dark, but today he tried for a long time and still couldn't align the key with the lock. Lu Heyang stood by and watched quietly for half a minute, then finally turned on the flashlight of his Mobile Phone, shone it over, and, holding Xu Ze's hand, guided the key into the lock.

'Don't be nervous.' Lu Heyang's voice sounded like it was smiling. 'I'm not a bad guy.'

'...' Xu Ze pushed the door open in silence, meaning to hold it and let Lu Heyang in first — but Lu Heyang pressed a hand to his shoulder, steered him inside, and pulled the door shut behind them with his other hand.

While shutting the door, Lu Heyang reached up to take off his cap. At the same instant, Xu Ze turned and stepped half a pace toward him, reaching out to hold him.

It was in that moment that Xu Ze suddenly, fully understood what 'making it official' meant.

It meant being allowed to set aside caution and hesitation and simply ask for, and give, an embrace — being allowed, with good reason, to be the one to reach out first. He happened to be precisely the sort of person who lacked that kind of courage.

Lu Heyang froze for half a second, then shut the door. With one hand he pulled off his cap and tossed it onto the cabinet beside them; with the other he settled against the side of Xu Ze's neck, thumb pressed under his chin, tilting his face up, and kissed the corner of his mouth. Then he just looked at him, saying nothing.

Under a gaze like that, Xu Ze's throat went tight. He swallowed down a breath and leaned in, brushing a kiss against Lu Heyang's lower lip — still that same artless, unstudied kind of kiss. Lu Heyang parted his lips slightly and the tip of Xu Ze's tongue met his; he could feel Xu Ze's breath catch and tremble, his arms tightening around him. Xu Ze had not spoken a single word since they'd met, and yet every gesture seemed to say everything.

'Mind if I borrow your shower?' The hem of Lu Heyang's shirt had been unconsciously bunched in Xu Ze's grip, the collar nearly choking him. He drew back a little from Xu Ze, tugged the collar back into place, and said he'd only rinsed off quickly after training before getting on the plane, and wanted to wash again properly.

The kiss had been a little too short. Xu Ze licked the corner of his mouth, nodded, and after a pause said, 'You cut your hair.'

The living room was dark; Lu Heyang couldn't figure out how Xu Ze had noticed, since it had only been trimmed a little. He hummed in acknowledgment and joked, 'That's why I wore the cap.'

Xu Ze wanted to say it looked good shorter, but only thought it. He let go, went to the bathroom and turned on the light. Lu Heyang took the change of clothes from the schoolbag and followed him in, asking offhandedly, 'Have you showered?'

'Already did.' As though afraid Lu Heyang might bump into something in the dark, Xu Ze switched on the brightest of the lights. He leaned against the sink to clear a path, and under the glare raced to trace every line of Lu Heyang's face with his eyes.

'Planning to watch me shower?' Lu Heyang set the clothes down and turned his head to look at Xu Ze.

There was something different in his gaze — a sharpness, like the muzzle of a gun locked on target after professional training. Xu Ze felt himself a shooting target, hit dead center.

In the gap while Xu Ze stood there stunned, Lu Heyang raised his hands and began undressing. 'Then keep me company.'

In the mirror, Lu Heyang caught sight of the red flush creeping up behind Xu Ze's ears. By the time he'd pulled his shirt off, Xu Ze had already made it to the door and shut it quickly behind him.

Lu Heyang laughed, turned off the power-hungry light and switched on a dimmer one. He reached for the shampoo on the shelf — the kind Xu Ze always used, a soft plastic bottle that gave off a cheap scent when opened, but on Xu Ze, perhaps because it had mingled with his Pheromone, somehow smelled good.

Xu Ze had actually been standing outside the bathroom for a while, motionless, as though a rope had sprouted from the door handle, stretched over, and looped itself around his neck — just waiting for Lu Heyang to open the door and undo the knot.

Only after finally realizing how perverse this was did Xu Ze make himself go back to his room.

The draft paper lay spread on the desk. Because Xu Ze had assumed Lu Heyang would call tonight, he'd kept the four questions right in front of him. He sat down and began reciting them — usually knowledge points and textbook passages came to him quickly and smoothly, but these four short questions he stumbled over, unable to make them stick. His attention was clearly scattered to the winds, yet he was stubbornly, almost mulishly determined to get every word exactly right.

When Lu Heyang came in, Xu Ze was still wrestling with his own focus. At the sound of the door he immediately dragged a stack of test papers over the draft paper to cover it, and stood up.

'What are you looking at?' Lu Heyang, toweling his hair, walked over and sat down in the chair.

'...Test papers.'

'Test papers.' Lu Heyang echoed Xu Ze's answer, then laid a hand on the stack. Xu Ze's shoulders tensed; he was already bracing to give up the fight — but Lu Heyang didn't lift the papers. Instead he asked, 'How can you lie to me?'

'You're going to get a spanking.' He looked up at Xu Ze. 'Hand out.'

Xu Ze offered his palm to Lu Heyang without resistance. His heartbeat quickened — not from nervousness, but from some baseless, wordless anticipation.

But Lu Heyang only gave a symbolic pat to his open palm, then caught his hand and drew him down onto his lap.

'Didn't I tell you before — whatever you want to know, just ask, and I'll answer.' Lu Heyang ran his fingers through the hair at the back of Xu Ze's head; it had just been washed too, cool and soft, sliding through his fingers like water. The cheapest shampoo, and yet the best hair it had ever touched — this Alpha really was easy to keep.

'One.' Xu Ze hesitated a moment, then began reciting the questions on the draft paper. 'You said the target wasn't him — then who was it?'

'A bodyguard. Tang Feiyi had a grudge against him, so he sent people to snatch that Alpha out from beside you, to draw him out into the open.'

Xu Ze thought for a moment. His grandmother's Sanatorium already had heavy security of its own, with strict entry and exit controls — so the easiest way in was through him. And Tang Feiyi had indeed pulled it off.

'Anything else?' Lu Heyang asked.

'Two.' Xu Ze recited, textbook-stiff and word-perfect, 'Are the bodyguards you arranged for me and my grandmother very expensive — can you tell me how much...'

Halfway through he realized something was off. The original had been 'can you tell me how much?' — he'd dropped the question. So after speaking, he paused, then added the missing question back on, uncertainly: '...can you tell me?'

'Just learned to talk?' Lu Heyang's fingertip slid down along the back of Xu Ze's neck, pressing lightly along his spine and the small of his back. 'Where's the language-function reset button?'

Xu Ze caught his hand and turned his face aside to hide his embarrassment, but pressed on stubbornly: 'Can you tell me?'

'Protecting you and your grandmother is, for the bodyguards, actually the lowest-risk assignment they could draw. Even on a quiet day they're still getting paid, so there are no extra fees — you don't need to worry about that.'

Seeing Xu Ze's brow still slightly furrowed, Lu Heyang shifted the subject. 'What else?'

'Oh... three.' Xu Ze paused — not because he couldn't remember the line, but because he wasn't sure he ought to ask it.

'Go ahead, then we sleep. I'm a little tired.' Lu Heyang tipped his forehead against Xu Ze's shoulder.

Xu Ze turned toward him, one arm slipping around Lu Heyang's waist, and caught the same scent in his hair as his own — and for no clear reason, that made him feel steadier. He asked, 'He Wei said you don't remember anything from when you were little. Why is that?'

'Because I don't remember.' Lu Heyang lifted his head, unsurprised by He Wei's loudmouth tendencies. 'It sounds like a non-answer, but I genuinely don't. I had it looked into — nothing turned up.'

'Mm.' Xu Ze nodded. The last question — 'how long before you come back?' — was obviously no longer necessary to ask.

'Anything else?'

'Nothing left.' After a brief two-second exchange of looks with Lu Heyang, Xu Ze looked away — and suddenly noticed, just behind Lu Heyang's shoulder, beneath the collar, what looked like a dark bruise.

He leaned in at once, tugged the collar up a little, and asked, worried, 'How did you get hurt?'

'Didn't you say you had no more questions?' It was only a small bruise — nothing, compared to the injuries Xu Ze had taken boxing. Lu Heyang drew Xu Ze's hand back down. 'Training always comes with a few knocks.'

Xu Ze said nothing, plainly unconvinced, and began scanning Lu Heyang's body for any other injuries.

'Probably hidden under clothes.' Lu Heyang's smile was faint, unusually a little lazy — he seemed tired.

— To Xu Ze, of course, it was simply 'Lu Heyang is tired,' not 'there seems to be some other meaning.'

'Where?' Xu Ze's expression was serious, his tone even carrying a trace of coaxing. 'Let me look. I'll put some medicine on it, and once it's done we'll sleep.'

'Don't look.' Lu Heyang leaned back in the chair, trying to talk him out of it.

The more Lu Heyang tried to dissuade him, the less reassured Xu Ze felt. 'I want to look.'

Somehow, between one thing and another, 'looking' had ended up on the bed — and the one whose clothes came off first turned out to be Xu Ze. Lu Heyang caught Xu Ze's ankle and pressed a kiss to it. 'How are your legs this long.'

Xu Ze lay back against the pillow, panting, one hand still fisted in the hem of Lu Heyang's T-shirt — still set on wanting to see his injuries.

'No other injuries — I'm not lying to you, don't be tense.' Lu Heyang soothed him, one hand settling over the place where Xu Ze's heart was beating fast. The faint swell of his chest rose and fell with each breath, supple and quietly powerful.

'...' Xu Ze opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He took Lu Heyang's hand, drew it to his lips, and kissed his fingertips.