When Fang Fengzhi reached the hospital, Fu Baiqi’s parents were talking outside the ward. His mother kept wiping her tears with a tissue.
“Dad, Mom…”
They both turned toward him.
“How is Baiqi?”
His mother’s expression immediately darkened.
She stepped away from her husband and fixed Fang Fengzhi with an angry, venomous stare. Instead of answering, she demanded shrilly:
“What is that disgusting scent on you?”
Fang Fengzhi paused.
He knew she meant Min Zhi’s pheromones. The temporary mark had not faded, and they had been intimate again the previous night. Concealing the scent was impossible.
But he had no intention of lying.
Her harsh words made him uncomfortable. He frowned and said nothing.
His silence amounted to an admission.
Fu Baiqi’s mother trembled with anger. His father also frowned, looking at Fang Fengzhi with reproach and disgust.
Still, this was a hospital. Unwilling to attract attention, she merely clenched her teeth and stared at him with hatred.
Just then, a nurse hurried out of the ward.
“Is the patient’s partner here?”
Fang Fengzhi hesitated.
His marriage to Fu Baiqi existed only on paper now. Besides, he carried Min Zhi’s mark. Physically, he was no longer Fu Baiqi’s partner.
The other two apparently shared that thought. Neither spoke.
“Is there something that needs signing?” Fu Baiqi’s father asked.
“No. The patient is only temporarily out of danger. He needs his partner’s pheromones to soothe him.”
His mother grew angrier still.
She blamed Fang Fengzhi for allowing another man to mark him, glaring as though she wanted to kill him. But stabilizing her son mattered most.
Suppressing her anger, she asked, “Would highly compatible pheromones work?”
“Yes.”
Fang Fengzhi followed the nurse inside.
Fu Baiqi lay weakly on the bed after the car accident. His already fair skin was now utterly bloodless.
Fang Fengzhi approached and saw the thick bandages around his forehead.
He could not quite name what he felt.
Only that Fu Baiqi looked pitiable.
The nurse explained that he had injuries of varying severity across his body, the worst being to his head. Highly compatible pheromones could ease his pain and help him through this dangerous period.
To an Omega, Alpha pheromones were like nourishment. The reverse was also true.
As Fang Fengzhi approached, Fu Baiqi’s weak pheromones seemed suddenly revitalized, reaching toward him.
But with Min Zhi’s mark on him, the scent of another Alpha had become unpleasant.
Fang Fengzhi rubbed his nose. Once the nurse left, he quietly loosened his collar and tucked the lower half of his face inside it.
A faint trace of gunsmoke remained there.
He breathed it in deeply, finally relaxing.
Craving another man’s pheromones beside his husband in name filled him with an inexpressible guilt, even if Fu Baiqi knew nothing.
He shifted and turned his back to the bed.
After more than an hour, Fu Baiqi’s pheromones had steadied considerably.
A doctor arrived to examine him, and Fang Fengzhi went outside to wait.
Free of the Alpha scent, he breathed more easily.
He checked his phone and found two missed calls from Min Zhi.
Both were from an hour earlier, while he had been rushing from work to the hospital.
After hesitating for a few seconds, he called back.
The call connected quickly, but no one spoke.
He lowered his voice, as though afraid of being overheard.
“Hello? Mr. Min?”
“Yes.”
A pause.
“You’re at the hospital?”
“How did you know?”
Min Zhi sounded somewhat cold, though perhaps no different from usual.
“I heard Fu Baiqi was in an accident.”
Then he asked, “Is everything all right?”
“Not really. He’s out of immediate danger, but he hasn’t woken up.”
There was a long silence.
Min Zhi seemed about to say more, but Fang Fengzhi saw Fu Baiqi’s parents approaching from the elevators.
“Mr. Min, something’s come up. I have to go.”
Fu Baiqi’s mother stopped before him.
“Why are you out here?”
“The doctor is examining him.”
She frowned and said nothing more, though her anger remained.
After the examination, the doctor came out.
“For now, there are no further problems.”
“But he will continue to need soothing pheromones during this period. They will be very beneficial to his recovery.”
Once the doctor left, Fang Fengzhi entered with Fu Baiqi’s parents.
At the sight of her son, his mother began crying again.
There were no outsiders in the room now. Suddenly, she swung her hand at Fang Fengzhi’s face.
He could not dodge in time, only take half a step back. Her fingers scraped across his cheek, leaving a burning sting.
Failing to land the blow as intended only enraged her further.
“Has our family not treated you well enough? How could you do something like this? Have you no shame?”
She raised her hand again.
This time, Fang Fengzhi caught her wrist.
Before she could continue, his expression startled her into silence.
“Was I the one who betrayed him first?”
The usually meek man seemed transformed. His eyes held anger and weary impatience.
“Why is he allowed to do it, but I’m not?”
Fu Baiqi’s mother froze, unable to answer.
His father frowned.
Only when he saw his wife losing ground did he step in, drawing her hand away as though mediating.
“Baiqi is still ill. We can discuss this later.”
Then he added, “Baiqi certainly bears some blame. But he’s ended things with that person. You shouldn’t go on degrading yourself like this.”
So he had known too.
Fang Fengzhi had been the only one kept in the dark.
Beyond his speechless anger, there was only disappointment.
He looked at them, then at the man lying in the bed.
From beginning to end, they had never treated him as family.
They had always kept that distinction clear, as though he were beneath them.
An uncontrollable disgust rose inside him.
“I don’t consider it degrading myself.”
He looked directly at them.
Before, he had respected them because he owed them money, because they were Fu Baiqi’s parents, because they were his elders. Hoping they would spend their lives as a family, he had tried to please them.
But things were different now.
More than half the debt had been repaid. His feelings for Fu Baiqi were almost exhausted.
He no longer needed to let them bully him.
“I printed the divorce agreement last week. All it needs is Fu Baiqi’s signature.”
“If you think what I’ve done has embarrassed your family, we can use his fingerprint instead. Then I’ll leave.”
Expressionless, he watched Fu Baiqi’s mother’s eyes widen.
They needed him now.
They would not dare do anything.
It was the first time she had seen him angry like this. His words frightened her too.
She wanted to lash out, but she was afraid he might simply walk away.
At present, Fu Baiqi could not do without him.
In the end, she could only glare resentfully before sitting down, her face livid.
Only then did Fang Fengzhi release a slow breath.
He went outside and sat in the corridor.
He rarely argued with anyone.
Especially since coming to this unfamiliar city, he had always felt bound by something. To live in peace, he had constantly swallowed his frustration.
But just now, that restraint seemed to have loosened along with his fading love for Fu Baiqi.
He wanted to let out everything he had held inside.
Having done so, he did feel lighter.
Yet their cruel words still lodged in him like thorns.
He leaned back.
The faint scent of gunsmoke drifted from his clothes.
Weary, he was about to close his eyes when he noticed a tall figure distinctly out of place among the people nearby.
He paused.
Turning, he saw Min Zhi approaching.
Fu Baiqi’s parents could not see him.
That was his only thought.
Before Min Zhi reached him, Fang Fengzhi stood, caught his hand, and pulled him away.
Min Zhi followed him into the stairwell.
Few people came here, but Fang Fengzhi remained tense.
He released Min Zhi’s hand and glanced back at the door.
“What happened to your face?”
“What?”
Fang Fengzhi touched his cheek without understanding.
“The scratch.”
Min Zhi looked at him.
“His family did that?”
“Yes.”
“Why are you here?” Fang Fengzhi asked.
Min Zhi did not answer.
He studied the mark on Fang Fengzhi’s cheek with an unreadable expression, then took his hand.
“Come on.”
Fang Fengzhi stayed still.
“Where?”
“Come home with me.”
“I can’t.”
He withdrew his hand and looked aside.
“The doctor says he needs my pheromones. I can’t leave yet.”
Min Zhi frowned.
It was true. As Fu Baiqi’s legal spouse, Fang Fengzhi ought to remain beside him at a time like this.
Besides, Fu Baiqi needed his pheromones.
Morally, leaving would be difficult to justify.
But smelling another Alpha’s pheromones on him stirred a possessiveness in Min Zhi.
He wanted only to take this Omega back to his own home.
So softhearted. So easily hurt.
“I’m worried about you.”
“What?”
Fang Fengzhi stared at him.
When Min Zhi did not repeat himself, he could not help asking again.
“Why are you worried about me?”
Min Zhi looked at him.
His sense of right and wrong tore at him.
He knew Fang Fengzhi was waiting for an answer.
He also knew he should not give it now. Doing so would make him a man deliberately pursuing someone else’s spouse.
Yet saying nothing felt even more unbearable.
He wanted his answer to hold Fang Fengzhi here, to give him something certain to rely on.
He wanted no one else to touch him.
He wanted Fang Fengzhi to be faithful to him—to the third party in his marriage.
Min Zhi felt as though he were being torn in two.
He might have hesitated longer.
But then he saw the timidity and hope in Fang Fengzhi’s eyes, and the conflict settled into a single decision.
He spoke.
“Would you give us a try?”
“What?”
Min Zhi looked at him and repeated, “Would you like to be with me?”
Fang Fengzhi’s heart pounded.
The more deeply the moment moved him, the harder it became to forget that he was still married.
His guilt reached its height.
“No… I can’t.”
But as soon as he said it, he seemed afraid Min Zhi might simply accept the refusal.
He hurriedly caught his hand.
“Wait until I’m divorced.”
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