HOYSE CHAPTER 105

Chapter 105 — Guard

The tall man wet his lips, as if savoring a taste.

He truly had not expected it. In Rong Jing’s arms, Gu Xi could go soft and liquid as water, yet now his reflexes and speed were razor sharp. Faced with someone who was not Rong Jing, he flipped back into that distant, cool, proud Omega. The real Gu Xi carried a bone-deep aversion to Alphas and he did not even bother to put them in his eyes.

The man was convinced his performance was flawless. He copied Rong Jing’s tone and cadence, and the room was pitch black. There was no way Gu Xi could tell. Yet Gu Xi still caught the difference almost at once and fought like a striking hawk, as if he was born with a sensor that recognized only Rong Jing.

“How did you figure it out? What gave me away?” [Rong Jing] pushed back, unwilling to concede, eyes like a hawk pinning Gu Xi in place.

He was not Rong Jing, so he could not ignore the body’s need. Heat hammered at him, and he held it down by force. He could feel how fatal the attraction to this Omega was in this body, especially after five temporary marks. Even his soul wanted Gu Xi’s name carved into it.

Gu Xi yanked his collar together. Where the imposter had touched him, his skin crawled.

Realizing this “Rong Jing” would not let him go like the last few times, Gu Xi knew he might not escape clean. He slid his phone behind his back and quietly dialed Xie Ling. But water from afar does not douse a nearby fire. Before Xie Ling could arrive, he had to evade on his own. And the Alpha in front of him, eyes full of hungry frustration, looked like he was out of patience.

Gu Xi let out a laugh. “What gave you away? Everything.”

That crisp contempt, calm and edged with rejection, snapped the man’s temper. Humiliation burned through him. Three months of this, the same face, a similar soul, yet Gu Xi treated them like two different worlds.

Resentment and shame festered into darker wants. He gathered himself to lunge again, but Gu Xi was already moving. He let the man grab air, rolled beneath the bed, and snatched the lamp off the nightstand.

The man glanced at the lamp, lips curling as if to mock him. Did Gu Xi really think that could stop him?

“If it were him, he would never force me.” Gu Xi had spent so long winning Rong Jing’s heart, trying every method he could think of. If luck had not turned, they might have remained only friends forever.

Rong Jing was one of a kind. You cannot copy that. No one can replace him. If he were anything less singular, you would never have appeared.

Gu Xi did not know where the double had come from, but he could guess. And his guess was likely close to the mark.

He was not calm. His gaze flicked toward his real target: the bedroom door.

The copy had Rong Jing’s body and senses. He tracked Gu Xi’s thought in an instant.

Silence pressed down on the room. Gu Xi stood in only a thin sleep shirt. Neither of them spoke. Even their breathing seemed to quiet, like the air before a storm.

Suddenly, Gu Xi feinted and then bolted the other way for the door. His hand closed around the knob, but the man was already on him.

Bang.

The door slammed shut.

Gu Xi kicked up, but the man pinned him with a knee and caught both wrists behind his back. Gu Xi was fully restrained.

“Get out,” Gu Xi roared, twisting hard. The strength of an Alpha near the top of the pyramid years later was overwhelming.

“I cannot get out. They say I am your Alpha.” He lowered his head toward Gu Xi’s throat. Rage flushed Gu Xi’s face and sped his breath.

Not satisfied, the man deliberately went for Gu Xi’s mouth next, savoring how Gu Xi dodged him with stubborn, furious grace. He chased, and Gu Xi refused. He wanted to “teach” him, one humiliation at a time. He whispered at Gu Xi’s ear, “We have done more than five temporary marks. If I release pheromones, I can force you to become my ‘slave.’ Even if you do not want it, your body will obey.”

He was not wrong about the mechanics. Rong Jing and Gu Xi were only one step from a lifelong mark. Their match was so high that in an AO pairing, if the Alpha truly wanted to press the claim, resistance could be useless.

But all of that belonged to Rong Jing, not this counterfeit. The instant Gu Xi felt the man’s pheromones flare for real, despair flickered in his eyes.

At that very moment, pain tore through the man’s skull, like invisible hands wrenching him back. Something was stopping him.

Somewhere in the locked-away dark, the bug that had been bound and buried raged. Rong Jing’s soul boiled up and shoved back. He would not allow anyone to force Gu Xi.

A scrap of memory he had left behind, small and unremarkable, flared and pulled tight like a tripwire.

From the beginning, Rong Jing had been almost free of obsession or fierce emotion. Now, slowly, a singular fixation formed.

It was to guard. To guard that soul he had once held carefully in his arms.

Gu Xi did not know why the thing in front of him suddenly clutched its head and crouched on the floor. He did not waste the opening. He tore for the door.

He made it out to the front and froze. Where could he go? Home was Rong Jing, and Rong Jing was gone. He had no idea which way to turn.

Footsteps pounded from down the path. In the light, the figure seemed to burn. Xie Ling had seen the call, dropped his foot soak, and sprinted out of his villa. Rong Jing had insisted on it recently, asking Xie Ling to live at Yushui Bay as a failsafe. The complex was a Xie property. He had an identical unit minutes away.

He skidded to a stop, phone still in hand, breath ragged. “Are you hurt?”

When he answered the call, he had not heard Gu Xi speak, but in the fragments of voices, he understood that his little brother had vanished.

Gu Xi had only ever seen Xie Ling in crisp suits, hair always neat, expression unruffled no matter what. This Xie Ling, hair mussed from the rush, the chill stripped from his aura, felt startlingly real. And somehow safe.

Gu Xi stepped into him and called softly, “Ling-ge.”

Xie Ling nodded. Given their genders, he did not reach out to embrace him.

“That thing came out again, did it?” he asked.

Gu Xi nodded.

“It never ends,” Xie Ling muttered, brows knit. “How many times now?”

Gu Xi showed him the phone. Xie Ling noticed that Gu Xi’s fingers were shaking, still caught in the rip tide. On the screen were the last three messages Rong Jing had sent him. Each was a single letter: F, L, U.

Gu Xi had stared at them earlier without understanding. Now the meaning was clear.

“The last time,” he said firmly.

Taken alone, the letters did not form a word. Taken as initials, they might. Final. Last. Ultimate.

He believed Rong Jing had not mistyped. Even inside constraints, Rong Jing had sent him a message.

One thing was different. The “return date” on this confinement was set three years out. Gu Xi did not tell Xie Ling that part.

He stayed silent because hope needs room to breathe.

Last time the cycle was set for a year, and Rong Jing came back in three months. This time, it would be early too. He knew it. Why crush Xie Ling’s hope with a number?

Back upstairs, the man’s stabbing headache subsided. It seemed that as long as he did not try to force Gu Xi, the pain stayed away.

He laughed hoarsely. “You think you can escape? The pressure this time is double what it was before and it’s only been building. You can barely stay conscious, let alone fight me. You can’t stand against a god. I will win in the end.”

He straightened and ran square into Xie Ling coming up the hall. Triumph curdled into fear in an instant.

Xie Ling was the ally he needed most. Only if he kept Xie Ling could he keep this life.

“Brother…”

Xie Ling’s voice was cool and full of warning. “Everything under your name is frozen for now. If you do not keep your head down during this period, you can try our group’s convalescent facility.”

He did not waste words. He gave the order and executed it at once.

The man knew he meant it. The bug had made Xie Ling the steward while he was away, signing a document that allowed Xie Ling to handle everything without further authorization. So Rong Jing had planned for this.

Why had Xie Ling seen through him? He had acted perfectly. Xie Ling wanted his brother back so badly he gave even Xie Jisheng chance after chance. Why not him?

“Big Brother, I can be your brother too. I can do better than he can.”

Xie Ling did not answer. He walked past and down the stairs.

I have only one little brother.

The one who stayed by me without asking for anything.

Freezing assets was the most effective move at hand. When Xie Ling had handled the transfer of the charity foundation, he had already noticed something wrong, but he held his tongue. If the copy loved money and had strong appetites, then hold the leash. Let out a little at a time. Dangle the carrot where he could see it. Keep him from using Rong Jing’s body to do harm. That was today’s plan.

Outside the door, Gu Xi had tidied himself. Apart from being in pajamas, he looked as composed as usual. Xie Ling sighed to himself.

Anyone who had seen Gu Xi around Rong Jing knew how that Omega shone, happiness spilling from him unchecked. It made it even harder to see him standing here, armored and brave.

Xie Ling did not offer comfort. He said evenly, “Come with me. Let us go home.”

Gu Xi followed. They walked side by side beneath the streetlights, warm gold pooling around two souls that had both been alone for a long time.

Together they would wait for that infuriating boy to come back. And when he did, they were going to give him a proper beating.

So he would remember this. Even if you lose yourself in the dark, there is always a light burning at home for you.

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