Moving back into Chen Lihuan's penthouse felt like stepping into a gilded coffin.
The ceilings still stretched toward nothing. The rooms were vast, cold, almost sterile in their precision. And beneath the expensive art, the curated lighting, the curated silence—Li Wei could feel it.
The weight of ownership.
He brought little with him. A suitcase. A few books. His work laptop. They looked absurdly out of place in the suite that had been assigned to him—spacious, luxurious, and soaked in the faint, unmistakable signature of Alpha scent. Every inch of the space screamed his. Not Li Wei's. Chen Lihuan's.
He'd been here before.
And he had died here once, in a timeline no one remembered but him.
So now he moved like a ghost.
He taught his classes with laser focus. He graded papers with mechanical precision. He arrived at school early, stayed late, and clung to the familiar rhythm of routine. His students became his sanctuary, their laughter and curiosity a balm against the sharp edges of his new reality.
At home, he was silent.
He ate alone. He used scent suppressants religiously, masking his presence until even the air around him felt sterile. He avoided the living room. The kitchen. The library. The man. He became a polite absence in the place he now "lived."
And Chen Lihuan noticed.
At first, it was just the silence. The Li Wei he remembered—subdued but warm, hesitant but hopeful—had always lingered. Had waited, had tried, in his quiet way, to meet the Alpha halfway.
But this Li Wei was different.
He wasn't lingering. He was absent.
Even when he was physically there.
---
One evening, Chen sat alone at the massive dining table, untouched food cooling beneath the soft lighting.
"Where is Li Wei?" he asked, not looking up.
The butler, unflappable as always, replied, "Mr. Li preferred to eat in his suite tonight. He's preparing for tomorrow's classes."
Chen frowned. "He's always preparing for classes."
He had expected pushback after the contract. A burst of defiance. Maybe tears. But not… this.
This complete emotional withdrawal.
This quiet war of indifference.
It got under his skin.
He started to notice the little things: the scent-neutralizers so strong they left only a faint chemical undertone in the air. The light beneath Li Wei's door flickering into the late hours of the night. The way the Omega left for school with his chin lifted, gaze fixed ahead, never glancing in Chen's direction. The way he came home with the same quiet resolve, never speaking unless directly addressed.
He wasn't being disobedient. He was being invisible.
And for Chen Lihuan—used to being the gravity in every room—invisible was the one thing he could not abide.
---
The next morning, he found Li Wei in the kitchen, quietly making toast and tea before leaving for school. The sight was oddly domestic, almost tender. His back was to the door, posture straight, movements calm.
Chen stepped in, and his Alpha scent followed.
Li Wei's hand paused mid-motion. A nearly imperceptible stillness.
He didn't turn. Didn't speak.
Just resumed buttering the toast with surgical care.
"You're avoiding me," Chen said, his tone carefully flat. But something sharp lingered beneath it. A demand for acknowledgement. For recognition.
Li Wei finally turned. His face was unreadable.
"I'm focusing on work," he replied. "That's what the contract allows me, isn't it?"
He picked up his plate and tea without waiting for a reply and walked past Chen, his scent so thoroughly neutral it might as well have been air.
Chen didn't follow. He didn't speak again.
But as the door clicked softly behind Li Wei, frustration curled low in his chest. Not just frustration. Something else. Something he didn't yet have the language for.
This wasn't the Omega he thought he'd brought back.
This was someone sharper. More careful. Someone who had been cut once and now refused to bleed again.
And strangely, it wasn't rejection that disturbed him.
It was that—despite all the power he wielded—Li Wei no longer feared him.
He couldn't be controlled with contracts or cornered by circumstance.
He was simply… unreachable.
And for Chen Lihuan, that was the most dangerous kind of desire.