The Bangkok skyline glimmered like it was stitched together with neon and temptation. From the thirty-ninth floor of the VERTIX Club & Lounge, the world below seemed insignificant just a blur of blinking lights and echoing bass. The rooftop was alive, pulsing with expensive perfume, the clink of glasses, and laughter that slithered like smoke across the night air.
Mek Tanawan a beautiful and sassy looking omega sipped from his mojito, perched against the tempered glass railing with a view fit for the rich and reckless. He wasn't either, but tonight wasn't about logic. It was about celebration. His final university project had been approved. He was done. No more papers, no more professors, no more pretending to care about expectations that never fit his shape.
He wore a cropped satin top and loose white pants that danced with the wind, his short bangs falling across his forehead in a chaotic frame. People looked at him, some with curiosity, some with lust but he was used to that. An omega like him always drew eyes.
What he didn't expect was the man whose eyes he couldn't look away from.
The stranger stood on the far side of the lounge, cloaked in a tailored black suit that fit too perfectly to be casual. His hair was jet-black, half-tied in a loose knot at the back, while the rest cascaded around sharp cheekbones and a jawline that could cut through the Bangkok humidity. He didn't smile. He didn't drink. He just watched.
And somehow, it was Mek he was watching.
He swallowed, setting his drink aside, trying not to feel the sudden heat crawling up his spine. "Earth to Mek," a familiar voice broke through. "You're staring like he owes you child support."
It was Peach, his fellow omega best friend, draped in glittering mesh and dark jeans, eyebrows raised. Mek laughed. "He looks like he's here to either assassinate someone or seduce a prince."
"Or both," Peach said, sipping her drink. "Want me to wingman?"
"No," Mek said too quickly. "He looks like trouble."
"Trouble's your middle name," Peach smirked.
Mek ignored her, turning his gaze away. But the heat on his neck didn't fade. Something in the man's stare clung to him, unrelenting. It was the way his eyes long, upturned, haunting traced Mek like he was already undressing him with precision. Like he was memorizing.
Mek tried to laugh it off. Just another enigma elite, probably someone's son playing at mystery and money. Not his world.
But then the stranger moved.
One step. Two. A drink untouched in one hand, his other sliding into his pocket with effortless grace. People stepped out of his way without being told. Like they could smell something dangerous in him.
Mek's heart kicked up. He turned to leave,an instinct he didn't understandvbut a voice stopped him.
"Leaving already?" Deep. Smooth. Controlled. The kind of voice that didn't ask questions.It delivered them like a challenge.
Mek turned back slowly.
The man stood inches away now, the city's lights behind him like a crown of fire.
"You were watching me," the man said.
Mek lifted his chin. "Maybe you were watching me."
"I was." The man's lips twitched. Not quite a smile. Something darker. "Why?"
Mek blinked. "Excuse me?"
"Why did you look at me like that?" he asked, voice low, deliberate. "Like you wanted something from me"
Mek crossed his arms, covering the slight flutter in his chest. "Who says I didn't?"
That made the stranger's gaze sharpen. His hand cool, gloved in control and lifted to brush a piece of hair behind Mek's ear. A flicker of possessiveness in the gesture. And Mek should've pulled back. Should've walked away. But something about the man felt like a challenge wrapped in danger and Mek never could resist either.
"Come with me," he said.
"To where?"
"My car," the man said smoothly. "Then my apartment. Or a hotel. Your call."
Mek narrowed his eyes. "What makes you think I'm that easy?"
The man finally smiled barely. "I didn't say you were easy. I said you were curious."
Mek hated how right that was.
He hesitated, heart racing.
"I don't even know your name."
"You don't need it tonight," the man replied. "Unless you want to know what it sounds like when you scream it."
Mek's mouth opened in disbelief and he followed him.
The car was a matte-black Maybach with tinted windows and no driver. The moment Mek stepped inside, the outside world vanished. It was scent-controlled, cooled to perfection, music low and seductive. He barely had time to think before the man was beside him, leaning in, lips grazing Mek's ear.
"I'll give you one chance to leave."
Mek swallowed.
"I'm not leaving."
"Good," the man growled, and kissed him.
It wasn't soft.
It wasn't slow.
It was war.
Their mouths collided with heat and hunger, hands exploring with the desperation of strangers who knew this would be their only night. Mek moaned into it, clutching the man's jacket, tugging him closer. He didn't even remember arriving at the hotel just the flash of card keys, elevator lights, the door clicking open.
The suite was lavish, far too expensive, walls lined with silk and marble. But Mek's mind blurred as he was pinned against the wall, the stranger's mouth trailing fire down his neck, hands on his waist, pushing clothing away like he had done it a hundred times.
"You're mine tonight," the man growled.
Mek gasped, "Then make me yours."
The night was a blur of heat, sweat, and whispered profanity. Phayu, because that's what he finally murmured into Mek's skin was relentless, dominant, but careful. As if even while he devoured Mek, he was still in complete control.
Mek had never been touched like that. Worshipped and broken down at once.
When he woke, the bed was cold.
Phayu was gone.
Only a note remained on the pillow:
"You shouldn't look at strangers like that. They might not leave you whole."
The silence in the suite was deafening.
Mek sat up slowly, the silk sheets slipping from his bare chest. The warmth of the night before had long vanished. The bed was cold, untouched on the other side. No jacket on the chair. No lingering scent on the pillow. It was like he had dreamed the entire thing.
Except he hadn't. His sore hips and scattered clothes across the polished marble floor were evidence enough.
He pressed a palm to his forehead, blinking against the filtered sunlight pouring through the tall glass windows. The city below was already alive, but up here, everything was too still. Too clean.
Then he saw it.
A black envelope, neatly placed on the nightstand, as deliberate as a blade left behind.
Mek stared at it. His fingers trembled only slightly as he picked it up. The card inside was blank except for one line written in dark, slanted script:
You shouldn't look at strangers like that. They might not leave you whole.
Mek's stomach twisted.
He let out a quiet, bitter laugh, tossing the note aside. "Dramatic bastard."
He stood, stretched, and retrieved his clothes piece by piece his crop top, pants, earrings, even his phone, which somehow hadn't died. Not a single text from Peach. She must've figured he got laid and let it be.
Mek caught his reflection in the mirror above the bar. His hair was a mess, hickeys lined the column of his throat, and his lips were still red from being kissed too hard.
He should've been embarrassed. Instead, a slow smirk pulled at his mouth.
"Guess I still got it."
But beneath the smirk was something else. A sting. Like he'd handed over a piece of himself to a man he didn't even know, and now, he didn't know how to take it back.
Later that evening, Mek walked down his apartment hallway, plastic bags from the nearby convenience store in hand. His hoodie was pulled over his head, hair damp from a long shower, and his lips were slightly chapped from biting them all day.
He told himself it was nothing.
One night. A mistake.
A great mistake.
But a mistake.
He kicked his door open with his foot and froze.
There was a sleek, black car parked directly across the street. Windows tinted so dark they reflected the blinking city lights. It hadn't been there when he left ten minutes ago.
Mek lingered on the threshold. His instincts prickled, that same cold shiver crawling up his back. He locked eyes with the car like it was a living thing. Watching.
He stepped inside his house quickly and shut the door. Locked it.
But he couldn't stop himself from peeking out through the curtain a few minutes later, the car was already gone.
Phayu leaned back in the car seat, dark sunglasses over his eyes despite the city's descending dusk. His driver said nothing, trained to be invisible.
"He followed directions?" Phayu asked quietly.
"Yes, sir. Woke up. Found the note. No calls. No complaints. Walked out like nothing happened."
Phayu nodded.
But he didn't look convinced.
The image of Mek's flushed face, his mouth parted in surprise and defiance, haunted him. He'd had dozens of omegas, but none who kissed like that. None who touched him like they wanted to know the shadows inside him not just his body.
He hated that Mek had looked at him like that.
And he hated more that he hadn't forgotten it.
"Keep eyes on him," Phayu murmured.
"Understood."
Two days later, Mek hated how quiet his phone was.
He wasn't the clingy type. He didn't do "text me when you get home" energy. But for the past two days, his mind had been a loop of replays. The way Phayu held him. The way he moved. How his voice sounded wrapped in lust.
Worse, Mek couldn't stop thinking about that note. About the warning hidden beneath flirtation.
"You shouldn't look at strangers like that."
Mek knew danger. He'd grown up with men who flirted with fists and women who loved with knives. But Phayu was different. Controlled chaos. Cold heat. Like a loaded gun wrapped in velvet.
Still, he didn't want to be curious.
He just was.
Peach noticed.
They were lounging in a small café near campus, Mek stirring his iced matcha into a puddle. Peach tilted her head. "You're not usually this quiet unless you're post-breakup. But this wasn't even a relationship."
"It was just a night," Mek mumbled.
"But?"
He sighed. "But I can't stop thinking about him."
Peach raised an eyebrow. "You think he's someone important?"
"Too polished. Too silent. He didn't even try to charm me. Just said what he wanted and took it."
Peach whistled. "Damn. You're into that?"
"I don't know what I'm into anymore."
That Night
Phayu stood in his private study, eyes scanning the digital monitor that displayed surveillance footage. Mek walking out of the hotel. Mek grocery shopping. Mek laughing with his friend.
Nothing he didn't expect.
But the way Mek touched people, smiled at strangers, waved at the dog down the street, it made something cold in Phayu's chest twitch.
He wasn't used to warmth.
He didn't trust it.
But Mek wasn't someone who played the game. He didn't follow the unspoken rules of Bangkok's upper elite. He existed like fire in the wrong forest. Beautiful. Wrong. Addictive.
And Phayu hated how addictive he was.
It was nearly midnight. Mek lay in bed, fingers scrolling mindlessly through his phone. His notifications were dry. No texts. No ghost.
He let the phone drop to his chest.
And then he heard it.
A knock.
Three soft taps on his apartment door.
His heart jerked. He sat up slowly, silence thick as fog. Another knock.
He crossed the room barefoot, pausing at the peephole.
Empty hallway.
He cracked the door open just a bit.
A black envelope lay on the ground.
No one in sight.
Mek bent, picked it up with trembling fingers.
Inside, a card. This time with five words:
"Do you want more, omega?"
His breath hitched.
He looked around once more.
The hallway remained still.
He stepped back inside, locking the door but not his heart.
Because somewhere deep inside, he already knew the answer.