Chapter 176: Chapter 176: Desperation

Adam dug his fingers into his own hoodie pocket like he could anchor himself to stubbornness. “I didn’t think,” he rasped. “I needed food.”

“You needed a babysitter,” Max corrected.

Adam turned his head enough to glare at him. “I needed groceries.”

Max’s gaze remained fixed on the street, scanning reflexively for cars, pedestrians, and angles, as if his body was following security protocols even as he argued. “Your manager knows?”

Adam’s jaw clenched. “Yes.”

“And she let you leave?”

“I didn’t tell her I was leaving,” Adam admitted, then immediately regretted the honesty as it left his mouth.

Max made a sound that could have been a laugh if it hadn’t been so tightly controlled. “Of course you didn’t.”

Adam’s pride flared. “Stop talking like you’re in charge of me.”

Max’s eyes flicked to him, green and cold in the winter light. “I’m in charge of not letting you get dragged into a car by a stranger who calls you ’baby’ in public.”

Adam opened his mouth—

His stomach lurched again, sharp enough that he had to stop walking mid-step.

He pressed a hand to his abdomen, breathing shallow, the edge of nausea rising fast.

Max immediately steadied him, palm firm between Adam’s shoulder blades. “Hey.”

Adam swallowed hard, eyes stinging with the sheer indignity of his own body.

“Told you,” Adam rasped. “Pheromones—”

Max lowered his presence again, even more carefully this time, as if calibrating against Adam’s reaction. The air around them lightened, the pressure easing like a fist unclenching.

“Don’t you dare throw up on my shoes,” Max said, tone dry.

Adam let out an ugly laugh. “Your shoes deserve it.”

Max’s mouth twitched again, this time closer to genuine amusement, as he led Adam forward.

A black car waited at the curb like it had been summoned. The driver was already outside, door open, gaze politely averted.

Max didn’t slow. He didn’t ask. He simply got Adam to the door, and when Adam’s legs decided to wobble again, Max’s arm tightened around his waist and lifted him with controlled ease.

“I can walk,” Adam protested weakly.

“No,” Max said, and there was no room for argument in the word. “You can pretend. That’s different.”

Adam wanted to bite him. He settled for glaring.

Max slid him into the back seat, careful despite the firmness, then got in after him and shut the door. The outside world muted instantly.

Adam shoved himself toward the far side of the seat, putting distance between them on instinct, breathing hard through the mask.

Max sat angled toward him, forearms on his knees again, not crowding, just… present.

“You’re an omega,” Max said quietly, like he was naming a fact that changed everything.

Adam’s eyes narrowed, rage and humiliation flaring hot. “Don’t say it like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m an incident,” Adam snapped.

Max’s gaze held his. “You’re not an incident. You’re a risk.”

Adam stared at him, stunned for half a heartbeat.

Then his mouth curved into something vicious. “Romantic.”

Max exhaled through his nose, controlled. “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be safe?”

Adam’s throat tightened. He hated the question because it was unfair.

He wanted both.

He wanted neither if it meant taking anything from Max.

“Where are you taking me?” Adam asked, voice rougher now, his body dragging him toward honesty whether he liked it or not.

Max’s jaw tensed. “Home.”

Adam barked a laugh. “Whose?”

Max’s green eyes stayed steady. “Mine.”

Adam’s stomach dropped all over again.

“No,” he said immediately.

Max didn’t flinch. “Yes.”

Adam leaned forward, hands braced on his knees, breathing hard. “I’m not going to your home in heat.”

Max’s expression turned flat. “You’re not going to your apartment in heat either.”

“I can lock my door.”

“And someone can wait in your hallway,” Max replied, voice calm as a verdict. “Someone already tried to claim you in a grocery store. Don’t insult me by pretending your building is safer than this car.”

Adam’s fingers clenched. “I hate you.”

Max’s mouth twitched. “Not even the first one today.”

The engine started, a low, smooth purr that sounded expensive and final. The car pulled away from the curb, leaving the shop and its fluorescent air behind, and Adam realized with a spike of irritation that he didn’t even know where they were going.

“Where are you taking me?” he demanded, turning his head enough to glare.

Max didn’t look away from the window for a moment, like he was tracking the street out of habit. Then he answered, his tone maddeningly even.

“I have a mansion,” he said. “You’ll be safe there. And you won’t have to see me if you don’t want to.”

Adam stared at him, suspicious even through the heat haze. “You are suspicious. You have a mansion, you have an ether car expensive enough to cover at least two of my shows, and you lied about leaving me alone.”

Max’s gaze slid to him, slow and calculating, as if he was deciding whether to take the bait or remove it entirely.

“I didn’t lie,” he said. “I said you don’t have to see me if you don’t want to.”

“And yet here you are,” Adam snapped.

Max’s mouth twitched. “Yes. Because you’re currently in my car.”

Adam’s laugh came out rough and breathless. “Ah. So the ’choice’ comes after you drag me across the city.”

“I didn’t drag you,” Max corrected, maddeningly calm. “I carried you.”

Adam’s eyes narrowed. “I hate you so much.”

Max’s expression remained flat, but his tone turned dry. “I’m sensing that.”

The car glided through the capital with a smoothness that felt unfair, like it had bribed the streets into cooperation. Etherlines ran along the road edges in faint, pale threads, pulsing occasionally as the vehicle passed—security wards reading signatures, gates opening before the car even reached them. Adam noticed despite himself. Not because he admired it.

Because he recognized infrastructure built for power.

“Who are you?” Adam asked suddenly, his voice rawer than he meant it to be. “Don’t give me your name. I have your name. Give me the truth.”

Max’s eyes stayed on the darkened window for a beat, taking in their reflection like it was an inconvenient mirror.

Then he answered, tone controlled. “I’m the person the Emperor trusts to stand between him and the parts of the Empire that still bite.”

Adam scoffed. “So a glorified shield.”

Max’s gaze flicked to him. “A knife, when required.”

The phrase landed in Adam’s stomach like ice.

“Great,” Adam muttered. “So I’m in a car with the Emperor’s knife while I’m in heat. This is going very well for my life choices.”

Max didn’t rise to the insult. He just watched Adam for a second, and Adam had the infuriating sense Max was counting breaths, not words.

“Do you want water?” Max asked.

“I want to go home.”

“You will,” Max said evenly.

Adam glared. “To my home.”

Max’s eyes didn’t blink. “When it’s safe.”

Adam’s fingers clenched in his lap, nails biting into his own palm through the fabric of the hoodie. His body kept pulsing with heat, a slow, relentless throb that made his skin feel too tight. Suppressants dulled the edge but couldn’t erase the fact that his instincts were awake, loud, and angry.

The words came out hoarse, too sharp to be soft, and too honest to be clever. He hated that he was asking at all. He hated that he couldn’t stop himself, that his body had taken the wheel and pointed him at the most dangerous solution available simply because it was immediate.

Then, because heat made courage out of desperation, he added, “Then sleep with me.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep