He pulled his wrist gently out of Grayson’s grip, noting that the ointment had already begun to work as the redness was fading to a faint pink. The medical technology of this era was nothing short of miraculous, but it was incredibly effective and fast-acting.

"When I first came here," Neville began to explain, selecting his words with care, "we fought—a lot."

Grayson nodded slowly, his expression still unreadable and incredibly skeptical.

Because what alpha fights with an omega? Clearly, Neville had no idea what he was saying.

"Probably because we were both dominant." Neville saw that and shrugged lightly, the gesture was deliberately casual as if he didn’t know why either. "Or maybe we just aren’t that compatible. Either way, the first few days were... intense."

Intense. That was one word for it.

That was completely the opposite of what actually happened. They were more intimate than other couples that he had seen before, but Neville kept those to himself.

"I managed to get you to sleep eventually," he continued. "When I tried to escape and get to the hospital for help, I found that the door was locked."

"Locked?" Grayson’s brow furrowed sharply. "The security system shouldn’t have—"

"Well, it did." Neville cut him off, not wanting to dwell on the details. "I checked every possible exit. Everything was sealed shut. So I resigned myself to keeping us both alive for the rest of the days. I really thought it would go on for another week just reading the articles in the StarNet."

As if it had been a fight for survival rather than just an inconvenient lockdown.

"When you woke up the next day," Neville continued, "you fought with me again. But this time, instead of coming at me, you holed yourself up in some room upstairs..."

He gestured vaguely toward the upper levels of the penthouse because he didn’t know what else was in there other than the office and the library.

"...doing I don’t know what. The next thing I knew, I couldn’t access StarNet anymore."

Grayson could only imagine what ’rut-addled Grayson’ had done to the communications system. But found some ripple of truth to it based on Bryan’s testimony. Yet, he still couldn’t come to terms with the fighting part.

"Good thing I had already messaged my colleagues when I first realized I was stuck here." Neville didn’t care about that and added. "Told them I had a rut-induced heat and managed to get home. It prevented them from worrying or sending someone to check on me."

And gave me cover for being absent from work for an entire week. Something that he didn’t need to say for Grayson to understand.

Grayson was silent for a long moment, processing everything that Neville had told him. His silver eyes stared at Neville’s face, looking for cracks in the story, looking for the truth that he wanted to see.

Finally, he sighed.

"You’ve been through a lot."

The words were soft, almost apologetic.

Neville shrugged, brushing off the concern. "Only cleaning up the mess after was the hard part."

That was just a physical mess, anyway.

The emotional one is still a work in progress.

Grayson closed the medical kit, setting it aside on the table. But he didn’t move away. Instead, he remained close, his knee nearly brushing Neville’s beneath the blanket that was still wrapped around the omega’s shoulders. 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

"Why are you hiding that you’re a dominant omega?" He asked with concern and curiosity.

"I thought," Neville carefully said, "that being a dominant omega would lower my chances of being hired. It was a naive concern, but back then, I was just a simple orphan.

"I have no background, no connections, nothing but my own self-cultivated abilities." He shook his head dramatically. "The risk of being an omega in the workforce is already high enough. Being a dominant omega? That’s asking for trouble."

It wasn’t entirely a lie. But he didn’t have that much of a concern.

He just wanted to get hired. He didn’t even know that dominant omegas were at high risk. He only knew that in the future, the original body would die by dissection. That was enough to keep his personal information closely monitored and deeply hidden.

Grayson nodded slowly, accepting the explanation. But his eyes still held questions.

"Why didn’t you get affected by my pheromones?" he asked. "Even a dominant omega should have felt something during an alpha’s rut. Especially one as strong as mine."

You forgot that our compatibility is off the charts, too. Neville thought wryly. But he couldn’t say he took a miraculous calming pill from the system mall, couldn’t I?

"I have a problem with smelling pheromones," Neville said, the lie rolling off his tongue naturally. "Since the star pirate incident. It never got better. I can feel how intense the pheromones was but I can’t actually smell them. It dulls the effect significantly."

He paused, then added lightly: "Add that to the fact that we’re probably not compatible, and it explains why your rut didn’t affect me the way it would affect most omegas."

Grayson’s expression changed a little

Not compatible.

The words tasted like ash in Neville’s mouth, but they were necessary to say.

He had to let Grayson believe they were incompatible. Let him think that the past seven days had been nothing more than an unfortunate accident. Let him forget his curiosity in his forgotten memories.

It was better this way.

Grayson was still watching him intently with a skeptical look on his face, but he let Neville’s words slide.

Finally, Grayson seemed to reach a conclusion.

"I cannot confirm whether what you’ve told me is the truth," He said, each word carefully, "But you are the only person who knows the truth about this situation. You’ve witnessed it firsthand."

"Which means I cannot afford to let you out of my sight."

Wait.

What?

Neville’s brain short-circuited for a full three seconds.

"From today onward, you’ll be promoted to my personal secretary."

"What?"