Work Text:
Sheng Shaoyou had discovered, somewhat belatedly, that his lover was a liar.
This was not, strictly speaking, a new discovery. Hua Yong had lied to him before. Hua Yong could lie with an expression so soft and sincere that lesser men probably walked away from conversations with him questioning whether they themselves had misunderstood reality, and Sheng Shaoyou had long ago accepted that loving Hua Yong required developing a certain tolerance for omissions, carefully arranged truths, and those enormous innocent eyes that became approximately thirty percent larger whenever their owner was guilty of something. None of that particularly bothered him anymore. He knew Hua Yong loved him. He knew Hua Yong would choose him. He knew that underneath all the strange little secrets and evasions there was a devotion so fierce that sometimes Sheng Shaoyou could feel its weight even when Hua Yong was standing across the room pretending not to watch him.
No, the lie currently irritating Sheng Shaoyou was considerably more specific.
Hua Yong was not sweet.
Or, more accurately, Hua Yong was sweet, because Sheng Shaoyou had personally experienced enough sleepy kisses, quietly offered cups of tea, fingers straightening his collar before meetings, and arms winding around his waist in the middle of the night to know that tenderness came naturally to him. But Hua Yong was not only sweet. He was certainly not the endlessly yielding, agreeable little Omega he seemed determined to present whenever Sheng Shaoyou looked directly at him. There was something else underneath it, something Sheng Shaoyou kept catching in fragments: a flash of teeth hidden behind a smile, the narrowing of Hua Yong’s eyes when someone stood too close to Sheng Shaoyou, a cutting remark delivered so elegantly that the victim usually needed several seconds to realize he had been insulted. Once, Sheng Shaoyou had watched Hua Yong reduce a businessman twice his age to stammering silence after the man had made a condescending comment about Omegas participating in negotiations, only for Hua Yong to notice Sheng Shaoyou watching him and immediately lower his lashes.
“Was I too rude?”
Sheng Shaoyou had nearly fallen in love with him all over again from sheer frustration.
“No,” he had answered.
Hua Yong had smiled.
Sweetly.
Obediently.
Infuriatingly.
And that was how Sheng Shaoyou’s campaign began.
His first attempt was embarrassingly simple.
They were deciding where to eat.
Sheng Shaoyou had noticed that Hua Yong disliked one particular restaurant several weeks earlier, mostly because Hua Yong had spent their entire previous dinner there smiling politely while moving mushrooms around his plate as though arranging evidence at a crime scene. Sheng Shaoyou therefore suggested it again.
Hua Yong looked up from his phone.
“The Western restaurant?”
“Yes.”
There it was.
Barely anything. The tiniest tightening around Hua Yong’s mouth.
Sheng Shaoyou leaned back against the sofa and waited.
Hua Yong stared at him.
Sheng Shaoyou stared back.
“I thought you liked the Sichuan restaurant near my office,” Hua Yong eventually said.
“I do.”
“But you want Western food.”
“Yes.”
Another pause.
Sheng Shaoyou could practically see the argument happening behind Hua Yong’s eyes. There was the real reaction—I hate that place, their food is terrible, and if you make me watch you order that ridiculous steak again I may commit a felony—fighting desperately against whatever imaginary handbook entitled How a Proper Omega Behaves When His Alpha Has an Opinion Hua Yong had apparently swallowed whole.
Then Hua Yong smiled.
“Of course. We can go wherever you want.”
Sheng Shaoyou closed his eyes.
“Why are you sighing?”
“No reason.”
Attempt one: failure.
The restaurant was terrible.
Hua Yong ate the mushrooms.
Sheng Shaoyou suffered more.
The second attempt involved clothes.
This one, Sheng Shaoyou felt, was brilliant.
Hua Yong had opinions about Sheng Shaoyou’s wardrobe. Strong opinions. Opinions he pretended not to possess until Sheng Shaoyou reached for a tie Hua Yong disliked, at which point an extraordinary transformation occurred in which Hua Yong’s hand somehow arrived first and an entirely different tie materialized between his fingers.
Usually, however, Hua Yong disguised this as assistance.
So Sheng Shaoyou deliberately chose the ugliest tie he owned.
It was a gift from a business associate whose judgment Sheng Shaoyou had questioned ever since receiving it. The color was offensive. The pattern was worse. It made an expensive suit look cheap, which Sheng Shaoyou had previously believed required supernatural intervention.
He put it on.
Hua Yong entered the bedroom.
Stopped.
Sheng Shaoyou almost smiled.
Hua Yong’s gaze traveled slowly from Sheng Shaoyou’s face to his throat.
Silence.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Do you like the tie?”
Hua Yong looked at it again.
Sheng Shaoyou watched an entire moral crisis unfold.
“It’s… distinctive.”
Coward.
“I think I’ll wear it to dinner.”
A tiny muscle moved in Hua Yong’s cheek.
“We’re having dinner with President Liu.”
“Yes.”
“And his wife.”
“Yes.”
“Who owns a fashion company.”
“Yes.”
Hua Yong’s eyes sharpened.
There.
There you are.
Sheng Shaoyou waited eagerly.
Hua Yong inhaled.
Then he smiled.
“If you like it, you should wear it.”
Sheng Shaoyou nearly tore the tie off with his bare hands.
Instead, he wore it.
For four hours.
President Liu’s wife looked at it twice and then politely stopped looking below Sheng Shaoyou’s chin.
Attempt two: catastrophic failure.
By the fourth attempt, Sheng Shaoyou had begun to suspect that he was losing a war Hua Yong did not know they were fighting.
By the seventh, it had become personal.
He tried giving Hua Yong choices and then deliberately choosing the option Hua Yong obviously disliked. Hua Yong yielded.
He tried stealing Hua Yong’s side of the bed. Hua Yong paused beside it for three full seconds, stared at Sheng Shaoyou with an expression promising a remarkably creative death, and then walked around to the other side.
He tried taking the last piece of Hua Yong’s favorite dessert.
Hua Yong’s fork twitched.
Sheng Shaoyou ate it while maintaining eye contact.
There were moments in a man’s life when courage became indistinguishable from stupidity.
That had been one.
Hua Yong smiled.
“I’m glad you enjoyed it.”
Sheng Shaoyou chewed slowly, waiting for retaliation.
Nothing happened.
Later that night, however, he discovered that Hua Yong had somehow taken every pillow except one.
Sheng Shaoyou stared at the single pillow remaining on his side of the bed.
Then at Hua Yong.
Hua Yong was already lying down with his eyes closed, surrounded by an obscene abundance of pillows.
“Hua Yong.”
“Mhm?”
“Where are my pillows?”
“I don’t know.”
“You have five.”
“I like to be comfortable.”
“One of those has my pillowcase.”
Hua Yong opened his eyes and looked toward it as though seeing the object for the first time.
“Oh.”
Sheng Shaoyou waited.
Hua Yong closed his eyes again.
Something warm expanded behind Sheng Shaoyou’s ribs.
Victory.
Tiny, petty, deniable victory, but victory nonetheless.
He climbed into bed with his single pillow feeling absurdly pleased.
Then Hua Yong rolled toward him in his sleep three hours later, stole that one too, and used Sheng Shaoyou’s chest instead.
Sheng Shaoyou decided to count it as a draw.
The problem was that the more he watched, the more impossible it became not to notice how much effort Hua Yong was putting into being easy to love.
That realization took most of the humor out of the game.
It was there in the hesitation before Hua Yong disagreed with him. In the way an angry expression disappeared almost the instant Sheng Shaoyou noticed it. In how Hua Yong would sometimes begin a sentence with obvious certainty, catch himself, and soften it into a suggestion. Sheng Shaoyou had initially found the contradiction amusing because the Hua Yong beneath that careful sweetness was so obviously capable of biting. Slowly, however, he began to understand that Hua Yong was not hiding those parts because he enjoyed deceiving him.
He was hiding them because somewhere, somehow, he had decided Sheng Shaoyou would love him less if he saw them.
That was considerably less funny.
Sheng Shaoyou thought back to the things he had said over the years, the preferences he had expressed without imagining someone might memorize them. His careless comments about Omegas. His assumptions about what kind of partner suited him. The confidence with which he had once divided people into categories and expected them to remain there.
Then he thought about Hua Yong.
Hua Yong, who remembered everything about him.
Hua Yong, who could probably reconstruct Sheng Shaoyou’s entire romantic history from evidence Sheng Shaoyou himself had forgotten.
Hua Yong, who had apparently taken all that information and arrived at the deeply stupid conclusion that love was an examination and Sheng Shaoyou had supplied the marking criteria.
Sheng Shaoyou felt suddenly murderous toward his younger self.
Unfortunately, punching himself several years in the past remained technologically difficult.
So he changed strategy.
He stopped testing Hua Yong.
Instead, he began rewarding every crack.
When Hua Yong snapped at him for skipping lunch, Sheng Shaoyou ate without argument and kissed his temple afterward.
When Hua Yong took his phone away at midnight and informed him that no company emergency required answering emails with half-closed eyes, Sheng Shaoyou went to bed.
When an attractive Omega at a reception touched Sheng Shaoyou’s arm for slightly too long and Hua Yong appeared beside him with a smile beautiful enough to disguise murder, Sheng Shaoyou did not tease him about jealousy. He simply slid an arm around Hua Yong’s waist and kept it there until the other Omega understood.
That one produced particularly interesting results.
Hua Yong was quiet in the car.
Too quiet.
Sheng Shaoyou watched city lights move across his face.
“Are you angry?”
“No.”
A lie.
“Jealous?”
“No.”
A worse lie.
“Do you want me to stop letting other Omegas touch me?”
Hua Yong turned.
For one glorious second, Sheng Shaoyou saw him.
Not the carefully agreeable lover. Not the Omega who would say that Sheng Shaoyou was free to do whatever he wanted because trust meant never asking anything of him. Hua Yong’s eyes were dark, sharp, territorial enough that something primitive in Sheng Shaoyou responded before his mind did, Alpha instincts lifting their head with startled interest.
Then the shutters descended.
“I trust you.”
Sheng Shaoyou nearly groaned.
“That wasn't what I asked.”
“You don't need my permission.”
“I know.”
Hua Yong looked away.
Sheng Shaoyou reached across the space between them and took his hand.
“I asked what you want.”
Hua Yong’s fingers went still inside his.
For a moment, Sheng Shaoyou thought this might finally be it.
Then Hua Yong smiled faintly.
“I want you to be happy.”
Sheng Shaoyou leaned his head back against the seat.
“What?”
“I’m on a lose streak.”
Hua Yong blinked.
“A what?”
“Nothing.”
Attempt twelve: failure.
Perhaps Sheng Shaoyou should have accepted defeat.
He did not.
He was an Alpha, a businessman, and a man who had spent enough of his adult life winning negotiations that stubbornness had long ago been promoted from character flaw to professional qualification.
More importantly, he loved Hua Yong.
So he waited.
The eventual victory arrived without strategy.
That was probably the most irritating part.
It was late. Sheng Shaoyou had returned home after a dinner that had stretched two hours longer than intended, exhausted enough that his shoulders hurt beneath his jacket and his patience had dissolved somewhere between the third toast and the final discussion about quarterly projections. Hua Yong was waiting in the living room, curled into one corner of the sofa with a book open in his lap, although the fact that he looked toward the door before Sheng Shaoyou had fully entered suggested he had not absorbed a single word for some time.
“You’re late.”
Not Welcome home.
Not Was the meeting difficult?
Not even the soft little smile Hua Yong usually offered him first.
Sheng Shaoyou stopped.
Hua Yong seemed to realize what he had said.
His expression shifted.
“No,” Sheng Shaoyou said immediately.
Hua Yong frowned. “No?”
“Don't fix it.”
“Fix what?”
“That.”
Sheng Shaoyou dropped his keys onto the table and walked closer, trying very hard not to look as delighted as he suddenly felt.
Hua Yong’s eyes narrowed.
“You said you would be home at ten.”
“I know.”
“It’s nearly midnight.”
“I know.”
“You didn't message me.”
“I forgot.”
Wrong answer.
Beautifully, wonderfully wrong answer.
Hua Yong closed the book.
“You forgot.”
There was enough offense in those two words to flatten a boardroom.
Sheng Shaoyou bit the inside of his cheek.
“Yes.”
“I called you.”
“My phone was silent.”
“Three times.”
“I saw.”
“And?”
“And I came home.”
Hua Yong stared at him.
Sheng Shaoyou could almost watch the familiar machinery begin to operate. Anger rose first. Then restraint moved to smother it. Hua Yong’s lips parted, closed, and Sheng Shaoyou knew with sudden certainty that if he did nothing, the moment would disappear again. Hua Yong would tell him it was fine. He would ask whether Sheng Shaoyou had eaten. He would become gentle because somewhere inside his ridiculous head he believed gentleness was the price of being kept.
So Sheng Shaoyou sat beside him.
Close.
Close enough that their knees touched.
“You're angry with me.”
“No.”
“Liar.”
Hua Yong glared.
Sheng Shaoyou’s heart gave an embarrassing little leap.
“I was worried,” Hua Yong said.
“I know.”
“You could have sent one message.”
“I should have.”
“I waited.”
“I know.”
“And now you're smiling.”
Sheng Shaoyou had not realized he was.
Apparently that was the final offense.
Hua Yong moved.
One moment Sheng Shaoyou was sitting beside him; the next, Hua Yong’s hand had closed around the front of his shirt and pulled.
There was no hesitant pause.
No lowered eyes.
No careful request.
Hua Yong simply took him.
His mouth landed against Sheng Shaoyou’s with enough force to push a startled breath from his lungs, fingers tightening in expensive fabric as though Sheng Shaoyou might otherwise escape, and for perhaps half a heartbeat Sheng Shaoyou was too astonished to respond.
Then every Alpha instinct he possessed caught up.
His hand found Hua Yong’s waist.
The other slid behind his neck.
And Sheng Shaoyou kissed him back.
Hard.
Hua Yong made a small sound against his mouth—not surrender, not exactly, because there was something almost challenging in the way his fingers tightened rather than loosened—and Sheng Shaoyou felt heat roll through him, bright and immediate. He shifted closer, answering pressure with pressure until the kiss changed shape beneath them, until Hua Yong’s impulsive demand became something shared and hungry, Sheng Shaoyou taking control because that came as naturally as breathing and Hua Yong letting him without becoming passive beneath his hands.
That was the difference.
Sheng Shaoyou felt it instantly.
Hua Yong had started this.
Hua Yong had wanted something and taken it.
And the world had not ended.
Sheng Shaoyou had not pushed him away.
He had not become disappointed.
He had not loved him less.
If anything, Sheng Shaoyou was currently considering whether it would be unreasonable to cancel tomorrow morning’s meetings.
When they finally separated, Hua Yong was breathing harder, his lips flushed and his carefully arranged hair slightly disordered where Sheng Shaoyou had caught it between his fingers.
He also looked horrified.
Sheng Shaoyou refused to permit that.
He kissed him again.
Shorter this time.
Deliberate.
When he drew back, Hua Yong stared at him.
“You—”
“Yes.”
“I didn't ask.”
“I noticed.”
Hua Yong’s expression became guarded.
Sheng Shaoyou touched his thumb to the corner of Hua Yong’s mouth.
“And I liked it.”
Silence.
Something vulnerable flickered behind Hua Yong’s eyes.
Sheng Shaoyou softened his voice.
“If you want to kiss me, kiss me.”
Hua Yong swallowed.
“If you want me home, tell me to come home. If you're jealous, be jealous. If you're angry, get angry. If I wear an ugly tie, for the love of everything sacred, stop me before I embarrass both of us.”
Hua Yong blinked.
“That tie was ugly.”
Sheng Shaoyou froze.
Hua Yong froze.
Then Sheng Shaoyou began to laugh.
“You knew,” Hua Yong accused.
“I knew!”
“You did that deliberately?”
“It took you this long to admit it!”
“That dinner was four hours!”
“I suffered too!”
“You deserved it.”
There.
Again.
Sharp. Offended. Bossy.
Perfect.
Sheng Shaoyou leaned forward until their foreheads touched, still laughing softly enough that he could feel Hua Yong trying very hard to remain irritated.
“You're impossible,” Hua Yong muttered.
“And you're mean.”
“I am not.”
“You stole my pillows.”
“You ate my dessert.”
“Because I was trying to provoke you.”
“That makes it worse.”
“You could have stabbed me with the fork.”
“I considered it.”
Sheng Shaoyou’s laughter stopped.
Hua Yong apparently realized his mistake.
Too late.
Sheng Shaoyou looked at him with profound satisfaction.
“You considered stabbing me?”
“With the fork,” Hua Yong said defensively. “Not seriously.”
“I love you.”
“That is a strange response.”
“I love you so much.”
Hua Yong’s ears began turning red.
Sheng Shaoyou thought, with the deep peace of a man who had finally succeeded after a humiliating sequence of defeats, that victory had never looked so beautiful.
Then Hua Yong caught his collar again.
This time Sheng Shaoyou was ready.
He went willingly for exactly one second before turning them, pressing Hua Yong back into the sofa and taking the kiss deeper, smiling against his mouth when Hua Yong made an indignant sound and immediately pulled him closer rather than yielding an inch.
Yes.
This.
This was what Sheng Shaoyou had been trying to explain without knowing how to say it.
He did not need Hua Yong to be easy.
He did not need him endlessly agreeable, endlessly gentle, endlessly grateful for whatever Sheng Shaoyou decided to give. He did not want a lover who folded himself smaller so Sheng Shaoyou could occupy more space. If Hua Yong wanted to argue, Sheng Shaoyou would argue with him. If he wanted to be possessive, Sheng Shaoyou could certainly survive being possessed. If he wanted to take, demand, pull, glare, sulk, steal pillows and issue orders, then Sheng Shaoyou would simply have to learn which battles were worth fighting.
He suspected he would enjoy losing some of them.
Especially if Hua Yong celebrated victory like this.
When they separated again, Hua Yong remained close enough that their breaths mingled, one hand still gripping Sheng Shaoyou’s collar.
Sheng Shaoyou looked down at it.
Then back at him.
Hua Yong slowly loosened his fingers.
Sheng Shaoyou caught his wrist before he could retreat.
“No.”
Hua Yong’s eyes flickered toward him.
“Keep it.”
The fingers tightened again.
Sheng Shaoyou smiled.
There was still something strange about Hua Yong. Something Sheng Shaoyou could not name, a sharpness beneath the Omega scent he knew so well, an instinctive pressure that occasionally made his own Alpha nature rise to meet it rather than simply surround it. Perhaps one day he would understand that too. Perhaps Hua Yong would tell him when he was ready.
For now, this was enough.
Hua Yong wanted him.
Not politely.
Not carefully.
Not in whatever way he had decided an ideal Omega was permitted to want an Alpha.
He simply wanted him.
And when Hua Yong pulled him down for a third kiss, Sheng Shaoyou went with a satisfaction so profound it bordered on smugness.
His lose streak was officially over.
Although, judging by the way Hua Yong’s hand tightened in his shirt and dragged him closer, Sheng Shaoyou had the distinct impression he was about to start losing an entirely different kind of battle.
He found that he did not mind at all.