I Lay Completely Naked On The Sofa

Riley's POV

I had no memory of how last night's loss of control had ended.

All I could recall was the searing heat coursing through my body, the frantic restlessness, and the vague sense that I'd been with someone. But as I scanned my surroundings, I found myself lying on a plush sofa beneath the bar's ceiling, a blanket draped over me.

The strangest part was how completely relaxed my body felt. The bizarre, agitated sensation from before had vanished entirely, and I could sense that my physical capabilities seemed somehow enhanced compared to before.

Yet this rare comfort lasted mere seconds before waves of soreness and aching swept through me.

A sudden unease bloomed in my chest. I lifted my hand and gently pulled back the blanket.

In that instant, my pupils constricted sharply. My breath caught, frozen in my throat. The blood in my veins seemed to turn to ice.

My clothes were gone. I lay completely naked on the sofa.

What terrified me more was the landscape of marks covering my skin—kiss marks of varying depths and shades, densely scattered across my body. My neck, collarbone, shoulders, back, abdomen, even my inner thighs—all bore the unmistakable evidence of intimacy, bruised purple and red.

Only then did I register where the worst pain centered: my penis and my hole. I reached down to touch both areas tentatively. As I'd feared, they were badly swollen.

Why would my penis be this swollen? And why were there bite marks on my inner thighs? Had someone actually bitten me there?

I probed my hole carefully. A wave of raw, swollen tenderness answered. The soft flesh had turned outward, unable to contract back into place.

My pupils trembled. Panic seized me completely.

What had happened?

Had those four men witnessed me in that depraved state last night?

If they'd seen me like that, I'd rather die on the spot.

"Sir, the establishment will be closing soon. Please gather your belongings and prepare to leave."

A polite voice from outside the door yanked me back from the swamp of panic into harsh reality.

I jerked my head up toward the wall clock. The hour hand pointed to four in the morning.

I'd been unconscious the entire night.

I didn't dare delay. Suppressing the panic and shame churning in my gut, I scrambled up using both hands and feet, frantically gathering the clothes scattered across the floor and pulling them on piece by piece to cover the damning evidence all over my body.

I practically fled, head down, hurrying out of the bar. The early morning breeze felt cool against my skin, making me shiver. I wanted nothing more than to get home.

Two years. It had been two full years since I'd last returned to this house that held all my pathetic, unrequited longing.

I pushed open the door to find Theo and Isolde sitting on the sofa, bathed in warm lamplight.

Isolde was speaking animatedly, her face bright with expression, while Theo listened with that gentle gaze he never offered anyone else.

The sight of their intimacy was so piercing it brought instant tears to my eyes.

My heartbeat stuttered, missing a beat. A dense web of bitterness instantly engulfed me—sourness, grievance, humiliation, resentment layering upon each other, lodging in my chest until I could barely breathe.

Theo noticed the movement at the door and looked up at me.

His tone was gentle. "Riley, are you feeling better?"

My muddled thoughts snapped back into focus, and I dimly recalled that last night before I'd lost consciousness, Theo had been at the bar, right in front of me, witnessing my complete loss of control.

Extreme embarrassment and mortification surged through me.

I stood stiffly in the doorway, unable to meet his eyes. Lowering my gaze slightly, I shook my head with difficulty, my voice hoarse and dry. "I'm fine."

After a pause, I suppressed the roiling emotions and asked with forced calm, "Theo, last night... where did you go afterward?"

I desperately needed an answer. I needed confirmation that he hadn't witnessed me at my most debauched, that I could preserve some final scrap of dignity.

"Seeing how weak and disoriented you were, I settled you in the private room to rest, then came back home," Theo said.

At his words, I exhaled a long, relieved breath. The tension in my nerves eased somewhat.

Thank god.

Thank god he hadn't seen me shaking my ass, begging someone to fuck me.

If Theo had witnessed me in such a disgraceful state, I truly would have preferred to simply cease existing in this world.

I nodded hastily and said in a low voice, "I'll go upstairs to rest now."

My room, untouched for two years, was spotlessly clean—almost unnaturally so.

The bedding lay smooth and fresh, the desk surface dust-free, the potted plants by the window thriving healthily. Clearly someone had been cleaning regularly, tending to everything with care, day after day.

I closed the door behind me, shutting out the warm yet piercing scene downstairs, and finally dropped all pretense.

I stripped off my wrinkled clothes and stood naked before the full-length mirror.

The boy in the reflection had shed his youthful innocence, grown into someone tall and handsome. Clean-cut silver hair, pale gray-violet eyes, refined and striking features, a lean and well-proportioned six-foot frame carrying the crisp efficiency characteristic of hunters.

Beautiful, perhaps, but this was a human Beta body, destined never to match any of those elite Alphas who stood among the clouds.

And at this moment, this already ordinary body was covered in chaotic, intimate marks—bruises in shades of purple and blue, crisscrossing in wretched disarray, a constant reminder of everything that had happened last night.

I raised my hand to cover my face, my fingertips brushing my eye sockets. The emotions I'd suppressed for so long finally crumbled. Scalding tears slid down between my fingers.

If Theo had seen me like this, would he despise me?

My heart filled with panic. I cried for a long time until my eyes grew sore and swollen before I could barely suppress the sourness churning inside me. Then I turned and walked into the bathroom.

Hot water cascaded down, the scalding stream scouring my skin. I took the bath sponge and scrubbed every marked spot on my body over and over, using so much force I wished I could scrub away every trace of last night's debauchery, erase every memory of that loss of control.

I didn't stop until my skin turned red and raw with pain. Only then did I shut off the water.

After two years of solitary training and living alone, I'd grown accustomed to walking around naked after bathing.

But just as I stepped out of the bathroom doorway, the door handle turned gently.