Minho stepped into the recording booth, the air thick with the faint hum of equipment and the lingering traces of his own scent — rich chocolate laced with sharp cherry. He was twenty-seven, an alpha in his prime, leader of his dance trio, and today he was here to lay down vocals for a track that promised to be a banger. The studio at JYP buzzed with its usual controlled chaos, but something felt off. The scent in the air was sweeter than usual, a creeping vanilla and caramel that tugged at his instincts, making his jaw tighten.

He glanced through the glass into the control room, expecting the full 3RACHA crew — Chan, Changbin, and you, Han Jisung, the omega prodigy who always had a way of making his pulse kick up a notch. But only you were there, hunched over the soundboard, your fingers flying across the controls. Your scent was muted, deliberately so, but Minho’s alpha senses picked up the edges of it, fraying like a frayed wire. Suppressants. Patches. He’d seen you use them before, but never like this — never with that faint tremor in your hands or the way your shoulders seemed to carry an invisible weight.

Chan and Changbin were nowhere in sight. Minho had heard through the grapevine — some rookie band had hit a wall with their comeback track, and JYP’s higher-ups had yanked 3RACHA’s dynamic duo to salvage it. Emergency lyrics and production overhaul, overnight deadline. That left you, Jisung, twenty-three and radiating a heat that shouldn’t have hit for another week, stuck holding the fort. Minho’s lips twitched into a half-smirk, half-scowl. You were stubborn as hell, always pushing through, but this? This was reckless.

“Hey, Jisung,” Minho called, his voice low and smooth, carrying through the booth’s mic. He leaned closer to the glass, one hand pressed against it, his eyes locking onto you. “You look like you’re about to keel over. Where’s the rest of your posse?”

You didn’t look up right away, your focus on tweaking a vocal layer, but Minho saw the way your jaw clenched, the slight flush creeping up your neck. You quickly mumbled something about how they had been urgently called in to help with a young band's failing comeback, where deadlines were looming.

Minho’s brows lifted. He knew you were good — hell, you were brilliant, crafting melodies that made his group’s choreography pop off — but you were fighting a losing battle today. That vanilla-caramel scent, even dulled by patches, was sneaking through, curling into his lungs, stoking a fire low in his gut. He was an alpha; he couldn’t just ignore it. Didn’t want to.

“Alright, pretty boy,” Minho said, his tone teasing but edged with something darker, hungrier. He adjusted the headphones over his ears, his gaze never leaving you. “Let’s do this. Play it back from the second verse.”

You nodded, hitting the controls, and the track filled the booth — pulsing bass, sharp hi-hats, a melody you’d woven with that magic touch of yours. Minho’s voice slid into the mix, smooth and commanding, each note dripping with the confidence of a man who owned every stage he stepped on. He moved with the rhythm, hips swaying slightly, eyes flicking to you every few bars. You were watching, lips parted just enough to make his blood hum, your scent spiking despite your efforts to keep it locked down.

Halfway through the take, Minho caught it — a faint whimper, barely audible over the music. Your hand had slipped to your neck, pressing against the scent patch like it was the only thing keeping you tethered. Your heat was clawing through the suppressants, and Minho’s alpha instincts roared to life, primal and unyielding. He finished the line, voice dropping into a growl that wasn’t just for the song, and signaled for you to cut the track.

“Jisung,” he said, stepping out of the booth, his tone firm but laced with concern. He closed the distance between you, looming over the soundboard, his chocolate-cherry scent flooding the small space. “You’re burning up. Those patches aren’t holding shit back. Why the fuck are you here?”