“All of you belongs to me,” he had said.

Josh remembered the words that he had forgotten for a long time. One corner of his heart ran cold, and Josh instinctively creased his brow.

* * *

Since Josh had to drop off Pete, it was decided that he would leave first before the rest of the team and join them later when they were starting work. Since he was about to meet his family for the first time in a long while, he also wanted to spend a few days with them.

He thanked Mrs. Robert for everything and promised her to stay in touch. She didn’t hide her disappointment as she tightly embraced Pete. After that, Josh pulled multiple all-nighters and barely managed to pack everything up before heading off to the airport.

When he boarded the plane with a child in one arm and a small carry-on suitcase in the other hand, the stewardess’ faces showed mixed emotions. They looked up at Josh’s face and beamed, immediately saw the child in his arm and flinched, and put back on their customer service smile. This went on repeat.

Josh sat the boy down on the baby seat and wrapped the boy’s body cozily in a blanket. He gave Pete a piece of candy, which satisfied Pete enough to sit still without whimpering.

As Josh loaded the luggage in the overhead bin, he glanced at the boy’s face. His round, puffy, tempting cheeks that bobbed up and down as he sucked on his candy naturally reminded Josh of him. 

Was it because he knew that Pete was his child, or was it because Pete actually looked like him?

It wasn’t like Josh could ask anybody to confirm this. He had no choice but to force down his uncomfortable curiosity.

The boy quickly fell asleep. As Josh wiped away the drool of melted candy from his mouth, he wondered, ‘Would he recognize me? Does he even remember me?’

Josh subconsciously recalled what the man had said to him when they first met and knitted his eyebrows. Josh’s image of the man inside his brain was always the same: a snobby narcissist.

Most Extreme Alphas were pseudo-sociopaths, but those who manifested before puberty never got to experience the emotional rollercoaster ride of the so-called “juvenile angst.” This resulted in a very high chance of them growing up to become psychopaths.

In the case of Chase C. Miller, it was said that he had manifested past puberty. Thanks to this, he at least understood emotions; the only problem was that most of his emotions consisted of pure rage.

‘Apparently, psychopaths can also feel anger,’ Josh thought gruffly.

After all, acting was only possible for those who had emotions—or so he thought. Even the most beautiful of humans couldn’t succeed as actors if they couldn’t act.

‘Actually, with his looks, he could just stand there without even acting…’ Josh corrected himself.

Josh recalled the chocolate advertisement that Chase had filmed when he was five. When the advertisement, Chase’s debut work, was published, the entirety of North America went wild. Even now, that chocolate advertisement was still mentioned by people from time to time. The advertisement was that big of a sensation, and even Josh, who was just a little boy, had been enticed.

He had been truly disappointed when he learned that the actor was a boy a few years later.

Of course, Josh wasn’t the only one who was disappointed. The boys his age who had dreamed of romance with the little girl were basically heartbroken on a national scale. At the same time, they had all learned the one truth in life: one’s first love never ended in success.

Even now, it would be the same. Chase didn’t need to bother taking all that effort to memorize the script and act. It would be enough for him to just stand there.

At one point, Josh had wondered why this man even bothered to maintain an acting career. However, that was until Josh watched one of Chase’s works.

Chase Miller truly delved into his act—almost scarily so.

This was true even when he was just filming an advertisement.

“Oh my,” someone exclaimed softly.

Josh looked up. The passenger who was sitting across from Pete was staring intently into the screen attached to the back of the seat. Through the reflection of the monitor, Josh saw the man that had been taking over his head alive on the screen. At that moment, he was taken.

‘Yes, just like that,’ he thought.

A soaking wet man walked out of the fierce waves of the ocean. It was as if the god of the sea had taken human form and was gracing the earth with his presence. His long fingers that swept up his dripping hair, his deep purple eyes that stared directly into the camera, his lips that were curled into a faint, cold smile—there was no way that Chase Miller was a human like everyone else.

Feeling his heart plummet, Josh felt a strong surge of emotion. Sadly, unless his brain was completely pulverized into powder form, he probably wouldn’t be able to forget that man until he died. His thrashing heart was proof enough.

Somewhere along the line, the advertisement had ended and the screen had moved on to show something else. Josh, however, couldn’t peel his gaze off of the screen.

He would soon have to come face-to-face with the real deal. He wanted to delay that moment with all his might.

He closed his eyes and kept them closed in an attempt to look away from reality, but the plane was zooming toward California with no care for Josh’s wishes.