Mistakenly Marked – Chapter 13
by Little PandaCaught in the Act
Dropping to One Knee.
Outside the dressing room, the assistant’s footsteps faded down the corridor, leaving silence behind.
Inside, the person reclining on the sofa tilted her head, breathing shallowly.
A few seconds later, her breath caught.
Her body in poor condition, Bo Suiqing’s perception of scent had grown sluggish.
Only now did she catch it.
A familiar presence, faintly threading through the air.
Not pheromones — and yet the one scent that could make an Apex Omega lose control with ease.
The nape beneath her suppressant patch1 began to burn. Bo Suiqing closed her eyes, followed the scent to its source, and looked up in a daze — at the garment hanging to one side.
No time to reason through the cause. The heat inside her caught like a flame on kindling, fast swelling into an inferno that threatened to burn her to ash.
…Wanted it…
…Needed it…
The thread of reason burned through, strand by strand. She could only act on instinct — reach out and tear down the thing that was both antidote and poison, the craving at the core of her.
Clang —
The clothes rack crashed to the floor.
“Did you hear something from the dressing room? …What was that?”
The photographers stationed in the corridor exchanged glances.
“She looked like she wasn’t feeling well when she went in. Should we go check on her?”
“Hold on — Xu Jialuo hasn’t come back yet—”
The voice slammed to a halt. Eyes dropped to the black skirt hem entering the frame.
The photographer stiffened and looked up, meeting a pair of dark, fathomless eyes.
The usual politeness and warmth, withdrawn.
Blunt. Edged. Wordlessly crushing down on them — like a beast lying silent in wait beneath the night.
The photographer’s eyes went wide. An involuntary shudder ran through them. “…”
A few seconds later, Xu Jialuo sidestepped the photographer and strode onward toward the room.
“Phew…” The photographer let out a long breath, muttering, “Jesus — isn’t she supposed to be a beta? …What the hell was that look…”
Standing before the dressing room door, Xu Jialuo reached for the handle.
A sidelong glance caught the figure ducking out of sight at the far end of the corridor.
She turned the handle and walked in.
On her way over, Zhou Fu had already explained that tonight’s gala had a backstage livestream crew dropping in on performers. And the team handling tonight’s stream had a history of staging stunts to manufacture drama for clicks. Zhou Fu had just texted her another reminder:
“Keep an eye on the photographers around you, okay? If any of them get in your face and it makes you uncomfortable, just head back to the dressing room.
“There won’t be any cameras inside the dressing room. Just walk away — I’ll handle the cleanup.”
So maybe this was some prank they’d set up for her—
Her gaze snagged to a stop. Xu Jialuo stood in the doorway, taking in the extra figure on the sofa.
The first thing she saw: shoulders and back, half-bared amidst a cluster of flowers, smooth as jade.
Delicate butterfly wings2 poised to flutter. Cool-brown curls cascading like a waterfall down her back.
One porcelain-white arm draped over the backrest. The woman knelt on the sofa, curled in on herself.
She was clutching something tight against her chest, waist swaying gently, body trembling.
At the sound of the door opening, she went still.
Looking at the person who had left her own apartment just that morning, Xu Jialuo frowned. “What are you doing?”
Why was she in her dressing room?
“…Mm!”
The instant she recognized her voice, the figure flinched as though jolted awake — helpless, panicked, struggling to rise, only to be dragged down by her long skirt. She tumbled off the sofa.
Her body reacted faster than her mind.
Xu Jialuo shut the door, flicked the lock with one fingertip, and crossed to the sofa in a few long strides. She bent down and scooped up the woman who had slid to the floor.
The woman sat frozen, letting herself be handled without resistance — whether startled by her sudden appearance or simply too far gone to function.
Only her trembling arms loosened, and what she had been clutching so tightly dropped to the floor.
Xu Jialuo glanced down. It was the hoodie that should have been hanging on the clothes rack.
“…”
Neither of them spoke. Neither moved.
Silence thick enough to hear a pin drop.
Only the pheromones Xu Jialuo couldn’t smell trembled in the air, released alongside the collapsing emotions of the one exuding them.
Found out.
Found out.
Found out.
Bo Suiqing kept her head down, fingertips trembling beyond control.
It was over.
It was over.
It was over.
She’d done it again. And this time… she’d been caught red-handed.
This shameful thing — the kind of thing the other person would surely find disgusting, would spit curses at her for—
“Sneaking into my dressing room, wrinkling my clothes to take it out on me — Bo Suiqing, are you a child?”
“…”
Bo Suiqing’s lashes fluttered. She looked up at Xu Jialuo in a daze.
Xu Jialuo looked down at the woman’s flushed, dazed, absurdly beautiful eyes — which somehow still dared to look aggrieved.
Her brow tightened, furrowing completely. Xu Jialuo hauled her up, pressed her back against the sofa, and laughed through her anger. “What — you can do it but you can’t own up to it?”
“…”
Sinking into the soft sofa, Bo Suiqing gazed up at Xu Jialuo, leaning over her. Her eyes trembled faintly.
Beneath the concealment of her skirt, her fingertips curled tight.
A megastar, always sharp-tongued and rarely giving anyone the time of day — now, unusually, not saying a word.
Close enough to a tacit admission.
Because that answer… seemed easier for the person in front of her to accept.
Seeing Bo Suiqing persistently silent, Xu Jialuo released her and picked up the garment from the floor, turning it over to inspect it.
Bo Suiqing’s eyes widened. She reached out to stop her — Xu Jialuo batted her hand away. “What are you getting nervous about now.”
“Was it just wrinkling?” Xu Jialuo’s voice was flat and cold. “Or did you cut it open, or slip a blade inside—”
Her gaze caught a small, faintly glistening damp patch on the garment.
The room went dead silent.
Xu Jialuo lowered her head and met, with something close to disbelief, Bo Suiqing’s hollow, despairing pale-silver eyes.
“You… actually spat on my clothes.”
“…”
“…?”
Bo Suiqing stared at Xu Jialuo. A few seconds passed before she processed the misunderstanding. Her voice was raw: “…I’m… sorry.”
Which meant she was admitting it.
“You—” Xu Jialuo dropped the hoodie, swallowing down the harsher words clawing up her throat, leaving only: “You’re out of your mind!”
“…”
Bo Suiqing, again: “I’m sorry.”
Her voice was hoarse, threaded with a sob.
Wronged, wretched tears — the kind that came after surviving a catastrophe — dripped down the tip of her straight nose.
In Xu Jialuo’s line of sight, they struck the scattered flowers on the skirt.
Xu Jialuo paused. She turned her head away.
Right.
The woman was, in fact, out of her mind right now.
She’d been sick that morning. At her apartment.
If she’d made her take medicine first instead of sending her straight to the shower, maybe she’d be faring better.
“Since you know you’re sorry,” Xu Jialuo lowered her gaze, picked up the tissues from the table, and tossed them down beside Bo Suiqing’s hand.
She righted the fallen clothes rack and draped the hoodie back over it. “Don’t do it in the first place.”
“…I’m sorry.”
As if that were the only sentence she knew.
Was she genuinely sorry, or was the fever burning so hot she couldn’t think of anything else?
Xu Jialuo was quiet for a few seconds, then leaned down, pinched Bo Suiqing’s chin between her fingers, and tipped her face up.
She met the woman’s flushed ears and cheeks — too red, too obviously abnormal, not even the stage makeup could conceal it. Frowning: “Didn’t you take fever medicine?”
“…I did.”
Bo Suiqing struggled to lift her lashes and look at her. She tilted her head weakly to one side, her cheek pressing against the palm cradling it.
Every trace of frost had melted from her features. Only softness remained, docile and fragile, her voice sticky with grievance. “…It didn’t work.”
Her hand closed around Xu Jialuo’s skirt of its own accord.
It had just been a fever.
But the moment she caught this person’s scent, her pheromones had started surging out of control.
Soothing…
She wanted to be soothed…
The palm against a burning cheek — Xu Jialuo’s finger bones tightened. She tried to pull away, but the weight of the other woman pressed in.
As if all strength had left her; the moment Xu Jialuo let go, she would simply crumple sideways to the floor.
Troublesome.
It was just a fever.
How could she be this weak.
Frowning, Xu Jialuo endured the slippery heat against her palm and raised her other hand, intending to prop Bo Suiqing back against the sofa.
But Bo Suiqing moved first. She reached up and seized Xu Jialuo’s shoulders.
Still bent forward, mid-motion, Xu Jialuo’s center of gravity shifted. Caught off guard, she was wrenched downward.
To avoid toppling straight onto the person beneath her, she lunged a leg forward — and dropped to one knee.
Her kneecap struck the floor. Even through the carpet, the impact landed with a dull, heavy sound.
Pain shot straight up her spine.
Xu Jialuo frowned and looked up.
Before the first sharp word could leave her mouth, Bo Suiqing’s soft body leaned in. Gently, she folded into Xu Jialuo’s arms.
Footnotes
- 抑制贴 | Yizhitie | A specialized adhesive patch applied over the scent gland on the nape to suppress Omega pheromone output and conceal scent from others.
- 蝴蝶骨 | Hudiegu | Literally 'butterfly bones' — a Chinese colloquial term for the prominent scapulae visible on a slender back, likened to butterfly wings about to take flight.
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