(BL) I'll Let The World Burn For You

When the lawyer arrived, Zhenyu almost didn't open the door.

He'd been curled on the couch all night, the taste of Yu Bai's warning still burning the back of his throat. The cheap blanket tangled around him like a net he couldn't tear off. Every creak in the pipes, every passing car, made him jolt awake.

His phone buzzed twice: once from an unknown number — Chen's — and once from Yu Bai.

Yu Bai: Be good. Listen to him. And stay quiet.

Zhenyu almost hurled the phone at the wall. Instead, he stared at the message until the battery bled out under his thumb.

---

Mr. Chen looked like a tax accountant on a holiday: conservative tie, neat hair, expensive watch. But there was that same chill under his polite smile — the same thin ice Zhenyu felt under Yu Bai's men's tailored suits.

They sat across the old kitchen table. Chen opened the folder again — the same pages Zhenyu had crumpled the night before: his name, the debt statements, the restraining orders, the custody petition for a baby he'd barely held more than once.

"She's filing for sole custody," Chen said, voice bland, as if they were discussing grocery lists. "Citing financial instability, emotional distress. She'll tell the court you're a danger to your son."

Zhenyu's jaw locked. "He's barely two months old. How can I—"

Chen lifted one page — a blurry photo of his ex-wife stepping out of a black car, the baby carrier strapped across her chest. She looked polished. Rich. Safe. Everything Zhenyu wasn't.

"She hired a top firm," Chen continued. "They'll paint you as a scandal waiting to happen. Drunk, unstable. No assets, no prospects. They'll push you into supervised visits, then… nothing."

Zhenyu felt the laugh catch in his chest like a stone. "I'd never hurt him. I can't even hold him properly—"

"She doesn't care," Chen said, his voice almost gentle. "You're leverage. You're the pity piece."

Zhenyu stared down at the paper. The baby's name, in black ink. Lu Yan.

He hadn't even chosen it. She'd registered it while he was still in a hospital bed, the divorce papers half-signed at his bedside.

---

Chen slid another document over — thicker, with Yu Bai's neat corporate seal stamped in red.

"Mr. Yu has arranged an option for you," Chen said. "This will clean up your debt and give you stable income under his new venture."

Zhenyu's hands trembled as he flipped through the clauses: housing, legal coverage, a salary with no real job attached. He knew what it meant. He didn't know why it made him want to laugh until he broke.

"What does he want for it?" he asked hoarsely.

Chen only smiled — that tight, polite curve of his lips. "What you're already giving."

---

Zhenyu signed.

He didn't remember putting the pen down — only that his signature looked crooked, the ink smudged by his shaking hand. When Chen leaned forward to take it, Zhenyu yanked the papers back.

"I want to see her," he snarled. "I want to talk to her. She's still my— my son's mother. I need—"

Chen's eyes flicked up, blank and cold. "I don't recommend that."

Zhenyu was about to snap back when a soft knock split the silence. The door swung open before Chen could speak.

Yu Bai stepped in like a storm slipping under the door — black coat draped over one arm, eyes razor-sharp. Zhenyu's breath caught in his chest.

"Out," Yu Bai said to Chen. His voice didn't rise — it didn't have to.

Chen gathered the papers with steady hands and left without a word. The door shut like a vault behind him.

Yu Bai didn't speak at first. He stalked around the table — each step deliberate, echoing on the warped floorboards.

"You want to see her?" he asked, soft but dripping poison.

Zhenyu's chin jerked up. "She's my son's mother."

Yu Bai's fingers closed around his jaw so fast Zhenyu's teeth clicked together. His thumb pressed just shy of a bruise.

"Do you think she pities you?" Yu Bai hissed. "Do you think she ever did?"

Zhenyu's laugh scraped out of him like rust. "We built everything together. She— she stayed when the company—"

"She stayed until there was nothing left to take," Yu Bai snapped. "When you had nothing else to bleed dry, she left you in the dirt."

He didn't loosen his grip — he traced the edge of Zhenyu's bottom lip with his thumb, so soft it made Zhenyu shiver.

"She was never your family," Yu Bai murmured. "She was a collar. And you wore it so well."

---

They left within the hour.

Zhenyu didn't remember consenting. Yu Bai gave him no room to argue — just the steel press of a hand at his back as they stepped into the black sedan idling outside. Chen sat in the front seat. Nobody spoke.

By the time the car rolled through the gates, Zhenyu's stomach was a pit of ice.

She stepped onto the porch, cradling the baby in her arms like a trophy. A blanket wrapped around the infant's tiny head — he couldn't even see the child's face, just a pink, clenched fist poking out near her collarbone.

She looked at Yu Bai first — then at Zhenyu. Her painted lips curled into something almost kind, but her eyes glinted with the same cruelty that haunted Zhenyu's dreams.

"Back so soon?" she cooed. She adjusted the blanket, rocking the baby just slightly. "Did your new benefactor run out of patience with you already?"

Zhenyu's knees almost gave out at the sight of that tiny hand. His breath snagged on every word.

"Let me hold him," he whispered. "Just once. Please."

She tilted her head, pretending to consider it. The baby gurgled softly, mouth opening and closing. The sound cracked something in Zhenyu's ribs.

"Oh?" she murmured. "And when you can't feed him tomorrow? When you can't stop him crying at night? Will your mafia master cradle him too?"

Zhenyu's head snapped up, eyes wide. "Don't—"

Yu Bai stepped forward, fingers sliding over Zhenyu's wrist — a vise that felt like protection and prison in the same heartbeat.

"You'll give him access," Yu Bai said, voice so calm it made her flinch. "Or you'll lose everything else you're clinging to."

She laughed. "Blackmail, then? How romantic."

The baby shifted — a soft cry muffled by the blanket. Zhenyu reached out, desperate — but she pivoted just out of reach.

"He'll never remember you," she whispered, low enough only he could hear. "One day he'll call someone else 'father.' And you'll still be nothing."

The door clicked shut. The wind slammed the gate behind them.

---

They rode back in silence.

Yu Bai's hand never left Zhenyu's knee — a heavy, possessive brand through the fabric of his trousers.

When they stepped back inside the apartment, Yu Bai pressed him up against the door, breath ghosting over his ear.

"Look at me," he ordered.

Zhenyu's eyes fluttered open, glassy with tears he hated himself for.

"You're mine now," Yu Bai whispered. His fingers slid under Zhenyu's shirt, brushing the sharp edge of his ribs, the bone he kept hidden under expensive clothes that no longer fit.

"They can't take what's mine."

Zhenyu let his head drop to Yu Bai's shoulder, shame burning down his spine. He hated how good it felt — the lie of safety, the trap disguised as a promise.

Yu Bai's lips traced the curve of his jaw — not a kiss. A mark. A brand.

"Bite me if you want," Yu Bai murmured. His teeth grazed Zhenyu's earlobe, a shiver of threat and something worse. "You're still mine."

Zhenyu didn't bite.

Not yet.