"I'm fascinated by everything you do. Your smile, your touch, your laughter. Believe me or not, I have spent my entire life waiting for this moment."
"Was I in your dreams?"
"I rarely sleep. My mind has this scary capability of being dark and twiste...
"People do bad things when they're trying to survive."
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"It was him," I said in a trembling voice, picking at my nails anxiously. "I'm telling you, he saw us."
"Valerie, calm down," Taehyung soothed, running a hand down his face. "We don't know that for sure."
I looked over at him and I felt like I had transformed into a ball of nerves.
It had been three days. Three whole days since detective Min visited our home.
And nothing.
I jumped and gasped loudly anytime the wind moved the bushes outside in the garden. Every now and then, I would run to the phone because I'd thought I heard it ring. I was on the verge of insanity, wondering whether I wasn't having auditory hallucinations, and felt almost as unstable as my mother.
"I'm telling you, if he had anything on us, he'd have run down here with handcuffs a long time ago," Taehyung said, calmly crossing his legs at the ankles in front of him.
I shifted my gaze to stare through the window and towards the lake where Jimin's body lay buried. I started wondering whether I wasn't just being paranoid. I felt like I was having a mini panic attack every hour or so. My thoughts had become so scattered and unfocused, hijacking my ability to think logically.
It had been fun at first, enjoying my relationship with Taehyung, but now this whole ordeal was becoming burdensome. Not my feelings for him of course, but this heavy secret that hung over our heads like a glass chandelier waiting to be shattered any moment. Like a ghost, it was haunting my conscience and making my anxiety reach its peak.
"Just stop thinking about it," Taehyung took my face in his palms and planted a cute peck on my forehead. "I have a surprise for you that would make you feel better."
"What is it?" I questioned, his statement piquing my interest.
With an enigmatic smirk, Taehyung shoved his hand in the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out what seemed to be two plane tickets.
I squealed softly, grabbing them from his hand promptly and bringing them closer to my face to inspect them.
"Oh my God!"
"Two tickets to New York," he said, smiling warmly as he observed my enthusiasm.
Relief washed over me. At the time, fleeing the country with him suddenly seemed like a fantastic idea, the salvation I had been craving.
"Oh my gosh," I gasped softly. "For you and me?"
He nodded, peering down at me lovingly.
"I really think you're gonna love New York," he said. "What do you say?"
Without missing a beat, I gazed up at him as my mouth spread into a face-splitting grin.
