"Yuri, this way!"
Chen's excited voice guided you to the corner of the swimming pool, where he and Yejin were seating on the L-shaped cushioned bench under the pergola, next to a table where two tall glasses of drinks in pink and green color decorated with sliced of pineapple and watermelon on its rim.
She was looking at her phone, sported a sky blue long sleeves wrap dress, completed with sunglasses and matching heels, looking out of place. Chen looked casually normal with a navy hoodie and dark jeans, and somewhat clueless attitude like usual.
"Isn't it too cold to hang around outdoor? It's cloudy, and it's freezing."
You were grateful you brought your coat with you, otherwise the pullover you wore wouldn't be enough.
"Honey, do you know what day is it?"
She took of her shades, threw a magazine haphazardly on the other side of the couch, then lifted up the pink drink and took a sip.
"Sunday, right?"
You furrowed your brows.
"You don't remember my family, correction, my mom's schedule every sunday morning?"
Right...you almost forgot.
You spent most of your high school sunday in Yejin's house, and it had been a routine for her mother, that her family to attend Sunday mass at the nearby church, went home, and then she would shoo them out of the house for two hours because for her, Sunday was a thorough cleaning day.
It was a sacred routine, which she hired additional four cleaning staff specially for the job, where an overlooked dusty corner was an unforgivable sin.
The rest of their family would usually took you out for breakfast together somewhere downtown Seoul, before coming back home to have 'family dessert time' after house cleaning was done.
So this was Yejin's devout fashion style, apparently. Although you were wondering if the pastor could really focus at the ceremony looking at Yejin's pretty low neckline showing off her plump cleavage, because Yejin's mum always occupied the first row in front of the altar.
You took a seat on the other side of the bench, while taking of your flats.
"So, how was it? Did you get, ... did you retrieve it?"
Yejin made a gesture with her finger, silently asked you to hold your question.
There was a young maid brought a tray with a plate of food and two tall glasses of iced drink, most likely it was tea, looking at the amber orange color.
"This is sunday snack everyone, please don't hesitate, serve yourself."
Yejin took a piece of the pale whitish stuff on the white china, dipped it in sauce next to it.
"What is this?"
Chen bent forward while sniffed, tried to get a good look on the foreign looking stuff.
"It's Tempeh. My mother just came back from Bali three days ago, and brought a whole luggage of this stuff, said that this is the new trend of 'owr-gann-nic' lifestyle that her yoga instructor at the hotel mentioned."
She made a whimsical gesture with her hand holding the tempeh and dipped it into the other kind of sauce, imitating the way her mom talking.
You narrowed your eyes while observed the sliced of soy based food. You familiar with tempeh, you lived in Bali before, but you never saw people eating it raw.
"You need to cook this. I ate it several times when I was in Bali, but usually they make it into fritters or stir fry if you don't want it deep fried."
"This one is steamed."
Yejin shrugged her shoulder nonchalantly.
"Can't say the taste is to my liking, but it's the best option between kimchi or vegetable salad that my mom offered. Kimchi got my stomach upset everytime. At least with this one I can eat it with sauce. And it tastes slightly meaty."
You took a slice and dipped it into what looked like ketchup, judging from its color. The taste wasn't so bad, but looked like Chen definitely disagreed. He made such an excessive distasteful face, while put the bitten slice back to his plate and hurriedly took a big gulp of his drink.
Yejin scoffed while took another slice.
"Oh for god sake." She rolled her eyes.
"Don't you have any normal snacks at all? What happen to auntie's donuts and yangyeom -chikin?"
He mentioned Yejin's mother signature dishes she used to make before.
"We are trying to eat healthy here, well, my mom is trying to. And I must say I'm impressed with her dedication. I can feel my breasts are down one size because of all these crap."
You listened to her frivolous remark while holding back your snort.
"I don't think breast size has anything to do with body weight."
After several bites, you decided that steamed tempeh in gochujang was definitely not something to be fond of.
"Oh it is. Let me show you, so you can compare. You knew my size before."
She reached on the attached ties of her dress near her rib to loosen it, at the same time with Chen shrieked in horror.
"I'm still here, you do realize that, right?" He dramatized an attempt to cover his eyes.
Yejin clicked her tongue and glared at Chen in annoyance.
"Tsk, like you haven't seen my boobs before."
"I've been with you since we're in diapers, you're almost like a sister to me, it was gross."
"I saw your peewee before, but I didn't overreact like you."
"Don't call it peewee, and we were in elementary, it was different!"
You were sure, if you didn't cut right in between their banter, there was no way you could finish your purpose in coming here soon.
You looked at Mrs. Kwon, seated on one of the sun lounger a few meters away.
You were grateful that Yoongi agreed to send her to you to replace that old nurse.
Her presence and assistance eased a lot of things for you, as well as your mood swing.
As required in the agreement, she had to follow you going places, but she knew when to leave you alone and give you some privacy, and most important, she trusted and listened to you.
You looked back at Yejin and Chen, as much as you were happy to be with them, but you were tired and would need your rest soon. Your head started to get heavy.
"Guys, please, I need to know the result."
Your words brought them back immediately, stopping their squabble.
Chen cleared his throat, reaching to his bag and took out his laptop, firing it up before plugged a usb drive in the slot.
"I got in their surveillance room, and Jong Wook helped me to look into their server and storage. The size was quite massive, and we worked on a very tight time frame.."
"Well, you should have waited, I told you there would be an hour idle between night shift transfer."
Yejin shot Chen a glare.
"What do you mean?"
"These two idiots almost got caught because they didn't want to wait. I got the schedule of their shift by calling to the security department using Hoseok's name, but they just didn't follow my instruction."
"We were antsy and worried, besides it wasn't like we had choices!"
"Wait, please calm down you guys ... I really need to hear it."
You looked at Yejin with pleading eyes, to let Chen talk.
"Well, the footage between time stamp when they were in your room were deleted. Jong Wook couldn't find anything. The missing gap didn't look like out of place. Must be someone from the inside. You will need administrator password to do it."
Chen clicked on several pictures that apparently he randomly picked and downloaded from the surveillance record, as well as some video, but there was no Estela nor faces that looked familiar to you, besides your brother, his family and Yoongi. You still couldn't identify the man accompanied her that night.
There was one record showing the russian man and one of his bodyguard in front of the elevator at the lobby, but the rest of them were pretty grainy and useless.
Yejin looked at you with empathy in her eyes.
"I'm sorry, Yuri, we tried. But I think you need a professional for this job."
Yes, but if the footage had been deleted, what was the point of hiring a pro?
"If I were you, I'll go to Yoongi, bang to his desk, shout at him to put some sense on him. Or you can fuck him beforehand, that should help your case. Men are usually pliant after orgasm."
"Oh god, you're so nasty."
Chen threw her a glare.
"Now, look who's talking. You should be grateful I saved your ass by making a last minute tactical action, otherwise both you and Jong Wook would have been doomed."
You looked at both of them in puzzle.
"What are you talking about?"
"Well, I succesfully persuaded Hoseok to take me to dinner in the restaurant at that hotel, you know, as a valid ground for both of them to use his name to infiltrate the security. He is one of the big bosses, mentioning his name alone would do the trick. In case they want to check with him, they probably would call the reception desk to confirm his name was on the guest list. Actually the surveillance operator wouldn't even need to do that, had these two waited until the shift transfer, but they cut to the chase. I had to give Hoseok a blowjob under the table just to keep him from walking to the reception to take the call."
You looked at her in dumbstruck.
"You gave him a .. a..-"
You looked at Chen moving his eyebrows down, incredulity was evident on his face.
"- .. head at the restaurant, right under the table where people could see you?"
"No silly, the table linen covered me, of course. Although I'm not sure if our table waiter was oblivious. I could hear his repetitive throat clearing, maybe looking at Hoseok's face while I was doing it."
Yejin chuckled mischievously, while Chen scolded her.
"Spare the details, I don't want to know!"
"I ... I'm sorry, you had to go through that length to help me."
You felt bad to put both of them into that situation, but you couldn't risk to do it yourself when you face was probably known among the hotel staff, since you were the supposed bride to be of the grand event in that hotel.
Everyone in the employee list wanted to know who was the woman their big boss would marry.
"Darling, don't worry, it was far from an ordeal for me. I quite enjoyed it, you know, Hoseok is such a generous man. He ordered a bottle of four million won Screaming Eagle for me after he got his release. Rinsing the aftertaste of sperm with fine cabernet sauvignon was not bad, not bad at all."
She chuckled while ignoring Chen's disgusted look.
"Especially when he returned the favor in his Maserati right at the parking lot."
Yejin shook her head while laughing.
"It felt like in that movie of femme fatale, you know."
You admired Yejin sometimes, if only you had just a fraction of her daredevil nature, it probably save you all the heartache in your life.
Her laugh finally died down when she looked at you with brows furrowed.
"I don't understand why you have to look for proof and all. You love him, he loves you, just say it to each other, there, you should have your happily ever after. Why it have to be so difficult anyway?"
You really wished it was that simple. However, everything between you and him had been intricately troublesome from the start.
"It's quite ... complicated, with his upbringing and things that happened between us before."
Your mind was flashing back all the way to your initial encounter with him, his family background, and missions he carried with his group members. All the events in his life that molded into his personality, his unreasonable fear of losing his mother, then his fear of losing you.
"He thought of me as mentally unstable, and put a nurse and bodyguards to watch me. Do you think he will believe me if I just jump over and cry while beg to him? All the more reason for him to think I'm crazy!"
"Well, it sounds quite easy and cheap, but what's the harm of trying?"
She mused while gazed at blank space.
"Who knows it might work?"
The thing was, if he didn't trust you enough and your rushed attempt to make him to believe in your story fail, it would make your case even worse.
You needed a valid evidence, so it would quell his insecurity once and for all.
You had to think of another way fast, because there was an inkling that danger would always lurk if Estela was free out there, you were racing with time.
"Let me just think of something else."
The haze of your wandering mind lingered even when you already left Yejin's house, seated on the back seat of the black bulletproof Range Rover that the showroom sent to your house yesterday.
Sejin drove the car while Mrs. Kwon seated at the back, next to you.
Many times when you were confined inside the mansion, there was nothing you wanted but to get out, far from him.
Now that you were free to go and do whatever you wanted, you wished to be with him instead.
How ironic, people often longed for things that they couldn't get in the end.
"Hee Jun Unnie?"
"Yes, Miss?"
Your eyes scanned on the passing vehicles outside the car window, the switching view of colorful billboard ads along the street side, people bustling over the pedestrian lane going about their own lives and problems.
It was four in the afternoon, your usual time for a nap. You were tired, but you were too restless to be able to sleep.
"What was Mrs. Min like?"
It was silent for a few seconds, you almost think she didn't hear you, with her lack of response.
You caught Sejin's eyes briefly glanced at you from the rear view mirror, but he quickly looked away.
It was a rare sight to see Mrs. Kwon's tensed manner.
"I was twenty four years old when I first came to work for Master Min's mother. He was ten years old at the time, and Master Kim was six."
You could tell she was spacing out, recalling the memories.
"It was my second week to work there when I found Master Min in the kitchen at eleven at night, he was trying to make some porridge. When I approached him, I saw how he was sobbing while frantically mixing the broth with rice, said that his little brother had a really bad fever."
You were wondering what was Yoongi like when he was a kid? Why haven't you ever thought to ask for his child pictures before?
You saw several of his mom's pictures, she was beautiful, her face resembled Taehyung a lot, but Yoongi rarely talked about her.
"He kept saying while crying, 'I don't want him to be taken away from me', not really answering my question. I accompanied him to Master Kim's bedroom, to help him with the cooling pad and calmed him down. I remember the younger boy complained that the porridge was too salty, but Master Min patiently spoon-fed him until he finished it. I wasn't sure whether he put too much salt on the porridge, or it was because of his drop of tears while carrying the bowl to the bedroom."
She paused and her manner changed, along with darkening of her eyes.
"I was curious of course, why didn't he call his mother? I wondered why she didn't check on her kids."
You now realized how obvious her dislike of the woman.
"I found her playing the piano in the lounge room, she didn't even answer when I called. She was drowning in her own world while her son took care of his sick little brother.
Master Min was always so afraid to lose his mother that he tried to be with her and pleased her all the time, not even realizing he never had a mother from the start. She probably had never been a proper mother figure to him since he was born, always so busy pitying herself."
"It's quite a normal reaction when you are being confined in the mansion. Just like me before."
Mrs. Kwon scoffed lightly, but her words next were bitter, you could feel her disappointment.
"Not quite a reasonable excuse to abandon your own children, was it? She wasn't that helpless, and she knew well how her husband loved her to the moon and back. Should have used it to her advantage, if she had the slight wit, don't you think?"
You were quite surprise with the way Mrs. Kwon talked about Yoongi's mother.
"How about his father?"
"He was away most of the time, his work often required him to leave very early in the morning, in the end, he often slept in the apartment near his office instead of came home to his wife."
"Must be very lonely for her."
"She wouldn't feel that way had she chosen to hang around with her children instead of drowning in pity party, lamenting her fate. We shouldn't focus on things we can't control."
Her words brought you back to your situation with him.
You couldn't yet change his mind, and with the kind of childhood he endured, it was hard not to become the man he was, you understood him more now.
He was always trying to win the love he never really had, always too afraid to be left behind.
Finding you almost died bleeding on that floor, worsened his fear of losing you, he finally realized, he would rather to let you go safe and sound, than losing you forever.
The car stopped in front of the traffic light ahead of an intersection, your eyes trained at the giant billboard across the street, displaying a picture of two storey luxury house, the writing under the photo caught your attention.
It was an ad for the sale of residence complex inside Suwon satellite city.
The name nudged a distant memory inside your mind, where did you heard it before? Even the picture of the house looked somewhat familiar to you.
Where did you see it?
Something in your brain clicked before you finally remembered.
The leaflet, ... yes that was it.
You saw the glossy paper with the same house printed on a brochure they put on the table during gala dinner before Yoongi got shot.
Before he stabbed the guy on his neck with the pen.
How was the guy anyway? You wondered if he could still talk properly after the wound healed, after all-..., you froze mid thought.
The man's voice.
That voice you had been wondering who it belonged to.
There were flash back of memories from the chaos inside that VIP room after the commotion and the fight, shifted to the night when you got drugged and collapsed to the floor.
You remembered that voice, his voice.
The guy who came to your room with Estela that night.
In your daze from your mind rambling, you heard Mrs. Kwon's words,
"She wasn't even surviving, she was just accepting whatever things came her way. I wouldn't even call her a survivor. Only dead fish go with the flow. Definitely not a suitable woman to be with a man with power like Master Min's father."
She was still talking about Yoongi's mom, but you felt like her words were meant for you.
The next chapter will be told from Jungkook's POV. I didn't plan to write like that, all the previous chapters have been told from Yoongi and Yuri's POV, so it's kind of out of place.
But several readers asked for it, so I'll do it.😉
Hopefully I can post it in three days.
Don't forget to vote, thank you so much!♥️💋
For those of you in India, please stay safe and healthy. I couldn't do much beside praying and donated a little. (I donated through Oxfam India, but there are so many channels out there you can find.
Hopefully this pandemic will be over soon.