"Court is adjourned."
* * *
Prosecutor Jeon brought his hands together in quiet claps appreciatively and mouthed 'K.O' but Heiran was quick to ignore the gesture as she breezed right past him and out of the courtroom. Her partner, it seemed, was determined to get on her nerves as he followed her outside and caught up with ease.
"You were incredible back there, partner. Especially when you said, "Seems like you weren't as clever as you thought." You floored him with that comment!" He commented, striding by her side.
He might as well have been talking to thin air as his comments fell on deaf ears. Heiran marched on with her gaze trained straight. She was just as determined to ignore him as he was to make her react.
"You got the whole jury with that one sentence and if I may be so bold, it was hot." He enthused, ecstatically. Heiran kept her pace.
"Heiran."
Silence.
"Ran."
Silence.
"Partner Ahn."
She paused. A glimmer of hope fluttered in Jungkook's chest but it was soon extinguished rather coldly.
"Prosecutor Jeon," Heiran's voice had never taken such a strong husky turn before. It was cold. Bone-chilling as her gaze found him, eyes guarded like the Pentagon. "The court just ended. Both defendants are sentenced to 5 counts to a lifetime in prison with no hope for parole or appeal. The case is officially over. I assume you're smart enough to figure out what that means. If you're not, let me spell it out for you. We. Are. No. Longer. Partners. So..."
She inclined her head to the side, gesturing to the exit as she held out her hand to show him the way out.
He winced. Anything but that shutting out, Jungkook could bear. It would have been less painful had she taken out the hacksaw from the Yeongsan Murders and sawed a hole straight through his heart than that indifferent stare she aimed at his soul. As if he were a mere stranger uttering absurdities she didn't care enough to bother with.
He sighed, squeezing his eyes shut, begging. Pleading. "Heiran, please. Let me explain. I need you to—"
"There he is! There's the Silent Wolf!"
The cry of a reporter from a distance made them swivel around to face the oncoming swarm, flashes alighting and blinding the area. Jungkook grit his teeth at the worst timing of the century. Of course, they had to interrupt the most decisive moment of his entire life. However, before they could get to him, he decided he wasn't ready to answer their questions and that he should risk it all. Taking a deep breath, Jungkook made to catch the wrist of his partner and run away from the swarm only to grab onto empty air. Confused, he turned to look only to be disappointed. Heiran had slipped away at the momentary distraction.
All he saw as he stood there watching in utmost betrayal was the tail ends of her prosecutor's robe vanishing around a corner.
The swarm closed in like rabid dogs and he could feel himself beginning to drown. He could feel her slipping away and he knew as each second he wasted, the distance between him and her was growing farther apart. And so he turned away from the reporters and ran.
Too long. He had been letting himself ride to the will of fate for too long. It was finally time to take control of the reins, make his own decisions, act on his free will, and get back what he had once lost.
The reporters were hot on his tail, screaming his name as he strode away, entering back into the labyrinth of the court. My, my can't they take a single hint or what? But it was alright. Jungkook had enough field experience in the art of losing tails.
The dogs (reporters) followed the wolf like ravening predators but soon, to their unfortunate luck, fell prey to a trick as he entered a discreet door in a corner. It was no use by the time the dogs reached the door. Because by then, the silent prosecutor had already vanished from sight.
Five minutes later, something looped around Heiran's arm and she yelped as she was whisked away from the public, away from prying eyes. Her surprise soon turned to frustration just as she recognized the familiar feel of his hands on her arm. It must have been 8 years but Heiran still remembered the details of his palm, the feel of his touch as if it was yesterday. And she hated it.
"Prosecutor Jeon Jungkook, you're crossing the line," Heiran warned.
"And God be damned if I did Ahn Heiran because I'm not taking this treatment from you any longer!" He exploded. It was the first time Heiran had ever seen him so furious, eyes blazing like the burning embers, jaw clenched, and suddenly, he looked so much older and fearsome. It was a part of him she had never seen before.
"Y-you have no right to yell at me after what you did and make me the bad guy here, Jeon. Leave me alone!" Stunned as she was, Heiran wasn't known for her temper for nothing.
"I won't! Not until you hear me out, Ahn Heiran!" Jungkook yelled back as she struggled against his vice grip, eyes unyielding. Somehow finding some loophole, she tried to twist her hand out of his grip but Jungkook was adamant. "Listen, I'm so sorry. You don't know! Not even a bit, just how much I regret leaving you that day! I have regretted it every single day for the past 8 years of my life, Ahn Heiran, so please hear me out!"
Heiran wrenched her wrist away from him even when it hurt her gradually healing burns. "Do you still not understand, Jeon Jungkook? Don't you get it? It's not because you left me. It's because you made me a fool!"
Jungkook paused. "What?"
"I know," Heiran cried, voice shaking as it would break. "I know and I could guess why you left me! And I don't blame you for it, Jungkook. I never blamed you for it! Not for leaving! I understood why, and I hate that I couldn't blame you but still, I never blamed you for leaving, Jungkook!"
Heiran scoffed as he stood frozen, "but you would never understand that. You just played me like a fool and pretended that nothing ever happened between us! You just pretended to be someone else. I guess it's that easy for you to forget everything, huh?!"
Jungkook's voice cracked as he called her name, hands reaching out to touch her. "Heiran, I—"
"I hate you for that!" She punched his chest, shoving him away, "And I hate every single thing about you! I hate you! I hate you! I hate you! I want you to die!" With each uttered syllable, Heiran pushed him away and punched him on the chest, yet Jungkook never raised a hand, not so much as lifted a finger to protect himself, receiving every painful blow to his chest. It only fuelled her anger more. "Why aren't you defending yourself!"
"Hurt me all you want, Heiran," his words were a mere whisper, heavy with so much emotion as his gentle fingers came to hold her wrists, "if it helps you."
Heiran yanked her hands off of him.
"F*ck off!"
***
At a distance, Minseo's trembling fingers went up to her parted lips as she saw the recent drama that had taken place at the discreet corner of the district court between Silent Wolf and Prosecutor Ahn Heiran.
Soon the sobs erupted from her throat, "NO, No! Prosecutor Jeon too? Why? Why are all the handsome men in the world taken? Why do I not get a chance!! I thought I finally had a chance, God, why??"
Fishing out a napkin from her purse, she blew out her nose so loud it might as well have been a trumpet. "I always make fun of Aphrodite for her terrible love life but my love life is even more pathetic than hers. Because it's basically non-existent! I hate this world!" She sniffled noisily, squeezing the snot out of her nose with her napkin when she noticed the disgusted stare of a pale man, standing a few feet away looking scandalized.
"What are you looking at?" She snapped.
Min Yoongi quickly regained his composure, assuming a cool and refined stance as if he hadn't been watching her bawl her eyes out with revulsion a second ago. "I suppose I have already answered that question once, Ms. Minseo— wait," Yoongi paused, noticing the rivulets of teardrops miserably making a mess of her makeup. "You ARE crying? You didn't actually think you could score the Silent Wolf, did you?"
The way her teeth clenched was so visible and ominous of the awaiting doom but Yoongi didn't seem to notice. "Come on, that man has high standards. How did you even think in that peabrain of yours that you stood a chance? Talk about being delusional."
Yoongi shook his head disappointedly and something in Minseo broke. Months of constant rivalry and salty, demeaning comments from the jerk of a man had finally taken a toll on her. She roared.
"You a$$!"
Yoongi looked startled, "Excuse me?"
But Minseo, it seemed, had set her predatory eyes on her prey, "YOU A$$HOLE! TODAY IS THE DAY YOU DIE!"
And she launched herself at him. The last thing Min Yoongi saw as his life flashed before his eyes was the long flowing mess of her hair, and her wide mouth screeching before all hell broke loose and the darkness descended on him.
That was the day Min Yoongi learned that sometimes one just needs to learn how to keep their opinions to themselves.
***
A few months before, Mahanji Restaurant_
"You're done! You're done! I will end you and your entire career and the entire men's race— Ougph– Bleh... Bleaarrghhh!"
Everything looked a hazy hue of red as if she were looking at the world through tinted glasses. She swore last time she checked it was night. Could the night sky make everything look red? Funny what liquor did to one's head.
Vaguely, she heard the exasperated sigh of a roommate along with the faint realization of his arms around her, holding her back from what appeared to be... a man.
Her elbows shoved her roommate back and before the man regretfully observing his coat could look up, she had slipped and stumbled right into him. Claws clamped down on the lapels of his shirt, Heiran forced the man to meet her eyes whom she was convinced was her greatest enemy for some unknown reason. Yet as she stared up at the startled man, her face so close, and looked into the depths of those eyes, something seemed familiar.
"But you're kinda handsome..." An involuntary giggle escaped her lips, "Tell me have we met before?"
Heiran saw the way his eyes grew at her question as Yoongi pried her hands off of the strange man but unfortunately, she never received an answer. As Yoongi made her claws draw in and pulled her off from the man, all she could think about was his familiarity. It was ridiculous because for a brief moment Heiran could have sworn she thought it was him.
Funny what liquor did to one's head.
A/n: Bahaha! How was that little surprise from their first meeting? Did it give you goosebumps?