Ten minutes outside the city and I was struggling to stay awake. Once, I even started to lose consciousness and almost fell off the bike. Jin had to elbow me in the side to get me to snap back to reality.
"Stay with me, baby. We'll be there soon," Jin yelled over the noise of the wind.
"I'm trying Jin...so tired..."
"I know. Please, just hang on a little longer." He wrapped my arms tighter around his waist and held on tight, steering with only one hand. I did what I could to stay awake, but it was the hardest thing I'd ever had to do.
A few minutes later, the flat lands around the outskirts of the city began to ripple and rise into foothills and then into a snow-capped mountain range. Jin pushed the bike through the turns, urging me to pay attention so I could help balance out the weight. It gave me something to focus on besides my exhaustion. Halfway up the mountain, Jin took a dirt road cut through the trees that wound up perpendicular to the main road. The road was narrow and it had been so long since anyone had driven on it, a person would have to know it was there to see it.
Over the crest of the mountain, we pulled up to a cabin that backed up to a small pond. The cabin looked like it was barely big enough for one bedroom, but the lines were straight and it looked like it had been taken care of. At that point, though, the only thing I cared about was having a place to crash. I was so gone that Jin had to catch me and carry me up to the door, kicking it open with his foot. The last thing I knew was him laying me gently on a bed and brushing my hair out of my face. Between the pain in my head and the exhaustion in my bones, I was gone in seconds.
When I woke again, it was dark outside. I could hear the low din of noise in the other room so I slipped out from under the old comforter and walked silently out of the bedroom. Jin sat on the floor in between the couch and a roaring fire with one leg underneath him and the other raised so that he could prop his arm lazily across his knee. I leaned against the door frame and watched him silently for a few moments. He flipped through channels on the old TV randomly like he wasn't even paying attention to the images flashing before his eyes.
"You planning on standing there forever, or are you going to come in here where it's warmer?"
My eyes went wide for a moment before my body reacted. No one else had seemed to be able to hear me when I was trying to be quiet. Jin was starting to show just why he was the real leader of Bangtan.
"Well, since you put it that way," I said, padding over and flopping down on the couch. He leaned his head back against my stomach like we hadn't just gone to war with one of the most dangerous men in the country. "How long have I been out?"
"Two days. I was starting to get worried."
When I looked down at him, I noticed he did seem more relaxed than he had when I'd first found him. The muscles in his face weren't as tense and he seemed to be breathing a little more deeply.
"I used a lot of energy. It wiped me out." He just nodded and stretched his legs out, stopping the channel surfing on some kind of stupid game show. I sighed and leaned my head back on the arm of the couch. "Have you heard anything out of the rest of the guys?"
"They're safe. Jungkook needed surgery to remove the bullet and close the wound, but Yoongi managed just fine without me. They've gone underground at one of our other hideouts and we're just waiting for the Baron to give up the search."
"How likely is that to happen?"
Jin shrugged. "Don't really know. No one has ever tried something so stupid before."
I bit back the 'I told you so'. It wouldn't be productive at the moment. Instead, I went with a relatively safe question. "How many hideouts do you guys have?"
The corner of Jin's lips turned up into something of a smirk as he lifted his head away from me. My skin felt cold in the absence of his. "Enough."
I rolled my eyes. Jin loved his elusive answers. I started to ask specifically how many when my stomach rumbled so loud, I thought it was thunder for a minute. Jin turned around and looked at me with comically large eyes and parted lips. I couldn't help myself from laughing at his ridiculous face.
"I take it you're hungry," he asked as he fought back a smile.
"Sounds like it. I mean, it's been a couple days since I ate."
"Well, lucky for you," Jin started as he pushed himself up off the floor, "I was just about to cook something." Once he stood, he turned and reached out a hand to me. "Want to help?"
I nodded with a smile even as I pulled my limp body up with a groan. Though I really didn't feel like helping, I knew moving around would be good for me after spending so long in bed. He pulled, giving me a little help and then wrapped his hands around my waist while I caught my balance. I tried not to let his touch get to me, but it was impossible. Jin had always been attractive, but after seeing the way he blew through that fire and took out the driver chasing the other guys, I realized that I had seriously underestimated him. He was strong and commanding and devastatingly sexy. It wasn't just his looks, either. It was his quiet confidence and the way he kept the guys in line without having to constantly throw his masculinity around.
As I watched the muscles in his back flex as he moved, I realized that there was so much more to Jin than I'd originally given him credit for. So many men were masculine in an overt, macho, way, but Jin was masculine in a quiet way that could almost be mistaken for feminine if you didn't know him. I'd originally thought of him as something of a mother figure to the boys, but he was something so much more. He was a leader in a way that transcended gender stereotypes and it gave him a powerful aura that was impossible to ignore.
I leaned against the small rolling island in the middle of the kitchen and watched as he pulled out different ingredients. I had no idea what he was planning on doing with any of it and was kind of hoping he'd forget he'd asked me to help, but when he turned, lifted an expectant eyebrow at me, and nodded toward the stove, I knew that hope was shot to hell.
"I'm not doing this by myself," he quipped.
I sighed. "Well, you might not like what I end up doing. I've never cooked before. I don't know what to do."
"There's a first time for everything," he said, grabbing the front of my shirt and pulling me forward. Of course, it was then that I realized I wasn't in my ball gown anymore. Jin let me go and cleared his throat, apparently noticing the way I tensed up. He glanced at me out of the corner of his eyes. I pursed my lips together, but didn't say anything. There was no way he would have let me sleep for two days in my dress. It would be ridiculous to expect him to do that. And besides, I trusted that he didn't do anything inappropriate.
Without saying anything else, I took the knife out of Jin's hands and started chopping vegetables. He looked relieved as he moved back to the fridge and pulled out some kind of fish. My eyebrows scrunched together as I looked from the fish to Jin.
"Where did that come from?"
"Didn't you see the pond out back?" He motioned toward the back of the cabin with a tool he was using to removed the scales from the fish.
"Yeah, but I didn't realize you knew how to catch and prepare one."
Jin gave me an unimpressed look before shaking his head and returning his attention to the fish. "There's apparently a lot you don't know about me."
"So it would seem," I murmured, returning to the vegetables.
The two of us stood there in pleasant silence as we worked. When Jin finished with the fish, he washed his hands and gently placed them on my waist to move me aside. His body brushed against my back and I had to work to suppress the shiver that passed down my spine. When I glanced up at him, his cheeks were a shade of red, but he ignored my look.
"I'm through with these vegetables. What do you want me to do now?"
"Watch these filets while I get the rice going. When the oven beeps, put the pan in."
"Okay, I think I can handle that. Is there anything to drink here besides water?"
Jin grinned and stuck his head in the fridge, coming back out with a bottle of wine. "As long as you like white wine."
"Beggars can't be choosy," I said with a smile. It was more than I could hope for. I rummaged around in a drawer until I found an ancient corkscrew and popped the top. After putting the fish in the oven, I poured glasses for Jin and myself and hopped up on the counter to watch him work.
His movements were smooth and efficient and as the wine warmed my belly, I found myself wondering if he was the same way in every situation. Of course, after that, my whole body warmed and it had nothing to do with the wine. I tried to calm myself down, but it was no use. It made no sense for me to be so horny after what we'd been through, but my body had it's own agenda. I was just along for the ride. So to speak. I took a sip of my wine and looked away from Jin after my mental pun, hoping he wouldn't notice my pained expression.
"It will take a few minutes for everything to cook, so why don't we step outside?"
"Okay." I hopped down from the counter, happy for a distraction as Jin handed me a sweater and a pair of slippers. The night was cooler up in the mountain, but the air was crisp and smelled faintly of something fresh and bright. When I looked up, the sky was dotted with a million points of light like glitter on the surface of the water. The moon hung low over the tree line and insects called out their music on their way up into the trees. Having been in the city for so long, I'd never seen something so pretty before. The lights from the advertisements and buildings had drowned it all out. I stood there for a long time just staring at it all.
"You look like you've never seen stars before."
I pulled the sweater tighter around my shoulders and took a sip of my wine. "I haven't. The city isn't the best place for star gazing. They're beautiful."
"Not as beautiful as you."
I was glad Jin couldn't see me blush. "Right."
"I mean it." He stepped closer, taking my glass and setting it down on a nearby table. Then he pulled me closer and looked down into my eyes. "When we first found you, I wanted to hate you. I wanted to hate everything. I was hurt and angry at the world." His voice trailed off as he looked at something over my head.
"Because of what happened with Natalia?"
He winced as his eyes came back to me. "How much do you know about her?"
"Not much. I overheard Hoseok and Jimin talking about her. How you were all in love with her."
Jin stepped away from me and leaned against the porch railing. I hated myself for bringing her up, but I was tired of feeling inferior to a dead woman. I wanted to know what happened.
"We were. When she...after she died, I didn't think I could feel like that for anyone else. But then you came along." He sighed and drank from his glass. "I thought we were just going to use you for a while and send you back." He winced again. "I'm sorry for that, by the way, but you have to understand that I wasn't in the right mind. None of us were. But then you were...you. I don't know how to explain it. You fixed part of me that I didn't think could ever be put back together again. And when we thought we lost you, too, I thought that would be the end of me. But here you are."
"Apparently, I'm pretty hard to kill."
Jin laughed, but there was no joy in it. "So it would seem."
After a long pause, I got the nerve up to ask the question that had been consuming me for way too long. Taking a deep breath, I turned to him.
"What happened to her?"
Jin looked at me with pain and sorrow in his eyes. He opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again. But just before he spoke, the bell on the rice cooker dinged, effectively cutting off the conversation.
"That story requires a lot more wine than we have right now," he said almost apologetically as he turned away and disappeared into the house.
It's fluffy, I know... but there have to be bridges between the action.
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