Jimin's Plan

Chapter 36

By the end of the following week, Jimin felt as if his nerves were strung as tight as a newly tuned piano's strings. After Jungkook's brothers left for home, Jungkook had retreated into himself. He hadn't touched him, kissed him—had hardly looked at him in days. And the strain of that was beginning to take its toll.

While Jimin stood at his bedroom window looking out at the night, his mind raced even as he stood as if frozen in place.

Sensing a coming confrontation between him and Jungkook, Jimin had made a trip into the local town and found the pregnancy test he'd been looking for. But buying it didn't mean using it. The tidy blue box was still sitting in the cupboard beneath his bathroom sink, unopened.

Jimin knew why he was hesitating to use it, of course. If he wasn't pregnant, then he'll be staying on, whether Jungkook approved or not—he'd find a way to stay close. To fight Jungkook's instincts to chase him off. If he was pregnant, then he could leave—just as Jungkook wanted him to.

As Jimin planned.

Which, Jimin told himself sadly, was exactly why he hadn't used the test kit yet. He didn't want to go. Didn't want to leave Jungkook, this place and the handful of employees that had given him such a feeling of family. He was a part of the life here now. He'd become one of them. He'd found his place in the world, found the one man he wanted above all others and he didn't want to lose any of it.

Giving up went against Jimin's very nature.

But was it giving up to leave when that had been the original plan? And was it worth it to stay if Jungkook never allowed himself to care for him? God, his head hurt.

"What're you doing?"

Melody yipped in excitement from her perch on the bed and Jimin spun around to face Jungkook when he spoke up from the doorway to Jimin's bedroom.

"Nothing," Jimin blurted because Jungkook caught him off guard and at a vulnerable moment. He forced a smile that felt brittle and false. "Just thinking."

Jungkook walked into the room and didn't stop until he was no more than an arm's reach away. He ignored Melody, who pranced to the edge of the bed, hoping for a scratch and head rub.

"I've been doing some thinking, too." Jungkook said and he didn't look any happier with his thoughts.

The time had come.

Everything inside Jimin braced for whatever was next.

When silence spun out between them, Jimin took it for as long as he could and then felt what little patience he had left splinter and blurted, "For heaven's sake, Jungkook, just say it."

Jungkook's brows drew together and his mouth flattened into a grim line. "Say what?"

"What you came here to say," Jimin challenged. "What you've been dying to say since the day I arrived. You want me to leave the mountain."

"You're wrong," Jungkook ground out. Shoving one hand through his hair, he stalked past Jimin, looked out the window and, after a long minute, swiveled his head to lock his gaze with Jimin. "I don't want you to go..."

Jimin's heart swelled and an instant later deflated as if someone had popped it with a needle.

"...which is why you have to."

Jimin blinked at him, shook his head and finally managed to say, "That makes absolutely no sense."

"Doesn't have to," Jungkook told him flatly. "Like I said before, my mountain, my rules."

So cold.

So hard.

So distant.

Not the man Jimin had come to know at all. Jungkook was already pulling away so fast that he could hardly reach him. And that tore Jimin's heart.