The Rules

Chapter 20

Three months later

Ami had been busy at work and hadn't seen the guys for a couple of weeks. She had been working on a big project and the deadline was coming up fast. The guys had been working long hard hours on their new album, everyone was just busy.

Ami's boss took them out for a celebration dinner afterward on Friday. They had just made their deadline and while she just wanted to go home, Jae and Ji-Hoon convinced her to go out for a while. Mr. Lu was going to be coming as well. She wished he wasn't coming, he made her uneasy, even though he never really said or did anything inappropriate towards her.

"Drink with us, you never do!" Jae said when they went to the restaurant. "No, no" Ami said laughing, "I'm meeting some friends later, but you guys go ahead." Jae looked at her and said, "When are we going to meet these other friends, you see them more than you see us." Ami looked at her and smiled thinking 'never.' to herself, but she opted with, "Ahh, they are just neighbors. They aren't as exciting as you two, I look after their plants when they travel." This seemed to please Jae, in the meantime and she went back to singing to the music and drinking.

After a few hours of watching them drink and eat, it was getting dark. "I need to get going," Ami said as she stood up and collected her things. It was almost 8 pm and she knew the guys would be getting home in a few hours. She wanted to get to her house, drop some stuff off and head over to the apartment. She was ready to spend some time with them and just relax after the last few weeks of constant work.

"Aaaammmiii.. Stay! We have the whole night to enjoy!" Ji-Hoon said as he and Jae swayed to the music.

"You guys have the whole night, I'll talk to you tomorrow." Ami laughed at them both. She hugged her friends and headed out the door to get a taxi. She didn't notice someone had also slipped out and headed out the door behind her.

As she got into the taxi, she was about to shut the door, but someone grabbed it and slipped in with her.

"OH! Mr. Lu, was this your taxi? I can get the next one." She reached for the door handle to get out.

"We are going the same way, yes? Let's share a cab." he said with a less than pleasant tone, "Driver, you can go." And with that, the taxi took off.

Ami was really uncomfortable with the quiet ride. She told the driver which lane she needed to stop at but didn't want him to take her to her door. She definitely wasn't going to have him drop her off at the boy's apartment, although that is where she wanted to go. She fired off a text to all the guys, 'Someone call me, now.'  She was hoping one of them saw her message. She knew they had been working hard in the studio into the night, so she didn't know if anyone would see her message.

About 10 seconds later, she was relieved her phone rang.

"Hello?" She answered, pretending like she wasn't expecting a call.

"Ami, you are on speaker phone in the van, we are all here. What's going on?" Namjoon's tone was not playing around.

"Oh hi! How are you? Are you back from your trip?" Ami's voice was overly happy and trying not to give away to her co-worker she was nervous.

"What? We are on our way back to the apartment, we are about 8 minutes away. Are you OK?" Namjoon was confused about what was going on.

"No.. no... I'm not home yet. We had dinner after work, so I'm sharing a taxi with my co-worker, Mr. Lu. Yes, we just finished our big project, so the bosses took us out." She heard someone in the background tell the driver to head to her house, NOW. They all knew she was uncomfortable with her co-worker. She had been from the first day they met.

"We are on our way, don't get off the phone, you'll be OK," Jimin said, trying to reassure her.

Ami responded, "Of course! I would love to see you soon! It would be great to catch up, oh, here is my stop driver. Goodbye Mr. Lu, see you next week."

"Don't get off the phone, Ami, stay on with us and keep talking." Namjoon was anxious but tried to keep his voice steady, "We are almost there." She could hear one of them making a phone call and talking quietly in the background.

As soon as she closed the taxi door they could hear the sound of her breathing change and listened to her footsteps quickly jog up the lane.

Hobi piped up, "Ami, did the taxi pull away already?"

Ami glanced behind her nervously, "yes, it pulled away, it's driving down the road." She took out her key and opened her door. "OK, I'm back home." Her voice hitched as she closed the door behind her.

"Lock your door, we are just a few minutes away, and wait for us to come. Are you OK??" Jin asked.

"I'm OK, just shook up a little. Thank you for calling me." She said as she took off her jacket and shoes.

Tae murmured, "it's like listening to a horror movie..".

"It felt like a horror movie, I don't know what it is about him, but he bothers me." She was gathering her stuff to head over to their apartment in a bit. Just then there was a knock at the door. Ami walked over they heard her say, "oh you guys are here already..."

Yoongi yelled.. "What?! Ami! We aren't there yet!" But she didn't hear him in time.

The next few minutes felt like an eternity and they didn't know if they would ever forget the sounds they heard.